Sentinels. Why???

[Bill Z Bubba]

8 minutes ago, Brutal Justice said:

My tanks are tired of just taunting and holding aggro.  I would like for taunt to give me a toggle that allows my tanks to crit.  Shorter duration than scrapper crits, so they still feel useful, but strong enough I don’t have to chase runners.  

 

Shoot, am I in the right thread?

 

Bah! Tanks are already overbuffed all to hell. And I know HELL!

 

In all seriousness, though, I greatly dislike the fact that in my entire roster the character that has the easiest time soloing the ITF is a tank and this is only partially due to the extreme mitigation the AT provides but it's coupled with pretty grotesque levels of ST damage. At this point, we should NOT be comparing anything to what tanks can pull off because the last batch of tanker buffs broke the AT completely.

[MTeague]

2 hours ago, skoryy said:

Why not?

 

Let people enjoy things.

 Don't you understand!!!?!?  They're ENJOYING IT WRONG!!!111!!!oneone!!!11   (/sarc)

[srmalloy]

1 hour ago, MTeague said:

 Don't you understand!!!?!?  They're ENJOYING IT WRONG!!!111!!!oneone!!!11   (/sarc)

 

[Crysis]

9 hours ago, Coyotedancer said:

Sents were intentionally undertuned and need some tweaks.

I have to question why you think the undertuning was “intentional?”  I can understand conservative modeling due to the whole fear of creating a tank mage.  But why would any dev intentionally neuter the AT to the degree it has been?  Perhaps accidentally….sure.  But intentionally?

[MTeague]

1 hour ago, Crysis said:

I have to question why you think the undertuning was “intentional?”  I can understand conservative modeling due to the whole fear of creating a tank mage.  But why would any dev intentionally neuter the AT to the degree it has been?  Perhaps accidentally….sure.  But intentionally?

 

Is it though?  That question may circle back to the whole "Are things balanced around tricked out IO builds, or around SO usage?".

 

If balanced around SO's, then I think a case can be made that Sentinels are in a very nice niche. Quite durable, constant status protection, modest range and ability to hoverblast, etc.  Not even close to the damage output of a blaster, true, but, IF ONLY CONSIDERING SO's, that blaster is going to eat pavement a LOT. The Sent? Won't.

 

My personal sense is that it's probably time to balance things around IO builds, but, that is far from a universal opinion, and I do not know if the Dev's share it.  (or for that matter, if they agree with my impressions of the relative strengths at SO usage.)

[skoryy]

6 minutes ago, MTeague said:

Is it though?  That question may circle back to the whole "Are things balanced around tricked out IO builds, or around SO usage?".

After spending several months playing FFXIV and its lack of class balance sturm und drang, my question is 'why is balance such a huge matter when any combination of classes can clear content?'

[Coyotedancer]

1 hour ago, Crysis said:

I have to question why you think the undertuning was “intentional?”  I can understand conservative modeling due to the whole fear of creating a tank mage.  But why would any dev intentionally neuter the AT to the degree it has been?  Perhaps accidentally….sure.  But intentionally?

 

I remember some of the discussions about the AT from the pre-public server days,.. and there was a pretty straight-forward concern about making them "too good". As you say, there was the fear of making a tank mage. Sentinels were (and still are-) essentially an unfinished project that's never been completely settled.

 

Starting out with them on the not-all-that side damage-wise was absolutely a choice, not an accident.

 

 

Edited June 20, 2021 by Coyotedancer

[Snarky]

2 hours ago, Coyotedancer said:

 

I remember some of the discussions about the AT from the pre-public server days,.. and there was a pretty straight-forward concern about making them "too good". As you say, there was the fear of making a tank mage. Sentinels were (and still are-) essentially an unfinished project that's never been completely settled.

 

Starting out with them on the not-all-that side damage-wise was absolutely a choice, not an accident.

 

 

and probably a wise one.  But now how do you unscrew that pooch?  Because increasing the damage scalar does crap for the AT.  Basically the ST attacks they have create an anemic DPS chain and the AoE, equally anemic, also suffers from small target caps.  Even I am not advocating for increasing target caps.  So basically the AT is now hardcoded into unfixability.

 

Wise to not overpower them from the start.  Bone headed stupid to not build in an easy way to scale them up if that was the intention.  

 

I do not believe most of the people designing these things are bone headed stupid.  So either 1) They never intended them o be more than a semi gimped low performance option 2) somebody made an executive decision to choose really crappy powers to slam onto these things and that was the only way they would let the project go forward.

[Rumors]

Is the problem that Sentinels don't do enough damage?  Or is the real problem that Blasters are too durable?  🤔

 

 

Of course, everyone loves softcapping all the things, so I fully expect to get shot for that line.

 

 

Anyway, I only have one Sentinel.  A Fire/Fire/Fire and one of my two 50s since I play very off and on and am usually in no rush to level cap.  And... honestly?  She's a lot of fun, even at 50.  Granted, I didn't try to build optimal but rather focused on setting everything on fire.  I probably have some needless attacks-  no, I most likely really do not need the fire breath at least.  But I wanted it because I wanted to literally spit fire.  I wanted a relatively sturdy character without IO softcapping* who can set the enemies on fire and the ground on fire and the air is on fire and you're on fire and I'm on fire and WHY IS EVERYTHING ON FIRE!?!?!?  And the Sentinel delivered on that in spades.  Besides, not sure anyone else has access to both Rain of Fire AND Burn.

 

From what I understand, Fire/ is the outlier for Sentinel blasts in how well it performs (not that I was aware of that before making the alt), however, and a lot of Sentinel stuff is a bit undertuned.  They probably need some nudges upwards in some respects, but they definitely ain't useless. 

 

 

*Since I hate softcapping non-defense sets, even if that "gimps" me compared to others, but it at least makes the Force Field user happy.  Before you slot up to 900% Smashing/Lethal defense again, think of the poor and neglected bubblers!

[Dark Dove]

2 hours ago, Rumors said:

Besides, not sure anyone else has access to both Rain of Fire AND Burn

 

Fire/Fire blaster? I can't look right now, but I think that's a thing.

 

EDIT: I eventually looked, yep, Fire/Fire blaster has access to both Rain of Fire and Burn. Is Burn even worth using without something to stop mobs from running?  I have no experience with it outside of AT's with aggro control.

Edited June 20, 2021 by Dark Dove

[Hexquisite]

3 hours ago, Rumors said:

I probably have some needless attacks-  no, I most likely really do not need the fire breath at least.

 

Fire breath is ALWAYS necessary! Not enough games allow you to exhale gouts of searing flame upon people. 

 

 

3 hours ago, Rumors said:

But I wanted it because I wanted to literally spit fire.

 

This is the correct attitude to have, regarding all things in life. Breathing fire on a problem is always the best solution.

[Bill Z Bubba]

9 hours ago, skoryy said:

After spending several months playing FFXIV and its lack of class balance sturm und drang, my question is 'why is balance such a huge matter when any combination of classes can clear content?'

 

Dunno about others, but for me, balance is its own goal, much akin to making other things beautiful in the world.

[ForeverLaxx]

11 hours ago, MTeague said:

My personal sense is that it's probably time to balance things around IO builds

Running the risk of derailing this thread, what IO Builds do you propose the game be balanced around? Considering the plethora of set bonuses people can chase, and how ED does effectively lower the in-slot values to just above SO level for most sets anyway, trying to balance around "IO Builds" assumes all players are chasing the same bonuses and that just isn't the case. You're asking for the impossible; you should be asking for more ways to inject optional difficulty into the game in order to flex your personal build, not dictate the game be made to suit your personal build and F everyone else.

 

@Snarky

The real problem with Sentinels is how widely varied each blast set is and how the AT overwhelming favors defense sets due to their smaller HP cap (though Regen breaks this mold, likely entirely due to the absorb power and nothing else). I feel each blast set needs its own sort of tuning pass, because as it stands, some of them are actually pretty good when compared to other AT versions while the rest are below average to terrible. It just doesn't feel like there was a unifying idea between what each blast set offered, so instead of getting one set of perks in exchange for losing something, some sets just lost everything while gaining nothing.

 

For the base game though, Sentinels are actually pretty fine. They're more soloable than a Blaster out of the box and safer than a Scrapper for the most part. The issue with Sentinels, once you get past the questionable intraAT balance, is that certain IO Builds show how ultimately meaningless your "easier time leveling" means for high-end content. In a world of people PLing and tricking out every character, Sentinels are going to be left behind. Any change made to make them better, though, will likely have to be limited to just how they perform in high-end content as I have no real complaints leveling one solo.

 

I will say though that in a team, some people expect you to take the alpha since you have an armor set. This... doesn't usually end well for most of the armor sets, particularly the resist ones. Maybe that should be addressed first.

Edited June 20, 2021 by ForeverLaxx

[VashNKnives]

From the first time looking at Sentinels I thought the team dynamic of the inherent could use some help. My current migraine induced thoughts:

1. Add stacking team aura for each Sent that gives teammates very small +mez prot/def/res.
2. Add short duration personal AoE target cap/range buff to Sents that just used 2 consecutive single target attacks.

Edited June 20, 2021 by VashNKnives

[Snarky]

7 minutes ago, VashNKnives said:

From the first time looking at Sentinels I thought the team dynamic of the inherent could use some help. My current migraine induced thoughts:

1. Add stacking team aura for each Sent that gives teammates very small +mez prot/def/res.
2. Add short duration personal AoE target cap/range buff to Sents that just used 2 consecutive single target attacks.

I appreciate the thought.  I honestly do.  On my Blasters here is the dynamic.  AoE AoE AoE repeat until mobs are gone.  Boss/AV ST for a minute.  continue for X minutes until blob melts.

 

pumping AoE with ST attacks is not necessarily helping.  Although anything at this point is an add.  

 

Disclaimer:  I run ZERO "gimmick" combo powersets.  To me they are about as useful as having a tail in RL.  Most of that flavor is completelyuseless against true hard targets.  The closest I came was running a Invul/Kinetic Tank.  My "Tank Mage"  Danged thing actually worked moderately well at short/medium range.  But, in the end, gimmicky and not as useful as other Tanks at the job.  to me.  The mechanic was hard to milk for anything meaningful. And since riding the mechanic became the job instead of getting the objective accomplished it is just in the way. 

[Vanden]

9 hours ago, Snarky said:

increasing the damage scalar does crap for the AT.

 

Then why did you say that increasing the damage would be a laughably easy fix to it’s prpblems?

[Snarky]

5 minutes ago, Vanden said:

 

Then why did you say that increasing the damage would be a laughably easy fix to it’s prpblems?

Hmmm.  Increasing the Damage.  Not Increasing the Damage Scalar..   You see the difference?  I can explain in detail if needed.   

[Vanden]

6 hours ago, Snarky said:

Increasing the Damage.  Not Increasing the Damage Scalar..   You see the difference?

Of course not.

 

Edited June 20, 2021 by Vanden

[Snarky]

18 minutes ago, Vanden said:

Of course not.

 

Okay.  So no.  If you increase the damage scalar on Sentinels to Blaster levels they still do crapola damagesky.

 

Take an Energy Blast, compare it on Sentinels and Blasters.  Even with the Damage Scalar the same a Sentinel will do FAR less damage.  Because they do not have attacks that are as good.  The ST DPS chain is crap and the restricted number of targets pretty much leaves the AT in the kiddie pool.  Because it is a carry in a league going for badges.

 

Get the picture?

[Vanden]

1 minute ago, Snarky said:

Okay.  So no.  If you increase the damage scalar on Sentinels to Blaster levels they still do crapola damagesky.

 

Take an Energy Blast, compare it on Sentinels and Blasters.  Even with the Damage Scalar the same a Sentinel will do FAR less damage.  Because they do not have attacks that are as good.  The ST DPS chain is crap and the restricted number of targets pretty much leaves the AT in the kiddie pool.  Because it is a carry in a league going for badges.

 

Get the picture?

 

They have the same sets except Sentinels have the Snipes and some control powers replaced with more traditional attacks. How are their ST attack chains so much worse, then?

[Haijinx]

16 minutes ago, Vanden said:

 

They have the same sets except Sentinels have the Snipes and some control powers replaced with more traditional attacks. How are their ST attack chains so much worse, then?

No Blappin Melee attacks!  

 

 

[Snarky]

50 minutes ago, Vanden said:

 

They have the same sets except Sentinels have the Snipes and some control powers replaced with more traditional attacks. How are their ST attack chains so much worse, then?

-blinks-  You seriously are making the argument these things do something in the neighborhood of Blaster damage?

 

In the real world.  (well, the City of Villains, errr Heroes) These things do less damage than Defenders as an AT.  

 

My name is not Arcana.  I am not going to spoon feed you data and sing you the "here comes the choo choo song" to get you to accept it.  

 

Run one.  Take it on Really Hard Way attempts.  Enjoy the misery.  PS, try to stay away from my badge attempts.  Thanks.

[Vanden]

4 minutes ago, Snarky said:

-blinks-  You seriously are making the argument these things do something in the neighborhood of Blaster damage?

 

In the real world.  (well, the City of Villains, errr Heroes) These things do less damage than Defenders as an AT.  

 

That's how the game works. Attacks follow the standard damage formula and powers shared between archetypes only differ by AT mods except when the powers themselves are actually modified. Is that the case? You haven't answered me on that, but you have twice now assured me that Sentinels do less damage than Defenders, even though I can plainly see that Defenders' .65 ranged damage mod is barely over 2/3rds of Sentinels' .95 ranged damage mod.

[Snarky]

7 minutes ago, Vanden said:

 

That's how the game works. Attacks follow the standard damage formula and powers shared between archetypes only differ by AT mods except when the powers themselves are actually modified. Is that the case? You haven't answered me on that, but you have twice now assured me that Sentinels do less damage than Defenders, even though I can plainly see that Defenders' .65 ranged damage mod is barely over 2/3rds of Sentinels' .95 ranged damage mod.

and I won't.  You go on believing these things do almost as much damage as Blasters.  Stay golden.

[ForeverLaxx]

14 minutes ago, Snarky said:

In the real world.  (well, the City of Villains, errr Heroes) These things do less damage than Defenders as an AT

I mean, if you're going to take the angle of "some Defenders use Debuffs/Buffs to ramp their damage" then sure, Defenders "do more damage" than Sentinels. They also "do more damage" than Blasters in that scenario, too, but try using that argument when Blasters are involved and you usually get laughed at since to do that, Defenders have to spend time laying out the buffs/debuffs which slows down their clear times when solo and can be completely nullified by a single CC or, in the case of something like Poison, miss entirely and do nothing at all.

 

Blaster Ranged Damage Scalar is 1.125. Sentinel Ranged Damage Scalar is 0.95. What this means is that a blast with a base 100 damage will do 112.5 damage on a Blaster and 95 damage on a Sentinel. To "raise Sentinel Damage" would be to increase their damage scalar, something that seems to be lost on you for some reason. The only other way to adjust a Sentinel's damage is to completely rebuild their ranged damage sets and choose different blasts, or adjust the ones they do have by giving them slower recharge so they fall into a higher damage tier according to the Standard Damage Formula.