Focused Feedback: Pets & Henchmen Updates for December 6, 2019

[Doc_Scorpion]

3 hours ago, Erydanus said:

Ok but the thing is, you CAN NOT balance a game around a top player's performance. You can not. If you do that, then average and even bad players will be performing poorly or outright non-functional.  That's why anytime any comment along the lines of "X is not a problem for me because I'm able to do this complicated/expensive thing and work around it" is made, it needs to be ignored as the outlier it is.

Quoted for truth and emphasis.

[Myrmidon]

3 hours ago, Erydanus said:

Ok but the thing is, you CAN NOT balance a game around a top player's performance. You can not. If you do that, then average and even bad players will be performing poorly or outright non-functional.  That's why anytime any comment along the lines of "X is not a problem for me because I'm able to do this complicated/expensive thing and work around it" is made, it needs to be ignored as the outlier it is. If changes made to MMs make them more playable by the masses but overpower a handful of top PVPers and Farmers, that's just the breaks. There's always going to be some top players of every type of character who has the best tuned super optimized solo AVs builds and then there's going to be good players with time and money, good players with only time or money, decent players with money, decent players with time but no money, average players with money, all the way down to people who can't understand the basic controls, etc.

 

The main point should be most people are able to play the character type/powerset and have a good (fun) experience.  

This cannot be emphasized enough.

[M3z]

4 hours ago, Erydanus said:

Ok but the thing is, you CAN NOT balance a game around a top player's performance. You can not. If you do that, then average and even bad players will be performing poorly or outright non-functional.  That's why anytime any comment along the lines of "X is not a problem for me because I'm able to do this complicated/expensive thing and work around it" is made, it needs to be ignored as the outlier it is. If changes made to MMs make them more playable by the masses but overpower a handful of top PVPers and Farmers, that's just the breaks. There's always going to be some top players of every type of character who has the best tuned super optimized solo AVs builds and then there's going to be good players with time and money, good players with only time or money, decent players with money, decent players with time but no money, average players with money, all the way down to people who can't understand the basic controls, etc.

 

The main point should be most people are able to play the character type/powerset and have a good (fun) experience.  

First off let me just address what @monos1 said, MMs are not overpowered or even close to being overpowered in any pvp format(in arena or zones).

 

 In zones they are shutdown by a single judgement from one player (if you are camping body guard mode) If you are moving around out of body guard mode (which you are usually forced to do anyways to get any offense off) you are subject to being 2 shotted by just about anyone (most min/max builds hover around 1100-1300 HP). MMs are a very dysfunctional AT right now, they used to rely on slows/mezzes, which essentially just dont work anymore in pvp (yes mezzes exist but 2 mez durations accomplish nothing, slows DO NOT WORK in pvp).

 

In arena MMs are very situational and really only function with kins. There are many prerequisites to making MM teams work in arena and on top of that they are difficult to play and easy to punish.

 

Overall MMs desperately need buffs at both the high level of pvp play, casual play of zones and I'd even say pve (for many builds not all builds).

 

And to @Erydanus I agree with you 100% every AT should be functional/fun/playable by any player. I guess my point before was that MMs are UNPLAYABLE on a casual level (in zones) and BARELY PLAYABLE at a competitive arena level (and that's only if you have a kin on your team. If you do not have a kin on your team they are not viable in arena either). I am a MM mainer from a competitive pvp team, there are like 2-3 of us in the whole game that play MM at that level and it can be a real struggle for us if that gives people an idea of the state of MMs in the game right now.

Edited December 12, 2019 by M3z

[Monos King]

12 hours ago, Erydanus said:

Ok but the thing is, you CAN NOT balance a game around a top player's performance. You can not. If you do that, then average and even bad players will be performing poorly or outright non-functional.  That's why anytime any comment along the lines of "X is not a problem for me because I'm able to do this complicated/expensive thing and work around it" is made, it needs to be ignored as the outlier it is. If changes made to MMs make them more playable by the masses but overpower a handful of top PVPers and Farmers, that's just the breaks. There's always going to be some top players of every type of character who has the best tuned super optimized solo AVs builds and then there's going to be good players with time and money, good players with only time or money, decent players with money, decent players with time but no money, average players with money, all the way down to people who can't understand the basic controls, etc.

 

The main point should be most people are able to play the character type/powerset and have a good (fun) experience.  

Hahaha yeah you're right, I realized it after I said it.

[esotericist]

On 12/11/2019 at 1:23 PM, Myrmidon said:

Sorry that the Tanker changes are going to put this back a bit from going live.

 

Note that the Tank changes are still marked with "Experimental" but the pet changes are not.

 

I don't actually think the tanker changes will be holding this back, and it's being evaluated separately.

Edited December 13, 2019 by esotericist

[golstat2003]

Yeah I can see the pet changes definitely being able to go before the tanker changes, especially since it sounds like CP already confirmed that at least one more patch will be in testing related to the tanker changes.

[Epsilon Assassin]

  

10 hours ago, M3z said:

First off let me just address what @monos1 said, MMs are not overpowered or even close to being overpowered in any pvp format(in arena or zones).

MMs are actually fairly overpowered. They're also dysfunctional. They're two wildly different things that quite commonly occur at the same time. It's similar to the melee problem. Melee classes are basically unkillable, therefore buffing them to be able to kill things is impossible because it's overpowered. MMs are in a similar boat. Played well they're borderline unkillable, if not unkillable outright without egregious attention (IE they can quite easily tank 5 man spikes and remain healthier then tanks). On the same hand, their damage is actually far higher then it should ever be given the previous statement. 

 

I would never, and don't ever, object to QoL things like buffing or changing AI mechanics (Knights/Bots IE), but buffing the damage of a class that already occupies a near unkillable status in one of the more common PvP game modes, and actively detracts from the game mode at that, should be done separately with a different set of debate, questions and issues raised. 

Edited December 13, 2019 by Epsilon Assassin

[Monos King]

I agree with @ErydanusOn how using high end statistics as a gauge is debilitating for everyone else, I shouldve noted it right after I realized it. However @M3z, judgement isnt really an issue to an MM that has destiny (although it recharges slower than judgement) and since we're assuming judgement is an availability I'll reciprocate with destiny too. One barrier nullifies pet damage entirely and if the mastermind is therm, sonic, or in some cases dark, the pets will be completely fine without even the need for destiny to begin with; the damage will be quick to heal. But as end tier material should be observed separately, let's look at the mastermind shortcomings with clarity.

 

1) Squishiness

     a) Player Health Weakness*

Prevents player from moving away from pets

     b) Pet Vulnerabilities

Allows pets to die easily regardless of context (see 2a,2b) and thus kills the Player

     c) Pet Wandering after damage

Causes Player to issue commands, resetting pet aggressiveness and permitting additional damage, or simply leaves Player open to damage

2) Pet Squishiness

     a) Inherent Resistances

Leaves pets highly vulnerable to certain types of damage

     b) Pet Health

Makes pets extremely prone to sudden death beyond Supremacy radius

Leaves pets vulnerable to burst damage death

     c) Pet Level

Leaves pets vulnerable to damage, low health, lower damage, causes various issues as expected of color cons

     d) Pet Threat Level*

Leaves pet(s) prone to immediate death from stronger enemies 

3) PvP Specific

     a) Summon Recharge Time*

Leaves Player vulnerable to damage after quick pet death

     b) Supremacy Induced Slowness

Prevents player from pursuing a moving target at all without risk of two shot, supporting traveling team; must be very near slow pets

     c) Pet Movement Speed

Prevents pets from keeping up with Player attempting to pursue or travel, prevents pets from being able to do damage to moving targets.

 

Starred (*) issues are from my perspective inherent to the balance and theme of the archetype, and were only listed for reference. I want to pitch a few possibilities to the bigger issues.

 

Increasing Pet Level  (Issues 2a,2b,2c)

This addresses 3 issues by increasing pet combat attributes accordingly. Pets at lower levels especially will die very quickly when tossed into a hoard, and should be AT LEAST Player level. They do poorly versus higher ranked enemies. Related to that,

Increasing Pet Rank (2a,2b,2c)

Increasing the t8 henchmen or others to pet rank strength would probably solve these issues, but I don't feel too safe on this one. 

Increasing Pet Benefits To Buffs (2a,1b)

What I had in mind for this was an effect similar to Support Hybrid Incarnate Power. We could raise the base resistances of pets, but that wouldnt be thematic and would probably cause problems anyhow. 

In PvP, this would be similar to a power like Tough, where protection from everything is added. For instance, in PvP giving your henchmen Thermal Radiations Plasma Shield would provide resistance to everything, or Cold Dominations Glacial Shield would offer Elusivity and/or defense to all.

Thematically? Increase Pet Movement Speed (3b,3c)

This one could be done just by doing exactly as the subtitle states, but I also think that it would be cool to see henchmen bust out a thematic travel power once the attack target or owner gets a certain distance away ( zombies emerge from ground closer to target, Mercs get out jetpack , robots fly, demons and thugs might just charge) to make up ground.

 

I would like to hear how many of these seem like legitimate issues or solutions to everyone else.

 

[Maxzero]

On 12/7/2019 at 4:37 AM, The Curator said:

The following is a list of patch changes since the last Pineapple patch. For a full list of the consolidated changes (difference between production and test) see the main patch thread.

 

Pets & Henchmen Updates

 

• The pets that no longer move in to use melee attacks are:
  • Thugs > Arsonist

 

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

The greatest change in the history of CoH.

[Myrmidon]

4 hours ago, esotericist said:

 

Note that the Tank changes are still marked with "Experimental" but the pet changes are not.

 

I don't actually think the tanker changes will be holding this back, and it's being evaluated separately.

That would actually be great. I guess I am just mistakenly falling back to old development time.😁

Edited December 13, 2019 by Myrmidon

[Epsilon Assassin]

34 minutes ago, monos1 said:

 

In PvP, this would be similar to a power like Tough, where protection from everything is added. For instance, in PvP giving your henchmen Thermal Radiations Plasma Shield would provide resistance to everything, or Cold Dominations Glacial Shield would offer Elusivity and/or defense to all.

 

 

See. Here's the deal;

 

In PvP there is a high amount of sheer dissonance with how pvp actually works. As it stands, increasing the survivability of an MM effectively does absolutely nothing as the class has already hit a curve where anything that will kill them now, will kill them with almost any proposed change, and anything that can't now, still won't. 

 

Masterminds, along with melee classes like Tanks, Brutes, Scrappers and even to an extent, Stalkers, suffer from the fact that their intended design simply does not function in PvP. What this has lead to is an increasingly obtuse balancing scenario where the above classes, in most of the PvP they are played in, are nigh into unkillable, but are still able to contribute noticeable, though not lethal, damage. This in and of itself, is highly overpowered. A Tanker or MM running around with well over 5k eHP, being able to deal half of a squishies life in an instant, simply does not comport within "Balance". However, because in this game the difference between half dead and dead, is oceanic, it results in the classes being nearly useless. Making the class useful, simply by increasing its damage in binary manner, would also make it unbearably broken. 

 

You cannot simply "Buff" these classes in ways that will fix their inherent problems, without also nerfing them significantly. 

 

* NPCs in RV are disgusting and should be addressed. They alone make Zone almost impossible for MMs to survive in, as the boss class npcs (Warden or TTs) can one shot an MM straight up with some of the AoE attacks at their disposal. This is, overall, an issue for all classes, but doubly so for MMs. 

Edited December 13, 2019 by Epsilon Assassin

[barrier]

Epsi, I love you dude, but you need to try playing a MM in 8v8 before going on these.

 

I am probs one of the 3 people in the game with the gall to show up to kickball on a mastermind. Being kin-less is an exercise in total frustration.

 

At the risk of airing dirty laundry: there have been a solid 5 times where I have basically refused to play MM on my team because a comp that doesn't have a kin. Even VORI have had to make due with running a kin MM because its the only one secondary that can function in a high movement environment without requiring that you sacrifice a corr or defender spot to a kin.

 

Movement in the PVP game is huge. It becomes exponentially more important as you go up the rungs in competitive PVP. You can run a crunchy brute, tank or scrapper without a kin and they get to take advantage of the WASD keys. Masterminds do not. What is the trade on that? All of those ATs still do a bunch of damage so.. You'll say the force multiplier effect of MM buffs? I say no. The kin requirement. Remember that. You are taking a full set of otherwise better buffs, be it a poison, nature or whatever, turning it into a kin and bringing crappier versions of them.

 

MM travel powers should be inheritable by pets just like alpha slot is.

Edited December 13, 2019 by barrier

[Sovera]

PvP with its, numbers pulled out of my ass, 5% of the total population shouldn't be this thing balance revolves around. I still remember when PvP was two immortal character slugging it out for minutes before giving up. 'nuff of dat.

 

MMs have a mystique of an high damage AT that is supported by the lack of a DPS meter that accounts for total damage. Sure, they do great against a pylon, but the game is about fast moving from pack to pack.

 

I mean, hell, in any mission where we need to back track because we reached a dead end my MM will toggle on their travel power and back track until finding enemies again.... and then sit there twiddling their thumbs as the rest of the team trickles in and starts killing things, and then the pets arrive using Sprint. Eventually arrive.

[golstat2003]

I think there needs to be a separate patch for dealing with mm issues in pvp, versus this patch.

[Epsilon Assassin]

30 minutes ago, barrier said:

Epsi, I love you dude, but you need to try playing a MM in 8v8 before going on these.

It isn't rocket science. This game is hilariously linear, extremely predictable and to put it bluntly. Simple. There is no reason I don't have the ability to understand everything there is to do, at most levels, about MM's simply because I haven't spent 150 hours playing them. 

 

  My initial point was that this isn't a good place to deal with "Buffing" MMs, rather it should be about focusing on improving the QoL and streamlining them into a platform that can then be improved later. Addressing specifically M3z's points of increasing their damage (You shouldn't). Or someone else's suggestion of buffing their survivability (Even though his suggestions technically didn't really do anything). 

30 minutes ago, barrier said:

Epsi, I love you dude, but you need to try playing a MM in 8v8 before going on these.

 

I am probs one of the 3 people in the game with the gall to show up to kickball on a mastermind. Being kin-less is an exercise in total frustration.

 

At the risk of airing dirty laundry: there have been a solid 5 times where I have basically refused to play MM on my team because a comp that doesn't have a kin. Even VORI have had to make due with running a kin MM because its the only one secondary that can function in a high movement environment without requiring that you sacrifice a corr or defender spot to a kin.

 

Movement in the PVP game is huge. It becomes exponentially more important as you go up the rungs in competitive PVP. You can run a crunchy brute, tank or scrapper without a kin and they get to take advantage of the WASD keys. Masterminds do not. What is the trade on that? All of those ATs still do a bunch of damage so.. You'll say the force multiplier effect of MM buffs? I say no. The kin requirement. Remember that. You are taking a full set of otherwise better buffs, be it a poison, nature or whatever, turning it into a kin and bringing crappier versions of them.

 

MM travel powers should be inheritable by pets just like alpha slot is.

To put it in simplistic terms. MM's and to an extent, those other melee archetypes represent taking the game in an increasingly bad direction. Sure, it could be considered within "Balance". The last time I had an interaction with VORI's MM team it boiled down to them moving around, and losing, or huddling into corners, and drawing. I don't particularly think that's good. The entire problem with Melee, which includes MMs as the same problems with melee apply, is wholly too intrinsic to simply be addressed in a thread about QoL changes in a PvE environment as the entire issue is entirely a PvP issue, and knowing how those threads go, it risks hijacking this entire thread. 

Edited December 13, 2019 by Epsilon Assassin

[ScarySai]

1 hour ago, Maxzero said:

 

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

The greatest change in the history of CoH.

After EXTENSIVE testing to decide on if I wanted to roll thugs/storm or bots/storm, rest assured - he will still typically be the first to die. 😛

 

My only issues so far are with demonlings and ember demon on my demon/cold, otherwise this is basically just a straight QoL boost to all masterminds.

Edited December 13, 2019 by ScarySai

[M3z]

4 hours ago, Epsilon Assassin said:

  

MMs are actually fairly overpowered. They're also dysfunctional. They're two wildly different things that quite commonly occur at the same time. It's similar to the melee problem. Melee classes are basically unkillable, therefore buffing them to be able to kill things is impossible because it's overpowered. MMs are in a similar boat. Played well they're borderline unkillable, if not unkillable outright without egregious attention (IE they can quite easily tank 5 man spikes and remain healthier then tanks). On the same hand, their damage is actually far higher then it should ever be given the previous statement. 

 

I would never, and don't ever, object to QoL things like buffing or changing AI mechanics (Knights/Bots IE), but buffing the damage of a class that already occupies a near unkillable status in one of the more common PvP game modes, and actively detracts from the game mode at that, should be done separately with a different set of debate, questions and issues raised. 

Should try pvping on a MM in zones/arena first before making comments like this.

9 minutes ago, Epsilon Assassin said:

It isn't rocket science. This game is hilariously linear, extremely predictable and to put it bluntly. Simple. There is no reason I don't have the ability to understand everything there is to do, at most levels, about MM's simply because I haven't spent 150 hours playing them. 

 

  My initial point was that this isn't a good place to deal with "Buffing" MMs, rather it should be about focusing on improving the QoL and streamlining them into a platform that can then be improved later. Addressing specifically M3z's points of increasing their damage (You shouldn't). Or someone else's suggestion of buffing their survivability (Even though his suggestions technically didn't really do anything). 

To put it in simplistic terms. MM's and to an extent, those other melee archetypes represent taking the game in an increasingly bad direction. Sure, it could be considered within "Balance". The last time I had an interaction with VORI's MM team it boiled down to them moving around, and losing, or huddling into corners, and drawing. I don't particularly think that's good. The entire problem with Melee, which includes MMs as the same problems with melee apply, is wholly too intrinsic to simply be addressed in a thread about QoL changes in a PvE environment as the entire issue is entirely a PvP issue, and knowing how those threads go, it risks hijacking this entire thread. 

Apparently you do need experience especially if you're coming to these conclusions? Why is it that every single high level/competitive pvper has been saying the same thing for months about MMs in zone pvp and arena? Should I get the other players to chime in this thread? Or do you know more than the best MM players in the game? You tell me.

 

You're right this game isn't that complicated, but apparently I still have to spell it out why MMs need a damage buff.:

• MMs movement/survivability is limited by supremacy range/BG MEANING if you are ever threatened by a MM or its pets, just move away,there's no effective way for a MM to chase nullifying the class completely. This leads to situations where people kite or fly above and there is quite literally nothing you can do to combat this(if your pets are melee you are even more screwed). If they did more damage and were more threatening, they'd be able to fight back against these tactics rather than being completely helpless. The pets lack of movement is a HUGE weakness, and without slows MMs should be rewarded for correctly positioning themselves to set up offense. Again this is something you'd know if you played MM.
• PvP is dominated by proc damage, MM pets have extremely limited access to proc damage for numerous reasons. Even the few attacks that do have procs, you cannot micro your pets to do their proc'd  out attacks so therefor even when you do proc pets it's unreliable. Proc damage accounts for upwards of 60% of a total attack chains damage on other ATs  (in addition to the base damage). MM pets are still stuck in the past relying on base damage in 90% of cases competing with the proc damage. Therefore in order to compete with other ATs damage which have been supplemented by proc damage, MMs pets should have base damage increases (in pvp only).
• I've dueled on MM, MMs die 1v1 to corrs/blasters/defender THROUGH bodyguard, on top of getting kited and the pets unable to do anything. This AT is just broken and unplayable in many cases.

I'm not asking for corruptor/blaster/defender levels of damage. These are bandaid fixes for the AT that I'd never propose if procs weren't out of hand and slows/mezzes functioned like they used to. But it doesn't seem like there's going to be systemwide mechanics changes for pvp anytime soon so we may as well do SOMETHING to help the AT in the meantime.

 

TL;DR

• MMs are unplayable in zones(unless you are just standing still in bg mode/barrier which if that's the case are you really actually playing? You will never kill anyone with this tactic), and unplayable in arena unless your pets are speedboosted (are other ATs literally unplayable unless speedboosted?) and even then they are not great
• Because MMs cannot slow or mez in any meaningful way, they are dysfunctional (like you said) unable to catch anyone, endlessly being kited, smart players have no problem picking apart even high level MM players
• Every other viable AT in the game right now has around 60% of their damage come from procs, MMs dont have access to damage procs IN A MEANINGFUL WAY they need damage buff to stay on par with what other ATs have access to
• If these buffs are pvp only that is fine with me, they need SOMETHING though

[Monos King]

7 hours ago, Epsilon Assassin said:

To put it in simplistic terms. MM's and to an extent, those other melee archetypes represent taking the game in an increasingly bad direction. Sure, it could be considered within "Balance"

I don't really understand why it's a bad direction or why my buffs don't "do anything".  It feels like your looking at things from a circumstantial perspective instead of a mechanical one when it comes to MMs, because they really aren't anything like melee classes. At least, I don't get the comparison fully. MMs will die when you separate pets from them, or kill the pets quickly enough. You can also just brute damage them down, or burst the pets. I thought we were addressing why MMs needed to be buffed in some regard, but in PvP you seem convinced nothing will work. I'm receptive but I think I need more info.

 

8 hours ago, Epsilon Assassin said:

will kill them now, will kill them with almost any proposed change, and anything that can't now, still won't. 

That's kind of expected for everything though, right? If you were to say insert needs a survivability nerf, it would still die from the same thing but it would take less of that thing. If you were to say "tanks don't take enough damage" and then you lowered their resistance, now they still die from damage but now its easier to do. If you were to say "stalker stealth is too high" perception is already what would have done them in, but with the nerf now less is needed. The goal isn't to make anything unkillable. Am I missing something?

 

 

Edit: Nevermind I understand. I just disagree. And besides the PvP specific section, these are mostly PvE improvements I'm proposing.

Edited December 13, 2019 by monos1

[Erydanus]

Is there any interest in holding a non-instanced mothership raid on the test server, perhaps this weekend? I find in real ones my pets (Best/Nature) just run away from me and die so I basically end up randomly spamming nature buffs and resummoning my pets as if they were trip mines. The last one I did I resorted to alternating between heel and attack commands to make my pets re-converge on me (and my supremacy + various def/resist proc radius) from the 60' away they had gotten in just 10 seconds. I am not proposing a 100% mastermind mothership raid, other people would certainly be welcome and actually necessary to simulate the effect of the changes in a real play scenario. But say, if we got a 50% mastermind and 50% everybody else composition that should still be interesting. I would also propose people create level 50 characters who are not super duper double-decker tripped out. Like, say both ATOs and maybe 1 purple set to better simulate a real ordinary mix of casual and hard core players.

 

Is there interest in doing this as a deliberate testing activity? We can create a new thread if there is and suss out a good time. 

[Nullbolt]

I saw this and got super excited, hopefully this comes to live sooner than later. MMs are my favorite but the idiotic AI makes me have to take rage breaks from the game.

[Doc_Scorpion]

<Deleted because it seems that two cups of coffee were insufficient to properly energize my brain.  Maxima mea culpa.>

Edited December 13, 2019 by Doc_Scorpion

[barrier]

4 hours ago, Epsilon Assassin said:

It isn't rocket science. This game is hilariously linear, extremely predictable and to put it bluntly. Simple. There is no reason I don't have the ability to understand everything there is to do, at most levels, about MM's simply because I haven't spent 150 hours playing them.

I don't know, dude. A lot of the Mastermind PVP issues are not purely mechanical and are pretty qualitative in nature (Pet AI quirks - super subtle -, responses to near optimal spike patterns, tactics to deal with prolonged spikes, etc). Limited pet mobility is something that hasn't been a problem since i13 but is now. Back then in i12, limited mobility and blaster damage basically meant that you'd never see a MM in a kickball or a mixed hero/vill team because getting nuked in the face wasn't nice. Procs and Judgement have brought us way closer to i12 - but I like where damage is right now. I just don't like where MM's are right now.

Most issues aren't really super apparent in casual zone play (ex Judgement), but they are extremely easy to spot if you play a MM in 8v8.

4 hours ago, Epsilon Assassin said:

My initial point was that this isn't a good place to deal with "Buffing" MMs, rather it should be about focusing on improving the QoL and streamlining them into a platform that can then be improved later.

This is exactly the time to try to address the mobility of MM pets in 8v8's. You didn't take time to respond to my 8v8 comp notes. Playing a MM without a kin in 8v8 is impossible. For context, people love to say masterminds are overpowered. Watch M3z's stream. There are two great instances of both us reacting the same way on our MM's. I pick his kin MM on my bots/nature before I pick any blaster, and he picks me on kin (a kin has literally no use outside of a MM team and other very specific comps that are rarely ever present in a kickball) on his poison MM.

The fact you literally have to intertwine two comp picks to make the MM's work (or play a kin mm) should be a huge red flag for developers re: game balance. Find me another AT that requires the same pairing?

4 hours ago, Epsilon Assassin said:

To put it in simplistic terms. MM's and to an extent, those other melee archetypes represent taking the game in an increasingly bad direction.

I'm going to take this with a grain of salt. You advocated in the past for NOT fixing the dark hold's mez duration and makes me wary of what you see as a proper direction for the game. I am asking for an iterating fix that is 100% pet-related and therefore part of the subject to this thread.

4 hours ago, Epsilon Assassin said:

Sure, it could be considered within "Balance". The last time I had an interaction with VORI's MM team it boiled down to them moving around, and losing, or huddling into corners, and drawing.

I'm pretty sure you're referring to the VORI turtle responding to TBD's all-damage team. Turtling as perfectly legit tactic against a disorganized damage team.

But if anything, you're not lending much credence to "masterminds are fine" here.

4 hours ago, Epsilon Assassin said:

I don't particularly think that's good. The entire problem with Melee, which includes MMs as the same problems with melee apply, is wholly too intrinsic to simply be addressed in a thread about QoL changes in a PvE environment as the entire issue is entirely a PvP issue, and knowing how those threads go, it risks hijacking this entire thread. 

I strongly disagree. Simply making the MM pets inherit travel powers from the MM would go a long way in solving most of the issues. MM damage output is intrinsically linked to pet travel speed (This is why I say that you need to play MM's in 8v8's to really understand how the pet AI works). MM survivability is intrinsically linked to pet travel speed (very obvious if you 8v8 on a MM).

Right now the balance issue is pretty glaring: When do you pick the non-kin MM in an 8v8 comp assuming all other ATs in the comp are blind picks: the answer is literally never. That's a red flag right there.

[siolfir]

 

6 minutes ago, Doc_Scorpion said:

That makes me question whether you've even ever played an MM.  Or what you consider "casual"...  Because this statement is incompatible with my experience playing MMs.  (And I'm anything but a high level player.)  No, a solo MM can't "casually" solo at 8/8...  But I don't regard that as casual.  Unless you're particularly inept, MM's are just fine playing at or around even odds.  For teaming, see below.
 

<snip>

At least in PvE, these [ranged combat] fixes will fill the single biggest hole in MM's overall performance level.  There's no need to add to power creep.

Context.

 

You're making a PvE reply to a complaint about PvP. Here's the first sentence of the post you quoted before telling them to l2p, and the full sentence that includes the context mentioning the arena:

19 hours ago, M3z said:

First off let me just address what @monos1 said, MMs are not overpowered or even close to being overpowered in any pvp format(in arena or zones).

 

And to @Erydanus I agree with you 100% every AT should be functional/fun/playable by any player. I guess my point before was that MMs are UNPLAYABLE on a casual level (in zones) and BARELY PLAYABLE at a competitive arena level (and that's only if you have a kin on your team.

 

Now, they probably don't need my help but if you're going to start off with questioning whether they've ever played the AT you could at least re-read the post to make sure you're both talking about the same thing.

[barrier]

13 minutes ago, Doc_Scorpion said:

That makes me question whether you've even ever played an MM.  Or what you consider "casual"...  Because this statement is incompatible with my experience playing MMs.  (And I'm anything but a high level player.)  No, a solo MM can't "casually" solo at 8/8...  But I don't regard that as casual.  Unless you're particularly inept, MM's are just fine playing at or around even odds.  For teaming, see below.

He's talking about PVP 😉

 

Zone means Recluse's Victory.

[Galaxy Brain]

PvP should have it's own pass, the back and forth for this is confusing.