Can we give more blasting powers the "Sentinel/Freeze Ray Treatment"?

[Bartacus]

There are many blasting powers currently that are automatically skipped because they do almost no damage and only are used for mez. Freeze Ray actually used to be this way, if I recall, in that it didn't do very much damage and was only taken for the hold. Now, it does more damage than the T1/T2 powers. Additionally, in the Sentinel blasting sets, many of these powers were reworked to deal reasonable damage in addition to the mez effect. Sentinel is a completely different animal, to be sure. But, it seems like a good QoL change and buff to a lot of these blasting sets. 

Some examples of these powers:

Archery - Stunning Shot

Assault Rifle - Beanbag

Electrical Blast - Tesla Cage

Energy Blast - Power Push

Psychic Blast - Scramble Thoughts

Sonic Attack - Screech

 

I understand that for many of these sets, this would be a straight up buff. But, we did it with Ice Blast and that was a set that already had a solid single target attack chain. Some of these sets struggle with that already and it would be a nice buff/help to them. 

 

Thoughts? 

[General Idiot]

As I understand it the two Freeze Ray powers in Ice Blast were buffed specifically because of the i24 changes to sniper powers. Ice lacks a snipe and thus became noticeably weaker than some other sets, so it was buffed a little. The only other set I could see similar logic applying to would be Electric Blast, which is well known to be underpowered.

[Bartacus]

12 minutes ago, General Idiot said:

As I understand it the two Freeze Ray powers in Ice Blast were buffed specifically because of the i24 changes to sniper powers. Ice lacks a snipe and thus became noticeably weaker than some other sets, so it was buffed a little. The only other set I could see similar logic applying to would be Electric Blast, which is well known to be underpowered.

Sonic has no snipe, so if this is true it should receive the same treatment.

[Itikar]

Sonic does have -resistance all across the board though, which is already one of the most powerful debuffs.

[Bartacus]

1 minute ago, Itikar said:

Sonic does have -resistance all across the board though, which is already one of the most powerful debuffs.

and this means that Screech should be useless? 

[Itikar]

1 minute ago, Bartacus said:

and this means that Screech should be useless? 

I am afraid strawmen arguments will not be very helpful to show the validity of your points.

[Bartacus]

5 minutes ago, Itikar said:

I am afraid strawmen arguments will not be very helpful to show the validity of your points.

I'm not sure I understand. You assert that because Sonic Attack has -Res, that the power Screech should not be buffed (and therefore remain useless). I assert that -Res does not mean that Screech should be useless, as it currently is. This is not a strawman argument. 

Edited March 2, 2020 by Bartacus

[Itikar]

22 minutes ago, Bartacus said:

I'm not sure I understand. You assert that because Sonic Attack has -Res, that the power Screech should not be buffed (and therefore remain useless). I assert that -Res does not mean that Screech should be useless, as it currently is. This is not a strawman argument. 

I have never said that:

a) Screech is useless.

b) Screech should not be buffed.

 

Hence yes, this is a strawman argument, because you are arguing with me about things I have never actually said. Sometimes it happens that people use strawman arguments without being aware, maybe this is your case. If it is indeed your case, be aware it does not help show the validity of your argument even one bit. Quite the contrary in fact.

 

Now let's have a little more in depth look:

 

- You assert Screech is useless. This is simply false, as it is false for virtually all the other mez blasts that do little to no damage. Maybe they are not necessary powers to take, and that's all right, but there are dozens and dozens of guides out there on those blast sets that beg to differ with you. Not to mention the numerous players who take and use those powers. So, maybe a more convincing argument here would help too, I think.

 

- What I did above was simply pointing out that comparing sonic blast to ice blast, without considering the incredibly powerful -res effect it has, was not, in my opinion, a fair comparison. At least to a certain extent. I do not see why in a reasonable discussion this point should not be mentioned and addressed. Escalating immediately with a hyperbolic strawman toward the party that simply dares to bring up this, and with a patently false strawman at that, is not, again in my opinion, an effective way to address such point.

 

I hope it is clearer now.

 

To be frank, also, I am not particularly hostile to your proposal, just a little skeptical, as it seems a buff for powers that are in general okay. Not that they cannot be improved and rebalanced of course, but I would personally like to read some more compelling and reasoned arguments in this regard.

 

 

Edited March 2, 2020 by Itikar

[Bossk_Hogg]

Yes, please. Abyssal Gaze, Lancer Shot, Cosmic Burst also all deal decent damage. Moreover, stuns have crappy proc options so there needs to be some more compelling reason to take these powers.

[Purrfekshawn]

9 minutes ago, Bossk_Hogg said:

Yes, please. Abyssal Gaze, Lancer Shot, Cosmic Burst also all deal decent damage. Moreover, stuns have crappy proc options so there needs to be some more compelling reason to take these powers.

True, l also would like to see in future sone new Stun Enhancement set with its 6-th piece to provide Proc Chance of +2 MAG Stun (so one cast could reach MAG 5 stun and stun a boss this way).

[Bartacus]

7 hours ago, Itikar said:

I have never said that:

a) Screech is useless.

b) Screech should not be buffed.

 

Hence yes, this is a strawman argument, because you are arguing with me about things I have never actually said. Sometimes it happens that people use strawman arguments without being aware, maybe this is your case. If it is indeed your case, be aware it does not help show the validity of your argument even one bit. Quite the contrary in fact.

 

Now let's have a little more in depth look:

 

- You assert Screech is useless. This is simply false, as it is false for virtually all the other mez blasts that do little to no damage. Maybe they are not necessary powers to take, and that's all right, but there are dozens and dozens of guides out there on those blast sets that beg to differ with you. Not to mention the numerous players who take and use those powers. So, maybe a more convincing argument here would help too, I think.

 

- What I did above was simply pointing out that comparing sonic blast to ice blast, without considering the incredibly powerful -res effect it has, was not, in my opinion, a fair comparison. At least to a certain extent. I do not see why in a reasonable discussion this point should not be mentioned and addressed. Escalating immediately with a hyperbolic strawman toward the party that simply dares to bring up this, and with a patently false strawman at that, is not, again in my opinion, an effective way to address such point.

 

I hope it is clearer now.

 

To be frank, also, I am not particularly hostile to your proposal, just a little skeptical, as it seems a buff for powers that are in general okay. Not that they cannot be improved and rebalanced of course, but I would personally like to read some more compelling and reasoned arguments in this regard.

 

 

It is clearer now. Genuinely, I don't see how these powers are useful seeing as how I virtually never see anyone take them. In my mind, they are objectively useless. I'd be very interested in seeing the breakdown of how often these powers are skipped, because I suspect they are skipped more than literally every other power in the sets they are in. So, this to say, I wasn't really trying to say that YOU SAID Screech is useless, but merely that Screech is in fact useless regardless of what you have asserted. I did take your comment to mean that you don't think Sonic should be buffed because of its effect, so, sorry about that. 


Aside from addressing you specifically, I think that Electric Blasting and Sonic Blasting should be at the top of the list for this improvement. 

[Itikar]

18 minutes ago, Bartacus said:

 So, this to say, I wasn't really trying to say that YOU SAID Screech is useless, but merely that Screech is in fact useless regardless of what you have asserted.

Firstly I see people who take them all the time, guess we hang around different folks. And I am sorry but regardless of what you say, I do not see any compelling evidence to assert Screech and similar powers are *useless*. Back to square one. Again, I suggest you find a more compelling argument, and for your own sake. If you don't like the idea, then I am afraid you are the one who stands to lose the most here. Repeating a falsehood, even if it appears true to you, won't make it magically turn into the truth. (And just in case you want to strawman again and point out I am doing the same here: no. I am not trying to convince you Screech is useful. I simply find it useful, and that's enough -for me-. I am not the one making proposals here and trying to convince others.) The positive side at least is that you can skip the powers if you deem them useless, or, well, play sonic blast on a sentinel if this bothers you that much.

 

Secondly I find it quite odd that so far you have omitted to mention dual pistols, which perfectly fits the paradigm, no snipe, nothing else that seems crazily overpowered, and which certainly does not shine as the most popular set at least as far as numbers are concerned. And yet you omitted to mention it not only as a counterexample, where it was certainly more appropriate than sonic blast, but even in your original post.

[biostem]

1 hour ago, Bartacus said:

So, this to say, I wasn't really trying to say that YOU SAID Screech is useless, but merely that Screech is in fact useless regardless of what you have asserted.

I'd love to know what "facts" you can bring to bear, regarding your position on this matter.

[Bartacus]

29 minutes ago, Itikar said:

Firstly I see people who take them all the time, guess we hang around different folks. And I am sorry but regardless of what you say, I do not see any compelling evidence to assert Screech and similar powers are *useless*. Back to square one. Again, I suggest you find a more compelling argument, and for your own sake. If you don't like the idea, then I am afraid you are the one who stands to lose the most here. Repeating a falsehood, even if it appears true to you, won't make it magically turn into the truth. (And just in case you want to strawman again and point out I am doing the same here: no. I am not trying to convince you Screech is useful. I simply find it useful, and that's enough -for me-. I am not the one making proposals here and trying to convince others.) The positive side at least is that you can skip the powers if you deem them useless, or, well, play sonic blast on a sentinel if this bothers you that much.

 

Secondly I find it quite odd that so far you have omitted to mention dual pistols, which perfectly fits the paradigm, no snipe, nothing else that seems crazily overpowered, and which certainly does not shine as the most popular set at least as far as numbers are concerned. And yet you omitted to mention it not only as a counterexample, where it was certainly more appropriate than sonic blast, but even in your original post.

Would you rather I use the phrase "marginally useful"? Again, I am confident that each of these powers are the least taken powers in every set. I'm not very interested in arguing this point, as I feel confident that the average person would agree on this point even if you don't. I do not believe that these powers being the least useful in the sets by a large margin is a falsehood like you say. I think its the truth, and I do not think very many people would disagree with this even if you do. Sorry that you feel that way. Useless is hyperbole. Obviously there is a use in that it stuns at a mag 3 for shit damage. That use is not very good, and most people skip these powers as such, especially in a level 50 respec. Possibly useful when leveling up solo if you like to stun Lieutenants or something.

I honestly forgot that dual pistols even had a stun ability in the same vein as these sets. But, that's certainly another good example of an ability that could use the same treatment.

 

The point in all of this is... why? Why on earth do these abilities need to be gimped by doing basically 0 damage? I see no reason for it, and I don't see how it would imbalance a single set. It would be a substantial buff to something like sonic which struggles to have a good ST attack chain... but certainly not imbalanced. 

Edited March 2, 2020 by Bartacus

[Itikar]

Now we are more on the reasonable side. So please, bring on more facts, if you will.

 

Yes, they can be useful, maybe not to many, but they have a niche. And that's not necessarily bad by itself, many powersets have such powers.

[MunkiLord]

Screech is the sleep power right? If that's the case, I agree it's useless in almost all situations, especially in team play. Procs can make it fun though. 

[Itikar]

No, screech is the stun of Sonic Blast.

 

The sleep is Siren's Song, and it's not a bad power at all, at least compared to other sleep powers.

[Frosticus]

Meh I'd just like them to speed up shout a lot. Cut a full second and a half off that animation.  I think one time I hit a target that wasn't already dead on a team. 

Howl could be a bit faster. Shockwave could be faster too.

Screech would be nice if it did damage like the sentinel version

shriek and scream should have a bit slower base recharge.

[Bartacus]

Actually, let me explain why these powers are problematic to say the least. You say that I can either play on a sentinel or just skip the powers if I find them to be useless. The problem with this is that every power in every set, ideally, should be fighting for a power slot. They all should be good enough that they are worth taking. I think this is the ideal balance that this game would have, although it is difficult to achieve. I do not believe they are worth taking, and I will explain why below. But first, to clear one thing up, just because some people are content taking a power in this game does not make it good or very useful. Many people that play this game do not play to min/max. Many people are content enjoying even the shittiest of powers. I am one of those people, sometimes. I use Voltaic Sentinel for example. I am thankful for other people that do this, and that make thematic characters regardless of how good the powers are because its refreshing to see. But, just because some are willing to choose these abilities does not make them inherently good or very useful.

 

An example of this is force field. This powerset woefully underperforms. I love force field because of the theme, and have a bubbler that I enjoy. Lots of people love force field. But it is not very useful in the game right now (relative to others support sets), especially at 50. There are far too many powers in force field that are not worth picking up. Detention Field, and Repulsion Bomb especially. You may find use for force bubble, the T9, but many skip that too. Some may take Force Bolt for the luls or for lower level cc... but largely, there are tons of skippable powers in the set because they are not worth casting compared to other abilities.

 

This is because of the mechanics of the game and something I will hereafter call an attack chain (no condescension intended). If you are casting one ability, it means you are not casting another. When you cast Repulsion Bomb, you are (for 3 seconds) not casting another abililty AND your other, more useful abilities are recharging. I must reiterate, I know that some people take Repulsion Bomb. But, if you do, you are using 3 seconds of your attack chain for a very low DPA ability that provides CC that most teams would rather avoid (unless you slot a KB -> KD). This to say, if I'm casting that, I'm not casting any of my other abilities that either are much better DPA or have a more useful effect. This means that Repulsion Bomb is not a very useful ability, because there are other abilities that will do something similar or better, with more damage and less casting time. As a result, this power is very skippable and does not have a compelling case for one to bother using a slot on it. 

 

Why am I talking about Force Field? Because it illustrates the problem I am trying to address here. This is the very same problem, but I am trying only to address the specific low damage CC abilities in blasting sets instead of all of the abilities in the game that are not useful for the average attack chain. I believe that especially in Sonic and in Electric Blasting, they're reasonably bad because you have to choose between damage and CC where other sets do not have to make this choice. Freeze Ray is both. Lancer Shot is both. Abyssal Gaze is both. And there's no real reason for it. Moreover, the targets you'd want to use single target CC on are usually bosses and you will sacrifice a considerable amount of DPS to use these abilities in your attack chain. This means that you're making a choice over whether you want CC or damage, and when you're 50 the single target CC doesn't tend to matter as much because you're in much less danger.

Moreover, in the case of Electric Blasting and Sonic Blasting, they lack multiple other single target damage abilities besides their T1 and T2 abilities. This forces you to take both T1 and T2 abilities for a single target attack chain (usually needs 3 abilities) where many other blasting sets only need to take one, since there are other, better options available. Fire Blasting has Blaze and Snipe in addition to their T1/T2. Water has Dehydrate and Water Jet. Even Dual Pistols has Executioner Shot and Piercing Rounds and its a set that has one of these low damage CC abilities (which is perhaps why I forgot it to begin with). Not every set needs to be a single target god, to be clear. But a QoL change and buff here I think is warranted and certainly smooths out the gameplay for Electric and Sonic. 

For the other sets in question that have abilities like this - they may not need it as much, but I welcome any change like this that makes you have to make a significant choice in which abilities to pick up rather than just neglecting these abilities entirely because they won't be used in almost any attack chain. The slight benefit to having them does not outweigh the cost unless you want them as a set mule.

I'd rather people have to make the choice between multiple powers that are very useful than just neglect these powers entirely because there are obvious, better choices to pick up. 

[Bartacus]

2 hours ago, Itikar said:

No, screech is the stun of Sonic Blast.

 

The sleep is Siren's Song, and it's not a bad power at all, at least compared to other sleep powers.

Sirens Song does have low damage, but is unique in that it's an AoE Sleep ability in a blasting set that still deals damage. It's not bad, tbh, I agree. 

[Itikar]

10 hours ago, Bartacus said:

Actually, let me explain why these powers are problematic to say the least.

Finally some good and reasoned points. I am really glad to read them and I believe this does really help making the proposal seem more reasonable and thoughtful. I will still argue with these points to further try to see whether there are other points that need to be addressed, but I wanted to say in advance that now your argument does look stronger.

 

Now, the main issue I see here is that you are looking at this topic with a min-maxer mentality, and I commend you for your sincerity in admitting that. A min-maxer mentality can be effectively useful in comparing numbers, but at the same time, it cannot be the main concern when analyzing a balanced mechanic in a roleplaying video-game, for the simple reason that unless all abilities, in our cases powersets, differ merely cosmetically from each other, there will always be a better or worse powerset and a better or worse power to take. This does not mean they should not be reviewed and their shortcomings addressed to achieve a better balance, but just focusing on that aspect is not going to work. It may work for powers intended to do the same, like comparing charged bolts to, say, dark blast, but it does not work as well when you compare a crowd control power to a damaging one. They are simply not the same thing.

 

For instance your mention of force fields is pretty telling. That's a powerset that revolves around two things: defence and knockback. Defence can be easily capped at least on some archetypes, and with more difficulty on others, and defence is also the more passive aspect of that powerset to boot. Knockback, well, is a large and complex topic that I believe goes way beyond the aims of this thread, so I will not digress much on it, but I will just say two obvious things: the first is that with a portion of the playerbase it is not very popular, to say the least, and the second is that you can fix a power but not the way people look at things. That's true for you, for me, and for the people who loathe or love knockback. But in the end if you don't like knockback don't play force fields, and maybe also energy blast and peacebringers too. Furthermore what should archetypes that are built around crowd control say in this regard, then? Well, controllers' woes are known, but I sincerely doubt turning the mezs on blast set into damaging powers with a mez will fix the issues with crowd control.

 

Also, to be clear, Repulsion Bomb is a bad example, since first it does knockdown, and second it's generally an opener, comparable to assassin's strike from hiding. You mentioned the single one power from force fields on which KB -> KD enhancements would be wasted.

 

Now to be fair I will give you one thing, even if the comparison of crowd control powersets with blasting sets is wrong, because they are supposed to do different things, it must be made clear the aim of a blasting set is not to mez stuff, but to actually, well, blast stuff. Defenders and corruptors lend themselves to other considerations, to be honest, but as far as blasters are concerned, their blasts are supposed to blast, no point to argue otherwise there. If they also mez, good, but I cannot disagree a power that only mezzes without doing much damage is a little odd on a blasting set of a blaster.

 

I am mentioning this because it ties to one of the examples you made: Dark Blast. You did mention Abyssal Gaze, which replaces Dark Pit on the blast set, but which is actually more similar to Petrifying Gaze from Dark Miasma, but I will also add Torrent to it. Torrent on defender and corruptor does little damage and even among Knockback powers it's by no means a bad one, but not a good one either, and I am saying this as someone who enjoys using knockback to my advantage when I play powersets with that feature. On blasters and sentinels, on the other hand, there is Umbral Torrent that also does (significant) damage, and it makes sense since those archetypes are meant to deal damage, the debuffs and crowd control are icing on the cake.

 

This further ties to the matter of archetype differences that cannot be ignored in a proposal like this. Specifically, going back to Screech and Sonic Blast, the difference between Sentinel's version and the other archetypes' version is not just in the damage. Currently, and I must reprimand you for overlooking this point, Screech is the one attack from the set that offers the longest lasting resistance debuff after the nuke. That means that on a defender, for instance, whose damage would not be great to begin with, if you want to focus on reducing resistance you are likely using screech in your attack chain, even if its damage is negligible. But this is true also for the other archetypes should they want to focus on that aspect, even if it would be less effective than on a defender. Why am I mentioning this? Because on the Sentinel version the damage increase did not come without a price and that price was among other things a lowering of the damage resistance debuff on Screech and other attacks. This is in part made up by the T1 and T2 inherent debuff, but other archetypes do not have this. That said, at the same time, this does not mean one should either go all the way, the damage increase might be a little lower than on Sentinel and still be all right, for instance, and I doubt that would create any imbalance, no question there, but still I do not feel this point in an accurate analysis of Screech should be overlooked.

 

This ties in to a further point, however, which is that it's pointless to watch yourself from the kicks of fleas and not from those of elephants, as a proverb says in my native language. What I mean with that is that it's all nice and dandy to buff an ability of an underperforming powerset, it certainly will not hurt, but in the end, if you have a problem with 5 powers over nine, making one of the other 4 better won't fix the other 5. Take for example Electrical Blast, yeah, I will be honest and say that powerset needs all the help it can get and that making tesla cage a damaging ability, especially on blaster, would not be a bad thing. But the issue here is that tesla cage, in the end, works as intended, it's charged bolts, lightning bolt, ball of lightning, thunderous blast and most of all voltaic sentinel that need to be revised. That would fix the powerset, not improving tesla cage, even if it would certainly not be unwelcome. Going back to Sonic blast, it seems to me its problems, if they are indeed there, lie more in its damaging powers, especially with the DPA of Shout, than with Screech. Furthermore the matter with stuns seems more about the fact they lack good sets and procs than in the mez itself being worse than others. Compare for instance with confuse that has the best purple set or with holds that have Basilisk's Gaze and Lockdown, and many useful procs. Now, to be fair, if those problems you and other mention are there, and I am not unwilling to accept some things might not be right there, I believe a fix across the board, rather than for a single power on a single powerset, would be what is truly needed.

 

Lastly I want to close saying I agree with your closing statements, that there should be multiple significant choices. I think that so far a good job has been made in showing the aspects that are connected with this proposal and of the other gameplay aspects connected to it.

Edited March 3, 2020 by Itikar

[Bartacus]

9 minutes ago, Itikar said:

Finally some good and reasoned points.

Yeah, I really only used force field as an example of a powerset that has way too many powers that I feel are "skippable" and why that's a problem... I didn't really intend to talk about force fields shortcomings specifically as much as use it as an example of a set where you don't have to make very many meaninful choices when it comes to power selection. You may have a different opinion on that, but I think the principle still stands that if the game were perfectly balanced, each power in a powerset would be 'fighting' for a spot in your selection. I feel that this is probably the most important thing to consider.

I will say that I don't understand what the problem is with Charged Bolts, Lightning Bolt, and Ball of Lightning from electricity. They all seem pretty standard for T1/T2/Targeted AoE blasting abilities from the standpoint of DPA, and therefore don't seem like the problem for Electrical Blast. Sentinel needs buffed, most agree. And Thunderous Blast is bugged if I remember correctly? The recharge isn't proper? I can't remember. I have been playing a storm/Elec defender lately and Thunderous blast seems fine to me. I think, to me, this comes back to attack chain overall. Most sets have 2 single target abilities AFTER their T1/T2 abilities. Most attack chains, given some recharge, probably only needs 3. This means for sonic and for electric, you must take both T1 and T2 (which tend to have similar DPA) to have a decent single target attack chain. I think that kind of sucks, and feels bad, which is why I called out Sonic and Electric to begin with. 

I did neglect to mention that Screech has a 12 second duration on the -Res debuff, and as such this would be a significant buff for Sonic in particular. I think on Defenders, though, many will still skip Screech despite that fact. Is the extra 4 seconds of -Res worth it when considering that it does negligible damage? Certainly not when solo. Maybe when you're in a team, but even then it is debatable. This said, I still believe that while it is a buff it would not exactly 'break' Sonic Blasting and make Screech too powerful. In the case of Sentinels, I could be wrong but I just assumed the -Res numbers were adjusted because of how durable they are not because of the Screech change. This to say, it's not a fair assumption that they changed the debuff numbers BECAUSE of the screech change (unless this was stated somewhere that I was unaware of). 

All in all, I still think that this would be a nice buff to some underperforming sets and a good QoL change for others to provide a more meaningful choice when considering whether or not to pick this power up. I have doubts that many people pick it up in Archery or Psychic Blast, but it sure would make sense that they had to choose between that power and something else instead of defaulting to not picking it up. 

[Itikar]

24 minutes ago, Bartacus said:

They all seem pretty standard for T1/T2/Targeted AoE blasting abilities from the standpoint of DPA, and therefore don't seem like the problem for Electrical Blast.

There is not just DPA to attacks, in particular to attacks that are meant to also debuff. In the case of electrical blast a very glaring issue of the powerset is that its endurance drain does not scale across archetypes, and that is noticeable on those abilities the most, although for fairness one should also add zapp to them, since it's affected by the same issue as well, even if by itself it's a good power, and the one attack with the best endurance drain after the nuke and short circuit.

 

24 minutes ago, Bartacus said:

and a good QoL change

Of all things you said I find that this one is the most disagreeable, even if it is just a matter of semantics. This proposal is around balance and power, not quality of life. And there is nothing wrong with that, to be clear, but quality of life, in my book, qualifies a different type of proposals. To make an example concerning electrical sets, finding a a way to turn force of thunder on electricity manipulation into a sustenance toggle could fall under quality of life, buffing the damage of a power like tesla cage is another thing entirely and it has really little to do with quality of life.

Edited March 3, 2020 by Itikar

[MunkiLord]

16 hours ago, Itikar said:

No, screech is the stun of Sonic Blast.

 

The sleep is Siren's Song, and it's not a bad power at all, at least compared to other sleep powers.

Thanks for the clarification! In that case nevermind my comment as I was wrong. 

[Bartacus]

3 hours ago, Itikar said:

There is not just DPA to attacks, in particular to attacks that are meant to also debuff. In the case of electrical blast a very glaring issue of the powerset is that its endurance drain does not scale across archetypes, and that is noticeable on those abilities the most, although for fairness one should also add zapp to them, since it's affected by the same issue as well, even if by itself it's a good power, and the one attack with the best endurance drain after the nuke and short circuit.

 

Of all things you said I find that this one is the most disagreeable, even if it is just a matter of semantics. This proposal is around balance and power, not quality of life. And there is nothing wrong with that, to be clear, but quality of life, in my book, qualifies a different type of proposals. To make an example concerning electrical sets, finding a a way to turn force of thunder on electricity manipulation into a sustenance toggle could fall under quality of life, buffing the damage of a power like tesla cage is another thing entirely and it has really little to do with quality of life.

The proposal for the other sets in question (such as Psy), not electric/sonic I think is a QoL change. There's no question it would be a slight buff as well, but I think for something like Psychic blast it is less about not having a single target attack chain (it has plenty of those) and more about being able to choose which of them you prefer. That seems like primarily a QoL change to me. 

For Electric/Sonic, it would certainly be primarily a buff. 

Edited March 3, 2020 by Bartacus