Weekly Discussion 39: Incarnate Powers!

[Ura Hero]

/slight rant

 

Not having been mentioned yet is the way to get to the Incarnate slotting menu is extremely well hidden.  I've had to point it out to several people.  Poor UI design is one of my biggest pet peeves.  And the Incarnate slotting and crafting access is one of the poorest UI implementations that I have ever seen.

 

Incarnates are Powers and the button to get to the slotting and crafting should be more visible.  Words on top of a header is a horrible implementation, most people assume that it is just a heading, not something that can be clicked on.

 

Other than that I am pretty happy with the system as a whole.  The down side is that shards and threads need to be slightly more interchangeable.  I have tons of threads and very few shards.  It seems like it is taking forever for me to accumulate enough shards to finish my T4, while I have all but one of my thread based T4's.

Edited February 28, 2020 by Ura Hero

[VileTerror]

Somewhat tangential to Incarnate Content, but severely exasperated by it, and Ura reminded me of it:  90 Power Slots in the Trays is not enough.  Even before getting in to Incarnate territory, my bars are terribly full with Powers I frequently make use of, and while I've heard there are special "Pop Menus" for Macros, I've not really wrapped my head around making use of those yet.

 

As we get more Incarnate Powers (assuming), unless they're all Auto Powers, then the limited Power Slots in Trays is just going to get even worse.

[Abraxus]

4 hours ago, Ura Hero said:

/slight rant

 

Not having been mentioned yet is the way to get to the Incarnate slotting menu is extremely well hidden.  I've had to point it out to several people.  Poor UI design is one of my biggest pet peeves.  And the Incarnate slotting and crafting access is one of the poorest UI implementations that I have ever seen.

 

Incarnates are Powers and the button to get to the slotting and crafting should be more visible.  Words on top of a header is a horrible implementation, most people assume that it is just a heading, not something that can be clicked on.

 

Other than that I am pretty happy with the system as a whole.  The down side is that shards and threads need to be slightly more interchangeable.  I have tons of threads and very few shards.  It seems like it is taking forever for me to accumulate enough shards to finish my T4, while I have all but one of my thread based T4's.

Well, to be fair, the Incarnate system was an add-on/bolt-on (as so many things were along the way) that they probably would have streamlined a bit had the game been around longer.  But, it's still possible for improvements when the Devs finally get 'round to looking at the Incarnate thing again.  I expect it will get better at some point, but if it's biggest perceived failing is the non-obvious placement of the menu to access it, that's not so bad in the grand scheme of things. 😎

[Sovera]

I really think the last thing we need is -more- damage increasing incarnates. We already have everything we need. More recharge and endurance options, more damage, more defense.

 

I'm going to derail a bit because this is an example of things that are useful without increasing the power creep at max level.

 

If there is one really big thing that would completely change the face of CoH (but I don't think it is Incarnate business) would be something much more interesting and that is exemplaring. That would completely change the game:

 

Not losing powers when we examplar down.

 

Other games manage it, there is no reason it cannot be managed here (other than the usual regarding the cost of man hours to code such a thing). Suddenly it is no more 'well, I would level Super-Strength/Psi Melee, but god, the moment I exemplar down for anything 27 and under I lose all my AoE'

 

Or 'Well, my attack chain is crap without Gloom serving as a filler at 35, but if I examplar down I lose it and now have gaps'.

 

All of this makes examplaring crap and a chore.

 

Of course it would need to be nerfed in usefulness but this can be done with testing.

 

[Troo]

Mender Ramiel showed us how ridiculously powerful we'd become.. just saying.

[Alouu]

Over the course of the game's history level 50 content in CoX has been trivialised, hopefully this is an uncontested fact. The central causes for this also I would expect not to be in dispute, those being the IO system introduced in issue 9, and the Incarnate system added much later starting in issue 19.

 

Comparing the two, the IO system offers many ways to kit out your character, allowing you to take on different roles with the same power-sets. It has a level of depth that can have users spending hours planning every slot and set bonus if they so wish. Additionally since for the most part set bonuses are passive stat boosts, the feel of the power-sets is not deviated from no matter what manner of build the player is aiming for. My feeling on this system is that any power creep that resulted from its implementation was well worth it for the depth it added to the game.

 

On the other hand there is the Incarnate system. Barring the Alpha slot, each other incarnate ability is its own independent effect, tacked on and often at odds with the concept or theme that players had for their character when they conceived it. These effects are both far less customisable than IO's, while at the same time their immense value or power overshadow the player's chosen power-sets.

 

If the difficulty of end game content is to be restored through the tweaking of either of these systems, it is my opinion it should be the latter.

 

To show how I would go about this please see the following images:

 

 

This one is just for reference and shows an example of what a fully slotted set of incarnates looks like currently.

 

 

        

 

These two images show how my proposal would work. To explain, there would be three rows of mutually exclusive incarnate powers. They would be arranged as shown above so that Alpha and Interface compete, Hybrid and Lore compete, & Destiny and Judgement compete. By slotting an incarnate power into one of the slots on a row, the other slot will become disabled and greyed out as shown above. Unslotting an incarnate power will re-enable both slots on that row and enable a player to change their choice at any time.

 

The benefits of this system are an increased level of character customization whilst at the same time decreasing overall power. Thematically many issues with the current system are also resolved by choosing the mutual exclusions in this layout, the main ones being a character that does not want to be about summoning pets can now take Hybrid and thus avoid Lore, a character based around being a support can take Destiny and avoid having to take Judgement, and conversely a character that is most certainly not supposed to be about support thematically can take Judgement and avoid Destiny. This layout of mutual exclusions also lines up nicely with the power level of the incarnate powers in question, in terms of incarnate-stomping your way through task forces and trials the Judgement and Destiny powers stand out as the worst offenders, so they are made exclusive at the highest tier. Alpha and Interface on the other hand are relatively unoffensive more passively oriented buffs so are made exclusive at the lowest tier.

 

With the system above, a small number of additional changes would need to be made in order to create parity for each exlusive pair.

• Alpha would no longer provide a level boost. This helps create power-level parity with interface and removes the most unnesscary part of the incarnate system at the same time.
• Interface would no longer "cancel on miss". Combined with the previous change this should bring power-level parity with Alpha.
• Hybrid recharge increased to 3 mins. This would give it a 50% uptime instead of 60% and close its power-gap with Lore.
• Destiny and Judgement recharge increased to 3 mins. Simply to lower their strength.

 

And thats it! Critique welcome.

 

Edited February 29, 2020 by Alouu

[VileTerror]

I like the exclusivity idea, Alouu!  Nice.  Even if we don't change the existing 6 Incarnate Slots, perhaps the remaining 4 could be exclusive with Lore, Destiny, Judgement, and Interface.  So, of all 8 (excluding Alpha and Hybrid, for this example), you only get 4 more Incarnate Slots to fill.

[Caulderone]

I think the level boost from Alpha should changed from level-shift to incarnate-shift like the other incarnate abilities.

 

This would bring back the ability to do non-incarnate content at level 45+ at +4 difficulty with the Alpha slot filled, instead of the effective max of +3 with it as it is.

[GM Miss]

This thread is now locked, check the suggestions and feedback for a recap on this week topic soon!