Focused Feedback: Other Powers Changes

[Chimeran42]

I'm gonna throw my hat in the ring to say that the Travel power nerf from things like Ninjitsu and with Gymnastics are pretty FEEL BAD. At least, if you suppress them, can they provide a travel speed buff to the travel powers that cancel them out? 

People should be rewarded for taking a power like that, and feel like they have even more mobility rather than situational. You'd basically turn those powers into skips. 

 

Even if the boost only impacted similar powers (Shinobi - Run Speed, Gymnastics - Jump Distance) or something along those lines it would be nice. Just a passive boost goes a long ways.

[Galaxy Brain]

5 hours ago, modest said:

Dark Melee is currently an under-performing set based on the tests performed by @Galaxy Brain. If these changes are implemented, then they will have no positive effect on Stalkers. These changes are effectively a minor but unnoticeable nerf to an under-performing set.

In my testing it was not underperforming, if anything it was actually among the best sets for the normal missions.

 

That being said, the main issue here is that the set is technically being nerfed with the SM change as with only Shadow Maul (pre patch) I was able to match the results of current SM + ToF. This means that before you could have SM + Epic AoE for great output while now you need either both AoE's from Dark or youre worse off.

[Bopper]

1 hour ago, Galaxy Brain said:

That being said, the main issue here is that the set is technically being nerfed with the SM change as with only Shadow Maul (pre patch) I was able to match the results of current SM + ToF. This means that before you could have SM + Epic AoE for great output while now you need either both AoE's from Dark or youre worse off

This might need to be retested. The chart you showed was dated 9/7 for dark melee, which was when ToF had a 2.17s cast time. Now that it is 1.97s, there is a chance the performance might technically be better than current live, however not by much.

[Galaxy Brain]

8 hours ago, Bopper said:

This might need to be retested. The chart you showed was dated 9/7 for dark melee, which was when ToF had a 2.17s cast time. Now that it is 1.97s, there is a chance the performance might technically be better than current live, however not by much.

While true, I doubt it will be better in reality as Live Shadow Maul is roughly equal to SM and ToF combined, so if you took live SM + any other AoEs.... yeah

[Hew]

20 minutes ago, Galaxy Brain said:

While true, I doubt it will be better in reality as Live Shadow Maul is roughly equal to SM and ToF combined, so if you took live SM + any other AoEs.... yeah

While true, you don't get epic aoes until, well, epic levels. SM + ToF are available immediately, offer slotting choices with procs (ToF can be proc'd pretty heavily) or for set bonuses, and using attuned sets gets you bonuses that you probably don't have until epic levels due to slot compatability.

 

To me, this is a QoL change that enables more accessibility to aoe than just shadow maul, especially at low levels. Not all QoL changes mean guaranteed moar damagez.

[modest]

6 hours ago, Hew said:

While true, you don't get epic aoes until, well, epic levels. SM + ToF are available immediately, offer slotting choices with procs (ToF can be proc'd pretty heavily) or for set bonuses, and using attuned sets gets you bonuses that you probably don't have until epic levels due to slot compatability.

 

To me, this is a QoL change that enables more accessibility to aoe than just shadow maul, especially at low levels. Not all QoL changes mean guaranteed moar damagez.

I approached the changes with the mindset that they were a QoL change that would improve the AoE output of the set, but play testing revealed that they were not. It's not a question of "moar damagez", and framing someone else's opinion in this manner is not helpful and only serves to devalue your argument.

 

On a Stalker, Touch of Fear takes three or more uses to kill an even-level minion at lower levels. At level 50 with T4 incarnates, it can take four or more uses to kill a level 50 minion. It is nearly impossible to hit more than three targets with the skill. With a 6ft radius, the target cap of 10 is functionally meaningless. These issues go beyond the lack of damage; the power has fundamental problems with its functionality and design.

 

The skill is not much better on a Scrapper. It appears to have been designed with the idea that it will be affected by a fully-saturated Soul Drain at all times. This is a terrible design choice because that does not reflect the actual game play of a Dark Melee character. Even if we accept the premise that Touch of Fear will be under the influence of Soul Drain that provides a permanent 120% damage buff, Touch of Fear slotted purely with damage IOs will deal 178 damage (84 DPA) over 3.1 seconds in a 6ft radius. In comparison, Spin from Claws slotted in the same way with 0% damage buffs from skills will deal 228 damage (86 DPA) in an 8ft radius to 10 targets. Again, that's without Build Up/Folow Up applied to it. The skill looks even worse when compared to the top performing AOE skills such as Fire Ball which, on a Scrapper, deals 144 damage (121 DPA) in a 15ft radius to 16 targets.

 

I'll expand for a moment on why it does not make sense for Touch of Fear (or any of Dark Melee's skills) to be balanced with the assumption that they will be affected by Soul Drain. The simplest and best argument for why this should not be done is that this has not been the practice for any other power sets that receive damage% buffs. For example, Blasters receive damage buffs from their inherent Defiance. Blaster ranged attacks are not given lower damage to compensate for the significant damage buff that Blasters receive. Some Blaster secondaries (Martial Combat: Reach for the Limit) provide additional damage buffs. The skills in Martial Combat were not balanced with lower damage to compensate for the damage buff. It simply does not make sense to do so.

 

Edit: @Bopper pointed out to me that Mid's is incorrect and that Soul Drain on a Scrapper can actually buff by 150% total. I do not think that the extra 30% will meaningfully change the function of Touch of Fear, but I am editing my post here for accuracy.

 

Bopper kindly calculated Touch of Fear with the 150% modifier for me. With a fully-saturated 150% Soul Drain, Touch of Fear is behind Fireball, Exploding Shuriken, Whirling Smash, Spinning Strike, and Ball Lightning. It's my opinion that it's not reasonable to balance Touch of Fear as if it were affected by this 150% damage buff, but I'm adding this information to this post for accuracy.

Edited November 11, 2020 by modest

[Bopper]

6 hours ago, Hew said:

While true, you don't get epic aoes until, well, epic levels. SM + ToF are available immediately,

Fair points you bring up. However, for Stalkers, ToF is not available until level 26. Granted, Stalkers don't normally get two AoE attacks, so I'm not expecting much to change there. For the most part, I think every Stalker will likely skip ToF given other options Stalkers can have for AoE by level 26 from pool powers, as well as epics that become available at level 35+. Given the small radius, small damage, and relatively slow cast time, it's safe to assume Stalkers would only consider taking this power as a ST debuff attack and treat the AoE damage as splash, as opposed to taking this power as an AoE attack. That might apply to other ATs as well, but seems to definitely apply for a stalker.

 

Just a quick break down of numbers, I count 14 primary attacks available to Stalkers that are classified as Spherical AoEs. Among those, only Spine Burst has lower DPA (but is available at level 2 and has a 15 ft radius as opposed to ToF available at level 26 with 6 ft radius). In terms of raw damage, Touch of Fear is by far the worst of these powers, doing only 0.8630 scale damage (over 3.1 seconds). Next lowest is Spine Burst with its 1.1362 scale damage (+31.7%). 

[modest]

I created a separate thread in the Suggestions forum where I proposed Dark Melee changes that are different than the ones in this thread. I am cross-posting that thread here because the changes that I propose are significantly different than what is on the test server, and more closely follow the original proposals that Captain Powerhouse made in a previous Beta Feedback thread.

[Kanil]

6 hours ago, modest said:

Shadow Maul:

 

The power changes notes state that the target cap of Shadow Maul was reduced from 10 to 5. This version of Shadow Maul has a 7 ft. radius and 120° arc.

 

I tested this version of Shadow Maul by attempting to line up groups of enemies in the Rikti War Zone. I gained their attention, then circled until they were in as tight of a clump as possible. Once they were grouped together, I faced the group as close as possible and activated Shadow Maul. I was unable to hit 5 enemies in any of the tests that I attempted. I suspect that the cause of this was the 7ft radius. My recommendation is to increase the radius to 9ft or 10ft.

 

My conclusion when testing this change is that the target cap reduction does not have a measurable impact on the power because it is either incapable of hitting 5 enemies in most game play.

 

Touch of Fear:

 

Unfortunately, it is difficult for me to provide constructive feedback on this power because, as far as I can tell, it has no redeeming qualities.

 

Touch of Fear is a Targeted AOE attack with a 7ft range, a 6ft radius, and a target cap of 10. On a Stalker, it does 5 ticks of 9.60 negative damage over 3.1s (48 damage). It has an animation time of 1.97 seconds before Arcanatime.

 

Here are the issues that I identified with this power:

• It is functionally impossible to hit more than 3 enemies with this power due to its 6ft radius. The 10 target cap is essentially meaningless.
• The damage is too low to be meaningful. At level 50 with full T4 incarnates, this power takes four or more applications to kill a level 50 minion.
• The damage takes too long to be applied. 3.1 seconds is simply too long, especially given the low damage per tick.
• The animation time of 1.97 seconds is too long. It would be tolerable if this were an exceptionally high-damaging power.

 

modest kept messaging me about this so i ended up being curious about his results. ended up just running a bunch of trapdoors and running through the KR skulls arc to get a feel for the powers - didn't use any build at all, i literally just hit "generic IOs" in the auto-enhancer on the test server, haha. played 'em both at x8+0 with a dm/bio scrapper because i wanted to have an armorset i was comfortable with- kept efficiency mode on so no mega damage buff to skew stuff too crazy. note my impressions are coming from someone who has never even looked at dark melee besides checking out it's animations and going "this looks stupid" and clicking away from it

 

i first tested the target-cap stuff since that seems like it's ultimately the biggest part of the changes, especially given the changes seem to relate to that alongside touch of fear's interesting point being it's really high target cap relative to it's low damage and long recharge.

 

for shadow maul, i got pretty much the same deal - even with very high saturation in a cramped area like the trapdoor mission and more open stuff like the offices/warehouses of the KR skulls arc, you're basically ideally gonna hit 3-6 enemies, with crowds usually sitting in the 4-5 enemy mark.  i'm kind of curious on what the conditions were to make it consistently hit above 5. i'm not sure if the original 10 target cap was like a, "well, sometimes it hits 6 or 7 in shoulder-to-shoulder fire farm" type thing to where it's just convenient since it tips over 5 every now and then? that's the vibe i get, anyways.

 

for touch of tear, it's kind of a weird power because it changes so much depending on enemy positioning and saturation. it's a very finnicky kinda move, to where at high saturation and ideal enemy positioning where they are completely circled around you, it'll actually hit all 10 enemies. as long as there is like, an enemy in the "center" and they are really close to each other you're likely to hit 5 or so enemies even if they aren't ideally positioned.

 

however, if there's like, roughly a 1.75+ character length gap at all in the enemy groupings you suddenly only start hitting 2-3 enemies, even if there's 10 or more dudes attacking you. it's extremely feast/famine in a way that feels kinda awkward, especially given it's overall low damage and long recharge.  even at level 19, it feels really, really bad against +0 enemies.

 

speaking of which, in terms of being a power that is supposed to be in the vein of like those t1/t2s that you end up dropping or skipping later down the road for more optimized builds, it feels a bit strange. i guess the nature of AOE options makes it kind of unique in that aspect in that most sets don't have a power like that - they either have an AOE that you take because you need everything you can get and it's good, or an AOE that's totally worthless (ie breath of fire, whew) that you would skip even on the way leveling up. given the actual damage of the move, it feels like it's supposed to be akin to something like broadsword's slice or katana's flashing steel which are also low-damage early AOEs that generally only hit 2-3 targets with a chance to hit up to their cap.

 

but it feels like the cute twist of having the "potential" to hit up to 10 targets is something that is actively making the power trend more towards the breath of fire side than the slice/flashing steel side more than anything else. the damage itself is pretty middling and seems to be meant to kinda whittle away at enemies but even with lvl50 generic IOs vs. +0 family and skulls, the move takes 5-6 uses to actually kill minions.

 

i can't say it's useless because at that level you're basically just taking shit to fill out any string at all and having an aoe that does damage is Something, but the damage combined with the really long recharge makes it kinda feel that way. it's a power that really starts to gain value with higher saturation but the level of saturation needed for it to really like, feel worth it is.. strange given the level range it's designed around helping. it'll be rare to see someone really clumping enemies up like that or fighting even x4 and above at those levels, i think.

 

my gut feeling is that it has such a weird design because dark melee has the weird ass build up AND a bunch of weird AOEs in dark consumption and the build up (soul drain? whatever it's called) that are on longer cooldowns. like there's a bit of a soft-touch to it because of how there might be a potential for someone on a high-end build to really push the limits and somehow use all of those together with a good AOE to push dark melee (which is traditionally seen as a ST-focused set) from being primarily ST to a more all-rounder gimmick in the vein of like, super strength or something.

 

in my testing with trapdoor though, those two powers are just like... kinda there? touch of fear at maximum soul drain saturation against +0s who are all clumped together starts to feel better but given the scale of high-end/endgame stuff, esp. when folks tend to fight at +2/3 (or true +4 rarely) it seems like the scale dips extremely hard into the fire breath "don't take this" range, which seems to be by design? it's a power pick that lacks a lot of potential juice over just grabbing the good stuff.

 

cheers to another rambling post that nobody will read while i alt tab between afking in ouro and watching vergil get his ass kicked in dmc5

 

 

 

Edited November 12, 2020 by Kanil

[Bopper]

2 hours ago, Kanil said:

cheers to another rambling post that nobody will read

FWIW, I did read it all and I greatly appreciate the testing feedback you provided. I was confused by one thing however. You kept referring to Touch of Fear as having a long recharge. This should not be true, as it is only an 8s recharge, which makes it one of the fastest recharging AoEs available (but is also why the damage is so small). I'm replying in hopes that you can clarify your statement, just in case I misunderstood what you meant by a long recharge.

[Kanil]

1 hour ago, Bopper said:

FWIW, I did read it all and I greatly appreciate the testing feedback you provided. I was confused by one thing however. You kept referring to Touch of Fear as having a long recharge. This should not be true, as it is only an 8s recharge, which makes it one of the fastest recharging AoEs available (but is also why the damage is so small). I'm replying in hopes that you can clarify your statement, just in case I misunderstood what you meant by a long recharge.

ah, goddamnit it i knew i should've looked more carefully at the generic io slotting choices. all that ramblin' for nothing, haha. they don't slot for recharge time! so i was running off the assumption that the 8s rech time was the enhanced amount.

 

gonna do a bit more testing to see if that changes much, but in my initial runthrough of a level 19 mission the intended flow clicks a lot more - it seems the idea is that 2 shadow mauls + 1 touch of fear will kill a +0 minion roughly, so it's meant as a way to 'soften up crowds' so you can shadow maul 'em to death, or something like that for the lower level since you can basically just run t1->t2->t3->t4 as a chain with the proper enhanced recharge values.  properly lookin' at the recharge values at that level makes it more apparent though that doing the power more than once or twice is kind of a waste because it takes 4 full ToF applications at least to get shadow maul to kill in one go, which at that point you already could've shadow mauled 'em twice anyways. it feels very much like 'filler' after the initial application, even in high saturation environments - the goal is less about hitting one enemy with it but rather applying it to as many as possible so you can double shadow maul 'em or t1/t2 'em.

 

weirdly, having that solid chain strengthens my impression of the power kind of being an awkward spot because of the saturation it requires for that to really be... "useful"? the same issues persist in terms of the number of affected enemies where shadow maul usually hits 5 at max and touch of fear can vary wildly between 2-10 depending on how friendly the enemies want to be with their spacing.

if the intention is something like that, then the radius might want to see an increase to alleviate that, but i'm sure there's an awkward aspect to that given tanks increased aoe radius/cone too.

 

one of the things i've noticed as well is that whenever touch of fear is in a famine situation in terms of targets, it's likely that shadow maul will also be in a famine situation too - that's more correctable because of the cone/aimable aspect but it's an aspect that clearly comes into play.

 

 

Edited November 12, 2020 by Kanil

[Hew]

So, dumb question, because I am definitely not a CoH math guy, but....

 

What does this look like when you factor in 2 mob soul drain, with 50% uptime and 100% uptime?

 

It seems that the dpa is intentionally anemic when you count souldrain in, but I don't really know what that means in "math" numbers. Figuring it with 50% uptime and only 2 mobs seems a reasonable capability for a mildly slotted player. 4 mobs and ~100% uptime would also be a good bellweather to get a feel for it, sans slotting of power (just raw input from drain)

 

Thanks!

[modest]

Thank you to @Kanil for testing the Scrapper version of the set.

 

Captain Powerhouse previously stated that the design intent for Touch of Fear is to be a filler AOE skill that can be replaced once a character is leveled to the point where they can take Epic pool AOE skills, or pool power attacks. Touch of Fear is intentionally balanced to have extremely low damage because it is intended to be used while buffed with a saturated Soul Drain. However, Scrappers and Brutes get Soul Drain at 26, and Brutes get Soul Drain at 28. That is just a few levels shy of when Epic pools are available. Touch of Fear underperforms significantly until Soul Drain at levels 26 and 28 respectively, at which point it becomes an average AoE attack if buffed by a 150% damage buff.

1 hour ago, Hew said:

What does this look like when you factor in 2 mob soul drain, with 50% uptime and 100% uptime?

 

It seems that the dpa is intentionally anemic when you count souldrain in, but I don't really know what that means in "math" numbers. Figuring it with 50% uptime and only 2 mobs seems a reasonable capability for a mildly slotted player. 4 mobs and ~100% uptime would also be a good bellweather to get a feel for it, sans slotting of power (just raw input from drain)

 

Thanks!

On a Scrapper at level 50, with Soul Drain at 100% uptime, with Soul Drain gaining bonuses from hitting two enemies, and with Touch of Fear slotted to 100% damage, it will deal 117 damage (69.7 DPA). A minion at 50 has 430.80. It will take 4 applications of the skill to kill a level 50 minion, assuming that the minion has no resistance to negative energy.

 

At level 50, a lieutenant has 857.50 health and a boss has 2,570.20 health. It will take 8 applications to kill a lieutenant and 22 applications to kill a boss, assuming that they have no resistance to negative energy.

 

Stalkers do not receive Soul Drain, but let's be generous and assume that Build Up has a 100% uptime, and that Touch of Fear is slotted for 100% damage. In that (impossible) scenario, Touch of Fear will deal 135.6 damage (64 DPA). It will take 4 applications to kill an even level minion. It will take 7 applications to kill a lieutenant, and 22 applications to kill a boss.

[Hew]

thanks modest! for me, that doesnt seem very unreasonable. use of other sources of aoe should be able to clear all minions o an alpha strike, leaving hard tatrgets, right?

[Jimmy]

Release Candidate 1 - November 13th, 2020

 

Other Powers Changes

Dark Melee

•  Shadow Maul
  • Target cap reduced from 10 to 5 (16 to 10 for Tankers)
•  Touch of Fear
  • Now a melee targeted AoE with a 10 target cap (16 for Tankers)
  • Now deals negative energy damage over time
  • Fear duration reduced by roughly 50%
  • Cast time increased from 1.17s to 1.97s
  • Only the main target will be affected by the Fear and ToHit debuff
  • Now accepts Targeted AoE Damage sets
•  Taunt (Tanker / Brute)
  • Now has the correct icon border
• AE versions of these powers have been updated with missing powers and to match current power effects

Energy Assault

•  Whirling Hands
  • No longer yields double damage with Energy Focus active
  • Instead it will instantly recharge the power
•  Energy Focus
  • Previously Energy Focus could only be acquired once every 15 seconds, regardless of if you used it or not - you can now regain it again immediately after it has been spent
  • Cleaned up some timing issues
  • Now shows up on the buff bar
• AE versions of these powers have been updated with missing powers and to match current power effects

Kinetics

• All versions of the following powers have been converted from old pseudopet mechanics to new execute power mechanics
  •  Transfusion
  •  Siphon Power
  •  Transference
  •  Fulcrum Shift
• Player powers should notice no difference beyond faster application
• Some NPC powers may become weaker or stronger depending on their rank
• AE versions of these powers have been updated with missing powers and to match current power effects

Movement Buffs

• This change has been reverted
• This will be looked at again in the future, potentially Page 2, as we look into proliferating Ninjitsu
• The following travel powers will suppress Primary/Secondary equivalent power travel buffs:
  •  Pool > Leaping > Combat Jumping
  •  Pool > Leaping > Super Jump
  •  Pool > Force of Will > Mighty Leap
  •  Pool > Speed > Super Speed
  •  Pool > Experimentation > Speed of Sound
  •  Prestige Travel > Ninja Run
  •  Prestige Travel > Beast Run
  •  Prestige Travel > Athletic Run
• Primary/Secondary powers impacted by this:
  •  Scrapper Defence > Ninjitsu > Shinobi-Iri
  •  Sentinel Defence > Ninjitsu > Shinobi-Iri
  •  Blaster Support > Ninja Training > Shinobi-Iri
  •  Blaster Support > Tactical Arrow > Gymnastics

Taunt Aura Slotting

The following powers now accept Taunt Enhancement Sets:

Spoiler

• Bio Armor
  •  Evolving Armor
  •  Genetic Contamination (Tanker/Brute only)
• Dark Armor
  •  Death Shroud (Tanker/Brute only)
  •  Cloak of Fear (Tanker/Brute only)
  •  Oppressive Gloom (Tanker/Brute only)
• Electric Armor
  •  Lightning Field (Tanker/Brute only)
• Energy Aura
  •  Entropic Aura
• Fiery Aura
  •  Blazing Aura (Tanker/Brute only)
• Ice Armor
  •  Chilling Embrace (Tanker/Brute only)
  •  Icicles (Tanker/Brute only)
• Invulnerability
  •  Invincibility
• Radiation Armor
  •  Beta Decay (Tanker/Brute only)
• Regeneration
  •  Integration (Brute only)
• Shield Defense
  •  Against All Odds
• Stone Armor
  •  Mud Pots (Tanker/Brute only)
• Super Reflexes
  •  Evasion (Tanker/Brute only)
• Willpower
  •  Rise to the Challenge

Accolades

• All active combat Accolade powers now recharge in 10 minutes (down from 25 minutes), but are no longer affected by global recharge buffs - this affects the following powers:
  •  Crey CBX-9 Pistol /  Stolen Immobilizer Ray
  •  Eye of the Magus /  Demonic Aura
  •  Geas of the Kind Ones /  Force of Nature
  •  Vanguard Medal /  Megalomaniac
  •  Elusive Mind
• Accolade powers with different alignment versions (eg: Vanguard Medal / Megalomaniac) can now be activated regardless of alignment, but will force the other version of the power into cooldown

P2W Powers

•  Summon Workbench
  • Can now be summoned while flying (but must still target the ground)
•  Jump Pack /  Steam Jump
  • These powers were intended to have a 30s lockout timer, but it never worked properly (on initial release, they had a 5 minute cooldown)
    • They sometimes were locked out permanently until you zoned, and sometimes could be used back-to-back
    • They also detoggled Intangibility powers on expiration, and were locked out for 2 minutes by NoPhase, despite having nothing to do with intangibility
  • The not-working lockout timer has been removed, and instead these powers now share a 30 second cooldown (which fixes all the above issues) using the new shared cooldown code tech developed for the accolades above
•  Renewal of Light (P2W) /  Return to Battle
  • These powers are no longer mutually exclusive - you can own both at the same time
  • Instead they share a cooldown
  • The Winter Event version of Renewal of Light has been renamed to Light of Renewal to prevent confusion with the P2W version

[Dispari]

23 minutes ago, Jimmy said:

Movement Buffs

• This change has been reverted

  Thank God. And thank the devs for listening to feedback. This particular changes was a bad idea.
 

23 minutes ago, Jimmy said:

• This will be looked at again in the future, potentially Page 2, as we look into proliferating Ninjitsu

I don't like this though -- makes it sound like it'll be on the docket to nerf again when fewer people are paying attention.

[General Idiot]

Hopefully, with more time to look at it again, they'll also have time to implement something a little less harmful to people's enjoyment that still accomplishes whatever it was they were trying to achieve. 

 

To the devs, though: Thank you for listening.

[Shayendrel]

On 10/24/2020 at 11:56 AM, Hew said:

Have you slotted and tried to use the new ToF? Maybe actually toss a character onto the beta server and try it out before you cast aspersions?

 

Also, you do realize that _target caps_ for tankers have been higher than any other melee for god knows how long right? It is how they manage agro!

I have, and do not like it. I have a DM/DA Scrapper and a DA/DM Tanker. Love them both, but only bothered to make the tanker after the changes to the angle and target cap for Shadow Maul. I made an original post in the main thread about it and was told to come here to critique, etc.

Honestly, the reversion on the target cap numbers just sounds like someone was sour grapes about DM being able to be actually semi-effective... that set has, well had if you count ToF (which I don't because the mechanics and damage are lame AF, even though improved in beta), only the one cone for AOE damage, and there are other sets with more and better AOE choices. I'm fine with only having the one *if* it's not nerfed the way you are nerfing it. The AOE for ToF is stupid, the area is very small, the fear is useless IMO, and I already cap out any debuffing from the single target and shadow maul usage already.

Honestly DM is almost entirely Single Target damage, and the one shining use for Shadow Maul was for clobbering a group that was trying to gank you for scrappers, and to help hold aggro effectively on my tanker. Since it does even less damage on tankers than scrappers/brutes, not sure what the actual rationale for the decrease is there. And yes, while the 'threat level' is higher for tankers, I've had blasters and scrappers pull aggro off my tanker many times (and done it to other tankers) before, so every little bit that helps me do my role there is a good thing.

It's almost as if they only want us to play Titan Weapons, Fire melee, Rad melee, and all the other sets that have better AOE attacks AND generally stronger single target attacks as well. I just don't understand it at all. I definitely don't want powers all the same and over homogenized for each AT, but seriously, they should all be relatively on par when all factors are accounted for, and DM has NEVER gotten any love since the inception of City, until the small bump earlier this year, and now you're yanking back half of that on us. Almost all the other changes I have seen in the list make a *HELL* of a lot more sense. That one though, not at all.

Oh, and Soul Drain is awesome. As a buff. But it is NOT really a damage "attack", even though it does do okay damage, but the fastest recharge I have gotten it down to is still more than 30 seconds.

Edited November 13, 2020 by Shayendrel

[xl8]

•  Jump Pack /  Steam Jump
  • These powers were intended to have a 30s lockout timer, but it never worked properly (on initial release, they had a 5 minute cooldown)
    • They sometimes were locked out permanently until you zoned, and sometimes could be used back-to-back
    • They also detoggled Intangibility powers on expiration, and were locked out for 2 minutes by NoPhase, despite having nothing to do with intangibility
  • The not-working lockout timer has been removed, and instead these powers now share a 30 second cooldown (which fixes all the above issues) using the new shared cooldown code tech developed for the accolades above

 

Does this mean we can no longer alternate when one runs out?

[Monos King]

27 minutes ago, xl8 said:

•  Jump Pack /  Steam Jump
  • These powers were intended to have a 30s lockout timer, but it never worked properly (on initial release, they had a 5 minute cooldown)
    • They sometimes were locked out permanently until you zoned, and sometimes could be used back-to-back
    • They also detoggled Intangibility powers on expiration, and were locked out for 2 minutes by NoPhase, despite having nothing to do with intangibility
  • The not-working lockout timer has been removed, and instead these powers now share a 30 second cooldown (which fixes all the above issues) using the new shared cooldown code tech developed for the accolades above

 

Does this mean we can no longer alternate when one runs out?

Unfortunately. Although on a side note this might mean they won't be disabled in PvP.

Edited November 13, 2020 by Monos King

[Gobbledigook]

On 11/13/2020 at 7:41 PM, Jimmy said:

Release Candidate 1 - November 13th, 2020

 

Other Powers Changes

Dark Melee

•  Shadow Maul
  • Target cap reduced from 10 to 5 (16 to 10 for Tankers)
•  Touch of Fear
  • Now a melee targeted AoE with a 10 target cap (16 for Tankers)
  • Now deals negative energy damage over time
  • Fear duration reduced by roughly 50%
  • Cast time increased from 1.17s to 1.97s
  • Only the main target will be affected by the Fear and ToHit debuff
  • Now accepts Targeted AoE Damage sets
•  Taunt (Tanker / Brute)
  • Now has the correct icon border
• AE versions of these powers have been updated with missing powers and to match current power effects

Energy Assault

•  Whirling Hands
  • No longer yields double damage with Energy Focus active
  • Instead it will instantly recharge the power
•  Energy Focus
  • Previously Energy Focus could only be acquired once every 15 seconds, regardless of if you used it or not - you can now regain it again immediately after it has been spent
  • Cleaned up some timing issues
  • Now shows up on the buff bar
• AE versions of these powers have been updated with missing powers and to match current power effects

Kinetics

• All versions of the following powers have been converted from old pseudopet mechanics to new execute power mechanics
  •  Transfusion
  •  Siphon Power
  •  Transference
  •  Fulcrum Shift
• Player powers should notice no difference beyond faster application
• Some NPC powers may become weaker or stronger depending on their rank
• AE versions of these powers have been updated with missing powers and to match current power effects

Movement Buffs

• This change has been reverted
• This will be looked at again in the future, potentially Page 2, as we look into proliferating Ninjitsu
• The following travel powers will suppress Primary/Secondary equivalent power travel buffs:
  •  Pool > Leaping > Combat Jumping
  •  Pool > Leaping > Super Jump
  •  Pool > Force of Will > Mighty Leap
  •  Pool > Speed > Super Speed
  •  Pool > Experimentation > Speed of Sound
  •  Prestige Travel > Ninja Run
  •  Prestige Travel > Beast Run
  •  Prestige Travel > Athletic Run
• Primary/Secondary powers impacted by this:
  •  Scrapper Defence > Ninjitsu > Shinobi-Iri
  •  Sentinel Defence > Ninjitsu > Shinobi-Iri
  •  Blaster Support > Ninja Training > Shinobi-Iri
  •  Blaster Support > Tactical Arrow > Gymnastics

Taunt Aura Slotting

The following powers now accept Taunt Enhancement Sets:

  Reveal hidden contents

• Bio Armor
  •  Evolving Armor
  •  Genetic Contamination (Tanker/Brute only)
• Dark Armor
  •  Death Shroud (Tanker/Brute only)
  •  Cloak of Fear (Tanker/Brute only)
  •  Oppressive Gloom (Tanker/Brute only)
• Electric Armor
  •  Lightning Field (Tanker/Brute only)
• Energy Aura
  •  Entropic Aura
• Fiery Aura
  •  Blazing Aura (Tanker/Brute only)
• Ice Armor
  •  Chilling Embrace (Tanker/Brute only)
  •  Icicles (Tanker/Brute only)
• Invulnerability
  •  Invincibility
• Radiation Armor
  •  Beta Decay (Tanker/Brute only)
• Regeneration
  •  Integration (Brute only)
• Shield Defense
  •  Against All Odds
• Stone Armor
  •  Mud Pots (Tanker/Brute only)
• Super Reflexes
  •  Evasion (Tanker/Brute only)
• Willpower
  •  Rise to the Challenge

Accolades

• All active combat Accolade powers now recharge in 10 minutes (down from 25 minutes), but are no longer affected by global recharge buffs - this affects the following powers:
  •  Crey CBX-9 Pistol /  Stolen Immobilizer Ray
  •  Eye of the Magus /  Demonic Aura
  •  Geas of the Kind Ones /  Force of Nature
  •  Vanguard Medal /  Megalomaniac
  •  Elusive Mind
• Accolade powers with different alignment versions (eg: Vanguard Medal / Megalomaniac) can now be activated regardless of alignment, but will force the other version of the power into cooldown

P2W Powers

•  Summon Workbench
  • Can now be summoned while flying (but must still target the ground)
•  Jump Pack /  Steam Jump
  • These powers were intended to have a 30s lockout timer, but it never worked properly (on initial release, they had a 5 minute cooldown)
    • They sometimes were locked out permanently until you zoned, and sometimes could be used back-to-back
    • They also detoggled Intangibility powers on expiration, and were locked out for 2 minutes by NoPhase, despite having nothing to do with intangibility
  • The not-working lockout timer has been removed, and instead these powers now share a 30 second cooldown (which fixes all the above issues) using the new shared cooldown code tech developed for the accolades above
•  Renewal of Light (P2W) /  Return to Battle
  • These powers are no longer mutually exclusive - you can own both at the same time
  • Instead they share a cooldown
  • The Winter Event version of Renewal of Light has been renamed to Light of Renewal to prevent confusion with the P2W version

Its a shame you didn't take the opportunity to try something different with Touch of Fear in dark Melee for us to test. This version of ToF is not good. The more i play it the less i like it.

 

The radius, the damage, the cooldown, adding the AoE but not the to hit debuff to the AoE is all bad (there you go). The power is mediocre for leveling, i preferred the old Shadow Maul and at higher levels i think ToF will just be respecced out.

 

Could you give us a slightly different version with more cooldown and higher damage and a larger radius or something else other than this to test?

 

Energy Melee definitely got the main focus and DM just an after thought with a boring mediocre fix that will probably need another fix in the future.

Edited November 14, 2020 by Gobbledegook

[Lockpick]

2 hours ago, Jimmy said:

Release Candidate 1 - November 13th, 2020

 

Other Powers Changes

 

Movement Buffs

• This change has been reverted
• This will be looked at again in the future, potentially Page 2, as we look into proliferating Ninjitsu
• The following travel powers will suppress Primary/Secondary equivalent power travel buffs:
  •  Pool > Leaping > Combat Jumping
  •  Pool > Leaping > Super Jump
  •  Pool > Force of Will > Mighty Leap
  •  Pool > Speed > Super Speed
  •  Pool > Experimentation > Speed of Sound
  •  Prestige Travel > Ninja Run
  •  Prestige Travel > Beast Run
  •  Prestige Travel > Athletic Run
• Primary/Secondary powers impacted by this:
  •  Scrapper Defence > Ninjitsu > Shinobi-Iri
  •  Sentinel Defence > Ninjitsu > Shinobi-Iri
  •  Blaster Support > Ninja Training > Shinobi-Iri
  •  Blaster Support > Tactical Arrow > Gymnastics

 

P2W Powers

•  Summon Workbench
  • Can now be summoned while flying (but must still target the ground)
•  Jump Pack /  Steam Jump
•  Renewal of Light (P2W) /  Return to Battle
  • These powers are no longer mutually exclusive - you can own both at the same time
  • Instead they share a cooldown
  • The Winter Event version of Renewal of Light has been renamed to Light of Renewal to prevent confusion with the P2W version

Thank you for these adjustments!

[InvaderStych]

@Jimmy

 

Checking again to see if there's a rational behind not giving Scrapper Beta Decay taunt sets while other Scrapper auras (AAO, RttC, etc) are getting them?

Edited November 14, 2020 by InvaderStych

[Wavicle]

1 hour ago, InvaderStych said:

@Jimmy

 

Checking again to see if there's a rational behind not giving Scrapper Beta Decay taunt sets while other Scrapper auras (AAO, RttC, etc) are getting them?

This seems like it could be just an oversight.

However, there's something I'm confused by:

On LIVE Scrapper Energy Aura Entropic Aura HAS NO Taunt component, as far as I know. On Test it seems like it has been added? This was intentional I guess? But I don't recall seeing it in the patch notes.

On Test Scrapper Entropic Aura does have Taunt, and so does Beta Decay, but Beta Decay didn't get the Taunt sets made available? Definitely seems like at least one mistake in there somewhere.

[Replacement]

17 hours ago, Gobbledegook said:

The radius, the damage, the cooldown, taking away the to hit debuff from the AoE is all bad. The power is mediocre for leveling, i preferred the old Shadow Maul and at higher levels i think ToF will just be respecced out.

This section, especially the bolded part, is incorrect.

 

On Live, it deals no damage and affects a single target.  On beta, it's also an aoe damaging attack.  It may not be great, but it's still everything it is Live and more.

 

They cannot "take away the to hit debuff from the AoE" because it never had it.