issue 26 Patch Notes for January 28th, 2020

[csr]

On 1/30/2020 at 2:05 PM, Noyjitat said:

Yes if im having to make more effort to kill things because of nerfs or bugs you have diminished the effectiveness of my character and wtf is the point of having burn if the targets run away? It isnt caltrops its burn and thats a very high loss of whats intended to do dps.

For the record, Burn was initially there to provide Fiery Aura with Immobilization Protection in a unique way.

[Wavicle]

8 hours ago, csr said:

For the record, Burn was initially there to provide Fiery Aura with Immobilization Protection in a unique way.

Indeed.  The "makes things run away" is an INTENDED feature of the power.  It is a defensive ability, not an offensive one.  You're overwhelmed, too many enemies beating on you? Hit Burn, gives you breathing room. THAT was the original intention. I'm not saying that's how we generally use the power these days, or ever, but the Cryptic devs thought that was how Burn was supposed to be used.  And yes, immobilized? Burn your way out.

[Noyjitat]

20 hours ago, csr said:

For the record, Burn was initially there to provide Fiery Aura with Immobilization Protection in a unique way.

 

11 hours ago, sacredlunatic said:

Indeed.  The "makes things run away" is an INTENDED feature of the power.  It is a defensive ability, not an offensive one.  You're overwhelmed, too many enemies beating on you? Hit Burn, gives you breathing room. THAT was the original intention. I'm not saying that's how we generally use the power these days, or ever, but the Cryptic devs thought that was how Burn was supposed to be used.  And yes, immobilized? Burn your way out.

Yet the set has a self rez that does damage and they buffed the damage of the burn over the years because its a squishy set meant to give both offense and defense simultaneously not excluding the fact that everyone has always played it for having extra damage. That must surely not be the reason why now... it cannot be the reason why, no that wouldn't make  any sense at all now would it?

Edited February 1, 2020 by Noyjitat

[Wavicle]

24 minutes ago, Noyjitat said:

 

Yet the set has a self rez that does damage and they buffed the damage of the burn over the years because its a squishy set meant to give both offense and defense simultaneously not excluding the fact that everyone has always played it for having extra damage. That must surely not be the reason why now... it cannot be the reason why, no that wouldn't make  any sense at all now would it?

Nobody is denying that. But to claim that because of those slight modifications over the years therefore should be treated exactly the same as an attack from your primary is a bit of a stretch.

[GM Korvin]

1 hour ago, SHOCKnAWE said:

PLEASE  Fix the taunt aura bug, asap.  It was perfect the way it was!  This bug makes the game aggravating and tedious!  I can see this mob behaviour happening with a  /fire Scrapper, but fire Brutes and Tanks?  NO WAY!!

There's been a few fixes to taunts in the beta shard, according to the beta patch notes. Are your issues resolved on the Pineapple shard?

[csr]

12 hours ago, Noyjitat said:

 

Yet the set has a self rez that does damage and they buffed the damage of the burn over the years because its a squishy set meant to give both offense and defense simultaneously not excluding the fact that everyone has always played it for having extra damage. That must surely not be the reason why now... it cannot be the reason why, no that wouldn't make  any sense at all now would it?

You might want to look up what the word "initially" means.  As for the damage buff to Burn, you will note that that buff took the form of up front damage, which is not decreased by things running away.

[Noyjitat]

9 hours ago, csr said:

You might want to look up what the word "initially" means.  As for the damage buff to Burn, you will note that that buff took the form of up front damage, which is not decreased by things running away.

hmm so now we are in such a disagreement that you want to insult me on the word initial...

Yet again the developers knew people were pulling tons of mobs into cargo containers to kill them with burn patches. Many of these cargo containers were also blocked so you couldn't use them anymore and are that is also featured in a badge description. People take fire aura for its burn patch and fiery embrace those two are the main reasons to have fiery aura you want maximum dps for that character firefarm or not.

[LQT]

On 1/28/2020 at 7:54 AM, The Curator said:

Invention > Sentinel ATOs should no longer show as a PString in mail attachments.

Still getting this on one of the Sent ATOs [Opportunity Strikes ACC/DAM] when retrieving from Character Items.

[SHOCKnAWE]

On 2/1/2020 at 8:50 PM, GM Korvin said:

There's been a few fixes to taunts in the beta shard, according to the beta patch notes. Are your issues resolved on the Pineapple shard?

I actually haven't tested any of the fixes on the Pineapple shard.  The patch changes that that caused this need to be reversed.; an "incremental fix" would simply be insufficient.  My fire aura Brutes/Tanks are quite broken.  I Lightening Rod into a group of 20 lvl 54 mobs, kill most of the minions,, lay a Burn Patch, and the remaining baddies scatter.  At one point, I was literally standing alone waiting for baddies to come back to fight, and I counted them as they returned....8 came back.  If I killed 8 LR'ing into that mob, leaving 12 alive, and 8 scattered after I dropped the  burn patch, that's  8/12 or  at least 67% of the mobs are fleeing. 

 

I have lost 25% efficiency in "arresting mobs", at a minimum!  There are lots of very frustrated people right now.  😠  Firey Aura is perhaps the "squishiest" of the defense sets.  That's why it has more AOE damage so you can withstand the onslaught of the mobs as successfully as the other sets (almost).  If this was meant to make the AI behaviour closer to real-life, you may have succeeded to some extent, but the power set's "balance" was broken in the process.  Most people who play Brutes and Tanks expect to hold aggro on themselves.  Without that ability, the Brute's Fury bar takes a hit.  In a full team instance, scattering mobs are far more likely to attack the squishies in their path, and the groups' overall efficiency and XP per min will diminish as well.   Please put it back the way it was, the way it's meant to be. 

 

Listening to the community is one of Homecoming's greatest strengths.  Thanks very much for everything you all do.  We know and appreciate that you are trying to do positive things for the game we all love!  Peace! ✌️

[GM Korvin]

8 minutes ago, SHOCKnAWE said:

I actually haven't tested any of the fixes on the Pineapple shard.  The patch changes that that caused this need to be reversed.; an "incremental fix" would simply be insufficient.  My fire aura Brutes/Tanks are quite broken.  I Lightening Rod into a group of 20 lvl 54 mobs, kill most of the minions,, lay a Burn Patch, and the remaining baddies scatter.  At one point, I was literally standing alone waiting for baddies to come back to fight, and I counted them as they returned....8 came back.  If I killed 8 LR'ing into that mob, leaving 12 alive, and 8 scattered after I dropped the  burn patch, that's  8/12 or  at least 67% of the mobs are fleeing. 

 

I have lost 25% efficiency in "arresting mobs", at a minimum!  There are lots of very frustrated people right now.  😠  Firey Aura is perhaps the "squishiest" of the defense sets.  That's why it has more AOE damage so you can withstand the onslaught of the mobs as successfully as the other sets (almost).  If this was meant to make the AI behaviour closer to real-life, you may have succeeded to some extent, but the power set's "balance" was broken in the process.  Most people who play Brutes and Tanks expect to hold aggro on themselves.  Without that ability, the Brute's Fury bar takes a hit.  In a full team instance, scattering mobs are far more likely to attack the squishies in their path, and the groups' overall efficiency and XP per min will diminish as well.   Please put it back the way it was, the way it's meant to be. 

 

Listening to the community is one of Homecoming's greatest strengths.  Thanks very much for everything you all do.  We know and appreciate that you are trying to do positive things for the game we all love!  Peace! ✌️

Give the patches on beta a try - while the dev team does their best, they do rely on the community to help test and report bugs. By doing so, they're given chance to resolve such issues, ideally before they are rolled out onto the live shards.

 

Here is a guide on how to get started with using the beta shard, along with how best to report issues that you see.

 

Hopefully you'll be able to report on the progress done there!

[Jazz Ripper]

5 hours ago, SHOCKnAWE said:

Firey Aura is perhaps the "squishiest" of the defense sets.

And mobs running away doesn't help your survivability?

5 hours ago, SHOCKnAWE said:

Please put it back the way it was, the way it's meant to be.

What makes you qualified to know how anything is "meant" to be? You can express your own preferences, but please don't pretend to speak for anyone else.

[Blackfeather]

16 minutes ago, Jazz Ripper said:

And mobs running away doesn't help your survivability?

What makes you qualified to know how anything is "meant" to be? You can express your own preferences, but please don't pretend to speak for anyone else.

Well, it's already been established that the aggro issues here are a bug. Perhaps they could have worded it better, but it will be fixed in future - I'm pretty sure there's some fixes in beta already.

[EverStryke]

On 1/30/2020 at 2:44 PM, Mr.Sinister said:

You’re not unable to do the things you could do before.  Your toon didn’t lose any of its power.  It just takes slightly longer to do what you were doing.  You don’t have to reroll...

 

...Making the AI better doesn’t diminish you and what you’re capable of. 

Every single player describing the changes, and problems caused by these changes dislikes them.

 

This is directly related to them being unable to "Do the things they did before"

 

It's ok to have an opinion, but it's safe to say the feedback you are getting on the subject doesn't parallel the communities views overall.

 

Chasing down runners might be something you feel is tolerable, but for most it exceeds normal and acceptable frustration levels. To the point it is a QOL issue at this point.

 

It's gone beyond annoying, it's actually reduced the server population levels at key playtime's.

 

It's been a near ghost town since these changes.

 

I would be obtuse if I didn't conclude or hypothesize the direct correlation between the running of mobs and server population decline since this issue began.

[Wavicle]

1 minute ago, EverStryke said:

Every single player describing the changes, and problems caused by these changes dislikes them.

 

This is directly related to them being unable to "Do the things they did before"

 

It's ok to have an opinion, but it's safe to say the feedback you are getting on the subject doesn't parallel the communities views overall.

 

Chasing down runners might be something you feel is tolerable, but for most it exceeds normal and acceptable frustration levels. To the point it is a QOL issue at this point.

 

It's gone beyond annoying, it's actually reduced the server population levels at key playtime's.

 

It's been a near ghost town since these changes.

 

I would be obtuse if I didn't conclude or hypothesize the direct correlation between the running of mobs and server population decline since this issue began.

On the contrary you’re making an enormous assumption. There are any number of different factors that effect population.

[EverStryke]

1 minute ago, sacredlunatic said:

On the contrary you’re making an enormous assumption. There are any number of different factors that effect population.

Thus the word "Hypothesize"... 

 

That combined with eyes to see, and ears to hear... Yeah, it's correlation is unmistakable impo.

[Wavicle]

4 minutes ago, EverStryke said:

Thus the word "Hypothesize"... 

 

That combined with eyes to see, and ears to hear... Yeah, it's correlation is unmistakable impo.

Maybe you've heard: correlation does not imply causation.

[SHOCKnAWE]

31 minutes ago, sacredlunatic said:

Maybe you've heard: correlation does not imply causation.

I don’t understand the antagonism.  The community members affected by this almost unanimously proclaim the bug is intolerable.  Of course, there are always those who are born contrarians and will find inane counter-arguments for everything, just because.  It’s an acknowledged bug in the patch, they are working on it, testers including me are providing feedback to the developers.  It will be resolved I’m sure, but none too soon, IMO.

[Wavicle]

16 minutes ago, SHOCKnAWE said:

I don’t understand the antagonism.  The community members affected by this almost unanimously proclaim the bug is intolerable.  Of course, there are always those who are born contrarians and will find inane counter-arguments for everything, just because.  It’s an acknowledged bug in the patch, they are working on it, testers including me are providing feedback to the developers.  It will be resolved I’m sure, but none too soon, IMO.

I don't dispute that it's a lousy bug, and I do hope it gets resolved soon.

Since they ARE working on it, and hopefully will resolve it soon, the histrionics, and in this case unjustified claims ("it's actually reduced the server population levels at key playtimes"), are unnecessary and unhelpful.  Relax.  Play a different character.  This too shall pass.

[Myrmidon]

1 hour ago, EverStryke said:

It's been a near ghost town since these changes.

I’m curious. To which server does this apply?

[KauaiJim]

Just thought I would pop in here and say that the latest patch on Beta seems to fix the mob scattering for my fire/fire brute if I detoggle blazing aura before zoning in and then turn it back on after zoning in and waiting 12 or so seconds.  Once I did that my entire run behaved pretty much the way it used to originally.  So they still have something that needs to be fixed but they are getting pretty close!

 

I recommend to anyone who can to jump on Pineapple (beta/test) and see if todays patch over there seems to work (as long as you wait to toggle on your aura after you zone in).  They could use your feedback over there.  It's easy to have your toons copied over now so you can test exactly what you are familiar with.

 

Note:  On my first test I zoned in with my fiery aura on and the scattering was still happening so if you still see scattering make sure to try the detoggle aura-zone in-wait a few seconds-retoggle aura trick.

 

Anyhow, seems like they are making progress and sounded like folks in this thread might want to check it out for themselves.

Edited February 11, 2020 by KauaiJim
spelling

[siolfir]

8 hours ago, SHOCKnAWE said:

The community members affected by this almost unanimously proclaim the bug is intolerable.

Intolerable is a bit strong - I've played with quite a few people who are tolerating it just fine (usually on my Fortunata), to the point where it's rarely mentioned. It's not liked nearly universally, but most people just move on, play as they would otherwise, and hope it gets fixed quickly. Only a couple of people posting here have been talking about how they weren't going to play here because of it, so I seriously doubt it has anything to do with server population, and I haven't seen any more "ghost towns" than I did before the patch.

 

As has been mentioned before in this thread and in previous threads, the best way to help is to test and provide feedback. Make sure that the tweaks to get this working aren't affecting something else. Or at least let people know that they might want to retoggle their taunt auras after zoning if you see them having trouble with holding aggro until that part of the issue gets fixed.

[EverStryke]

5 hours ago, siolfir said:

Intolerable is a bit strong - I've played with quite a few people who are tolerating it just fine...

Nope... It's universally disliked by EVERY single player I know, and play with.

 

We wish test well, but a rollback "Hotfix" is welcome asap until the "Fix/Patch" is complete impo.

 

We know they are trying, but the age old adage of "If it ain't broke, don't fix it." Seems like it has it's place here.

[Wavicle]

First off, I think you don’t understand what the word tolerate means.

 

Second, no we are not going to roll back the great improvements from the last patch just so that a few tanks and brutes don’t have to live with a small bug for a few weeks. They’re working on it.

Edited February 10, 2020 by sacredlunatic

[Wavicle]

13 minutes ago, SHOCKnAWE said:

I agree with the “patch roll-back” idea.  There wasn’t any earth shattering new content or game mechanic changes introduced In the patch from my perspective. 

Do you play Tankers or Masterminds?

 

[Wavicle]

3 minutes ago, SHOCKnAWE said:

Why attack and get defensive with people expressing their opinion?  I think he knows exactly what “intolerable” means.  There were some  “improvements” introduced with the patch, but there were also a disruptive bug introduced.  If you are one of the developers working on the fix, empathy and integrity would be a much better way to address community concerns and feedback, IMO.

No one is attacking or getting defense except those who are insisting on a roll back because of one bug that effects only a handful of powers.