DELETE Hasten, SLIGHTLY ALTER all enemies, SLIGHTY ALTER all player powers

[Vanden]

You know, it’s occurred to me that this whole thing might be based on faulty information. This thread was started when it was brought up that about 53k of the ~60k level 50 characters have Hasten. But there’s over 911k characters on Homecoming. Think about it: the players who care most about about min-maxing are also the ones most likely to get characters to 50. We only know the power pool statistics at 50. The more casual players, the ones who aren’t as likely to get a character to 50, how many of them are taking Hasten? We literally don’t know.

[TheAdjustor]

2 minutes ago, Vanden said:

You know, it’s occurred to me that this whole thing might be based on faulty information. This thread was started when it was brought up that about 53k of the ~60k level 50 characters have Hasten. But there’s over 911k characters on Homecoming. Think about it: the players who care most about about min-maxing are also the ones most likely to get characters to 50. We only know the power pool statistics at 50. The more casual players, the ones who aren’t as likely to get a character to 50, how many of them are taking Hasten? We literally don’t know.

Actually we do. It's around 150k out of the 911k this is something the OP actually brought up.

 

Just not in this thread for some reason

 

Hmmmmm

Edited September 26, 2019 by TheAdjustor

[nihilii]

6 minutes ago, TheAdjustor said:

They don't this a troll thread pure and simple. You can see it in the original post and title which "Delete hasten, Too many people take it"

 

You can see it in the revised proposals which are now "Just screw with people because they don't play the game the way I think is proper"

 

You can see it in the lack of thought that has gone into this in that the proposer hasn't even bothered to properly run the numbers or even fully consider the effects.

 

This is particularly amazing that someone who a few days ago insisted she was working far too much to even bother taking a look at the code behind changes she insisted were impossible for pets, has been able to spend so much time in this thread.

Indeed, very hard not to read the thread this way.

It's worth remembering "balance" is not a goal in itself. Choices are what's interesting. Balance is the means through which we create choices.

When an AT outpaces another AT at the same job and has little to no drawbacks, this is an issue as there's no reason to play the other AT.
When a powerset overperforms all other powersets by a large margin, this is an issue in that the diversity is lowered from x * y to 1 * y.
If a powerset combination overperforms, it gets even worse as the range of possibilities becomes 1 * 1 rather than x * y.

A power pool every character can pick as soon as level 4 doesn't hurt diversity in the same manner. There's only so many power pools you want, if you're even going to grab 4. It doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things if Hasten is better than Grant Invis, provided Hasten doesn't make you invulnerable. While +70% recharge is pretty fantastic, it's not an I Win button.

The ultimate balanced game has every power an identical clone. Maybe the perfect balanced CoH would have every power be Fire Blast. Nothing but Fire Blast. You're a Tanker? Have Fire Blast in your primary, and Fire Blast in your secondary. All scales for all ATs should be 1.0 on everything.

Absurd example of course, but the point is: balance in a vacuum is not a goal to strive towards.

There's little question (to me) high recharge makes the game more interesting both mechanically and psychologically. Mechanically: each new level of recharge is incentive to rethink your attack rotation. Long cooldown powers can be chained in new different ways (perma or not; frankly, the focus on perma here is hardly relevant). Psychologically: character progression becomes more obvious, thanks to the significant rise in power.

So any proposal to nerf Hasten is really a suggestion to dumb down the game. Even the revised suggestions reflect that: let's give everyone inherent recharge, instead of having them manage a click power with slots, a cooldown, and an endurance crash.

For a suggestion to dumb down the game to even make sense, there ought to be an upside that is at least as great. So far no such upside has been put forward.

Incidentally, we now have an announcement telling us Force of Will ("new" power pool) is being worked on. This is the right way to do things. Add options. Make us feel the crunch between picking Speed/Leaping/Leadership/Fighting and Speed/Leaping/Fighting/Force of Will and Speed/Leaping/Leadership/Force of Will and... You get the point.

The "smart" way to nerf Hasten is to increase the opportunity cost we face in taking one pool just for that power.

[Bossk_Hogg]

1 minute ago, Vanden said:

You know, it’s occurred to me that this whole thing might be based on faulty information. This thread was started when it was brought up that about 53k of the ~60k level 50 characters have Hasten. But there’s over 911k characters on Homecoming. Think about it: the players who care most about about min-maxing are also the ones most likely to get characters to 50. We only know the power pool statistics at 50. The more casual players, the ones who aren’t as likely to get a character to 50, how many of them are taking Hasten? We literally don’t know.

I've honestly dropped it on quite a few characters. What am I taking it for on my sentinel? So I can inferno 2 seconds faster? Hell, stopping to actually talk with my teammates takes more time. Players usually arent functioning close near peak performance.

[TheAdjustor]

6 minutes ago, Bossk_Hogg said:

I've honestly dropped it on quite a few characters. What am I taking it for on my sentinel? So I can inferno 2 seconds faster? Hell, stopping to actually talk with my teammates takes more time. Players usually arent functioning close near peak performance.

The inherent diminishing return on recharge in general. Once you get above 150% or so applied to a power the benefits really drops off significantly

Edited September 26, 2019 by TheAdjustor

[Infinitum]

5 minutes ago, Bossk_Hogg said:

I've honestly dropped it on quite a few characters. What am I taking it for on my sentinel? So I can inferno 2 seconds faster? Hell, stopping to actually talk with my teammates takes more time. Players usually arent functioning close near peak performance.

Well its not about balance anyway, all the foaming at the mouth is because other people play in a way that doesnt fit their global game view on things.

 

Its their idea of balance, whether its good for the long term health of the game or not.

[Epsilon Assassin]

10 minutes ago, nihilii said:

The "smart" way to nerf Hasten is to increase the opportunity cost we face in taking one pool just for that power.

This is the correct way, though personally I find the idea of making it an auto that scales appropriately to our recharge an appealing change. It is true that making people manage clickie abilities around a single auto ability adds difficulty, but I find that, particularly in some cases (Like /EM on Blaster, or Hasten), that some clicks should be autos. 

 

[macskull]

1 hour ago, Megajoule said:

IMO:  No, the game was pretty obviously designed with the expectation that some powers would be balanced by only being up some of the time.

The playerbase took that and did everything they possibly could to break / get around that design decision, so that they could have those powers up all of the time.

This was, still IMO, clearly not the devs' intent (or they would have made those powers a toggle or whatever from the start), but they just couldn't keep up with a bunch of players dedicated to breaking their original intent/design into little pieces.

 

To people saying, here and now, that this would break Perma________, I say good.

Perma_______ was never meant to be.

The powers that would be balanced by only being up some of the time are the powers that are mechanically impossible to make perma, or are unaffected by recharge bonuses. Let's stop kidding ourselves by pretending we know what the original developers' intentions were unless we have specific evidence to show them - and besides, most of those developers haven't been involved with the game for over a decade.

 

If perma-[thing] was never meant to be, [thing] would have a recharge time greater than 5x its duration. Since that obviously isn't the case for Hasten, and it's been perma-able more of this game's run than not, that's a really bad argument. Hasten already doesn't stack with itself, and hasn't since day one, so obviously it was forseen that people would have enough recharge to make it perma.

 

I'm aware that the above quote is your opinion but your opinion is objectively incorrect.

 

EDIT: It's also worth pointing out the IO vs SO balancing discussion that's come up several times in this thread. Yes, the game is balanced around SOs (and incarnate content is balanced around that with incarnate powers on top of it) and as a result even a modest IO build makes the game easier. If players are still looking for a challenge they can simply not use the IO system, but to start to balance the game against "well, a cheap IO build can do this" is a dangerous path to start down. The game should never be balanced against the invention system because as soon as you start doing that the invention system is no longer an option and is instead a requirement.

Edited September 26, 2019 by macskull

[Haijinx]

If it was about balance it would have a duration of about 30 seconds, but the same cool down it has now.

 

No, I'm not advocating that.

Edited September 26, 2019 by Haijinx

[SlimPickens]

21 hours ago, Rathulfr said:

Why is that?

So OP is suggesting everyone be given perma hasten? Because thats not what I thought I read. If I am not given perma hasten, its a nerf plain and simple to all my characters- I min/max build for perma. If its perma for free, then thats one less thing I need to build for which throws out of whack the whole power dynamic, making everyone turbo powered without even spending the time and influence needed to properly build for high recharge.

 

I am fundamentally against radical change to as important a dynamic as recharge in how it would affect so many builds.

 

Having a free power pool I no longer needed to choose for speed would be great and all, but I cannot justify people just being given hasten level perma effectiveness without making the needed build sacrifices to get there. Otherwise its all take and no give to get the massive boosts that hasten currently provides when made perma. And I quite simply would never agree to not being able to reach perma hasten levels of effectiveness by choosing to make those build choices in my min/max schemes because i was given for free a dumbed down version that everyone now gets.

 

so, no.

[macskull]

1 minute ago, SlimPickens said:

So OP is suggesting everyone be given perma hasten? Because thats not what I thought I read. If I am not given perma hasten, its a nerf plain and simple to all my characters- I min/max build for perma. If its perma for free, then thats one less thing I need to build for which throws out of whack the whole power dynamic, making everyone turbo powered without even spending the time and influence needed to properly build for high recharge.

 

I am fundamentally against radical change to as important a dynamic as recharge in how it would affect so many builds.

 

Having a free power pool I no longer needed to choose for speed would be great and all, but I cannot justify people just being given hasten level perma effectiveness without making the needed build sacrifices to get there. Otherwise its all take and no give to get the massive boosts that hasten currently provides when made perma. And I quite simply would never agree to not being able to reach perma hasten levels of effectiveness by choosing to make those build choices in my min/max schemes because i was given for free a dumbed down version that everyone now gets.

 

so, no.

Well, even though I vehemently disagree with the OP's premise that Hasten needs to be nerfed or changed because everyone takes it, I understand her logic for wanting to make a change. Hasten is far and away the best single-pick option for any power pool and in the end the only real build sacrifice you've got to make is tying up one of your 4 power pool picks (assuming you don't take Super Speed, but why wouldn't you?).

 

I'm with you though - it would be nice to free up an extra power pool pick if I didn't need to dip into the Speed pool, but I feel like if Hasten were made inherent it would be in a significantly less powerful form and that's not a compromise I'd be willing to make.

[EyeLuvBooks]

On 9/25/2019 at 1:49 PM, PaxArcana said:

Don't delete it.

 

Double it's recharge time, so it can't be perma'd.  Watch it get respec'd out of most of those 50K characters double-quick.

And watch the internet burn down because over 100k players (many with their 'perfect' build) would pretty much flee to one of those other servers where A) they haven't done this and B) They never would because they saw Homecoming do this.

 

Do NOT forget that CoH isn't a monopoly any more. There are many servers out there and more can be created almost overnight. You want the population on Homecoming to leave? Go ahead and treat them like 'those people who would never leave'.

[Lost Ninja]

7 hours ago, subbacultchas said:

Would it help any if hasten were a bit deeper in the speed pool, you think? Currently a lot of folks have it, and likely on hasten, from the speed pool because it's a very easy dip into it. And honestly I do think it's by far the most useful power in said pool by a pretty wide margin.

Would IMO make a bigger difference to the number of people taking it than fiddling around with how it appears to work. If I had to take SS as my travel power just to get Hasten I would work my way round having it at all as I hate SS unless playing a character that is required to play close to the ground (looking at you Hot Feet)... actually that's not true I hate it even if the character has powers that require you to be near the ground. 😕

[Lost Ninja]

2 hours ago, macskull said:

If perma-[thing] was never meant to be, [thing] would have a recharge time greater than 5x its duration. Since that obviously isn't the case for Hasten, and it's been perma-able more of this game's run than not, that's a really bad argument. Hasten already doesn't stack with itself, and hasn't since day one, so obviously it was forseen that people would have enough recharge to make it perma.

Not sure if it was only when zoning but Hasten Pre-ED certainly did stack with itself. Six slot it with 50++ SOs and it briefly stacked (at least visually). ED put a stop to that.

[Cooltastic]

On 9/25/2019 at 2:24 PM, Steampunkette said:

There are about 60k characters at level 50. About 50k of them use Hasten. It's one of the single most used powers in the game, far outstripping most pool powers, though less people overall use Hasten than Fly.

 

It's a power that is, essentially, never used for Theme but exclusively used for Function. Much as how Stamina, Health, and Swift were used before the Fitness Pool was incorporated into all characters.

 

Instead, we should increase the baseline recharge of all characters by 20% and replace the power with something else.

 

The 20% value is based on Hasten's recharge time being 3.75 times longer than it's Duration, then dividing the 70% hasten bonus by the time difference which is 18.6%. I rounded up the other 1.4% just to make it looks more presentable. This way everyone gets the 'full benefit' of unslotted Hasten by averaging out it's effect as a permanent autopower instead of a click power.

 

With Hasten gone we'd need a new Super Speed power. I'd like to suggest some sort of 'Combat Superspeed' ability. Perhaps a weaker version of Martial Manipulation's "Burst of Speed"? I'm open to suggestions.

 

To be clear: This is a serious suggestion at this point. Not a ruse or a joke meant to poo poo on a different thread. Seeing the level 50 numbers on Hasten compared to the populace showed me that Hasten is the new Fitness. It may not be MANDATORY. But it is too good in relation to it's neighbors in other power pools.

 

EDIT:

 

After continued discussion I have revamped my suggestion to the following:

 

1) Lower Hasten's Cooldown to 200 Seconds

2) Lower Hasten's Recharge Rate Buff to 25%

3) Grant all players a +20% Recharge Rate Buff starting at level 1

 

This would allow Hasten to be 'Perma' with 2 Recharge SOs at 45% Recharge Rate increase. But would also allow people to Double-Stack Hasten if they have enough recharge rate buffs to a full 70% total Recharge Rate Increase over the current baseline.

 

The intent is to split out portions of the buff to make it less attractive, overall, while still retaining it's ultimate function, in the hopes that more people will take the 20% recharge rate increase as 'Enough' of a benefit that they feel they don't -have- to take Hasten.

All I have to say on this subject is this...

 

The part I highlighted from the OP is what they're going after, but it's just not going to happen. @Steampunkette You want to have the devs spend time altering hasten and making these suggest changes in THE HOPE that less people will choose hasten, but that's just not going to happen. MOST pool powers aren't all that attractive. I can't speak for everyone but I know I'd still end up taking hasten on the majority of my chars (even if it only provided +10% recharge), over most of what the other pools have to offer. So many other pool powers need to be worked on and improved before we should even be thinking about making changes to hasten. Maybe if we were given NEW pool powers to choose from then less people would think about taking hasten. Basically what I'm trying to say Hasten is always taken because it alone is a MUST HAVE, sometime's it's because it's one of the few pool choices that isn't complete garbage aswell.

 

So right now I think the dev focus would be better spent elsewhere to actually improve the gaming experience.

[Starforge]

1 minute ago, Cooltastic said:

So right now I think the dev focus would be better spent elsewhere to actually improve the gaming experience.

Exactly.

[Vindicator]

On 9/25/2019 at 2:24 PM, Steampunkette said:

 

/jranger

[Haijinx]

18 minutes ago, Lost Ninja said:

Not sure if it was only when zoning but Hasten Pre-ED certainly did stack with itself. Six slot it with 50++ SOs and it briefly stacked (at least visually). ED put a stop to that.

Think it was only visually, not buff values.

 

If it stacked you'd get a recharge feedback loop.  Stacking would make it easier to stack ... moar recharge!!!!111

 

[Lost Ninja]

1 minute ago, Haijinx said:

Think it was only visually, not buff values.

 

If it stacked you'd get a recharge feedback loop.  Stacking would make it easier to stack ... moar recharge!!!!111

 

If you have sufficient recharge to get it's cool down below 120s now, it will stack with itself on zone change (so In zone it's not finished the uptime in the next zone it finishes the cool down and fires off again). And the powers monitor will show you the doubling. So I expect it did stack with itself back in the "Good Old Days" but it may still have only stacked after zoning.

[Some Random User]

I can tell you the one thing they won't follow through with: Removing [Hasten] entirely in favor of a global Recharge buff. Why? They'd have to tinker with the balance of everything else.

 

Know what should happen? Removing [Hasten] entirely in favor of a global Recharge buff, then doing balance work on everything else that's even indirectly affected.

[Epsilon Assassin]

5 minutes ago, Lost Ninja said:

If you have sufficient recharge to get it's cool down below 120s now, it will stack with itself on zone change (so In zone it's not finished the uptime in the next zone it finishes the cool down and fires off again). And the powers monitor will show you the doubling. So I expect it did stack with itself back in the "Good Old Days" but it may still have only stacked after zoning.

Nope. It used to stack regularly

13 minutes ago, Haijinx said:

Think it was only visually, not buff values.

 

If it stacked you'd get a recharge feedback loop.  Stacking would make it easier to stack ... moar recharge!!!!111

 

and this is why it no longer does

[Lost Ninja]

Just now, Epsilon Assassin said:

Nope. It used to stack regularly

TBH that was why I was hedging my bets, it is a very long time since ED hit and I might have mis-remembered it, and as I only started playing in i3 I didn't have as long before they started nerfing everything... my poor regen scrapper. 😢

[Haijinx]

This is one of the reasons sequels tend to have muted mechanic variations.  

 

Something like hasten would have been a lot different in a COH 2

 

Of course removing mechanic variations in games tends to make builds boring ...

[EyeLuvBooks]

15 minutes ago, Some Random User said:

I can tell you the one thing they won't follow through with: Removing [Hasten] entirely in favor of a global Recharge buff. Why? They'd have to tinker with the balance of everything else.

 

Know what should happen? Removing [Hasten] entirely in favor of a global Recharge buff, then doing balance work on everything else that's even indirectly affected.

Um...why? Don't say something SHOULD happen without supporting evidence.

 

Do many people take Hasten? Sure they do. The numbers provided by the OP show that MANY people take Hasten. Does that mean it's too good? Maybe. Does that mean it MUST be changed? Not necessarily.

 

How much work are we talking about here? (Let's forget the MASSIVE blowback from enraged players) I can't get my head around the idea of removing Hasten, putting in some arbitrary buff to Recharge and THEN worry about rebalancing EVERYTHING. Dozens of sets...hundreds of powers to work with.

 

I'd rather grant a small universal Recharge buff and nerf Hasten to the point that they balance with what we have now but I still see MANY other things that are more important than this.

[macskull]

28 minutes ago, Lost Ninja said:

If you have sufficient recharge to get it's cool down below 120s now, it will stack with itself on zone change (so In zone it's not finished the uptime in the next zone it finishes the cool down and fires off again). And the powers monitor will show you the doubling. So I expect it did stack with itself back in the "Good Old Days" but it may still have only stacked after zoning.

This isn't a Hasten-specific phenomenon, any buffs can be stacked after zoning because the game "loses track" of who cast the buff (even if you were the caster). S'why I always tag teammates with a round of buffs right outside the mission door and immediately again after entering.