Focused Feedback: Travel Power Updates (Build 3)

[PirateCrew]

1 hour ago, Bopper said:

What makes you think that, exactly?

Reason 1:

I'm seeing the totality of the offer, not just its speed features.  For me, Flight's (the pool) Beta potential includes not being grounded, among other things.   And I could be mistaken, but the -Fly protection is unavailable elsewhere, and -Fly effects are more frequently autohit than immobilization.   We have at least had options for dealing with Immob.  A rare use case, to be sure.  I just wish this protection wasn't as separated from hover, or could be more available to mystic flight and other fly-ish tactics.  I'm also not suggesting any other posters should value this aspect of EvM any higher just because I do.

 

What unlock's Speed Pool's potential, from this perspective?  Combat Jumping or any Immob protection does, plus Slow Resist.  A movement power that enemies can disable or neutralize feels way less potent to me, and I'd guess I'm not alone.  Otherwise Knives of Artemis wouldn't bother throwing those caltrops...and we wouldn't bother with Winter's Gift +Slow Resist.

 

Reason 2: 

Focusing on the movement speed angle, I think it's important to consider how many players/characters are only minimally slotting travel powers - and will continue to do so for reasons too complex to detail here; I trust you know these.  Applying that logic to my characters, EvM supports Flight pool's speed potential without consuming often-constrained slots (~59 vs ~70 with both unslotted, from Jimmy's "newer build / 2mph fix" post).  Since set bonuses vary by character, I'm not yet inclined to fully analyze each, but may place some value on EvM as a boost to reach or reach closer to the flight speed cap.  This also counts as bringing forth Flight's potential, to me.

 

So while it's right that sprint doesn't *fully* bring forth Speed pool's potential, it does support it, without requiring a power pick or slots beyond the free one.  Swift/Hurdle too, are free and supportive of the full potential of speed/jumping/flight, to varying degrees.  EvM fits in this supportive category for me, but requires a power pick of questionable value if used purely for the speed and global IO slot...Reason 1 might help justify it.  Stretching even further to get EvM to support alternatives like Mystic Flight would be "flavor-driven", to put it mildly.

 

Comparable build logic provides a pre-IO'ing SS speed value of ~84 from the "Illustrated" topic table (thanks!), without a second power pick.

Edited April 5, 2021 by PirateCrew
added SS speed for reference

[Wavicle]

Is the 4 mag flight of Hover considered a form of -Fly protection?

[Jacke]

14 minutes ago, Wavicle said:

Is the 4 mag flight of Hover considered a form of -Fly protection?

 

I imagine it depends on the -Fly magnitude of mob attacks.

[Bopper]

15 minutes ago, Wavicle said:

Is the 4 mag flight of Hover considered a form of -Fly protection?

It is. But it uses the same suppression logic that other travel powers use with speed. Highest number wins. However, EvMa doesn't use that suppression so its 4 mag is always added on top of whatever you currently have.

 

Hover gives 4 mag (suppresses with other travel buffs),

Fly gives 1 mag (suppresses with other travelbuffs)

Evasive Maneuvers gives 4 mag.

 

So if you have Hover, Fly and Evasive Maneuvers on (or just Hover and EvMa on), you will have 8 magnitude Fly.

 

If you have Fly and Evasive Maneuvers on, you will have 5 magnitude Fly.

 

If you have Fly and Hover on (or just Hover on), you will have 4 magnitude Fly.

 

If you have just Fly on, you will have 1 magnitude Fly.

[PirateCrew]

19 minutes ago, Wavicle said:

Is the 4 mag flight of Hover considered a form of -Fly protection?

The protection may have value, of course.  Since I don't use regular Fly or variants in combat on Live (hover only), I couldn't say whether it's making a difference compared to Fly.  However, I find that hover's is occasionally inadequate, in a number of cases where the enemy spawns don't seem to normally generate particularly heavy -Fly.  So whenever the grounding happens, it's more of a surprise and something that doesn't clearly trace back to a tactical decision, and as already mentioned, I haven't identified a source of more protection as a build choice that I could improve.  The effect also seems to persist longer than I would expect (being grounded).  Whether Hover's built-in protection is simply being overcome by stacking -Fly, or something odd is happening like the "wobbly" combat attribute stacking, I couldn't say.

 

Unfortunately, it's not a combat attribute I can monitor, so I am not prepared to test it the way I'd like.

 

(And since I was too slow posting, in the best possible way...) That's very useful info, Bopper.

[Blackbird71]

3 hours ago, Wavicle said:

Regarding how much investment each pool requires in order to max it out, and again someone please correct me if I've missed something:

 

SS must have 2 slots.

SJ must have 2 slots.

Fly may need 3 slots, or 2 slots with additional bonuses from sets or powers, or No slots with EvM.

Teleport must have 3 slots (and theoretically also additional Range bonuses or Range buffing powers such as Boost Range or Clarion Radial).

 

 

I'm not really sure if that's all good or not, but it seems mostly ok to me.

 

So far as I'm aware, SS and SJ benefit from the same travel speed set bonuses as Fly.  If you're going to consider that the enhancement slots in Fly may be reduced because of these bonuses, then you should consider that the same is true for the other powers as well.  I.e., SS and SJ would still require fewer slots than Fly in order to be maxed out.

[Wavicle]

2 hours ago, Blackbird71 said:

 

So far as I'm aware, SS and SJ benefit from the same travel speed set bonuses as Fly.  If you're going to consider that the enhancement slots in Fly may be reduced because of these bonuses, then you should consider that the same is true for the other powers as well.  I.e., SS and SJ would still require fewer slots than Fly in order to be maxed out.

Yea, that’s fair, but I understand that’s changing in the next build.

[Bopper]

2 hours ago, Blackbird71 said:

 

So far as I'm aware, SS and SJ benefit from the same travel speed set bonuses as Fly.  If you're going to consider that the enhancement slots in Fly may be reduced because of these bonuses, then you should consider that the same is true for the other powers as well.  I.e., SS and SJ would still require fewer slots than Fly in order to be maxed out.

They get the same set bonus, but Fly has a 50% stronger base value. So a 7.5% movement speed bonus will work off of base 14.32 mph for run/jump, but it will be working off of base 21.48 mph for fly.

[Wavicle]

Yet more numbers. Real world tests of Maxed out travel in Boomtown and St. Martial.

 

All three toggle travel powers were slotted such that they were at their caps.
Teleport was slotted with 3 range and 3 end red (for testing purposes)
No global bonuses of any kind.

In Boomtown going from the Base Portal to the North West corner of the map took approximately:

 

56 seconds with SS (including several leaps with Momentum, monitoring Jump stats while running you can see that you don't need the Ring to light up for it to be useful)
55 seconds with Fly (including one use of Afterburner)
54 seconds with SJ (including one use of Double Jump to clear most of the city in one leap)
37 seconds with Teleport

In St. Martial going from Krazy Mark in the South East to Dead Man's Tree at the North West corner of the island:

 

60 seconds with SS
49 seconds with Fly (one use of AB)
48 seconds with SJ (one use of DJ)
31 seconds with Teleport

 

These tests show the toggle powers in VERY close parity, with SS struggling a bit in difficult terrain. I imagine SoS would perform very similarly to SS, with Jaunt instead of Momentum, Mighty Leap should perform very similarly to SJ with Takeoff instead of Double Jump. Testing Mystic Flight and Translocation might prove interesting. How many times must I hit Translocation to make up for Afterburner? Still, the difference is likely to be very, very small. Maybe I'll test the Origin pools and Infiltration tomorrow.

Edited April 6, 2021 by Wavicle

[Zepp]

So in the terrain that is least advantageous to SS and most advantageous to 30s timer AB+Fly the travel powers are basically on par?

[Blackbird71]

3 hours ago, Wavicle said:

Yet more numbers. Real world tests of Maxed out travel in Boomtown and St. Martial.

 

All three toggle travel powers were slotted such that they were at their caps.
Teleport was slotted with 3 range and 3 end red (for testing purposes)
No global bonuses of any kind.

In Boomtown going from the Base Portal to the North West corner of the map took approximately:

 

56 seconds with SS (including several leaps with Momentum, monitoring Jump stats while running you can see that you don't need the Ring to light up for it to be useful)
55 seconds with Fly (including one use of Afterburner)
54 seconds with SJ (including one use of Double Jump to clear most of the city in one leap)
37 seconds with Teleport

In St. Martial going from Krazy Mark in the South East to Dead Man's Tree at the North West corner of the island:

 

60 seconds with SS
49 seconds with Fly (one use of AB)
48 seconds with SJ (one use of DJ)
31 seconds with Teleport

 

These tests show the toggle powers in VERY close parity, with SS struggling a bit in difficult terrain. I imagine SoS would perform very similarly to SS, with Jaunt instead of Momentum, Mighty Leap should perform very similarly to SJ with Takeoff instead of Double Jump. Testing Mystic Flight and Translocation might prove interesting. How many times must I hit Translocation to make up for Afterburner? Still, the difference is likely to be very, very small. Maybe I'll test the Origin pools and Infiltration tomorrow.

But how many players are going to max out the travel powers?  Build slotting is often tight, and I think it much more likely that these will continue to be slotted as they often are now.  Basing this on researching dozens of player-made builds across all ATs, most commonly it seems that no additional slots are given to travel powers, or sometimes one at the most.  For SO builds or (non-set) IOs, there might be a single travel speed enhancement slotted (if not an endurance reduction).  At the "higher end" builds, (i.e., IO set builds), these are most typically dedicated to IOs with bonuses other than travel speed, and any speed boosts come from set bonuses.  So I submit that basing any analysis off of maxed out travel powers does not satisfy the premise of "real world" conditions.

[Sovera]

14 minutes ago, Blackbird71 said:

But how many players are going to max out the travel powers?  Build slotting is often tight, and I think it much more likely that these will continue to be slotted as they often are now.  Basing this on researching dozens of player-made builds across all ATs, most commonly it seems that no additional slots are given to travel powers, or sometimes one at the most.  For SO builds or (non-set) IOs, there might be a single travel speed enhancement slotted (if not an endurance reduction).  At the "higher end" builds, (i.e., IO set builds), these are most typically dedicated to IOs with bonuses other than travel speed, and any speed boosts come from set bonuses.  So I submit that basing any analysis off of maxed out travel powers does not satisfy the premise of "real world" conditions.

 

I have mentioned this a few times already but it has been glossed over. I personally make some difficult decisions over a single IO and don't see myself dropping slots into travel powers.

 

To be completely honest, and I am not saying this in a snarky way, this change favors a lot the casual players who randomly slap slots semi randomly all over their build.

 

 

The only way would be for travel power IO sets to be reworked to give significant bonuses that would allow them to be alternatives. I have several builds that have Brawl and Boxing slotted with Kinetic Combat for the S/L defense, powers I am not going to use. I would happily allocate these slots to my travel powers if I could get the same bonuses there.

 

I often try to disperse those muled slots from Brawl to other powers that I will actually use. Even if the end result is the numerically (or a bit worse) I prefer those slots augmenting power I do use, even if it's just, for example, a few % more in To Hit (when I'm already at the softcap to hit +3 anyway).

 

But this may be the next thing down the line. We were given this, which exposes the weakness in the travel IOs. So maybe they will work on that part next.

 

Or maybe not and we are to rely on gimmicks like the jump pack.

 

Edited April 6, 2021 by Sovera

[Apparition]

27 minutes ago, Sovera said:

 

I have mentioned this a few times already but it has been glossed over. I personally make some difficult decisions over a single IO and don't see myself dropping slots into travel powers.

 

To be completely honest, and I am not saying this in a snarky way, this change favors a lot the casual players who randomly slap slots semi randomly all over their build.

 

 

The only way would be for travel power IO sets to be reworked to give significant bonuses that would allow them to be alternatives. I have several builds that have Brawl and Boxing slotted with Kinetic Combat for the S/L defense, powers I am not going to use. I would happily allocate these slots to my travel powers if I could get the same bonuses there.

 

I often try to disperse those muled slots from Brawl to other powers that I will actually use. Even if the end result is the numerically (or a bit worse) I prefer those slots augmenting power I do use, even if it's just, for example, a few % more in To Hit (when I'm already at the softcap to hit +3 anyway).

 

But this may be the next thing down the line. We were given this, which exposes the weakness in the travel IOs. So maybe they will work on that part next.

 

Or maybe not and we are to rely on gimmicks like the jump pack.

 

 

 

The vast majority of my characters use the Agility Core Paragon Alpha.  I'm simply going to rework them into the Agility Radial Paragon Alpha, which will basically act as an additional +travel speed IO in both of my travel powers.  (Every character I have takes both Fly and either Super Speed or Speed of Sound.)

[Bopper]

57 minutes ago, Blackbird71 said:

Basing this on researching dozens of player-made builds across all ATs, most commonly it seems that no additional slots are given to travel powers, or sometimes one at the most. 

I would certainly hope nobody on live is investing more than that as you can hit the cap with each movement type by slotting 1 SO into the respective travel power. Increasing the caps will incentivize folks to invest more enhancements into their travel powers if they like (you only need 2 slots at most to reach the caps), but they are more than welcome to not do that and go the same speed as Live (if not faster).

[Blackbird71]

11 minutes ago, Bopper said:

I would certainly hope nobody on live is investing more than that as you can hit the cap with each movement type by slotting 1 SO into the respective travel power. Increasing the caps will incentivize folks to invest more enhancements into their travel powers if they like (you only need 2 slots at most to reach the caps), but they are more than welcome to not do that and go the same speed as Live (if not faster).

You're missing the point.  The conventional wisdom on the AT forums isn't to even put 1 SO in the travel power, but instead to slot for -KB or -Slowness, etc.  And when every single slot being in the right place is critical to getting the right set bonuses, a little less time between missions is not going to incentivise any serious builders into devoting any additional slots to these powers; not when the tradeoff is performance in the missions.  Any builds that do will be laughed at as "sub-optimal," and with good reason.

But the real point is this:  Wavicle's analysis does not mimic "real world" conditions, as it does not reflect either the current popular slotting, or the likely slotting that will be devoted to travel powers even after these changes.

[Bopper]

4 minutes ago, Blackbird71 said:

You're missing the point.  The conventional wisdom on the AT forums isn't to even put 1 SO in the travel power, but instead to slot for -KB or -Slowness, etc

The point wasn't missed. The reason why that is conventional wisdom is because of how easy it is to hit the caps without slotting travel powers.

 

Fly is at the cap the moment you choose the power. No slotting needed.

 

Super Leap is at the cap by simply slotting Hurdle with an IO and having some set bonuses. You can make it easier if you want to use boosters. A +5 IO in Hurdle and a 7.5% movement speed bonus from 2 piece performance shifter, you're at the cap. No slotting in Super Leap needed.

 

Super Speed is nearly at the cap by just enhancing Sprint and Swift. Use a +5 IO in each and don't slot Super Speed and you're over 90 mph running. Throw in 16% movement speed set bonuses and you're at the cap.

 

So again, to my point, it is so easy to reach the speed caps on Live that nobody should be investing in their travel powers. In Page 2, those caps are raised so it incentives players to invest in them if they wish to reach the new caps, but you don't have to as you will still go just as fast (if not faster) as you do on Live.

[Blackbird71]

1 minute ago, Bopper said:

The point wasn't missed. The reason why that is conventional wisdom is because of how easy it is to hit the caps without slotting travel powers.

We'll have to disagree on the reason behind the slotting priority then.  I will continue to maintain that in-mission performance is a much greater slotting priority than speed outside of missions.  As noted by others, for players who use travel powers inside of missions, additional speed can even be problematic.  No, I don't think we're going to see any significant swing in slots being moved from combat powers to travel powers.

[Bopper]

8 minutes ago, Blackbird71 said:

We'll have to disagree on the reason behind the slotting priority then.  I will continue to maintain that in-mission performance is a much greater slotting priority than speed outside of missions.  As noted by others, for players who use travel powers inside of missions, additional speed can even be problematic.  No, I don't think we're going to see any significant swing in slots being moved from combat powers to travel powers.

Sure, in a mission I don't like going at the speed cap either. Luckily I can control my speed with various options. Turn off Fly/Super Leap/Super Speed, then decide if I want to turn on Hover (if applicable) or use Sprint or use Nina Run (or both). There are various options for going my preferred speed in a mission without needing travel power always turned on.

[arthurh35353]

14 minutes ago, Blackbird71 said:

We'll have to disagree on the reason behind the slotting priority then.  I will continue to maintain that in-mission performance is a much greater slotting priority than speed outside of missions.  As noted by others, for players who use travel powers inside of missions, additional speed can even be problematic.  No, I don't think we're going to see any significant swing in slots being moved from combat powers to travel powers.

That is why I brought up the basic travel set bonuses. My logic is that it was intended to be slotted for 3 and those 3 slots would get you to your caps or maxes. For Fly and Mystic Flight, you can't do that any more. You have to either devote another slot or an extra power (Evasive Maneuvers).

 

Yes, it may have been over slotting before but now it would be under slotting and expecting that you either devote another slot/power or have to take specific bonuses to get there. Which is forcing a build?

[siolfir]

Because it's popping up here with relative travel speeds, I'll drop a link to a post I made in the flight thread (about slotting and hitting caps) a few minutes ago for discussion:

 

To summarize: since SS allows more overhead with a 120 mph cap, why not lower it to 110-111 which would put the percentage of the speed cap you hit the same as it is for Fly. It would hurt SS more in the time examples posted above because the absolute speed would be lower, but SS would still be a top "ghost mission" power due to stacking its stealth with an IO even discounting the ability to phase through mobs, and the people complaining about speed disparities will get closer straight-line-nothing-in-the-way numbers.

Edited April 6, 2021 by siolfir

[Glacier Peak]

1 hour ago, Blackbird71 said:

But how many players are going to max out the travel powers?  Build slotting is often tight, and I think it much more likely that these will continue to be slotted as they often are now.  Basing this on researching dozens of player-made builds across all ATs, most commonly it seems that no additional slots are given to travel powers, or sometimes one at the most.  For SO builds or (non-set) IOs, there might be a single travel speed enhancement slotted (if not an endurance reduction).  At the "higher end" builds, (i.e., IO set builds), these are most typically dedicated to IOs with bonuses other than travel speed, and any speed boosts come from set bonuses.  So I submit that basing any analysis off of maxed out travel powers does not satisfy the premise of "real world" conditions.

The options are there if players choose to use them. 

[Pzn]

1 hour ago, Sovera said:

 

The only way would be for travel power IO sets to be reworked to give significant bonuses that would allow them to be alternatives.

I really like this suggestion.  It would be amazing to have a few more options for travel slotting that focus on typed defense instead of positional.  Something to match zephyr would be fantastic.

Edited April 6, 2021 by josh1622

[Bopper]

10 minutes ago, arthurh35353 said:

That is why I brought up the basic travel set bonuses. My logic is that it was intended to be slotted for 3 and those 3 slots would get you to your caps or maxes. For Fly and Mystic Flight, you can't do that any more. You have to either devote another slot or an extra power (Evasive Maneuvers).

 

Yes, it may have been over slotting before but now it would be under slotting and expecting that you either devote another slot/power or have to take specific bonuses to get there. Which is forcing a build?

You can also not chase the 2nd set bonus in a 3 piece travel set and instead replace that Endurance reduction IO with another Speed/Endurance IO. You will hit the speed cap with that slotting if it's important enough to pursue given 3 slots already invested in the power. 

[Derek Icelord]

39 minutes ago, Bopper said:

The point wasn't missed. The reason why that is conventional wisdom is because of how easy it is to hit the caps without slotting travel powers.

 

<snip>

 

So again, to my point, it is so easy to reach the speed caps on Live that nobody should be investing in their travel powers. In Page 2, those caps are raised so it incentives players to invest in them if they wish to reach the new caps, but you don't have to as you will still go just as fast (if not faster) as you do on Live.

Unless the movement cap is effectively tripled (or increased by some equally ridiculous amount) with no increase in base speed, I'm not burning precious slots in movement powers. I know I'm not alone in that thinking, either. Getting from A to B faster is nice and all, but it's at best 4th down on my build priority list.

 

As I posted earlier, slots are so tight 99% of the time I would far rather take an extra power that I don't have to slot than try and pry a slot out of an already slot starved build to throw on my travel power.

[Bopper]

4 minutes ago, Derek Icelord said:

Unless the movement cap is effectively tripled (or increased by some equally ridiculous amount) with no increase in base speed, I'm not burning precious slots in movement powers. I know I'm not alone in that thinking, either. Getting from A to B faster is nice and all, but it's at best 4th down on my build priority list.

 

As I posted earlier, slots are so tight 99% of the time I would far rather take an extra power that I don't have to slot than try and pry a slot out of an already slot starved build to throw on my travel power.

Certainly, I get that. You're talking to a guy who currently has no travel powers on their main characters (excluding the TP I took on my stone tank). That will change now as the increased caps makes my methods of travel possibly fall too far behind, but I'd still slot them more as mules than travel buffs.

 

The nice thing with the change, though, you're not gonna be any slower in P2 than you are on Live. So if you're content currently, then nothing really changes. Maybe some teammates get an earlier start on a mission, but big deal. I won't lose any sleep for not getting a hit on the first mob in a mission.

 

And let's be honest, in teams I'm still traveling with mission transporter, LRT, and team transporter. Also many of my teammates are gonna drop TT as well. So no matter what I do with my travel powers (if I take them), I'm still not gonna be far behind when getting around.