Focused Feedback: Pool Powerset Revamp: Sorcery

[Mezmera]

1 hour ago, arcane said:

I don't think we can really say Sorcery is getting nerfed anymore. Did you read the new patch notes above?

 

Yes I can comprehend the notes.  

 

Rune is going from an up time of 90s to 40s, less than half.  The total up time you're able to achieve went from a max of 75% to 33%.  I'd be totally fine with it being a max of 50% but likely only feasibly achievable in the 40-45% range realistically.   This change is skewing towards the same reason I don't take Shadow Meld on my stalkers, the constant reapplication of SM is intrusive to my attack chain, which this'll likely be.  

 

The ally buff is going to be a small tick up in absorb shield starting at a lower value than what I already didn't have slotted to use in my tray.  

 

Best thing was the Arcane Bolt with a mechanic I'm familiar with.  I'd venture to say most players will still already have a better attack in their arsenal for their chains.  

 

Overall nerf.  

 

 

Edited April 6, 2021 by Mezmera

[Coyotedancer]

At this point, I'm just resigned to having my Mastermind carry twice as many Breakfrees as she currently does. And Spirit Ward (which I have on quite a few of my magi-) will go from being a "Toss this on a team-mate who looks like they need a quick second or two of breathing room to get things back under control" to a pure set-mule for a Numina pair for the regen that I'm unlikely to even keep on a tray.

 

Crap occurs. 

That's life.

 

Although, to find one small silver lining... I guess I'll be able to respec the members of the gang who have RoP and get a slot back. WIth it no longer taking recharge at all, there's no reason to have that second slot with a recharge enhancement in it that I typically put there. That'll be useful. Some of those builds are pretty tight and one free slot to put elsewhere will make things easier for a few of them. 

 

 

Edited April 7, 2021 by Coyotedancer

[siolfir]

I will say this - and this is before testing so might be dismissed due to that, but I know how I build and play and so don't need to test for some changes - that I'm no more or less likely to take the Sorcery pool than before, but I'm far less likely to go deep into it.

 

What I would like to see from the attacks in all of the origin pools is some reason to take them over a weak blast from your primary or secondary. "But pool powers are supposed to be weaker," I'm told, but that's a garbage argument since pool powers are supposed to provide customization and options for your character. Why penalize for flavor even further beyond the disparities between ATs and primary and secondary choices within them? That's for a different discussion, but that reasoning is what is driving my feedback about these changes, particularly since I don't bother with Rune of Protection.

 

How does this apply to this build? I'll never take Rune. It provides me nothing that I can't get better elsewhere. Sure it won't require as much slotting, because recharge is now useless in it (yay?) but the uptime being capped at just under 33% if you fire it every time it recharges means I'll simply continue to find things that work far more often. There is no temptation in it whatsoever. Since this was similar to my feelings on the 60 second duration, then I'll at least say this: these changes effectively give you a capped recharge version compared to the old one, at the cost of 33% of the already-shorter duration from the last build. It's obvious that the intended design for this build is to use it more often, likely retroactively so you're not wasting duration (which starts even earlier during the animation!) moving between spawns.

 

That said, I'm mildly intrigued with the Arcane Bolt changes, because they do offer something to look at instead of just a weak attack that only works for Controllers with Containment - even if I'm still tired of the "here's a status builder, here's a status drainer" mechanic that always seems to accompany tweaks (*coughEMcough*) because for some reason we don't just want to make solid, dependable powers: I would be much happier, for example, with the same animation time reduction and just setting the recharge to 10 seconds with accompanying increase in endurance cost and damage scale, since that would provide another T3 blast, or one at all for some sets which don't have one.

 

Spirit Ward I will have to test out and see if I care for. Enflame I likely will completely ignore: currently I have it on my Plant/Kin because I can keep mobs in the effect, but rarely use it and if I'm going to respec I may as well get something else useful.

 

Mystic Flight and Translocation are nothing particularly special because all of the travel powers are being adjusted; it's a buff but changes nothing relative to other pools considering that the origin pools compete with each other and all of the standard pools in addition to your primary and secondary.

[Arbegla]

13 minutes ago, Mezmera said:

 

Yes I can comprehend the notes.  

 

Rune is going from an up time of 90s to 40s, less than half.  The total up time you're able to achieve went from a max of 75% to 33%.  I'd be totally fine with it being a max of 50% but likely only feasibly achievable in the 40-45% range realistically.   This change is skewing towards the same reason I don't take Shadow Meld on my stalkers, the constant reapplication of SM is intrusive to my attack chain, which this'll likely be.  

 

The ally buff is going to be a small tick up in absorb shield starting at a lower value than what I already didn't have slotted to use in my tray.  

 

Best thing was the Arcane Bolt with a mechanic I'm familiar with.  I'd venture to say most players will still already have a better attack in their arsenal for their chains.  

 

Overall nerf.  

 

 

 

Old RoP had a 600 second recharge, and 90 second duration. The absolute best you could get, at the recharge cap (400%), which is impossible to get without outside buffs is 1/5 of that time, so 120 seconds. Even a very heavy IO build can only squeeze about 300% recharge counting global recharge, and enhancement slotting, giving you roughly 150 seconds of recharge. Most places I've seen high end builds say between 160 and 150 seconds on recharge. With a 90 second duration, yes, at the recharge cap, you're sitting at 75% uptime.

 

But at the highest IO build you can get, you're at ~150 seconds, giving you a 60% uptime. Now, you get the same power, with a 33% uptime, without any slotting.

 

Before, without slotting you had a 15% uptime. (90 second duration, 600 second recharge)

 

So, overall, this is a buff to base RoP, a buff to low to mid tier builds (as you still needed 222% recharge to get OLD RoP to have a 33% recharge, meaning 100% in enhancements, and still over 100% in global recharge) and a nerf to the VERY high end builds.

 

The other powers getting turned into toggles actually helps the powers out more than it hurts them. You can slot enhancements in Spirit Ward, and being a toggle means you can now effectively permanently have an absorb shield on someone, which refreshes constantly. I'm not sure why you're so upset over an overall BUFF to the entire power pool.

[dangeraaron10]

Still iffy on rune but...

 

Arcane Bolt is back on the menu!

 

For my Controller, at least.

[siolfir]

2 minutes ago, Arbegla said:

The other powers getting turned into toggles actually helps the powers out more than it hurts them. You can slot enhancements in Spirit Ward, and being a toggle means you can now effectively permanently have an absorb shield on someone, which refreshes constantly.

It saves animation time, which is why I said I'd have to try it to see if I care for the changes. Just looking at patch notes I'm fairly certain I'm going to hate the endurance cost, so I'm unlikely to want to keep it up permanently on anyone, although the old one was 7.8 endurance and lasted for 15 seconds, so theoretically it should be a net even for that duration.

 

But I use it as a panic "heal" on people who refuse to stay near mobs (Plant/Kin, after all) since it hit them with a base 10% right off the bat and refreshed every 3 seconds and if it takes 20 seconds to build up that won't work.

[Coyotedancer]

6 minutes ago, siolfir said:

But I use it as a panic "heal" on people who refuse to stay near mobs (Plant/Kin, after all) since it hit them with a base 10% right off the bat and refreshed every 3 seconds and if it takes 20 seconds to build up that won't work.

 

And like any other toggle it's going to have a "leash" range, rather than just being fire-and-go-about-your-business. 'Better hope that danger-prone team-mate stays close! 😝

 

 

Edited April 7, 2021 by Coyotedancer

[Zepp]

Toggling powers on can cause Arcane Power to trigger. In other words, I can toggle/untoggle hover or combat jumping before combat to get a free power boost.

Edited April 7, 2021 by Zepp

[siolfir]

Just now, Coyotedancer said:

 

And like any other toggle it's going to have a "leash" range, rather than just being fire-and-go-about-your-business. 'Better hope that danger-prone tem-mate stays close! 😝

Exactly.

[siolfir]

Bug? Or issue with the patch notes?

 

90 second recharge gives you a much better uptime ratio.

[Mezmera]

1 hour ago, Arbegla said:

 

Old RoP had a 600 second recharge, and 90 second duration. The absolute best you could get, at the recharge cap (400%), which is impossible to get without outside buffs is 1/5 of that time, so 120 seconds. Even a very heavy IO build can only squeeze about 300% recharge counting global recharge, and enhancement slotting, giving you roughly 150 seconds of recharge. Most places I've seen high end builds say between 160 and 150 seconds on recharge. With a 90 second duration, yes, at the recharge cap, you're sitting at 75% uptime.

 

But at the highest IO build you can get, you're at ~150 seconds, giving you a 60% uptime. Now, you get the same power, with a 33% uptime, without any slotting.

 

Before, without slotting you had a 15% uptime. (90 second duration, 600 second recharge)

 

So, overall, this is a buff to base RoP, a buff to low to mid tier builds (as you still needed 222% recharge to get OLD RoP to have a 33% recharge, meaning 100% in enhancements, and still over 100% in global recharge) and a nerf to the VERY high end builds.

 

The other powers getting turned into toggles actually helps the powers out more than it hurts them. You can slot enhancements in Spirit Ward, and being a toggle means you can now effectively permanently have an absorb shield on someone, which refreshes constantly. I'm not sure why you're so upset over an overall BUFF to the entire power pool.

 

I understand how those Origin t5 powers work, I typically will have Unleash Potential, the Force of Will pool overall feels just right and the other powers I needed to select in it were fine powers in their own right.  So my issue was never really with RoP going down to 60s to match the others, it was that the other powers were not attractive to take which you had to do to get RoP.  

 

On my dom with 100% global built in recharge, Hasten and then internally on Unleash I have I'd say 120% recharge thanks to Agility alpha.  That's quite a lot to build for and still Unleash Recharges at 150s, which would net me 40% uptime without neutering my build in other things.  To achieve 45-50% uptime would be quite the feat which would likely be detrimental to the overall survivability of the character chasing recharge bonuses while not targeting defense or hp as well.  And yet still I'd like to have that option than a value set lower for me than what I could already get by accident.  

 

It's not a buff, it's making it a lesser power for the sake of making it more user friendly for the general population that already didn't take Sorcery.  

Edited April 7, 2021 by Mezmera

[GM Impervium]

14 minutes ago, siolfir said:

Bug? Or issue with the patch notes?

 

90 second recharge gives you a much better uptime ratio.

Bug that's already been fixed internally (The recharge is not supposed to be affected by global recharge buffs enhancements, but it is at the moment - Thanks for the correction, @Captain Powerhouse)

 

Edited April 7, 2021 by GM Impervium
Wrong info

[siolfir]

5 minutes ago, GM Impervium said:

Bug that's already been fixed internally (The recharge is not supposed to be affected by global recharge buffs, but it is at the moment)

 

[Captain Powerhouse]

9 minutes ago, GM Impervium said:

Bug that's already been fixed internally (The recharge is not supposed to be affected by global recharge buffs, but it is at the moment)

 

Clarification: currently it is being affected by recharge enhancements, but not by recharge buffs. Next patch it wont be affected by any form of recharge.

[Crasical]

Ooooh, those are neat looking changes. I was just thinking about a character who could take Bolt and Enflame. Getting able to tag a foe for INCINERATION and letting the dot burn them sounds like it it'd be good.

[Riverdusk]

19 minutes ago, dangeraaron10 said:

Still iffy on rune but...

 

Arcane Bolt is back on the menu!

 

For my Controller, at least.

 

Same.  Tried it as one of the few ways to add a ranged attack for my controllers and it was so sluggish it just didn't feel good.  New one feels a bit better.  Bolt and mystic flight might become a staple for my controllers.

 

I find the whole ROP nerf a bit funny.  With so many ways to get mez protection in the game now, I almost never really felt it was worth 3 power picks to pick up, especially with most characters only looking at around 50% uptime typically.  And here the devs thought it was some overpowered god like thing, I had no idea!   I think I have it on like 1 character out my dozens. 

 

Of course the only "squishy" AT's  I usually play are controller and MM.  Controllers have easy access to indom will which I always thought was a MUCH better deal than ROP.  MM's I honestly don't find typically that squishy and being mezzed isn't as a big of deal for them in my experience.   

 

I can see it a bigger deal for defender/corrupters, as the data bears out.  Hence why I always thought defenders/corrupters should get an epic power choice like indom will that controllers have. 

 

[Puma]

1 hour ago, arcane said:

I don't think we can really say Sorcery is getting nerfed anymore. Did you read the new patch notes above?

You're turning two click powers into end heavy toggles.  You're also trying to work yet another "state of" mechanic into making one of the attack powers actually worth using, except making that based on a "chance for state of" makes it really ineffective to build into any sort of attack chain since you can't reliably build around chances. Granted, the power is a poor one to begin with so it's a wash there.  And now RoP will have a set 33% up time, which is a big nerf to almost anyone who was actually using it since they were very likely building around their recharge to use it. 

 

This entire approach, as well as the very reason the approach is even being considered, seems very off to me, especially when it's all to try and "fix" a power that very few people were taking anyway and that wasn't breaking any builds in its current state. 

  

It's a "let me fix stuff that really isn't bothering anyone because I know better" mentality that I disagree with. 

Edited April 7, 2021 by Puma

[siolfir]

18 minutes ago, Captain Powerhouse said:

 

Clarification: currently it is being affected by recharge enhancements, but not by recharge buffs. Next patch it wont be affected by any form of recharge.

I had a dummy character that still had it on a build I never use with just 1 SO slotted (it was the character that I was testing it with), so that makes more sense than Hasten being active and messing it up. That said, I thought that clicking the link from chat would ignore my current slotting, and later clicking the same link showed 2 minutes, so whatever.

 

Edit: after very brief testing, count me as voting for "rather have a click that hits peak immediately" for Spirit Ward rather than the more limited sustain.

Edited April 7, 2021 by siolfir

[PeregrineFalcon]

Ok, I just got done running around on test server with my Blaster who has the Sorcery pool. Remember before you delete my post that this is my feedback and you did ask for feedback.

 

1) Spirit Ward & Enflame
Spirit Ward has a decent range, and it doesn't toggle off if you break line of sight, but it does stop buffing the target until you reestablish line of sight. It doesn't drop until you actually get so far away that the UI drops your target.

 

I like the change to Spirit Ward. It allows me to help someone and keep helping them without having to constantly remember to click it.

 

At first I thought it was dumb to have both of these powers be toggles, but I guess I'll just have to pick one. I tried Enflame once, it didn't appear to even do anything, and never used it since, so if it wasn't improved I guess it'll be an easy choice.

2) Mystic Flight
It's faster. Cool. I don't understand the point behind the travel power changes so it's a whatever to me.

3) Arcane Bolt
Boy you guys REALLY love adding this combo mechanic, or whatever you call it, to powers, don't you? First to Energy Melee then to Arcane Bolt. Please, for the love of god, don't add this mechanic to Mercenaries or Assault Rifle.

 

Is this the wave of the future? Am I going to log on to Homecoming in a couple of years and be playing wack-a-mole with all of the various yellow rings constantly popping up on many of my powers? Holy cats will that be annoying.

 

I don't know why I see people constantly complaining that Arcane Bolt does so little damage. According to Mids (I don't have the Sorcery pool on many of my characters so I couldn't check) it does decent damage on most characters except for Scrappers. Which makes sense I suppose. And at least this mechanic allows it to do more damage on occasion.

4) Rune of Protection
So now it has a shorter duration than the tier 2 and 3 breakfrees. Ok, it gives damage resistance equal to a Tier 3 or 4 Orange, depending on slotting, but also with a much shorter duration.

 

Now, given the changes you made to travel powers, to make actual powers better than the P2W temps, it doesn't make much sense to me than an actual power, especially one that has two prerequisites, should be worse than an inspiration.

 

Shouldn't a Tier 5 power, with 2 prerequisites, be more powerful than an inspiration? It seems to me that you have one guiding principal for one set of powers (travel powers) and a totally different guiding principal for another (buff powers).

 

Also, by removing the ability to slot recharge enhancements into the power, you've now removed the ability to place an IO set into it. Take a look at the Damage Resistance IO sets. All of them include recharge enhancements.

 

Look, I totally get that you're trying to keep Rune of Protection from being used to give squishies near-perma mez protection below 45, and keep it from being used to make squishies into near-tanks. However, you've just nerfed this power in 4 different ways. Although, with the decrease in recharge, you've done it in a way that actually makes it a buff for people like me who don't use set IO's much and who don't even try for perma-Hasten. Maybe that was the intent. If so then you hit the nail on the head.

Overall the changes to Spirit Ward and Arcane Bolt might temp me to take the Sorcery pool more often for those character's for whom it's thematically appropriate.

 

[Dahkness]

Loving arcane bolt change! Can’t wait to test it out. Hope it procs often on a heavy clicky build

Edited April 7, 2021 by Dahkness

[PeaceMack]

They certainly are following through with their weird hate for Rune of Protection. This is a power that's not taken by a lot of people, and that even with these additional changes requires significant powers sacrifice in a pool that even with these changes is still lackluster or irrelevant for many squishies.

 

Whichever spreadsheet jockey came up with this  seems opposed to people making interesting decisions. In this case the decision has, up to now, been to sacrifice two mostly pointless powers to get one that will help a squishy character to survive a tough fight a bit better.

 

That their reasoning for the nerf is poorly construed and the details behind the reasoning for the nerf remain secret, also doesn't engender a great deal of trust in their future ability to analyze powers in general.

 

Back to the leadership pool on those squishies that currently have sorcery or abandoning squishies for more melee archetypes, I guess. At least my tanks are better than ever.

[Bopper]

24 minutes ago, PeregrineFalcon said:

At first I thought it was dumb to have both of these powers be toggles, but I guess I'll just have to pick one. I tried Enflame once, it didn't appear to even do anything, and never used it since, so if it wasn't improved I guess it'll be an easy choice

Enflame was incredibly bugged for that past ...year and a half? I'm curious what you were seeing, but here is a list of bugs you might have experienced.

 

The default visual fx of Enflame was too small. You might have seen a fire patch that looked something like a 4 ft diameter (slight exaggeration?) when it was supposed to have a 16 ft diameter. This could have appeared as though it didn't do much of anything. 

 

The bright/dark fx of Emflame was bugged and did not show its continuing animation. This literally would look like it wasn't doing anything. 

 

The summoned patches from Enflame were not accepting enhancements. So if you enhanced the damage or slotted procs, it did nothing for the Enflame patch. Only extra damage you might have gotten were procs that fired on the main target when summoning Enflame, but that's it. This definitely would make one feel like the power wasn't doing anything.

 

So I don't what your past experience was, it's worth testing the non-bugged version to see how you like it.

[Replacement]

I sent these changes to the 3 friends I play with. They were all floored, excited, and apprehensive that they may not make it.

 

Turns out, 5 good powers is better for fun than a single power that really shines on high Recharge builds, and 3-4 unfunny jokes.

 

It's good to get the non-forum perspective sometimes.

[Captain Powerhouse]

1 hour ago, PeregrineFalcon said:

Also, by removing the ability to slot recharge enhancements into the power, you've now removed the ability to place an IO set into it. Take a look at the Damage Resistance IO sets. All of them include recharge enhancements.

 

That is not how that works. Passive resistance powers dont accept recharge enhancements either, and you can slot Damage Resistance IOs on them too.

 

This simply means you cant slot a simple Recharge TO/DO/SO or crafted IO into the power, simply because on it's own it does nothing for the user. Set enhancements can be slotted even if they only offer recharge, because those add up value via set bonuses.

[Saikochoro]

I just got done testing the new changes. 

 

Spirit Ward/Inflame: I never really cared about spirit ward or inflame. These changes don’t make them interesting enough for me to consider taking sorcery for them. I’ll let others who use those powers more give more detailed feedback on them.

 

Mystic Flight: buffs to it don’t hurt anything. If I’m being honest though I don’t go into sorcery for the travel power. I just take it because I already decided to go into the pool. Still buffing mystic flight makes the pool more attractive to some I’m sure. 
 

Arcane Bolt: I was intrigued by this and so tested it. I have no interest in arcane bolt on archetypes that have blast sets already so I focused my testing on melee archetypes that don’t have as many ranged options. Buffing this power doesn’t hurt, but after testing it’s still not worth going into sorcery for this power. If I want a ranged option I will take moonbeam/gloom.  Not saying this is a bad change, just saying it’s not enough to make up for the RoP nerf in deciding whether or not to take sorcery. 
 

Rune of Protection: My builds generally got the recharge down to 180 seconds give or take a few (about perma hasten levels of recharge). So with the first iteration of the nerf I was at about 33% uptime. This change locks in 33% uptime, but requires me to activate it more often. As such, this is even worse for the proactive way I use rune. I will run one more test once they fix rune respecting slotted recharge to confirm, but given my testing and dislike of the first change I am confident in my conclusion.
 

I appreciate the work that went into the sorcery pool revamp. I also appreciate that the revamp was put forward to be tested with the rune nerf. I sincerely hope that it makes the pool more popular and that many people enjoy the set more. This however has made the decision to completely drop the sorcery pool from my builds an easy one.