Focused Feedback: Rage

[Sylar]

yeah is is a massive nerf to super strength when it needed a buff after foot stomp got nerfed way back when. i highly sugest re thinking this idea and coming up with something like others have suggested similar to hasten, it can be done, there is no reason to nerf this power at all when it doesnt even do as well as other build ups anyway...

[Cawshun]

4 hours ago, Chrome said:

I am trying to imagine a time when doing 90% less damage is fun...regardless of the AT

For 10 seconds. YOU might not enjoy high damage output with a small period of downtime, but that doesn't mean other people don't. Not to mention you can still judgement for full damage and there are plenty of non-damaging abilities available for most kits that might be worth activating or re-applying during the downtime.
 

 

4 hours ago, Chrome said:

however at least during those cases my defensive/resistances are not dropped to minute amounts

Defense is dropped by 10%, resistance is dropped by 20%. For 10 seconds. If that drops you to "minute" amounts, you were probably in trouble to begin with. 

 

4 hours ago, Chrome said:

worse yet more recharge = im definitely going to suck if i stack this awesome damage buff but if i dont have hi recharge im going to fall behind everybody else as far as damage contributions

What exactly is stopping you from stacking recharge? Why would your kin friend care that you don't want to cast rage more often? Rage will not crash in this iteration without overlap. Recharge does not cause rage to overlap unless it's left on auto, at which point the user has nobody to blame but themselves. I don't understand how it's hard or inconvenient to press a button every two minutes. Put it on a hot key and keep an eye out for the glow.


 

4 hours ago, FUBARczar said:

Do people feel weaker currently when BU is not up?

Build up is a short period of burst damage. That's what it was designed to be and it has never been anything different. Rage is a prolonged period of increased damage. Sure they both increase damage, but they are very different mechanics. There's nothing wrong with some kits having unique mechanics.
 

4 hours ago, FUBARczar said:

Or currently when Rage isn't double stacked?

On a character with high up-time or perma double stack, very much so. That's not just a feeling, that's simple math. The average damage, even with the crash, is higher than with a single stack. It's not absurdly higher, but it is high enough to be noticeable. On a fully built character (on beta), I found that foot stomp hit for 232 with a single stack and for 275 with two stacks. That's a nice jump in damage. If you were constantly hitting for the 275, then logged in one day and could only hit for 232 because a patch removed stacking or drastically reduced the duration, wouldn't you feel weaker?
 

4 hours ago, FUBARczar said:

The point is there is a reward for achieving higher recharge numbers, for teaming with others than can boost your recharge, etc.

That's the case already, though. Getting to perma double stack is rewarding, and with recharge buffs from team mates you could triple stack if you really wanted to for some extra burst at the cost of sustained damage. Sure if you're still leveling or building the character and are struggling to survive already, then probably don't double stack, in which case that additional recharge won't help rage. Rage is just one power of many that benefit from recharge, though, so more recharge is still rewarding.

 

4 hours ago, FUBARczar said:

Also I think you are not taking into account other changes, such as the Tanker melee damage modifier being increased from 0.80 to 0.95

That's irrelevant to rage because ALL tanker melee damage is buffed by the change, not just Super Strength. Saying that one kit can be nerfed because the whole AT is buffed doesn't really make sense unless the kit is over-performing, which I don't believe it is. SS is also popular on brutes, which don't get any benefit from the change in tanker modifiers.

[Vanden]

4 hours ago, Sylar said:

yeah is is a massive nerf to super strength when it needed a buff after foot stomp got nerfed way back when. i highly sugest re thinking this idea and coming up with something like others have suggested similar to hasten, it can be done, there is no reason to nerf this power at all when it doesnt even do as well as other build ups anyway...

But there is no nerf being tested here...?

[Chrome]

my issue is not how severe the debuffs of the crash are...it is that they exist at all you can minimize that all you want by saying it is only for ten seconds... but in reality ...they are debuffs and they suck ...

 

also SS has been balanced to have perma rage...this is why the base line attacks do so little without rage...essentially making rage not the buff it is supposed to be but making it mandatory to do similar damage to other powersets without it... this is not rocket surgery here...the crash is the problem and working around it is the standard build idea for this particular powerset.  people trying to double stack rage is not to get a super god buff, but  imho make it so rage is actually how it was intended to be in the first place, a super strong buff that has a harsh crash at the end...

 

the changes to it are not sufficient to make it worth while to mess with no matter what convoluted orange or green circles you put around it.

[FUBARczar]

@Cawshun bro you took a couple things out of context and...

 

Quote

Build up is a short period of burst damage. That's what it was designed to be and it has never been anything different. Rage is a prolonged period of increased damage. Sure they both increase damage, but they are very different mechanics. There's nothing wrong with some kits having unique mechanics.

It's actually the same mechanic, both are click powers with the same buff %'s, with the duration and recharge as the only differences.  Isn't it odd how Ice and Stone Melee can get along with out Rage.  

 

Quote

That's the case already, though. Getting to perma double stack is rewarding, and with recharge buffs from team mates you could triple stack if you really wanted to for some extra burst at the cost of sustained damage. Sure if you're still leveling or building the character and are struggling to survive already, then probably don't double stack, in which case that additional recharge won't help rage. Rage is just one power of many that benefit from recharge, though, so more recharge is still rewarding.

yes it is currently similar, but this discussion was about getting rid of the Crash.  And it is pretty difficult to reach 100% double stack.  My character with 183% global recharge and 100% enhancement recharge has perma hasten but is still 2 seconds shy of perma double stack rage.  Also a very low percentage of SS characters will be playing with that kind of recharge.   And this is also compared to having the crashless/no-double-stack solution on test.

 

Amongst other things...

[ironjoe]

I did some longer testing tonight switching out from my tank on live and then back to a similar tank I made on test. I can say the current mechanic on test is preferable to what is on live for most people. It gives a solid damage boost and the notification works. Rage junkies can go and double and triple stack it with the penalties if they want but a single stack seems most balanced to me. I'd also be happy with some of the other suggestions going around but as is I believe the devs have something better here than what's currently live.

[Cawshun]

15 hours ago, FUBARczar said:

It's actually the same mechanic, both are click powers with the same buff %'s, with the duration and recharge as the only differences.  Isn't it odd how Ice and Stone Melee can get along with out Rage. 

The difference in duration and recharge is what makes it a different mechanic. Think about the build up proc from Gaussian's. That's a different mechanic from the build up ability because it has a shorter duration and it is a proc rather than on demand. It doesn't matter that the %tohit and %damage bonus are the same, the abilities are used differently. The SS kit is balanced around the way rage works, it's a key part of the set. Different kits work differently, and that's a good thing. I don't want every kit to just be a reskin of each other; that would be incredibly boring.

 

In terms of damage, SS wipes the floor with Ice and Stone Melee. Those sets have great CC, which is where they shine. While yes, some abilities like Knockout Blow are baseline weaker because of rage, Knockout Blow actually scales to above average damage for its recharge even with one stack. That's why the crash applied even with one stack, because crashing would bring the overall damage more in line with similar power sets. It's fine to remove it now, as there are other kits that do well above average without the need for a permanent buff, but don't make the mistake in thinking one stack of rage is even with similar kits. If one stack is above average, then two stacks is well above average, so the damage crash is needed to pull back the overall performance of the kit to reasonable levels.

15 hours ago, FUBARczar said:

And it is pretty difficult to reach 100% double stack.  My character with 183% global recharge and 100% enhancement recharge has perma hasten but is still 2 seconds shy of perma double stack rage.  Also a very low percentage of SS characters will be playing with that kind of recharge.

You more than have perma double stack at that value of recharge. Keep in mind you won't refresh the stack immediately when it falls off or you're wasting 10 seconds of the buff in the crash. It's a little pricey to get there, but I wouldn't say it's difficult, especially with incarnates available. Certainly anyone built towards perma hasten will also have perma double stack of rage, which is probably more than a very low percentage of SS players. 

[Odhinn]

18 hours ago, Cawshun said:

Defense is dropped by 10%, resistance is dropped by 20%. For 10 seconds. If that drops you to "minute" amounts, you were probably in trouble to begin with.

100 damage -90% capped resist is 10 damage. Ooops Rage Crash! 100 damage - 70% resist is 30 damage. Three times the damage when your job is to get hit does make 70% feel rather "minute".

 

[ShardWarrior]

On 9/13/2019 at 5:54 AM, Haijinx said:

Hulk does turn back into Banner when he calms down.  

That depends on which incarnation of the Hulk he is. :)

[Cawshun]

33 minutes ago, Odhinn said:

100 damage -90% capped resist is 10 damage. Ooops Rage Crash! 100 damage - 70% resist is 30 damage. Three times the damage when your job is to get hit does make 70% feel rather "minute".

 

Most kits have ways to mitigate that to decent extent and you can always pick up barrier incarnate, which has a 120s CD so it can be used every other crash to completely negate it. Either way, it's unlikely you'll die in those 10 seconds. Pretty much every resist set has a self heal or increased regen, which is normally complete overkill at 90% resist, so dropping to 70 just means you might actually get more value out of the self healing. In a group, buffs come in to play too. A lot of people run maneuvers, so the defense loss is basically already countered most of the time, and if you happen to have anyone that provides resist buffs, that hit will be countered too. This isn't even taking in to account CC, which SS has some of on its own.

[Cutter]

Prolly a stupid question but one I haven't seen answered elsewhere... if my tank is overcapped on a resist (e.g. Elec/ way overcaps to Energy), does the overcap in any way compensate for the debuff? I.e. Say I'm sitting at 120% energy resist on a 90% cap; when the Rage crash drops me by 20%, am I now at 70%, or at 100% on a 90% cap?

[Cawshun]

1 hour ago, Cutter said:

Prolly a stupid question but one I haven't seen answered elsewhere... if my tank is overcapped on a resist (e.g. Elec/ way overcaps to Energy), does the overcap in any way compensate for the debuff? I.e. Say I'm sitting at 120% energy resist on a 90% cap; when the Rage crash drops me by 20%, am I now at 70%, or at 100% on a 90% cap?

Not a stupid question at all. The crash doesn't lower the resist cap, it simply applies a -20% modifier.  So if you have 120% resist, the crash would take you to 100%, leaving you still at the cap.

[Cutter]

3 minutes ago, Cawshun said:

Not a stupid question at all. The crash doesn't lower the resist cap, it simply applies a -20% modifier.  So if you have 120% resist, the crash would take you to 100%, leaving you still at the cap.

Awesome and thanks!

[Leogunner]

21 hours ago, Chrome said:

also SS has been balanced to have perma rage...

Just wanted to chime in and ask that you people don't see this as a problem?

 

I know Perma Domination is amazingly good but the AT isn't balanced around needing it as a permanent buff.

 

There won't ever be a good solution until people are willing to decide what the problem is.  The debuff isn't the problem, the crash or even the exploitability of it isn't either...

[Captain Citadel]

If it was viable to take Rage out of my build and still deal respectable damage, I would. I think it's a huge problem that the set is balanced around having at least one stack of Rage up most of the time. I'd rather it be replaced with Build Up and then not have to take it. You can build a Tanker or Brute to have high enough defense/resists to eat the mitigation debuff, but you can't eat the 10 seconds of -999% damage. All you can do is pop Judgment and then stand around being weak as a kitten for the remaining 8 seconds.

[Leogunner]

11 minutes ago, Captain Citadel said:

If it was viable to take Rage out of my build and still deal respectable damage, I would. I think it's a huge problem that the set is balanced around having at least one stack of Rage up most of the time. I'd rather it be replaced with Build Up and then not have to take it. You can build a Tanker or Brute to have high enough defense/resists to eat the mitigation debuff, but you can't eat the 10 seconds of -999% damage. All you can do is pop Judgment and then stand around being weak as a kitten for the remaining 8 seconds.

But is it though (balanced around having 1 stack of Rage)?

 

I suppose there's an argument for how something is balanced vs what the design intent is.  I don't play SS as the appeal wasn't emulated by the set or the game as a whole, but sitting on the outside looking in, I don't think it was ever designed to be an always on buff and the cost of using Rage vs it's benefit seems to illustrate that.  And while you can't deal damage when Rage expires, you can still control the mobs, which again, is likely why that debuff exists.  But rather than looking at this intent, many have been duped by min/maxers who are now holding the entire set hostage so they can reap benefits of double stacked Rage.

[Captain Citadel]

6 minutes ago, Leogunner said:

But is it though (balanced around having 1 stack of Rage)?

 

I suppose there's an argument for how something is balanced vs what the design intent is.  I don't play SS as the appeal wasn't emulated by the set or the game as a whole, but sitting on the outside looking in, I don't think it was ever designed to be an always on buff and the cost of using Rage vs it's benefit seems to illustrate that.  And while you can't deal damage when Rage expires, you can still control the mobs, which again, is likely why that debuff exists.  But rather than looking at this intent, many have been duped by min/maxers who are now holding the entire set hostage so they can reap benefits of double stacked Rage.

And as I've said before, in light of this, I would be willing to give up Rage stacking. The window of dealing next to zero damage feels terrible and I really want that part gone. Just removing the crash for a single stack and effectively slapping a penalty only on the people who currently have high recharge in their builds and liked to auto-cast the power for the sake of convenience (because they cannot currently avoid the crash) doesn't feel good to play either.

Given that SS as a set has a lot of really lackluster powers in it beyond Foot Stomp and Knockout Blow, I find it unlikely that I'm the only one using the set who stacked global recharge purely for the benefit of those select powers. I'd happily accept some pretty hefty reworks to how Rage works if it made the power more convenient to use without leaving it held hostage to those players who are unable to accept that allowing the power to stack (and therefore forcing some kind of penalty to be imposed on it when other perma-capable powers neither have nor need such a penalty) might be a bad idea.

[Cawshun]

I made a Shield/SS tanker to see how the crash felt on a character that doesn't have a self heal. +4/x8 non-farm AE mission and it was a breeze. The lowest I got during a crash was 50%, and even then that was with aggro cap and I didn't have darkest night on a good mob to have the debuff on everything. By the time the next crash came around, I was back at full life with the issue solved. If I was really that worried about it, I could swap hybrids from Assault Radial to Melee Core for the regen and resist buff. I'd probably do something like that if I was tanking incarnate content, but for regular +4/x8 it didn't feel necessary. Shield also was a bit nice because I could cast active defense during the crash, giving me another worthwhile ability to utilize during the damage downtime. Using gloom and dark obliteration is also useful to keep the -tohit rolling. Taunt can also be used to help pull in any ranged stragglers. Foot stomp will still throw almost all the enemies in the air to keep them from hitting you.

 

9 minutes ago, Captain Citadel said:

I'd happily accept some pretty hefty reworks to how Rage works if it made the power more convenient to use without leaving it held hostage to those players who are unable to accept that allowing the power to stack (and therefore forcing some kind of penalty to be imposed on it when other perma-capable powers neither have nor need such a penalty) might be a bad idea.

It's a bad idea in your opinion. That's fine and nobody is making you play SS. Seriously, there are a lot of other melee sets, and StJ is great if you want the brawling feel without rage. There are plenty of people who enjoy the play style it offers and don't want it to be dumbed down. It's not a play style for everybody, and honestly no set should try to be. Look at Archon Wizard in D3. Ungodly damage in archon form and then does effectively no damage when archon drops while also losing some survivability. The play style is pretty similar, with D3 just having the highs and lows to the extreme.

[Captain Citadel]

It was not designed from the start to be stackable though. We know that much. It was impossible to achieve that level of recharge before the advent of IO sets. And if memory serves, it was Castle who imposed the crash penalty on it. Castle was not exactly a genius. That's the dev that made sweeping PvP changes which gave all ATs relatively similar mitigation and damage output, which the PvP community hated.

[aethereal]

It should've been possible to stack rage before ED.  240% or so recharge on both hasten and rage just from six-slotting them with recharge SOs.  I didn't play back then, but did it happen?

[Chrome]

33 minutes ago, Cawshun said:

It's a bad idea in your opinion. That's fine and nobody is making you play SS. Seriously, there are a lot of other melee sets, and StJ is great if you want the brawling feel without rage. There are plenty of people who enjoy the play style it offers and don't want it to be dumbed down. It's not a play style for everybody, and honestly no set should try to be. Look at Archon Wizard in D3. Ungodly damage in archon form and then does effectively no damage when archon drops while also losing some survivability. The play style is pretty similar, with D3 just having the highs and lows to the extreme.

this mentality is a road block in real change for the better.  SS IS NOT OK as it is.  If SS was similar to your D3 Archonwhatsit and had extreme damage during rage and minimal damage outside of it..that would be fine...that is not actually the case.  as it stands currently, if you compare SS to other power sets, you will find that the damage outside of rage is minimal (similar to your archiewhatever) but when you have one stack of rage your damage is now on Par with the other sets, and when you double stack it it begins to behave like a stronger feeling character.   so if they wanted to bring Archiezard play to SS they would have to make one stack of rage perform like 2 stacks of rage and remove the crash completely and maybe you will have a similar playstyle to your dude...the issue is and always has been SS is not good with out rage and with rage it is super punishing when it doesnt need to be.

[siolfir]

All this talk about comparing Super Strength to other sets, but nobody is posting comparisons. So let's compare to something similar: Stone Melee. It does the same damage type, has similar crowd control abilities, and many similar/comparable powers. It was also designed at around the same time.

 

So let's see what's similar:

Punch animates slower, but otherwise is Stone Fist. Advantage Stone Melee for DPA.

Haymaker animates slightly faster, but otherwise is Stone Mallet. Advantage Super Strength for DPA. <--- I done goofed! Mallet animates slower! 

Hurl and Hurl Boulder are the same power with two names. It's a wash.

Taunt is the same power across all the powersets.

 

Stone Melee gets Heavy Mallet. Super Strength gets Jab. Stone Melee wins this one in a landslide, as there's nothing positive to say about Jab beyond "at least Brutes don't have to take it".

 

Seismic Smash is a 9.536 second mag 4 hold doing scale 3.56 damage for 18.512 endurance with a 20 second recharge.

Knockout Blow is an 11.92 second mag 3 hold doing scale 3.56 damage for 18.512 endurance with a 25 second recharge.

Stone Melee wins this one for higher magnitude and shorter recharge: KOB has a longer hold duration, but a shorter animation and lower recharge are both much better for your heavy hitters.

 

Fault and Hand Clap have the same radius and Stun (duration, magnitude, and chance for bonus magnitude); Hand Clap does not have the Smashing damage type (only AoE). 

Fault has a 20' range to the target, Hand Clap is PBAoE.

Fault has a 20 second recharge, mag 0.67 knockback (knockdown), and costs 10.192 endurance.

Hand Clap has a 30 second recharge, mag 5.193 knockback (sends thing flying), and costs 13 endurance.

Stone Melee wins this one, too.

 

Tremor's animation is horribly slow. But it does scale 1 damage to a 15' radius for 13.52 endurance on a 14 second recharge, and has an 80% chance to knockdown (mag 0.67 knockback).

Foot Stomp animates a lot faster, does scale 1.42 damage to a 15' radius for 18.512 endurance on a 20 second recharge, and has an 80% chance to knockdown (mag 0.67 knockback).

Super Strength wins this one, but if Tremor got the Dominator 2.5 second animation across all ATs it would be much closer.

 

Then there's Build Up vs Rage. With no crash (ie, single-stack beta version) Rage is far superior, no question.

 

So with 9 powers, the score is Stone Melee, 4-3-2, with Super Strength winning only on Rage and Foot Stomp.

Edited September 21, 2019 by siolfir
highlighted above; completely screwed up Haymaker vs Stone Mallet (I didn't double-check those because "it was obviously the same power" and forgot the mallets each had 0.5 sec animation time increases, which I remembered later in a different discussion)

[Vanden]

1 hour ago, Leogunner said:

But rather than looking at this intent, many have been duped by min/maxers who are now holding the entire set hostage so they can reap benefits of double stacked Rage.

The “min-maxers’” playstyle is just as legitimate as anyone else’s, and since it’s not unbalancing the game, there’s no good reason to take it away from them.

[Captain Citadel]

19 minutes ago, aethereal said:

It should've been possible to stack rage before ED.  240% or so recharge on both hasten and rage just from six-slotting them with recharge SOs.  I didn't play back then, but did it happen?

I doubt many people were giving up 10 enhancement slots just to do that at the expense of basically everything else in their build. Possible? Yes. Practical and widely used? No.

I certainly never remember it happening, and I played Invuln/SS back then, from launch to around the time F2P happened.

[Leogunner]

6 minutes ago, Vanden said:

The “min-maxers’” playstyle is just as legitimate as anyone else’s, and since it’s not unbalancing the game, there’s no good reason to take it away from them.

I never said min/maxers were illegitimate playstyles.  In fact, most min/maxers likely could adapt to changes if Rage was completely removed and exchanged for something else...that's what min/maxers do.  It's those that have adopted the min/maxed dressing for SS who are now holding the rest of the set hostage so they can try to keep their double stacking.  Yeah, forget FIXING the set so the rest of it is good, we need to keep double Rage despite it having nothing to do with the concept.