I Love Knockback

[molten_dragon]

I don't enjoy knockback when playing on teams.  My experience is that about 10% of the time, the person using it does it tactically and it overall benefits the group.  80% of the time the person uses it like they would any random power, and it slows the group down slightly, and the remaining 10% the person using it is an active hindrance, significantly slowing down and irritating the group.

 

I'd like to see some way of easily toggling all KB powers to KD.

[Grouchybeast]

8 hours ago, Haijinx said:

If knockback was like the old FF comics where The Thing gets smashed through a wall, then through an entire supermarket, then the back wall, and gets up pulling the banana peel off his head, then it would be cool.

 

 

Otherwise, not so much.

If Knockback could shorten every Oranbega map by letting me grab the first Death Mage and smash him through the walls to create a direct route to the final boss room, I would play nothing but Energy Blasters.

[Super Homer]

Here is an idea:

 

Dont touch knockback.

Give every melee character access to a "charge/catchup" ability (similar to that awesome rush ability Warriors had in WoW back in the day (not sure if they still have it, not played that game in too long.)

That ability:

Has low recharge.

If used at melee range is just a weak punch.

If used at range, against an enemy that just was knocked down, it inflicts bonus damage AND places the player back on melee range to the target.

 

Wont do anything or much about AoE knockback messing with AoE damage, but will make single target knockback not only fun, but actually productive.

 

[Galaxy Brain]

38 minutes ago, unknown said:

Here is an idea:

 

Dont touch knockback.

Give every melee character access to a "charge/catchup" ability (similar to that awesome rush ability Warriors had in WoW back in the day (not sure if they still have it, not played that game in too long.)

That ability:

Has low recharge.

If used at melee range is just a weak punch.

If used at range, against an enemy that just was knocked down, it inflicts bonus damage AND places the player back on melee range to the target.

 

Wont do anything or much about AoE knockback messing with AoE damage, but will make single target knockback not only fun, but actually productive.

 

Way more complex than just altering KB, and not only melee is effected by other people knocking dudes out of auras and stuff

[Troo]

Thanks for voting and the constructive comments.

[Solarverse]

Don't even get me started on Knock Back...

[Outrider_01]

There is an IO that fixes the problem.

 

No, the IO doesn't compromise builds builds as most bonus 6 are kinda "meh" , the KB/KD IO is no different than a proc which you don't always need to add a bonus damage or debuff, and you don't need to always FOTM the same as everyone else.

 

Realistically KB is fine, its the idiotic way people use it. Try educating them when and how, ask them to not use the power.  Biggest key component to understanding advancees education of people instead of just complaining about personal issues of a game mechanic.

 

My biggest beef in the game is MM pets cause choke points and caves don't need require AI spaz blocking me from even doing anything.  Should MM pets be removed because the owner  is pissing me off or educated that -2 one shot cannon fodder necessary running +4/8 content when those 3 minions are -6 levels? 

 

Personal opinion, at creation the Devs had no idea that 1/2 the map types are office/cave/sewars choke points that come up up 90% of the time.  They also forgot it was a team game, not crappy moron AI weak pets...but there is no way to fix that.

[Bossk_Hogg]

11 hours ago, Outrider_01 said:

There is an IO that fixes the problem.

 

No, the IO doesn't compromise builds builds as most bonus 6 are kinda "meh" , the KB/KD IO is no different than a proc which you don't always need to add a bonus damage or debuff, and you don't need to always FOTM the same as everyone else.

I think we'd see a lot less griping if Sudden Acceleration wasnt designed like ass. It wastes an absurd amount of enhancement budget to buff knockback to 210% then removes ALL of it? The set bonuses aren't particularly bad either.

 

Make a new set, Sudden Deceleration, with enhancement values comparable to Thunderstrike, and no wasted portions going towards KB that will just be removed. Maybe have the 6th slot bonus also give a -2 knockback global mag for those that want it. 

Edited January 8, 2020 by Bossk_Hogg

[Outrider_01]

3 hours ago, Bossk_Hogg said:

I think we'd see a lot less griping if Sudden Acceleration wasnt designed like ass. It wastes an absurd amount of enhancement budget to buff knockback to 210% then removes ALL of it? The set bonuses aren't particularly bad either.

 

Make a new set, Sudden Deceleration, with enhancement values comparable to Thunderstrike, and no wasted portions going towards KB that will just be removed. Maybe have the 6th slot bonus also give a -2 knockback global mag for those that want it. 

You misunderstood.  Assume its an energy blast, 5 slot range IO set, throw a KB to KD set as the 6th slot.  I was talking about only the one IO, as the 6th bonus in any set is usually meh and random...like mez resistance in some melee sets which most melee already have resistance to nearly every type.

 

All the KB sets are ass and should be altered to give damage or way better bonuses...maybe a mag reduction as well as you suggested (one give +3 status protection, nice for a squishy). Any power with knockback is either punt to the other end of the block and Up/Down which you don't want to mess with.  Except for Ki Focus in the blaster Martial Combat Secondary...I laugh every time you essentially power push the punk and they fly slowly up, away, while rag dolling as you shoot them like a skeet contest with a shotgun.  Ki Focus is half the KB mag as power push, has repel and a wacky hold value.  But the slow flying...worth 6 slotting with knockback distance (no knockdown convert IO) just to send a boss flying into the War Wall from the other side of the zone or maybe an AV when triangles down 🤣

[Saiyajinzoningen]

24 minutes ago, Outrider_01 said:

You misunderstood.  Assume its an energy blast, 5 slot range IO set, throw a KB to KD set as the 6th slot.  I was talking about only the one IO, as the 6th bonus in any set is usually meh and random...like mez resistance in some melee sets which most melee already have resistance to nearly every type.

 

All the KB sets are ass and should be altered to give damage or way better bonuses...maybe a mag reduction as well as you suggested (one give +3 status protection, nice for a squishy). Any power with knockback is either punt to the other end of the block and Up/Down which you don't want to mess with.  Except for Ki Focus in the blaster Martial Combat Secondary...I laugh every time you essentially power push the punk and they fly slowly up, away, while rag dolling as you shoot them like a skeet contest with a shotgun.  Ki Focus is half the KB mag as power push, has repel and a wacky hold value.  But the slow flying...worth 6 slotting with knockback distance (no knockdown convert IO) just to send a boss flying into the War Wall from the other side of the zone or maybe an AV when triangles down 🤣

yup thats another alternative idea make all KB like the ki focus power

[SeraphimKensai]

Knockback might be better appreciated if mobs violently getting tossed via knock back take increased damage when they land (impact damage via force*velocity) so the further something is knocked back the more damage it's going to take from it's eventual impact will the environment.

[Galaxy Brain]

9 minutes ago, SeraphimKensai said:

Knockback might be better appreciated if mobs violently getting tossed via knock back take increased damage when they land (impact damage via force*velocity) so the further something is knocked back the more damage it's going to take from it's eventual impact will the environment.

Yes! KB doesnt feel super in CoH, launching a guy should be an impact, not a minor setback for the guy

[SubZippo]

I don't get the hate knockback gets.  Its so much fun knocking an enemy off a cliff or into a lava pool.  People should stop treating it like its cancer.

[Troo]

@SeraphimKensai @Galaxy Brain I can see it would be fun.  knockback = +damage and more knockback = more +damage.

 

If we can launch a target far enough.. One shooting minions or leave em with only 1hp remaining. That would be kinda awesome.

Edited January 10, 2020 by Troo

[Galaxy Brain]

16 hours ago, SubZippo said:

I don't get the hate knockback gets.  Its so much fun knocking an enemy off a cliff or into a lava pool.  People should stop treating it like its cancer.

If there were more places where actually moving people into a spot = win that'd be a huge gamechanger. Currently, you end up moving people out of the danger zone most of the time.

[Megajoule]

3 hours ago, Galaxy Brain said:

If there were more places where actually moving people into a spot = win that'd be a huge gamechanger. Currently, you end up moving people out of the danger zone most of the time.

In SWTOR (which I've been playing a lot of lately), a couple of character classes have a PBAOE KB power.  Not only is it effective in re-opening the range against melee-only foes, it can often be used to knock them off ledges or catwalks etc.

 

Here, of course, the issue is that this doesn't defeat/get rid of them; instead, you have to chase them down or wait for them to climb back up.  (And TOR doesn't require you to "defeat all" to clear the mission, raid, etc.)

Edited January 10, 2020 by Megajoule

[Haijinx]

17 minutes ago, Megajoule said:

In SWTOR (which I've been playing a lot of lately), a couple of character classes have a PBAOE KB power.  Not only is it effective in re-opening the range against melee-only foes, it can often be used to knock them off ledges or catwalks etc.

 

Here, of course, the issue is that this doesn't defeat/get rid of them; instead, you have to chase them down or wait for them to climb back up.  (And TOR doesn't require you to "defeat all" to clear the mission, raid, etc.)

The groups are also a lot smaller and you have tools to either fight at range, grapple bad guys to you or leap to them.  

 

Fun game, but feels more like a single player game with a nice level 10ish coop mission.  

 

I have 50s of every class so I could play through all the stories.  

 

 

[MunkiLord]

On 1/5/2020 at 11:54 PM, Outrider_01 said:

Knockback is fine, there is a IO that fixes it. 

 

Other thread is people complaining they don't want to compromise builds, suck it up buttercups.  Bandaid fix for a "QoL Personal" issue that people throw shit around or whining someone else is doing it. 

 

Instead of breaking a mechanic, global bandaid slots on brawl/rest/fitness, or a accolade click (cause passive would break inherent knockback in the weaker powers like KU/KD) simply buff the weak IO set of KB that no one really uses.  Add damage, set bonus that reduces KB, another converter or proc ect...how many plus rech/acc/mezz rez/resist/def/regen/rec do we need?

Agreed 100%

On 1/6/2020 at 1:05 AM, oedipus_tex said:

I think Energy Blast (exclusively) should be able to turn its knockback on or off at will. They are masters of their energy blasts. Dual Pistols already has this mechanic. I'd like to be able to decide shot to shot if I want knockback. Then I could slot the attacks for knockback distance but only apply it when I want it. Brilliant.

 

 

I like this idea.

On 1/6/2020 at 10:09 AM, GM Miss said:

From a players perspective -  I don't like kb as it slows everyone down. I play tanks most of the time and people knocking stuff back from me just makes every single mob take longer. There are players that know how to use it, but for groups - I say leave the kb to solo characters.

It's my experience that tanks slow teams down more than KB and I just deal with it. I think the people that dislike KB should just do the same instead of complaining all the time. That isn't directed at you specifically because I don't recall any comments you've made on the subject. The Tank example was just a good opportunity.

On 1/6/2020 at 10:42 AM, Bossk_Hogg said:

It's not a question of adapting, but being irritated frequently in one's leisure time. Do you want to sit next to a random person that smells like cat piss? I mean, can't you adapt and hold your nose? That's KB for many people. That constant, mild irritant that detracts from their fun. So lets stop trying to gaslight people. You arent a master player for dealing with KB, you simply have different tastes. 

When I have teammates that irritate me, I find new teammates instead of whining and complaining and making suggestions about how they can do things differently to appease me since I'm the one that has the problem. It's actually not difficult.

[Troo]

Even with a small sample size of the poll. It appears some solution involving the top 4 choices would make the most sense. 

[Captain Powerhouse]

My 2 cents:

 

Knockback is a mechanic that adds a lot of "power" feel to a player. It is usually disliked in this game only because it gets in the way of optimizing kill time (something that goes back to the root of this game over-rewarding kill speed instead of task completion, but that's a topic for another day.) That is a feeling of power I heavily am against removing from the game.

 

A reason I heavily oppose the addition of a global switch for KnockBack is that as soon as it's available, anyone that does not use it will become an outcast, accused of trolling, and what not.

 

Ideally, I would like to see improvements to the game that could help tone down (never remove) the downsides of knocback (note that most of the stuff I write here are just wishful thinking items, other than the first bullet point.)

• Improve Immob's ability to lock enemies in place so they cant be knocked back, across the board (In the works already)
• Provide a tool for melee characters to close gaps with their targets (most modern games actually give melee classes similar tools on some cool-down.)
• Less likely to happen, but potentially provide a tool some tool to some, like a PBAoE, that could allow re-centering a large group of enemies. Perhaps imagine a PBAoE version of teleport foe.
• Add Event-Driven bonuses to knockback, allowing for bonuses to powers that hit an enemy that has been knocked back (these event systems exist in game but rarely used, mostly used by suppression mechanics.)

 

 

 

Edited January 13, 2020 by Captain Powerhouse

[seebs]

What if knockback-into-object produced damage or disorient, or knockback-into-enemy produced (lower mag) knockback/knockdown on enemy?

 

(I also vaguely feel like things might be better if high-mag KD were a thing, like, instead of low-mag KB and KD being the same thing, KD were a distinct thing that had its own mag ranges.)

[Galaxy Brain]

1 hour ago, Captain Powerhouse said:

Add Event-Driven bonuses to knockback, allowing for bonuses to powers that hit an enemy that has been knocked back (these event systems exist in game but rarely used, mostly used by suppression mechanics.)

This would be best imo. As you stated, KB currently goes "against" the win condition most of the time since the game puts more value on killing lots of guys quickly than any other objective, like if there were "king of the hill" objectives then suddenly KB would be amazing for keep-away! 

 

In the current meta though, I will continue to champion that KB could feel more super as @seebs put it where flinging a mook across a room should have much more impact than just knocking them on their butt. Stunning them, having a much longer get-up time like in the Gadget power pool (see @oedipus_tex) , or just flat out having more damage associated to make it feel like a tactical, super-action to blow everyone away rather than a headache to deal with.

 

[Rathulfr]

On 1/8/2020 at 2:31 PM, Outrider_01 said:

the 6th bonus in any set is usually meh and random...like mez resistance in some melee sets which most melee already have resistance to nearly every type.

 

I hear this a lot, and it's true about the melee sets, but not the ranged sets.  The ranged sets usually have defense as their 6th-slot bonus, and many ranged builds are trying to maximize defense (usually ranged or typed).  This is also true of the Blaster and Sentinel ATO sets.

 

So the 6th-slot bonus in the ranged sets are not "meh" -- they're usually pretty significant, which means my ranged builds don't get the luxury of sacrificing the 6th slot for procs.

 

For example, I can't give up on the ranged defense bonuses in the 6th-slot of Thunderstrike, so my single-target attacks with Thunderstrike slotted keep KB, because it would cost too much ranged defense (2.5%, which is more than CJ, Hover, or Stealth alone) to give up that 6th slot.

 

But in Nova I've got Superior Avalanche 5-slotted and the 6th slot holds the Sudden Acceleration KB-to-KD proc.  Doing this costs me a little bit of typed damage defense (fire/cold), but that's worth it to spare me the b*tching I get from team mates whenever I use Nova.

 

 

Edited January 13, 2020 by Rathulfr

[Outrider_01]

15 minutes ago, Rathulfr said:

I hear this a lot, and it's true about the melee sets, but not the ranged sets.

true, but I look at things as a whole.  That means all sets together.  If its different ATs, then its a different point of view and someone has to slap me upside the back of the head to point it out. 😝

[Rathulfr]

Just now, Outrider_01 said:

true, but I look at things as a whole.  That means all sets together.  If its different ATs, then its a different point of view and someone has to slap me upside the back of the head to point it out. 😝

 

If this were limited to just you, that would be one thing.  But I've lost count of how many other people have told me (the guy with a couple dozen or so ranged characters above level 35) that I shouldn't be 6-slotting IO sets in my ranged attack powers, or that I should put SA KB2KD in the 6th slot of all my KB powers, or "meh, the 6th slot is never any good anyway, so you should slot proc X, instead."

 

I used to argue with them, but then I gave up, and now I just smile and nod and ignore them.