Patch Notes for February 25th, 2020 (Issue 26, Page 5 - Build 1)

[merrypessimist]

My reaction to these patch notes, if somewhat belated, would definitely quality as a NSFW image.

[Bionic_Flea]

1 hour ago, merrypessimist said:

My reaction to these patch notes, if somewhat belated, would definitely quality as a NSFW image.

In a good way or a bad way?

[Replacement]

15 hours ago, Mr.Sinister said:

 

I agree but increasing damage all over the board is not healthy for the game.  If a set has great utility it shouldn’t sport equal damage to less utility sets.  

 

The reason damage is being increased acrossed the board, to try to help sets, is because it’s already completely out of control.  At this point, adding utility does nothing for sets because damage is already overwhelming and utility is more or less pointless.  

 

There are sets that are really suffering in this environment and still, increasing damage is the focus.  Increasing damage pushes those sets farther into the grave.  Oil slick arrow is awesome, except when mobs are dead before you can even light it.  

 

Incremental increases is how avalanches happen.  Eventually it hits a threshold and nothing can be done but be overwhelmed.  We are stuck in an avalanche of damage, and utility, crowd control, aggro management, anything other than damage is just debris along for the ride. 

I absolutely agree with the general cut of your jib, here. I also commend you for a well-reasoned response. When damage becomes too important, all other core gameplay loops become obsolete. 

 

The separation, then, is that I'm not seeing incremental increases that are affecting top-line sets and builds with these changes.  Just increases to bring up lower performing sets in line with the top performers. 

 

I make it no secret that I would be nerfing the top performers instead if this were my server, though.   But that's not popular, so instead we will get everything up to Titan's level...

 

Anyway, thanks again for being civil and nuanced in your response. 

 

I thought I had posted this yesterday but apparently my phone won't let me compliment people.

[Captain Powerhouse]

19 minutes ago, Replacement said:

I make it no secret that I would be nerfing the top performers instead if this were my server, though.   But that's not popular, so instead we will get everything up to Titan's level...

 

There are more things coming down the line, dont expect everything to be a buff. But note that in my testing, Dark Melee still is on the lower side of AoE damage output. If used optimally it can yield some fun alpha strike numbers, but over time, keeping in mind you wont always have full endurance, its not that crazy.

 

This game is, like it or not, heavy on the enemy spawns, and every set should have at least some access to tools to deal with multiple foes more efficiently.

 

That said, nothing will be buffed to Titan Weapons current levels, and i have made no secret that TW over performs. 

[Neogumbercules]

13 minutes ago, Replacement said:

I absolutely agree with the general cut of your jib, here. I also commend you for a well-reasoned response. When damage becomes too important, all other core gameplay loops become obsolete. 

 

The separation, then, is that I'm not seeing incremental increases that are affecting top-line sets and builds with these changes.  Just increases to bring up lower performing sets in line with the top performers. 

 

I make it no secret that I would be nerfing the top performers instead if this were my server, though.   But that's not popular, so instead we will get everything up to Titan's level...

 

Anyway, thanks again for being civil and nuanced in your response. 

 

I thought I had posted this yesterday but apparently my phone won't let me compliment people.

Certain live retail games out there like Diablo 3 take the route of bringing up the underperforming as opposed to nerfing powerful sets and I agree with that approach. The reason I agree is because from a player perspective it feels good as a player of an underperformer like Dark Melee or Devices to be able to reach high performance play and the spectacle of blowing away +4s is a lot of fun! On the other hand, a TW player might question why it was justified that some "bad" set was chosen as the performance standard and their play style was neutered. The outcome of a nerf like that is players will just gravitate to the next highest performing set and use that, and bad sets will stay bad forever.

 

Buffing rarely played, weak sets like DM is a positive change that excites the player base. Nerfing powerful sets doesn't solve the problem that weak sets have and only pisses off the people playing them. Worse yet if the nerf doesn't make something else better, players will just be left wondering why they got nerfed at all, and if something else does end up being better, they will just dump what they were playing, move to the next best thing, and the cycle continues. 

 

I think most importantly though is that there are no truly bad combinations in this game and everything can be powerful. A powerful set doesn't diminish the role of anyone else on the team, and this game isn't competitive at all, so you don't need to compare your performance to anyone else. 

 

It's also important to realize that this is a very old game, with some mechanics that are highly exploitable, that most people have mastered, and is not hard at all, even on the hardest settings.  The mechanics in play here are inherently broken. There were plans to expand the incarnate level content but that never happened. Now we have a bunch of IOd up T4s curb stomping content that they were never intended to be challenged by. 

 

To me it would make the most sense to make a pass across every underperforming set try to get them to some level of power that's on par with the top performers, then focus on expanding the difficulty options for the game to make the fights more interesting. 

[Coyote]

1 hour ago, Captain Powerhouse said:

 

There are more things coming down the line, dont expect everything to be a buff. But note that in my testing, Dark Melee still is on the lower side of AoE damage output. If used optimally it can yield some fun alpha strike numbers, but over time, keeping in mind you wont always have full endurance, its not that crazy.

 

This game is, like it or not, heavy on the enemy spawns, and every set should have at least some access to tools to deal with multiple foes more efficiently.

 

That said, nothing will be buffed to Titan Weapons current levels, and i have made no secret that TW over performs. 

 

I can't put enough likes for this post. Lowering top-tier damage will effectively buff control, buffing, debuffing, endurance drain, etc. As well as balance sets within ATs.

[Coyote]

1 hour ago, Neogumbercules said:

A powerful set doesn't diminish the role of anyone else on the team

 

Actually, it does.

 

A powerful AoE damage set kills everything dead too fast to bother throwing AoE controls, AoE debuffs, etc. Basically, anything other than more AoE damage to finish off the few who survived the alpha strikes of the high-AoE-damage sets.

 

Let's extend it to a silly level: If you have an AoE insta-kill button for the entire spawn, that kind of does diminish the role of anyone else on the team. Does that sound like a silly argument? Maybe, but there are builds who have every-spawn AoE openings of 900 damage pretty fast, and 1100+ with weaker follow-up AoEs. What is the point of an AoE Hold when in 5 seconds we're down to Bosses? There are already lots of builds whose presence on a team makes AoE controls and debuffs irrelevant due to their high AoE damage.

 

So, yes, SOME powerful sets DO diminish the roles of other people on the team. And it's literally impossible to fix this by buffing, because... you buff my Fearsome Stare to be -100% ToHit, and I still wouldn't bother activating it in many fights, because it's still literally useless to debuff enemies into doing nothing when they're going to be dead a second after my animation ends. I'm not against buffing, but sometimes it's just not possible to solve balance issues through buffing. Nerfing is absolutely necessary at times, painful as it may be.

[Doc_Scorpion]

1 hour ago, Neogumbercules said:

Certain live retail games out there like Diablo 3 take the route of bringing up the underperforming as opposed to nerfing powerful sets and I agree with that approach. The reason I agree is because from a player perspective it feels good as a player of an underperformer like Dark Melee or Devices to be able to reach high performance play and the spectacle of blowing away +4s is a lot of fun!

Something many people don't grasp is that what's "good" for the players isn't necessarily "good" for the game.  The two are not the same.
 

3 minutes ago, Coyote said:

So, yes, SOME powerful sets DO diminish the roles of other people on the team. And it's literally impossible to fix this by buffing, because... you buff my Fearsome Stare to be -100% ToHit, and I still wouldn't bother activating it in many fights, because it's still literally useless to debuff enemies into doing nothing when they're going to be dead a second after my animation ends. I'm not against buffing, but sometimes it's just not possible to solve balance issues through buffing. Nerfing is absolutely necessary at times, painful as it may be.

So. Much. This.   Went on a Mender Silos TF the other night with my rad/rad defender and for the bulk of the mission my role was occasionally rezzing another player.  I got my full set of debuffs off exactly twice - against Lord Recluse and against Jade Spider.  And no, leading a team and increasing the difficulty settings is not an effective option.  Even if I did enjoy leading, all too often we end up steamrolling.  When we don't steamroll and folks die because they use steamrolling tactics against mobs that demand tactical play - they complain the settings are too high.

It's getting to the point where I wonder sometimes I wonder why I even build or take out a support toon.

The DPS builders, the optimized builders, the folks with nothing but high end IO's slotted, the folks with all the finesse of a thermonuclear weapon...  They may be having fun, but that fun comes at a cost.

[_NOPE_]

So then don't play with those "power-gamers" if they are making you feel inadequate.

[Anubis_TD]

About dark melee and dark consumption change. I love the fact dark got some love.

I do wonder if DC makes sense. Maybe if if drew in endurance first then exploded out. 

Also, I love soul drain but it fails heavily esp In AV encounters. Is it possible to give it a base 20% dam and reduce from 8 to 6% the dam per person. This keeps its mob dam the same but gives a little extra in AV situations, esp now keeping mobs alive to boost off of will be harder.

[Zeraphia]

My only thought that I don't understand is why it is Dark Melee got the immense buff whereas Energy Melee, classically described as the all-time-worst melee set for its extremely long animation times and less-than-stellar AoE was unaffected by this patch. It could be that it will take more time or have to use a different animations, but I am genuinely curious as to why this particular set is not getting the recognition it deserves. 

[WindDemon21]

Agreed

Just now, Anubis_TD said:

About dark melee and dark consumption change. I love the fact dark got some love.

I do wonder if DC makes sense. Maybe if if drew in endurance first then exploded out. 

Also, I love soul drain but it fails heavily esp In AV encounters. Is it possible to give it a base 20% dam and reduce from 8 to 6% the dam per person. This keeps its mob dam the same but gives a little extra in AV situations, esp now keeping mobs alive to boost off of will be harder.

Agreed. It fails a long on smaller mobs I always wanted this change as well. They also need to make the base recharge 90 seconds soit can run in line with the shield and rad armor nukes and ESPECIALLY with this new dark consumption. Nothing is more annoying than when powers within the same set especially cant even line up and are just that little bit off ruining the sets flow.

[Anubis_TD]

Ya I would not even mind DC being set at SD' s recharge. I got SD down to 34s so only a 4 sec off time. 

 

Most will use the 2 together so having same recharge makes sense. 

 

Since mine is fire aura , would love fiery embrace faster too , lol.

[SwitchFade]

21 hours ago, Mr.Sinister said:

Uh... just because you use different words doesn’t make the outcome any different.  Pro choice is still pro abortion.  Changing the word only makes it more palatable and therefore more acceptable to the masses.  Literally pulling the wool over their eyes.  Incremental increases that lead to incremental increases that lead to incremental increases is bad.  

That was way, WAY over the line. Hyperbole is good for no one.

[GamerRick]

On 2/25/2020 at 12:25 AM, The Curator said:

All players can now move through Mastermind henchmen and push them out of the way, not just their owners.

Thank you 😃

[Narfu12]

Looking at how Shock Therapy is would need a more offensive boost. Due to how second power sets are it can take a while to catch up offense wise so a little bit of a boost to the offense part of the power set. 
Honestly though I had seen a glimpse of some sort of Freakshow like power sets on Youtube. So if these ever come to Homecoming I'd like to see how they go.

[Brutal Justice]

1 hour ago, SwitchFade said:

That was way, WAY over the line. Hyperbole is good for no one.

I take full responsibility and do not wish for this thread to devolve into a similar state of another thread that shall not be named.  

[Doc_Scorpion]

21 minutes ago, Narfu12 said:

Looking at how Shock Therapy is would need a more offensive boost. Due to how second power sets are it can take a while to catch up offense wise so a little bit of a boost to the offense part of the power set. 

Shock/ is a Defender Primary... it's a support set, not an offense set.  Offense for Defenders is found in their secondary.  Yes, some Defender primaries have offensive capability along with their support elements...  But by no means do all Defender primaries have that characteristic.

Yet Defender primaries without offensive aspects (rad/, emp/, nature/, etc...) remain popular.

[Coyote]

2 hours ago, 33053222 said:

My only thought that I don't understand is why it is Dark Melee got the immense buff whereas Energy Melee, classically described as the all-time-worst melee set for its extremely long animation times and less-than-stellar AoE was unaffected by this patch. It could be that it will take more time or have to use a different animations, but I am genuinely curious as to why this particular set is not getting the recognition it deserves. 

 

This also seems to me like something worth wondering about. I assume that there is some reason why Dark Melee specifically was easier to fix. We did have some dev comments saying that they're aware that Energy Melee needs some fixing, so I don't think it's an issue where they disagree with the existence of the problem. Maybe putting a fix in for it like Energy Assault received might have been more complicated, and they put out what was easier to finish?

[Coyote]

13 minutes ago, Doc_Scorpion said:

Yet Defender primaries without offensive aspects (rad/, emp/, nature/, etc...) remain popular.

 

I get the impressing that by "offensive aspects" they were including aspects that those powersets have: +Damage, +Recharge, -Resistance, etc. Powers that increase damage dealt, not necessarily powers that directly deal damage. Support CAN mean supporting offensive output, not only supporting defensively.

 

I'd have to take a much closer look at the set once I have time to see the power numbers, to have an opinion. Basically, it looks like it provides +Damage... is this up often enough and at a high enough strength to make a noticeable difference, or is it a minor boost? For now, I have no opinions on how strong it is on either defensive or offensive support.

[Doc_Scorpion]

51 minutes ago, Coyote said:

I get the impressing that by "offensive aspects" they were including aspects that those powersets have: +Damage, +Recharge, -Resistance, etc. Powers that increase damage dealt, not necessarily powers that directly deal damage. Support CAN mean supporting offensive output, not only supporting defensively.

I can see that reading...  but to me, "offense" is "damage" and "support" is "+DMG".

[Zeraphia]

1 hour ago, Doc_Scorpion said:

Shock/ is a Defender Primary... it's a support set, not an offense set.  Offense for Defenders is found in their secondary.  Yes, some Defender primaries have offensive capability along with their support elements...  But by no means do all Defender primaries have that characteristic.

Yet Defender primaries without offensive aspects (rad/, emp/, nature/, etc...) remain popular.

Rad has offensive aspects, it has -res and gives +dmg from accelerated metabolism (although herding people to get it is a pain)

Nature has definitely an offensive aspect, it gives a hefty +dmg bonus in one of its key powers

Emp yea I agree even though it technically has Fortitude for +dmg

[merrypessimist]

12 hours ago, Bionic_Flea said:

In a good way or a bad way?

Good way.  Rising to the occasion, as it were.

[Frosticus]

10 hours ago, Captain Powerhouse said:

 

There are more things coming down the line, dont expect everything to be a buff. But note that in my testing, Dark Melee still is on the lower side of AoE damage output. If used optimally it can yield some fun alpha strike numbers, but over time, keeping in mind you wont always have full endurance, its not that crazy.

 

This game is, like it or not, heavy on the enemy spawns, and every set should have at least some access to tools to deal with multiple foes more efficiently.

 

That said, nothing will be buffed to Titan Weapons current levels, and i have made no secret that TW over performs. 

I like these changes to DM. I've never had interest in the set before.

I'd vote for dark consumption being 12ft and doing less damage myself.

 

I see no reason that dark melee even exists for stalkers at this point though.

[siolfir]

9 minutes ago, Frosticus said:

I like these changes to DM. I've never had interest in the set before.

I'd vote for dark consumption being 12ft and doing less damage myself.

 

I see no reason that dark melee even exists for stalkers at this point though.

The focused feedback thread has a couple of suggestions for Stalker-specific changes (notably keeping the original damage scale with the higher arc for Shadow Maul, and replacing Touch of Fear), because I feel the same way. But let's face it - when a Scrapper is going to get nearly 2300 damage on a Dark Consumption critical (screenshots in the thread), who needs to use Assassin's Eclipse to do 1946.51* at the damage cap?

 

* - based on scale 7 damage from hidden status, so 55.61 * 7 * 5