Revisit the Energy Melee nerfs

[Rylas]

1 hour ago, Tater Todd said:

I knew about this Rylas but I didn't want to directly say it because Powerhouse said that he can't promise anything.  I think you managed to comment about the Energy Assault changes but I wasn't sure.  I don't think I often see you hang out in to Dominator section :P.  Regardless if you did or did not I wanted you to know more than anyone about the possible future changes.

Heh, yeah, I've never wandered into that section. Mainly because I've never played a Dominator. But hey, anything's possible. I like the sound of Assault sets, but have always shied away do to any protection from the primary outside of control.

 

I try not to have my hopes too high with EM changes coming through anytime soon. But it's at least good to see that something's happened that could end up having an impact on EM.

[Golden Azrael]

On 8/27/2019 at 6:34 PM, LateNights said:

I'd like to see the Total Focus animation moved to Whirling Hands (balance the power around it properly), as well as the changes Will Valance mentioned earlier.

Swapping the animations for those two might be an idea....

 

Azrael.

 

"What if they turned ET into a targeted AoE with only 5 max targets, similar to Thunder Strike? Each target besides the primary takes some Energy damage, but if you don't hit some extra targets you take that damage instead. As an example, if you hit only the primary target, it's identical to how it works now. Hit 1 other target, and you take half the damage you take now. Hit 2 or more extra targets, you take no damage.

 

I dunno, I'm just spitballing. I like the animation. I figure making it an AoE means the animation is more justified."

 

Good idea, Vanden.  It would give Energy another AoE which it's light on.

 

I don't see the problem in giving a bit more oomph.  Go back to its pre-change style.  Energy Transfer being fast and hard.  Beef up the AoE.  Job done?  En Transfer having a Thunder Strike style AoE splash damage would be good.  Extreme damage for the main target and high damage for the rest.  I hit you so hard, I knock the rest of you out...  I like Energy, it's the tweety bird set.  As in that's what you should be seeing.  More stuns.  I'd even give the stun a high damage element.

 

A lot of these pre-titans (favour of the month and dev' catch to play the latest cool thing...so make it teh KING DAMRGE!@) tanking sets are old.  Tweaking here and there re: the tanking changes. Swapping 'some' of the T1 and 2s make sense for Energy.  Some not.  Energy Punch is a better T1.  Barrage is a better T2.  I can't speak for all sets.  Whirling hands is so-so without another AoE power to stack with.  Energy Transfer is a good candidate for it.

 

And as for Build Up?  I'd make all non-ss tanks have single stack no end drop punishment instead of Build UP.  It's a simple swap out.  And the so-so damage of ice/stone and energy would be transformed along with the higher base dam and higher team cap of damage and the AoE 'splash' damage change.  Then Tanks would be more competitive on their own terms with brutes.  They become more 'tank' like.  'I punch you in the face' and can make a difference.  I'm slow?  Sure.  But I hit hard.  

 

 

and....

 

"Heh, yeah, I've never wandered into that section. Mainly because I've never played a Dominator. But hey, anything's possible. I like the sound of Assault sets, but have always shied away do to any protection from the primary outside of control.

 

I try not to have my hopes too high with EM changes coming through anytime soon. But it's at least good to see that something's happened that could end up having an impact on EM.

 

Just keep nagging them on the forums. 😉  I think  you are making a strong case for energy melee on tank.  As for Domi?  You got to try one.  They are a thing of beauty.  Try an elec or stone one.  Lots to do.  Challenging to play.  Perma Domi is godly.  I say that with 1 SR/SJ tank at 50, a stone/wp tank at L39, one ice/ice tank at L41 and an en/invul tank at L8, I think.  And a beta server En/Invul tank at L50.  (Had one on live at L50.  Diamond hard it was.  1.5 billion build.)  I was less impressed with Energy with Incarnates after trying a titans weapons rad tank with incarnates on Beta.  Times have changed.  And a revision here or there...as per some of your suggestions are over due.  Some of these sets are old or got left behind or the AT itself got out designed by eg. Brute.  Not the only AT that was superseded by CoVs ATs.

 

I like Brutes super damage potential.  But I still like tanks teh TOUGHNESS!  The recent Tank changes on beta are a start.  Step in the right direction.  But as per my other comments, not the only thing that needs changing for them to be more competitive.

 

Edited September 30, 2019 by Golden Azrael

[kenlon]

Personally, I hope that whatever changes they make to Energy Melee (and it does need it, badly), the set stays focused on single target damage. Having EM be the premier ST damage set would be both cool and thematically appropriate. 

[Galaxy Brain]

3 hours ago, kenlon said:

Personally, I hope that whatever changes they make to Energy Melee (and it does need it, badly), the set stays focused on single target damage. Having EM be the premier ST damage set would be both cool and thematically appropriate. 

Ehhhhhhh, I'd rather AoE be put in while still having great ST. Even at the lowest difficulty, you get much more mileage from AoE attacks.

[Rylas]

2 hours ago, Galaxy Brain said:

Ehhhhhhh, I'd rather AoE be put in while still having great ST. Even at the lowest difficulty, you get much more mileage from AoE attacks.

True, you get more mileage from AoE attacks. But all the most recent sets have done it. And hey, I'm not complaining, I've made use of them. It's just that having a set that's *the* Single Target king would be more fun and unique. And in my opinion, it should be king by a strong margin to make up for the weak AoE. 

 

Back before being nerfed, I would focus on the bosses and lieutenants first while spamming WH when it was up. I never felt like it took too long to get through mobs. It was just the inverse of the usual "scorch minions/slave away on bosses" routine of other sets. 

 

Adding more AoE isn't really a great solution. We're just rehashing other sets at that point. Aren't we?

[Galaxy Brain]

I dont mean to make it into an AoE set, but like having some method to do another AoE would be nice. Like if you kill an enemy with ET they explode or something for AoE 🙂

[Leogunner]

I've been playing a Grav/Energy Dominator lately, mainly because I never got a Grav anything to max level in the past but also because I heard Energy Assault was changed with the whole charge and release mechanic.

 

If you haven't tried it, it's pretty nice.  Whirling Hands is a premiere power when you release your energy.  If they import this to Energy Melee, I think the set would actually be pretty nice.  All they really have to do is up the damage, recharge and END cost of Whirling Hands and give the unload a hefty punch.  Rather than changing Energy Transfer to its old animation, the set really only needs to charge a weaker power to have higher DPA via charge and suddenly it doesn't matter that ET takes a while to animate, you're getting your damage from charged up...Bone Smasher or something.

 

Might have to change Stun into an AoE when charged.  You might also be able to get away with giving the set a "Energy Regulator" kind of mechanic where, upon releasing the energy you charge, you get a bonus to regeneration.  If you set Total Focus and Build Up (renamed Energy Charge) to auto charge your energy (with a chance to charge when striking stunned foes) and have Bone Smasher, Stun and Whirling Hands be the skills that "release" that energy that then gets you some +regen (stacking when you release), now you have a ST melee set with some strong control and damage, moderate AoE and +regen for utility on armor sets without healing.

[Zenex]

2 hours ago, Leogunner said:

I've been playing a Grav/Energy Dominator lately, mainly because I never got a Grav anything to max level in the past but also because I heard Energy Assault was changed with the whole charge and release mechanic.

 

If you haven't tried it, it's pretty nice.  Whirling Hands is a premiere power when you release your energy.  If they import this to Energy Melee, I think the set would actually be pretty nice.  All they really have to do is up the damage, recharge and END cost of Whirling Hands and give the unload a hefty punch.  Rather than changing Energy Transfer to its old animation, the set really only needs to charge a weaker power to have higher DPA via charge and suddenly it doesn't matter that ET takes a while to animate, you're getting your damage from charged up...Bone Smasher or something.

 

Might have to change Stun into an AoE when charged.  You might also be able to get away with giving the set a "Energy Regulator" kind of mechanic where, upon releasing the energy you charge, you get a bonus to regeneration.  If you set Total Focus and Build Up (renamed Energy Charge) to auto charge your energy (with a chance to charge when striking stunned foes) and have Bone Smasher, Stun and Whirling Hands be the skills that "release" that energy that then gets you some +regen (stacking when you release), now you have a ST melee set with some strong control and damage, moderate AoE and +regen for utility on armor sets without healing.

I think the dom changes were great on their own for a buff to whirl hands however I would kill to have a ground punch or alternative animation as well.

 

 I disagree with not doing anything to energy transfer with the animation being 2.6 and TF being 3 it is a hell of a long time to just sit there especially on fast moving and grooving teams. The old ET + TF was 4 seconds, and if we get the same TF animation buff as dom's at 2.5 seconds I would still want the old ET back, but I would live with a slightly lower animation time on ET down to say 2 seconds which would bring it back to what it was kinda.

 

No idea if this is possible but what if having energy stored could turn ET back to it's one second animation or speed up the current animation ? Doing it this way would make people have to choose between getting a boosted aoe or boosted ST dpa when using stored energy. Idk I think it would make both people who like the old animation and new animation happy.

 

Stun could use a sped up/new animation or making it aoe would be nice.

[Noyjitat]

Energy transfer did get buffed already in all of its versions archetype and epic. It happened around the time they added the 5 power to ever epic pool.

 

Problem with aoe for energy melee has the same problem all sets have with that stupid jump up and spin aoe. It sucks like hell on every set.... mace, claws, widow, fire melee, ice melee. Its a terrible dumb looking aoe that doesn't do enough damage for every set that animation is a part of.

[Galaxy Brain]

It looks cool on claws at least cus it feels very... *checks new user agreement* ... Canadian Mutant Origin-ish, on top of doing a ton of damage for that style of move. I do agree that the animation in particular could use a look as it is a detriment to many sets.

[Rylas]

10 hours ago, Leogunner said:

I've been playing a Grav/Energy Dominator lately, mainly because I never got a Grav anything to max level in the past but also because I heard Energy Assault was changed with the whole charge and release mechanic.

 

If you haven't tried it, it's pretty nice.  Whirling Hands is a premiere power when you release your energy.  If they import this to Energy Melee, I think the set would actually be pretty nice.  All they really have to do is up the damage, recharge and END cost of Whirling Hands and give the unload a hefty punch.  Rather than changing Energy Transfer to its old animation, the set really only needs to charge a weaker power to have higher DPA via charge and suddenly it doesn't matter that ET takes a while to animate, you're getting your damage from charged up...Bone Smasher or something.

I'm currently leveling up a Dark/Energy Dom to test out what those changes are like. It's only in the mid-20s, so my feed back would only be preliminary. I like the boost from the Release part of it, but charging currently seems to happen too little to make it all that useful. I'll have to see how it goes once I'm in the mid-30s. 

 

That said, I still don't see why ET needs to be a ridiculously slow animation time. Corpse shots that take your health aren't a fun team experience. Nor does it contribute to the team in any meaningful way. Why keep an animation time that negates the power's use in team play?

[0th Power]

4 minutes ago, Rylas said:

That said, I still don't see why ET needs to be a ridiculously slow animation time. Corpse shots that take your health aren't a fun team experience. Nor does it contribute to the team in any meaningful way. Why keep an animation time that negates the power's use in team play?

I think that we should use the power thrust animation, keep the -health and add the KB from power thrust.  Anything not killed by energy transfer would be knocked back and offset the short animation time.  

Edited October 3, 2019 by 0th Power

[Rylas]

6 minutes ago, 0th Power said:

I think that we should use the power thrust animation, keep the -health and add the KB from power thrust.  Anything not killed by energy transfer would be knocked back and offset the short animation time.  

No thanks on KB. You're just negating the DPS through a different method. And considering it's old DPS has been shown not to stack up against current top performers, I'd have to ask why do so?

[0th Power]

2 minutes ago, Rylas said:

No thanks on KB. You're just negating the DPS through a different method. And considering it's old DPS has been shown not to stack up against current top performers, I'd have to ask why do so?

You wouldn't be attacking defeated enemies.  If we could have it w/o the KB, I'm for it, but if it has to have something else, I'd rather have KB than a 90 second animation.

Edited October 3, 2019 by 0th Power

[Infinitum]

5 minutes ago, 0th Power said:

You wouldn't be attacking defeated enemies.  If we could have it w/o the KB, I'm for it, but if it has to have something else, I'd rather have KB than a 90 second animation.

Could slot sudden accelerations possibly also.  Still would be better than as it is now.

[Leogunner]

18 minutes ago, Rylas said:

I'm currently leveling up a Dark/Energy Dom to test out what those changes are like. It's only in the mid-20s, so my feed back would only be preliminary. I like the boost from the Release part of it, but charging currently seems to happen too little to make it all that useful. I'll have to see how it goes once I'm in the mid-30s. 

 

That said, I still don't see why ET needs to be a ridiculously slow animation time. Corpse shots that take your health aren't a fun team experience. Nor does it contribute to the team in any meaningful way. Why keep an animation time that negates the power's use in team play?

It changes when you get Total Focus slotted.

 

As for the ET animation, I would think the best outcome would be having ET getting a reduced animation upon energy release but I was more just saying it isn't needed if you implement the charge and release mechanic in a way that doesn't rely on the power at all.

[0th Power]

Also, I have an /energy dominator and I'm not a big fan of the stored energy mechanic.  Not that it didn't make the set better, but it was just one other think I had to be mindful of.  (I don't enjoy the water blast or street fighting mechanic either)  I like the simpleness of the older sets.

Edited October 3, 2019 by 0th Power

[Steampunkette]

Okay, so...

 

EM can't be the mondo ST damage dealer that it used to be. There's simply no way to make that a reasonable choice without completely screwing over PvP balance thanks to it's tendency towards one-on-one combat and Spike-Centric damage shutting people down as quickly as possible.

 

Giving it KB on top of it's Stuns as a way to offset the DPS loss is also not really much of an option.

 

Giving it AoE attacks requires a bit of a stretch of the Cottage Rule and results in a fair amount of pushback, particularly with the new AoE Increase that Tankers will be getting.

 

So how about we give the set a Gimmick?

 

Quote

 

Energy Release

As you build up and release bursts of energy with each punch and strike, residual energy is built up and can be released in an explosive burst. Barrage, Energy Punch, and Whirling Hands each provide a stack of Residual Energy each time they're used. This energy is short lived, and will all dissipate 10 seconds after the last stack was gained. Once you have 5 stacks of Residual Energy you can trigger a massive release of energy with the powers Build Up, Total Focus, Stun, or Energy Transfer. (Each Energy Punch and Barrage has a 50% chance of building a charge. Whirling Hands has a 10% chance per target struck and can build multiple charges)

 

When you use Build Up to trigger an Energy Release you knock down nearby targets and gain an additional ToHit and Damage bonus per target hit, stacking up to 6 times. (5-8% ToHit/Damage per target hit)

 

When you use Total Focus to trigger an Energy Release, all enemies within 8ft of your target take moderate Energy Damage from the released energy wave. (40-50 damage at level 50, modified by enhancements and boosts, roughly equivalent to a Whirling Hands)

 

When you use Stun to trigger an Energy Release it increases the magnitude of the Stun Effect by 10 magnitudes for a brief time. (10 Mag Stun with a 7s duration in addition to the normal Mag 3 for 12s)

 

When you use Energy Transfer to trigger an Energy Release all enemies within 8ft of your target take high Energy Damage from the released energy wave. (60-70 damage at level 50, modified by enhancements and boosts, about 50% more damage than a Whirling Hands)

 

This way, we keep them largely focused on ST attacks, but allow them to throw out more AoE once in a while, or to temporarily heighten their ST attacks. 

 

Fighting AVs this would have very little impact, since the AoE increase from Total Focus or Energy Transfer wouldn't have secondary targets to hit, typically, while the Build Up buff would only increase the build up damage by a single target struck by the Knockdown Effect. The effect in PvP would be similar, but Stun's benefits would be more useful, though only once (Thanks to the PvP control resistance rules) and only if the Energy Melee character had 5 stacks before firing off the big mag stun.

[0th Power]

5 minutes ago, Steampunkette said:

EM can't be the mondo ST damage dealer that it used to be. There's simply no way to make that a reasonable choice without completely screwing over PvP balance thanks to it's tendency towards one-on-one combat and Spike-Centric damage shutting people down as quickly as possible.

I wonder if the -heath could be increased for pvp and add a %1000 -regen for a short period of time as an offset.  

 

Is there a way to make any healing (insps, clicks, team) ineffective for a short period of time?  If so, that could be an option too.

Edited October 3, 2019 by 0th Power

[Golden Azrael]

1 hour ago, 0th Power said:

I think that we should use the power thrust animation, keep the -health and add the KB from power thrust.  Anything not killed by energy transfer would be knocked back and offset the short animation time.  

Good ideas.

 

Azrael.

[BrandX]

Love the pink pom poms.  Miss the old Energy Melee.  It never felt the same!  I main WP/EM Tanker until they ruined Energy Melee.  I didn't even mind the heightened animation time, I just didn't care for the animation.

 

Been looking at making an EM/ Brute (Scrappers need EM!) just because I do love the pom pom animations 🙂 but some thoughts...

 

If possible, give ET the Spinning Strike animation!  Throw a kick in there, the feet don't need the pom poms!  Doesn't even need the AOE, just a better (okay, it's opinion based) animation and faster!

 

Total Focus...Crushing Uppercut.

 

Maybe even lower both their recharges down to 15-18 seconds.

 

Let us use them more!  Though it could just be one of them.

One of the things I loved about the set was it's ST focus.  Got a PBAOE to feel like a bit of AOE was going on, and big hits! 🙂  Also the pom poms.

[Steampunkette]

25 minutes ago, 0th Power said:

I wonder if the -heath could be increased for pvp and add a %1000 -regen for a short period of time as an offset.  

 

Is there a way to make any healing (insps, clicks, team) ineffective for a short period of time?  If so, that could be an option too.

You could do it, I'm fairly certain... But it would be a bad idea.

 

For starters it would have minimal effects on certain content and -massive- effects on other content (Since most basic NPCs don't have much regen or time to regen in, but AVs regen 100hp/second)

 

It would also affect some builds significantly more than others. Regen Scrappers/Stalkers/Brutes would be far more affected by a -Regen effect than, say, an Invuln user.

 

And stopping people from Self-Healing would also impact those groups more than others, as well as Bio Armor characters and Ninjitsu stalkers/scrappers/blasters/sentinels.

[0th Power]

8 minutes ago, Steampunkette said:

You could do it, I'm fairly certain... But it would be a bad idea.

 

For starters it would have minimal effects on certain content and -massive- effects on other content (Since most basic NPCs don't have much regen or time to regen in, but AVs regen 100hp/second)

 

It would also affect some builds significantly more than others. Regen Scrappers/Stalkers/Brutes would be far more affected by a -Regen effect than, say, an Invuln user.

 

And stopping people from Self-Healing would also impact those groups more than others, as well as Bio Armor characters and Ninjitsu stalkers/scrappers/blasters/sentinels.

The effects (-regen and no healing) would be to self.  (In Pvp only: to balance the spike damage)

Edited October 3, 2019 by 0th Power

[Steampunkette]

2 minutes ago, 0th Power said:

The effects (-regen and no healing) would be to self.  (In Pvp only: to balance the spike damage)

You're suggesting as a way to offset the self-harm of Energy Transfer?

 

.... seems like a reasonable way to go. At least potentially.

[0th Power]

26 minutes ago, Steampunkette said:

You're suggesting as a way to offset the self-harm of Energy Transfer?

 

.... seems like a reasonable way to go. At least potentially.

sorta... I want to remove the long animation. 

I was suggesting adding those effects because the self damage was not enough of a downside in pvp, which led to the new animation.  If more downside were added for pvp (lose more health, cant heal and/or cant regen), it should bring the set (closer) into balance while being able to go back to the fast animation for both pve and pvp.

Edited October 3, 2019 by 0th Power