Kinetic Melee on Tanker/Brute

[SableShrike]

Hi all!

 

I'm currently running an Invulnerability/Kinetic Melee tanker as my main, and I've got some ideas I wanted to hear your opinions on.

 

Changes I'm thinking could be made:

 

1.  Make Power Siphon stacks last longer.

Getting and keeping 5 stacks of Power Siphon is a chore on Tanker/Brute.  If you throw in Taunt, Repulsing Torrent, Burst, Concentrated Strike, or even just mob re-positioning you have seriously diminished the up-time of your 5 Siphon stacks.  Routinely I will only hit 4 or 3 stacks, rarely the max 5.  I'd extend the stack decay to allow you to actually use the power as it was intended.  Also, Repulsing Torrent does not build a stack of Power Siphon.  It should!

 

2. Make Concentrated Strike always Stun.

Concentrated Strike has the really long windup like Total Focus, Eagle's Claw, or Knockout Blow but not the guaranteed mez.  It's basically just a slower, heavier Smashing Blow.  Giving Concentrated Strike the ability to always Stun means that Kinetic can reliably detoggle harmful enemies now.  As it currently stands 40% of the time you don't turn off that Daemon Lord's aura or Behemoth's Invincibility even if Concentrated Strike hits.

 

Anyone else with a Kinetics hero/villain have thoughts?

[nihilii]

My pet peeve with KM has always been Quick Strike 0.70 KB (which sends blue con enemies flying, meaning level 50s once you're levelshifted).

I like your idea to extend time before stacks decay. I always hit the 5 stacks, but I also make it a point to spam the faster moves. KM design shoehorns you into this rapid-fire playstyle if you want top performance, which leaves half of the powerset underused. Repulsing Torrent, Focused Burst, even Burst and Concentrated Strike to an extent. Many highlevel builds even skip CS on purpose. Skipping the T9 in a melee powerset is unheard of in just about every other melee powerset, save for Martial Arts and Dual Blades... and those aren't exactly contenders for top performers.

A Power Siphon stack should probably last 20 seconds instead of the current 10 seconds.

[Saiyajinzoningen]

KM is a weird set. I want to love it as it has a  great look and sound. but the animations are just a bit too long and the amount of effort you need to keep power siphon up seems to be too little value for the damage it does. its better on a scrapper because the t9 power refreshes the siphon when it crits which isnt difficult to achieve with ATO's. And even better on a stalker. I think the long cast times make KM kinda counterproductive on a brute. I am aware you build fury when attacked as well and they changed it so its easier to build fury but i havent tested KM on a brute since those changes were put into effect. Personally i think a lot of your issues would be fixed if they changed the "reduce interrupt time" IO's to "reduce cast time"

[nihilii]

6 minutes ago, Saiyajinzoningen said:

its better on a scrapper because the t9 power refreshes the siphon when it crits which isnt difficult to achieve with ATO's.

Unfortunately, CS' description is misleading: the chance to recharge Power Siphon is not a proper crit, so the scrapper ATO doesn't help that chance at all.

[SableShrike]

What would you guys think about Power Siphon as a toggle instead of a clicky for all but Stalker?

 

AKA it's always on giving your attacks the -Damage and +Damage benefits, but since it's a toggle it does so to a lesser extent.  Say 7% damage per stack rather than the 25% we get right now.

 

That'd only give you at maximum 5 stacks for +35% Damage, but it would be up all the time in a fight.  Less of a bursty damage buff and more a continuous motion thing.

 

Like nihilii and I are saying though you'd still probably want to increase each Power Siphon stack's duration to 20 seconds to prevent unintended decay due to long animations.

Edited February 3, 2020 by SableShrike

[Replacement]

I would even accept minor DPS nerfs if it meant better uptime on power siphon. Something like a toggle or just a decrease in base recharge so I don't need crazy +recharge just to cash in on what makes the set feel unique.

 

But about the 10 second stack thing -- it looks to me like each power has this +damage component. It's not a global proc or something. For example, Quick Strike has a condition on that power that tests if Power Siphon is true and if so, Quick Strike (not Power Siphon!) gives a damage bonus.

 

If I'm right, that means it's quite feasible to simply adjust the duration of the stacks to 10+(animation time) seconds. That would at least make it consistent, though it doesn't solve things like Taunt and Repulsing Torrent, or clicks from your other pools.

[biostem]

9 hours ago, SableShrike said:

What would you guys think about Power Siphon as a toggle instead of a clicky for all but Stalker?

 

AKA it's always on giving your attacks the -Damage and +Damage benefits, but since it's a toggle it does so to a lesser extent.  Say 7% damage per stack rather than the 25% we get right now.

 

That'd only give you at maximum 5 stacks for +35% Damage, but it would be up all the time in a fight.  Less of a bursty damage buff and more a continuous motion thing.

 

Like nihilii and I are saying though you'd still probably want to increase each Power Siphon stack's duration to 20 seconds to prevent unintended decay due to long animations.

I would prefer that siphoning power from the enemy be an inherent aspect of each attack, (basically -dmg to them, +dmg to you as KM's schtick).  Perhaps the actual clicky could provide some minor endurance and/or health over time instead.

[nihilii]

On 2/3/2020 at 6:30 PM, SableShrike said:

What would you guys think about Power Siphon as a toggle instead of a clicky for all but Stalker?

 

AKA it's always on giving your attacks the -Damage and +Damage benefits, but since it's a toggle it does so to a lesser extent.  Say 7% damage per stack rather than the 25% we get right now.

 

That'd only give you at maximum 5 stacks for +35% Damage, but it would be up all the time in a fight.  Less of a bursty damage buff and more a continuous motion thing.

 

Like nihilii and I are saying though you'd still probably want to increase each Power Siphon stack's duration to 20 seconds to prevent unintended decay due to long animations.

I think that'd be a pretty large hit on performance (at least for me).

 

Right now, you can slot Gaussian's Chance for Build Up in Power Siphon and get BU for the first few seconds while you build your stacks, then you've got your stacks so it's more or less like proper BU.

On high recharge builds and using Concentrated Strike, Power Siphon is up pretty often too. More often than not. So a >50% nerf (and likely even >40% or >30%) in damage per stack would be a negative.

I'm sold on your previous ideas. I feel it would solve (most of) the stack problem for players who enjoy using the longer animating powers and/or may not be as twitchy.

19 hours ago, Replacement said:

If I'm right, that means it's quite feasible to simply adjust the duration of the stacks to 10+(animation time) seconds. That would at least make it consistent, though it doesn't solve things like Taunt and Repulsing Torrent, or clicks from your other pools.

Also a great idea.