Game Balance & The Endgame

[Widower]

41 minutes ago, ScarySai said:

What do they pay you?

 

Because it's not enough. 😄

The only compensation I receive is in the form of forum rep. So, uh, well, anyway.

[Dreamkeeper]

11 hours ago, Mezmera said:

That's why I'd like to get us to those 10 powers and then activate some limitation set where you can only have active 6 of those 10 powers.  They'll all have quite a range of choices within each power so you'd likely be hard pressed to find a team full of all the same incarnates.  

As some others have said, I really like this idea. I think i'd say 5/10 or 4/10 would be better, but I think this would add a lot of diversity to end game content and builds. I'd even be okay with some type of diminishing returns for incarnates i.e. first two T4 powers will work at 100%, 3rd T4 power at 80%, 4th at 60% or something like that. 

 

Overall I think Alpha slots work well and don't push many toons grossly over the edge (no more so than a high end IO build) and I think some Destiny powers work well (like Clarion) while others could have the scale of their buffs reduced a bit so it's more even overall and not as high on initial activation. 

[Kanil]

lmao what the hell did i miss here i skimmed the las tpage and some dude is goin on about cancel culture or something

 

anyways back to the grind of shouting into the void: fire blast is an outlier in the same way as tw in the parts where it matters most and negatively affects power choice variety more than tw because the incentive to pick fire blast in it's competition vs. the incentive to pick tw due to the momentum mechanic actively making tw unappealing to many players, especially during the character journey while levelling up

 

both are perfectly fine and they should be focusing on making battle axe stronger than war mace because i don't want to play with mace's ugly ass models

[Ralathar44]

4 hours ago, ShardWarrior said:

 

 

5 hours ago, Ralathar44 said:

I think the goal is that everyone has space within the team to not just be useful but feel awesome.  This is actually a delicate balance because there is only so many mobs and so much incoming damage and a finite value of to-hit checks coming in.  So if any 1 person or if a few people are TOO awesome then that takes away from the ability of everyone else to be feel awesome.  Now as a sometimes thing, that's not a problem, but when everyone is too awesome as a matter of course it becomes a problem because again, there is a finite amount of awesome to go around because the mechanics by which we obtain the awesome are based on finite values.

I will repeat this again, everyone CAN feel awesome.  If you are on a team where you are not feeling useful, then find another team.  If you are staying on a team where you are not having fun or feeling super, that is definitely a you problem not a game problem.  Socialize, make friends with like minded people and go have fun together.  More importantly, no matter what level of nerfs are applied, there are always going to be players who are simply better and will outperform others.

 

Instead of advocating to nerf everyone down to a level where no one feels super because they need 7 other people to cross the street, we should be advocating for more choice in my opinion.

TBH I really like this reply.  It shows exactly where you stand and where you are coming from to a rather unflattering level.  I can be accused of being imperfect, and that's totally fine :), but I have been arguing for having a place on every team for every AT and every power set as much as possible so we can all have fun regardless of what role we want to play.  That's where I'm coming from and it can be seen over and over again in my comments, flaws and all.  Someone can say I'm mistaken in some of the details, but the overall idea is nonetheless sound and the issues i mentioned are nightly occurrences.

You have provided the other side of it.  Rather than trying to make sure that the game let every AT and every power set feel valuable on as many teams as possible your solution is "leave the team and make a specialist team" so that you can also have fun.  And then you insinuate that all of those people are bad players who are not doing good because they are not "better players who outperform others".  And you pretty directly call them special needs in your last sentence.  This is also counter-productive because if you really think folks are bad and that's why they are performing poorly then why would you believe them capable of forming specialized teams to have fun in?  That's highly illogical, even most good players won't form teams.  Wouldn't you rather mentor and help people you feel are "less skilled" to give more players to the server who have a better experience instead of shunning them and trying to drive them from the game?

 

If you really believe in your point of view, I'd advise being less vocal and losing the insulting edge.  Your poisoning the well of the position your trying to advocate for with the tact you've taken and the insults you've slung at people who do not deserve it.  It's not just "people being bad".  Game Balance controls team, AT, and powerset viability.  A good player make a powerset focused around making their allies more survivable useful on high level teams that die to nothing in 90%+ of the content they run.  Changing characters is a viable answer to fix that problem of feeling useful, but if the answer is almost always to change characters that's a balancing issue.  Same story with pug teams vs curated teams.  If you have to cherry pick a team to make survivability buffs even be useful because PUG teams are so safe they never use them....that's a balancing issue.

Edited September 25, 2020 by Ralathar44

[Ralathar44]

3 hours ago, ShardWarrior said:

Well no, but if you want to feel that way, more power to you.  Feel free.

 

While I do not agree with the tone that was used, I can understand the reasoning behind it.  The nerfs to Regen, ED, GDN etc. drove quite a lot of people away from the game back in the day, so expressing caution about nerfing is a valid discussion point in my opinion. 

 

It is very easy to say people need to be tolerant and try to understand the viewpoint of others.  Actually doing it appears to be another thing. 

People don't like nerfs, nerfs were badly needed.  And I say this considering that my first 50 was an Earth/Emp controller and my second was a Stone Stone Tank.  I hadn't really played around with many defenders yet at that time.  MMs and brutes and etc didn't exist yet.  When ED, GDN, and aggro/AOE caps happens rolled around it GUTTED my most played characters.  But I did this weird thing where I tucked away the pain and waited and evaluated the situation critically.  Multiple tanks could now be on teams and be useful.  Multiple controllers on a team could now be useful.  Tanks now had a use for support rather than just needing more people to DPS the dumpster...or the more common task of "don't kill anything, just fill and sit at the door" as the fire tank gathered the entire map into a dumpster and killed them.  They just needed you to ramp the difficulty up because you couldn't choose it back then.  RIVETING gameplay....

At lest the current situation on homecoming takes multiple people to make you feel like a useless lackey of the gods.  Pre-ED/GDN/Caps it took 1 tank or scrapper lol.

Edited September 25, 2020 by Ralathar44

[Ralathar44]

3 hours ago, Coyotedancer said:

From "lived experience", it's always seemed to me that high level teams have never really needed support characters, though. Sure, they liked having them around... Most smart teams still do... But even in the pre-ED days they weren't exactly All That on an otherwise solid team.  Like I said upthread, maybe that perception is just a reflection of the type of people that I ran with in the old days, but the impression I got at the time was always of being "nice to have, but we'd have been fine if you'd brought the scrap instead".

Why would you say "even in the pre-ED days".  That implies that's the best time for support characters, which is not the case.  Pre-ED was almost as bad as now.  It was worse in some cases but less consistently.  The best time for support characters was post-ed until sunset.  Even after IOs were introduced they were not common enough for most people to be min/maxed like they are now and so support felt like a worthy and powerful addition to most teams with the godly teams being more of a rare exception instead of the normal like it is today.

Pre-ED days support was useful based on the team.  If the team had a high level tank then support was only useful for the same thing it is today, -res and +dmg.  If the team did not have a tank then support was very useful unless you ran into the odd scrapper who controlled aggro. (most were too busy scrapperlocking).  On a non-tank team there was plenty of useful room for multiple supports or 1 controller...since back then controllers could permalock the entire mob.

Right now support is rarely useful outside of -res/+damage.  Teams where you are useful do happen, but they are fairly rare with the average being teams in which nobody dies because enough to the team has good defenses to soak all the aggro.  The amount of damage a +4/+5 mob can do is finite and every point of damage they aim at a godly defense character (built out tank/brute/scrap or softcapped through IOs character) is effectively negated.  Especially since each mob tends to only get 1 alpha of damage and then instantly die these days.

Edited September 25, 2020 by Ralathar44

[carroto]

5 hours ago, macskull said:

5 hours ago, BitCook said:

Part of that discussion talked about AT balance.  Whether you like it or not, there is a large imbalance due to the kill speed of modern teams.

<snip>If the game were only about DPS and not about support you'd see all the DPS ATs concentrated at the top - but you don't.</snip>

You seem to be implying here that AT popularity is the primary measure of AT balance.  Plenty of people can and do enjoy ATs that are not top performers.  They can and do enjoy the play style they offer, even if they under-perform.  They can also want to feel like they contribute with their favorite characters.  If all it takes is a few kitted out gods to make everyone else on a team feel useless, those ATs don't need to be the most popular.  They just need to be popular enough that you can expect to have at least a couple on a high-level team invalidating your contribution.

 

I guess the implication here is that if people playing support ATs truly felt that their contributions were wasted, then people wouldn't play them, and we would see nothing but melee and Blasters?  I don't think that's necessarily true.  It's possible to favor a play style and continue to play it while also lamenting the change in the experience of doing so.

[Pzn]

It's not necessary to nerf other players because of an inferiority complex about performance.   Just play with people you like to play with.  The burden should be on the people that want more restrictions.  You are welcome to find like minded players to join you instead of forcing other players to conform to your ideal through nerfs.

 

Edited September 25, 2020 by josh1622
typo

[Bionic_Flea]

5 hours ago, GM Widower said:

The only compensation I receive is in the form of forum rep. So, uh, well, anyway.

I think you deserve a 50% raise!

[ShardWarrior]

5 hours ago, Ralathar44 said:

You have provided the other side of it.  Rather than trying to make sure that the game let every AT and every power set feel valuable on as many teams as possible your solution is "leave the team and make a specialist team" so that you can also have fun.  And then you insinuate that all of those people are bad players who are not doing good because they are not "better players who outperform others".  And you pretty directly call them special needs in your last sentence.  This is also counter-productive because if you really think folks are bad and that's why they are performing poorly then why would you believe them capable of forming specialized teams to have fun in?  That's highly illogical, even most good players won't form teams.  Wouldn't you rather mentor and help people you feel are "less skilled" to give more players to the server who have a better experience instead of shunning them and trying to drive them from the game?

So much ignorance and incorrect things to unpack here....

 

First, you can already let every AT and every power set feel valuable on as many teams as possible in the current game.  If you or anyone else does not feel useful, this is a self inflicted problem and there is a very simple solution - stop PUGing.  Either stop PUGing where you will not know for certain who you are teamed with or what their build is and such or accept the fact that you are going to get what you get with regard to the team.  PUG teams are a roll of the dice and we never know what we will get.  Nerf herding to a degree is trying to rig the dice in my opinion. 

 

Serious questions - what exactly is keeping you or anyone from staying on a team where they feel inadequate or not needed?  What is preventing you or anyone else from socializing, finding others who enjoy the game the same way, forming your own groups to team up and run content the way you like?  Where are the forum posts here or on Reddit or wherever setting up "old school" teams?  If there are truly this many people looking for "old school" styles of play, where are the requests for this in LFG or other team forming channels?  I personally have yet to see a LFG request for "forming non-incarnate old school team".  Take advantage of the existing tools here and elsewhere to make full use of the multiplayer in MMO and socialize.  Put in the effort, it is worth it.  Throughout the years across many, many MMOs I have put in the effort and found the time to make friends with like minded players and have a blast playing together.  If I found myself on a team I did not like, I left to go do something else.  Anyone can do this.  Anyone. 

 

Secondly, I in no way, shape or form said anyone  is "special needs" or insinuate anything of the sort.  That is 100% a projection you injected into what I said and to be quite honest is a truly disgusting thing to say.  Let me be even more clear - you can have every single AT and every single power set nerfed and homogenized to the point where they all do equal damage 100% of the time and there are still going to be players who outperform others.  Those players are going to be able to do better because they are simply faster, have better reaction time or are more experienced, not because anyone else is stupid.  My post was not counterproductive with regard to suggesting others form their own teams as I expressly said people can form their own teams.  It is you, not me, who seems to be insinuating people are incapable of doing that.  As to mentoring, I do mentor people all the time.  However from what I am reading here, some people seem to think that if I am somehow built better or react faster or have more experience or just want to play differently than they do, I am "making them feel bad" or "useless" or I am just doing it to lord over them, which could not be further from the truth.  If I am capable of destroying entire maps solo while we are on a team and it makes you feel bad, I am not the one keeping you there - you are.

 

5 hours ago, Ralathar44 said:

If you really believe in your point of view, I'd advise being less vocal and losing the insulting edge.  Your poisoning the well of the position your trying to advocate for with the tact you've taken and the insults you've slung at people who do not deserve it. 

It is interesting that you say I am insulting to others while accusing me of calling others "special needs."  

5 hours ago, Ralathar44 said:

It's not just "people being bad".  Game Balance controls team, AT, and powerset viability.  A good player make a powerset focused around making their allies more survivable useful on high level teams that die to nothing in 90%+ of the content they run.  Changing characters is a viable answer to fix that problem of feeling useful, but if the answer is almost always to change characters that's a balancing issue.  Same story with pug teams vs curated teams.  If you have to cherry pick a team to make survivability buffs even be useful because PUG teams are so safe they never use them....that's a balancing issue.

Forming your own teams to play the way you like is also a very viable answer to fix the perceived problem.  It is the option that gives everyone the capability to play the way they find fun together with others who enjoy the game as they do.  As I mentioned above, go right ahead and homogenize every AT and power set in the game to the point where everything is 100% mathematically equal.  Remove IOs or enhancements of every kinds so everyone is exactly 100% the same.  There are still going to be players who out perform others.  Feel free to disagree.

 

[ShardWarrior]

5 hours ago, Ralathar44 said:

People don't like nerfs, nerfs were badly needed. 

The players who left en masse after ED, GDN, purple patch and the like disagree with you.

[macskull]

5 hours ago, carroto said:

You seem to be implying here that AT popularity is the primary measure of AT balance.  Plenty of people can and do enjoy ATs that are not top performers.  They can and do enjoy the play style they offer, even if they under-perform.  They can also want to feel like they contribute with their favorite characters.  If all it takes is a few kitted out gods to make everyone else on a team feel useless, those ATs don't need to be the most popular.  They just need to be popular enough that you can expect to have at least a couple on a high-level team invalidating your contribution.

 

I guess the implication here is that if people playing support ATs truly felt that their contributions were wasted, then people wouldn't play them, and we would see nothing but melee and Blasters?  I don't think that's necessarily true.  It's possible to favor a play style and continue to play it while also lamenting the change in the experience of doing so.

I think just about the only "underperforming" AT right now is Sentinel. Pretty much every other AT still has a role to play in a team. Is that role different than it used to be? Maybe. Is that a bad thing? No, not really. The game has been constantly evolving and changing throughout its lifespan and at the very least it's helped keep things interesting.

[ZacKing]

6 hours ago, Ralathar44 said:

Same story with pug teams vs curated teams.  If you have to cherry pick a team to make survivability buffs even be useful because PUG teams are so safe they never use them....that's a balancing issue.

No it isn't it's a player laziness issue. anybody can create the challenge they want here.  what you're looking for is nerfing everyone to force them to play how you like instead of letting others do their own things.  That's selfish no matter how anybody tries to hide it.  You want the rewards without putting in the effort.  I'd love the play in the NBA but I'm nowhere near as good as any of the pros.  Should they all get nerfed so I can join and "feel useful"?  sure, fix stuff that's totally broken.  don't nerf people just to make the game bland. 

[Apparition]

7 minutes ago, macskull said:

I think just about the only "underperforming" AT right now is Sentinel. Pretty much every other AT still has a role to play in a team. Is that role different than it used to be? Maybe. Is that a bad thing? No, not really. The game has been constantly evolving and changing throughout its lifespan and at the very least it's helped keep things interesting.

 

I'd argue that Mastermind is an underperforming AT as well, at least in endgame.  The lower level of the pets makes the purple patch in level 54 and above content (like Incarnate trials), a brick wall.

[golstat2003]

On 9/24/2020 at 9:01 AM, BitCook said:

The idea is coming from many (again I can really only speak to myself and the people I've talked with about it)  of us who have been playing Support Mains.

On most endgame teams, you do not have time to get out any of the "force multiplying" powers that were hallmark to teams back on live.  Try playing a Rad anything.  You might.... might have time to get a cast of RI out.  You certainly won't get much else.  As a controller, you may get a singular control in play... although why?  If a mob is going to die in 2-5 seconds, what possible use to the team is stunning them before their very quick demise.

Several of us have shared experiences and done the following test.

Run to a mob with your team, use your support/debuff/controls.  See how long the team takes to defeat the mob.  Run to the next one and do nothing.  Odds are, it's about the same time.

The thing about force multiplication is that as the time to kill decreases so does the effects of your multiplication.  Say a buff/debuff adds 10% to the entire team's kill speed.  That's pretty good!  If it took the team 30 seconds to defeat the mob, you might expect 27 seconds to wipe them out with that buff.  However, let's go with our steamroller team.  They take 10 seconds to wipe the same mob.  Now you changed them to 9 seconds.  Your value decreases as kill speeds increase.  At some point, the kill speed is essentially 1-2 cast times and adding any support/control/aggro management is essentially useless.

I have never seen any AT turned down.  That is something that I would agree with.  However, sometimes that's because you often get teams like:
"PI Missions LF2M +4, bring anything."

Because they already have 1-2 characters that can solo that content.  They could literally care less what you bring.  You want to door sit?  Okay, no big.

Some of it is people who still really believe in the power of support sets.  Some is that any 8 heroes will clear anything in the game (in general).

I don't know what you are experiencing and the groups you are playing, however, for me and at least some people I have worked with on builds and tips, this is a pretty common scenario.

I've only seen door sitting allowed on Farms. Not actual TFs or content.

 

I won't discount the rest though as each person has their own experience.

 

One suggestion I would make is trying to form your own teams. 

 

I believe any 8 heroes clearing anything in the game is a key strength. It's NOT something I would want to see changed.

[golstat2003]

21 hours ago, Phoenix' said:

Nukes need to return to where they were tbh. 

I'd rather see them having a good damage buff than recharging every 25 secs with no end penalty. 

I remember people were having second thoughts on using them and that was fine

It wasn't second thoughts. The devs on live datamined that folks simply were not picking them as  power pick. The crash was trash.

[ShardWarrior]

3 minutes ago, Apparition said:

I'd argue that Mastermind is an underperforming AT as well, at least in endgame.  The lower level of the pets makes the purple patch in level 54 and above content (like Incarnate trials), a brick wall.

I would argue they underperform all the time lol 😁  For anyone looking to roll Ninjas/Dark - do not do it.  Trust me.  😂

[macskull]

2 minutes ago, Apparition said:

I'd argue that Mastermind is an underperforming AT as well, at least in endgame.  The lower level of the pets makes the purple patch in level 54 and above content (like Incarnate trials), a brick wall.

MMs do get incarnate shifts as part of Supremacy to mitigate this, but what hurts them the most is the prevalence of high-damage AoE powers in iTrials because pets aren't subject to one-shot code so the T1 pets just spend their time inspecting the floor. At least in the case of Masterminds you bring (usually) decent damage and buff/debuff but it can be difficult to leverage. Won't argue about up-leveled content though, the purple patch really starts to screw over MMs like no other AT once you pass +2 or so.

[Wavicle]

13 minutes ago, Apparition said:

 

I'd argue that Mastermind is an underperforming AT as well, at least in endgame.  The lower level of the pets makes the purple patch in level 54 and above content (like Incarnate trials), a brick wall.

I think in Incarnate content the pets are all your level, someone please correct me if I’m wrong.

[Grouchybeast]

9 minutes ago, macskull said:

MMs do get incarnate shifts as part of Supremacy to mitigate this, but what hurts them the most is the prevalence of high-damage AoE powers in iTrials because pets aren't subject to one-shot code so the T1 pets just spend their time inspecting the floor.

A bit of help for MMs would certainly be nice.  I levelled up a MM to 50 and incarnated it for the first time on HC.  Eventually the tier 1 pets just turned into an annoyingly clicky Absorb shield.  Okay for helping to soak up the alpha, otherwise basically useless.

[golstat2003]

And again for the people in the back:

 

I believe any 8 heroes being able to clear anything in the game is a key strength. It's NOT something I would want to see changed.

 

I would hope we don't EVER get to a point where teams are "waiting for defender or corrupter" to get going. That's never been a part of the history of this game, even in the so-called "good ol days" I keep seeing spoutted. Let's not start now.

[Apparition]

11 minutes ago, Wavicle said:

I think in Incarnate content the pets are all your level, someone please correct me if I’m wrong.

 

You're wrong.  The Tier 3 pet is the same level as the MM, but not the Tier 2 nor the Tier 1 pets.

[skoryy]

10 hours ago, Ralathar44 said:

Mentored down to a Penelope Yin TF on my TA defender and felt very useful and we had actual fights.  Joined a PI radio team afterwards and groups were literally dying by the time my second debuff landed.

The thing is, you're comparing mildly challenging content (mid-level TF) to end game easy mode (PI radios).  The better comparison to Penny Yin at 50 would be Hami, MLTF, Tinpex, or the incarnate trials.  In those, more support will always bring faster drops.  Vice versa, support's not going to be all that important if you're blazing your way through a Talos Island radio mission.

[laudwic]

On 9/20/2020 at 5:56 PM, Bopper said:

Those are examples of "whataboutism". Instead of discussing a change on its own merits, you're pointing to something else and saying "but what about this? this needs a change more".

 

Whataboutism is simply an attempt to deflect an argument without addressing it. 

 

Titan weapons has long activation times which are part of the bad and good you have to accept taking the set. 

 

It is certainly a valid argument that every aspect of a power and a power set should be considered if the power or set is deemed in need of a change.

 

It is certainly valid to compare one set to another in creating an opinion of what is appropriate to change and what should be a priority.

 

In a game in which players look to every possible advantage, it is certainly appropriate to look at how popular a set is, especially in groups that seek optimization such as farming.  If a set that is considered to be out of balance is not utilized in those areas, it is certainly a valid question as to why.

[Ralathar44]

1 hour ago, golstat2003 said:

And again for the people in the back:

 

I believe any 8 heroes being able to clear anything in the game is a key strength. It's NOT something I would want to see changed.

 

I would hope we don't EVER get to a point where teams are "waiting for defender or corrupter" to get going. That's never been a part of the history of this game, even in the so-called "good ol days" I keep seeing spoutted. Let's not start now.

This is a false dichotomoy.  Support was much more valuable post-ED but pre-homecoming and never was there a time where you NEEDED support characters to clear content.  There is room for everyone to be valuable but that does indeed mean that no one group can get too powerful or they remove the abilities of others to feel powerful.  That's means non-supports can't get too powerful and that means non supports can't get too weak.  That means supports can't get too powerful and that means supports can't get too weak.

I too firmly believe that a flexible team comp is a core feature of the game and we had that along with supports feeling super in every part of the game pre-sunset.  And every other AT felt super too.  The one AT that prolly needed help pre-sunset was prolly blasters faceplanting a little too much and between direct HC team love and plentiful IOs they've gotten huge amounts of power increase to their survivability, offense, and sustainability.  So they are definitely not hurting anymore, they might even be too good, I need to do more testing.  So far results are not encouraging since I've actually tanked on my high level (but not 50 yet) blapper on multiple occasions and he's nowhere near optimized.