Struggle free of mez effects

[Alchemystic]

Just now, Bill Z Bubba said:

 

Oh, c'mon, we know it's more than three archetypes that have to unnecessarily deal with the idiocy of zero mez protection.

 

I do play one of every AT after all. Not like I'm comin into this blind.

 

I think you very much missed the point. I never said defenders/controllers/corruptors suffered from mez problems, I said they were the solution to mez problems.

[Greycat]

44 minutes ago, Night said:

Uhhh, Massively Multiplayer Online game, emphasis on the multiplayer bit.

 

That solely refers to the fact it's a game with a shared persistent world multiple people play in at the same time. (As opposed to something like Diablo.) That does not mean "Team or you're doing it wrong."

16 minutes ago, Night said:

Ehh? This is a team-based game and everything is balanced around teaming. If you wanna do otherwise on AT's that weren't designed for soloing, you can with the right build and tactics, but then don't be surprised when you struggle. You're weird.

 

"Right" build? Which build is the "right" build? Every AT can solo with every combination. You don't need to "build" a specific way. Yes, some take longer. But the majority of content here can be soloed without doing anything special. The only time you get into "builds" is soloing content that actually WAS designed for teams (IE, task/strike forces) that were later opened up for soloists, and even some of that doesn't really require anything special in a build (such as Posi 1.)

[Alchemystic]

17 minutes ago, parabola said:

The soloing vs teaming debate rather misses the point of this.

 

Quite right, this seems to have gone off track.

 

My initial post here was just to highlight that a majority of the problems people have with mez stems from soloing the game on ATs without access to mez protect, something that can be alleviated by teaming with somebody who can offer mez protection (corruptor, defender, mastermind, controller) or instead soloing as an AT with personal mez protection (scrapper, stalker, sentinel, tanker, brute, HEATS, VEATS).

 

My personal opinion is that making it so that every AT can inherently break free of mez would diminish the value of the powers that provide protection to it.

[Alchemystic]

3 minutes ago, Greycat said:

"Right" build? Which build is the "right" build? Every AT can solo with every combination. You don't need to "build" a specific way. Yes, some take longer. But the majority of content here can be soloed without doing anything special. 

 

Force Field/Psionic Blast defenders would like to have a word with you.

[Greycat]

Just now, Tyrannical said:

 

Force Field/Psionic Blast defenders would like to have a word with you.

They can solo, too. Ask my Earth/FF controller. It's not fast, but they can solo just fine.

[Arbegla]

I gotta agree with Bill here. This game has ALSO been solo friendly. Especially when compared to other high end games.

 

Now for the suggestion itself, I like the concept, but it really comes down to the devil in the details. Out of all of the ATs and powerset combinations, how many are directly affected by a lack of mez protection?

 

Blasters -> Access to T1,T2 primary, T1 secondary while mezzed.

Brute -> All armors get mez protection, some cover more then others, but they all cover the big 4 (Stun, Sleep, Hold, Immobilize)

Controller -> /Elec (Faraday Cage), /Force Field (Dispersion Bubble), /rad (Accelerate Metabolism) though that is only resistance, /sonic (Sonic Dispersion), /traps (Force Field Generator)

Corruptor -> Same as Controller

Defender -> Same as Controller (though sooner, as its a primary not a secondary)

Dominator -> Domination has built in mez protection, perma Dom is possible giving permanent mez protection

Mastermind -> Same as Controller (and arguably you could include /thermal, /emp, /poison, and /pain as well as they grant mez protection to the henchmen)

Scrapper -> Same as Brute

Sentinel -> Same as Brute

Stalker -> Same as Brute

Tanker -> Same as Brute, except sooner because the armor set is a primary.

Warshade and Peacebringer -> Dwarf form has Mez protection built in

VEATs -> Resistance to all mez, and I think some magnitude of protection as well.

 

So out of all the ATs, 5 are basically immune to mez (with VEATs being mostly immune, depending on if its resistance or protection), 2 get limited immunity (blasters, and dominators), 4 get access to powers that grant self mez protection, and HEATs get an entire form that is immune to mez.

 

Having a struggle mechanic, that only covers the 'holes' doesn't seem very worthwhile, especially as it would require a very large design challenge.

 

 

Edited March 23, 2021 by Arbegla

[Greycat]

2 minutes ago, Arbegla said:

Now for the suggestion itself, I like the concept, but it really comes down to the devil in the details. Out of all of the ATs and powerset combinations, how many are directly affected by a lack of mez protection?

 

(snipping list for space)

 

So out of all the ATs, 5 are basically immune to mez (with VEATs being mostly immune, depending on if its resistance or protection), 2 get limited immunity (blasters, and dominators), 4 get access to powers that grant self mez protection, and HEATs get an entire form that is immune to mez.

 

Having a struggle mechanic, that only covers the 'holes' doesn't seem very worthwhile, especially as it would require a very large design challenge.

 

It should be noted that even those *with* mez protection can have it broken, either by loss of END, click mez protection not overlapping (usually only an early level issue, though I suppose enough slows could do it,) or getting enough mezzes stacked (rare-ish, granted - I'm thinking MSRs with a bunch of stuns happening to hit the same time as the most common example.)  So it wouldn't *necessarily* be a waste, even for those with built in mez protection, its use would just be really rare.

[Bill Z Bubba]

20 minutes ago, Tyrannical said:

I think you very much missed the point. I never said defenders/controllers/corruptors suffered from mez problems, I said they were the solution to mez problems.

 

Not when we solo with them.

 

Edit: I have squishies that solo ok, others, not so much. All due to mez protection and the lack thereof. Fix it with defense amps and they solo perfectly well.

 

This is a balance problem. No AT, no powerset combo, should have to suffer with the lack of mez protection when a tank can solo a Werner rules ITF.

 

It's ridiculous.

Edited March 23, 2021 by Bill Z Bubba

[Parabola]

7 minutes ago, Tyrannical said:

 

Quite right, this seems to have gone off track.

 

My initial post here was just to highlight that a majority of the problems people have with mez stems from soloing the game on ATs without access to mez protect, something that can be alleviated by teaming with somebody who can offer mez protection (corruptor, defender, mastermind, controller) or instead soloing as an AT with personal mez protection (scrapper, stalker, sentinel, tanker, brute, HEATS, VEATS).

 

My personal opinion is that making it so that every AT can inherently break free of mez would diminish the value of the powers that provide protection to it.

I would approach this from the other direction and say that the fact most AT's can largely forget mez exists is a design flaw in itself. But it's not one that can realistically be addressed without a rebuild of the mez mechanics from the ground up so we more or less have to work with what we have.

 

I'm not suggesting we allow all AT's to break free of mez, just that we could create a mechanism that would allow mez duration to be reduced, at a cost, in an interactive manner. The cost could be quite high so that in overall balance terms it usually isn't worth paying but it would still give the player an option and a decision to make. It strikes me as potentially a good game mechanic regardless of considerations around who would use it under which circumstances.

[Alchemystic]

1 hour ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

 

Not when we solo with them.

 

Edit: I have squishies that solo ok, others, not so much. All due to mez protection and the lack thereof. Fix it with defense amps and they solo perfectly well.

 

This is a balance problem. No AT, no powerset combo, should have to suffer with the lack of mez protection when a tank can solo a Werner rules ITF.

 

It's ridiculous.

 

Again, not the point I was making.

 

I'm saying if YOU get mezzed, SOMEBODY ELSE playing a controller/corruptor/defender/mastermind can un-mez you.

 

The game was built around dynamics like this, most MMORPGs are, that's what the R stands for after all.

[Arbegla]

7 minutes ago, Tyrannical said:

I'm saying if YOU get mezzed, SOMEBODY ELSE playing a controller/corruptor/defender/mastermind can un-mez you.

 

Or you pop a break free and move on with life. Mez's really aren't that big of a hurdle to a long-term player who understands mechanics. Even on a squishy.

[Alchemystic]

1 hour ago, parabola said:

I would approach this from the other direction and say that the fact most AT's can largely forget mez exists is a design flaw in itself. But it's not one that can realistically be addressed without a rebuild of the mez mechanics from the ground up so we more or less have to work with what we have.

 

I'm not suggesting we allow all AT's to break free of mez, just that we could create a mechanism that would allow mez duration to be reduced, at a cost, in an interactive manner. The cost could be quite high so that in overall balance terms it usually isn't worth paying but it would still give the player an option and a decision to make. It strikes me as potentially a good game mechanic regardless of considerations around who would use it under which circumstances.

 

I think that would probably be a new mechanic entirely that could be introduced into existing powers maybe?

 

Sort of like how we have both defense and resistance, we could create mez defense and mez resistance.

 

mez defense working much like how mez protection works right now

 

mez resistance working as you suggetsed, something that reduces the amount of time you spend mezzed?

[Night]

1 hour ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

 

Not when we solo with them.

 

Edit: I have squishies that solo ok, others, not so much. All due to mez protection and the lack thereof. Fix it with defense amps and they solo perfectly well.

 

This is a balance problem. No AT, no powerset combo, should have to suffer with the lack of mez protection when a tank can solo a Werner rules ITF.

 

It's ridiculous.

If mez protection is the only reason you die, then you might wanna rethink how you build and play the game.

 

What's that over there, is that a breakfree?

 

Problem solved

[Moka]

I think we should nerf Rune of Protection even more. I just want to cause chaos.

[Arbegla]

5 minutes ago, Tyrannical said:

 

I think that would probably be a new mechanic entirely that could be introduced into existing powers maybe?

 

Sort of like how we have both defense and resistance, we could create mez defense and mez resistance.

 

mez defense working much like how mez protection works right now

 

mez resistance working as you suggetsed, something that reduces the amount of time you spend mezzed?

 

We already have that actually. Mez Protection is Mez defense, its even Mag based, most mez toggles grant 12 'mags' of protection, ~4 mez powers to break it.

 

Mez Resistance like those granted by AM (Accelerate Metabolism) reduces the duration of the mez. Heck, we all get a form of it in Health, which grants ~50% sleep resistance, so sleeps (one of the big 4 mez's) only last half the duration that they normally would.

[MTeague]

If we're going to make changes to mez/holds/stuns to allow people to break free early, hey cool, but I'd also like a similar reverse angle looked at.

EB's / AV's with stupid amounts of Mez protection, leaving Control powers effectively useless against the.

 

Yes, I'm aware with a hastened perma-dom you can stacck a lot of holds. 

I'm talking more when you're dealing with an EB on a lvl 24 mission on a Controller. 

At least allow for the concept of a Partial Hold. Some kind of sluggish debuff that reflects them having to fight to shrug off the control powers.

[Alchemystic]

8 minutes ago, Arbegla said:

 

We already have that actually. Mez Protection is Mez defense, its even Mag based, most mez toggles grant 12 'mags' of protection, ~4 mez powers to break it.

 

Mez Resistance like those granted by AM (Accelerate Metabolism) reduces the duration of the mez. Heck, we all get a form of it in Health, which grants ~50% sleep resistance, so sleeps (one of the big 4 mez's) only last half the duration that they normally would.

 

Exactly, I'm pitching the idea to rename these things to mez defense/mez resistance to make them more coherent, and create greater distinction between the two in terms of mechanics.

 

Edited March 23, 2021 by Tyrannical

[Arbegla]

6 minutes ago, MTeague said:

If we're going to make changes to mez/holds/stuns to allow people to break free early, hey cool, but I'd also like a similar reverse angle looked at.

EB's / AV's with stupid amounts of Mez protection, leaving Control powers effectively useless against the.

 

Yes, I'm aware with a hastened perma-dom you can stacck a lot of holds. 

I'm talking more when you're dealing with an EB on a lvl 24 mission on a Controller. 

At least allow for the concept of a Partial Hold. Some kind of sluggish debuff that reflects them having to fight to shrug off the control powers.

 

To be fair, most straight EBs don't have the purple triangles And even if they do, like when you reduce an AV down to an EB, they can still be immobilized.

 

Yes, that doesn't limit all powers, but ranged attacks usually do less damage then melee ones, and you can easily use your environment to kite or run around corners to heal back up while the mob is immobilized. You don't need to face tank everything out there. There is more than one way to skin a cat.

[Arbegla]

7 minutes ago, Tyrannical said:

 

Exactly, I'm pitching the idea to rename these things to mez defense/mez resistance to make them more coherent, and emphasise the difference between the two, while also looking into how to better diversify how we handle mez in existing powersets.

 

 

I mean, its already named Status Effect (Read: Hold, Sleep, Stun, Fear, Immobilize, etc) Protection and Status Effect Resistance (Read: Hold, Sleep, Stun, etc)

 

You can actually already track both of those stats in your Attribute Monitor

[Bill Z Bubba]

15 minutes ago, Arbegla said:

Or you pop a break free and move on with life. Mez's really aren't that big of a hurdle to a long-term player who understands mechanics. Even on a squishy.

 

They are when you're a long term player (read since issue 1) and base performance on XP/MIN.

[Bill Z Bubba]

15 minutes ago, Night said:

If mez protection is the only reason you die, then you might wanna rethink how you build and play the game.

 

What's that over there, is that a breakfree?

 

Problem solved

 

See last comment. Breakfrees run out. Unless you're the type of person to store a hundred of them in email.

[Greycat]

22 minutes ago, Tyrannical said:

The game was built around dynamics like this, most MMORPGs are, that's what the R stands for after all.

 

Ummm....

 

*looks down to the RolePlaying section*

 

... no.

[Arbegla]

6 minutes ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

 

They are when you're a long term player (read since issue 1) and base performance on XP/MIN.

 

Oh, I know you've been around the block a few times, though XP/MIN is kinda a weird metric to capitalize on, especially when running solo. A good solid team, with all the pros and cons that has, generates more XP/MIN then just about any solo play. Granted, that XP/MIN is across all the players involved so individually you might earn less XP/MIN, but the values are higher.

[Arbegla]

5 minutes ago, Night said:

Oh whoops! I dropped my Clarion Core Epiphany that I use for my 100% mez protection uptime!

 

Side note, does the +special side of that still last the full 120 seconds?

[Bill Z Bubba]

5 minutes ago, Night said:

Oh whoops! I dropped my Clarion Core Epiphany that I use for my 100% mez protection uptime!

 

But I actually keep things in my mail, usually wakies for emergencies. Why not breakfrees? refill your tray when you use your last one. It's all simple solutions you choose to ignore.

 

That's great. Now about that game for the FIRST 50 levels....