Why can't you put damage enhancements in ESD Arrow?

[Gloryous1]

I have a fire/trick arrow blaster and I just put a bunch of slots on ESD Arrow and then I saw that it does not take damage enhancements. In the info for the power it says it does moderate damage against robots or machines, so why can u not enhance the damage of the power? Also does it only do damage to robots and machines or does it do more damage to them, but still some to others? The info was kinda confusing.Thanks so much for any help understanding this.

[Uun]

The flag is "Electronic". It's a pretty long list that includes not only robots and machines, but also Freaks. No damage to anything else. Not sure why the damage can't be enhanced. The power is modeled after EM Pulse and EMP Arrow, neither of which take damage enhancements either. I find the blaster version pretty skippable.

 

https://cod.uberguy.net/html/entity-tags.html?tag=electronic&q=bears

[Bill Z Bubba]

What happens to that damage if you 6 slot it with Power Transfer?

 

 

Not tagged to ignore enhancement, so should be buffed just fine by that set.

Edited January 4, 2022 by Bill Z Bubba

[InvaderStych]

6 hours ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

Not tagged to ignore enhancement, so should be buffed just fine by that set.

 

If I understand Link Minds and similar powers correctly (I first noticed on the Sent *PP version) those don't accept RechRdx enhancement, but the stat is enhanced if it is included in a set.

 

In this case, I would expect the same - valid sets that include some +dmg enhancement should enhance that dmg.  I don't have a relevant toon to use to test it though.  Should be easy enough to check by slotting/un-slotting and comparing dmg output in the log scroll.

 

Edit: Nope.

Edited January 4, 2022 by InvaderStych

[UltraAlt]

9 hours ago, Gloryous1 said:

I have a fire/trick arrow blaster and I just put a bunch of slots on ESD Arrow and then I saw that it does not take damage enhancements. In the info for the power it says it does moderate damage against robots or machines, so why can u not enhance the damage of the power? Also does it only do damage to robots and machines or does it do more damage to them, but still some to others? The info was kinda confusing.Thanks so much for any help understanding this.

 

https://hcwiki.cityofheroes.dev/wiki/Tactical_Arrow#ESD_Arrow

 

The Electrostatic Discharge arrow is an EMP weapon (Electromagnetic pulse). It's made to fry machinery.

You can so see that it is an AoE Hold and Stun. Most of the AoE Holds/stuns do little or no damage. 

 

With the recharge time (that I expect to be on it based on the Tier), it's more like a "Everything's gone south! Delay them so we can get away!" power.

That's what most of that tier hold/stun powers are for. They give you enough time to get away or at least buy your team a little time.

 

It is largely an anti-tech (robot) weapon, but the same kind of electrical blasts can disorient people.

" This ESD ... is even powerful enough to affect synaptic brain patterns. It will stun all foes in its radius. Additionally, most machines and robots will be held and take moderate high damage."

 

The hold only apparently works on machines and robots, but I haven't played an archer in a long time, so I don't know how effective it is.

It looks to me like you should slot it up with disorient rather than hold as most enemies aren't machines or robots in this game.

[Hedgefund]

I thought this was an interesting question.  I took a /TA blaster into the "Take down Nightstar" mission full of WarWorks.

 

I have ESD slotted with 2 Endoplams (acc/mez) and 2 recharges, I took out one of the endos and put in a Dmz/Mez, in this case a D-Sync Containment.

 

The extra damage with the new slotting was unchanged.  In both instances I saw:

 

"You hit BCU with your ESD Arrow for 132.92 points of Energy damage."

 

So no, attempting to sneak in some dmg via multi-aspect enhancements doesn't work.

Edited January 4, 2022 by Hedgefund

[Bopper]

9 minutes ago, Hedgefund said:

I thought this was an interesting question.  I took a /TA blaster into the "Take down Nightstar" mission full of WarWorks.

 

I have ESD slotted of 2 Endoplams (acc/mez) and 2 recharges, I took out one of the endos and put in a Dmz/Mez, in this case a D-Sync Containment.

 

The extra damage with the new slotting was unchanaged, in both instances I saw:

 

"You hit BCU with your ESD Arrow for 132.92 points of Energy damage."

 

So no, there's no way to sneak in some dmg via multi-aspect enhancements.

That might be a Hami-O thing. Like with Mind Link, hamis don't reduce the recharge, but slotting defensive/toHit sets will reduce the recharge. I think the EndMod set idea would change the damage if you try it out

[Hedgefund]

I took out another loan from the unslotter bank.

 

I happened to have a level 41 Power Transfer Acc/Dmg/End so I unslotted an Endo and replaced with the PT.  Since it's a triple I wouldn't expect the damage to be significantly more but I would be > 0 difference.

 

So with the 2 Endos I would get:

 You hit BCU with your ESD Arrow for 131.83 points of Energy damage.

 

After substituting an endo for the PT triple, I saw this result:

 You hit ACU with your ESD Arrow for 131.83 points of Energy damage.

 

So, unchanged.  I welcome others to experiment but I'm done.

 

[Bill Z Bubba]

3 minutes ago, Hedgefund said:

So, unchanged.  I welcome others to experiment but I'm done.

 

Well, hell.

[macskull]

The Hami-O trick stopped working a while back when those enhancements were specifically adjusted to not boost attributes the power couldn't be slotted for because it let you do things like bypass ED caps in defense powers by using the defense debuff/* Hamis. Set IOs are handled differently and will sometimes allow you to boost attributes that otherwise can't be enhanced (like recharge in Vengeance or Mind Link). I just tested the Blaster version and found that slotting it with an endmod set with damage aspects didn't change the damage dealt. I'll check the Trick Arrow version next but I feel like the results will be identical - and at any rate the best bang for your buck is to load the power up with hold set damage procs since those will deal damage to any target regardless of whether they're "electronic" or not.

 

EDIT: The Trick Arrow version is also unaffected by damage enhancement. Definitely go with some acc/rech and max out on damage procs if your goal is to use the power to deal damage.

Edited January 4, 2022 by macskull

[Bopper]

Interesting I don't see what would be mechanically different that would allow defense sets to enhance the recharge of mind link, but not enhance the damage of ESD arrow. Perhaps it's at the code level.

 

Edit: I suppose there is one mechanical difference. Recharge isn't an effect you enhance,  it affects the power as a whole

Edited January 4, 2022 by Bopper

[Uun]

35 minutes ago, macskull said:

at any rate the best bang for your buck is to load the power up with hold set damage procs since those will deal damage to any target regardless of whether they're "electronic" or not

This is true for the Trick Arrow version, but not the Tactical Arrow version. EMP Arrow holds all targets, with electronic targets getting 1 mag extra. ESD Arrow stuns all targets and only holds electronic targets. Hold set damage procs would only deal damage to electronic targets. You could slot stun or endmod set damage procs if there were such a thing.

[macskull]

13 minutes ago, Uun said:

This is true for the Trick Arrow version, but not the Tactical Arrow version. EMP Arrow holds all targets, with electronic targets getting 1 mag extra. ESD Arrow stuns all targets and only holds electronic targets. Hold set damage procs would only deal damage to electronic targets. You could slot stun or endmod set damage procs if there were such a thing.

Just tested this ingame and this is not correct - damage procs slotted in the power will have a chance to trigger on any mob hit by the power regardless of whether they're actually held or stunned. This behavior is consistent with how procs work in all other powers, where the proc will have a chance to fire each time regardless of whether the attribute it's for actually occurs.

Edited January 4, 2022 by macskull

[Bill Z Bubba]

1 hour ago, Bopper said:

Interesting I don't see what would be mechanically different that would allow defense sets to enhance the recharge of mind link, but not enhance the damage of ESD arrow. Perhaps it's at the code level.

 

Edit: I suppose there is one mechanical difference. Recharge isn't an effect you enhance,  it affects the power as a whole

 

There any other powers in game that we could test this with?

[Bopper]

53 minutes ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

 

There any other powers in game that we could test this with?

Probably, but I'll have to find them. In the mean time, I'm curious what Musculature Radial would do. I am 99.9% certain the damage enhancement won't buff the damage, but it's worth verifying. 

[Uun]

1 hour ago, macskull said:

Just tested this ingame and this is not correct - damage procs slotted in the power will have a chance to trigger on any mob hit by the power regardless of whether they're actually held or stunned. This behavior is consistent with how procs work in all other powers, where the proc will have a chance to fire each time regardless of whether the attribute it's for actually occurs.

Interesting. I know on Touch of Fear, fear and -tohit procs only go off on the main target - if you want to hit the AoE targets, you need to use melee AoE or taunt procs.

[macskull]

41 minutes ago, Uun said:

Interesting. I know on Touch of Fear, fear and -tohit procs only go off on the main target - if you want to hit the AoE targets, you need to use melee AoE or taunt procs.

Touch of Fear is explicitly coded this way and is the exception rather than the norm. The Perfect Zinger proc works the same way in taunt and placate powers.

 

EDIT: Seems this is also incorrect, while only the fear and -tohit affect the main target the procs for those effects can fire against any of the targets.

 

EDIT 2: Nope, I was right originally. The -tohit and fear portions are explicitly only flagged to affect the main target. The reason taunt and melee AoE procs will still work is because ToF actually executes two powers to achieve its effects.

Edited January 5, 2022 by macskull

[ScarySai]

It will benefit from bu+aim, though. So despite this minor flaw, you'll basically delete any robots under a boss you fire it at, especially if you opted to proc it out.

[kiramon]

Seriously just proc it out 🙂 

[Carnifax]

On 1/4/2022 at 11:22 PM, macskull said:

Just tested this ingame and this is not correct - damage procs slotted in the power will have a chance to trigger on any mob hit by the power regardless of whether they're actually held or stunned. This behavior is consistent with how procs work in all other powers, where the proc will have a chance to fire each time regardless of whether the attribute it's for actually occurs.

Yup, chances always seem to roll the proc effect. Even if the chance is 0%, like non standard ammo for dual pistols. Knockback procs still go off happily despite the kB being disabled.

[ScarySai]

Global damage buffs it, like from bu/gaussian/aim.