Weekly Discussion 61: Inherent Powers

[GM Miss]

Weekly discussion 61 - Week 7/26/20-8/01/20:

 

⚔️YOU VOTED: Let's talk about Inherent Powers!⚔️ 

 

❓Things to think about:

>Here is a link on Inherent Powers: https://hcwiki.cityofheroes.dev/wiki/Inherent_Powers

>Which inherents need some TLC?

>Which are functioning well?

 

Let's Chat 😄

[Chance Jackson]

i'd like Brawl to be better something that wouldn't be unreasonable to use from lvl 1 to 50

[0th Power]

I wish old defiance could make a comeback (maybe on sentinels).

[DoctorDitko]

I would personally love it if we could have the Freem! version of Brawl back from April Fool's Day!

[chi1701]

Defenders inherent is up to 30% damage increase depending on team size which is good, but the endurance reduction based on the overall health of team doesnt do much if the defenders primary role is buff/debuff with no healing. EG A force field defender as a pro-active buff set has limited to no benefit to reduced endurance cost of abilities.

[drbuzzard]

Sentinel opportunity mechanic needs some work. It's hard to understand, makes you take both T1 and T2 to fully utilize it, and is fairly weak. A good case could be made for scrapping it altogether for an alternative. This has been discussed plenty in the sentinel forum.

 

Soldiers of Arachnos have a pretty weak inherent. The AT is pretty solid, and plays well, but the inherent is not terribly noticeable. I suppose it is useful, but it's very background.

 

[ImpousVileTerror]

Vigilance has long been incongruent in terms of function and playstyle, inconsistent in usefulness between Power Sets, and further diminished in effectiveness during team play now that IO Set Bonuses and Incarnate Powers do what they do.

The counter argument is, of course, that Defenders are such massive force multipliers as it is that their Inherent can't be any good, lest it turn the Archetype in to an absolute monster.

 

Containment is irksome to me, especially with Domination making Dominators better Controllers than Controllers are themselves.  I would much prefer something to improve the Controller's potency in their given role.  Of course, there are all those standing complaints regarding Control just not being that useful when everything is melted by high damage.  

 

Scourge is neat on paper, but really only comes up in practice against hardened targets with large health pits.  It would be neat if Scourge might have a random chance to Proc in addition to its current behaviour.  

 

Conditioning is kind of the other way around; boring on paper, but surprising effective when you start to stack some Set Bonuses in to a build.  

 

I don't play Kheldians enough to really get a feeling for how their Inherent plays out, but I've heard many people have concerns, criticisms, and complaints there.

 

And, of course, the Sentinel Inherent of Opportunity is already getting "looked at," according to Captain Powerhouse.  Would be nice if it became a Toggle, allowing players to choose the effect without -having- to take either the Tier 1 or Tier 2 Attack to get the specific function.

 

All the other Archetype Inherents seem to be a good place to me.

Although, more use of Bars to fill to make the Frenzy Power more enticing could be handy.  I already make extensive use of it on my Brutes to jump-start their Fury.

 

 

 

In terms of things like Brawl, Rest, and Sprint and all the other variations of it, it might be interesting to introduce "Inherent ATOs" which could open the door for some +/- effects.  

ie:  +10% Recharge and +10% Endurance Discount, at the cost of -25% Damage.  

or

+15% Control Duration and +10% Control Magnitude, at the cost of -5% Defense, -10% Resistance, and -15% Regeneration.

Thus giving players the opportunity to personalize their characters on any Archetype, since every Archetype has access to those core Inherent Powers.

If something like that is implemented, I would strongly recommend avoiding anything that gives +Damage, or to make sure that anything that does has a suitably steep penalty to balance it out.

[Eldyem]

I'd really like if the Kheld inherent got bumped up to 2 or even 3 points of protection per Controller/Dominator. 1 does nothing.  There's other thoughts on the Kheld inherent, but that one is huge because it's glaring.

21 minutes ago, chi1701 said:

Defenders inherent is up to 30% damage increase depending on team size which is good, but the endurance reduction based on the overall health of team doesnt do much if the defenders primary role is buff/debuff with no healing. EG A force field defender as a pro-active buff set has limited to no benefit to reduced endurance cost of abilities.

I've found Vigilance to be extremely useful in specific kinds of content - Summer Blockbuster being a big one, where I find running low or out of end isn't particularly unusual, especially at low levels. I don't think it needs touched; it's semi-useful when Defenders are probably at their worst and largely unnecessary once they're absurdly good.

2 minutes ago, ImpousVileTerror said:

Containment is irksome to me, especially with Domination making Dominators better Controllers than Controllers are themselves.  I would much prefer something to improve the Controller's potency in their given role.  Of course, there are all those standing complaints regarding Control just not being that useful when everything is melted by high damage. 

Controllers already have Overpower, I think? If there was a way to get increased control over it - the Stalker ATO that procs hide comes to mind - I think it would be substantially more useful.
 

[chi1701]

16 minutes ago, Eldyem said:

I'd really like if the Kheld inherent got bumped up to 2 or even 3 points of protection per Controller/Dominator. 1 does nothing.  There's other thoughts on the Kheld inherent, but that one is huge because it's glaring.

I've found Vigilance to be extremely useful in specific kinds of content - Summer Blockbuster being a big one, where I find running low or out of end isn't particularly unusual, especially at low levels. I don't think it needs touched; it's semi-useful when Defenders are probably at their worst and largely unnecessary once they're absurdly good.

Controllers already have Overpower, I think? If there was a way to get increased control over it - the Stalker ATO that procs hide comes to mind - I think it would be substantially more useful.
 

Kheld is good until 50 and have access to ios and incarnates. Its so easy to cap resistances especially with perma hasten and lightform. 

[Sakura Tenshi]

3 hours ago, chi1701 said:

Kheld is good until 50 and have access to ios and incarnates. Its so easy to cap resistances especially with perma hasten and lightform. 

That really does not make it any better, honestly. Are we really going to start balancing this game purely around IOs and Incarnate abilities? Because for more than a few people, none of that stuff even comes into play until level 50. Plus, you know what other powers are built entirely around the Tier 9? Stone armor, and that's considered a very VERY troubled set because of how it's Tier 9 effectively invalidates the rest of the set.

[gameboy1234]

Wow, where to start?

 

I was in late beta for CoH.  Brawl and the origin based powers were added because you'd only start with one offensive power and that wasn't enough to even get through the tutorial without dying of boredom.  Suggestion: give people three primary picks at level one and two secondary picks.  That's three more than the one and one you get now.  Then delete Brawl from the game.  The origin powers can be removed too but left on the P2W vendor.  Also the damage on the first two offensive powers should be improved so that they're not a joke at level 50.

 

Furthermore: three extra picks is *most* of the Fitness pool.  Make Stamina inherent (as it is now) but move the rest of the pool back into the regular power pools, and add two more powers to the Fitness pool.  You can take the pool or you can skip it.  You're almost losing nothing (you are losing a power pool pick), but I think that will be worth it in exchange for the extra picks at level 1.

 

Also I'd like the prestige power slide to be removed from new characters.  I hate this thing, the animations is stupid, and it just clogs up my powers screen.  Put it on the P2W vendor where I never need to deal with it again.  (Longer term, if you add "element surfing" with an appropriate animation, I think that would be cool.  Having a water wave or ice or earth to surf around on would be a better travel power.)

 

Other inherent powers:  I think some of the AT inherents just don't work.  I don't think there's anything wrong with admitting that it's just too hard to make unique powers that are balanced and just port the best inherent powers over to other ATs.  Give Controllers Domination, for example.  Easy, done.  For Defenders, I think using their buffs and debuffs should get them a bonus, not being low on health.  Using your Heal should get you bigger green numbers.  Buffing allies or debuffing enemies should get you bigger buffs and debuffs.  This might be hard but I kinda feel that "make your teammates vengebait" isn't really what a Defender should be about.

 

Blaster's Defiance just looks weird to me too, although I don't really play Blasters.  I think the idea that Blasters can still use powers while held just means that squishies need better defenses and status protection.  I would give Blasters crit damage like Scrappers and be done with it.  Scourge too might be better just to be extra crit damage all the time.  It barely seems to fire until a mob is already to the point were any hit would kill it.

 

I'm not sure how I feel about Sprint and Rest being slottable.  Seems like a good way to have newbies mess up their builds.  I think I'd take them off the list of slottable power (reduce the End cost of Spring though please, to half or less) and also remove them from the Enh screen.  That screen is really busy as-is and I think it should be less so.

 

The other "inherent powers" that you get from the P2W vendor are fine.  They're fun, and optional.  You don't need to clutter up your powers window with them if you don't want them.

 

 

[drbuzzard]

13 minutes ago, gameboy1234 said:

Blaster's Defiance just looks weird to me too, although I don't really play Blasters.  I think the idea that Blasters can still use powers while held just means that squishies need better defenses and status protection.  I would give Blasters crit damage like Scrappers and be done with it.  Scourge too might be better just to be extra crit damage all the time.  It barely seems to fire until a mob is already to the point were any hit would kill it.

Defiance in its current state is one of the best inherents out there and does not at all need to be changed. Blasters already do very high damage, they sure as hell don't need criticals added in. I say this as someone who actually does play blasters.

[Six-Six]

6 hours ago, Chance Jackson said:

i'd like Brawl to be better something that wouldn't be unreasonable to use from lvl 1 to 50

I use Brawl slotted and in conjunction with Box, Kick, and Cross Punch. It's not as puny as it sounds.

on the AT Inherent powers, I can only comment on the ones I've played extensively (I haven't played Tanks, Stalkers, Defenders, Controllers, and MMs enough). 

Blaster's Defiance, Spider's Conditioning, Brute's Fury, Scrapper's Critical Hit and Corruptor's Scourge are all working fine for me. I don't have anything major enough to warrant a suggestion, any minor grievance I may have, I can adjust my play style. in fact I really like all of the above as they are.

Sentinel's opportunity is a can of worms that I will not open. But I hear that it is getting a good look, so I'm remaining hopeful.

Domination. I dunno. I don't really "feel" it's presence or effect during actual play. I can't tell whether it's bad or it's so good that it is inseparable or indistinguishable from my "normal" attack chain. (I could also suck at playing Doms, so there's that)

Khelds.
Energy Flight and Shadow Step are cheap powers for an Epic AT, IMHO, especially that you can choose your travel power as early as level 4. I suppose it had more premium when travel powers and fitness weren't inherent or as easy to get.
Cosmic Balance and Dark Sustenance. I really like the concept of "feeding off your team/synergising with your team". the only change I would suggest (and I'm not sure if I'm just missing it as a newb) is to have an effect when you team with other Khelds. This stems from playing spiders--the spider's Leadership secondaries stack tremendously when you run with a team of 8 spiders. I know Leadership is not an inherent, but a similar effect to/for Khelds would be awesome. 😃


Other than that, my only other wish is to be able to customise the colour of Power Slide.

[Myrmidon]

1 hour ago, gameboy1234 said:

I'm not sure how I feel about Sprint and Rest being slottable.  Seems like a good way to have newbies mess up their builds.  I think I'd take them off the list of slottable power (reduce the End cost of Spring though please, to half or less) and also remove them from the Enh screen.  That screen is really busy as-is and I think it should be less so.

Sprint is where the Stealth IO goes. No thank you.

[Six-Six]

to add to Myrmidon's, I usually put 2 Celerity IOs in sprint: Stealth + end redux. Less tiring when your run, nice little set bonus on the side. 

[DoctorDitko]

24 minutes ago, Six Six said:

Other than that, my only other wish is to be able to customise the colour of Power Slide.

Oh, yes! Being able to customize inherents would be incredible!

[Oginth]

Power Slide - too damn bright, the default needs to tone down, and then we need to be able to customise it

 

Defiance - IMO, fine as it is

 

Opportunity - I believe many people think that it only affects the enemy you are targeting, but there is a secondary effect on the player/caster, but that is not documented on the HC wiki. Even so, the effect on the enemy is so brief and useless in most case, I rather it the power focus on buffing the player

[Galaxy Brain]

8 hours ago, ImpousVileTerror said:

 

In terms of things like Brawl, Rest, and Sprint and all the other variations of it, it might be interesting to introduce "Inherent ATOs" which could open the door for some +/- effects.  

ie:  +10% Recharge and +10% Endurance Discount, at the cost of -25% Damage.  

or

+15% Control Duration and +10% Control Magnitude, at the cost of -5% Defense, -10% Resistance, and -15% Regeneration.

Thus giving players the opportunity to personalize their characters on any Archetype, since every Archetype has access to those core Inherent Powers.

If something like that is implemented, I would strongly recommend avoiding anything that gives +Damage, or to make sure that anything that does has a suitably steep penalty to balance it out.

Now this is a neat idea...

[chi1701]

12 hours ago, Sakura Tenshi said:

That really does not make it any better, honestly. Are we really going to start balancing this game purely around IOs and Incarnate abilities? Because for more than a few people, none of that stuff even comes into play until level 50. Plus, you know what other powers are built entirely around the Tier 9? Stone armor, and that's considered a very VERY troubled set because of how it's Tier 9 effectively invalidates the rest of the set.

Devs asked a question I answered, just because you dont like the answer doest means its still not valid. End game is still endgame and why should part of the inherent get invalidated as I put more time and effort into the character? 5% resistance and 5% defence instead of pure resistance could be a fix.

[Yomo Kimyata]

13 hours ago, gameboy1234 said:

 

 

Also I'd like the prestige power slide to be removed from new characters.  I hate this thing, the animations is stupid, and it just clogs up my powers screen.  Put it on the P2W vendor where I never need to deal with it again.  (Longer term, if you add "element surfing" with an appropriate animation, I think that would be cool.  Having a water wave or ice or earth to surf around on would be a better travel power.)

 

 

 

 

1000 times yes.

[Yomo Kimyata]

My overall opinions on AT inherents:

 

Assassination:  Core.  Working as intended.

Assassin’s Focus:  Overpowered in my opinion.  Criticals on demand without Hide.

Combat Flight:  Working as intended.  Good defense IO mule.

Conditioning:  Working as intended, but not particularly sexy.

Containment:  Working as intended.  This is a great example of what an inherent should be.

Cosmic Balance:  Working as intended, but not particularly sexy.

Critical Hit:  Underpowered, certainly in comparison to Stalkers.

Dark Sustenance:  Working as intended, but not particularly sexy.

Defiance:  I feel like this is overpowered, but I run so few blasters I don’t have enough data.

Domination:  Tremendously overpowered.

Energy Flight:  Working as intended.

Fury:  Working as intended.  This is a great example of what an inherent should be.

Gauntlet:  Working as intended.

Opportunity:  Underpowered.  Too complex for what it does.

Scourge:  Underpowered.  I’d like there to be a (decreasing) chance for scourge damage over 50%.

Shadow Recall:  Working as intended.

Shadow Step:  Working as intended.

Supremacy:  Working as intended, but not particularly sexy.

Vigilance:  Working as intended, but not particularly sexy.

Prestige Power Slide:  Burn it with fire.

[Bill Z Bubba]

2 hours ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

Prestige Power Slide:  Burn it with fire.

Or a nuke. Just to be sure. Please move it to P2W vendor so that I don't have to ever see it again.

[Eldyem]

20 hours ago, chi1701 said:

Kheld is good until 50 and have access to ios and incarnates. Its so easy to cap resistances especially with perma hasten and lightform. 

Which is why specific ATs giving a bonus that does essentially nothing is awful. I shouldn't think to myself "God, I hope I don't team with x" as a selfish aside - 1 mag mez protection isn't anywhere near the level of usefulness as even the Slow Resistance, which is itself pretty blatantly just filler.

[chi1701]

36 minutes ago, Eldyem said:

Which is why specific ATs giving a bonus that does essentially nothing is awful. I shouldn't think to myself "God, I hope I don't team with x" as a selfish aside - 1 mag mez protection isn't anywhere near the level of usefulness as even the Slow Resistance, which is itself pretty blatantly just filler.

Point is, the resistance was very useful before the introduction of incarnates and ios, the inherent hasnt changed even if the game has.

[EmergentRain]

I would really like combat flight to have an alternate option to animate like hover instead of always using the fly animation. I look incredibly derpy making a fly pose while hovering around at barely sprint speed.