Weekly Discussion 55: Power Pools!

[arcane]

12 hours ago, xl8 said:

New Power Pool: Chance

1. "Dodger" -10% ToHit aura ally buff affecting 8 targets max. Duration 30s.

2. "Coin Toss" 50% chance to boost all powers by 25%, 50% chance to reduce all powers by 25%. Duration 10s.

3. "Karma" Intangibility, plus all enemy powers reflected for 30s.

4. "God Of Gamblers" Debuff immunity. Auto self.

3 and 4 sound *obscenely* broken unless you have some serious caveats to unveil to us.

[xl8]

7 minutes ago, arcaneholocaust said:

3 and 4 sound *obscenely* broken unless you have some serious caveats to unveil to us.

Karma would have a long cooldown and although all enemy attacks would be reflected (providing brief immunity) only a portion would affect the original caster--similar mechanism as proc per minute.
God of Gamblers would require 2 other powers from the pool, which is a heavy investment and presents a tough choice about which other powers and pools to forego. But... works exactly as described cannot be debuffed.

Edited June 18, 2020 by xl8

[arcane]

8 minutes ago, xl8 said:

Karma would have a long cooldown and although all enemy attacks would be reflected (providing brief immunity) only a portion would affect the original caster--similar mechanism as proc per minute.
God of Gamblers would require 2 other powers from the pool, which is a heavy investment and presents a tough choice about which other powers and pools to forego. But... works exactly as described cannot be debuffed.

Yeah, no. Absolutely overpowered beyond a shadow of a doubt.

[Zepp]

This proposal covers mechanical adjustments, it does not cover the need for broader customization options. This proposal is an emergent proposal based on feedback within this thread. I curated and adjusted these proposals, but many of them are from other posters. There are just too many posters to credit, so I would prefer to offer it as a communal effort.

I would like to make all power pools standardized as:

 

T¹_a: Requires level 4, no pool investment

T¹_b: Requires level 4, no pool investment

T¹_c: Requires level 4, no pool investment

T²: Requires level 14, 1 pool power investment

T³: Requires level 20, 2 pool powers investment

 

Builds that are not in compliance with these requirements would continue to exist as is until respec.

 

Next, all damaging attacks would have their DpA adjusted. In addition, recharge and other effects should be consistent with equivalent level powers.

Pool Power Tier	Primary Power Set Tier Equivalent
T1	T3
T2	T6
T3	T7

 

Next, there may need to be some fine-tuning of individual sets. --Only adjustments to non-origin pools are being written about for the most part--

 

Inherent Fitness:

T⁰_a: Swift: Add 20% recharge

 

Concealment:

T¹_b: Invisibility: Revert changes (affects only self, no defense reduction in combat).

T²: Misdirection: Addition of +Placate and -Res IO sets (sets need to be developed).

T³: Phase Shift: Add +Res (All Dmg) equivalent to Tough but only effective while intangible.

 

Fighting:

Power Pool Standardization and DpA adjustments would be sufficient for this set.

 

Flight:

T¹_b: Fly: Speed cap increased to 75. (This cap increase is only in effect with Super Jump).

T¹_c: Hover: Base speed increased by 50%.

T²: Afterburner: Speed cap increased to 85, upgradable to 90. (80/85 when affecting Mystic Flight). [consider making an auto power, reducing defense ~1/2 Hover and removing the "Affect only Self" tag]

T³: Group Fly: Change from toggle to PBAoE (60s cooldown 120s effect). Remove the -Acc.

 

Leadership:

T¹_abc: Assault, Tactics, Maneuvers: 20-25% reduction in Endurance Cost.

T³: Victory Rush: Recharge reduction 300s->150s, duration increase 2s->10s.

 

Leaping:

T¹_b: Super Jump: Speed cap increased to 95. (This cap increase is only in effect with Super Jump).

T²: Acrobatics: Add +Res (Immobilize, Stun, Smashing, Lethal). S/L Resistance equivalent to half of Tough.

 

Medicine:

T¹_a: Injection: Reduce Cast to 1.5 (same as Poison Dart for Widows).

T¹_b: Aid Other: Reduce Cast to 1.67, make PBAoE.

T¹_c: Aid Self: Reduce cast to 1.17.

T²: Field Medic: Convert to Auto power. In addition to current secondary effects, adds a 40% Absorb Shield to Aid Self, a 20% Absorb Shield to Aid Other, and doubles the effect duration of Injection.

T³: Resuscitate: Reduce Cast to 3, increase debt protection to 30s. Increase range to 40'.

 

Presence:

T¹_b: Intimidate: Reduce Recharge to 10s.

T¹_c: Pacify: Addition of +Placate IO sets (sets need to be developed)

T³: Unrelenting: Recharge 600s->300s. Duration 30s->60s. +Dmg 25%->15%.

(Fear added to Containment for Controllers).

 

Speed:

T¹_b: Super Speed: Speed cap increased to 105. (This cap increase is only in effect with Super Jump).

T¹_c: Hasten: Toggle 0.19/s endurance cost. +Recharge reduced to 50%, add +Res (Smashing, Lethal, Energy, Negative, Fire, Cold) S/L equivalent to 25% Tough, E/N/F/C equivalent to 50% Tough.

T²: Burnout: Reduce Recharge to 600s.

T³: Whirlwind: KB 2.08->0.03. -ToHit 15%. Addition of -Res IO sets (sets need to be developed).

 

Teleportation:

T¹_a: Recall: Can target ally or enemy, brings target to caster, never causes in-game aggro. Cast time around 2-3s (no interrupt), recharge around 4s.

T¹_b: Tactical Teleport: Range= 30', +Def (all [equivalent to Combat Jump]), +Res(Teleportation) duration 60s. Uses Jaunt animation. Recharge around 3-5s.

T¹_c: Group Teleport: Cast time reduced to .67s, endurance reduced to 1. Hover tar is 6s and cancelled by movement. Affects self, team, & pets within 30' range.

T²: Long-Range Teleport: Cast time reduced to 3s. Expand the number of choices to include most zones and current mission.

T³: Teleport Assault: Chain attack (up to 16 targets). -Def, 50% chance for Mag 3 Fear, 10% chance for Mag 5 fear. Takes ranged AoE enhancements.

Edited June 18, 2020 by Zepp

[arcane]

Hard no to most of that, Zepp. Again, I’m of the opinion that we should focus on throwing a lil bone to the struggling powers pools without making the entire game even easier.

[drbuzzard2]

2 hours ago, arcaneholocaust said:

Yeah, no. Absolutely overpowered beyond a shadow of a doubt.

I didn't mention this fact, but yes, it is utterly broken. Everyone would make room for a power which made you immune to debuffs. I'd live on ninja run and sprint even though I love fly for that.

[Sakura Tenshi]

not sure what to add to this conversation beyond a few things (probably already well-treaded).

1. it'd be nice if pool attacks were stronger/more worthwhile than feeling like just taxes to get the better powers. I'd be nice if the fighting pool attacks were legitimately good enough to be sort of an attack chain together.
2. I kind of wish origin pools were not exclusive. I can sort of understand since the tier 4s are mini-tier 9 armors powers. Maybe just those parts could be made exclusive?
3. my real pink-unicorn wish would be if someday, it were possibly to basically select 1 power pool at creation and it basically becomes a 'third powerset' for our characters with powers which automatically unlock as we level and do not count towards max powerpool count or origin pool limitations. The drawback could be that, while buffed to be more effective than normal, they could not be slotted. Conceptually the idea would be to allow a player to have their origin or travel pools just as part of their character without needing to wait to start on it.

But these are all pretty rough and vague ideas. I get why they wouldn't happen but it'd be nice.

[Zepp]

9 hours ago, arcaneholocaust said:

Hard no to most of that, Zepp. Again, I’m of the opinion that we should focus on throwing a lil bone to the struggling powers pools without making the entire game even easier.

Could you point out any specific areas where I have made a suggestion that was in any way "making the entire game easier"? I'm definitely open to revising any area of the suggestion, just let me know rather than offering vague and unsupported assertions that can not be acted on.

[arcane]

21 hours ago, Zepp said:

In addition, recharge and other effects should be consistent with equivalent level powers. [Pools and Primary Powers should not be compared...]

Pool Power Tier	Primary Power Set Tier Equivalent
T1	T3
T2	T6
T3	T7

 

Inherent Fitness:

T⁰_a: Swift: Add 20% recharge

 

Leadership:

T¹_abc: Assault, Tactics, Maneuvers: 20-25% reduction in Endurance Cost.

 

Leaping:

T¹_b: Super Jump: Speed cap increased to 95. (This cap increase is only in effect with Super Jump).

T²: Acrobatics: Add +Res (Immobilize, Stun, Smashing, Lethal). S/L Resistance equivalent to half of Tough.

 

Medicine:

T²: Field Medic: Convert to Auto power. In addition to current secondary effects, adds a 40% Absorb Shield to Aid Self, a 20% Absorb Shield to Aid Other, and doubles the effect duration of Injection.

 

Presence:

T³: Unrelenting: Recharge 600s->300s. Duration 30s->60s. +Dmg 25%->15%.

(Fear added to Containment for Controllers).

 

Speed:

T¹_b: Super Speed: Speed cap increased to 105. (This cap increase is only in effect with Super Jump).

T¹_c: Hasten: Toggle 0.19/s endurance cost. +Recharge reduced to 50%, add +Res (Smashing, Lethal, Energy, Negative, Fire, Cold) S/L equivalent to 25% Tough, E/N/F/C equivalent to 50% Tough.

T³: Whirlwind: KB 2.08->0.03. -ToHit 15%. Addition of -Res IO sets (sets need to be developed).

Here, Zepp. I've deleted everything that sounds like common sense balance and left only quoted parts that sound more like broad power creep than balance.

 

EDIT: Deleted half the ones I left to be nice and to differentiate between the soft no's and hard no's.

Edited June 19, 2020 by arcaneholocaust

[Frostbiter]

Fly could stand to have its speed and cap revisited. Taking a 3rd power in the pool just for increasing the flight cap to where its competitive vs other travel powers is obviously a work around by the OG Devs. Hover speeds are fine, especially with a few boosts to travel powers from IO sets.

Edited June 19, 2020 by Frostbiter

[Redlynne]

I would actually prefer to see pools revert from having 5 powers in them back to only having 4 powers in each pool.

A lot of the 5th powers added to pools are either unnecessary or do wonky things to the overall game balance.

 

There, I said it.

[Zepp]

5 hours ago, arcaneholocaust said:

Here, Zepp. I've deleted everything that sounds like common sense balance and left only quoted parts that sound more like broad power creep than balance.

 

EDIT: Deleted half the ones I left to be nice and to differentiate between the soft no's and hard no's.

So you are opposed to pool powers being competitive with primary/secondary powers and for specialized travel powers to be competitive with origin mixed travel powers. Nnow I understand your position. Still don't know why you believe that, just what you believe.

 

Power creep is the increase in power of toons, not bringing extremely underperforming powers to similar levels as current powers is not power creep, it is balancing. Allowing powers available at level 4 to be roughly equivalent to powers available at level 2 isn't even close to power creep. Same for 14/12 and 20/18. Also, go back and read the discourse on Hasten in this thread or the suggestion page.

Edited June 19, 2020 by Zepp

[arcane]

1 minute ago, Zepp said:

So you are opposed to pool powers being competitive with primary/secondary powers and for specialized travel powers to be competitive with origin mixed travel powers. Nnow I understand your position. Still don't know why you believe that, just what you believe.

 

Power creep is the increase in power of toons, not bringing extremely underperforming powers to similar levels as current powers is not power creep, it is balancing. Allowing powers available at level 4 to be roughly equivalent to powers available at level 2 isn't even close to power creep. Same for 14/12 and 20/18. Also, go back and read the discourse on Hasten in this thread or the suggestion page.

Thinking power pools and primary powers shouldn’t be comparable isn’t an opinion. It’s how the game is designed. 
 

As far as hasten goes, for a pool power toggle to give that much +recharge, your proposed endurance cost probably needs to be tripled.

[Redlynne]

4 minutes ago, Zepp said:

So you are opposed to pool powers being competitive with primary/secondary powers

 

1 minute ago, arcaneholocaust said:

Thinking power pools and primary powers shouldn’t be comparable isn’t an opinion. It’s how the game is designed.

 

Primary

Secondary

Tertiary (ie. Pools)

... in that order.

 

By design and by explicit intent, Pool powers are NOT intended to "compete" with or otherwise overshadow the effectiveness of primary or secondary powers.  It's the same reason why powersets that appear in a primary for one Archetype are "less effective" when that same powerset appears in the secondary for a different Archetype.  The exact same thinking, game design and explicitly stated developer intent (from day one!) also creates a gap in effectiveness between secondary and pool powers.

 

The fact that this needs to be pointed out to people and explicitly enumerated just goes to show what I keep needing to say in threads like this.

 

You can lead a man to water, but you cannot make him THINK.

 

9 minutes ago, Zepp said:

and for specialized travel powers to be competitive with origin mixed travel powers.

 

Nice strawman you've got there.

Uh oh, I see a herd of hungry cows coming for it ...

[arcane]

Exactly. Powers are NOT balanced solely on level acquired (in fact, they barely are at all in that sense) but on where you get them from. Your epic power pools do not have those worse stats because of when you got them; they have worse stats because they aren't your primary or secondary role. Multipliers affecting damage, endurance cost, recharge, defense, resistance, etc should be best for primaries, then secondaries, then epics, then power pools, then inherents by design. It may seem to make some powers worthless, but power pool attacks just barely edging out brawl is absolutely consistent with the game design going back 15+ years.

 

That said, there is a very obvious preference towards certain pools throughout the history of this game, so the least popular pools (medicine, presence, teleport) should probably get thrown a bone if devs are going to spend time on power pools right now.

Edited June 19, 2020 by arcaneholocaust

[Frostbiter]

So how does all this talk of tertiary pools being less powerful than Primary and Secondary apply to Hasten?

[plainguy]

Someone mentioned Field Medic auto power.. Yes.. +1 Here.. 

 

[Zepp]

The scaling that already exists would keep them in line. At the moment we have primary/secondary/sitting around twiddling your thumbs/pool powers level scaling.

 

Basing your arguments on irrational authoritarianism "because the original game designers said so a couple decades ago" is not convincing. Why do you believe the continuation of this flawed game design principle is beneficial? Make an argument, not an appeal to authority, and I will consider altering my proposal. I am not ignoring you, y'all just haven't made any rational arguments.

 

Also, by your authoritarian consideration, shouldn't origin pool travel powers be ranked below power pools rather than being nigh twice as powerful? Wouldn't my suggested adjustment fit into your authoritarian theological stance?

Edited June 19, 2020 by Zepp

[Sakura Tenshi]

oh, another suggestion about powerpools: make field medic power a passive auto power that's always on? I know that's an incredibly redundant statement, but I can't stress how useless it kind of is when it's a click buff with a limited duration that removes the interrupt from the medicine pool for only a minute or so.

[Redlynne]

2 hours ago, Zepp said:

Basing your arguments on irrational authoritarianism "because tge original game designers said so a couple decades ago" is not convincing. Why do you believe the continuation of this flawed game design principle is beneficial? Make an argument, not an appeal to authority, and I will consider altering my proposal. I am not ignoring you, y'all just haven't made any rational arguments.

 

Also, by your authoritarian consideration, shouldn't origin pool travel powers be ranked below power pools rather than being nigh twice as powerful? Wouldn't my suggested adjustment fit into your authoritarian theological stance?

You're always welcome to download the server software, alter it to your personal specifications, put it online and invite everyone to come over and play on your perfectly balanced realm.

 

After all, if you're going to accuse people who disagree with you of bowing to "irrational authoritarianism" it would therefore be incumbent upon you to liberate them from the tyranny of the Cryptic Studios/Paragon Studios development legacy ... no?

 

 

 

Also, nice job of inserting Whataboutism into your reply in the last paragraph (quoted above).

It's very in keeping with the rest of your rhetorical jabs.

Quote

 

Whataboutism, also known as whataboutery, is a variant of the tu quoque logical fallacy that attempts to discredit an opponent's position by charging them with hypocrisy without directly refuting or disproving their argument.^[1][2][3]

 

Whataboutism is particularly associated with Soviet and Russian propaganda.^[4][5][6] When criticisms were leveled at the Soviet Union during the Cold War, the Soviet response would often be "What about ..." followed by an event in the Western world.^[7][8][9] According to Russian writer and political activist Garry Kasparov, it is a word that was coined to describe the frequent use of a rhetorical diversion by Soviet apologists and dictators, who would counter charges of their oppression, "massacres, gulags, and forced deportations" by invoking American slavery, racism, lynchings, etc.^[10] Whataboutism has been used by other politicians and countries as well.

 

 

[Zepp]

26 minutes ago, Redlynne said:

You're always welcome to download the server software, alter it to your personal specifications, put it online and invite everyone to come over and play on your perfectly balanced realm.

 

After all, if you're going to accuse people who disagree with you of bowing to "irrational authoritarianism" it would therefore be incumbent upon you to liberate them from the tyranny of the Cryptic Studios/Paragon Studios development legacy ... no?

 

 

 

Also, nice job of inserting Whataboutism into your reply in the last paragraph (quoted above).

It's very in keeping with the rest of your rhetorical jabs.

 

The discussion here is about how things ought to be. Making arguments based on authority, well isn't really making arguments in any rational sense. Bringing powers in line with current scaling allows for attack powers in pools, that are generally irrelevant, to become useful and improve character diversity. I develop curriculum, and at every stage I have to analyze whether activities are pedagogically sound and comparatively efficacious for the goals of the courses (and whether the goals are rationally and pedagogically sound). Keeping an activity because I like it or because it's always been there is irrational.

 

Maintaining broken systems for authoritarian (in the philosophical, not the governmental sense - something that you either accidentally or intentionally confused) justifications is in direct opposition to rational discourse. I made no rhetorical jabs, I debunked your justifications (they weren't in the strictest sense arguments) and pointed out a logical contradiction to demonstrate that neither you nor arcaneholocaust were willing to follow your justifications to their logical conclusions.

So, unless you have the intent to offer arguments and productive discourse, I think this is the end of our interaction in this thread.

And, as I have stated and demonstrated throughout this thread (and others), I am willing and interested in amending my proposal. But the amendments must be rationally justifiable. The entire proposal has been developed through forum discourse. It is not, strictly speaking, my proposal. I compiled and curated large portions of it.

Edited June 19, 2020 by Zepp

[Palladiamors]

Might I suggest a Mastermind inspired power pool,  called "Hired Help"?  Three basic summons and two buffs for them.  Nothing major,  a low DPS pet,  a simple debuffer pet,  and a simple healer pet.  The first pet can use a pistol or even just use basic fighting pool attacks,  the second can debuff defense/resistence,  to-hit,  and recharge,  and the third can do basic small single target heal,  basic group wide AoE,  and a basic HoT,  either AoE or single target.  First buff gives the second attack listed,  third gives the third ability.  Nice,  simple,  and thematic.  Further it can help some sets earlier on like controllers without being too much in the long run.  Also by 'basic' I mean 'lower than merc medic heal'.

Also throwing in my voice for a single pistol pool.

[ImpousVileTerror]

I think a lot of these new Pool ideas can be tackled with a different method; one which has been bounced around a lot over the past year but not yet fleshed out.  Different names have been tacked on to the projects, but the premise is "side game content."  Outward progression, rather than upward; content which allows players to essentially "craft" things like Pistols or Hired Help.  Similar to the P2W Vendor Temp and Prestige Powers, but built from the ground up to be accessible at all levels.

More on this idea . . . after clearing my plate of the other three projects that I'm juggling, heh.

[Frostbiter]

You can already craft pistols, bats and a few others as temp powers from recipes. Some of them are even mediocre!

 

Edit: apparently there's also a back-up radio that summons either Arachnos or PPD.

Edited June 20, 2020 by Frostbiter

[ImpousVileTerror]

Yes, as well as the Signature Summons, and the Prestige Buff Pets.  And those Powers aren't as mediocre as they might seem on paper, particularly at lower levels.

 

So what if we got some things that are on par with the Pool Powers, but were much more thematic and ranged through a tiered system?  

Similar to how those Recipes used to be random drops in game, but instead we were to redesign them to be much more accessible, with highs and lows spanning a character career.  

The usual complaints about "Power Creep" and "the game is easy enough" . . . but quick follow-up?  If the game's too easy for you already, you don't need to use these.  If you're afraid that they'll make the game too easy for other players . . . wut?  

But even still; I've got to noodle the ideas around some more yet, as they're in their earliest forms right now.  I'm considering them to be a bit of a balancing element compared to late-game Incarnate stuff.  Essentially giving players the opportunity to dedicate growth on their character outward, rather than upward (there's that catchphrase again).  As the player reached the 40s, 50, and Incarnate territory, the effectiveness of this branched content would peter out and diminish relative to the higher metric of Incarnate.

 

The short version:  New player Power content to incentivise low level play, and to help flesh out character concepts in to more realized forms for player enjoyment.