So, procs...

[arcane]

12 minutes ago, Glacier Peak said:

Did you try using the command [/setdifficultyteamsize x], with x representing the '9999' number? I was able to do this for the first respec trial on a solo run and holy yikes, I was working my butt off with the spawns. I had to use everything, pets, temps, nukes, the whole bag.

Yes I did that and got it to show up as x9999 on the nav - but still just +4’s in the mission. 
 

This was based on Yomo’s thread though and I think the only qualifier he mentioned was for the mission to be below 50. But I’m guessing it’s more complicated than that and I need to try something that isn’t level 49 OR isn’t an AE mission.

[Glacier Peak]

13 minutes ago, arcane said:

Yes I did that and got it to show up as x9999 on the nav - but still just +4’s in the mission. 
 

This was based on Yomo’s thread though and I think the only qualifier he mentioned was for the mission to be below 50. But I’m guessing it’s more complicated than that and I need to try something that isn’t level 49 OR isn’t an AE mission.

Ah interesting - I believe I was exemped down to level 24 for the 1st respec trial and I was facing level 30s. Not sure how it works for the around lvl 50 content.

[Olerus]

1 hour ago, aethereal said:

 

I mean, I think also that a lot of content is SO easy.  Like, if you can solo +4/x8 (and a lot of people can), then 8 people on the team who all can solo +4/x8...  that's a lot.  It's gonna take an enormous amount of increased difficulty to catch back up to "about ten times the power necessary to overcome this mob."

 

Against the right opponents, bigger bags of HP can be a potent difference -- there are enemy types that, with some characters, I definitely rely on "kill enough of them to lower incoming damage before my defenses get overwhelmed" (much of my high-level play has been with bio armor, where your defenses are clicky-based.  It's presumably less important to apply the death debuff with mitigation that's more steady-state).

I would argue that the game needs more 'easy to kill' dangerous enemies, not more difficult bosses.  Consider the following:

• Sappers
• Cimeroran Surgeons
• Devouring Earth crystals
• Nemesis lieutenants

None of these are hard to defeat by themselves, but substantially change the gameplay patterns.  If a sapper survives an AoE burst, it can mean death despite it being a minion.  Surgeons aren't as lethal, but because they don't rush into melee they can be a major timewaster especially if they heal a Cyclops or Minotaur that has gone Unstoppable.  Nemesis lieutenants, on the other hand, are almost deliberately easy to kill in bunches but punish wanton AoEs with their vengeance buff.  The Devouring Earth have the Rularuu aspect of almost flat-out ignoring defense buffs, but do so in a way that is more engaging (find the summon or kill the summoner, rather than eyeballs just being always on deathbots).

 

This is far aside from the proc discussion, but I think the fun of difficult content comes from a variety of factors:

• changes in gameplay
• excitement from risk/storytelling
• planning/puzzle solving
• personal achievement/bragging

Higher level enemies do not change gameplay.  The same 'force mobs to group, nuke, use single targets to finish off bosses' gameplay is still present, it is just slower.  Likewise, it rarely presents a more interesting narrative.  Either a player or team can defeat them thanks to sufficient defenses, or they cannot and get destroyed.  Recently, I've been watching Nuzlocke Pokemon challenges, which made me consider this narrative issue.  Nuzlocke challenges are more exciting than a generic 'Lets Play' because of the storytelling they present: being forced to adapt to challenges, potentially being screwed or saved by luck, etc.  

A narrative challenge in City of Heroes might be a mechanic that reduces your character to 100 HP, and forces you to dodge traps while defeating relatively weak enemies, for instance.  Random trap areas might make a run easy, or very difficult, and this lends to the storytelling aspect of difficulty.  "I beat this even though the odds were against me" is much more compelling than "I beat this even though it was slow."  Or a section may be difficult because of a massive undodgeable recharge debuff, but a character may plan for this and easily clear the challenge by building to resist recharge debuffs or playing a resistant powerset combination.  

 

The latter two aspects are more problematic, because they are only realistically a factor for a small minority of the player base.  Players that like designing strategies for an organized team or claiming "World First!"s aren't and can't be the majority.  Ideally, making the game more difficult would still focus on making it more enjoyably difficult for all types of content, not just for hyper-enfranchised groups (which are even more rare than hyper-enfranchised individuals).  

 

And ultimately, even the fun some players get from having to change tactics or create narratives isn't present for others.  Even some players with hyper-optimized builds have perfectly fun times going slightly faster through TFs and turning Council and Cimerorans in rolling pins, and that's okay too.  

 

 

 

Edited July 8, 2021 by Olerus

[Bionic_Flea]

I like this Olerus guy.  He makes good points.

[Galaxy Brain]

These threads keep popping up for good reason, but I think we are all a little guilty of not seeing the forest for the trees. Individual procs as a whole are not an issue by themselves outside of very specific instances, but they do exacerbate issues with power creep + encounter design as a whole which has a lot of interlocking parts to it that go beyond just IO slotting.

[oedipustex]

4 hours ago, Olerus said:

I would argue that the game needs more 'easy to kill' dangerous enemies, not more difficult bosses.  Consider the following:

• Sappers
• Cimeroran Surgeons
• Devouring Earth crystals
• Nemesis lieutenants

None of these are hard to defeat by themselves, but substantially change the gameplay patterns.  If a sapper survives an AoE burst, it can mean death despite it being a minion.  Surgeons aren't as lethal, but because they don't rush into melee they can be a major timewaster especially if they heal a Cyclops or Minotaur that has gone Unstoppable.  Nemesis lieutenants, on the other hand, are almost deliberately easy to kill in bunches but punish wanton AoEs with their vengeance buff.  The Devouring Earth have the Rularuu aspect of almost flat-out ignoring defense buffs, but do so in a way that is more engaging (find the summon or kill the summoner, rather than eyeballs just being always on deathbots).

 

 

I agree with you. More specifically I'd like a revisit of how randomized dungeons are generated. Right now the formula tends to create homogenized maps, especially when generating x8 enemies. What team content should be doing IMO is generating maps more like this (numbers made up):

• 60% of packs as now
• 20% chance of a pack made entirely of 1 to 4 randomly selected enemies
• 5% chance of a pack made entirely of bosses
• 5% chance of a pack made entirely of a specifically troublesome minion (Sappers etc) 
• 1% chance of an exotic enemy pack (whatever that means)
• etc

 

Something else kinda subtle I think should happen is that some enemy Auto powers that represent "armors" should suppress the way player powers do. The tech is there to do it, an Auto power behaves just like a Toggle, the check just needs to be added. That would bring Dominators and Controllers further into the role they are supposed to be playing and allow us to ease off the raw upper echelon damage restrictions. I particularly feel this way about enemies in iTrials where Dominators and Controllers tend to contribute less.

Edited July 8, 2021 by oedipustex

[Naraka]

2 hours ago, Galaxy Brain said:

These threads keep popping up for good reason, but I think we are all a little guilty of not seeing the forest for the trees. Individual procs as a whole are not an issue by themselves outside of very specific instances, but they do exacerbate issues with power creep + encounter design as a whole which has a lot of interlocking parts to it that go beyond just IO slotting.

 

I don't think the proc thing affects encounters much beyond adding power to less powerful aspects of the game.  One of the main reasons I made the thread is to get down some of my ideas, specifically the 2nd one, because if done right, you'd have fewer procs to "proc-bomb", so to speak, and have a bit of an avenue to "buzzsaw build" or even create new kinds of "procs" rather than them all being PPM and bound to high usability on certain powers with certain recharge times.

 

It got bogged down because people just don't want to lose their current power proc-bombs or just purely dislike procs or some varying degree of the two.  But overall, I agree with your sentiment.  Perhaps me not wanting to pay attention to the specifics like "Are procs OP?" or "What specifically is wrong with procs?" might be my blind spot but to my defense, even if presenting numbers to outline a point, it would inevitably get dismissed because it is numbers looking for a problem which, in this context, would likely be easy to find such.

 

4 hours ago, Olerus said:

I would argue that the game needs more 'easy to kill' dangerous enemies, not more difficult bosses.  Consider the following:

• Sappers
• Cimeroran Surgeons
• Devouring Earth crystals
• Nemesis lieutenants

None of these are hard to defeat by themselves, but substantially change the gameplay patterns.  If a sapper survives an AoE burst, it can mean death despite it being a minion.  Surgeons aren't as lethal, but because they don't rush into melee they can be a major timewaster especially if they heal a Cyclops or Minotaur that has gone Unstoppable.  Nemesis lieutenants, on the other hand, are almost deliberately easy to kill in bunches but punish wanton AoEs with their vengeance buff.  The Devouring Earth have the Rularuu aspect of almost flat-out ignoring defense buffs, but do so in a way that is more engaging (find the summon or kill the summoner, rather than eyeballs just being always on deathbots).

 

This is far aside from the proc discussion, but I think the fun of difficult content comes from a variety of factors:

• changes in gameplay
• excitement from risk/storytelling
• planning/puzzle solving
• personal achievement/bragging

 

 

I've also put up some share of ideas to diversify play and not merely bolster HP.

 

I put forward a blanket change to give all mobs toggle armor and transfer some of those player detoggle changes to the NPCs, making it some there is only a minor chance of the toggles dropping with a hold or stun and a much higher chance with Sleep mez (as well as a scaling chance to knock off toggles with knockback depending on the magnitude of the KB/KU). Spread more "toggle drop" utility around other useful powers and maybe even a certain kind of mez that nullifies toggles for a short time (even on players).  That last one would be a doozy and might make click buffs from support and tier 9s a bit more interesting.  

 

I also suggested a kind of upgraded-minion that has HP between Lt and minion and also has the inherent ability to count as more than one target (I suggested 3) that would randomly replace a single minion.  The result would be, if 3-4 of these get sprinkled in a spawn and you throw your volley of AoEs, it would cut a 16 target AoE in half and the other 8 targets you could have hit would have "Guarded!" float over their heads.  Couple that with the idea of them having certain abilities to make you really have to pull out all your tricks at the right time.

 

25 minutes ago, oedipustex said:

 

I agree with you. More specifically I'd like a revisit of how randomized dungeons are generated. Right now the formula tends to create homogenized maps, especially when generating x8 enemies. What team content should be doing IMO is generating maps more like this (numbers made up):

• 60% of packs as now
• 20% chance of a pack made entirely of 1 to 4 randomly selected enemies
• 5% chance of a pack made entirely of bosses
• 5% chance of a pack made entirely of a specifically troublesome minion (Sappers etc) 
• 1% chance of an exotic enemy pack (whatever that means)
• etc

 

Something else kinda subtle I think should happen is that some enemy Auto powers that represent "armors" should suppress the way player powers do. The tech is there to do it, an Auto power behaves just like a Toggle, the check just needs to be added. That would bring Dominators and Controllers further into the role they are supposed to be playing and allow us to ease off the raw upper echelon damage restrictions. I particularly feel this way about enemies in iTrials where Dominators and Controllers tend to contribute less.

 

I want to say some missions do mix around the mobs a bit but not often times intelligently.  I want to say there might be some limitations on mob spawning from the perspective of AE but no idea if any of the rest of your suggestions is currently possible.  Although, making an enemy group that just have 25 different minions from different factions, 18 Lts from various factions and every boss in the game and putting them on a map would certainly make for an interesting map.

[Bionic_Flea]

You want to make enemy encounters more interesting and diverse? 

 

Give each NPC faction a Defender/Corrupter/Mastermind/Controller character with appropriate buffs/debuffs for their level. 

[golstat2003]

On 7/8/2021 at 1:19 PM, Olerus said:

I would argue that the game needs more 'easy to kill' dangerous enemies, not more difficult bosses.  Consider the following:

• Sappers
• Cimeroran Surgeons
• Devouring Earth crystals
• Nemesis lieutenants

None of these are hard to defeat by themselves, but substantially change the gameplay patterns.  If a sapper survives an AoE burst, it can mean death despite it being a minion.  Surgeons aren't as lethal, but because they don't rush into melee they can be a major timewaster especially if they heal a Cyclops or Minotaur that has gone Unstoppable.  Nemesis lieutenants, on the other hand, are almost deliberately easy to kill in bunches but punish wanton AoEs with their vengeance buff.  The Devouring Earth have the Rularuu aspect of almost flat-out ignoring defense buffs, but do so in a way that is more engaging (find the summon or kill the summoner, rather than eyeballs just being always on deathbots).

 

This is far aside from the proc discussion, but I think the fun of difficult content comes from a variety of factors:

• changes in gameplay
• excitement from risk/storytelling
• planning/puzzle solving
• personal achievement/bragging

Higher level enemies do not change gameplay.  The same 'force mobs to group, nuke, use single targets to finish off bosses' gameplay is still present, it is just slower.  Likewise, it rarely presents a more interesting narrative.  Either a player or team can defeat them thanks to sufficient defenses, or they cannot and get destroyed.  Recently, I've been watching Nuzlocke Pokemon challenges, which made me consider this narrative issue.  Nuzlocke challenges are more exciting than a generic 'Lets Play' because of the storytelling they present: being forced to adapt to challenges, potentially being screwed or saved by luck, etc.  

A narrative challenge in City of Heroes might be a mechanic that reduces your character to 100 HP, and forces you to dodge traps while defeating relatively weak enemies, for instance.  Random trap areas might make a run easy, or very difficult, and this lends to the storytelling aspect of difficulty.  "I beat this even though the odds were against me" is much more compelling than "I beat this even though it was slow."  Or a section may be difficult because of a massive undodgeable recharge debuff, but a character may plan for this and easily clear the challenge by building to resist recharge debuffs or playing a resistant powerset combination.  

 

The latter two aspects are more problematic, because they are only realistically a factor for a small minority of the player base.  Players that like designing strategies for an organized team or claiming "World First!"s aren't and can't be the majority.  Ideally, making the game more difficult would still focus on making it more enjoyably difficult for all types of content, not just for hyper-enfranchised groups (which are even more rare than hyper-enfranchised individuals).  

 

And ultimately, even the fun some players get from having to change tactics or create narratives isn't present for others.  Even some players with hyper-optimized builds have perfectly fun times going slightly faster through TFs and turning Council and Cimerorans in rolling pins, and that's okay too.  

 

 

 

 

You sir make very good points.

 

For me new mechanics would be more fun than just "moar numbers to keep up with player builds".

 

It's part of what I expect each time I ask for new content.

[golstat2003]

20 hours ago, Bionic_Flea said:

You want to make enemy encounters more interesting and diverse? 

 

Give each NPC faction a Defender/Corrupter/Mastermind/Controller character with appropriate buffs/debuffs for their level. 

 

I would say maybe at certain levels have those mobs show up. Like in level 40-50 range. But not in the 1-40 range.

[Bionic_Flea]

18 minutes ago, golstat2003 said:

 

I would say maybe at certain levels have those mobs show up. Like in level 40-50 range. But not in the 1-40 range.

It would be OK if limited.  Like Tsoo Sorcerers - hurricane, a heal, TP, a few attacks, and they can cause havoc.  It doesn't take all 9 buff/debuff powers, just one or two. 

 

Think about Flash Arrow for Warriors . . . Heat Shields and Heat Exhaustion from CoT Demons . . . Gang War and Wormhole from Family . . . etc.

 

But yeah, hellions and skulls probably don't need more help, unless they were upgraded to higher levels!

Edited July 9, 2021 by Bionic_Flea

[Luminara]

38 minutes ago, Bionic_Flea said:

Think about Flash Arrow for Warriors

 

NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO.

 

No.

 

If one more critter with Blind is added to the game, I'll hit someone with my shoe.  Fuckers aren't difficult, they're just time-outs.  If there's one thing we don't need, it's more time-outs.

[Bionic_Flea]

*Puts Luminara in timeout for language.*

[Aurora_Girl]

34 minutes ago, Luminara said:

If one more critter with Blind is added to the game, I'll hit someone with my shoe.  Fuckers aren't difficult, they're just time-outs.  If there's one thing we don't need, it's more time-outs.

 

Time-outs can be helpful, in that it diverts attention. I for one like status hits like Blind (especially on my kitted Savage/SR brute), that remind me I'm not 100% unaffected; a time-out may be frustrating, but it can also provide a small moment of novel challenge and a reminder of one's own digital mortality, to get a wee philosophical.

[MsSmart]

Mmm....

 

Not sure Procs need to be "nurfed" at all, when looked with a narrow view, they may appear over-powered, but if you look at them taking a few steps back, the perception will certainly change.

 

In order to put that many Procs in a power, that means that many slots where not used for something and thus there is a definite trade that goes with it. For example, when I used on a few of my alts multi-proc powers; there are usually 2 things that goes down: Power Recharge and Defense, that is a lot to give up for a little more DPS. Some my alts had gone from 50s defense to the 35s, and their power recharge almost halved; these are very significant sacrifices for that modest gain in DPS.

 

To help validate this, say you want to 3 proc a power, that means that slot s4,5 and 6 are procs. In most IO sets, the 4th combo gives you recharge time, the 5th and 6th are mostly defense and resistance to toxic and psionic. So by going to a single power to 3 proc, I already gave up 10% recharge, and 5% defense in four different defense types; that is a high price to pay to do more damage when the procs happen to work.

 

I suggest before, going around nurfing anything, to please look at the big picture, before going crazy doing changes based in a very narrow perception.

 

Hugs

 

Sue

[Bill Z Bubba]

Point of info:

 

Copied my claws/bio scrapper to test, respeced into a fully proced out attack chain:

Followup: 1acc/dam HO, 3 dam procs, BU proc, 50+5 recred.

Focus: 1acc/dam HO, 4 dam procs, BU proc.

Slash: 1acc/dam HO, 4 dam procs, 1 -damres proc

Crosspunch: 1acc/da, HO, 4 dam procs, 1 -damres proc

 

Pylon times were between 1:45 and 2mins where my standard build sits at 1:40-1:50 consistently. The proc build loses out on practically everything on the mitigation and utility fronts. It's certainly not a build style suited for someone that likes to stay alive at the bleeding edge while ignoring insps and the P2W cheats.

 

Maybe this is a claws only issue but I found the proc build quite sucktacular.

 

Doesn't mean that procs are ok, however. Turning non-damage powers into damage powers has always seemed wrong to me.

 

Doesn't stop me from doing it, of course. I play a shield/em tank knowing damn well how broken that is these days.

Edited July 9, 2021 by Bill Z Bubba

[Myrmidon]

2 hours ago, Luminara said:

 

If one more critter with Blind is added to the game, I'll hit someone with my shoe. 

And now, I must advocate for that arrow just to see this.

[Bionic_Flea]

18 minutes ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

Followup: 1acc/dam HO, 3 dam procs, BU proc, 50+5 recred.

Focus: 1acc/dam HO, 4 dam procs, BU proc.

Slash: 1acc/dam HO, 4 dam procs, 1 -damres proc

Crosspunch: 1acc/da, HO, 4 dam procs, 1 -damres proc

Try again with 2 level 53 Acc/Dam HOs and 4 procs per attack.  Oh, and musculature if you aren't using it already.  I haven't done the math, but I think you are giving up too much scrapper attack damage for the procs.

[arcane]

If the shoe isn’t a proc bomb shoe it might not hurt too bad

[Bill Z Bubba]

7 minutes ago, Bionic_Flea said:

Try again with 2 level 53 Acc/Dam HOs and 4 procs per attack.  Oh, and musculature if you aren't using it already.  I haven't done the math, but I think you are giving up too much scrapper attack damage for the procs.

 

Of course the HOs were 53 but I wasn't missing enough to bother with 2 of them. Musc and Assault core were both in play. Had to swap out barrier for ageless to cover the end suckage.

[Mezmera]

19 minutes ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

 

Of course the HOs were 53 but I wasn't missing enough to bother with 2 of them. Musc and Assault core were both in play. Had to swap out barrier for ageless to cover the end suckage.

 

One 53 Acc/Dmg HO is 38%.  Musculature is another 45% which also 2/3 of that factors past ED values.  You're sitting at 83% or less damage in these powers when another 53 HO will get you to 100-105%.  Dropping one minor dmg proc with an uncertain proc rate for another 20-25% will make up for that proc damage for certain ATs, especially scrappers, but this additional slotted dmg value in essence will always proc.  There's a sweet spot for proc's and some regular slotting of your abilities.  

Edited July 9, 2021 by Mezmera

[Coyotedancer]

31 minutes ago, arcane said:

If the shoe isn’t a proc bomb shoe it might not hurt too bad

 

Lumi can borrow my spike heels.

[Bill Z Bubba]

4 minutes ago, Coyotedancer said:

Lumi can borrow my spike heels.

 

Pics?

[Bill Z Bubba]

12 minutes ago, Mezmera said:

One 53 Acc/Dmg HO is 38%.  Musculature is another 45% which also 2/3 of that factors past ED values.  You're sitting at 83% or less damage in these powers when another 53 HO will get you to 100-105%.  Dropping one minor dmg proc with an uncertain proc rate for another 20-25% will make up for that proc damage for certain ATs, especially scrappers, but this additional slotted dmg value in essence will always proc.  There's a sweet spot for proc's and some regular slotting of your abilities.  

 

Understood. But I still fail to see where that little extra DPS can come close to the massive loss in mitigation and utility that I'm seeing. But, for a character that does nothing but fight pylons just to get the big numbers, yea, makes perfect sense.

[Coyotedancer]

3 minutes ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

 

Pics?

 

Ha!

 

FlyingCodeMonkey would not approve. 😆