Focused Feedback: Tank Updates

[Auroxis]

4 minutes ago, Myrmidon said:

 

 

 

 

 

It seems that this is literally waiting on you.

 

 

Would it surprise you to know that the first thing I wondered about Force of Will was whether or not they kept the -res power on it?

[Snakebit]

On 9/26/2019 at 11:06 AM, Captain Citadel said:

a vocal minority is shouting down 

I didn't read any of that. What I read were a bunch of ideas bandied about and supported by rhetoric. I read a bunch of posts with theoretical numbers that got mashed by other posts with realistic numbers. I read a bunch of posts about subjective "Role" of the AT that were met with rebuttal. And I read a bunch of rhetoric about the changes on beta which are dismissed in 15 minutes of actual play. In other words....a discussion. 

 

The goal here is to make the AT better with the most efficient use of the resources available.  What the team is doing meets that goal. The team is clearly open to those ideas because multiple requests to focus this thread on the thread title and move the "Here's my idea" posts to another thread were not implemented and the person in charge of the changes replied to quite a few points brought up. Many many pages of discussion about every idea.

 

You should bad for this bit of melodrama. It serves no purpose and is patently false. It makes you look like a butthurt whiner and immediately makes the rest of your post not worth reading.   

Edited September 27, 2019 by cejmp

[XaoGarrent]

6 hours ago, Auroxis said:

When facing +3's on my Tanker (as high as it gets with alpha), the debuff is reduced from 20% to 13%. And against giant monsters it stays at 20%. "purple patch shrinks anything but the most powerful debuffs in the game down to almost nothing" is also incorrect, you might be thinking of AV debuff resistance which does not affect resistance debuffs.

Apparently I'm a contrarian bully now?

+3's is not +4's and that is still small. Especially for an inherent.

 

So yes, you are. I'd take a flat damage increase to all my attacks that exists before the entire buff stack over a debuff that's going to shrink to less than 10% when I need it most. Especially on teams where I'm probably going to have damage buffs from a support.

[Captain Powerhouse]

1 hour ago, Unknown Magi said:

@Captain Powerhouse can you confirm whether things are "Working as Intended" in regard to Leviathan Mastery Arctic Breath, Shield Defense Grant Cover, etc. or whether these were intended to receive the benefit from the patch notes and were just missed?  

Melt armor was not intended to become that much stronger. Grant cover uses personal defense buff modifiers, already is stronger for tankers than other ATs.

 

Edit to add: Melee -def  or -tohit should had not gone up either, only ranged -def and -tohit (so, stuff in the epics.)

Edited September 27, 2019 by Captain Powerhouse

[Auroxis]

2 minutes ago, XaoGarrent said:

+3's is not +4's and that is still small. Especially for an inherent.

 

So yes, you are. I'd take a flat damage increase to all my attacks that exists before the entire buff stack over a debuff that's going to shrink to less than 10% when I need it most. Especially on teams where I'm probably going to have damage buffs from a support.

+3 is as high as I can go, since 54 mobs are +3 to my character. And no, -13% res (or -20% against GM's) isn't small in my opinion.

 

You can buff Tanker without nerfing an aspect of the class many players like. Besides if it's so insignificant as you imply, surely there's no harm in keeping it right?

[Bossk_Hogg]

59 minutes ago, csr said:

I tend to run (and just retested on a L24 Claws/En Brute) about 50 Fury solo'ing on 0x0yn.  At the end of boss fights in that testing I was around 65 Fury (I believe my DM/Regen tends to be a touch higher than that at L50+3, but I don't run at +1x0 often, so it's hard to be sure).  I don't find it hard at all to maintain 40+ Fury in any situation.

I suggested this in the Rage thread, but adding Fury to Rage and the various buildups would help stomp out these corner cases, and also help brutes on teams with multiple tank types so they arent scrambling for aggro. Basically if Fury is under 60%, set Fury to 60% otherwise give +10% Fury. 

Edited September 27, 2019 by Bossk_Hogg

[XaoGarrent]

Just now, Auroxis said:

+3 is as high as I can go, since 54 mobs are +3 to my character. And no, -13% res (or -20% against GM's) isn't small in my opinion.

 

You can buff Tanker without nerfing an aspect of the class many players like. Besides if it's so insignificant as you imply, surely there's no harm in keeping it right?

I really don't see a problem with keeping it, honestly. It really doesn't amount to much anywhere it matters.

[Auroxis]

38 minutes ago, Captain Powerhouse said:

Melt armor was not intended to become that much stronger.

I was under the impression you gave them the Defender modifier for it on purpose, so what wasn't intentional exactly?

[Captain Powerhouse]

2 minutes ago, Auroxis said:

I was under the impression you gave them the Defender modifier for it on purpose, so what wasn't intentional exactly?

 

I gave the AT defender modifiers to +Damage buffs for Assault, but -res modifiers were not actually changed. That was a different error in the whole melee/ranged swaps on powers, shifted melt armor to use the melee modifier (same as self-armor) instead of the ranged one.

 

Both will be changed somewhat in the next patch, though.

[Auroxis]

Just now, Captain Powerhouse said:

 

I gave the AT defender modifiers to +Damage buffs for Assault, but -res modifiers were not actually changed. That was a different error in the whole melee/ranged swaps on powers, shifted melt armor to use the melee modifier (same as self-armor) instead of the ranged one.

 

Both will be changed somewhat in the next patch, though.

Are you going to bring it down to 13% to mirror the current -res difference of Arctic Breath between Brute and Tanker?

[Unknown Magi]

1 minute ago, Captain Powerhouse said:

 

I gave the AT defender modifiers to +Damage buffs for Assault, but -res modifiers were not actually changed. That was a different error in the whole melee/ranged swaps on powers, shifted melt armor to use the melee modifier (same as self-armor) instead of the ranged one.

 

Both will be changed somewhat in the next patch, though.

 

So then if Melt Armor was not intended to be modified, can you please elaborate on the vision/goal for "Tanker modifiers to debuff enemy ToHit and Damage and Resistance with support abilities in epic pools have been increased" from the patch notes?  As it stands, there are only 3 powers being modified (and potentially one that should be but isn't?) so I'm confused as to what was intended when the patch notes talk about buffing epic pool debuffs if Melt Armor wasn't intended for buffing.  Was this *just* intended to be a buff to Darkest Night?  I like the idea of "make tank epic/patron pools debuff more" in general that you seem to be aiming for, it just seems like it's not actually applying to most EPP/APP debuffs due to the scope.

[Captain Powerhouse]

11.25

 

BTW different value but the bug that made Melt Armor too strong also hit the brute version. Was doing -13% when it should had been -9.75%

[Auroxis]

5 minutes ago, Captain Powerhouse said:

11.25

 

BTW different value but the bug that made Melt Armor too strong also hit the brute version. Was doing -13% when it should had been -9.75%

So the buff went down from +5.25% to +1.5%, pretty disappointing. It was looking like Melt Armor would cover for Bruising's absence but it seems that won't be the case anymore.

Edited September 27, 2019 by Auroxis

[Captain Powerhouse]

@Unknown Magi, poor phrasing on my part: the goal was to increase modifiers that help the tanker improve team survivability. So, ranged (epic/pool) -ToHit, -Damage, +Resistance Buffs. This is why -def mods were not increased, and -resist should had not been.

 

Keep in mind sooner or later, there will be more epic pools, and those too will likely benefit from changes.

 

Either way, in the next patch will tweak things further, if i get chance to finish that up it should be up maybe tomorrow.

[DreadShinobi]

8 hours ago, Auroxis said:

For fury, it'll be:

0%, 25%, 50%, 75%, 100%

 

For enhancement+damage buffs, it'll be:

0%,100%, 200%, 300%, 400%, 450%, 500%, 600%

 

Calculation will be:

(0.95*(1+enh))/(0.75*(1+enh+fury)). We will be assuming a 550% Tanker cap and 775% Brute cap.

 

	0%	25%	50%	75%	100%
0%	1.27	0.84	0.63	0.5	0.42
100%	1.27	1.01	0.84	0.72	0.63
200%	1.27	1.09	0.95	0.84	0.76
300%	1.27	1.13	1.01	0.92	0.84
400%	1.27	1.15	1.06	0.97	0.9
450%	1.27	1.17	1.07	1	0.93
500%	1.16	1.07	1	0.93	0.9
600%	0.99	0.93	0.9	0.9	0.9

 

As you can see, there are quite a few cases where the tanker matches or exceeds the brute's damage while retaining all other advantages. This is why I'm in favor of lowering the cap to 500% (aka +400%) in order to reduce the number of scenarios where this occurs.

 

2 hours ago, Mr.Sinister said:

In a full team how much time does a brute actually spend over 50% fury?   Considering different team makeups.  1 tank on the team.  1 tank 1 brute.  2 tanks.  A full incarnate team where 6 out of 8 people are taking alphas.  

 

I don’t have any raw data but with my experience, if as A brute I am not taking alphas or even if I am taking the alpha and a tank strips me of aggro, it’s pretty hard to maintain higher levels of fury.  

 

With these numbers, in a team of eight I can easily see a tank more or less matching single target damage with the brute.  Add the increased aoe and target cap and the tank easily out damages the brute.  If the brute is good at building fury on a single target then they will be better vs AVs but with 7 other people focusing fire that small advantage is a drop in the bucket.  

 

Does 1 tank on a team make adding a brute less optimal than adding pretty much any other archetype?   Even a second tank will add more damage than a brute for normal play?   

A brute does have to work hard/quickly to maintain high fury, whereas a tank has to do absolutely nothing to maintain it's higher base modifiers, base survivability, and all the other buffs that it is receiving. The table above demonstrably shows that the 0.9 damage-survivability ratio of tanker v brute that captain powerhouse is pushing for is bogus and a midrange buffed damage scenario in team play is more practical than a max damage cap scenario.

 

In a team scenario with me actively taking point, I'd say it isn't hard to achieve over 70% fury, but that is something that has to be worked for, and the first portion of combat where a brute has to start from zero fury and build up to that is not non-existant. Whereas a tanker can come in a unload their full damage from their first strike. Being able to jump in a drop your foot stomp or whatever aoes you might have is a factor being devalued on the tanker side where they can deal 27% more damage before fury would build. I've also just about got through running all the praetorian arcs solo on my brute and certainly that 0-50% fury marker has been an important factor in my damage output. The size of my aoes has also been something I've been paying more attention to, and having to wait for enemies to group up or simply not hitting foes in my radius that I would have otherwise hit if I were a tanker post-patch is something that can be noticeable. That's something you can have more control over in a solo scenario, but something that takes time to reposition enemies, and in a team scenario it can sometimes not be possible to group up enemies into your radius, where a tanker's effective damage can go higher than numbers would suggest.

 

10 hours ago, Myrmidon said:

Everyone take a break and read this. The tug-of-war can be resumed in the morning.

 

1 hour ago, Myrmidon said:

It seems that this is literally waiting on you.

Cluttering up a feedback thread with your constant 'witty banter' has been enough. That thread has nothing to do with this one. Your ulterior motives are becoming more clear whether that is just post count padding or keeping attention off of amending any of the original proposed changes, I can't say I am the only one that finds it tiring to sift through the mass of posts to find the relevant ones.

[Unknown Magi]

4 minutes ago, Captain Powerhouse said:

@Unknown Magi, poor phrasing on my part: the goal was to increase modifiers that help the tanker improve team survivability. So, ranged (epic/pool) -ToHit, -Damage, +Resistance Buffs. This is why -def mods were not increased, and -resist should had not been.

 

Keep in mind sooner or later, there will be more epic pools, and those too will likely benefit from changes.

 

Either way, in the next patch will tweak things further, if i get chance to finish that up it should be up maybe tomorrow.

That makes a lot more sense, thanks for the elaboration!  

 

As it stands right now, the only -tohit or -damage I'm aware of in tank epics is entirely in Soul Mastery, and there is no +resistance buffing (for self or others) anywhere in the current epics.  So, while this is a neat idea, it isn't actually doing much (yet?).  Would it be possible to consider also modifying recharge debuffs in tank epics, as those also play into survivability equations and would mean this is a more impactful change now?  In particular it seems like this would improve several sets that aren't top picks right now, and I"m always down for increasing diversity of good choices! 

[Profit]

2 hours ago, Replacement said:

I know CP doesn't wanna talk about it, but if you wanted to nerf Brutes in a way that would barely be felt, numerically, but would further diversify them from Tankers?

Brutes will not be nerfed. End of Story.

 

Having said that, honestly, the only change that should be made to brutes at all is swapping the auto-hit Taunt with Provoke. That's it. One Simple Swap. Course, then tankers don't need to be changed at all I don't think. That one power swap would like cause a nice equilibrium between tanks and brutes.

[Profit]

20 minutes ago, DreadShinobi said:

Cluttering up a feedback thread with your constant 'witty banter' has been enough. That thread has nothing to do with this one. Your ulterior motives are becoming more clear whether that is just post count padding or keeping attention off of amending any of the original proposed changes, I can't say I am the only one that finds it tiring to sift through the mass of posts to find the relevant ones.

This was uncalled for. An attempt was made to get people to relax and chill for a moment to consider information given and you come in here with this?? You owe Myr an apology.

[GM Capocollo]

The more posts here about how you are the debate club's most genteel member and everyone you disagree with is a horrid clod with garbage mouth, the more time Powerhouse has to waste looking for the actual tanker feedback he's looking for.

[Captain Powerhouse]

So, I will be locking this thread, let everyone take a break. Run tests if you want, a new thread will be posted when there is a new patch, there should be lots of stuff to consider on that small but very significant wave of changes.

 

My inbox is always a click away if anyone needs clarification on anything.

Edited September 27, 2019 by Captain Powerhouse