Shadow Maul (Animation/Cone)

[TheMuna]

Hey, this has been a long standing issue from live. Thanks for any help with it at all.

 

As it stands, the animation for Shadow Maul is too long. Anyone who used the Dark Melee set with shadow maul takes on a large risk as the character can be hurt the whole time it continues. This would be offset if the cone of the attack were bigger so that it could be reliably used to hit multiple targets but it takes very careful placement to hit more than one target with the small cone of the attack. You can adapt a bit but the time to move into position is also a DPS loss. As it is right now, most people aren't using it once they get other attacks.

 

I think it could be fixed in one of two ways:

1. Spreading the same damage over 4 tics instead of 8, maybe .6-.75 of the original animation time

2. Making the cone bigger like the cone of Flashing Steel in the katana set.

 

Option 1 probably makes more sense given the animation itself. And this would allow for Dark Melee users to more easily stack the to-hit de-buff that they rely on.

 

Thanks guys,

Muna

[Leogunner]

Play Tanker instead, with the up coming changes. 

 

That being said, DM is more a single target set with lots of utility. So it's AoE's army great but DM Tanker will shine more. 

 

My opinion: don't you dare touch my shadow Maul animation time. I'm open to other suggestions though. 

[Outrider_01]

14 hours ago, TheMuna said:

Anyone who used the Dark Melee set with shadow maul takes on a large risk as the character can be hurt the whole time it continues.

Full Auto says Hi!

 

As for Shadow Maul, look at Crosscut. Awesome cone, recharge, and animated fast.

[TheMuna]

On 1/25/2020 at 11:14 AM, Leogunner said:

Play Tanker instead, with the up coming changes. 

 

That being said, DM is more a single target set with lots of utility. So it's AoE's army great but DM Tanker will shine more. 

 

My opinion: don't you dare touch my shadow Maul animation time. I'm open to other suggestions though. 

I understand. DM is my favorite set conceptually. I just think that without only having 1 AOE attack chain power it'd be cool for it to be more useful instead of just looking good. Also it does look terrible when you are whiffing for that long on a miss.

Edited January 27, 2020 by TheMuna

[biostem]

I wonder if they could break the power up into, say, 2 or more "pulses", with an ability to interrupt the animation between pulses, (perhaps just by trying to move).

[TheMuna]

On 1/27/2020 at 8:34 PM, biostem said:

I wonder if they could break the power up into, say, 2 or more "pulses", with an ability to interrupt the animation between pulses, (perhaps just by trying to move).

That's interesting. Is there any other poer that does that? I wouldn't want it to be labor intensive to change it.

[ShardWarrior]

On 1/25/2020 at 10:39 AM, TheMuna said:

Anyone who used the Dark Melee set with shadow maul takes on a large risk as the character can be hurt the whole time it continues.

Not if you pair it with /SR  😁

[Bossk_Hogg]

I wish rather than shortening all animations, they would simply give a damage bonus for long ones, beyond what the standard recharge/area formulas allow. That said, I do think Shadow Maul could use its cone widened and it wouldnt really harm the set. Alternately, maybe make Dark Consumption or Soul Drain more like Dark Dwarf Mire to be used more like actual attacks.

[Saiyajinzoningen]

9 minutes ago, Bossk_Hogg said:

I wish rather than shortening all animations, they would simply give a damage bonus for long ones, beyond what the standard recharge/area formulas allow. That said, I do think Shadow Maul could use its cone widened and it wouldnt really harm the set. Alternately, maybe make Dark Consumption or Soul Drain more like Dark Dwarf Mire to be used more like actual attacks.

this is a great idea, then long cast time single target powers can take down the aoe king lolz

 

also how about making shadow maul cancel the animation if it misses?

[Galaxy Brain]

Wonder if the dmg formula could be tweaked to give bonus damage based on animation time. Strictly boost damage, not lower existing damage for fast animation 

[Trickshooter]

43 minutes ago, Bossk_Hogg said:

I wish rather than shortening all animations, they would simply give a damage bonus for long ones, beyond what the standard recharge/area formulas allow.

There are actually examples of special considerations like this in the game, and interestingly Shadow Maul is one of them! It does about ~44% more base damage than powers with the same range, endurance cost and recharge time, but at the cost of a 5 degree smaller cone.

 

The damage formulas serve as a guide to keep powers in line with each other, but they are not rules that are set in stone. That's why the game engine doesn't calculate base damage itself. It's manually set so that the flexibility is there to adjust things as needed.

[Leogunner]

A change I would advocate for is maybe a slightly wider cover but also a native chance of KD (maybe around 30%). After playing with the busted KD procs over the last few days, it was so awesome using that Tanker-Maul and flip over like 5 or more with it. 

 

It really is a great power, it just might not pay off if used against less than 3 foes. The KD would just be for aesthetics. 

[Bossk_Hogg]

1 hour ago, Leogunner said:

A change I would advocate for is maybe a slightly wider cover but also a native chance of KD (maybe around 30%). After playing with the busted KD procs over the last few days, it was so awesome using that Tanker-Maul and flip over like 5 or more with it. 

 

It really is a great power, it just might not pay off if used against less than 3 foes. The KD would just be for aesthetics. 

I mean, they might even stand up before the animation finished, so that seems a pretty reasonable minor perk.

[Sarrate]

5 hours ago, Trickshooter said:

There are actually examples of special considerations like this in the game, and interestingly Shadow Maul is one of them! It does about ~44% more base damage than powers with the same range, endurance cost and recharge time, but at the cost of a 5 degree smaller cone.

 

The damage formulas serve as a guide to keep powers in line with each other, but they are not rules that are set in stone. That's why the game engine doesn't calculate base damage itself. It's manually set so that the flexibility is there to adjust things as needed.

Actually, that's because Shadow Maul's cone is "free." Shadow Maul is balanced as a single target attack... or so I thought. I never realized that Shadow Maul, an 8s recharge cone did more damage (134.9) than other single target, 8s recharge attacks like Hack (102.6 dmg).

 

Shadow Maul's cone, while it isn't huge, can reliably hit multiple targets completely offsetting its animation time. Don't ask devs to look too closely at it, or they might bring it in line with other cones, much to Dark Melee (and all Sands of Mu users') detriment.

[TheMuna]

Thank you guys!!!!

[Uun]

On beta server today:

 

Shadow Maul (Tanker, Scrapper, Brute, Stalker) is now a much larger, faster cone that's actually capable of easily hitting multiple targets - especially on tanks!

• Arc increased from 45 to 120 degrees.
• Recharge increased from 8 to 14 seconds.
• Cast Time reduced from 3.07 to 2.35 seconds.
• Damage lowered from scale 2.156 to 1.588.
  • DPS reduction is minor, it has only been lowered from scale 0.653 to scale 0.633.
• Target Cap increased from 10 to 16 for Tankers.
• Target Cap increased from 5 to 10 for Scrappers, Brutes and Stalkers.

 

[TheMuna]

On 2/25/2020 at 12:57 PM, Uun said:

On beta server today:

 

Shadow Maul (Tanker, Scrapper, Brute, Stalker) is now a much larger, faster cone that's actually capable of easily hitting multiple targets - especially on tanks!

• Arc increased from 45 to 120 degrees.
• Recharge increased from 8 to 14 seconds.
• Cast Time reduced from 3.07 to 2.35 seconds.
• Damage lowered from scale 2.156 to 1.588.
  • DPS reduction is minor, it has only been lowered from scale 0.653 to scale 0.633.
• Target Cap increased from 10 to 16 for Tankers.
• Target Cap increased from 5 to 10 for Scrappers, Brutes and Stalkers.

 

They went further and lowered the recharge time down to 11s and increased the damage a smidge.   While yes, the damage on it is lower on it's face, DPS is basically the same as it was now and you can hit far more targets reliably.  As it was, you needed to position yourself just right to hit multiple targets or have herded a massive crowd.  This update makes it much better in every way in my opinion.

 

This will be a large increase to survive-ability and  QOL.  For one, you can now hit everyone in front of you with that sweet -tohit debuff, so you're getting hit less by mobs and this keeps you in the game if your defense is taking a beating from defense debuffs.  For another thing, that's less time swinging (or whiffing, if you miss) as you have a chance to hit a heal, or buff instead of helplessly watching your little green bar dwindle.  I don't see any downside to this.  I really appreciate how they've help the set. 

 

Also, as far as Dark Consumption, you always have the option to slot if for damage if you want a little more AOE damage.  It won't do that much but in my AOE chain it often provides just enough to take out minions at the end.  And with the +25 end, you can still fill up your bar with small mobs in the early levels or when fighting end absorbing goons.  The mini-nuke would have been nice but people couldn't seem to agree on what they wanted and just appreciate the damage buff.  People seemed to forget that DC is an end recovery tool first and an attack second.  So having a close range mini-nuke wrapped in was still going to be a dope addition even with 90 second recharge.  Whatever... at least shadow maul got some love after all these year (live and HC)