Sniper Beta Patch Notes, June 2nd 2019

[Jaguaratron]

All snipes, regardless speed, will again have maximum range. This means 150ft feet for most snipes, 175ft for Psionic snipes.

 

The "engaged" flag that drives fast snipe now requires 10 seconds without attacking or being attacked, down from 15 seconds.

 

And the good gets even better.  Is this an attempt to make Blast and Assault sets' ST DPS better?  If so... what about those sets without a Snipe?

 

If this is in fact the intent, then I suggest that for Blast sets Executioner's Shot (DP), Bitter Ice Blast (Ice), Shout (Sonic) and Water Jet (Water) should be turned into Snipes.  Don't adjust the Recharge or Damage, just increase the range and give them an out-of-combat version, with that version's Damage scaled for the shorter Recharge.  That would give every Blast set a Snipe.  Though the four sets mentioned would have less Alpha Strike value in their Snipe, it would add the mechanic to all sets and give each a long-ranged attack.  (NOTE: Water Jet's special mechanic wouldn't enable back-to-back OOC versions to be cast, so I don't see a problem there.)

 

For Assault sets it's only a little trickier.  Call Hawk (Savage) and Thorn Barrage (Thorns) could be replaced with Snipe versions (Call Falcon and Thorn Lance?).  Bitter Ice Blast (Icy) would again be made a Snipe.  Which would leave only Earth without a Snipe.  There's no obvious fix for that, unlike the other sets, since the Snipes are P6 or later and I don't think power order should be changed.

 

 

Nothing personal against the server runners, but this is where they seem to not understand how complex balancing a MMO is. You can't just go "Oh, I'll change X" because of all the various moving parts in a game this complex you're shifting the balance so radically that a million things you didn't think of end up being impacted by what you thought was a simple change.

 

Change snipes? Sure...until you realize that it make several sets in the AT objectively worse than they were by comparison. Not to mention that it jacks people's attack chains, and then to fix the attack chain you have to make it do less damage....and so on...

 

I'll say it again. People came to the game knowing what it was. You don't need to be making these changes for the player base...yes I know people immediately started screaming for nerfs and buffs the second the forum opened. Ignore them and invest your resources in making fun content for everyone, not just tweaking a few numbers here and there which will inevitable just pisss people off and ad nothing to the net "fun" of the game.

 

And before the greek chorus starts singing "But different devs do different things" This was never really a sensible answer when the game was a s commercial product and it's not now. Whether you are paying devs or they are volunteers, you have X hours of dev time available to you. Every time you subtract from X, there's something else that you're unable to do. The only time the "Different devs do different things" argument hold up to logical scrutiny is when Dev Time is infinite, which it wasn't in live and certainly isn't now.

 

And all of this simply ignores the human factor, which was another great failing the original dev team had. People get attached to their characters, from the way they look to the way they play. Imagine saving up and buying a red car. Then one day the manufacturer of the car comes to your house and paints it yellow. Now, some people may like their new yellow cars, some will not. But the fact remains that the people bought and were invested in a red car. All you done by changing it is break the psychological connection between them and the car and remind them that they have no power and are not in control of something they previously thought of as theirs.

 

And lastly there's the elephants in the room:

 

1) This is not a paid game any more. It's supported by donations, yes, but you don't have to do things to draw out the time people play the game in order to pay your rent or put food on your table. This is, or had better not  be, a money making business, else NCsoft will come after it and shut it down

 

2) Following from number 1, there are already articles in the press about harassment going on in this game. How do you think NCSoft would respond to a bunch of negative publicity whipped up by angry people that got their characters changed? In today's "cancel culture" I really don't think it would be hard at all for a bunch of angry players to launch a petition or letter  writing campaign to NCSoft to take notice of the server and shut it down, which they could easily do.

 

3) You guys have done a good job, but aren't professional MMO creators with years of experience, and the code for this game is notoriously messy. It's pretty obvious, based on this and the Rage situation, that understanding the complexity of these systems and the way they interact is very difficult and will take years to get right. As loud as all of the people calling for this or that fix/nerf/buff etc. are, I don't think they get how much of a mess the code must be to work with.

 

My suggestion: Before implementing any kind of game mechanic changes, spend a great deal of time openly discussing it with the community before even considering touching the code. If it seems that the community ifs feeling that it's somehow so bad it's destroying the game, then work with the community to agree upon a solution. Tell us what's technically possible and what isn't. Finally release it onto test and honestly listen to all feedback. Then, if it's well received and doesn't cause other problems, releasing it to live wont cause this kind of consternation in the community.

 

Honestly what I'd really suggest you do is read a few books on organizational leadership theory. There are numerous good ones covering the topic of implementing change within an organization and I think they help you immensely if you're going to keep fiddling with the power sets.

 

What exact experience do you have running your own server? Your balancing credentials? Your coding abilities?

 

Your hot air is little more than a weak attempt to get your own way by attempting to place obstacles, if you ever want anything to never arrive you throw it into committees and redistribute the power to greater numbers so there is no decision maker. Theres some prime examples of how your masterful plan of decentralization of authority works in the debacle that was Anthem where they dithered their way to likely death of the Bioware studio. Leadership requires a leader which means a decision maker, no successful business would ever invoke your cunning plan.

 

You, me and everyone else here who are players have NOTHING to do with their "organizational leadership", you wont even take the time out to go on the Beta server and test some things, no, you just keep stewing and coming up with these sad attempts to get what you want which is for these changes to never see the light of day, you arent even clever about it, you just sit there trying to drip poison

 

Heres some paraphrasing from your gems

 

"you dont understand the complexities of balancing a MMO"

 

"oh if you upset the players they will cry to NCSoft and you could lose your server"

 

"You arent even game developers so listen to me because you dont know what you are doing"

 

"buy a organizational book because you are dumb as a box of rocks compared to me"

 

"the codes a mess, you shouldnt touch it because you dont understand it"

 

You are literally clueless about what is going on and its clear this isnt the server for you, you knew from the off that it was a progression server given that its running a version of issue 25 while live closed down without even getting issue 24, but good news there are several others out there thats more your cup of tea with static builds, or you could take your masterful "organizational leadership" skills and show us all how its really done, Im sure it would be a roaring success.

 

Oh as for me? I do run my own MMO server, Im well versed in how things function, technical issues, ability construction and and Im really used to seeing the self serving drivel coming out of your mouth by people trying to manipulate things for their own preferences, your posts on this sniper stuff reads like it comes from a form letter because its the same fluff in different words

 

I personally dont care if these changes go live or not but the difference between you and me is that I respect and TRUST them to do whats right in the best interests of the game, you however illustrate nothing but overt contempt, you think they are idiots and that you know better yet wont even test anything and offer empirical evidence.

[Kelaris]

While it's not quite a build-up, Ninja's stealth offers a very light permanent +dmg buff, and ramps it up to a total of +50% on your first attack each 30s. So it's not quite lacking a +dmg power, but like Martial it's not a click and while available more often it's also less reliable for timing its re-use in longer fights

 

Thanks for the correction. I'm still getting familiar with all the new blaster secondaries and relied on glancing through stuff in the Hero Designer in this case, instead of in game info. My bad.

 

-----

 

JackRooks: Earlier in this thread you specifically said "I don't mean to come across as an ass", which is the only reason I'm directly addressing you here. Almost every comment from you in this thread has come across as rude, and often belittling to the people volunteering their time to run this server. If you intend to be constructive, you can argue your point without attempting to talk down to anyone.

 

To address some of your points:

 

 

1) This is not a paid game any more. It's supported by donations, yes, but you don't have to do things to draw out the time people play the game in order to pay your rent or put food on your table. This is, or had better not  be, a money making business, else NCsoft will come after it and shut it down

 

Nothing is being done to artificially inflate people's time spent in game. In fact a great deal has been done to reduce timesinks that were put in place by Paragon Studios. At the same time, a greater degree of balance in the game is always worth striving for. Paragon Studios wanted to bring ranged single target damage output closer to melee single target damage output. They were halfway through implementing this with the snipe changes. The Homecoming team is attempting to finish the job, and inviting player feedback to assist in getting a balanced and enjoyable result.

 

2) Following from number 1, there are already articles in the press about harassment going on in this game. How do you think NCSoft would respond to a bunch of negative publicity whipped up by angry people that got their characters changed? In today's "cancel culture" I really don't think it would be hard at all for a bunch of angry players to launch a petition or letter  writing campaign to NCSoft to take notice of the server and shut it down, which they could easily do.

 

In my opinion, each part of this scenario is unlikely in the extreme. I don't believe that the Homecoming team would push to live a change that was widely detested. I find it hard to believe that even if it were, that enough people would be so upset that they would not only quit, but also write to NCSoft, for some reason, in some attempt to shut the servers down. And even if these two things happened, it seems unlikely that a hundred (A thousand? How many do you imagine?) angry petitioners would be able to move NCSoft into an action against this server unless that was already planned.

 

I really had hoped that a team running a private server would focus on real content - missions, stories, events, new arts, powers, etc. instead of just trying their hand at the old nerf/buff/rinse/repeat game that people hated back when MMOs were still a thing.

 

In my experience with MMOs and other online games, having small but relatively frequent changes to the balance of the game does a good job at retaining and renewing player interest. People with a high time investment are generally happy to try out new things, and people with low time investment are generally happy that they aren't stuck forever with a "bad" character. I agree that adding new missions and art and powersets would be great, but they would also be a larger undertaking than balancing powers and reworking a single mechanic that is unintuitive to new players.

 

My suggestion: Before implementing any kind of game mechanic changes, spend a great deal of time openly discussing it with the community before even considering touching the code. If it seems that the community ifs feeling that it's somehow so bad it's destroying the game, then work with the community to agree upon a solution. Tell us what's technically possible and what isn't. Finally release it onto test and honestly listen to all feedback. Then, if it's well received and doesn't cause other problems, releasing it to live wont cause this kind of consternation in the community.

 

This is almost exactly what is happening. The section of the community that is interested is testing things on a test server and providing feedback well in advance of any changes going live. In what way is this insufficient?

[azamean]

I'd like to request Web Grenade in Traps also get the Toxic Web Grenade treatment :)

[Guest JackRooks]

Again, the "You can't do it better yourself" argument is the stupid response of a frightened child that can't take criticism.

 

I don't need a film degree or an award winning TV show under my belt to know the last season of GoT was garbage.

 

Please stop trying to shut down dissent with the childish "You don't like it, you do it better!" argument. It's nonsensical and makes you look like an idiot.

 

Feel free to post your opinion, but stop trying to censor mine.

 

All snipes, regardless speed, will again have maximum range. This means 150ft feet for most snipes, 175ft for Psionic snipes.

 

The "engaged" flag that drives fast snipe now requires 10 seconds without attacking or being attacked, down from 15 seconds.

 

And the good gets even better.  Is this an attempt to make Blast and Assault sets' ST DPS better?  If so... what about those sets without a Snipe?

 

If this is in fact the intent, then I suggest that for Blast sets Executioner's Shot (DP), Bitter Ice Blast (Ice), Shout (Sonic) and Water Jet (Water) should be turned into Snipes.  Don't adjust the Recharge or Damage, just increase the range and give them an out-of-combat version, with that version's Damage scaled for the shorter Recharge.  That would give every Blast set a Snipe.  Though the four sets mentioned would have less Alpha Strike value in their Snipe, it would add the mechanic to all sets and give each a long-ranged attack.  (NOTE: Water Jet's special mechanic wouldn't enable back-to-back OOC versions to be cast, so I don't see a problem there.)

 

For Assault sets it's only a little trickier.  Call Hawk (Savage) and Thorn Barrage (Thorns) could be replaced with Snipe versions (Call Falcon and Thorn Lance?).  Bitter Ice Blast (Icy) would again be made a Snipe.  Which would leave only Earth without a Snipe.  There's no obvious fix for that, unlike the other sets, since the Snipes are P6 or later and I don't think power order should be changed.

 

 

Nothing personal against the server runners, but this is where they seem to not understand how complex balancing a MMO is. You can't just go "Oh, I'll change X" because of all the various moving parts in a game this complex you're shifting the balance so radically that a million things you didn't think of end up being impacted by what you thought was a simple change.

 

Change snipes? Sure...until you realize that it make several sets in the AT objectively worse than they were by comparison. Not to mention that it jacks people's attack chains, and then to fix the attack chain you have to make it do less damage....and so on...

 

I'll say it again. People came to the game knowing what it was. You don't need to be making these changes for the player base...yes I know people immediately started screaming for nerfs and buffs the second the forum opened. Ignore them and invest your resources in making fun content for everyone, not just tweaking a few numbers here and there which will inevitable just pisss people off and ad nothing to the net "fun" of the game.

 

And before the greek chorus starts singing "But different devs do different things" This was never really a sensible answer when the game was a s commercial product and it's not now. Whether you are paying devs or they are volunteers, you have X hours of dev time available to you. Every time you subtract from X, there's something else that you're unable to do. The only time the "Different devs do different things" argument hold up to logical scrutiny is when Dev Time is infinite, which it wasn't in live and certainly isn't now.

 

And all of this simply ignores the human factor, which was another great failing the original dev team had. People get attached to their characters, from the way they look to the way they play. Imagine saving up and buying a red car. Then one day the manufacturer of the car comes to your house and paints it yellow. Now, some people may like their new yellow cars, some will not. But the fact remains that the people bought and were invested in a red car. All you done by changing it is break the psychological connection between them and the car and remind them that they have no power and are not in control of something they previously thought of as theirs.

 

And lastly there's the elephants in the room:

 

1) This is not a paid game any more. It's supported by donations, yes, but you don't have to do things to draw out the time people play the game in order to pay your rent or put food on your table. This is, or had better not  be, a money making business, else NCsoft will come after it and shut it down

 

2) Following from number 1, there are already articles in the press about harassment going on in this game. How do you think NCSoft would respond to a bunch of negative publicity whipped up by angry people that got their characters changed? In today's "cancel culture" I really don't think it would be hard at all for a bunch of angry players to launch a petition or letter  writing campaign to NCSoft to take notice of the server and shut it down, which they could easily do.

 

3) You guys have done a good job, but aren't professional MMO creators with years of experience, and the code for this game is notoriously messy. It's pretty obvious, based on this and the Rage situation, that understanding the complexity of these systems and the way they interact is very difficult and will take years to get right. As loud as all of the people calling for this or that fix/nerf/buff etc. are, I don't think they get how much of a mess the code must be to work with.

 

My suggestion: Before implementing any kind of game mechanic changes, spend a great deal of time openly discussing it with the community before even considering touching the code. If it seems that the community ifs feeling that it's somehow so bad it's destroying the game, then work with the community to agree upon a solution. Tell us what's technically possible and what isn't. Finally release it onto test and honestly listen to all feedback. Then, if it's well received and doesn't cause other problems, releasing it to live wont cause this kind of consternation in the community.

 

Honestly what I'd really suggest you do is read a few books on organizational leadership theory. There are numerous good ones covering the topic of implementing change within an organization and I think they help you immensely if you're going to keep fiddling with the power sets.

 

What exact experience do you have running your own server? Your balancing credentials? Your coding abilities?

 

Your hot air is little more than a weak attempt to get your own way by attempting to place obstacles, if you ever want anything to never arrive you throw it into committees and redistribute the power to greater numbers so there is no decision maker. Theres some prime examples of how your masterful plan of decentralization of authority works in the debacle that was Anthem where they dithered their way to likely death of the Bioware studio. Leadership requires a leader which means a decision maker, no successful business would ever invoke your cunning plan.

 

You, me and everyone else here who are players have NOTHING to do with their "organizational leadership", you wont even take the time out to go on the Beta server and test some things, no, you just keep stewing and coming up with these sad attempts to get what you want which is for these changes to never see the light of day, you arent even clever about it, you just sit there trying to drip poison

 

Heres some paraphrasing from your gems

 

"you dont understand the complexities of balancing a MMO"

 

"oh if you upset the players they will cry to NCSoft and you could lose your server"

 

"You arent even game developers so listen to me because you dont know what you are doing"

 

"buy a organizational book because you are dumb as a box of rocks compared to me"

 

"the codes a mess, you shouldnt touch it because you dont understand it"

 

You are literally clueless about what is going on and its clear this isnt the server for you, you knew from the off that it was a progression server given that its running a version of issue 25 while live closed down without even getting issue 24, but good news there are several others out there thats more your cup of tea with static builds, or you could take your masterful "organizational leadership" skills and show us all how its really done, Im sure it would be a roaring success.

 

Oh as for me? I do run my own MMO server, Im well versed in how things function, technical issues, ability construction and and Im really used to seeing the self serving drivel coming out of your mouth by people trying to manipulate things for their own preferences, your posts on this sniper stuff reads like it comes from a form letter because its the same fluff in different words

 

I personally dont care if these changes go live or not but the difference between you and me is that I respect and TRUST them to do whats right in the best interests of the game, you however illustrate nothing but overt contempt, you think they are idiots and that you know better yet wont even test anything and offer empirical evidence.

[csr]

Again, the "You can't do it better yourself" argument is the stupid response of a frightened child that can't take criticism.

 

But... wasn't that what your initial post was implying?  That the current devs can't do it better than it was done 7 years ago despite having the experience of playing the game (and working with the code) for much of that time?

[Pzn]

I hope that you guys slow down with the balance changes.  Most of us have only had access to the game back for a bit over a month.  We could use more time to experience the game as it's currently balanced.  If you played on the secret SCoRE server you might be pushing for changes too quickly while it all still feels new to the majority of the playerbase.  I think that a few months with the current version of the game will prepare players to give more accurate feedback for later changes.

[Guest JackRooks]

Again, the "You can't do it better yourself" argument is the stupid response of a frightened child that can't take criticism.

 

But... wasn't that what your initial post was implying?  That the current devs can't do it better than it was done 7 years ago despite having the experience of playing the game (and working with the code) for much of that time?

 

 

I think you're confusing me with another poster. I never said that.

[Rahveryn]

I'm enjoying the needed changes.  Better to get them in now and establish a baseline.  honestly these do not effect much outside a niche of builds.  The ATs with snipe are not even the most prevalent classes I find being played in my grouping experiance.  Perhaps these is a reason?  People tend to gravitate toward playing the toons they enjoy the play of.  Hense all the meleeists, masterminds, and controllers.  Keep it up guys, love playing on your server, love being part of this community again.

 

I still think they should finish the circle and apply enough +to hit in the 50 Snipe IO sets to hit the +22% threshold, making a 5 Set investment in Snipe a natual progression into full use of this mechanic, and still limit it from use at the lower levels.  This also does not mean you cannot monkey around and get it differently or earlier if you are clever, but for those of us just doing it without all the min-maxing, we can wait and have it at endgame.

[senseichen]

Are there just not enough Dominators playing (or running Sniper attacks?) to be concerned about how badly this is going to hit us? 

 

My Plant/Energy Dom is going to be dramatically nerfed by this change.  I didn't need a fifth generic-damage curve blast in my set (maybe 4.5, Power Push is slightly less generic.)  I'd been having a lot of fun with Force Feedback and BU proc on my snipe, but the recharge change guts that as well.  I'll have to do a big re-build, and for the first time I'm regretting my secondary. (Looking at the Epic Pool changes, I wish I could get the Epic pool version. :()

 

Please take a look at what you can do with the Dominator secondaries (or Domination, or something) to make up for this nerf.

[Mezmera]

Are there just not enough Dominators playing (or running Sniper attacks?) to be concerned about how badly this is going to hit us? 

 

My Plant/Energy Dom is going to be dramatically nerfed by this change.  I didn't need a fifth generic-damage curve blast in my set (maybe 4.5, Power Push is slightly less generic.)  I'd been having a lot of fun with Force Feedback and BU proc on my snipe, but the recharge change guts that as well.  I'll have to do a big re-build, and for the first time I'm regretting my secondary. (Looking at the Epic Pool changes, I wish I could get the Epic pool version. :()

 

Please take a look at what you can do with the Dominator secondaries (or Domination, or something) to make up for this nerf.

 

I've been trying!  But I think those of us that don't stalk this forum are getting drowned out by a vocal minority of blasters who'd rather their snipe act as a t3 blast with range as if they don't already have an abundance to choose from.

 

I really really don't feel dominators need the recharge to be so fast on their snipe, we got other things to do in between damage spam.  Much rather leave the recharge where it's at and damage BUT I do think there's a concerted effort to lower Dominators snipe damage as they feel it's too much so we getting nerfed hard without nary a comment about our concerns.  God forbid dominators have something to compete with other damage dealers.  It's a shame too since it was this dev team that brought about a power I never took before, they giveth and they taketh away. 

[Kelaris]

Would you mind explaining how this is a nerf for dominators? I don't have a dominator with snipe on the live servers to compare against, but have been playing a fair amount of the test server, and played dominators quite a bit on the official servers.

 

Based on my calculations with the changed snipes, we appear to be somewhere between no change in damage output, and a modest buff minor nerf. The damage, at +22% tohit, will be 77.5% of what it is on live, while recharging in only 60% as much time.

 

 

Numbers:

 

Here is a comparison of my dark/dark dominator's ideal attack chains between live and test at +177.5% global recharge, +22% tohit, base damage values, and my test server character's level of recharge in each power.

 

Attacks:

Smite: 95.76 damage, 2.09s recharge, 1.188 cast time

Gloom: 92.98 damage, 2.02s recharge, 1.32 cast time

Midnight Grasp: 161.2 damage,  3.79s recharge, 2.244s cast time

Moon Beam (live): 293.64 damage*, 5.67s recharge, 1.452 cast time**

Moon Beam (test): 227.66 damage,  3.13s recharge, 1.452 cast time**

 

*Since I don't have a live character with this snipe, I can't confirm that this is correct. However this is how much damage it should do, at damage scale 3.56.

 

**Arcanatime cast times based off the assumption that 1.33s activation time is accurate.

 

6-Part attack chain (live version):

 

Gloom

Smite

Midnight Grasp

Gloom

Smite

Moonbeam

 

95.537 DPS

 

 

6-Part attack chain (test version):

 

Moonbeam

Smite

Gloom

Moonbeam

Smite

Midnight Grasp

95.185 DPS

 

 

10-Part attack chain (live version):

 

Midnight Grasp

Smite

Gloom

Moonbeam

Smite

Midnight Grasp

Smite

Gloom

Moonbeam

Smite

 

100.019 DPS

 

 

10-Part attack chain (test version):

 

Smite

Moonbeam

Midnight Grasp

Gloom

Moonbeam

Smite

Midnight Grasp

Smite

Moonbeam

Gloom

 

94.360 DPS

 

 

If snipe was somehow your only attack and you filled the rest of the time with CC powers (live version):

 

Moonbeam

Moonbeam

Moonbeam

 

41.230 DPS

 

 

If snipe was your only attack and you filled the rest of the time with CC powers (test version):

 

Moonbeam

Moonbeam

Moonbeam

 

49.686 DPS

 

[Mezmera]

Would you mind explaining how this is a nerf for dominators? I don't have a dominator with snipe on the live servers to compare against, but have been playing a fair amount of the test server, and played dominators quite a bit on the official servers.

 

Based on my calculations with the changed snipes, we appear to be somewhere between no change in damage output, and a modest buff. The damage, at +22% tohit, will be 77.5% of what it is on live, while recharging in only 60% as much time.

 

Dominator Snipes:

-Fast Snipe:

-Base Damage scale 2.28 (down from 3.56)

-Recharge time 12 seconds (down from 20 seconds)

 

For comparison purposes lets say your damage comes out to be about 200x the scale.  Damage is going down from 712 points of damage to 456, yes I know there's the new bit about to-hit which will add more damage so that would be an additional 100 points.  As you can deduce 712 > 556.  That's a big loss if you can't see that.  Now I'm not sure about you but as a dominator I'm not spamming all my damage attacks in sequence, I sprinkle in a bit of my primaries into my cycle, or else I may as well be a blaster.  So then by the time I'm looking for a snipe it should be recharged by when I need it at the current longer recharge time. 

 

On to the Recharge time.  IO set procs are based on procs per minute, so say you have that Apocalypse Range extra damage proc that averages out to fire 4.5 times per minute and your snipe has a 20 second base recharge, that proc in snipe will ALWAYS fire so you're getting guaranteed moderate damage on top of that base.  Lowering the recharge to 12 seconds makes it so there's instances where it won't fire.  Like I said I'm not just there spamming my snipes and damage powers solely so when I have that chance for big damage it's there and consistent. 

 

The outrage over blasters snipes going up a few seconds guaranteeing that the extra moderate damage proc fired every time to now it being lowered back to the point of "probably" will fire with a loss on the damage scale to boot and most are happy with that I find laughable. 

[csr]

I hope that you guys slow down with the balance changes.  Most of us have only had access to the game back for a bit over a month.  We could use more time to experience the game as it's currently balanced.  If you played on the secret SCoRE server you might be pushing for changes too quickly while it all still feels new to the majority of the playerbase.  I think that a few months with the current version of the game will prepare players to give more accurate feedback for later changes.

 

I tend to agree.  Though I do like the Snipe change as it stands, I would still want a better OOC handling and Snipes for all Blast sets before I'd be completely sold on it (see my suggestions above).

[Monkeyking]

Finally got some testing time in.

 

Sniper Changes

Seems like a generally positive change. In combat, I didn't find that it changes very much. Your snipe just becomes a heavy 4th blast, which I was used to as a Devices user, but without the risk of losing a blast you might have gotten used to because someone threw a dark blast at you. As a Blaster I have enough attacks in my rotation that I didn't notice my snipe having a longer recharge. From the perspective of Beam Rifle, I have Disintegrate management eating up enough time that the recharge doesn't matter, and I imagine other sets have similar concerns.

 

The out-of-combat sniper shot hits pretty hard, but I could almost live without it. Testing at level 50, enemy resistances tend to blunt the impact quite a bit unless you juice it up with Aim/Build-Up/Surveillance/etc. It's basically good for deleting one boss Stalker-style. Was that the intent here, to mimic Stalkers?

 

All in all, seems like a modest buff, but nothing that really breaks the game. Just a tweak upwards in DPS for the most part. I'm not really seeing what's making people complain.

 

Devices changes

The damage on Web Grenade doesn't matter to me much because I've rarely used the tier 1 immobilize on any Blaster. It will be extremely welcome for low level Blasters though, before you have a functional attack routine.

 

Taser becomes a melee attack, and that's cool. Actually, there's some great synergy here with Caltrops. Again, it's of more value to lower level players, but it's a nice hard-hitter that's a bit longer than melee range to wreck up people stuck on your Caltrops. Even at higher levels, 4 slots in Taser will give you something to fall back on when you've sucked down slow debuffs.

 

Targetting Drone gets recharge reduction, which isn't quite what I was hoping for, but I'll take it. Given Time Bomb's extended recharge, to say nothing of Gun Drone and the thematically linked LRM Launcher, it's a pretty nice benny.

 

The change to Time Bomb feels team oriented. It's still going to get used the same way: Throw Smoke Grenade, drop bomb, start fight. This will just annoy teams far less now that they don't have to wait 10 friggin' seconds for you to deploy the thing. Now it seems like Trip Mine is the skippable explosive, with Time Bomb being the vastly more usable alternative.

 

If I could talk you guys into a quick deploy for Trip Mines, I'd be pleased as punch, but Devices feels pretty good amongst all the other power creep now.

 

P.S. Change Field Operative to not permanently turn the user into a ghost, please. Blasters have to run it all the time now, and I'd like to be able to see myself in combat. Maybe get the low-pitched hum to fade out like other toggles, while you're at it.

[Pzn]

Would you mind explaining how this is a nerf for dominators? I don't have a dominator with snipe on the live servers to compare against, but have been playing a fair amount of the test server, and played dominators quite a bit on the official servers.

 

Based on my calculations with the changed snipes, we appear to be somewhere between no change in damage output, and a modest buff. The damage, at +22% tohit, will be 77.5% of what it is on live, while recharging in only 60% as much time.

 

The damage decrease is substantial and the base recharge reduction is enough to make procs occur much less.  It's a huge nerf to dominator burst damage.  I don't even understand why the damage is being reduced.  The damage is being left alone for blasters, why the huge hit to doms?

[senseichen]

@kelaris On live, Sniper w/Force Feedback is an 80% proc rate (2ppmx(4.33+20)/60s.)  With these changes, it's a 54% proc rate (or 71% and 44% depending on how it calculates the activation times.  That's the primary nerf for me.  Sniper Blast right now is a great reliable place for a FF proc, and that's my primary use for it.  With ~200 "natural" global recharge and the FF procs, I'm never waiting on recharge for Sniper, and I'm usually cycling it in with Roots/Psionic Tornado/Whirling Hands for AoE.  This change turns it into a second Power Burst.  Which makes a secondary that's already pretty boring even more boring.

 

I can't really speak to your attack chain.  It seems weird that Midnight Grasp is only in one of your attack chains?  i would have though a) that it would have better damage than test Snipe (2.76 vs 2.28) and b) it would be worth putting into your rotations.  I'd also expect the damage on your snipe to go from 293 to (293*2.28/3.56=187.6.)  I'm not sure if they hotfixed in a different change to the damage scaling already?

 

I'm really grateful to the devs for the work they've done, I don't think they're trying to do something horrible.  I just think they don't understand the impact of having another generic 12s recharge blast is on sets that already have a generic 14s blast.

[Widower]

Sorry to hear about the way this is impacting Doms. I really think that it causes a lot of unintended consequences on several fronts, but it seems most people don't want to hear any dissent at all.

 

Unfortunately the forum is overrun with a case of Hero Worship...the server operators have brought us this game down from the mountain and we should all be on our knees thanking  them rather than daring to question any idea that they have. The prevailing attitude seems to be that this is their server and they can do what they want, the rest of us should just shut up and take it or leave it.

 

I've already started examining other servers who seem more committed to the player base rather than playing "MMO Dev Simulator 2004" and would really recommend  looking into those. Yeah, it's probably not going to draw the same level of crowd as perma 2xp, P2W vendors, getting to skip over the incarnate trials, etc. but you do get a lot less DFB and AE farm spam.

 

With respect, plenty of people have objected to these changes, and we're going into round three of testing soon enough, based largely on player feedback. If you have something constructive to say, say it and it will be heard. If all you're going to do is levy personal attacks against the devs, then you aren't going to get anywhere, same as any game.

 

(And yes, there are plans for new content, but that takes time. It's been a little over a month.)

[Mezmera]

Sorry to hear about the way this is impacting Doms. I really think that it causes a lot of unintended consequences on several fronts, but it seems most people don't want to hear any dissent at all.

 

Unfortunately the forum is overrun with a case of Hero Worship...the server operators have brought us this game down from the mountain and we should all be on our knees thanking  them rather than daring to question any idea that they have. The prevailing attitude seems to be that this is their server and they can do what they want, the rest of us should just shut up and take it or leave it.

 

I've already started examining other servers who seem more committed to the player base rather than playing "MMO Dev Simulator 2004" and would really recommend  looking into those. Yeah, it's probably not going to draw the same level of crowd as perma 2xp, P2W vendors, getting to skip over the incarnate trials, etc. but you do get a lot less DFB and AE farm spam.

 

With respect, plenty of people have objected to these changes, and we're going into round three of testing soon enough, based largely on player feedback. If you have something constructive to say, say it and it will be heard. If all you're going to do is levy personal attacks against the devs, then you aren't going to get anywhere, same as any game.

 

(And yes, there are plans for new content, but that takes time. It's been a little over a month.)

 

I get where he's coming from.  The insta-snipe must have been so much fun to have for all these years hence why it never got "balanced" during that time.  Now that other people find it fun it needs to be brought into line.  In all honesty the snipe changes to blaster, corruptors, defenders and epic pools seem to be dumbing it down so more people can enjoy it and those more intuitive ones can buff it back to its original level.  Which I am completely fine with since I play most ATs anyways. 

 

What is concerning is that there IS a big nerf to the Dominator snipe and yet there's no dialogue about it.  Blasters are upset their range goes down, their recharge goes up a few seconds and shortly there's conversation and we have a change.  It's obvious there's an intention to nerf one out of the many.  All the dominator players are asking is for some honesty and clarification as to the thinking behind this, as in a whole their secondary lacks in damage which is what they are supposed to be somewhat good at.  I would think that rather than going in and revamping all of dominator secondaries to improve performance there could be concessions made on both sides of the coin in regards to their snipe that way we can just get this squared away right here and now.  No more need to look into dom secondaries (with the exception of those without a snipe). 

 

Anyways thanks for reading if you have. 

[Kelaris]

@kelaris On live, Sniper w/Force Feedback is an 80% proc rate (2ppmx(4.33+20)/60s.)  With these changes, it's a 54% proc rate (or 71% and 44% depending on how it calculates the activation times.  That's the primary nerf for me.  Sniper Blast right now is a great reliable place for a FF proc, and that's my primary use for it.  With ~200 "natural" global recharge and the FF procs, I'm never waiting on recharge for Sniper, and I'm usually cycling it in with Roots/Psionic Tornado/Whirling Hands for AoE.  This change turns it into a second Power Burst.  Which makes a secondary that's already pretty boring even more boring.

 

I can't really speak to your attack chain.  It seems weird that Midnight Grasp is only in one of your attack chains?  i would have though a) that it would have better damage than test Snipe (2.76 vs 2.28) and b) it would be worth putting into your rotations.  I'd also expect the damage on your snipe to go from 293 to (293*2.28/3.56=187.6.)  I'm not sure if they hotfixed in a different change to the damage scaling already?

 

I'm really grateful to the devs for the work they've done, I don't think they're trying to do something horrible.  I just think they don't understand the impact of having another generic 12s recharge blast is on sets that already have a generic 14s blast.

 

Thank you for your explanation. I can understand the desire for consistency with procs and diversity in attacks. The energy set does seem to have a lot of similar ranged single target attacks already.

 

Also thank you for pointing out that Midnight Grasp was missing in most of my attack chains. I was interrupted in the middle of calculating them, and apparently screwed something up. I've quadruple checked the numbers and updated my previous post.

 

On the test server my snipe hits for 188.06. May be off by a very small amount, as I'm having to manually remove my set bonus +dmg% modifier from my combat log damage. My calculations above include the planned + %21.0526316 buff to damage scale, when at +22% tohit (moves back to 2.76 scale).

[Widower]

I get where he's coming from.  The insta-snipe must have been so much fun to have for all these years hence why it never got "balanced" during that time.  Now that other people find it fun it needs to be brought into line.  In all honesty the snipe changes to blaster, corruptors, defenders and epic pools seem to be dumbing it down so more people can enjoy it and those more intuitive ones can buff it back to its original level.  Which I am completely fine with since I play most ATs anyways. 

 

What is concerning is that there IS a big nerf to the Dominator snipe and yet there's no dialogue about it.  Blasters are upset their range goes down, their recharge goes up a few seconds and shortly there's conversation and we have a change.  It's obvious there's an intention to nerf one out of the many.  All the dominator players are asking is for some honesty and clarification as to the thinking behind this, as in a whole their secondary lacks in damage which is what they are supposed to be somewhat good at.  I would think that rather than going in and revamping all of dominator secondaries to improve performance there could be concessions made on both sides of the coin in regards to their snipe that way we can just get this squared away right here and now.  No more need to look into dom secondaries (with the exception of those without a snipe). 

 

Anyways thanks for reading if you have.

 

All I can say is that this isn't the final version, but I'll be sure to pass that on.

[Pzn]

Why has no one responded about the dom nerf?  I see that the nerf to blaster snipes were dialed back but doms are being completely ignored.

[senseichen]

Ah, yeah.  If they're adding the buff based on to hit chance, that'll help out with Sniper Blast. 

 

Setting aside the proc nerf, I think that buff makes Power Burst (and probably Blaze and Explosive Shuriken?)kind of pointless?  It's a longer recharge attack, with worse animation time, shorter range doing less damage than Sniper Blast.  Maybe replace Power Burst with Explosive Blast or Energy Transfer?

 

 

[Captain Powerhouse]

I don’t like to announce things because it always comes back to bite me one way or another, but Dominator assault sets will get attention, as will Assault Rifle, Dual Pistols and Psi Blast. I don’t have full details yet, though. Honestly, biggest challenge is doing anything that is not seen as a nerf and results in hate.

 

Reduce recharge time for a more fluid attack change somewhere? PPM Nerf.

Redice cast time for increased DPA? PvP nerf.

Increase recharge for increased damage? Rotation nerf.

 

Regardless what is done, someone will hate an aspect of it. But i want all dominators to be on similar balanced footing and I’m not looking to nerf them, especially because it’s near impossible to implement the new assault sets that I have on my queue when existing ones are all over the place.

[_NOPE_]

“You can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time.”

[Pzn]

I don’t like to announce things because it always comes back to bite me one way or another, but Dominator assault sets will get attention, as will Assault Rifle, Dual Pistols and Psi Blast. I don’t have full details yet, though. Honestly, biggest challenge is doing anything that is not seen as a nerf and results in hate.

 

Reduce recharge time for a more fluid attack change somewhere? PPM Nerf.

Redice cast time for increased DPA? PvP nerf.

Increase recharge for increased damage? Rotation nerf.

 

Regardless what is done, someone will hate an aspect of it. But i want all dominators to be on similar balanced footing and I’m not looking to nerf them, especially because it’s near impossible to implement the new assault sets that I have on my queue when existing ones are all over the place.

 

Please leave doms alone.  After this nerf to snipes I would hate to see what else you have in minds for them.