Weekly Discussion 54: Martial Arts

[GM Miss]

Weekly discussion 54 - Week 6/07/20-6/13/20:

 

⚔️YOU VOTED: Now that our Archetype discussions are over let's focus on a few powersets you guys voted on that you would like to talk about.

Next up is: Martial Arts (Doth my eyes deceive me, no dark powerset?)⚔️

 

❓Things to think about:

>Here is a link on Martial Arts: https://hcwiki.cityofheroes.dev/wiki/Martial_Arts

>How does it compare to other DPS sets?

>What would you change?

>What do you love?

 

Don't just use these prompts, talk about whatever you want from this weeks prompt!

 

Let's Chat 😄

 

(Edit: Link to HCWiki replacing the prior, changed with permission.  -- GM Tahquitz)

Edited June 9, 2020 by GM Miss
Friends don't let friends use Fandom.

[Redlynne]

55 minutes ago, GM Miss said:

>What would you change?

Proliferate the swap of Crippling Axe Kick and Dragon's Tail to Brutes and Scrappers, not just Tankers.

 

Proliferate the +10% Defense that Tankers get to Scrappers in lieu of an additional +5% bonus critical hit chance.  This would make Storm Kick the "parry" power for Martial Arts, regardless of Archetype.

 

Remove Crane Kick (redundant) and replace with Dragon's Tail (NEEDED!!!) for Stalkers.

Speaking just for myself (of course), I'd rearrange power sequencing for Stalkers like so, to be more consistent with other Archetypes:

1  Thunder Kick

1  Storm Kick

2  Cobra Strike

6  Assassin's Blow

8  Focus Chi

12 Placate

18 Dragon's Tail

26 Crippling Axe Kick

32 Eagle's Claw

 

And finally, the motions/movements used in Eagle's Claw are FINE ... but if it could be sped up so it isn't quite so ... leisurely ... in its execution of animation, that would be great.  Same movements, just faster animating (all Archetypes).

1 hour ago, GM Miss said:

>What do you love?

The animations.

The sounds the powerset produces.

The "clean" visual FX used by the powerset, that are not wildly obscuring like some other powersets.

 

And I just LOVE this slotting for Thunder Kick ... it is just SO MUCH FUN!

Overwhelming Force - Accuracy/Damage
Overwhelming Force - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance
Overwhelming Force - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance/Recharge
Overwhelming Force - Damage/Chance for Knockdown/Knockback to Knockdown
Pounding Slugfest - Damage/Endurance
Pounding Slugfest - Disorient Bonus

 

Telling other teammates (legitimately!) ... "My sneakers are doing more damage than your sword!"

[Greycat]

I seem to recall the main complaint on live was that by 50, you were doing one of the most resisted damage types so it felt like it was falling behind.

 

Personally, I enjoyed the set, but I could see where they were coming from. (50 MA/Regen Stalker.) It *was* amusing taking that character against an MA/Regen scrapper and just calling it a draw after 15 minutes or so of just healing damage repeatedly. 🙂 Fairly sure this was pre-IO. Early IOs at most.

[Heraclea]

Biggest issue with MA isn't the set itself.   It's an older, middling melee set.  Probably better than Battle Axe.  

 

It's that now we have Street Justice.  That set occupies the 'punching and kicking character' niche quite well.  It has better debuffs, better AoE, and better control.  Martial Arts need some reason why a character would prefer it to Street Justice.  Right now it's got nothing.

Edited June 8, 2020 by Heraclea

[Peacemoon]

I love the animations for martial arts. Particularly Crane Kick. 
 

I don’t want to go off topic, but I wish Defenders and Controllers had more ‘natural’ epic power pools that could contain some of these moves.

High Pain Tolerance as the APP shield, and a good kick for good measure. 
Defenders can already get Total Focus, Greater Fire Sword, etc from APPs, I would love Crane Kick or Eagle’s Claw!

 

Also, I really wish Defenders could choose a melee attack set instead of a ranged blast set. If the damage numbers were comparable I don’t see the problem. Ranged is safer, but some Defenders can fight in melee. This is the only reason I don’t have a Martial Arts character, because it’s not available on any support AT (which is what I usually play). I would love to play a Force Fields/Martial Arts Defender, protecting everyone with zen shields!

Edited June 8, 2020 by Peacemoon

[Carnifax]

18 minutes ago, Peacemoon said:

Also, I really wish Defenders could choose a melee attack set instead of a ranged blast set. If the damage numbers were comparable I don’t see the problem. Ranged is safer, but some Defenders can fight in melee.

I'd quite like to have a few Assault sets ported to Defenders. Say Earth, Martial, Savage and Thorns since defenders don't have versions of those already. 

 

Kin/Savage sounds like it'd be a hoot. 

[DSorrow]

I like the animations of Martial Arts, but numerically the set just isn't particularly good at anything with its mediocre single target damage and below average AoE. What I think the set needs is something that either improves it defensively (the +10% Def Tankers get is great), gives it more reliable and effective crowd control (Stone Melee) or improves its damage output.

Edited June 8, 2020 by DSorrow

[Parabola]

MA is amazing on tanks but I have no experience with it on brutes or scrappers and you couldn't pay me to take it on a stalker. No aoe? Seriously?!

 

I can't help noticing that as predicted our journey through dark sets has finished before we stopped talking about sets that are absolutely fine and got onto one that would have actually been worth discussing: dark blast. Obviously totally off topic now but please can we look at the structure of the cones in dark blast to bring them closer together in range and arc?

[Damoklese]

I find it difficult to use this set on many characters just because of the animations.   They look great on certain types of characters..but only on those.  For everyone else that wants to beat someone with their fists.. street justice and super strength do the job.  Id love to see some alternate animations that are less "taekwondo" and more "Muy Thai" and "shaolin kung fu". It just feels like SJ/SS fit a LOT more themes.   That being said.. from a purely functional standpoint, martial arts just doesnt offer much.

 

If I was going to improve it, id probably lean into its niche of being for fast, agile fighter style characters.   A staple of those types of characters are the defense based sets like Ninjitsu and super reflexes.  So if you have your defense soft capped.. what would help sell Martial Arts as a primary are bonuses to resistance, some healing/absorption, and/or to-hit debuffs.

 

Some thoughts:

 

Replace Focus Chi with Defensive Stance or..i dunno.. "Horse Stance".  A toggle ability such as you might find in blaster secondaries that adds some recovery, and some absorption.   You are sacrificing some burst and gaining some durability and resource management.

 

Replace the disorient on cobra strike with a nice -to hit debuff.   Maybe add a debuff to storm kick too.  Dark has had the market cornered on -to hit for too long.

[Redlynne]

1 hour ago, Damoklese said:

Id love to see some alternate animations that are less "taekwondo"

Martial Arts set.

1 hour ago, Damoklese said:

and more "Muy Thai"

That would be Street Justice.

1 hour ago, Damoklese said:

and "shaolin kung fu"

We call that Kinetic Melee.

 

---

 

4 hours ago, Heraclea said:

It's that now we have Street Justice.  That set occupies the 'punching and kicking character' niche quite well.  It has better debuffs, better AoE, and better control.  Martial Arts need some reason why a character would prefer it to Street Justice.  Right now it's got nothing.

 

3 hours ago, DSorrow said:

What I think the set needs is something that either improves it defensively (the +10% Def Tankers get is great), gives it more reliable and effective crowd control (Stone Melee) or improves its damage output.

 

I will say that one of the more frustrating things about Martial Arts is the baked in inconsistency of the status effects that you can't do anything about.

• Thunder Kick ... 10% chance for a 7.152s mag 2 Stun
• Cobra Strike ... 75% chance for a 11.92s mag 3 Stun
• Crane Kick ... 60% chance for a mag 7.789 Knockback
• Crippling Axe Kick ... 100% chance for a 11.92s mag 2 Immobilize with a 50% chance for an additional 11.92s mag 1 Immobilize
• Dragon's Tail ... 75% chance for a mag 0.67 Knockback
• Eagle's Claw ... 100% chance for a 4.768s mag 3 Stun

This makes the powerset's performance really inconsistent.  REALLY REALLY INCONSISTENT.  Every status effect is a "maybe" except for Crippling Axe Kick and Eagle's Claw.

 

In this case, however, I would like to think that Crippling Axe Kick is pointing to a solution to this (legitimate!) complaint against Martial Arts, and it would be remarkably simple to implement.  You basically take the above and do this with it:

• Thunder Kick ... 100% chance for a 7.152s mag 1 Stun with a 10% chance for an additional 7.152s mag 1 Stun
• Cobra Strike ... 100% chance for a 11.92s mag 2 Stun with a 75% chance for an additional 11.92s mag 1 Stun
• Crane Kick ... 100% chance for a 0.75 Knockback with a 60% chance for an additional mag 6.039 Knockback
• Crippling Axe Kick ... 100% chance for a 11.92s mag 2 Immobilize with a 50% chance for an additional 11.92s mag 1 Immobilize
• Dragon's Tail ... 100% chance for a mag 0.67 Knockup
• Eagle's Claw ... 100% chance for a 7.152s mag 2 Stun with a 100% chance for an additional 4.768s mag 1 Stun

What these changes do is enforce a consistent "partial" effect of magnitude 1 or 2, so as to make the underlying attack "always meaningful" for stacking, but then applies a chance for the additional magnitude on a percent chance basis.  This holds the maximum performance steady, while only raising the minimum performance of the powers.  Crippling Axe Kick stays as is, Dragon's Tail changes slightly (improved chance and swapping KnockBACK for KnockUP so as to not hurl $Targets away from you with really high magnitudes), and Eagle's Claw gets an underlying bump in duration (vs Minions) that matches Thunder Kick for better in-set stacking potential, while keeping the single attack performance against higher order $Targets (Lieutenants and up) exactly the same (aside from the underlying duration buff for the mag 2 portion).

 

Would this change "revolutionize" Martial Arts?

Probably not as much as a lot of min/maxers might hope for ... but it would make Martial Arts a MUCH more consistent performer in which the name of the game for the powerset is (deliberately) STACKING the magnitudes of its various status effects in order to neutralize $Targets that you're fighting ... rather than making Martial Arts a victim of the "whims of RNGesus" (who is a fickle $DEUS that hates you).

 

Raise the minimums to reduce variability while holding the line on the performance maximums.

 

For reference, I would point out that originally Thunder Kick was a 100% chance for 7.152s mag 1 Stun (not 2 ... 1!) that was expressly designed to function as the "Stun stacker" for the powerset to make the other Stuns combo up into the mag 3-4 range consistently.  At some point, and I forget when it happened, the Live Devs switched Thunder Kick over to its present RNGesus madness and rather severely damaged the mez potential of the entire powerset.  It is that kind of misguided and flawed game design thinking that I would seek to overturn with a "blended" design of possibilities ... in which the Martial Arts powers yield a CONSISTENT baseline of mez performance (the 100% chances) combined with less than 100% chances for additional magnitude above that baseline.

 

To put it mildly, it's that kind of "lateral thinking" that leads to more consistent minimum outcomes that the game could use more of (I'm looking at you, Kheldian powersets!)

[ImpousVileTerror]

'lynne basically got to where I was going to go.

I played Martial Arts at Launch.   It had guaranteed Stun in Cobra Strike, and just generally felt like a better all-around Control'y Melee Set.   

I liked that a lot!

 

So, if we can't go back to the full value of guaranteed Stuns for fear of also returning Martial Arts to its original Damage values, then yes, please:  Make the Control consistent and easily stackable.  Let Martial Arts hold that wonderful niche of being the Melee Set which let's a Scrapper (and Stalker, and Brute, and Tanker now too) feel like they're a Controller.  I -like- that.

 

Alternatively, making Martial Arts a more self-Buff-centric Set could be an interesting direction to take it.  Each Power granting a small benefit such as Recharge, Defense, To-Hit/Damage, rather than just a select few.  Every attack flows in to the next by offering a little something-something for 5 to 10 seconds.

 

Also:

Previous thread on the topic:  https://forums.homecomingservers.com/topic/14417-fixing-martial-arts/

New Control Set idea inspired by Martial Arts:  https://forums.homecomingservers.com/topic/19887-new-powerset-suggestion-martial-control/

A little one about the animations:  https://forums.homecomingservers.com/topic/17385-kick-storm-kick-crippling-axe-kick/

Related discussion comparing Martial Arts to Street Justice:  https://forums.homecomingservers.com/topic/15505-street-justice-vs-martial-arts/

[zenijos10]

14 hours ago, Redlynne said:

Martial Arts set.

That would be Street Justice.

We call that Kinetic Melee.

 

---

 

 

 

I will say that one of the more frustrating things about Martial Arts is the baked in inconsistency of the status effects that you can't do anything about.

• Thunder Kick ... 10% chance for a 7.152s mag 2 Stun
• Cobra Strike ... 75% chance for a 11.92s mag 3 Stun
• Crane Kick ... 60% chance for a mag 7.789 Knockback
• Crippling Axe Kick ... 100% chance for a 11.92s mag 2 Immobilize with a 50% chance for an additional 11.92s mag 1 Immobilize
• Dragon's Tail ... 75% chance for a mag 0.67 Knockback
• Eagle's Claw ... 100% chance for a 4.768s mag 3 Stun

This makes the powerset's performance really inconsistent.  REALLY REALLY INCONSISTENT.  Every status effect is a "maybe" except for Crippling Axe Kick and Eagle's Claw.

 

In this case, however, I would like to think that Crippling Axe Kick is pointing to a solution to this (legitimate!) complaint against Martial Arts, and it would be remarkably simple to implement.  You basically take the above and do this with it:

• Thunder Kick ... 100% chance for a 7.152s mag 1 Stun with a 10% chance for an additional 7.152s mag 1 Stun
• Cobra Strike ... 100% chance for a 11.92s mag 2 Stun with a 75% chance for an additional 11.92s mag 1 Stun
• Crane Kick ... 100% chance for a 0.75 Knockback with a 60% chance for an additional mag 6.039 Knockback
• Crippling Axe Kick ... 100% chance for a 11.92s mag 2 Immobilize with a 50% chance for an additional 11.92s mag 1 Immobilize
• Dragon's Tail ... 100% chance for a mag 0.67 Knockup
• Eagle's Claw ... 100% chance for a 7.152s mag 2 Stun with a 100% chance for an additional 4.768s mag 1 Stun

What these changes do is enforce a consistent "partial" effect of magnitude 1 or 2, so as to make the underlying attack "always meaningful" for stacking, but then applies a chance for the additional magnitude on a percent chance basis.  This holds the maximum performance steady, while only raising the minimum performance of the powers.  Crippling Axe Kick stays as is, Dragon's Tail changes slightly (improved chance and swapping KnockBACK for KnockUP so as to not hurl $Targets away from you with really high magnitudes), and Eagle's Claw gets an underlying bump in duration (vs Minions) that matches Thunder Kick for better in-set stacking potential, while keeping the single attack performance against higher order $Targets (Lieutenants and up) exactly the same (aside from the underlying duration buff for the mag 2 portion).

 

Would this change "revolutionize" Martial Arts?

Probably not as much as a lot of min/maxers might hope for ... but it would make Martial Arts a MUCH more consistent performer in which the name of the game for the powerset is (deliberately) STACKING the magnitudes of its various status effects in order to neutralize $Targets that you're fighting ... rather than making Martial Arts a victim of the "whims of RNGesus" (who is a fickle $DEUS that hates you).

 

Raise the minimums to reduce variability while holding the line on the performance maximums.

 

For reference, I would point out that originally Thunder Kick was a 100% chance for 7.152s mag 1 Stun (not 2 ... 1!) that was expressly designed to function as the "Stun stacker" for the powerset to make the other Stuns combo up into the mag 3-4 range consistently.  At some point, and I forget when it happened, the Live Devs switched Thunder Kick over to its present RNGesus madness and rather severely damaged the mez potential of the entire powerset.  It is that kind of misguided and flawed game design thinking that I would seek to overturn with a "blended" design of possibilities ... in which the Martial Arts powers yield a CONSISTENT baseline of mez performance (the 100% chances) combined with less than 100% chances for additional magnitude above that baseline.

 

To put it mildly, it's that kind of "lateral thinking" that leads to more consistent minimum outcomes that the game could use more of (I'm looking at you, Kheldian powersets!)

 

I think this would be great.    I totally would be happy to see these changes!

 

As someone who played 100s of hours on the original servers as an MA, I offer a more radical (and possibly not possible and probably unrealistic) set of options designed to modernize the set while increasing consistency and remaining in line with the martial arts theme.  Replace Focus Chi with stances or styles that affect the following powers only: Thunder Kick, Storm Kick, Crippling Axe Kick.

 

Feral Tiger:   Each attack has a small chance to fire off a proc with the effect of the current focus chi.   I don't know how to determine an appropriate proc rate?  Make it fire off roughly twice a minute?

Drunken Monkey:  Each successful attack increases defense (melee, smashing) like parry, but a smaller amount, say 3% for ten seconds.

Iron Horse:  Each successful attack increases resistance (smashing, lethal, fire, cold) by 3% for ten seconds.

Dancing Dragon : Each attack automatically does a magnitude 1 stun in addition to whatever it normally does.

Trampling Elephant:  Each attack automatically does a magnitude 1 knockdown in addition to whatever it normally does.

 

This would recreate the feeling of classic kung fu flicks by allowing free flowing movement of martial arts style.

Edited June 9, 2020 by zenijos10

[cranebump]

My suggestion is cosmetic. The set is very "kicky." I think I'd like options to change some animations to punches. Then again, I could just play Street Justice, I suppose.:-)

[Redlynne]

46 minutes ago, cranebump said:

My suggestion is cosmetic. The set is very "kicky." I think I'd like options to change some animations to punches.

Already implemented by Cryptic Studios prior to shutdown in 2012.

The options already exist in the costume editor.

[mechahamham]

23 hours ago, Redlynne said:

 

• Dragon's Tail ... 100% chance for a mag 0.67 Knockup

Crippling Axe Kick stays as is, Dragon's Tail changes slightly (improved chance and swapping KnockBACK for KnockUP so as to not hurl $Targets away from you with really high magnitudes), a

Your suggestions are good, except for getting rid of the knockback. I like my KB on Dragon's Tail. I WANT my enemies to go hurling away so I can chase them down. There are already options for players who want to change KB. Don't take it away from those who want it.

[Black Zot]

On 6/8/2020 at 5:25 AM, Heraclea said:

 

It's that now we have Street Justice.  That set occupies the 'punching and kicking character' niche quite well.  It has better debuffs, better AoE, and better control.  

 

And doesn't look like the chop-socky stupidity that old low-budget movies passed off as "martial arts".

 

Visually speaking, no set in the game screams "I have no idea what I'm doing, please beat me to a pulp" quite like MA.

[Rathulfr]

22 minutes ago, Black Zot said:

 

And doesn't look like the chop-socky stupidity that old low-budget movies passed off as "martial arts".

 

Visually speaking, no set in the game screams "I have no idea what I'm doing, please beat me to a pulp" quite like MA.

But that's precisely why I like MA.  😁

 

[MTeague]

Brief Off-Topic:   

• I would love to see "Kick" from the Fighting pool have an additional option for animation, to look like Thunder Kick.  no boost to performance of Kick, but just look different. 

 

On Topic: 

• absolutely love @Redlynne's suggestions.  /signed
• if for whatever reason you did not want to do that, then it might make sense to look at where to squeak in some more AoE.  I do not think it needs additional AoE with Redlynne's suggestions.  A melee-control by stacking low-mag stuns would be great, but I can see that  more AoE plus stacking stuns would be a bit much.

Edited June 9, 2020 by MTeague

[Peacemoon]

1 hour ago, MTeague said:

Brief Off-Topic:   

• I would love to see "Kick" from the Fighting pool have an additional option for animation, to look like Thunder Kick.  no boost to performance of Kick, but just look different. 

 

On Topic: 

• absolutely love @Redlynne's suggestions.  /signed
• if for whatever reason you did not want to do that, then it might make sense to look at where to squeak in some more AoE.  I do not think it needs additional AoE with Redlynne's suggestions.  A melee-control by stacking low-mag stuns would be great, but I can see that  more AoE plus stacking stuns would be a bit much.

Yeah I would love to have some MA animations available elsewhere. Look how popular the martial set is for Blasters. People like doing cool kicks, it feels very super hero like being able to do some cool moves. I don’t want my hero to punch and kick as if they have no fighting prowess!

 

So yes, some MA animations for fighting would be great (cross punch is much much better than Boxing or Kick), and like I mentioned earlier, maybe some opportunity for ranged characters to get some cool moves from APPs. 

[Rathulfr]

I have a MA Scrapper named "Carioca", a master of capoeira, Brazilian martial arts.  I'd love to see some even wilder, more extreme, kicking and twirling animations for Martial Arts.  (edit: Yes, I've also trained Jump Kick, which is pretty wild.)

 

Edited June 9, 2020 by Rathulfr

[emisa]

MA is my hands down favorite powerset as far as animations go.

 

I just wish it was stronger overall. The single aoe in the set is very weak and has no other aoe powers or even cones.

a MA brute/stalker/scrapper will never outperform or even be on par with other sets. it's always underpowered imo.

 

If the powerset could have increased damage or reduced cooldown i think would solve a lot of the issues.

 

My biggest want ever more than anything for this set: give the dominator'/blaster's martial spin kick/storm kick animation to the tanker/brute/scrapper/stalker version please for the love of god. The absolute best animation for MA is stuck for only doms and blasters. it's a travesty.

[Troo]

@Redlynne seems to have a pretty good grasp on the good and meh related to MA.

 

Most succinctly: "Raise the minimums to reduce variability while holding the line on the performance maximums."

• This could be enough of a performance increase without the associated power creep.

 

Spoiler

  

On 6/7/2020 at 11:33 PM, Redlynne said:

Proliferate the swap of Crippling Axe Kick and Dragon's Tail to Brutes and Scrappers, not just Tankers.

 

Proliferate the +10% Defense that Tankers get to Scrappers in lieu of an additional +5% bonus critical hit chance.  This would make Storm Kick the "parry" power for Martial Arts, regardless of Archetype.

 

Remove Crane Kick (redundant) and replace with Dragon's Tail (NEEDED!!!) for Stalkers.

Speaking just for myself (of course), I'd rearrange power sequencing for Stalkers like so, to be more consistent with other Archetypes:

1  Thunder Kick

1  Storm Kick

2  Cobra Strike

6  Assassin's Blow

8  Focus Chi

12 Placate

18 Dragon's Tail

26 Crippling Axe Kick

32 Eagle's Claw

 

And finally, the motions/movements used in Eagle's Claw are FINE ... but if it could be sped up so it isn't quite so ... leisurely ... in its execution of animation, that would be great.  Same movements, just faster animating (all Archetypes).

The animations.

The sounds the powerset produces.

The "clean" visual FX used by the powerset, that are not wildly obscuring like some other powersets.

 

And I just LOVE this slotting for Thunder Kick ... it is just SO MUCH FUN!

Overwhelming Force - Accuracy/Damage
Overwhelming Force - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance
Overwhelming Force - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance/Recharge
Overwhelming Force - Damage/Chance for Knockdown/Knockback to Knockdown
Pounding Slugfest - Damage/Endurance
Pounding Slugfest - Disorient Bonus

 

Telling other teammates (legitimately!) ... "My sneakers are doing more damage than your sword!"

 

 

Spoiler

  

On 6/8/2020 at 6:50 AM, Redlynne said:

Martial Arts set.

That would be Street Justice.

We call that Kinetic Melee.

 

---

 

 

 

I will say that one of the more frustrating things about Martial Arts is the baked in inconsistency of the status effects that you can't do anything about.

• Thunder Kick ... 10% chance for a 7.152s mag 2 Stun
• Cobra Strike ... 75% chance for a 11.92s mag 3 Stun
• Crane Kick ... 60% chance for a mag 7.789 Knockback
• Crippling Axe Kick ... 100% chance for a 11.92s mag 2 Immobilize with a 50% chance for an additional 11.92s mag 1 Immobilize
• Dragon's Tail ... 75% chance for a mag 0.67 Knockback
• Eagle's Claw ... 100% chance for a 4.768s mag 3 Stun

This makes the powerset's performance really inconsistent.  REALLY REALLY INCONSISTENT.  Every status effect is a "maybe" except for Crippling Axe Kick and Eagle's Claw.

 

In this case, however, I would like to think that Crippling Axe Kick is pointing to a solution to this (legitimate!) complaint against Martial Arts, and it would be remarkably simple to implement.  You basically take the above and do this with it:

• Thunder Kick ... 100% chance for a 7.152s mag 1 Stun with a 10% chance for an additional 7.152s mag 1 Stun
• Cobra Strike ... 100% chance for a 11.92s mag 2 Stun with a 75% chance for an additional 11.92s mag 1 Stun
• Crane Kick ... 100% chance for a 0.75 Knockback with a 60% chance for an additional mag 6.039 Knockback
• Crippling Axe Kick ... 100% chance for a 11.92s mag 2 Immobilize with a 50% chance for an additional 11.92s mag 1 Immobilize
• Dragon's Tail ... 100% chance for a mag 0.67 Knockup
• Eagle's Claw ... 100% chance for a 7.152s mag 2 Stun with a 100% chance for an additional 4.768s mag 1 Stun

What these changes do is enforce a consistent "partial" effect of magnitude 1 or 2, so as to make the underlying attack "always meaningful" for stacking, but then applies a chance for the additional magnitude on a percent chance basis.  This holds the maximum performance steady, while only raising the minimum performance of the powers.  Crippling Axe Kick stays as is, Dragon's Tail changes slightly (improved chance and swapping KnockBACK for KnockUP so as to not hurl $Targets away from you with really high magnitudes), and Eagle's Claw gets an underlying bump in duration (vs Minions) that matches Thunder Kick for better in-set stacking potential, while keeping the single attack performance against higher order $Targets (Lieutenants and up) exactly the same (aside from the underlying duration buff for the mag 2 portion).

 

Would this change "revolutionize" Martial Arts?

Probably not as much as a lot of min/maxers might hope for ... but it would make Martial Arts a MUCH more consistent performer in which the name of the game for the powerset is (deliberately) STACKING the magnitudes of its various status effects in order to neutralize $Targets that you're fighting ... rather than making Martial Arts a victim of the "whims of RNGesus" (who is a fickle $DEUS that hates you).

 

Raise the minimums to reduce variability while holding the line on the performance maximums.

 

For reference, I would point out that originally Thunder Kick was a 100% chance for 7.152s mag 1 Stun (not 2 ... 1!) that was expressly designed to function as the "Stun stacker" for the powerset to make the other Stuns combo up into the mag 3-4 range consistently.  At some point, and I forget when it happened, the Live Devs switched Thunder Kick over to its present RNGesus madness and rather severely damaged the mez potential of the entire powerset.  It is that kind of misguided and flawed game design thinking that I would seek to overturn with a "blended" design of possibilities ... in which the Martial Arts powers yield a CONSISTENT baseline of mez performance (the 100% chances) combined with less than 100% chances for additional magnitude above that baseline.

 

To put it mildly, it's that kind of "lateral thinking" that leads to more consistent minimum outcomes that the game could use more of (I'm looking at you, Kheldian powersets!)

 

Edited June 10, 2020 by Troo
spoilers wer blanked

[Troo]

On 6/8/2020 at 1:25 AM, Heraclea said:

It's an older, middling melee set.  Probably better than Battle Axe.

whoa whoa whoa.. what's wrong with battle ax?

 

Lots of knockup & down plus an inherent hit bonus.

 

It is effective. Not as mush aoe as many, and no wierd mechanic. It's simple limiting factor is similar to MA where it's damage is lethal. (MA is smashing)

[Heraclea]

7 minutes ago, Troo said:

whoa whoa whoa.. what's wrong with battle ax?

 

Lots of knockup & down plus an inherent hit bonus.

 

It is effective. Not as mush aoe as many, and no wierd mechanic. It's simple limiting factor is similar to MA where it's damage is lethal. (MA is smashing)

Well, that's just it.  Nothing wrong with Battle Axe.  It too is a middling, older melee set.  War Mace is now better when it used to be worse.  My only point is that Martial Arts is newer and shinier and that if your concept calls for a character attacking with hands and feet, doing mostly smashing damage, it's better in the AoE and debuff department. 

[Brutal Justice]

Stacking stuns is sort of energy melee’s thing.  I like the increased crit chances and would rather see those expanded.  

 

My biggest issue is cobra strike and crane kick.  I love crane kick.  The problem is these two attacks are clones numbers wise.  I never have a reason to have both of these powers in my build.  Turn crane kick into a cleave type power.  Slightly increased range and damage with a narrow cone.  

 

The problem I have with spin kick has a little to do with the animation itself.  The animation is great!  The problem is it spins in the opposite direction as dragon’s tail.  Do a spin kick into a dragon’s tail.  Do you know how hard it is to stop the momentum of that rotation and reverse it?   Zero flow, missed opportunities.

 

The assassin strike animation is what keeps me from playing it on a stalker.  The original is bad.  The alternate is no better.  Those animations don’t feel like they fit in with the style of the rest of the set.  I propose a move like Guile’s flash kick as an assassin strike.  Leg uppercut!!

 

Expand the increased crit chances!  Cleave Crane Kick!  Leg uppercut assassin’s strike!