Feedback: Testing Melee Set Performance

[Megajoule]

No nerfs for any set ever, just keep buffing all the others!  Bring the loudness war to CoX!

[Infinitum]

14 minutes ago, Galaxy Brain said:

Would you rather we buff all other sets by 20% damage across the board and make the game even more trivial?

 

Edit: Sorry if I came off as crass, but what we are talking about it to keep TW as a top tier set but just reel it in slightly out of the "S" tier it stands alone on.

Buffing the melee sets wouldnt make it anymore trivial than what other ATs already do with stacking effects.

 

This is trivial compared to that.

[Hopeling]

It's funny how all successful games, including this one, get where they are by employing teams of professional full-time busybodies. Almost like game balance is important or something.

[DSorrow]

1 hour ago, MunkiLord said:

I know it over performs, I just don't care and I don't want it to be nerfed.

This is basically my position with the addition that I'm paranoid enough that I think it will be nerfed, so I'd rather be in the discussion of how to avoid repeating what happened to EM.

 

1 hour ago, Steampunkette said:

I'd prefer to nerf it not enough than too much

Definitely this. I like your original suggestion as the DPS impact wouldn't be huge and the changes wouldn't require completely redoing attack chains and builds.

[Infinitum]

42 minutes ago, Heraclea said:

I'm for a blanket ban on this sort of busybody thread.  Bad enough when it's the PvP crowd. 

That's how it was 12 years ago also.

[Infinitum]

3 minutes ago, Hopeling said:

It's funny how all successful games, including this one, get where they are by employing teams of professional full-time busybodies. Almost like game balance is important or something.

The game isnt melting though, most of the normal feedback is contentment.

[Haijinx]

14 minutes ago, DSorrow said:

This is basically my position with the addition that I'm paranoid enough that I think it will be nerfed, so I'd rather be in the discussion of how to avoid repeating what happened to EM.

 

If you Nerf what is evidently one of the most popular sets in the entire game, You are going to be repeating what happened with EM. Maybe worse since EM wasn't as relatively popular, and there is a contingent that resists doing any changes from the way things were when the game closed down. 

 

Additionally most people will have even more aversion to looking at numbers than Ifinitum and will just have a gut reaction.  

 

 

So yeah, needs to be done carefully. 

 

honestly from a PR standpoint, buffing the lower sets actually does sound "Easier" .. even though there are a ton of them.   

 

[Hopeling]

17 minutes ago, Infinitum said:

The game isnt melting though, most of the normal feedback is contentment.

There's a lot of room between "literally everything is fine and absolutely no improvement can be made" and "the whole game is melting".

 

There is quite a lot of feedback other than contentment about the state of game balance. People routinely complain about power creep, about how too much content is easy, about how new sets seem to be categorically better than old sets. There are plenty of people asking "why play X when Y is clearly superior?", and the Flavour of the Month numbers show that this isn't idle speculation, TW really has displaced other sets to a significant degree. I've personally talked in this very thread about how TW's superiority pretty directly sucked the fun out of several other power sets for me. On the other side, people routinely complain about underpowered sets like EM or Force Field. These are all game balance complaint. It's not that the righteous Bufficans defend our freedom while the degenerate Nerfocrats try to take things away; buffs and nerfs are both tools to keep the game balanced, and balanced games are more fun.

 

You and I have a difference of opinon over whether TW is balanced, but not over whether balance is desirable. You say we need more data, which is also fine. I'm asking you: what kind of data? What metric convinces you that TW is fine, and how could that be supported with something besides anecdote and opinion?

[DSorrow]

1 minute ago, Haijinx said:

If you Nerf what is evidently one of the most popular sets in the entire game, You are going to be repeating what happened with EM.

I think that depends a lot on how the adjustment is carried out. If it's something that mostly has an effect on top end builds while still keeping them top end builds, I don't think it's going to be a huge issue for anyone who wants to approach the change rationally. What happened to EM wasn't a <10% maximum DPS adjustment but completely nuking the set and I think the general reaction to it was pretty appropriate. I'll be among the first on the barricades if the same happens to TW, trust me on that.

 

2 minutes ago, Haijinx said:

honestly from a PR standpoint, buffing the lower sets actually does sound "Easier" .. even though there are a ton of them.  

I'd strongly prefer buffing up the lowest performing sets over tuning down TW, but the latter option is unfortunately a lot more practical so I'm expecting it to be the more likely scenario.

[Haijinx]

8 minutes ago, Hopeling said:

 

You and I have a difference of opinon over whether TW is balanced, but not over whether balance is desirable. You say we need more data, which is also fine. I'm asking you: what kind of data? What metric convinces you that TW is fine, and how could that be supported with something besides anecdote and opinion?

Maybe it would be worthwhile to develop something.  

 

Since you could use that to rate the under-performing sets also.  

 

For example, since the Pylon starts to be erratic when times are below 2 minutes, you might need a different kind of "Pylon"

 

You likely need some sort of AOE test as well .. since you could to gage the difference between just hitting a rage fueled Foot Stomp vs hitting Titan Sweep then Whirling Smash.

 

[MunkiLord]

What about a custom AV in AE? No attacks, doesn't run, no resists. I'm not sure how the regen and HP of an AV compares to a pylon though. 

 

Edit: or maybe a Pylon with extra resists to avoid the regen tick issue with shorter times. 

Edited September 13, 2019 by MunkiLord

[Steampunkette]

3 minutes ago, MunkiLord said:

What about a custom AV in AE? No attacks, doesn't run, no resists. I'm not sure how the regen and HP of an AV compares to a pylon though. 

 

Edit: or maybe a Pylon with extra resists to avoid the regen tick issue with shorter times. 

That's not a bad idea. Throw together an AV with Katana and Dual Pistols then take away all the attacks you can (AE Enemies are locked into at least 1 attack). Give it maximum Morale and put it in a mission all by itself. Maybe the Asteroid Map or something small.

 

Then just wail on it 'til it's dead or 1 minute is up, and take the damage dealt in that minute (Or however long it takes the thing to die) from the logs and go from there.

[Infinitum]

1 hour ago, Haijinx said:

If you Nerf what is evidently one of the most popular sets in the entire game, You are going to be repeating what happened with EM. Maybe worse since EM wasn't as relatively popular, and there is a contingent that resists doing any changes from the way things were when the game closed down. 

 

Additionally most people will have even more aversion to looking at numbers than Ifinitum and will just have a gut reaction.  

 

 

So yeah, needs to be done carefully. 

 

honestly from a PR standpoint, buffing the lower sets actually does sound "Easier" .. even though there are a ton of them.   

 

That makes me wonder, what exactly are the underperforming sets?

[Galaxy Brain]

19 minutes ago, Infinitum said:

That makes me wonder, what exactly are the underperforming sets?

EM, Broadsword, Battle Axe are under-performers off the top of my head. 

 

Broadsword in particular is a victim of progression where as it has direct competition from Katana, War Mace, and Titan Weapons and doesn't do much to stand out from those.

[Indystruck]

3 hours ago, Infinitum said:

So, we are back on pylon data and scrapper popularity as the metrics for proving the actual performances in game are OP?

 

That doesnt have it covered.  The drawbacks to the set cant be measured by any of that, im not sure they can be.  But they do exist.

My dude.

 

It is better than the tests you did.

[Infinitum]

5 minutes ago, Indystruck said:

My dude.

 

It is better than the tests you did.

No they aren't. 

 

Those are based on the most optimized offensive builds TW can muster.  Why dont we balance around incarnates with pets while we are at it.

[Indystruck]

1 minute ago, Infinitum said:

No they aren't. 

 

Those are based on the most optimized offensive builds TW can muster.  Why dont we balance around incarnates with pets while we are at it.

 

That sounds like a reasonable thing to do for content in which Incarnates are available.

[Infinitum]

21 minutes ago, Galaxy Brain said:

EM, Broadsword, Battle Axe are under-performers off the top of my head. 

 

Broadsword in particular is a victim of progression where as it has direct competition from Katana, War Mace, and Titan Weapons and doesn't do much to stand out from those.

War mace has needed a boost for a while.  Dual blades too maybe?

[Infinitum]

Just now, Indystruck said:

 

That sounds like a reasonable thing to do for content in which Incarnates are available.

Yeah, not to me.

[MunkiLord]

1 minute ago, Infinitum said:

War mace has needed a boost for a while.  Dual blades too maybe?

I can't speak for other ATs, but War Mace is excellent on Scrappers.

[Indystruck]

Just now, MunkiLord said:

I can't speak for other ATs, but War Mace is excellent on Scrappers.

War Mace doesn't need buffs, it's amazing, just not as amazing as TW.

[Infinitum]

1 minute ago, Indystruck said:

War Mace doesn't need buffs, it's amazing, just not as amazing as TW.

Since when is warmace amazing?  We avoided it back on live?  Did they do something to buff it?

[MunkiLord]

Here is a Scrapper DPS spreadsheet, excellent information in here:  

 

 

[Infinitum]

3 minutes ago, MunkiLord said:

Here is a Scrapper DPS spreadsheet, excellent information in here:  

 

 

Thats interesting, ive never played a war mace, I might now.

[Infinitum]

37 minutes ago, Galaxy Brain said:

EM, Broadsword, Battle Axe are under-performers off the top of my head. 

 

Broadsword in particular is a victim of progression where as it has direct competition from Katana, War Mace, and Titan Weapons and doesn't do much to stand out from those.

I knew about EM, what is wrong with battle axe?