Focused Feedback: Tank Updates for December 6, 2019

[Infinitum]

4 hours ago, Replacement said:

Errr, isn't that why we're on thread 3? We could have been happy with a minor shake up that occasionally has one AT eclipsing the (objectively strongest) AT in certain conditions and builds, it would have been fine...

 

But the the threads speak for themselves!

This,  we keep going backwards now.  Thats why more people need to test real numbers.  So the data is out there for Powerhouse can see it and make accurate determinations on what to do.

 

I love the - regen idea, yeah you wont need it on anything but Avs or hard targets but seriously do you really need -res on minions and bosses either?  If we are honest not really.

 

But -regen on t1 that stacks. Whoa. Tanks could be an Avs worst nightmare which combined with the increased aoe would be conceptually what I would expect a tank to do.

 

Everything else can take down an AV through some mechanic or bonus why not use -regen for a tank without overdoing damage mods so they can do it to... That way.  The tank way.

 

It wouldn't step on any other ATs toes eitjer really but would definately give tanks a niche team and solo.

[Galaxy Brain]

Just saying, but the reason we even have these threads is due to IO's allowing a Brute to take a Tank's place while a Tank cannot IO their way to become a Brute (currently). If we were to only buff IO's, the same core problem exists. Any tweak to them that takes away, even if "good" is a nerf in some way even if its like @Mr.Sinistersays with Defense and Offense being shuffled around. This is a separate topic sure, but I actually would love that where you can build hyper-offense, hyper-defense, or somewhere in the middle.

[csr]

13 hours ago, Captain Powerhouse said:

Every set gets some benefit at least from the increased target cap.

Some get little benefit (Dark Melee, for example).  My point is that some sets do much better than the average with the AoE improvements (Kinetic Melee and Staff Fighting) and some sets do much worse (Dark Melee, Spines, Stone Melee, Super Strength and Titan Weapons).  I don't think there should be as much set-to-set variation for an Inherent (counting the target cap increases as part of the Inherent, which I wasn't doing) as there are.

 

I think it's fine that there is some variation from set-to-set, I just think the variation is too large for those seven sets.  This is especially true of those where the target cap increases aren't all that effective.  Perhaps I'm undervaluing the increase in the target caps for Titan Weapons (Whirling Smash will hit more than 10 fairly often and Arc of Destruction more than 5 a fair bit of the time), but does the target cap increase of Shadow Maul and Dark Consumption really amount to all that much?  I'd say no.

 

The only sets I can see knocking off my list of seven due to the target cap increase are Spines (the increases for Ripper and Quills aren't big, but that for Throw Spines is substantial) and Titan Weapons.  I can also see Super Strength being removed as it's in line for a more general reworking.  That would leave just Dark Melee, Kinetic Melee, Staff Fighting and Stone Melee as outliers with regard to the Inherent AoE buffs.  I think those sets really need adjustment (DM and SM up, KM and SF down).

Edited December 12, 2019 by csr

[csr]

12 hours ago, Captain Powerhouse said:

 

Every set gets some benefit at least from the increased target cap.

 

 

It's being increased a tad for next patch. But keep in mind: if you compare bruise + old base damage + build up, to test, you will get less damage on that one click regardless. The question is: how much total DPS you get through the fight now that the windows outside build up do higher damage, and the T1 is not mandatory in any attack chain.

Is the -Regen going to be tied to the T1s, or a more general ability?

[csr]

8 hours ago, aethereal said:

Does the inherent malus to self-damage-bonus mean that a Tank under these rules would get less out of +damage set bonuses?

No, those, like red inspirations, ignore the AT multipliers.

[csr]

8 hours ago, Mr.Sinister said:

I would take that but I’m not sure it would be necessary.  It would also hurt the pre IO builds.  I already pointed out how there are defense set bonuses of 5%.  Thats 11% of the softcap.  If 95% is considered the damage enhancement soft cap then a +10.5 dam set bonus should exist to match that 11%.  Thats like running assault.  Just like weave.  

 

Of course that’s the top level bonus.  Even though you can enhance an attack for 95% and an armor for only 60%?, the res and defense values exist on a curve.  IE adding 5% defense at 40% defense is exponentially better than 5% at 30%.  

One significant issue with this analysis is that it doesn't take into account the frequency with which you are being attacked or are doing damage.  In general, you will be doing the latter more often than the former unless you're tanking (which includes running at high team size settings on small teams without a true tank).  Still, I agree that the +Dam set bonuses should be improved.

[MIG]

I'm unclear as to why we have such deference for Brutes. 

 

As of the September FOTM LVL 50 reports, Brutes are rolled 3x more than Tanks.  Yet we sit here and debate how  a Tank buff somehow degraded into a confusing nerf, while buffing Brutes in the same patch?  To be frank, Brutes are better at farming, soloing, and even grouped.  In its present state, and on test, Brutes are the better AT.  We keep seeing tests of one Tank doing damage Live vs. Test... the better comparison is taking a Brute with the same build/IOs and looking at the damage disparity.  In my experience, Brutes have 95% survivability to Tanks, but with 30%+ more damage output.  I don't need precision testing, when I'm racing a stock Porsche 911 to a Toyota Camry. 

 

My suggestion is to buff Tank damage further and if we must go down the -reg rabbit hole, please make it stack/contribute to effective levels (for group dynamics).

 

As I've said before, it doesn't matter if anything changes for Tanks, players can simply choose the superior AT.  

[csr]

7 hours ago, Haijinx said:

Ah okay

 

Yeah i use the T1 on my stalker too.

 

Course Build Up uptime is a lot higher on a stalker.

That's due to the ATO proc, in case anyone is wondering why.

[Noyjitat]

Gotta say im not a fan of removing taunt auras from ice or any other set that has always had it. But ice? I mean c'mon... there's like 5 of us that play ice armor.

[Replacement]

8 minutes ago, Noyjitat said:

Gotta say im not a fan of removing taunt auras from ice or any other set that has always had it. But ice? I mean c'mon... there's like 5 of us that play ice armor.

It's not removed, strictly speaking. They pulled it off those powers so they could let the global proc work on them instead.

 

It's like... Why paint your nails when we're about to give you a GUN ARM?!

Edited December 12, 2019 by Replacement

[Infinitum]

2 hours ago, Galaxy Brain said:

Just saying, but the reason we even have these threads is due to IO's allowing a Brute to take a Tank's place while a Tank cannot IO their way to become a Brute (currently). If we were to only buff IO's, the same core problem exists. Any tweak to them that takes away, even if "good" is a nerf in some way even if its like @Mr.Sinistersays with Defense and Offense being shuffled around. This is a separate topic sure, but I actually would love that where you can build hyper-offense, hyper-defense, or somewhere in the middle.

I've played a tank probable 95 percent exclusively since the beginning of September,

 

I played brutes probably 99% exclusively prior to that since late June.

 

I play and slot my brutes to tank not to do damage probably extremely so.  My attack chain usually consists of 4 attacks from the primary, a build up and a judgement.

 

That likely makes them crappy brutes but great tanks with slightly better damage than normal tanks.  They are 90% unkillable - just a few rare fringe things.

 

But, having played an uber tank the last 3 month's I would say it's 99% unkillable - incarnate trial get out of the way or you are dead attacks.  Really decent damage not too far behind the brutes.

 

So I would say what the clamor is for is already here.  I could make my brutes damage monsters but they won't be as unkillable and I don't want that.  It required hard choices to get them to that level of survivability and they still aren't as good as my tank.  Most people probably wouldn't notice, but I do.

 

My tank on the other hand, was easy to get to unkillable levels, I've got 2 destinys, 2 alphas, and 3 hybrids.

 

I can spec for damage - musculature, assault, rebirth, I can spec for resistance - resilient, ageless, melee core, or I can spec for defense - resilient, ageless, support radial.

 

The damage spec puts it still above the brutes in survivability, but only slightly behind them in damage, but my point is there are options and ways to get more damage - not to brute levels. But on the same token it may appear they can get to the same survivability levels tanks do, but ultimately they aren't quite there.  And that's your parity.

 

Moreover I have never had any issues teaming or taking down the hardest targets any in the last three months.  Never been kicked off a team because I wasn't a tank.  Even though there are some tanks out there that really don't get it.

 

[Auroxis]

8 hours ago, kenlon said:

The devs kept a lot of sub-par things around, so yeah, I'd say you do.

So I need to get my head checked, as do the original game's devs for choosing Bruising to address the Tanker's woes. I appreciate your concern for people's health, but please keep such comments to yourself.

Quote

Bruising provided a very small marginal benefit to damage against one target

You can say that about any single target -res power, it being marginal is your opinion. Multiplying team damage is a massive asset , so much that CP nerfed -res multiple times already and believes making Bruising stack (from multiple casters) would make the class OP.

Quote

 

 provided you were using your very terrible T1 attack every 10 seconds to keep it up, without there being any sort of useful indication when the effect fell off of a target.

You know there are visual red debuff indicators for -res? And the whole 10 second thing is a useful indicator in itself, it's not a random duration and it can fit into an attack chain seamlessly.

Quote

It did nothing in AoE situations, which are and always have been the predominant style of combat, and even with bruising, Tank damage was utterly laughable.

Tankers have a lot of good AoE options, ranging from powersets to power pools. And this patch is already addressing AoE.

 

Tanker damage is definitely not "utterly laughable" as it is right now,  that's more of a player issue than a class issue. That said I'm not gonna use that argument to deny the class damage buffs, but I am gonna talk against damage buffs when they come at the expense of taking away features of the class I enjoy.

Quote

If they had wanted to go in on "tanks serve as damage buffs to their teammates", then having it be, say, an effect that was applied alongside taunt could be useful, or simply have it apply to all tanker attacks.

I did actually suggest the former.

Quote

Bruising was a bad band-aid fix that didn't actually solve the problem, and removing it and giving tankers decent damage and better AoE is pretty damn near perfect.

Bruising was far from a bad "band-aid fix" though, as it fixed multiple problems while keeping the class unique, and Tankers remain popular to this day. It should be expanded upon, not removed in favor of having two Brute classes.

Edited December 12, 2019 by Auroxis

[csr]

4 hours ago, Noyjitat said:

Gotta say im not a fan of removing taunt auras from ice or any other set that has always had it. But ice? I mean c'mon... there's like 5 of us that play ice armor.

 

3 hours ago, Replacement said:

It's not removed, strictly speaking. They pulled it off those powers so they could let the global proc work on them instead.

 

It's like... Why paint your nails when we're about to give you a GUN ARM?!

The only question is whether or not the punch-voke Taunt is as strong as that removed (Mag 4, 13.6s duration).  Based upon the sub-text of Capt P's comments, I assume it is.

[nihilii]

13 hours ago, Auroxis said:

I already told CP why I disagree with the concept of stack-able bruising being OP. You currently have DPS+Support classes able to contribute greater -res/team utility (Corruptors and SoA's) and the game isn't suffering for it. You have lots of Defender combos that contribute tons of -res. A full team of tankers with the current damage buffs and stack-able bruising? Sure that's pretty strong, but the damage buffs can be toned down a bit to compensate.

Indeed. On top of that, sharing around the ability to do -RES has virtuous effects in smoothing the gap between power builds and the rest.

One of the reasons TW/bio scrappers are brokenly good is because they have access to three sources of -RES amplifying their huge base damage into infinity (Rend Armor, the /bio -RES aura, and slotting an Achilles' Heel), and then all of that -RES boosts team damage too.

Highend teams tend to be stuffed with -RES debuffs already. Blasters and corruptors are prized above all for their nonconditional damage and force multiplying. Letting tankers do -RES wouldn't change that dynamic much. At best, it'd let them join the party.

[Captain Powerhouse]

Three things:

• Please, try to be civil. Thread has not gotten as out of hand as some of the others but it’s starting to slide there.
• The -regen has already been scrapped internally. Won’t be on the next patch.
• The self dmg buff modifier will go back to its old scale in the next patch.

 

Edited December 12, 2019 by Captain Powerhouse

[siolfir]

Just now, Captain Powerhouse said:

Tree things:

• Please, try to be civil. Thread has not gotten as out of hand as some of the others but it’s starting to slide there.
• The -regen has already been scrapped internally. Won’t be on the next patch.
• The self dmg buff modifier will go back to its old scale in the next patch.

 

Thank you!

 

The plants have spoken!

 

Now you just need to push that patch live asap. 😛

[Captain Powerhouse]

Stupid phone... I typed “three”!! Also, I NEVER type “Duck”!

Edited December 12, 2019 by Captain Powerhouse

[Infinitum]

3 minutes ago, siolfir said:

Thank you!

 

The plants have spoken!

 

Now you just need to push that patch live asap. 😛

Does that mean we attack isengard now?

[Infinitum]

6 minutes ago, Captain Powerhouse said:

Tree things:

• Please, try to be civil. Thread has not gotten as out of hand as some of the others but it’s starting to slide there.
• The -regen has already been scrapped internally. Won’t be on the next patch.
• The self dmg buff modifier will go back to its old scale in the next patch.

 

*darth Vader*  nooooooooooooooooo

 

That was so intriguing though.

[Infinitum]

I have a thought.

 

As tankers we've been good boys and girls.

 

It's Christmas time.

 

Give t1 stackable -res AND -regen

 

Increase damage cap to 600

 

Increase base damage to 1.0

 

Then also give us fury.

 

Why not, people are going to complain either way it seems.

 

just do all that then RUUUUN don't even put a patch notes out.   lol. Never look back.  We will make you proud in game I promise.

[siolfir]

16 minutes ago, Infinitum said:

*darth Vader*  nooooooooooooooooo

 

That was so intriguing though.

Intriguing, but depending on the scale, a minor effect. In addition to the purple patch, regen debuffs are also specially resisted by the same hard targets you would need them most on.

 

Since I play a lot of Corruptors, let's look at some -regen numbers:

Kinetics has an easily stackable -50% regen debuff that doubles as an AoE heal... nobody asks for a Kinetic because of the -regen.

Dark Miasma has Twilight Grasp for the same -50%, but when people are actually trying to debuff regen with a Dark, they use Howling Twilight instead.

Radiation Emission is considered a "good" debuff set; Lingering Radiation is -500% (the -resistance for a Corruptor is -22.5%... barely above the "laughably weak" Bruising, but it's always available and in an AoE).

 

Edit to add:

If it wasn't also so heavily resisted, I'd suggest adding a -damage effect (similar to KM's secondary effect) to Tanker attacks; iirc -damage effects are resisted by damage resistance to that type in addition to the purple patch and AV resistances.

Edited December 12, 2019 by siolfir

[siolfir]

15 minutes ago, Infinitum said:

I have a thought.

 

As tankers we've been good boys and girls.

 

It's Christmas time.

 

Give t1 stackable -res AND -regen

 

Increase damage cap to 600

 

Increase base damage to 1.0

 

Then also give us fury.

 

Why not, people are going to complain either way it seems.

 

just do all that then RUUUUN don't even put a patch notes out.   lol. Never look back.  We will make you proud in game I promise.

I had almost gotten fed up enough in an earlier thread that I was going to suggest take Tankers and Brutes and normalize their AT modifiers, taking the highest for each value (which is actually the Tanker values across the board except for the damage cap). Give both ATs Fury (in its live incarnation) and Gauntlet. Then the only difference between the two ATs would be which powerset was the primary, and that Tanker Fire Melee would have Combustion.

 

That was in response to most of the "survivability doesn't matter Tanker need even more damage than 0.95" crowd. I had it all typed out, then deleted it before posting because just typing it was cathartic enough.

Edited December 12, 2019 by siolfir
wow I miss a lot of words when I type in a hurry... probably should post at work but oh well

[MIG]

4 hours ago, nihilii said:

Indeed. On top of that, sharing around the ability to do -RES has virtuous effects in smoothing the gap between power builds and the rest.

One of the reasons TW/bio scrappers are brokenly good is because they have access to three sources of -RES amplifying their huge base damage into infinity (Rend Armor, the /bio -RES aura, and slotting an Achilles' Heel), and then all of that -RES boosts team damage too.

Highend teams tend to be stuffed with -RES debuffs already. Blasters and corruptors are prized above all for their nonconditional damage and force multiplying. Letting tankers do -RES wouldn't change that dynamic much. At best, it'd let them join the party.

 

I agree with your thoughts.

 

In addition, I spend good amount of time playing a tank and I'm never looking for more survivability or taunt.  In addition, I read the Tanker thread religiously and no one is asking for more survivability.  Damage is the issue and I hope the current patch to beta will make a difference, while the devs consider a long-term solution for bruising (contribution to group dynamics).

[Infinitum]

1 hour ago, siolfir said:

Intriguing, but depending on the scale, a minor effect. In addition to the purple patch, regen debuffs are also specially resisted by the same hard targets you would need them most on.

 

Since I play a lot of Corruptors, let's look at some -regen numbers:

Kinetics has an easily stackable -50% regen debuff that doubles as an AoE heal... nobody asks for a Kinetic because of the -regen.

Dark Miasma has Twilight Grasp for the same -50%, but when people are actually trying to debuff regen with a Dark, they use Howling Twilight instead.

Radiation Emission is considered a "good" debuff set; Lingering Radiation is -500% (the -resistance for a Corruptor is -22.5%... barely above the "laughably weak" Bruising, but it's always available and in an AoE).

 

Edit to add:

If it wasn't also so heavily resisted, I'd suggest adding a -damage effect (similar to KM's secondary effect) to Tanker attacks; iirc -damage effects are resisted by damage resistance to that type in addition to the purple patch and AV resistances.

What's intriguing is ANY AT can purchase envenomated daggers.

 

Envenomated daggers freaking work.

 

They work even better if multiple are using it on a hard target.

 

So if this is purchasable and easily attained why couldn't tank t1 mimic a p2w power?

[KelvinKole]

 It's not a very unique skill or mechanic though if you can just purchase it from P2W or get it through an IO proc. I can't purchase a power that let's my character critical hit, can I? Or do double damage to controlled targets? And so on. Archetypes inherents should be completely unique to the Archetype.

 

With that in mind I'll offer this: Maybe instead of - res or -regen, Bruising could cause weakness to the target and reduce the effectiveness of their heals, buffs, debuffs, controls, etc. Being in the presence of the Tanker is quite demoralizing and this loss of confidence reduces their targets effectiveness in combat. This mechanic is not widely available, to my knowledge. 

Edited December 12, 2019 by KelvinKole