Focused Feedback: Tank Updates for December 6, 2019

[Bopper]

1 hour ago, Vanden said:

Old numbers:

Base damage: 80

Damage from enhancement: 76

Damage from Rage: 64

 

80 + 76 + 64 = 220

 

220 * 1.2 (from Bruising) = 264

 

New numbers:

Base damage: 95

Damage from enhancement: 90.25

Damage from Rage: 76

 

95 + 90.25 + 76 = 261.25

Great breakdown of numbers, but there is one minor issue. Bruising requires use of your T1 attack in your attack chain (typically a weak attack and single target), whereas now you can stick to whatever attacks you want that optimize your attack chain. The lack of bruising will be missed against AVs, as teammates also benefit from the bruising, but you'll make up for much of it with superior performance in AoE and general mob fighting.

[Brutal Justice]

31 minutes ago, aethereal said:

But now SS tanks don't need to have Jab in their attack rotation, since it no longer provides bruising, and Jab is terrible, right?  Surely that more-than-covers an extremely minor decrease in overall damage, when you look at sustained damage for an attack rotation.

Or you could do something crazy and just improve the numbers for jab and try to help tanks in a more creative way.  Any buff to tanks that requires a buff to another archetype is the wrong direction.

[Brutal Justice]

10 minutes ago, Bopper said:

Great breakdown of numbers, but there is one minor issue. Bruising requires use of your T1 attack in your attack chain (typically a weak attack and single target), whereas now you can stick to whatever attacks you want that optimize your attack chain. The lack of bruising will be missed against AVs, as teammates also benefit from the bruising, but you'll make up for much of it with superior performance in AoE and general mob fighting.

How long does bruising last?  Does jab need to be part of your rotation or just sprinkled in every 10s?  If it only needs sprinkled then how much does using jab with bruising actually hurt your dps? Or is sprinkling it in with the live setup a net wash with the test setup?

[Bopper]

6 minutes ago, Mr.Sinister said:

How long does bruising last?  Does jab need to be part of your rotation or just sprinkled in every 10s?  If it only needs sprinkled then how much does using jab with bruising actually hurt your dps? Or is sprinkling it in with the live setup a net wash with the test setup?

That is difficult to quantify without knowing the rotation. But you're right, you would sprinkle it in every 10 seconds. In the case of jab, it has a 1.32 second arcana time and does only 30.25 base damage. Not a great T1 power to sprinkle in. With the possible exception of Frozen Fists, Jab is the worst T1 attack as it has the worst DPA and is relatively slow to cast.

[Vanden]

49 minutes ago, Bopper said:

Great breakdown of numbers, but there is one minor issue. Bruising requires use of your T1 attack in your attack chain (typically a weak attack and single target), whereas now you can stick to whatever attacks you want that optimize your attack chain. The lack of bruising will be missed against AVs, as teammates also benefit from the bruising, but you'll make up for much of it with superior performance in AoE and general mob fighting.

It could be worth the tradeoff on other sets, but not Super Strength. As I pointed out, Super Strength has only one AoE attack and it barely benefits from the changes to the inherent.

[Brutal Justice]

The +dam modifier change hurts more than just super strength.  With Vandens super strength numbers showing an actual nerf I would be curious about the other +dam sets.  Claws, dual blades, kin melee, dark melee, anything shield, bio.  That could be a significant number of toons that come away from these buffs with less dps than they had before.  

 

Nerf tanks and buff brutes?  Might as well nerf energy melee and regen while buffing Titan weapons. 

 

Any buff to any archetype that requires a buff to another archetype is the wrong direction.  Unless maybe both archetypes are underperforming.  Which I don’t think brutes OR tanks are.  They just need differentiation.  

[csr]

8 hours ago, Mr.Sinister said:

Here’s how I understand all the chain of events with these changes.  

 

Buff tanks = way too good

 

lower buffs for tanks = still too good

 

buff brutes

even lower buffs for tanks

 

net result = some tank sets perform slightly better than on live and some things have been moved around and changed for the sake of changing things.  Therefore the tank buffs ultimately end up being a brute buff.  

 

Its like gauntlet 3.0.  “Let’s give tanks punchvoke to make them better at tanking than brutes.  Then give it to brutes too because fury is boring and brutes need two inherents.”

 

Poor scrappers.  If they didn’t have their ATIOs they would be completely irrelevant.  

 

This is why changes to help tanks shouldn’t revolve around damage.  

 

Interestingly, much of the aggro generating improvement has been backed out.  Taunt is back to the way it is on Live, the punch-voke in Gauntlet is down to a 10' radius (which is actually smaller on ST attacks with 12s+ recharge times - e.g. KO Blow went from 17.8' to 10'), many PBAoE powers had their radii  reduced so that with the Inherent there is no change, quite a few arcs were reduced so that the buff results in less or no change, and several others were marked to ignore the buff.  The biggest remaining aggro generation improvement now appears to be the larger Gauntlet radius on fast charging ST attacks.  The Inherent AoE buff, increased targets caps, and +10% still help as well, so there is still a lot of improvement in the overall Taunt ability, but the amount of that has dropped dramatically from the initial version.  Far more than the reduction in AoE and at-the-cap damage output has been reduced.

 

I have to agree that any Brute buffs are sort of out of left field to me.

 

Still, I believe Tanker damage needed to be boosted.  The ratio of Brutes to Tankers in the end game content was laughable.  I was at one Hami Raid before the zone cap change where there were 25 Brutes between the 2 leagues and *1* Tanker.  Now with the zone cap, having a Tanker doing little damage is a luxury.  The bottom line is that Tankers simply aren't bringing enough to the table for end game content.  They also suffer from being hard to level solo, due to the dearth of attacks and low DS.  So, basically: fine in low-to-mid level team content, bad at low-to-mid level solo and in end game content.  These changes fix both of those problems to a large degree.

[csr]

5 hours ago, Vanden said:

With the nerf to Tanker self +damage, these changes are now a straight nerf to Super Strength. If we start with an attack that does base 100 damage, with 95% damage enhancement:

 

New numbers:

Base damage: 95

Damage from enhancement: 90.25

Damage from Rage: 76

Ignoring the rest of the issues with this, which were addressed by others, you've miscalculated the Rage buff with the current Beta patch.  It should be 100 * 0.95 * 0.6 (not 0.8) = 57 (not 76).

[Haijinx]

I don't like how the proposed damage buff reduction is basically because of one set.

[Bopper]

1 hour ago, Mr.Sinister said:

Jab does indeed have a pretty low dpa.   However, since it’s balanced within the entire super strength set, you should account for perma rage.  Perma rage gives it a dpa of 50.9.  It’s a short list that has better dpa than that

If you're going to factor in perma rage, you need to factor all damage enhancements. I'm not sure how you did the math, but I'm hoping the comparison isn't simply applying the base damage with a 1.80 multiplier. If you wish to compare by incorporating a 95% damage enhancement as well, then you can use a 2.75x multiplier to jab and a 1.95x multiplier to non-SS attacks. 

[siolfir]

 

5 minutes ago, Haijinx said:

I don't like how the proposed damage buff reduction is basically because of one set.

 

Except that there's this post:

8 hours ago, Captain Powerhouse said:

Edit to add: The reduction in +Dmg mods is not due to Super Strength. I was debating about implementing that from day one.

 

Now, I disagree with the self-damage-buff nerf - I don't see the point in it since I didn't think that their modifier was too high (honestly, I thought Stalkers should have gotten the Blaster and Scrapper modifier, but that was long before any other changes when they still had a 0.9 modifier, lower hit points, a 1606hp cap, and their criticals out of hidden status were only for held or sleeping mobs... now I'd still like it and think it makes sense but they really don't need the help anymore).

 

I haven't tested the Fury generation changes at all - let alone on a team - but I somewhat agree that the changes probably aren't necessary even if the team is full of Tankers and one Brute since at that point you can run off and do your own thing.

 

So basically, other than the power descriptions and specific power fixes, I like the last beta patch better than this one.

[csr]

8 hours ago, Mr.Sinister said:

Jab does indeed have a pretty low dpa.   However, since it’s balanced within the entire super strength set, you should account for perma rage.  Perma rage gives it a dpa of 50.9.  It’s a short list that has better dpa than that.

Other sets have BU powers too.  You need to factor those in if you're assuming perma-Rage for Jab.  You should also factor in enhancement and the crash time.  Jab with 95% enhancement, perma-Rage and 8.3% at 10% damage gives a DPA (not using ArcanaTime) of 71.5.  That's with the Live numbers rather than the reduced +DMG from this patch.

 

Assuming 20% up time for basic BU powers, 50% with just 3 targets for Soul Drain, 100% for Follow Up and Blinding Feint, 30% for Power Siphon with 3 stacks, Staff Mastery at 2 stacks, and the Live buff scale we get:  Beheader 69.9, Hack 115.8, Swipe 100.0, Shadow Punch 102.2, Nimble Slash 81.6, Charged Brawl 95.0, Barrage 93.2, Scorch 96.5, Frozen Fists 70.5, Sting of the Wasp 93.1, Quick Strike 95.9*, Thunder Kick 95.0, Mental Strike 97.5, Contaminated Strike 139.4, Savage Strike 116.7, Barb Swipe 117.1, Mercurial Blow 76.6*, Stone Fist 113.1, Initial Strike 95.8, Jab 71.5, Defensive Sweep 32.1**, Bash 70.6.

 

Those that are unusually bad (85 or less) are in red, those that are unusually good (105 or better) are in green, with 95 as the nominal standard.

 

* I didn't double check this calculation for Power Siphon and Staff Mastery, but went off memory for the damage buff.  It may be wrong.

** A misfit power that is AoE with a significant secondary effect and I assumed was never used in fast mode, since I don't know what the animation time is for that.

 

So, Jab ranks in set context as bad, but there are three other sets that have a T1 just as bad: Battle Axe, Frost Melee and War Mace.

Edited December 8, 2019 by csr
Typo

[csr]

32 minutes ago, Haijinx said:

I don't like how the proposed damage buff reduction is basically because of one set.

Captain P said that that is not the case, he said he was considering it all along for some other non-stated reason.

[csr]

A question for Captain P:  One thing I tried to test, but couldn't get a definitive result for... do Dual Blades Sweep and Weaken combos benefit from the Inherent +Radius boost?

[Infinitum]

43 minutes ago, Haijinx said:

I don't like how the proposed damage buff reduction is basically because of one set.

Yeah im not crazy about this change, i havent tested it yet, but crunching the numbers in mids its a -30 point damage nerf when combat readiness and against all odds are active on my shield tank.

 

If that holds up when I test it i would almost rather there be no changes at all at this point if this is where we are going with it, this one has me scratching my head a little bit it seems like its going backwards a bit.

[Brutal Justice]

42 minutes ago, Bopper said:

If you're going to factor in perma rage, you need to factor all damage enhancements. I'm not sure how you did the math, but I'm hoping the comparison isn't simply applying the base damage with a 1.80 multiplier. If you wish to compare by incorporating a 95% damage enhancement as well, then you can use a 2.75x multiplier to jab and a 1.95x multiplier to non-SS attacks. 

That is more or less what I did.  I’ll delete that post. Thanks for the correction 🙂

[Haijinx]

57 minutes ago, csr said:

Captain P said that that is not the case, he said he was considering it all along for some other non-stated reason.

Hmm.

 

I guess none of the others really cast the shadow double rage does, though. 

[Myrmidon]

11 hours ago, Mr.Sinister said:

I’ll have to go back and reread the “Brutes are underperforming” thread then so I can be up to date. 

Once the changes hit, leave Fury generation like it is on live and I’m sure there will be plenty of them by this time next year.

[Myrmidon]

2 hours ago, Haijinx said:

Hmm.

 

I guess none of the others really cast the shadow double rage does, though. 

A situation that could be completely avoided if the very first non-stacking implementation was going live. Funny how that works out, eh?🤣

[Myrmidon]

15 hours ago, Mr.Sinister said:

 

Its like gauntlet 3.0.  “Let’s give tanks punchvoke to make them better at tanking than brutes.

Punchvoke (the original Name for Gauntlet and a rather stupid original name at that) was added in Issue 3, which is well before Brutes existed. That’s also when Taunt was turned into an AoE power, which allowed us to drop our dependence on Provoke. 
 

It’s more the other way around, with single-target gauntlet (punchvoke) being added to Brutes (I don’t remember if this in CoV beta, since that period was a Hurricane Katrina issue for me and my CoV beta participation came later as a consequence).

[csr]

5 hours ago, Haijinx said:

Hmm.

 

I guess none of the others really cast the shadow double rage does, though. 

Nope.  My average Rage buff, counting crash, on my Ice/SS Tanker is 94%, and that's a fairly modest +Rech build.  My next best tested average is 55% for a DM/Regen Brute with high Recharge.  I have SS being hurt roughly twice as badly as Claws, DB and DM and about four times as badly as everything else by the +DMG self-buff reduction.

[Haijinx]

20 hours ago, Myrmidon said:

A situation that could be completely avoided if the very first non-stacking implementation was going live. Funny how that works out, eh?🤣

We'll always have Rage. 

 

Stack it Again, Sam.   

 

 

Edited December 9, 2019 by Haijinx

[MrAxe]

So again I looked at Psionic Melee and desptie appearing to fit the requirements the AoE and cone only have the target increase. Can Powerhouse explain if this is intentional or have the range and arc buff been left out by accident? Before this discussion I always felt the arc was too narrow. Was the only reservation I had about the set.

[Captain Powerhouse]

You will not see the arc increase in power info same as you don’t see the recharge increase from hasten or enhancements there either.

[Brutal Justice]

I tried my hand at math earlier and failed, but I’m a tank and a glutton for punishment, so I’ll try again 😋

 

currently on live if we use an attack with base damage 100 we get 

 

Live

80 base + 76 enhanced = 156

 

Test

95 base + 90.25 enhanced = 185.25

 

thats good unless you factor in bruising then live becomes 156*1.2 = 187.2

 

not so good.  On test you’re not even covering your own damage when fighting an AV or hami or boss.  Then account for -20% your team is losing as well without bruising.  The test setup makes the tank vs brute debate even worse in favor of the brute when fighting a heavy target.  

 

Then factor in rage

live

80 base + 76 enhanced + 64 buffed = 220 * bruising 1.2 = 264

 

test

95 base + 90.25 enhanced + (95*.64 new rage buff= 60.8) = 246.05

 

not good at all

 

how about follow-up from claws?

 

live

80+76+24 buffed= 180 *1.2 bruising = 216

 

test

95+90.25+(95*.24=22.8) = 208.05

 

not good. 

Test with 1.0 buff instead of .8

95+90.25+(95*.3=28.5) = 213.75

better but still less. Any set with consistent +dam is hit pretty hard.  

 

the tank “buffs” are making tanks in a situation where dps matters even more of a liability than they are now.  Heavy targets are where teams stall out, not packs of minions.  Same for solo.  

 

The tank buffs have become tank nerfs with a brute buff to compensate.  Taking from the poor to give to the rich.

 

somebody needs to time how long it takes to kill an average boss spawn solo, live vs test.  I’ll wager test takes longer.  So much for helping tanks solo...