So, procs...

[Bionic_Flea]

4 hours ago, nihilii said:

Bring on the Apocalypse!

 

The aPROCalypse, you say?

[Bill Z Bubba]

5 hours ago, nihilii said:

(because, yes, the reason I die "a lot" and not "ALL THE TIME" on proc builds is because I abuse luck insps too...)!

 

So much heresy!

 

I don't know about anyone else but here are some things I've seen with my own diabolical eyeballs:

Respecing my claws/bio scrapper into a procmonster build granted him the same to worse times on pylons, drastically reduced his overall mitigation and made him horrifically end-inefficient, forcing me into Ageless.

My SG ran our mains on a max diff kill what's in the way ITF with ALL incarnate powers unslotted and it only added about 10-15 minutes to our normal time to completion along with a normal range number of faceplants.

I've always sung the benefits of defense uber alles for exactly the reasons you stated above. It's actually why I hate building resist based sets because I know I'm going to have to spend vastly more effort dealing with debuffs/slows/end drains/etc simply because so many more of them land.

 

It's not any one thing that has cranked up the power creep in this game. It's a death from a thousand paper cuts.

 

Tanks were ridiculously overbuffed.
Procs are turning some ATs and powersets into something that they weren't designed to be.

IOs grant far too much defense. (No, a hard cap of 40% is still dumb but so are softcapped blasters.) Far too much of everything, probably.

Solo, the difference between no incarnates and a full loadout of T4s is quite drastic. It makes sense that they make less of an overall difference on a full team because all my characters are much better off with a full team of random buffs.

Chronic inspiration chewing didn't exist at one time and I have to wonder how much more of an issue THAT has become than people want to talk about.

 

I know what I'd like to see fixed but I also know that those things ain't happening. The ship done sailed.

 

Last note: Yesterday I took my time/fire defender into a max diff ITF solo. She had 1 faceplant that was avoidable and another from when the seafood platter showed up and ate her ass. It also would have taken over an hour JUST to clear all the first mission. When I mentioned it to others, the very first reply was essentially "low DPS AT, proc it up."
And I expect it to be true. Procmonstering a defender is probably going to be vastly more beneficial than procmonstering a blaster, scrapper or stalker. Maybe I'll retest with my sentinel.

 

[Pzn]

22 minutes ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

Chronic inspiration chewing didn't exist at one time and I have to wonder how much more of an issue THAT has become than people want to talk about.

I've always chronically chewed inspirations since the very early days of the game.  However, being able to combine any 3 into what I need and turn off some of the more useless insp that cluttered my tray (awakens, break frees on ATs with mez, etc) was a big buff to insp chugging.  With the general increase in kill speed you get way more insps dropping than the old days and popping them leads to steamrolling which leads to more insps dropping and so on.

 

And that's not even really dipping into loading up through /ah or emails.  That's a whole other can of worms.

Edited July 17, 2021 by Pzn

[aethereal]

1 hour ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

And I expect it to be true. Procmonstering a defender is probably going to be vastly more beneficial than procmonstering a blaster, scrapper or stalker. Maybe I'll retest with my sentinel.

 

People keep mentioning this like it's a deal changer, but it's not.  Like, if you get good results from straight-up damage enhancing a power (as blasters, scrappers, and to a lesser extent stalkers will), then you can spend two or three slots reaching ED for damage, then use the other 3-4 slots for procs.  It's maybe a little less dramatic than six slots of pure procs, but that's still a proc build.

Edited July 17, 2021 by aethereal

[chi1701]

1 hour ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

 

So much heresy!

 

I don't know about anyone else but here are some things I've seen with my own diabolical eyeballs:

Respecing my claws/bio scrapper into a procmonster build granted him the same to worse times on pylons, drastically reduced his overall mitigation and made him horrifically end-inefficient, forcing me into Ageless.

My SG ran our mains on a max diff kill what's in the way ITF with ALL incarnate powers unslotted and it only added about 10-15 minutes to our normal time to completion along with a normal range number of faceplants.

I've always sung the benefits of defense uber alles for exactly the reasons you stated above. It's actually why I hate building resist based sets because I know I'm going to have to spend vastly more effort dealing with debuffs/slows/end drains/etc simply because so many more of them land.

 

It's not any one thing that has cranked up the power creep in this game. It's a death from a thousand paper cuts.

 

Tanks were ridiculously overbuffed.
Procs are turning some ATs and powersets into something that they weren't designed to be.

IOs grant far too much defense. (No, a hard cap of 40% is still dumb but so are softcapped blasters.) Far too much of everything, probably.

Solo, the difference between no incarnates and a full loadout of T4s is quite drastic. It makes sense that they make less of an overall difference on a full team because all my characters are much better off with a full team of random buffs.

Chronic inspiration chewing didn't exist at one time and I have to wonder how much more of an issue THAT has become than people want to talk about.

 

I know what I'd like to see fixed but I also know that those things ain't happening. The ship done sailed.

 

Last note: Yesterday I took my time/fire defender into a max diff ITF solo. She had 1 faceplant that was avoidable and another from when the seafood platter showed up and ate her ass. It also would have taken over an hour JUST to clear all the first mission. When I mentioned it to others, the very first reply was essentially "low DPS AT, proc it up."
And I expect it to be true. Procmonstering a defender is probably going to be vastly more beneficial than procmonstering a blaster, scrapper or stalker. Maybe I'll retest with my sentinel.

 

 

As a keldian who uses forms, the only defence I get is from IO set bonuses, any changes to them would be a direct nerf since forms cant use any other toggles or abilities.

[Fire Chief]

1 hour ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

Maybe I'll retest with my sentinel.

Best part of the whole thread.

[plainguy]

2 hours ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

 

So much heresy!

 

I don't know about anyone else but here are some things I've seen with my own diabolical eyeballs:

Respecing my claws/bio scrapper into a procmonster build granted him the same to worse times on pylons, drastically reduced his overall mitigation and made him horrifically end-inefficient, forcing me into Ageless.

My SG ran our mains on a max diff kill what's in the way ITF with ALL incarnate powers unslotted and it only added about 10-15 minutes to our normal time to completion along with a normal range number of faceplants.

I've always sung the benefits of defense uber alles for exactly the reasons you stated above. It's actually why I hate building resist based sets because I know I'm going to have to spend vastly more effort dealing with debuffs/slows/end drains/etc simply because so many more of them land.

 

It's not any one thing that has cranked up the power creep in this game. It's a death from a thousand paper cuts.

 

Tanks were ridiculously overbuffed.
Procs are turning some ATs and powersets into something that they weren't designed to be.

IOs grant far too much defense. (No, a hard cap of 40% is still dumb but so are softcapped blasters.) Far too much of everything, probably.

Solo, the difference between no incarnates and a full loadout of T4s is quite drastic. It makes sense that they make less of an overall difference on a full team because all my characters are much better off with a full team of random buffs.

Chronic inspiration chewing didn't exist at one time and I have to wonder how much more of an issue THAT has become than people want to talk about.

 

I know what I'd like to see fixed but I also know that those things ain't happening. The ship done sailed.

 

Last note: Yesterday I took my time/fire defender into a max diff ITF solo. She had 1 faceplant that was avoidable and another from when the seafood platter showed up and ate her ass. It also would have taken over an hour JUST to clear all the first mission. When I mentioned it to others, the very first reply was essentially "low DPS AT, proc it up."
And I expect it to be true. Procmonstering a defender is probably going to be vastly more beneficial than procmonstering a blaster, scrapper or stalker. Maybe I'll retest with my sentinel.

 

Following comments not directed at you but you mentioned it and I figured I would comment on the same thoughts 

Proc building on a full team, Yea I get it. You killed the mobs X amount faster..  Maybe you finishing off an ITF 10 to 15 minutes faster. 
My simple question is, is it such a BIG DEAL ( Maybe it is for some players. Maybe they only have a limited time to play and every minute counts ) to finish something that much faster ?

 

I think you said it best ( and you are not the only one ) that certain Arch Types with certain powers will  benefit much more from Procing then other builds.
For me after messing around with this..  I can say this type of build can benefit from Procing. Petless Whip Traps mastermind..  Just look at the Mu Mastery powers. 

Again I can see the value in certain powers.

Thunderstrike 214 vs 393 Plus if Force Feedback goes  off you get the following  benefits;
Triage Beacon goes from 71 to 54 seconds recharge.

Burnout goes from 716 to 527

Acid Mortar goes from 35 to 26

Poison Traps goes from 31 to 24

 

Thunderstrike is on a 12 second recharge.  
I do not know how Force Feedback +recharge (FFB+)  works on attack powers like this.  2 PPM does that mean I will need to wait 60 seconds on Thunderstrike for FFB+ to reset ?

 

I could put it in Trip Mine and loose some DPS as well.  That is a 7 second recharge but will go down to 5 if FFB+ tics. 

 

Static Discharge goes from 120 to 231 also has a stun proc in it 

Electric Fences goes 42 to 82 

 

 

Proc build

https://www.midsreborn.com/builds/download.php?uc=1500&c=711&a=1422&f=HEX&dc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

 

Non Proc

https://www.midsreborn.com/builds/download.php?uc=1480&c=702&a=1404&f=HEX&dc=78DA6594CB4F135114C6EF74A660A1C8D4B63C0A082D50B0C040D5BD89A204431312D0852F3281012681B6E923115F80BA7361E2466378697C6E5CF9C0A82B37BA7061FC135C2B2E444485F130DFB1347692E9EF9EEF9E7BCF771FD3D8D96EF7939ED90342520F4DE8E9F4504C4F678CD4A4191F71C6F431735816F414D31BDCEE191AC84E4E26E25AB741BF1C98F1317F5EC6C1ECE8A83698D293694F6F7CDC4819F18CF6AF51D69F484C6847CCB1F10C8D2AB1A381A4618C94DBCD3E431F3152E97133E9B1E3981E3793D9093D6326E281C3497358CBAB13CBB2E3A92AF218A6F7962AF8B19C629E1055C4CE05505D642E81BBEE30EF82530A51B2C70A719D1A758AB8ADB244F34927082145384E324F81CA69E619B069083C47F3C9182BE465D4384F9A133514672F355A14513428D97D4503A0BB077AE02838A7E20CB63C143F55EC9C1DCF98CFC19217CC65D0FD12BC407061ACE2FAE4B0B5F04787BDB6F007C42DEFC18677A0838A95B2EF528B1E21935206D752D95E19BB5A891DBA4815CAD1E728F7630555BE2DBA844F45ACD0780FE778FECB0970CE259AC7CBABF4AEC2A1EF07185C031B7E72BC0E467FC17188E6F7B33F7F1B76BA81D9487D95BC9A4A17F23DA455B39F6AF613611F111F384D7E6AD84FCD34B4DA19E62CB8FB32F30AF32AE8A5F9EB30BFB3EE1E6AEEB9CF7C00061F72FC884FE13118A0B1F5ECB73E0D6D86BC84D84B680E27DB38CF5C602E824D4BCCCFE06B3AAE6678919BD77176E1EF60CB2AD8B106BE22B4F26D697538B11F1B98A77D13ECB0C04E81FE15B7106DBCD6B6DFF0DBFE87B901766C829D161815A8F786A0F13968C738A79F73AE11BD741B2B84E8E2FDE8E2338D29B9AFDCAADD6E6F85745BFB0A947E25F7150BC956BE949022E5E77C2D5056B615491CC7B75811946D7ECBEFBB09C71537C04841FDAE02255AA0EC2B50F617282E35F78F62BD8DE4EEB5F5177D05FEDF

 

 

Edited July 17, 2021 by plainguy

[Luminara]

2 hours ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

I've always sung the benefits of defense uber alles for exactly the reasons you stated above. It's actually why I hate building resist based sets because I know I'm going to have to spend vastly more effort dealing with debuffs/slows/end drains/etc simply because so many more of them land.

 

Perhaps we should ask the HC team to look into coalescing various debuff resistances in the same way status resistances were, to bring parity to the Defense/Resistance discrepancy.

[arcane]

16 minutes ago, Luminara said:

 

Perhaps we should ask the HC team to look into coalescing various debuff resistances in the same way status resistances were, to bring parity to the Defense/Resistance discrepancy.

It’s pretty hard to argue that any melee classes need a buff though.

[Bill Z Bubba]

17 minutes ago, Luminara said:

Perhaps we should ask the HC team to look into coalescing various debuff resistances in the same way status resistances were, to bring parity to the Defense/Resistance discrepancy.

 

We could but we both know that would just add more power creep.

[Luminara]

6 minutes ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

 

We could but we both know that would just add more power creep.

 

Ignoring imbalances doesn't make creep less of a problem.  There is a lack of parity between how Resistance and Defense function with debuffs in play, as you noted, and that disparity should be dealt with in order to properly moderate creep.  Nerfing Defense won't change that, unless you nerf it drastically (or add new mechanics which allow debuffs to bypass Defense), to the point of gutting entire power sets, such as Energy Aura and Super Reflexes.  Defense will always be superior in that regard unless and until Resistance offers comparable mitigation.  By addressing that imbalance, setting a baseline across the board, we can find a fairer and more reasonable solution to creep than crudely hammering things until they conform.

[Bill Z Bubba]

8 minutes ago, Luminara said:

Ignoring imbalances doesn't make creep less of a problem.  There is a lack of parity between how Resistance and Defense function with debuffs in play, as you noted, and that disparity should be dealt with in order to properly moderate creep.  Nerfing Defense won't change that, unless you nerf it drastically (or add new mechanics which allow debuffs to bypass Defense), to the point of gutting entire power sets, such as Energy Aura and Super Reflexes.  Defense will always be superior in that regard unless and until Resistance offers comparable mitigation.  By addressing that imbalance, setting a baseline across the board, we can find a fairer and more reasonable solution to creep than crudely hammering things until they conform.

 

Or we accept that resists have their own benefits and leave that issue well enough alone. Invul is awesome for the simple reason that it's a beautifully constructed hybrid set and mixing res, def and hp/regen is the way to make a tough build, after all.

 

Edit: After all, there's a reason my SR tank survives shit that flatline my SR scrapper. All that extra HP and resist ain't there for nuthin.

Edited July 17, 2021 by Bill Z Bubba

[arcane]

Debuff resistant or not, armor sets do not need to be any stronger at this time.

[arcane]

22 minutes ago, Luminara said:

 

Ignoring imbalances doesn't make creep less of a problem.  There is a lack of parity between how Resistance and Defense function with debuffs in play, as you noted, and that disparity should be dealt with in order to properly moderate creep.  Nerfing Defense won't change that, unless you nerf it drastically (or add new mechanics which allow debuffs to bypass Defense), to the point of gutting entire power sets, such as Energy Aura and Super Reflexes.  Defense will always be superior in that regard unless and until Resistance offers comparable mitigation.  By addressing that imbalance, setting a baseline across the board, we can find a fairer and more reasonable solution to creep than crudely hammering things until they conform.

Power creep is literally the consequence of trying to balance but not allowing nerfs to be a part of the balancing effort. Your post can be summarized as “we should create more power creep in order to eventually address power creep”.

[Brutal Justice]

3 hours ago, Luminara said:

 

Ignoring imbalances doesn't make creep less of a problem.  There is a lack of parity between how Resistance and Defense function with debuffs in play, as you noted, and that disparity should be dealt with in order to properly moderate creep.  Nerfing Defense won't change that, unless you nerf it drastically (or add new mechanics which allow debuffs to bypass Defense), to the point of gutting entire power sets, such as Energy Aura and Super Reflexes.  Defense will always be superior in that regard unless and until Resistance offers comparable mitigation.  By addressing that imbalance, setting a baseline across the board, we can find a fairer and more reasonable solution to creep than crudely hammering things until they conform.

 

45% defense performs better than 90% resistance on average but I believe the disparity isn’t so large that it causes a huge issue.  like Bill said

3 hours ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

 

Or we accept that resists have their own benefits and leave that issue well enough alone.

 

40% defense also still outperforms 75% resistance but still results in about the same disparity as 45 def vs 90 res.  It is the balance metric we seek.  People just don’t want to accept it yet.  Nerfing defense will address it.  The math proves it every time.  

[Bill Z Bubba]

59 minutes ago, Brutal Justice said:

40% defense

 

/jranger

[Sovera]

My own tests with procs didn't show them having a huge impact on the long run. I have the tests posted in the Brunker thread in my signature.

 

Even at the start/middle of the thread I can be found puzzling why what started as an amazeballs procmonstered Burn (incidentally a -very- good carrier for procs) did not show a particular benefit over a regular slotted Burn despite the huge disparity in damage.

 

Later on I ended up switching to a non proc monstered Burn because the raw stats meant more uses even in the lower levels, and also because I could make use of the bonuses.

 

And yet, and yet, it is tantalizing to see a 200+ damage increase (further increased by Burn's double interaction with procs, which -should- have pushed the proc approach further), but testing, not maths, showed there was no great difference between both.

 

Now, -res procs do make a large difference, but mostly because pylons are the damage test and not AVs. Tested (again in the signature) and -res had negligible (against AVs) to no impact in actual gameplay (maps). Again, no math, just actual tests.

 

Unfortunately with Pylons as the subjects of damage tests -res procs will always have such a large impact (25% ish in my amateurish testing) that the discussion will give them more weight than they deserve. As if we fought +0 enemies that don't resist -res effects on a regular basis.

 

 

My last slew of tests before I went to play SWTOR for a month or two was me trying to improve the damage of a Fire Armor/Ice Melee and I won't bore people with the numbers (again, signature) but nothing I did really changed it. More procs, less procs, quadruple procs. The 5% whiffing accounted more than anything for the slight differences in numbers.

 

This, to me, after multiple tests until 3 AM, tells me that procs don't have as much impact as people might think they do. That said I've relegated all my testing to the Tanker AT and perhaps with other ATs this changes, though I remember many many moons back testing a Rad Melee/Bio Scrapper and posting on the Pylon thread over the Scrapper forums how I kept removing procs to fit more bonuses but it didn't seem to impact my times.

[America's Angel]

On 7/14/2021 at 5:16 PM, Olerus said:

One small note.  I've seen some suggest that Defenders have overwhelming defenses while still achieving blaster levels of DPS.  The former can be true; Defenders can fairly easily reach the softcap.  Some sets can even do so while maxing S/L resistance and getting a smattering of other resistances.  The latter isn't really true.  

 

The single best Defender blast is Char from the APP, followed by Dominate, followed by Blaze, followed by a few Ice Blast powers.  Slotted with two (2) 4.5 PPM purple procs and four (4) 3.5 PPM regular procs, Char has a DPA of 409 when use solo (Musculature and Vigilance providing +75% damage).  This is good, but is also means that other powers will not have said purple procs.  I have an extremely high DPS defender (Storm/Ice/Psy) as a concept, using a chain of:

 

Dominate > Bitter Ice Blast > Ice Blast > Bitter Freeze Ray

 

This deals 1556 damage in 6.6 seconds, or something close to 236 DPS.  I'm fairly certain this is close to maxing out a defender's DPS from an attack chain alone.  Now against a Pylon, said Defender would have Freezing Rain, Tornado, and 2x Lightning Storm also contributing -resistance and damage and would be cycling Aim every 35 seconds.  Cycling in these powers reduces the base DPS to around 200, but adds in roughly 40% -resistance.  Aim adds roughly 15 damage back, Tornado another 15, and 2x Lightning Storm roughly 43.  So altogether with setup and against a static target said completely focused defender can reach around 382.  

How does that compare to Blasters?  Well, a defensively specced blaster can easily clear 550 DPS.  Virtually every blaster combination can reach the same level of damage output as the defender, without needing to setup up 3 pets.  And the defender isn't reaching 90% either.  Even a clunky set like Assault Rifle is going to pump out 300-350 DPS from its attack chain alone (especially mixing in melee).  Even with procs helping to bridge the gap, it is hard to overcome the nearly double base damage.  Defenders can match non-IOed blaster damage, but they will only come up to around 66-75% of blaster damage at equal investment levels.  

 

Blasters aren't even that much less defensive.  They have higher base HP and regeneration, better ATOs, and can just as reasonably reach softcap defenses.  My main blaster is a Water/Time with 45% ranged defense, 1527 Max HP, and resistance splits of 60 SL, 50 Fire, 40 Cold, 17 Energy, 10 negative, 10 Psy/Toxic.  My defender is also a hover + ranged defense character, and has less resistances around the board with 400 less health.  

The point of this is just to give some harder numbers to the discussion.  That's all.  

 

Thank you for taking the time to post these numbers.

[Naraka]

On 7/17/2021 at 3:49 AM, nihilii said:

It is a little strange some arguments against procs are along the line of "but if I slot just this one power with procs then it becomes really good and I still have enough powers to make my bulid awesome with set bonuses".

 

Like... yes? Do you want procs to suck so universally there's never ever a rational reason to deviate from slotting full IO sets in everything?

 

And now that I write it out, I'm wondering if this is actually motivation for some people. Much like I've always struggled to understand "badge hunters" who gripped about some badges being a real challenge, perhaps there is an aspect of build making to some that is akin to collectionables, and 6 IOs of the same set are more satisfying psychologically than frankenslotting with procs?

 

Needless to say, while I could understand their perspective, I'd have to disagree with changing the game to fit that.

 

It's funny the discussion has now evolved to general overpoweredness. Because... I play Tankers these days. A lot. And my Tankers... die! A lot. Because I build them as proc monsters, and while this gives them fantastic damage, and their innate survivability still make them sturdy, they ARE softer than defensively-built characters filled with set bonuses. Tankers are overpowered, for sure. And yet my new baby Bio/Stone Tanker on full Incarnates dies much more often than my old(er) school MA/Shield Scrapper on just Alpha.

 

Maybe I *will* get on the Brutal Justice train to nerf defense to 40%, after all... Let's think about it. If some people slot some procs and softcapped defense and feel procs are OP, and if I slot all procs and no softcapped defense and feel I die a lot, doesn't that imply it's softcapped defense and not procs, that is truly OP? 😉 It's just that flooring enemy tohit has been taken for granted for so long, hardly anybody even thinks about it anymore.

 

Yet as far as the I6 rework of defense or whenever that came, defense started being silly good as the ability to reliably dodge most damage *coupled with* avoiding debuffs AND mezzes, just about any ill effect... cemented defense as the prime form of mitigation, especially with DDR or buffer values. Resist and regen folds like paper in comparison as they meet cascading failure just about anywhere, and the only reason the problem isn't as bad as it could be is thanks to the overpoweredness of luck insps themselves at +12.5% a pop, abundance of team defense buffs, +defense set bonuses.

 

I'm being half tongue in cheek playing devil's advocate here. But only half! NERF DEFENSE! Destroy my builds (because, yes, the reason I die "a lot" and not "ALL THE TIME" on proc builds is because I abuse luck insps too...)! Bring on the Apocalypse!

 

From my personal viewpoint with regards to procs, I have no qualms with proc builds and proc bombs.  That, in and of itself, isn't the problem but rather the culminating stacking nature...and that can go for a lot of things in the game, from defense to stacking buffs, etc.  You stack enough defenders on something and you break the game.  You stack enough defense and you can wade through a lot more than if you stack resistance.  I'm merely pointing out the observation that, stacking is the issue and to help alleviate that *without* straight up nerfing every proc, you merely strike at the stackable nature...which is why I proposed changing some procs into flat % based instead of all being PPM.  At least then, you could have a decent lot putting that flat % proc in a damage/debuff/control aura, for example, and having it have a decent chance of proc'ing with the caveat being you're also not going to have 4+ choices of % procs to stack in said powers and you're not always going to have 5+ procs to slot in your PPM based powers.

 

As for the Tanker part of it, without bringing into the point of difficulty settings, it's hard to judge.  If your Tanker is less durable with a proc build than with an IO bonus build, that means you've chosen offense over defense so you should lower your difficulty down a notch.  If you can survive just as well at +3 as the IO bonus build at +4 but defeat things very noticeably faster, how much worse are you really?

 

17 hours ago, Luminara said:

 

Ignoring imbalances doesn't make creep less of a problem.  There is a lack of parity between how Resistance and Defense function with debuffs in play, as you noted, and that disparity should be dealt with in order to properly moderate creep.  Nerfing Defense won't change that, unless you nerf it drastically (or add new mechanics which allow debuffs to bypass Defense), to the point of gutting entire power sets, such as Energy Aura and Super Reflexes.  Defense will always be superior in that regard unless and until Resistance offers comparable mitigation.  By addressing that imbalance, setting a baseline across the board, we can find a fairer and more reasonable solution to creep than crudely hammering things until they conform.

 

Why not give defense sets decreased resistances to debuffs then, outside of defense debuffs of course?

[Llewellyn Blackwell]

I will just point out this thread and attitudes in it have had an impact, they have made me choose to remove all utility and support aspects from all of my builds. From now on even my support ATs will be played and built entirely with solo play in mind, and even when teaming will basically just treat every other team member in pugs as no more or less then my summoned pets.

 

If this was the kind of social change the OP and those who support trying to push Defenders and trollers back into a box of stay in the back shut up and support had been hoping to have, than mission accomplished. If your goal was to see more people offering support to others via build choices rather than focus on their own immediate needs for leveling and enjoying their own game play loop in their way, than I would have to say you have failed greatly at least where I am concerned.

 

Sometimes folks can be their own worst enemy, and trust me on this as I know that lesson well from personal experience.

[arcane]

1 hour ago, Llewellyn Blackwell said:

I will just point out this thread and attitudes in it have had an impact, they have made me choose to remove all utility and support aspects from all of my builds. From now on even my support ATs will be played and built entirely with solo play in mind, and even when teaming will basically just treat every other team member in pugs as no more or less then my summoned pets.

 

If this was the kind of social change the OP and those who support trying to push Defenders and trollers back into a box of stay in the back shut up and support had been hoping to have, than mission accomplished. If your goal was to see more people offering support to others via build choices rather than focus on their own immediate needs for leveling and enjoying their own game play loop in their way, than I would have to say you have failed greatly at least where I am concerned.

 

Sometimes folks can be their own worst enemy, and trust me on this as I know that lesson well from personal experience.

Are you doing ok man

[Sovera]

1 hour ago, Llewellyn Blackwell said:

I will just point out this thread and attitudes in it have had an impact, they have made me choose to remove all utility and support aspects from all of my builds. From now on even my support ATs will be played and built entirely with solo play in mind, and even when teaming will basically just treat every other team member in pugs as no more or less then my summoned pets.

 

If this was the kind of social change the OP and those who support trying to push Defenders and trollers back into a box of stay in the back shut up and support had been hoping to have, than mission accomplished. If your goal was to see more people offering support to others via build choices rather than focus on their own immediate needs for leveling and enjoying their own game play loop in their way, than I would have to say you have failed greatly at least where I am concerned.

 

Sometimes folks can be their own worst enemy, and trust me on this as I know that lesson well from personal experience.

 

I wouldn't go around blaming others for your decision. They have presented certain facts or opinions and you've made a decision based on them. You, not the poster.

 

With that said I don't even know what builds you changed but all I need to see is 'defender and controller' and context to see you were probably trying to use the fancy procs such as holds, endurance drain, etc?

 

Now that you have made the change I suggest you play the build. If you say you notice no difference before and after I will not be surprised. We have a number of people on these forums ready to swear how their sapping mobs is really really helpful and how their -ToHit incarnates really really makes a difference, but if we were to ask them to change their slotting/power picks I'm willing to wager they will not notice a difference.

 

 

So please, chill, I'm pretty sure your change in gameplay/slotting won't even be noticed by anyone you're playing with.

[Naraka]

6 hours ago, Llewellyn Blackwell said:

I will just point out this thread and attitudes in it have had an impact, they have made me choose to remove all utility and support aspects from all of my builds. From now on even my support ATs will be played and built entirely with solo play in mind, and even when teaming will basically just treat every other team member in pugs as no more or less then my summoned pets.

 

If this was the kind of social change the OP and those who support trying to push Defenders and trollers back into a box of stay in the back shut up and support had been hoping to have, than mission accomplished. If your goal was to see more people offering support to others via build choices rather than focus on their own immediate needs for leveling and enjoying their own game play loop in their way, than I would have to say you have failed greatly at least where I am concerned.

 

Sometimes folks can be their own worst enemy, and trust me on this as I know that lesson well from personal experience.

 

Well since you specifically mentioned me, I'll ask you: what did Defenders and Controllers do before IOs or PPMs?  Did they never do damage?  Were Fire/kinetic controllers just flashy and that's why they were popular?  Or how about just the era before PPM when procs had a base % chance, how did builds and procs fit together then?

 

I think you're way off base assuming offensive built support ATs is only now a thing thanks to procs.  Maybe you are a new-ish player but maybe also you aren't and you just have forgotten where you came from.  At the end of the day, I've attempted to adapt to the overall meta and keep a more based playstyle and I like all sorts of build strategies but at the same time, experiencing the game's power-coster shenanigans as it progresses cements why it should be considered carefully to buff things.  Players forget where they came from and they feel entitled to power.  They won't even consider an alternate timeline where a nerf would happen.  Rather than entertaining a hypothetical change, they throw up their defensive-copium armor and lose sight of why people like to discuss ideas and see only attacks against their precious builds.

 

BTW, I'm not trying to take away your proc builds, I'd more like to expand on how you could make them.  Also, I find it a bit narcissistic to assume another's success or failure upon your own personal conclusion.  If you never decided to attempt to build an offensive Defender or Controller until today, that is your own failed creativity.  Players have been doing that for years.

[oedipus_tex]

I think some folks are thinking we're talking about soloing pylons and not just basic archetype-to-archetype comparisons. Procs probably aren't turning builds into top end performers. I think it's missing the big picture tho to say they aren't a real consideration in archetype to archetype comparisons.

 

For example, here is a Controller's non-damaging Acid Arrow compared to a Dominator's Fireball. It's just one power comparison, and not an entirely fair on. Still I think there is some room for questioning how procs are making a power that does very little damage on its own come so close to one of an archetype's best ranged blasts. I appreciate that Trick Arrow was recently buffed and don't want to see it nerfed, but I also have to recognize what's happening. I also appreciate that Fire Ball is an APP power, but it's the case that that is where the ranged Dominator AoEs are located.

 

 

 

There are ways I could even the score somewhat, of course. I could have taken a set with a damage proc in Fireball, or use the sixth slot for a damage proc. It may even be the case that Controller damage is too low and needs a buff, but if that's true, I feel like Dominators need a lift too, somewhere.

Edited July 18, 2021 by oedipus_tex

[Sovera]

42 minutes ago, oedipus_tex said:

I think some folks are thinking we're talking about soloing pylons and not just basic archetype-to-archetype comparisons. Procs probably aren't turning builds into top end performers. I think it's missing the big picture tho to say they aren't a real consideration in archetype to archetype comparisons.

 

For example, here is a Controller's non-damaging Acid Arrow compared to a Dominator's Fireball. It's just one power comparison, and not an entirely fair on. Still I think there is some room for questioning how procs are making a power that does very little damage on its own come so close to one of an archetype's best ranged blasts. I appreciate that Trick Arrow was recently buffed and don't want to see it nerfed, but I also have to recognize what's happening. I also appreciate that Fire Ball is an APP power, but it's the case that that is where the ranged Dominator AoEs are located.

 

 

 

There are ways I could even the score somewhat, of course. I could have taken a set with a damage proc in Fireball, or use the sixth slot for a damage proc. It may even be the case that Controller damage is too low and needs a buff, but if that's true, I feel like Dominators need a lift too, somewhere.

 

Mids screenshots are not... exactly... good reference material. As you've said the comparison made is not flattering to begin with. Then you don't account that with your slotting Acid Arrow has a 47% chance for each proc to go off. Not for -all- of them to go off. 47% per proc. Which means the odds are reduced of having all four happening. On the other hand the Fireball will always do that damage.

 

So since it's 47% we could say there's a 50% chance of only two procs going off (Bopper, don't look, I'm butchering math!). Now that Acid Arrow is doing 74 damage while the dominator is still chugging at 125 per cast, all casts.

 

 

To be clear I'm not on either side in particular, but I do caution about glib comparing of numbers. I urge testing for these things. Find a nice group of +0 enemies (in the name of easy testing despite skewing things) and hover out of the way casting that skill until all are dead then report. That Acid Arrow is just -not- going to be doing a Dominator's Fireball damage.