Against my Better Judgement (Ice Melee)

[Solarverse]

I am very reluctant to do this because honestly, the Suggestion Forums has a way of bringing out the worst in some of the best people on these boards. I have seen many of you post since the beginning of this game and I am fond of a great deal of you...however, these Suggestion Forums have been known to turn you in to something that you are not. So please bare this in mind and be nice. I swore the Suggestion Forums off, so I am taking a much larger chance posting this than I am comfortable with...however, I am compelled to do so in order to get a feel of the other gamers where Ice is concerned. Having said that...

 

The History

 

My favorite combinations for my Tankers has always been [Willpower/Energy - Ice Armor/Ice Melee - Anything/Stone - Invulnerability/Super Strength] and in that order. If you ever took a look at my Tanks, you would see that they very seldom deviate from this...and if I do create a character that goes outside of this, that character usually doesn't last very long. However, the only thing that has kept Ice from being in my number one spot, is the absurdity of some of the powers and how they aren't really all that pertinent to a Tank. For theme, I absolutely love Ice/Ice as a Tank, but the reality is that there is only one ability that really helps give Tanks crowd control and damage mitigation.

 

I know what you are thinking, you are thinking, "But Solarverse, what about all that -recharge!"

 

You mean all 8% of it? Not really a big help since you only have one power that is really somewhat useful with the -recharge and that is Frost, which is a short range (but now wide...thank God) cone and we are still only looking at -8% Recharge/Slow. Frozen Aura does not do this, in fact it is arguably the worst power in the set and it's a Tier 9 Power that has an AoE Sleep, which is broken immediately. It is completely useless outside of an AoE Cold Damage type.

 

All of the rest of the powers are straight forward single target damage and that -8% Recahrge/Slow is hardly worth getting all excited about. I have been playing Ice/Ice Tanks since the very beginning and after all these years, my opinion of the set has not been changed. The two best things to happen to Ice Melee since 2004 is when they added damage to Frozen Aura (which should have been done straight out of the gate) and the extra damage to Frost....which was desperately needed.

 

However, regardless if you agree or disagree I ask that you at least take a bit of time to check out my proposition for the set and kind of ignore my personal biased views on this set. I am going to love this set no matter how horrible the set is...I loved it when it first came out, back when it was pure garbage, and I still love it now. However, I think it needs some attention if it is ever going to be (which it has never been) on par with other sets. I don't expect this set to ever be the best, but I would like if it were at least ranked among the top 10 for once in its life.

 

THE COLD RULE!!!

 

One thing to keep in mind here is the COLD RULE (something I made up...sorry for the lame term) which is this: Any power that has a -8% Recharge/Slow must be accounted for when making any changes to a power. For an example, if you add a chance for Mitigation to a power that already has a -8% Recharge/Slow, that Mitigation affect must be no greater than half of what the duration or percentage of chance would be for similar mitigation tools of other sets.

 

 

 

ICE MELEE

Anything written in regular blue print are edits made after considering constructive feedback.

All damage scales are pulled from base Tank values at level 50

 

•   FROZEN FISTS: Change animation and activation time to match Stone Fist, Increase recharge from 3 to 4 seconds to keep in line with Stone Fist. Add a 10% Chance for a Mag 2 Scale 3 Stun (half the duration of EM Barrage since COLD RULE applies) to target, as the hit from a fist wrapped in Ice can cause a sudden cold rush to the head giving its victim brain freeze, stunning your target. 
•   ICE SWORD: Add a 25% chance for a Mag 2 Scale 6 Immobilize on target (half the duration of Spine's Lunge, half the chance as Stone Mallet) as the hit from Ice Sword can create large Icicles on the ground surrounding your target. (Uses the same VFX as Chilblain whenever the Immobilize procs)
•   FROST: Reduce cast time from 2.27 seconds to 1.83 seconds (matches Swoop from Battle Axe) and add a 35% chance for a Mag 2 Scale 7.45 Immobilize on all targets hit (half of the duration of Spine Burst of the same tier, half the chance as Swoop from Battle Axe) as the quick formation of Ice Crystals can accumulate to shackle your targets in Ice.
•   TAUNT: Stays the same, no change.
•   BUILD UP: Stays the same, no change.
•   ICE PATCH: Apply the same radius percentage bonuses to Ice Patch that Tanks get for other AoEs. Not sure why this was left out as a Tank's primary function over Brutes is to better mitigate damage. I believe this was simply overlooked. Also reduce cast time from 3.47 seconds to 3.1 seconds (matches Ice Slick cast times from Controller/Dominator sets). It has been argued that this is not enough, however, I feel the Devs would never allow a Tank to drop an Ice Patch faster than a Dominator or Controller can. Having said that, if a Dev decided that I was wrong, I would not be disappointed in the slightest.
•   FREEZING TOUCH: Stays the same.
•   GREATER ICE SWORD: Change the animation to that of Greater Psi Blade, change cast time from 2.33 seconds to 2.5 seconds to match GPB and add a 35% chance for Knock Down (less than half the chance for Heavy Mallet) which applies the COLD RULE and keeps the chance of mitigation in line with that rule. Increase Recharge from 10 Seconds to 15 seconds and add the values of Greater Psi Blade's damage scale. This increases the damage of Greater Ice Sword from 103.55 base value to 218.71 base value.
•   FROZEN AURA: In addition to the 100% chance for Sleep, add a 100% Chance for a Mag 2 11.175 Scale Immobilize to all targets hit (half of Chilblain in the Epic Pool Power for Tanks, but also ignores the COLD RULE due to there being no -8% Recharge associated with Frozen Aura) which will greatly help Tanks and other Melee classes with aggro control and situational control (I.E. Knock Back prevention, runner prevention) on teams, but does not interfere with solo play and the usefulness of Sleep. This Immobilize will not prevent Knock Down, but rather prevent Knock Back. Any target hit with a Knock Back will be Knocked Down instead.

 

Conclusion

 

The original iteration of this proposal had a couple of nerfs to certain powers that I felt might be a wee bit too over powered. However, after talking with people in the thread, I came to agree that the last thing Ice Melee needs is a nerf to justify a buff. Having said that, I felt that this was primarily a well deserved mitigation buff to Ice Melee with a slight DPA buff to the Tier 1 (Frozen Fists) ability and a Damage buff to the Tier 8 (Greater Ice Sword) ability. I am not a huge fan of buffing anything in this game, I do not believe it is any big secret that I hate the Power Creep that has been introduced to this game over the years. However, what I hate even more than Power Creep is when one powerset is far exceeded by others in the balance department, especially when a particular set that came straight out of the box (since day one) and has always remained far behind the others sets for the entire existence of the game. I don't ever expect (nor want) Ice to be the #1 powerset, however, it would be nice to see the set rise above the lower levels (in which it has always been a dweller of) high enough to finally be able to wave and say howdy to the other sets who didn't even know it existed.

 

 

Edited December 7, 2020 by Solarverse

[AerialAssault]

I could get behind all of these changes. I've been playing an Ice Melee/Ice Armour Scrapper recently and the set is "Fun" but by god it shows it's age.

 

The only suggestions I could add would be:

 

• To have a faster animation for Ice Patch. In groups it tends to suffer from Dead Enemy Syndrome from my experiences, and the AoE is so small as to almost be negligible. And all it takes is one teeny tiny Knockback and it's pretty much wasted. I think the AoE across all AT's should be bumped up a bit, with Tankers obviously having the wider range
• Not sure how I feel about changing the animation for Greater Ice Sword, but I'd take that & the chance for KD over what Greater Ice Sword is now.
• Maybe I'm weird but I .. kind of like the Sleep element of Frozen Aura? Maybe I can only appreciate it because it's cooldown is pretty low. In a group though, it basically only serves to stop a mob for about 0.1 seconds. It also seems counter-productive for a Brute? In any case, I do think that Immobilize would be the better status.

 

But other than that I'm down for all of this.

[ScarySai]

3 hours ago, Solarverse said:

  FREEZING TOUCH: Reduce duration of hold from 13.6 seconds to 9.54 seconds to match that of Tank Holds. Having a 13.6 second hold on a Tank is a bit over powered and should equal the values of other Tanks.

No. I can't support a random nerf to the best power in the entire set, sorry.

 

3 hours ago, Solarverse said:

  GREATER ICE SWORD: Change the animation to that of Greater Psi Blade, change cast time from 2.33 seconds to 2.5 seconds to match GPB and add a 35% chance for Knock Down (less than half the chance for Heavy Mallet) to keep the chances of mitigation lower due to the COLD RULE.

Why are we making this awful power worse for no reason?

 

3 hours ago, Solarverse said:

•   FROZEN AURA: Drop the 100% chance for Sleep and add a 100% Chance for a Mag 2 Immobilize to all targets hit for 8.95 seconds (half of Chilblain in the Epic Pool Power for Tanks, but also ignores COLD RULE due to there being no -8% Recharge on power)

Again, no.

 

These changes serve no purposes other than to make ice melee a worse set, I think these ideas are terrible. Ice Melee could use some minor tweaks, especially with GIS and Frozen Fists, but these suggestions do nothing but introduce more problems, rather than fix what exists currently.

 

 

Edited December 5, 2020 by ScarySai

[macskull]

• What Ice Melee needs: nothing, it's already one of the best melee sets in the game especially on Tankers where the arc increase on Frost practically lets you hit enemies behind you.
• What potential improvements Ice Melee could use:
  • The "weak points" in the set are Frozen Fists, Greater Ice Sword, and arguably Ice Patch.
  • FF could potentially pick up another secondary effect but a 10% chance for a stun which only affects minions still doesn't make the power worth using. Probably better to get a recharge increase to raise its damage scale and thus its DPA.
  • GIS suffers the same problem as FF - its DPA is awful. If anything the animation should be reduced, not increased, or its recharge should be increased.
  • Ice Patch could probably use a larger radius but the single biggest issue with the power is its cast time. It's awful and once you have enough mitigation from other sources it's just not worth using.

[Solarverse]

8 minutes ago, ScarySai said:

No. I can't support a random nerf to the best power in the entire set, sorry.

I would hardly call this a random nerf. The power does not need to have a 13.6 second hold. It just doesn't. Considering the power's recharge is 16 seconds, a single recharge SO brings it below 13 seconds...it actually puts it at 12 seconds and a single IO puts it at 11.24 seconds. By the time you finish your build with Hasten and/or your set bonuses, you can easily bring that recharge down to 6.02 seconds which gives you more than enough time to keep a single target held with a double stack of a Mag 2 Hold. That's not even including if you take Ageless Incarnate which brings it down to a whopping 4.76 second recharge. This is going of my build, which was not even optimized for recharge but rather optimized for resistance to cap my S/L damage and to get as much Energy Resist as possible with what I had left available.

I honestly can't see a legit complaint against the Hold Duration decrease here.

 

Also, I noticed that you only picked out the things you had a problem with, you never touched base on the others. Why not?

8 minutes ago, ScarySai said:

Why are we making this awful power worse for no reason?

How exactly are we making it worse? We are giving it something that it currently does not have...an actual mitigation tool. The only cost for that mitigation tool is a .17 second cast time. That is fractional at best and an extremely fair trade-off to add some real mitigation/status effect to the ability. If you truly feel the power is awful, how is adding a KD to the power making it worse exactly? Because I added a .17 second cast time for balance? Really? You are going to dis it over a .17 second difference? You yourself admit that it is awful...adding a Knock Down to it would help make it more useful, not make it worse.

8 minutes ago, ScarySai said:

Again, no.

 

These changes serve no purposes other than to make ice melee a worse set, I think these ideas are terrible. Ice Melee could use some minor tweaks, especially with GIS and Frozen Fists, but these suggestions do nothing but introduce more problems, rather than fix what exists currently.

So wait, you think that Frozen Aura should keep the AoE Sleep? You truly can't see the usefulness in adding a 100% chance AoE Immobilize to the ability? I sure can, it keeps the mobs from getting knocked away from you from members on your team with Knock Back, keeps those mobs right with you and knocks them down instead. They aren't going anywhere so you can maintain aggro control. It sure as hell beats a completely useless sleep power.

What would you do, add knock down to it? I hope not, too many sets already have this...we don't want to turn it in to Foot Stomp, so it needs something else that not only fits thematically, but also adds utility to the set. Not to mention, we already have Ice Patch, not much point for an AoE Knock Down. I think the 100% chance AoE Immobilize is far from making the set worse.

I honestly can't see any validity to your argument. Maybe it would help if you gave a few ideas on how you think it could be made better and give me something to work with here.

[Solarverse]

5 minutes ago, macskull said:

• What Ice Melee needs: nothing, it's already one of the best melee sets in the game especially on Tankers where the arc increase on Frost practically lets you hit enemies behind you.

I will agree to disagree here, Mac. I have never once hit a target behind me and I play my Ice Tank a LOT. I also would never in 1 million years agree that it is one of the best melee sets in the game. Not even close. Even if every single player who ever played this game came to this forum and tried to convince me otherwise, I would still not fall for it. I would say you all are playing some cruel joke on me, or I would say the world has lots its mind an I must be the only sane person left alive. So we will just have to agree to disagree on this, hehe.  😄

5 minutes ago, macskull said:

• What potential improvements Ice Melee could use:
  • The "weak points" in the set are Frozen Fists, Greater Ice Sword, and arguably Ice Patch.

I could easily be okay with decreasing the recharge for Ice Patch. However, making changes are tricky and balance is always 1st priority. I didn't want to get too crazy with my idea because I did not want to do too much and then be accused of making the build OP. I was very careful in planning this build and always kept balance at the foremost part of my mind when doing so. However, if the Devs decreased the activation time of Ice Patch, I would not complain a single bit. Nor would I complain if they actually shortened the cast time of GIS. I simply couldn't see the Devs doing that though if they are going to give it an actual utility that is helpful to the set other than -8% recharge/slow. However, I would still lke to see the animation for Greater Psi Blade applied here. The current animation looks very sluggish to me...if anything else, add it as an optional animation.

5 minutes ago, macskull said:

• • FF could potentially pick up another secondary effect but a 10% chance for a stun which only affects minions still doesn't make the power worth using. Probably better to get a recharge increase to raise its damage scale and thus its DPA.

Again, I was just trying to keep it as balanced as possible without making it overkill. I for sure don't think that it needs a recharge boost though, it recharges so fast already. If nothing else, maybe increase the chance to stun a bit more and add a bit more damage. I simply can't see shortening the recharge being something that would make the ability more useful though.

5 minutes ago, macskull said:

• • GIS suffers the same problem as FF - its DPA is awful. If anything the animation should be reduced, not increased, or its recharge should be increased.

What if on top of my original idea for GIS, we also increased the Damage of it as well? Maybe something that way more than justifies the increase to cast time? I mean, the old cottage rule, the loner the animation, the more damage, right?

5 minutes ago, macskull said:

• • Ice Patch could probably use a larger radius but the single biggest issue with the power is its cast time. It's awful and once you have enough mitigation from other sources it's just not worth using.

I could get on board with this. You won't get any argument from me. It never really bother me though since if I am laying Ice Patch as a Tank, I don't really plan to move from the spot anyway, heh.

[macskull]

6 minutes ago, Solarverse said:

I will agree to disagree here, Mac. I have never once hit a target behind me and I play my Ice Tank a LOT. I also would never in 1 million years agree that it is one of the best melee sets in the game. Not even close. Even if every single player who ever played this game came to this forum and tried to convince me otherwise, I would still not fall for it. I would say you all are playing some cruel joke on me, or I would say the world has lots its mind an I must be the only sane person left alive. So we will just have to agree to disagree on this, hehe.  😄

I did say "practically," not "literally," though you can do some really funny things with cones if you jump over/past your targets as you activate the power. That being said... you could delete every power in the set except Frost, Frozen Aura, and Freezing Touch and it would still be one of the best melee sets.

6 minutes ago, Solarverse said:

What if on top of my original idea for GIS, we also increased the Damage of it as well? Maybe something that way more than justifies the increase to cast time? I mean, the old cottage rule, the loner the animation, the more damage, right?

PvE damage design formulas generally do not take animation time into account, only recharge time. This is why longer-animation powers are usually worse. Only way to make GIS stick to the design formulas and make it a better power, damage-wise, is to reduce its animation or increase its recharge.

[ScarySai]

21 minutes ago, Solarverse said:

I would hardly call this a random nerf. The power does not need to have a 13.6 second hold. It just doesn't. Considering the power's recharge is 16 seconds, a single recharge SO brings it below 13 seconds...it actually puts it at 12 seconds and a single IO puts it at 11.24 seconds. By the time you finish your build with Hasten and/or your set bonuses, you can easily bring that recharge down to 6.02 seconds which gives you more than enough time to keep a single target held with a double stack of a Mag 2 Hold. That's not even including if you take Ageless Incarnate which brings it down to a whopping 4.76 second recharge. This is going of my build, which was not even optimized for recharge but rather optimized for resistance to cap my S/L damage and to get as much Energy Resist as possible with what I had left available.

A hold that's reduced by level and mob resists. I'm aware IOs exist, that doesn't justify this weird change at all, though.

 

22 minutes ago, Solarverse said:

How exactly are we making it worse?

By giving it a longer animation and worse DPA.

 

23 minutes ago, Solarverse said:

So wait, you think that Frozen Aura should keep the AoE Sleep? You truly can't see the usefulness in adding a 100% chance AoE Immobilize to the ability?

The immob is largely useless on a tank, and we have ice patch on top of that. I would go so far as to say the immob would be even more useless and potentially more frustrating than the sleep.

[Solarverse]

5 minutes ago, ScarySai said:

A hold that's reduced by level and mob resists. I'm aware IOs exist, that doesn't justify this weird change at all, though.

Okay, I can see why you didn't like it. However, just so you know, I mainly did that as a balancing act in order to justify the buffs I proposed for the set. You know, give a little take a little type of thing. If the Devs felt that the duration of the hold did not need to change in order to buff the other aspects of the set, trust me...they would get no complaints from me, heh.

5 minutes ago, ScarySai said:

By giving it a longer animation and worse DPA.

I get you here. This is the same issue @macskull brought up. Which is why I now suggest we increase the damage enough to more than compensate. Once I hash out a few ideas with you guys I will adjust the original post to reflect on the talks here. This is why I really need more input from you guys other than, "YOUR IDEA SUCKS!" (I know you didn't say that, but it sounded funny so I went with it.)

5 minutes ago, ScarySai said:

The immob is largely useless on a tank, and we have ice patch on top of that. I would go so far as to say the immob would be even more useless and potentially more frustrating than the sleep.

The Immob would not negate the Ice Patch if that is what you are thinking? It doesn't negate it on Controllers and would work much in the same way on other classes. Its "purpose" would be to keep mobs still and prevent them from being knocked away from you, or run away from you. Even if you don't take it as a Tank, I know Scrappers hate chasing their targets too, so it would help them as well IMO. I even considered possibly adding a small DoT to it similar to the Controller's DoT they get with an AoE Immob....I would like to run that by the players first though before adding it in to the original post.

[ScarySai]

3 minutes ago, Solarverse said:

the Immob would not negate the Ice Patch if that is what you are thinking?

Why does a tanker need an immob when all mobs they are capable of hitting by frozen aura will likely all be huddling to them? If anything, the immob will make things awkward at times.

 

There's a stronger argument there for stalkers/scrappers, but again, I find the sleep to be surprisingly useful even there.

Edited December 5, 2020 by ScarySai

[Solarverse]

1 hour ago, macskull said:

 you could delete every power in the set except Frost, Frozen Aura, and Freezing Touch and it would still be one of the best melee sets.

I did some research before I even made this thread because I wanted to be sure I had as much information as possible for when people started to ask questions about the idea and I wanted to be prepared and educated enough to talk about it. Having said that, my research shows me that Ice Melee is in 12th place for Tanks, 20th place for Brutes (only trialing behind 2 sets for last place) 18th place for Srappers (which is second to last) and the Stalker version of Ice Melee is second to last, ranking in at 15th place out of 16. The class that uses the set the most are Tanks and according to the data, Ice Melee is far from being anywhere near (or even practically near) one of the best; or even remotely close to being the most used set.

 

https://forums.homecomingservers.com/fotm-powers/#

 

Info can be found above if you care to cross reference. Hell, maybe you will point out something that I missed. It was easy to see for secondaries, however, I had to add together the first two powers for the primaries (since people can skip one of those) and then average them up to get a rough estimated number.

Quote

PvE damage design formulas generally do not take animation time into account, only recharge time.

Perhaps it is time they should? Just a thought.

Quote

This is why longer-animation powers are usually worse. Only way to make GIS stick to the design formulas and make it a better power, damage-wise, is to reduce its animation or increase its recharge.

Or then there is that. I kind of wish they would also include a cast time percentage in there personally to put in to that formula. However, having said that, I don't think the damage is on par with other abilities that have the same recharge. Bone Smasher for example. However, if we want to increase the recharge to match Greater Psi Blade at 15 second recharge with a .17 cast time increase and then give it the same damage scale as Greater Psi Blade, that would be awesome and it would actually hit like a ton of bricks. Add in the 35% Chance to Knock Down a target and we are golden.

Edited December 5, 2020 by Solarverse

[Solarverse]

47 minutes ago, ScarySai said:

Why does a tanker need an immob when all mobs they are capable of hitting by frozen aura will likely all be huddling to them? If anything, the immob will make things awkward at times.

 

There's a stronger argument there for stalkers/scrappers, but again, I find the sleep to be surprisingly useful even there.

As a Tank (and Scrapper I would assume) a lot of people run an AoE Damage Toggle. If your own character does not immediately negate the AoE Sleep, your team most assuredly will.

 

A Tanker needs an Immob (especially an AoE Immob the prevents Knock Back) because a lot of powers in game does Knock Backs. This can especially be frustrating for a Tank who uses the mobs to boost the Tank's Defense. For an example, Invuln uses Invincibility where they get a bonus to defense per NPC near the Tank, Ice gets Energy Absorption to boost not only his endurance, but his defense as well, Energy Armor gets the same deal. it makes it difficult for a Tank's survival if he goes to use his AoE +Endurance and +Defense power and suddenly before the attack hits the mobs have been blown away from the Tank. Times like this, those Tanks (or Scrappers or Brutes) would appreciate an AoE Immob that prevents this.

Not to mention, just having them there and making sure they stay there is helpful for the Tank since it is the Tank's job to keep mobs glued to the Tank. Makes things a lot easier for the rest of the team IMO.

 

I can see the sleep being useful or solo play, I could see that being a particular argument that may have to be addressed at some point as Solo players would find this change particularly useless. In which case I would simply have to suggest perhaps we instead drop the DoT from the AoE Immob and instead of removing the Sleep in favor of the Immob, we simply add the Immob to the Sleep.

[captainstar]

5 hours ago, Solarverse said:

I am very reluctant to do this because honestly, the Suggestion Forums has a way of bringing out the worst in some of the best people on these boards. I have seen many of you post since the beginning of this game and I am fond of a great deal of you...however, these Suggestion Forums have been known to turn you in to something that you are not. So please bare this in mind and be nice. I swore the Suggestion Forums off, so I am taking a much larger chance posting this than I am comfortable with...however, I am compelled to do so in order to get a feel of the other gamers where Ice is concerned. Having said that...

I understand you. But try not to consider people who only go into topics to criticize, without giving any productive opinions. These people add nothing to our lives. (and if I've ever done that, I'm sorry) I don't know if there's any option to ignore someone who just keeps doing this kind of thing. But if you guys don't have that option here, I want to leave it recommended, too.

[Riverdusk]

My main issues with the set are frozen fists and greater ice sword (GiS I avoid by just playing the set as a stalker instead).  The set is too lacking in single target attacks to have the starting one be as bad as frozen fists.

 

According to @Kaeladin's study of the sets, the ideal attack chain for ice is to swap out frozen fists for cross punch, a regular power pool attack (and not even the fully synergized version).  To me, that signals an issue.  I'd rather just see a flat damage boost and/or animation time cut to frozen fists and GiS.

 

 

 

[Solarverse]

16 minutes ago, Riverdusk said:

My main issues with the set are frozen fists and greater ice sword (GiS I avoid by just playing the set as a stalker instead).  The set is too lacking in single target attacks to have the starting one be as bad as frozen fists.

 

According to @Kaeladin's study of the sets, the ideal attack chain for ice is to swap out frozen fists for cross punch, a regular power pool attack (and not even the fully synergized version).  To me, that signals an issue.  I'd rather just see a flat damage boost and/or animation time cut to frozen fists and GiS.

 

 

 

Check the edit of the set; I just made edits based off feedback literally a minute ago. let me know if you think Frozen Fists still needs a buff in damage after looking it over. The primary change you will be looking at is Greater Ice Sword.

[Solarverse]

3 hours ago, AerialAssault said:

I could get behind all of these changes. I've been playing an Ice Melee/Ice Armour Scrapper recently and the set is "Fun" but by god it shows it's age.

 

The only suggestions I could add would be:

 

• To have a faster animation for Ice Patch. In groups it tends to suffer from Dead Enemy Syndrome from my experiences, and the AoE is so small as to almost be negligible. And all it takes is one teeny tiny Knockback and it's pretty much wasted. I think the AoE across all AT's should be bumped up a bit, with Tankers obviously having the wider range
• Not sure how I feel about changing the animation for Greater Ice Sword, but I'd take that & the chance for KD over what Greater Ice Sword is now.
• Maybe I'm weird but I .. kind of like the Sleep element of Frozen Aura? Maybe I can only appreciate it because it's cooldown is pretty low. In a group though, it basically only serves to stop a mob for about 0.1 seconds. It also seems counter-productive for a Brute? In any case, I do think that Immobilize would be the better status.

 

But other than that I'm down for all of this.

I have reworked the original build. Check it out and get back with me. Everyone's thoughts on the subject reflects the changes.

[Riverdusk]

2 minutes ago, Solarverse said:

Check the edit of the set; I just made edits based off feedback literally a minute ago. let me know if you think Frozen Fists still needs a buff in damage after looking it over. The primary change you will be looking at is Greater Ice Sword.

Increasing the recharge and damage of GiS just means you need a filler like frozen fists (cross punch) even more in the attack chain.  Frozen fists is still an issue of being a painfully bad power and you still being better off using cross punch as that filler.   Frozen fists is a frozen turkey and I wouldn't be happy with any change that doesn't help it out as I much prefer using my primary powers instead of pool powers to attack with. 

 

[Solarverse]

4 minutes ago, Riverdusk said:

Increasing the recharge and damage of GiS just means you need a filler like frozen fists (cross punch) even more in the attack chain.  Frozen fists is still an issue of being a painfully bad power and you still being better off using cross punch as that filler.   Frozen fists is a frozen turkey and I wouldn't be happy with any change that doesn't help it out as I much prefer using my primary powers instead of pool powers to attack with. 

 

I was looking at the values for Barrage in the Energy Melee set. The issue is that in order to get higher damage, you also have to increase recharge. As @macskull has pointed out, the damage values are partially factored in by recharge timers. So the only way to gain more damage, is increase recharge. Having said that, most builds should have zero issues with the increased recharge since most builds reduce recharge so much that rarely will it interfere with the rotation. So let me change some numbers on Frozen Fist and let you take a look at it.

 

Done. You can check it out now.

Edited December 5, 2020 by Solarverse

[Riverdusk]

3 minutes ago, Solarverse said:

I was looking at the values for Barrage in the Energy Melee set. The issue is is that in order to get higher damage, you also have to increase recharge. As @macskull has pointed out, the damage values are partially factored in by recharge timers. So the only way to gain more damage, is increase recharge. Having said that, most builds should have zero issues with the increased recharge since most builds reduce recharge so much that rarely will it interfere with the rotation. So let me change some numbers on Frozen Fist and let you take a look at it.

They could just make frozen fists a 4 second recharge power (increased from 3 seconds) with the appropriate increase in damage and/or shave a bit off its animation time.  It would make it a more worthy power.  I think that'd be a simple change.

[Solarverse]

Just now, Riverdusk said:

They could just make frozen fists a 4 second recharge power (increased from 3 seconds) with the appropriate increase in damage and/or shave a bit off its animation time.  It would make it a more worthy power.  I think that'd be a simple change.

I don't think the damage that we could gain from a 1 second recharge would even be worth it. I was taking a look at Energy Punch for comparison and it has a 5 second recharge but only does 8.45 more base damage than Frozen Fists as they stand now. We might be able to squeeze another 5 or 6 base damage to that due to it being a longer animating power, however, I still don't think that it would be worth it nor do I think it would out perform Cross Punch. If you feel it would be worth it then by all means I don't mind adding it in though. I just don't think you would be very satisfied. The problem is that it has such a low base damage to begin with and any change would feel trivial without giving it a huge damage boost....something I am willing to bet the Devs would not be too fond of. I think Frozen Fists is one of those lost causes that we kind of have to just scrape by with.

[Riverdusk]

1 minute ago, Solarverse said:

I don't think the damage that we could gain from a 1 second recharge would even be worth it. I was taking a look at Energy Punch for comparison and it has a 5 second recharge but only does 8.45 more base damage than Frozen Fists as they stand now. We might be able to squeeze another 5 or 6 base damage to that due to it being a longer animating power, however, I still don't think that it would be worth it nor do I think it would out perform Cross Punch. If you feel it would be worth it then by all means I don't mind adding it in though. I just don't think you would be very satisfied. The problem is that it has such a low base damage to begin with and any change would feel trivial without giving it a huge damage boost....something I am willing to bet the Devs would not be too fond of. I think Frozen Fists is one of those lost causes that we kind of have to just scrape by with.

I don't see them increasing its recharge (and damage scale) to 6 seconds as that would make it identical to ice sword.  Increasing it to more than 5 I'd bet is a no go.  I've never seen a set before with its tier 1 and 2 with the exact same recharge.  Energy melee has a 5 and 6 second recharging powers as tier 1 and 2 so there is precedent for that though.  I think 5 would be plenty.

 

I'd be satisified with ANY increase to FF damage/animation no matter how small so yes I'd also be happy with 4.  I use it now instead of cross punch even though it underperforms and I know it does because I'm just stubborn that way.

[Vanden]

I don't generally find immobilizes worthwhile on melee sets, since it hampers the ability to herd. I wouldn't see the addition of immobilize to any powers on a melee set to be much of a buff.

6 hours ago, Solarverse said:

Also reduce cast time from 3.47 seconds to 3.1 seconds (matches Ice Slick cast times from Controllers sets)

This is still much too long.

 

6 hours ago, Solarverse said:

Add a 10% Chance for a Mag 2 Stun for 2.85 Seconds

 

2 hours ago, Solarverse said:

The power does not need to have a 13.6 second hold

Where are you getting these mez numbers? Mids? They don't match up to anything I'm seeing in-game. Freezing Touch, for example, only goes up to 11.92s at level 50.

 

This is just a little bit of (hopefully) constructive criticism for talking about mez powers: I find it's usually better to talk about mez (and damage) in terms of the Scale, not the actual duration in seconds you see in-game. The duration is modified by enhancements, set bonuses, character level, AT, and the purple patch, and since it can vary so much in-game, talking in terms of seconds quickly muddles the discussion since not everyone's thinking about the power's performance in the exact same condition. Scale, however, never changes. So if you want to argue for changing the duration of Freezing Touch, for example, it's more helpful (for me at least) to call it a scale 10 Hold than an x-second Hold. Plus, it's future-proof in a way, since if that power somehow shows up on another AT in the future you can already know how it'll perform.

 

I know a big stumbling block is that it's not intuitively clear how to translate the base scale of a power into actual performance in-game, but even so, it's easy to understand that, for example, changing a scale 10 Hold to a scale 12 Hold means the power now lasts 20% longer. And it turns out, mez scales are very simple to convert to what the actual duration will be in-game: the scale of a mez is just the duration in seconds of the mez. That's it! It's then multiplied by the AT modifiers and a modifier for your level, which are also very simple: your level just increases the duration of mez by 1% for every level above 1 you gain, up to 49% at level 50. As for the AT mods, Defenders and Dominators have a 1.0 modifier, EATs have a 0.9 modifier, Controllers have a 1.25 modifier, and everyone else has a 0.8 modifier.* So a Tanker using Freezing Touch at level 30 is (Scale 10 base) * (0.8 AT modifier) * (1.29 level modifier) = 10.92s base duration.

 

(If you ever want to know the mez scale of an exisiting power, just open its info window, change the AT to Defender or Dominator, and pull the level slider all the way to the left to set it to level 1. The duration it shows will be identical to the actual scale.)

 

Anyway, sorry for the tangent, and I'm glad to see you're overcoming your aversion to posting about your ideas to improve the game.

 

*I'm pretty sure it's possible for ATs to have different scalars for different mezzes, and for a power's mez effect to use a scale that doesn't match its type of mez, but I haven't found any powers or AT combinations in-game where the numbers don't match what I've described here.

Edited December 5, 2020 by Vanden

[Solarverse]

Just now, Riverdusk said:

I don't see them increasing its recharge (and damage scale) to 6 seconds as that would make it identical to ice sword.  Increasing it to more than 5 I'd bet is a no go.  I've never seen a set before with its tier 1 and 2 with the exact same recharge.  Energy melee has a 5 and 6 second recharging powers as tier 1 and 2 so there is precedent for that though.  I think 5 would be plenty.

 

I'd be satisified with ANY increase to FF damage/animation no matter how small so yes I'd also be happy with 4.  I use it now instead of cross punch even though it underperforms and I know it does because I'm just stubborn that way.

Indeed. Check it out now. What I did was use your proposed +1 second recharge, took animation time in to consideration, then brought it down from what Barrage is and divided the damage between Cold and Smashing damage. I think what it sets at now should be right where it should be.

[Riverdusk]

1 minute ago, Solarverse said:

Indeed. Check it out now. What I did was use your proposed +1 second recharge, took animation time in to consideration, then brought it down from what Barrage is and divided the damage between Cold and Smashing damage. I think what it sets at now should be right where it should be.

As @Vandennoted, we get what you are trying to go for, but the damage numbers are better as a scale as they vary so much by AT and other factors.  Why I always just say increase its recharge and the "appropriate damage scale for its increased recharge" as that's the easy way out. 🙂  

 

Looks good to me though.

[Solarverse]

1 minute ago, Vanden said:

I don't generally find immobilizes worthwhile on melee sets, since it hampers the ability to herd. I wouldn't see the addition of immobilize to any powers on a melee set to be much of a buff.

These days herding is frowned upon though, so I tend to seek alternatives. it's one of those things where you can't please everyone so you try and find middle ground. I would think in combination with all the frustration to Knock Back that people express and how herding of any type is frowned upon these days, Melee Characters might actually find an AoE Immob (or any immob for that matter) to better suit them. Besides, not every set can be the same and sets have to fit the theme they are built under. Immobilize makes complete sense with an Ice set. At least that's where my mind sits on it anyway.

1 minute ago, Vanden said:

This is still much too long.

Yeah, I don't see us getting away with making it any shorter than that. I mean if we can get away with more, great...but I just can't see the Devs seeing eye to eye on this one. I think asking for the reduction mentioned in the OP is about the best we can hope for.

1 minute ago, Vanden said:

Where are you getting these mez numbers? Mids? They don't match up to anything I'm seeing in-game. Freezing Touch, for example, only goes up to 11.92s at level 50.

Hence the correction in the OP. I too noticed the difference between mids and in game stats. That is why I removed the change.

1 minute ago, Vanden said:

 

This is just a little bit of (hopefully) constructive criticism for talking about mez powers: I find it's usually better to talk about mez (and damage) in terms of the Scale, not the actual duration in seconds you see in-game. The duration is modified by enhancements, set bonuses, character level, AT, and the purple patch, and since it can vary so much in-game, talking in terms of seconds quickly muddles the discussion since not everyone's thinking about the power's performance in the exact same condition. Scale, however, never changes. So if you want to argue for changing the duration of Freezing Touch, for example, it's more helpful (for me at least) to call it a scale 10 Hold than an x-second Hold. Plus, it's future-proof in a way, since if that power somehow shows up on another AT in the future you can already know how it'll perform.

Good advice. Mind directing me to a chart that shows the scales and I can take it from there. thanks for the head's up, man.

1 minute ago, Vanden said:

 

I know a big stumbling block is that it's not intuitively clear how to translate the base scale of a power into actual performance in-game, but even so, it's easy to understand that, for example, changing a scale 10 Hold to a scale 12 Hold means the power now lasts 20% longer. And it turns out, mez scales are very simple to convert to what the actual duration will be in-game: the scale of a mez is just the duration in seconds of the mez. That's it! It's then multiplied by the AT modifiers and a modifier for your level, which are also very simple: your level just increases the duration of mez by 1% for every level above 1 you gain, up to 49% at level 50. As for the AT mods, Defenders and Dominators have a 1.0 modifier, EATs have a 0.9 modifier, Controllers have a 1.25 modifier, and everyone else has a 0.8 modifier. So a Tanker using Freezing Touch at level 30 is (Scale 10 base) * (0.8 AT modifier) * (1.29 level modifier) = 10.92s base duration.

 

Anyway, sorry for the tangent, and I'm glad to see you're overcoming your aversion to posting about your ideas to improve the game.

 

Again, thank you, man. You're always a welcome addition to any thread and your opinions are well respected by me. Especially any threads I make.