Focused Feedback: Blaster Secondary Revamp

[Lockpick]

17 hours ago, Chris24601 said:

One of my favorite things about Tac Arrow was that it had no Location-based powers at all... target, fire and forget. Oil Slick is worthless to me... on Test I ended up replacing it with Stealth and feel I got the better end of that deal. As someone else said... its another t9 to skip.

But THIS is my main complaint about the changes. The range change utterly disrupted my attacks as well. Reduce the damage, reduce the immobilize duration, just don't kill the range. This is a "shelve my Archery/TA blaster" level change for me as well.

 

How bad is it for me? I'd take an Endurance-hog toggle power that bumps the range of Electrical Net and Ice Arrow back to the live distance IF you slot it to the ED soft cap and be happier with that then where I currently sit.

 

As to "encourage to get into melee"... why must every blaster be the same? The fun of Tactical Arrow was precisely that it WASN'T just a carbon copy and encouraged a very different playstyle from the upclose "Blapper." This sort of hegemony of design is what destroyed my interest in SWTOR. Sure, its easier to balance if everyone gets exactly the same stuff, but it sucks the soul out of playing them.

I have to agree with this as well.  I'm fine with the changes to Mez, but not the range.  I use ENA at range with SS and AS.  I want my A/TA character to play at range, not get into melee range.  Please revert the range back to HC Live range.

[Nemu]

Testing out sonic manipulation made me take a step back and look at /Elec as a whole and FOT's role in it on live.

 

Ignoring the sustain part of it and focusing solely on the control aspect of FOT. What makes it so attractive on Live to melee blasters is due to the fact that /Elec is very single target focused. Therefore FOT in conjunction with Thunder Strike work well together to limit incoming damage from the adds surrounding the primary target. Dynamo can't do it alone, but if the splash damage on TS is increased by 300-400% it would surely increase kill speed and compensate for the loss of a consistent way to cycle KD. Even so, powers like ice patch from ice manipulation and even bonfire from the fire epic provides constant KD more efficiently and I see no reason that /Elec shouldn't be able to do the same with more effort and more risk.

[Ohsirus]

Total focus animation is still 3 seconds, but it activates in 2 seconds, very awkward now.

[Rejolt]

23 minutes ago, ohsirus said:

Total focus animation is still 3 seconds, but it activates in 2 seconds, very awkward now.

Have you tried moving before and while activating Total Focus? It could be a glitch that makes the old animation speed play but you can still move in the new 2.5 second window.

 

There are ways to break animations on rooting powers and breaking things is what beta is for.

[Errants]

Also jumping onto the hype/request train to keep /TA's ranges at 80', to match Arch blasts. The set is a ranged support set, let us leave it as such on the ranged powers. Increase End/Recharges if needed, to "pay" for the extra 30'.

[Ohsirus]

49 minutes ago, Rejolt said:

Have you tried moving before and while activating Total Focus? It could be a glitch that makes the old animation speed play but you can still move in the new 2.5 second window.

 

There are ways to break animations on rooting powers and breaking things is what beta is for.

Yeah I tried multiple ways. The animation still runs after the hit.

[Nemu]

22 hours ago, Dispari said:

Getting a weird bug on my newly made archery/nin blaster. While Shinobi is toggled on she frequently gets interrupted by the present opening animation out of nowhere, which roots her in place. It only happens while Shinobi is on. It was happening every time I trained up at Ms Liberty. Other people saw me opening presents so it wasn't just on my end.

And while I'm at it I also support giving Shinobi a move speed component. It's thematic and move buffs are harmless.

Seems to be triggering off certain procs. I noticed the animation going off every time a FF proc triggered off golden dragonfly, as well as defiant barrage proc, guassian's proc and I bet any of the other procs that grant a passive buff.

 

On the other hand /Nin feels very good now for melee blasters now that the damage is balanced against blaster formulas. The 20% chance for critical might be a bit overtuned when applied to all attacks, Might want to consider relegating it to /nin attacks or upping the crit rate on select sword attacks to add more incentive to go into melee.

Edited October 25, 2020 by Nemu

[Xanatos]

[PVP Power Tweak]

 

Darkness Manipulation: Soul Drain

 

Suggestion:

Change it to work even on a miss. Provide 100% +dam, 20% +tohit. Remove the ability to get buffed by hitting enemies.

 

Reasoning:

It's a PBAOE that requires multiple enemies to be within 10ft of you to get a +dam and +tohit buff, whilst rooting you for 2.37 seconds. This is just not feasible in PVP. It's a thoroughly useless power, and is massively underperforming vs build ups/build up alternatives (targeting drone, etc) in other sets in PVP. This change would alleviate that.

 

 

[Brutal Justice]

As a trick arrow player I am not a fan of tactical arrow getting oil slick arrow.  

[Heraclea]

My stealthy electric/electric blaster needs a taunt aura like she needs a hole in the head.   Currently it is an AoE attack, but one that needs to be activated voluntarily, not a taunt aura that aggroes every mob she tries to get past.   I tested 'Dynamo' and confirmed my worst fears.  Now her sustain power aggroes everything she gets in range of.  If this goes live the character will be stripped and retired.

 

This change needs to be walked back. 

 

---------

 

EDIT: And also, when I copied my TB electric/electric blaster to Brainstorm, it appears that my Sudden Acceleration set, including the KB to KD IO, are now sitting uselessly in 'Dynamo', where they do diddly squat.   This would appear to break the 'kitchen rule'.   Force of Thunder is now apparently something I don't have. 

Edited October 25, 2020 by Heraclea

[Blackbird71]

 OK, taking some time to delve into the TA changes a bit more.

Quote

 Electrified Net Arrow

• Range reduced from 80ft to 50ft to be in line with other Blaster Manipulation T1 Immobilize powers
• Endurance cost increased from 5.2 to 7.8 to be in line with other Blaster Manipulation T1 Immobilize powers

 Ice Arrow

• Range reduced from 80ft to 60ft to be in line with other Blaster Manipulation ST mez powers
• Recharge increased from 12s to 16s
• Hold changed from Mag 3, Scale 12 to:
  • Mag 2, Scale 10 (non stacking)
  • Mag 1, Scale 6 (stacking)

I'll echo what others have said:  reducing the range of these powers is a huge nerf to /TA blasters.  Remember, this is "Tactical" Arrow; and it plays like it's name.  Generally you have to use tactics to control and direct the flow of a fight to survive and win.  Two big parts of that are 1) maintaining range, and  2) planning and controlling the beginning of an encounter.  These powers are often used as openers to help with #2.  By reducing the range, these will either no longer be usable as openers, reducing /TA blasters' ability to plan their fights and therefore their survivability, or they will require the /TA blaster to get into closer range before using them, increasing the risk of aggroing mobs prematurely and therefore also reducing survivability.  Either way, it's a major change to how the set plays.
 

Quote

 Upshot

• +Recharge buff reduced to from 30% to 15%
• +Damage buff reduced from 100% to 81.25%
• +ToHit reduced from 20% to 15%

I'm not thrilled to see the damage reduction, especially when compared to the existence of Build Up.  I'd be interested to know why the TA version of BU specifically is considered too strong, but BU on other sets is fine.  Is it because of the included recharge buff?  Even with that, if the damage had to be reduced, could not the extra +ToHit remain to compensate?  This one is probably low on my list of complaints, and a little insight into the reasoning might be all I need to change my mind here, but there it is.

Oh, and the OCD in me says that if you have to reduce the damage, can it at least be a flat 80%, because round numbers? 
 

Quote

 Flash Arrow

• This power's effects are no longer irresistible

This kills my /TA blaster right here.  The -ToHit on this power is negligible; you could take it off and I probably wouldn't even notice.  But the -Perception was critical to the survival of my /TA blaster as it allowed me to set up the fights and maintain range.  Making it resistible makes my tactical approach no longer playable, period.  The core of the fun in playing a /TA blaster was rooted in this approach, so by taking away a key building block of that it kills the set for me; no exaggeration or hyperbole here.
 

Quote

 Gymnastics (Replaces Agility)

• Gymnastics and Agility have been merged into a new toggle power
• Provides knockback protection, a 1.75% defence buff, a recharge bonus, a movement speed buff and some slow / mez protection
• If you previously had Agility, you now have Gymnastics

As I've said before, I have mixed feelings about this one.  Put back the jump bonus and it will probably be fine though.
 

Quote

 ESD Arrow

• Hold now only applies to robots.
• Hold changed from Mag 3, Scale 8 to:
  • Mag 2, Scale 8 (non stacking)
  • Mag 1, Scale 5 (stacking)
• Added Stun against non robots:
  • Mag 2, Scale 8 (non stacking)
  • Mag 1, Scale 5 (stacking)
• Now accepts Stun enhancements and sets

WHAT???  You've taken a staple of /TA and made it so that it can only be effectively slotted against one type of enemies at a time?!?  Why would you ever do such a thing?  ESD Arrow is a major piece of /TA survivability; it's the go-to when things get out of control and you need to lock down a situation to either regain control or retreat and regroup.  By splitting up the effect, and therefore the slotting options, now /TA blasters will have to initially accept that they will only ever take missions against one type of enemy or the other according to how they are slotted, or they will have to accept that the power can now only be used situationally.  This really feels like a nerf to make OSA look better by comparison, and that's the wrong way to do this.  /TA blasters may as well drop ESD Arrow now in favor of something more reliable.
 

Quote

 Oil Slick Arrow (Replaced Gymnastics)

• Similar to the Trick Arrow version, but does not have a defence debuff and only has a 15ft radius
• If you previously had Gymnastics, you now have Oil Slick Arrow

For a T9, Tactical Arrow gets a worse version of Trick Arrow's T8.  How does that make sense?  I can't say that I have any interest in taking this on my /TA blaster.

I haven't had a chance to look over the other blaster secondary changes in any kind of detail, but my general assessment so far is this:  The TA changes have gone beyond reducing the set's power level and instead will fundamentally affect how the set is played, turning it into something it was not previously.  If these changes go into effect as is, I will have no further interest in playing my /TA blaster character.  And that is coming from someone who enjoys archery as a RL hobby, was incredibly excited when archery was added to CoH, and doubly so to find TA as a blaster option on HC. 

Also, if these changes are implemented then we need something else added to the game:  a new type of respec to be made available for one-time use after this and similar patches that allows an affected character to respec not just which powers they have, but also which power sets they have.  It's not fair to change the overall functionality of a set on characters that players have invested in without providing them the option to change those characters to something else more suitable. 

 

 

Edited October 25, 2020 by Blackbird71

[Zalkenai]

I decided to copy my archery/TA blaster out so I could test the changes before commenting.  Overall, I think it plays just fine. I'd say Oil slick is a welcome addition.  I have to agree the range changes don't make sense.  It made playing the sets a little more awkward.  I can live with it, but I feel as though I shouldn't have to.

 

Please be careful homogenizing all powers (which seems to be a trend). DnD 4.0 suffered from this. Basically every power did same thing from class to class, they were just named something different.  It made it boring to play for a lot of people.  There's nothing wrong with a few sets playing differently, and I think it's clear that some blasters want ranged-only options.

[Draeth Darkstar]

I LOVE the change for /Elec to have its sustain moved to Lightning Field. LOVE. LOVE. LOVE.

 

Force of Thunder was the worst choice of all the Blaster changes made by the original Devs. I protested it back in the day and I've always hated it. SO clunky. Thunder Clap was always very anti-synergistic with the rest of the set, so being forced into it has really sucked. Elec is all melee except for the T1 immob, having a huge PBAOE knockback has never made any sense at all.

 

That said - now that changes to the set are being looked at, the other really big struggle for /Elec has always been that it's very weak on AoE. Is there any chance that we could see some improvement there? The change I'd really love would be, instead of turning Force of Thunder into a more controlly, long cooldown power, to turn it into a damaging PBAOE, change the knockback to a knockdown, and either ditch the stun or leave it as a (possibly lower?) chance for mag 2. That would help the set be more competitive with the other Blaster secondaries that have amazing AoE potential (especially Fire, which Elec is the most similar to), and it would remove a power from the lineup that has never felt good to use before.

 

The other change I'd really like, if possible, would be to change Thunderstrike into a more traditional PBAOE that does full (reduced, of course) damage to all targets instead of a lot to one and a little to the rest. Elec isn't hurting for single target damage, and the power still seems very skippable to me. The animation looks WAY better like this, but it's still long enough that the DPA is too low for me to use on a single target, and it just doesn't do very much in AoE from my recollection. I've copied over my /Elec Blaster to mess around with the changes, though, so maybe it'll feel better than it looks.

 

On a related note, I have no idea where to report this, but the forum's text parser doesn't seem to like character names with apostrophes:

 

Quote

 

Character Copy Initiated

Tempest\ss Fury on Excelsior has been queued for copy to Brainstorm

 

 

Edited October 25, 2020 by Draeth Darkstar

[Lockpick]

This thread is a hodgepodge of different opinions about the different sets.  It is getting a little difficult to keep up with due to the overall nature of looking at all blaster secondaries instead of focusing on one.  I would suggest each secondary should have gotten its own thread, although I know that would likely be more effort to maintain.

 

I would really like to know the problems that are trying to be solved by some of these changes.  There is an old adage about "if it ain't broke, don't fix it".  I see a lot of changes here that are baffling to me and seem to be changes just for the sake of making changes. 

[Draeth Darkstar]

1 hour ago, Heraclea said:

My stealthy electric/electric blaster needs a taunt aura like she needs a hole in the head.   Currently it is an AoE attack, but one that needs to be activated voluntarily, not a taunt aura that aggroes every mob she tries to get past.   I tested 'Dynamo' and confirmed my worst fears.  Now her sustain power aggroes everything she gets in range of.

 

I just tested and can confirm that Dynamo is breaking stealth. I'm assuming this is a bug? Usually these toggle AOEs don't take affect while Stealthed IIRC.

 

Also, it's absolutely flooding my combat log with:  Your Dynamo causes you to recover health and endurance at an increased rate!

 

It appears to be reporting that twice every time the damage ticks.

Edited October 25, 2020 by Draeth Darkstar

[Jimmy]

On 10/24/2020 at 1:41 PM, Jimmy said:

Electrical Manipulation

•  Dynamo (renamed from Lightning Field)
  • Is now the sustain power in the set (along with the existing damage aura component)

Added this clarification.

[Draeth Darkstar]

After testing, my initial impression of Thunder Strike was spot on. It looks awesome now, but the DPA is too low to fit in a single target attack chain for a Blaster and the AoE damage is too low to be worth using for that, either. It would be great if it were normalized to just do a flat amount of damage to all targets, but as is, I still don't really see a reason why I'd take it other than goofing around with an all-melee build. /Elec by itself has 3 higher ST DPA powers, not even looking at the primaries.

Edited October 25, 2020 by Draeth Darkstar

[Chris24601]

5 hours ago, Lockpick said:

I have to agree with this as well.  I'm fine with the changes to Mez, but not the range.  I use ENA at range with SS and AS.  I want my A/TA character to play at range, not get into melee range.  Please revert the range back to HC Live range.

I'm very glad to see near uniformity in the comments and reactions so far both in not liking the reduced range, but also in being willing to accept further reductions in other stats like mez duration to compensate for keeping the range.

 

Since I'm not one to complain without offering possibly alternatives, I think one way of looking for alternate balance points would be to see what sort of slotting it would take to restore the lost range. For ENA at 50' two generic 50 Range Increase IOs will get 50' back up to nearly 80' (74.85' to be precise).

 

Similarly, two 50 Immobilization Duration IOs increase duration by 83.32%.

 

ENA has a current base immobilization duration of 17.88s... if reduced to 9.75s (17.88s / 1.8332) it would similarly take two level 50 IOs to bring the duration back up to the current live baseline.

 

Heck, round the immobilization duration down to 9.5 or even 9.0 seconds while leaving the range 80' and I think most of the Tac Arrow supporters having issues with this change would be okay with that.

 

Such a change might even be slightly riskier for the TA player because reducing the duration means that...

 

A) it reduces the number of enemies they can keep immobilized at range (with 4s recharge, 1s animation and 17.88s duration it can keep three mobs immobilized at once by cycling through them without ANY slotting... at 9 seconds it would just barely hold two).

 

-and-

 

B) it reduces the degree to which it can be stacked on more resistant targets (at Mag 3 and 17.88s with a cast and recharge time of 1s + 4s you could build up to a steady Mag 9 with bursts of Mag 12 with no slotting required). At 9 seconds you can only mostly maintain Mag 6 (it would drop to Mag 3 for about a second until you got a new stack on it).

 

Now, slotting helps obviously, but it does that for everything and frankly the reduced duration makes it a LOT easier for hostile mobs to close to melee range with a /TA blaster than just having them start from 50' but still being able to immobilize three targets or maintain Mag 9 immobilize with room to spare.

 

* * * *

 

So there's my pitch for an alternative to range reduction... drop the duration of ENA by about 85% (9 to 9.5s), but leave the range at 80'.

[Vanden]

12 minutes ago, Draeth Darkstar said:

It would be great if it were normalized to just do a flat amount of damage to all targets

Normalizing Thunder Strike is a fraught proposal, since it's so far out of the norm for attack powers. Currently it's scale 2.98 damage to the target, and scale 0.42 damage to enemies in the AoE. With it's recharge and radius, if it were turned into a standard AoE attack it would do scale 1.271 damage to all targets, which is significantly less than Charged Brawl. If you wanted it to do the full damage to every enemy in the AoE, the recharge would have to be nearly 50 seconds.

 

Actually they'd probably just round it up to 50 seconds exactly.

[Draeth Darkstar]

1 minute ago, Vanden said:

Normalizing Thunder Strike is a fraught proposal, since it's so far out of the norm for attack powers. Currently it's scale 2.98 damage to the target, and scale 0.42 damage to enemies in the AoE. With it's recharge and radius, if it were turned into a standard AoE attack it would do scale 1.271 damage to all targets, which is significantly less than Charged Brawl. If you wanted it to do the full damage to every enemy in the AoE, the recharge would have to be nearly 50 seconds.

 

Actually they'd probably just round it up to 50 seconds exactly.

Oh, yeah, I know - but I'd gladly take that over a power that's not really viable for either ST or AoE as it is. I'd personally also be fine with it dropping to a 10 target, 10 ft. radius to be more in line with most other PBAOEs Blasters have to get back some more damage. Right now /Elec just has nothing to contribute in AoE and that's a rough spot to be in for a Blaster secondary.

[Nemu]

Onto plant manipulation. The cast time reductions are good, Thorn burst still lags behind similar PBAoEs like combustion in both damage and recharge and it could use a slight tune up. For a T9 pick it feels even more lackluster than if it had been sitting in it's original slot.

 

Am I reading it wrong or is ESD arrow the only T8 AoE hold that's still on a 90 second timer? I get the mathematical rationale of increasing the recharge on AoE holds seeing that controller holds such as cinders have a 4 min recharge. However controllers also have other control options and their CCs last longer. Rather than looking strictly at numbers and formulas, consider the human element and look at how people build blasters: I doubt many will find these 3 min cooldown AoE holds with their low duration (especially against higher cons) useful enough to invest in them. There is an opportunity cost associated with picking up non-damage powers for blasters and this treatment of AoE holds renders that cost too high.

Edited October 25, 2020 by Nemu

[Xanatos]

[Power Feedback]

 

/Tactical Arrow

 

Electrified Net Arrow / Ice Arrow:

I actually like the lowered range. There's no reason they should have higher ranged CC than every other blaster secondary.

Having tested it in closed beta, 50ft/60ft is still plenty of range for engaging enemies at range.

Just my perspective, though. Imagine other people currently testing the power on beta might have different POV.

 

Gymnastics

The only change I'm not so keen on is the movement control being taken away from Gymnastics. I'd suggest adding it back in. Increased mobility was one of the main appeals of the set. Specifically:

• 4000% movement control to self for 0.75s
• 20% MovementFriction to self for 0.75s

Edited October 25, 2020 by Xanatos

[Coyotedancer]

1 hour ago, Lockpick said:

This thread is a hodgepodge of different opinions about the different sets.  It is getting a little difficult to keep up with due to the overall nature of looking at all blaster secondaries instead of focusing on one.  I would suggest each secondary should have gotten its own thread, although I know that would likely be more effort to maintain.

 

I would really like to know the problems that are trying to be solved by some of these changes.  There is an old adage about "if it ain't broke, don't fix it".  I see a lot of changes here that are baffling to me and seem to be changes just for the sake of making changes. 

"Solutions in search of a problem" is the phrase a friend used looking over the entire list...

 

 

[ZorkNemesis]

Preface: I haven't tried anything on the beta server and am merely going off what's in the patch notes.

 

I have a DP/Elec Blaster on the live servers who is primarily a close quarters character.  I really don't like the look of the change to Force of Thunder. I can understand that it's clunky for a sustain in the current state and not the best power for many builds, but I found a solid use for it through slotting to make it a useful sustain, damage and defensive power in one go.  As it is on the live servers, putting a Sudden Acceleration KB>KD is almost necessary, but thanks to it being a sustain it can also take Accurate Healing.  I have it slotted with TotN Negative proc and ES Smashing proc and run it as part of my attack chain after jumping in with Spring Attack.  Without the accurate healing it loses one of the two damage procs making it less useful for crowd damage.  I highly doubt Dynamo's damage aura would be able to replace that lost damage and would also likely make any survivors of the Spring Attack > FoT > HoB opening I run flee before I can drop Thunder Strikes or Havoc Punches (granted, I see HoB is getting fixed in this patch, so survivors should be less common).

 

I don't really know though.  I should test the new FoT and see how it plays but I honestly never had an issue with it in its current form and actually liked it for my playstyle.

 

Edited October 25, 2020 by ZorkNemesis

[Xanatos]

2 minutes ago, ZorkNemesis said:

Preface: I haven't tried anything on the beta server and am merely going off what's in the patch notes.

 

I have a DP/Elec Blaster who is primarily a close quarters character.  I really don't like the look of the change to Force of Thunder. I can understand that it's clunky for a sustain in the current state and not the best power for many builds, but I found a solid use for it through slotting to make it a useful sustain, damage and defensive power in one go.  As it is on the live servers, putting a Sudden Acceleration KB>KD is almost necessary, but thanks to it being a sustain it can also take Accurate Healing.  I have it slotted with TotN Negative proc and ES Smashing proc and run it as part of my attack chain after jumping in with Spring Attack.  Without the accurate healing it loses one of the two damage procs making it less useful for crowd damage.  I highly doubt Dynamo's damage aura would be able to replace that lost damage and would also likely make any survivors of the Spring Attack > FoT > HoB opening I run flee before I can drop Thunder Strikes or Havoc Punches (granted, I see HoB is getting fixed in this patch, so survivors should be less common).

 

I don't really know though.  I should test the new FoT and see how it plays but I honestly never had an issue with it in its current form and actually liked it for my playstyle.

 

I've been testing this on my DP/Elec. It's a good change IMO.

 

My DPS is higher for not having to pause and click a sustain button. I can just keep shooting.

 

Try it out, you might like it.