Underused Power Sets

[Exaltist Ethan]

There are eight power sets in City of Heroes/Villains. Some of them are being utilized very well. With the addition of the eleventh archetype with Sentinel, Ranged, Melee, Defense, and Buff/Debuff are all being heavily used by various archetypes in the game. On the other hand, there are a few, such as Support, Control, Assault and Summon that are hardly used at all, and seem to only be utilized whenever a specific class needs to have unique powers. 

 

Utilized Power Sets

Defense: 5 (Brute, Scrapper, Stalker, Tanker, Sentinel)

Ranged: 4 (Blaster, Corruptor, Defender, Sentinel)

Melee: 4 (Brute, Scrapper, Stalker, Tanker)

Buff/Debuff: 4 (Corruptor, Defender, Controller, Mastermind)

 

Underused Power Sets

Control: 2 (Controller, Dominator)

Support: 1 (Blaster)

Assault: 1 (Dominator)

Summon: 1 (Mastermind)

 

I recommend as a way to re-balance the game, to introduce archetypes that would employ more of these super powers. Something that got traction on the Discord server was my idea of a Commander archetype, with Primary being Summon and Secondary being Control. Thereby giving more options for people who wish to summon minions under their control, and also have controlling powers to aid them in combat.

 

Commander Stats
Survivability: 5
Melee Damage: 2
Ranged Damage: 3
Crowd Control: 7
Support: 2
Pets: 10

 

Inherent: Influence
Influence: Activating the influence ability while in combat will give more offensive might to your minions. Can only be used in combat and lasts 30 seconds. Two-minute cool-down.

 

I'd like to hear any ideas any of you guys have to balance the archetypes. I thought of other combinations, such as assault/support, but most of my ideas seemed to be bad ones, when people pointed out to me that would make your super hero very difficult to manage. You'd have too many powers and not enough defense and thereby die quickly at higher levels. This idea, commander, at least seemed to pull some traction. 

 

Primary: Summon (7)

Beast Mastery

Demon Summoning

Mercenaries

Necromancy

Ninjas

Robots

Thugs

 

Secondary: Control (8)

Darkness Control

Earth Control

Electric Control

Fire Control

Gravity Control

Ice Control

Mind Control

Plant Control

Edited November 8, 2019 by Mackerni

[DougGraves]

Keep in mind that the game exists to provide fun for players not exercise for powersets.  Creating things to increase player enjoyment is a good idea.  Creating things to make powersets feel more useful is not as good of an idea.

 

So ATs should be created because people want to play them.  Not because a matrix is missing an X in a box.

[Kistulot]

Personally, I still don't really understand sentinel. It brings damage, and survives, but if one needed that secondary set to survive blasting, blasters, corruptors, and defenders would all be dead. Assault+Support makes a good amount of sense to me, personally.

 

Summoning+Control also seems like it could potentially be very interesting. I could also see a more literal tankermind, combining summoning with defensive sets, including a taunt aura. It might devalue the presence pool, but I think it does a good job devaluing itself.

[Haijinx]

Why not just identify if there are reasons some powersets are so unpopular and address those?

 

Theme reasons - do nothing

 

Power reasons - improve short comings 

[DougGraves]

3 minutes ago, Haijinx said:

Why not just identify if there are reasons some powersets are so unpopular and address those?

 

Theme reasons - do nothing

 

Power reasons - improve short comings 

 

He's not really talking about powersets.  He is talking about types of powers.  Right now the only way to have a pet powerset is to be a mastermind which is also buff/debuff.  You cannot have a character who summons ninjas and has control powers.    It is not a question of how good ninjas is.  It is that you cannot combine them with control.

Edited November 8, 2019 by DougGraves

[Haijinx]

12 minutes ago, DougGraves said:

 

He's not really talking about powersets.  He is talking about types of powers.  Right now the only way to have a pet powerset is to be a mastermind which is also buff/debuff.  You cannot have a character who summons ninjas and has control powers.    It is not a question of how good ninjas is.  It is that you cannot combine them with control.

Ah i was reading the rationale instead of reading it as a rationalization.

 

So this is another MM pet primary/control secondary thread basically.  

 

Since there are no control secondaries, wouldn't that imply they would need a modifier reduction?

 

How good will control sets be with 0.75x normal mez values? 

 

 

[Lost Ninja]

3 hours ago, Haijinx said:

Ah i was reading the rationale instead of reading it as a rationalization.

 

So this is another MM pet primary/control secondary thread basically.  

 

Since there are no control secondaries, wouldn't that imply they would need a modifier reduction?

 

How good will control sets be with 0.75x normal mez values? 

 

 

Realistically I'd imagine if something like this was added they'd leave the mez values alone and reduce/remove the damage.

 

Personally I don't really see the need, you can build very controllery MMs */Dark/Ghost Widow (forget what her patron power pool is called), how I played mine back on live, think you end up with two holds and an immobilise, plus slows/debuffs. I think part of the fun in this game is coming up with solutions to problems.

 

If a new AT is needed it should be to address a hole in what we already have not just to make some play styles more attractive.

[biostem]

3 hours ago, Haijinx said:

Ah i was reading the rationale instead of reading it as a rationalization.

 

So this is another MM pet primary/control secondary thread basically.  

 

Since there are no control secondaries, wouldn't that imply they would need a modifier reduction?

 

How good will control sets be with 0.75x normal mez values? 

Well, I think it's more a matter of finding ways to proliferate the assault, manipulation and summoning sets, likely via new ATs.  One of the common ways of doing that, that I've observed, is to remove the direct attacks from the MM sets and replace them with something that's complimentary to or fills in the gaps of whatever other set you pair it with.  For instance, maybe have an assault set as the primary, and a MM summon as the secondary, only with the attacks replaced with 2 shields and a mez protection power.

[Haijinx]

Full powered pets with full powered mez control powers (with less damage) sounds a bit OP.

[biostem]

36 minutes ago, Haijinx said:

Full powered pets with full powered mez control powers (with less damage) sounds a bit OP.

AFAIK, no one gets control sets as a secondary, so it's hard to say if they could be adequately scaled down to fit such a secondary roll.  I suppose you'd have to reduce their duration and other effects;  Lowering the magnitude would be to great of a reduction in their effectiveness, IMO.

[Galaxy Brain]

Would the control set get the control pets too?

 

As for being OP, remember you lose the pet support that normal mms got

[Williwaw]

Bear in mind that AT multipliers have nothing to do with whether powersets are "Primary" vs. "Secondary", and are instead tuned for each AT individually. For example, Controllers have much better Mez multipliers than Dominators (1.863 vs. 1.490 for Fear/Immob/Sleep/Stun), even though it's a Primary set for both ATs.  Similarly, not only do Blasters have higher ranged damage multipliers than Corruptors (1.125 vs. 0.750), despite both being Primary, but so do Dominators (0.950), even though their damage powerset is Secondary.

 

So with that in mind, I'd give a Commander set Defender's slightly higher ranged damage multipliers (0.650, while MMs have 0.550 - note this wouldn't affect pet damage), and Dominator-level mez multipliers (at best).  This would give them decent offensive capability but without the inherent buffs that those ATs provide.  Instead, the Commander's Inherent could make the mezzes stronger (i.e., longer duration) depending on how many of your pets are nearby - sort of a reverse Supremacy.  (I'm thinking no Bodyguard Mode for this AT)

 

(And, of course, all multipliers would be subject to balance passes; that's just a general ballpark to start with)

 

 

 

Edited November 13, 2019 by Williwaw

[biostem]

9 hours ago, Galaxy Brain said:

Would the control set get the control pets too?

Well, MMs can already get an extra pet in dark miasma, and some of the primaries can summon additional ones.  If they were to implement some sort of summon/control or control/summon AT, I'd imagine that having all those pets would be factored into whatever damage numbers/scalars they'd get.  Still, I think they could make for some very fun play experiences...