Raise Argro Cap!

[Kaplow23]

It's pretty easy to spot that not a lot of people play tanks anymore. With the argro cap being so small it gives access to Scrappers and Brutes to tank as well. Something needs to be done so Tanks are useful again!

[Alchemystic]

They already raised tanker aggro cap, AoE range and max targets a few patches ago.

[kelika2]

Aggro cap lowered in issue 4 or 6

Its issue 25 or 26 right now

Taunt still only hits 5 targets

Tanker AoEs hit 16 targets

Gauntlet has a small radius taunt on attacking

Even if you got a larger aggro cap you wont really have the tools to get them all considering thae 95% of this game trash mobs die instantly or super quick

And to do one thing will lead to more work on other things and considering we went 20+ issues without the need for it.. sorry.

 

And if all you wanted to do was herd then you get a hard pass from me.  thats boring to watch and wait and take into consideration target limits on aoe attacks with vary from AT to power

[Troo]

An increasing number of odd '1 post' topics showing up lately.

 

Edited August 31, 2020 by Troo

[kelika2]

3 minutes ago, Tyrannical said:

They already raised tanker aggro cap,

Oh?  What is it now?

I know about the AoE and Range on attacks but dont remember the enemy aggro cap

[Haijinx]

[Solarverse]

1 hour ago, Tyrannical said:

They already raised tanker aggro cap, AoE range and max targets a few patches ago.

They raised Tanker aggro cap? Last I heard that was impossible.

[AerialAssault]

Unpopular opinion: The aggro cap is a good thing.

[Parabola]

This has to be one of the most popular bad ideas (imo) that keeps getting raised round these parts. The aggro cap was introduced for the very good reason that watching tankers herd everything was dull. Even without zone herding it was still dull if tanks (or others) could manage aggro to the extent that no-one else was ever in danger. The game is better for aggro management being imperfect.

 

There are also apparently technical issues around raising the cap for just one AT. It has been said that other servers have changed this but that doesn't necessarily mean they've done it in a way the homecoming team would consider.

 

The idea of having a sticky thread with the very common suggestions and their rebuttals has been suggested before hasn't it? This would have to be one of the first things on the list.

[macskull]

13 hours ago, Solarverse said:

They raised Tanker aggro cap? Last I heard that was impossible.

It's not, other servers have done it.

[Solarverse]

1 hour ago, macskull said:

It's not, other servers have done it.

Just for Tanks though? What the Homecoming Devs told me in another thread that I had started a while back, that there is no way to raise the aggro cap for Tanks without raising the cap for all classes.

[Solarverse]

11 hours ago, parabola said:

This has to be one of the most popular bad ideas (imo) that keeps getting raised round these parts. The aggro cap was introduced for the very good reason that watching tankers herd everything was dull. Even without zone herding it was still dull if tanks (or others) could manage aggro to the extent that no-one else was ever in danger. The game is better for aggro management being imperfect.

 

There are also apparently technical issues around raising the cap for just one AT. It has been said that other servers have changed this but that doesn't necessarily mean they've done it in a way the homecoming team would consider.

 

The idea of having a sticky thread with the very common suggestions and their rebuttals has been suggested before hasn't it? This would have to be one of the first things on the list.

The current aggro cap is outdated though. Keep in mind, the aggro cap was placed when HO's were the best you could get on a character. IO's and set bonuses were not even a thing yet. Since then, the power creep has caused more issues than it was worth IMO, where mobs die too quickly, NPC's just stand around waiting their turn to die instead of fighting and so forth. The aggro cap before the nerf was indeed way too much and extreme. However, the nerf to the aggro cap was the extreme in the reverse. Now that power creep has set in strongly, the old aggro cap of 17 max NPC's is far outdated and a bad mechanic for today's game and should be raised by double that amount, if not triple.

I think the fears of "Tanks will herd again!" is a bit of a stretch. The reason I say this is because on normal teams, Tanks herding was not that prominent as people seem to think it was. Most teams in those days that I was on, a Tank would ask the team if they are okay with it before they would do it. Most teams that had Tanks do it without checking in with the team first were usually booted from the team, which deterred Tanks in general from just herding entire maps. Yes, Tanks herding maps was a thing, but it was no where near as bad as people claim. I was there, I played the game just like everyone else. Rarely did I have to deal with a Tank scrub who was not a team player. Most Tanks that wanted to herd started their own teams and even called them herding teams.

However, this is not what the players are asking for. The players are not requesting infinite NPC aggro, they are simply asking for a realistic increase in aggro that meshes well with today's current state of the game. We aren't running around with HO's anymore, we are running around with God Mode.  🙂

[macskull]

29 minutes ago, Solarverse said:

Just for Tanks though? What the Homecoming Devs told me in another thread that I had started a while back, that there is no way to raise the aggro cap for Tanks without raising the cap for all classes.

Yes, Thunderspy has a higher aggro cap for Tankers only.

[General Idiot]

1 hour ago, macskull said:

It's not, other servers have done it.

Not impossible, just more work than it sounds. The aggro cap is part of the enemy AI, not something attached to players. That particular code doesn't reference the player's archetype at all so making it different for Tankers only requires adding whole new functionality to do that, not just changing a value somewhere.

 

They could make the aggro cap higher for everyone globally which I think might be what other servers have done, but really that only moves the problem rather than fixing it.

 

Edit: beaten by moments. If Thunderspy does have it for tanks only that's pretty cool and I'd be kind of curious to know how they did it.

Edited August 31, 2020 by General Idiot

[Solarverse]

33 minutes ago, macskull said:

Yes, Thunderspy has a higher aggro cap for Tankers only.

Wow...so that makes me wonder why they were able to pull it off but the Homecoming Devs believed it was impossible. Did they have to write custom code to pull it off or something?

[Parabola]

50 minutes ago, Solarverse said:

The current aggro cap is outdated though. Keep in mind, the aggro cap was placed when HO's were the best you could get on a character. IO's and set bonuses were not even a thing yet. Since then, the power creep has caused more issues than it was worth IMO, where mobs die too quickly, NPC's just stand around waiting their turn to die instead of fighting and so forth. The aggro cap before the nerf was indeed way too much and extreme. However, the nerf to the aggro cap was the extreme in the reverse. Now that power creep has set in strongly, the old aggro cap of 17 max NPC's is far outdated and a bad mechanic for today's game and should be raised by double that amount, if not triple.

I think the fears of "Tanks will herd again!" is a bit of a stretch. The reason I say this is because on normal teams, Tanks herding was not that prominent as people seem to think it was. Most teams in those days that I was on, a Tank would ask the team if they are okay with it before they would do it. Most teams that had Tanks do it without checking in with the team first were usually booted from the team, which deterred Tanks in general from just herding entire maps. Yes, Tanks herding maps was a thing, but it was no where near as bad as people claim. I was there, I played the game just like everyone else. Rarely did I have to deal with a Tank scrub who was not a team player. Most Tanks that wanted to herd started their own teams and even called them herding teams.

However, this is not what the players are asking for. The players are not requesting infinite NPC aggro, they are simply asking for a realistic increase in aggro that meshes well with today's current state of the game. We aren't running around with HO's anymore, we are running around with God Mode.  🙂

Yes the power levels of players vs mobs have shifted but I don't think that alters the basic argument against raising the aggro cap. You mention mobs standing around waiting for their turn to die but that only happens when the only available target is saturated. In a team scenario excess aggro spills over onto other players (who are far more able to handle it due to power creep but that's beside the point).

 

Increasing the aggro cap makes sense from the overdeveloped tanks point of view. 'I can survive more therefore I should be able to have more'. But the overall dynamics of the team combat experience rely on aggro spilling over onto other players. The game would be dull otherwise.

 

With my tanker hat on, and I play quite a few tanks, I would love a higher aggro cap. With my farmer hat on I would bite your hand off for it (and I suspect that alone is the reason it won't happen). But when playing any other AT I don't want the tank to be able to hold more than they can now; the game is easy enough as it is.

[macskull]

22 minutes ago, Solarverse said:

Wow...so that makes me wonder why they were able to pull it off but the Homecoming Devs believed it was impossible. Did they have to write custom code to pull it off or something?

Every new addition or change to the game is using custom code, in a manner of speaking. Lots of things in this game were once said to be "impossible." Power customization comes to mind as a big one.

[Solarverse]

16 minutes ago, parabola said:

Yes the power levels of players vs mobs have shifted but I don't think that alters the basic argument against raising the aggro cap. You mention mobs standing around waiting for their turn to die but that only happens when the only available target is saturated. In a team scenario excess aggro spills over onto other players (who are far more able to handle it due to power creep but that's beside the point).

 

Increasing the aggro cap makes sense from the overdeveloped tanks point of view. 'I can survive more therefore I should be able to have more'. But the overall dynamics of the team combat experience rely on aggro spilling over onto other players. The game would be dull otherwise.

 

With my tanker hat on, and I play quite a few tanks, I would love a higher aggro cap. With my farmer hat on I would bite your hand off for it (and I suspect that alone is the reason it won't happen). But when playing any other AT I don't want the tank to be able to hold more than they can now; the game is easy enough as it is.

For me personally, I play all classes pretty equally and what I find happening most is that since the Tank or Brute cannot hold more than 17 NPC's worth of aggro, the spill over ends up being cleanup after the Tank and Brute. For an example, Tank has mob on Tank, spill over comes at the Troller/Dom or any other "squishy" and when the Tank/Brute finishes their mob, they move on, leaving my Dom to clean up what's left...then it eventually turns in to a clean up while chasing the Tank around. To me that is more frustrating than the old days of "wait here while I herd the whole map" and then sitting and waiting. I would like to see the Tank actually hold the aggro of the NPC's so that I can help eliminate those NPCs rather than play clean up to the ones the Tank could not hold the aggro to.

Edited August 31, 2020 by Solarverse

[Solarverse]

1 minute ago, macskull said:

Every new addition or change to the game is using custom code, in a manner of speaking. Lots of things in this game were once said to be "impossible." Power customization comes to mind as a big one.

Oh trust me, I know all too well. I cannot even begin to start with how many ideas I used to request that were all told impossible that we now have in game today, lol.

[MTeague]

I just think it's illogical to the point I can no longer suspend disbelief to have 20, 30, or 40 mobs all attempting to dogpile the tank, even when they cannot physically even compress each ohter to get close enough to melee the tank at that point.  At a certain point, excess hostiles would say you know what?  Rather than take a number and wait until I can physically get close enough to the tank,  why don't I smack this Blaster / Defender / Corruptor / Squshy instead?

[AerialAssault]

One of the brilliant things about City of Heroes is that characters in a team should (in theory) be able to deal with a small amount of aggro spill. This isn't other MMO's where one enemy running amok can wreak havoc.

[Solarverse]

11 minutes ago, MTeague said:

I just think it's illogical to the point I can no longer suspend disbelief to have 20, 30, or 40 mobs all attempting to dogpile the tank, even when they cannot physically even compress each ohter to get close enough to melee the tank at that point.  At a certain point, excess hostiles would say you know what?  Rather than take a number and wait until I can physically get close enough to the tank,  why don't I smack this Blaster / Defender / Corruptor / Squshy instead?

That is the purpose of the Tank though, in every game that has one. I mean logic can't really place much of a role in a game that is built upon the total illogical. Of course in real life nobody is going to jump a Tank while leaving all his buddies alone, but that is in a logical world. Logically, nobody should have any more aggro than anyone else and Tanks should lose taunt of any and all types. However, since a Tank has Taunt and it is their role to gain the aggro, they should be able to do so to it's fullest extent. The problem with mobs attacking the squishies is what I explained earlier...that squishy most often, even on the best of teams, gets left behind to clean up the scragglers which leaves the game just as not fun as when they were sitting around waiting on tanks to herd the maps. I want to be a part of the team effort to wipe out the mobs, not be the clean up guy.

[Solarverse]

11 minutes ago, AerialAssault said:

One of the brilliant things about City of Heroes is that characters in a team should (in theory) be able to deal with a small amount of aggro spill. This isn't other MMO's where one enemy running amok can wreak havoc.

Oh, we can deal with them...but at a much slower pace and we end up getting left behind to run clean up. That is the issue with having an aggro/taunt limit that is so low the Tank can't even hold the aggro of everything that ends up getting aggroed by the team.

[Parabola]

41 minutes ago, Solarverse said:

For me personally, I play all classes pretty equally and what I find happening most is that since the Tank or Brute cannot hold more than 17 NPC's worth of aggro, the spill over ends up being cleanup after the Tank and Brute. For an example, Tank has mob on Tank, spill over comes at the Troller/Dom or any other "squishy" and when the Tank/Brute finishes their mob, they move on, leaving my Dom to clean up what's left...then it eventually turns in to a clean up while chasing the Tank around. To me that is more frustrating than the old days of "wait here while I herd the whole map" and then sitting and waiting. I would like to see the Tank actually hold the aggro of the NPC's so that I can help eliminate those NPCs rather than play clean up to the ones the Tank could not hold the aggro to.

Ah, but that's a different problem entirely. Believe me I feel your pain. I was ranting about this the other day; people running off to engage a new pile of minions because they can't be bothered to stay and clear the bosses is the scourge of the modern game. Increasing the aggro cap likely wouldn't do much to combat this, the bosses would soon lose interest in the tank who has run off over there, and would turn their attention to the juicy squishy support types trying to tickle them to death.

[Haijinx]

How dare we have extra enemies to fight making there be some tiny risk to this game.