issue 27 Focused Feedback: Attack Typing Adjustments

[arthurh35353]

On 7/13/2022 at 2:21 PM, KaizenSoze said:

Unless you can find an entire spawn of level 54 Ice Thorn casters and try melee them with a s/l capped blaster. It's not turning out to be a huge change.

I wonder how well the Winter's Event will go this year?

[Nixeras]

People keep arguing as to whether these changes are going to affect their build, or whether it's going to be as damning as others think because of how many enemies it affects or other worries, but I'd like to ask a different question: Why is this happening? What is the end goal? This absolutely is no doubt a change to the very way builds work or will work. The effects could be negligible sure, but if that's the case then why change it anyways?

 

Part of my biggest problem with this change is that it's happening with no transparency and it's a major change the community was hardly consulted about beforehand. It leads the way to other major changes down the line that would eventually take the game we know and love and turn it into something else. I really don't want to see that happen, I don't want this defense change to go through for various reasons but the ones I've stated are at the top of that list and the least discussed among previous posts. IMO there's very little reason to make a change like this that results in the subtraction of power from players, even a miniscule amount.

No one likes being nerfed, especially while there's so many things that already need buffs as it is. Balance changes should be focused on making weaker sets stronger, not making everyone in the game have to rethink their builds on a certain subset of characters because suddenly they're squishier.

 

 

[SwitchFade]

9 hours ago, KaizenSoze said:

I know I sound like a broken record. Have you gone onto Brainstorm and tested it?

 

Folks who have tested it are not reporting a massive change. When this change first appeared, I was worried.

 

So, I tested it very heavily and found it not to big a deal.

Running missions with exotic type damage being dominant (demons, pantheon, carnies, Arachnos, Crey) at +3-4/8 on a blaster that has 45 ranged, 36 melee, with varying exotics between live and beta shows a marked change in damage taken, pace of play and overall survivability.

 

If 3 of 17 MOBs in a group could not hit before and now can, at +4, this is quite a significant increase in damage taken.

 

To look at it another way, if I am said blaster and alpha, 3 of 17 MOBs will hit me BEFORE the change. This effectively doubles incoming damage where those exotic types are present. L

 

This is a lesser issue if one chooses to avoid factions that have a greater number of exotic damage MOBs, maybe 1-2 of a 17 count spawn, but will still be an increase in damage.

 

Fighting the much avoided exotic heavy factions like Malta, Carnies, Arachnos, pantheon, Vahz, CoT and so on, that spawn 3-7 exotic per 17 is a marked increase in damage. This will cause people to avoid them even more.

 

Now, am I against the change? No, not really, it makes sense and seems reasonable. Let's be clear though, in some cases the change is quite large.

 

That said, I'm ok with it.

 

However, guaranteed this will need, and receive, tweaking on the fringes.

[FUBARczar]

Just a random thought 🤔, were these changes inspired by Rularuu encounters?  It's fun to make defense kind of useless and turn SR into tinfoil.  Hey let's add a pinch of that for everyone! Yay! Yippee! 😁 😋

[Cidri]

I honestly don't care so much for the S/L defense of blasters getting weaker. What I worry about are the sets that have defense to some types of damage, resistance to others. Such as Ice Armor and Stone Armor.  Combined with the massive +ToHit mobs get at the new higher difficulty levels, I feel this is a heavy blow to defense-based toons.

 

But this is all testable. I hope people take their defense toons to Brainstorm and see what they can do.

[KaizenSoze]

12 hours ago, SwitchFade said:

Now, am I against the change? No, not really, it makes sense and seems reasonable. Let's be clear though, in some cases the change is quite large.

 

That said, I'm ok with it.

 

However, guaranteed this will need, and receive, tweaking on the fringes.

You're right, someone going is find a rarely fought group that is quite a bit nastier.

 

On that note!

 

12 hours ago, arthurh35353 said:

I wonder how well the Winter's Event will go this year?

Thank you for mentioning the Winter event. I looked up the Winter Event mobs. Yes, that needs to be tested, because it looks like all the mobs from minion to boss get an boost from this change. Lots of ice attacks are now cold/positional, changed from smash/lethal/cold/positional.

 

City of data:

https://cod.uberguy.net./html/category.html?pcat=event

 

If you click on the "Cryptic" or "Homecoming" link in the upper right corner you can switch between live and beta versions of the powers.

 

 

[Dokam]

This is probably slightly Off topic, but related to these changes.    Will we see these changes across some of the resistance armor powers that should have more advantage than others on certain attack types?  I cant help but think about how , take for example Dark Armor, Has more S/L resistance than Neg Energy resistance across most of its powers.  

[foosbabaganoosh]

Very opposed to this change. I don't think the argument of "I didn't notice a difference/it only affects a small amount of enemies/etc." isn't valid in the slightest as I disagree with the principle of this change at its core. It changes core game mechanics, which feels like an unnecessary and slippery slope. It's also targeting something that will only serve to make the game more difficult in a sense, which it feels like Homecoming does not need at this point. Is the motivation of this change to encourage a more balanced team composition (making it harder for solo squishy characters, who will need tanks/auxiliary buffs for better survivability)? I can hardly find people to do certain content as it is, making it ever harder to make do with what I can find at the moment is just going to make the play experience less enjoyable.

 

We're superheroes. It's okay to feel overpowered in certain situations. ESPECIALLY when this sense of power comes from a lot of carefully crafted end-game effort, lots of time, and lots of resources. It's not like someone who just hit 50 is now coasting through the game because S/L are typed together. It takes a finely tuned build to reach these levels and to nerf that seems so unnecessary. It feels like the only result from this will be to detract from players' experience by making things slightly more difficult. I'm really hoping this change doesn't go live.

[GM Flints]

6 hours ago, Cidri said:

I honestly don't care so much for the S/L defense of blasters getting weaker. What I worry about are the sets that have defense to some types of damage, resistance to others. Such as Ice Armor and Stone Armor.  Combined with the massive +ToHit mobs get at the new higher difficulty levels, I feel this is a heavy blow to defense-based toons.

 

But this is all testable. I hope people take their defense toons to Brainstorm and see what they can do.

I feel like SLEN and SLEP def sets are going to be fine, as well as sets that can sit comfortably at the HP cap on Tankers. 

Just by looking at the changes, my icers will probably die more often to en/neg damage, but that's going to just be me adjusting to using the barrier core/melee core on energy/negative mob and not just for psionics. 

[EPGAH2]

Why is this even being done? This seems like a "solution" with no problem to solve, and in the end weakening players, especially in the Christmas Event.

[SwitchFade]

16 minutes ago, GM Flints said:

I feel like SLEN and SLEP def sets are going to be fine, as well as sets that can sit comfortably at the HP cap on Tankers. 

Just by looking at the changes, my icers will probably die more often to en/neg damage, but that's going to just be me adjusting to using the barrier core/melee core on energy/negative mob and not just for psionics. 

And at lvls 10-40 where there's no barrier and exotic damage is quite common?

[SwitchFade]

15 minutes ago, EPGAH2 said:

Why is this even being done? This seems like a "solution" with no problem to solve, and in the end weakening players, especially in the Christmas Event.

Well, to be honest, a blaster that can trivialize 54/8 content across almost all factions is a bit OP. Granted, I have several that can blap and lean into S/L to alpha everyone. I can carry teams.

[EPGAH2]

11 minutes ago, SwitchFade said:

Well, to be honest, a blaster that can trivialize 54/8 content across almost all factions is a bit OP. Granted, I have several that can blap and lean into S/L to alpha everyone. I can carry teams.

This is a superhero game, we're supposed to be OP. But this will not change how much damage you can DO but rather how much you TAKE.

Kudos on making a Blaster that does lots of damage. Do you have Tough and Weave? They'll be useless if the enemy attacks are MOSTLY non-S/L.
Previously attacks checked for types of any damage involved in the attack, then would check whichever Defense you had that was highest.

Now it will be based on the defense against the attack's highest damage type. Ice Blast or Ice Bullet are mostly Cold Damage, and your S/L defense will be ignored.

https://cod.uberguy.net./html/category.html?pcat=event

Here's some hard numbers just for Christmas Event monsters.

And that's ignoring that Red Caps do far and away more damage than player Archer Blasters, even though they're both allegedly Archers.

 

As someone else pointed out, this does NOTHING to change your outgoing damage. The outgoing damage will still be dodged or not based on damage types present, not which is highest. This is a nerf only to the players, not the monsters.

Edited July 16, 2022 by EPGAH2
Adding in about outgoing damage.

[Gobbledigook]

I am off to work soon so don't have time to test, but how does this affect sets like Wp/Bio armor? they are quite low in the exotic mitigations and don't have DDR or much anyway. Bio's defensive stance may need looking at especially for the more difficult settings.

[SwitchFade]

16 minutes ago, EPGAH2 said:

This is a superhero game, we're supposed to be OP. But this will not change how much damage you can DO but rather how much you TAKE.

Kudos on making a Blaster that does lots of damage. Do you have Tough and Weave? They'll be useless if the enemy attacks are MOSTLY non-S/L.
Previously attacks checked for types of any damage involved in the attack, then would check whichever Defense you had that was highest.

Now it will be based on the defense against the attack's highest damage type. Ice Blast or Ice Bullet are mostly Cold Damage, and your S/L defense will be ignored.

https://cod.uberguy.net./html/category.html?pcat=event

Here's some hard numbers just for Christmas Event monsters.

And that's ignoring that Red Caps do far and away more damage than player Archer Blasters, even though they're both allegedly Archers.

 

As someone else pointed out, this does NOTHING to change your outgoing damage. The outgoing damage will still be dodged or not based on damage types present, not which is highest. This is a nerf only to the players, not the monsters.

You're misunderstanding, I can facetank 54/8 content and wipe 17+ foes with little danger. With blaster level damage. My nuke is up every 24 seconds and I always play in melee. Effectively, I have near scrap survivability and blaster level damage. The longer I survive the more damage I can unload 

Edited July 16, 2022 by SwitchFade

[EPGAH2]

29 minutes ago, SwitchFade said:

You're misunderstanding, I can facetank 54/8 content and wipe 17+ foes with little danger. With blaster level damage. My nuke is up every 24 seconds and I always play in melee. Effectively, I have near scrap survivability and blaster level damage. The longer I survive the more damage I can unload 

Are you complaining that you're surviving too much? Do you want to be forced to take along a Tanker player to take alpha for you?

Unfortunately, COH does not (And probably cannot) have Diablo II style hireling tanks. They would be forever getting lost in the straightest of corridors.

But remember your "near scrap survivability" was bought by hundreds of millions of Inf worth of sets, right? Or do you have that much unslotted?

If the former, you earned that. OR another character earned that and gave it to you. If the latter, please show me what I'm doing wrong.

Edited July 16, 2022 by EPGAH2
"bought" instead of "built" and suggestion of NPC hirelings.

[EPGAH2]

32 minutes ago, SwitchFade said:

You're misunderstanding,

What part am I "misunderstanding"? You survive because enemy attacks are dodged with your S/L defense. You put a lot of time, effort, and Inf into that Build, right? Do you want it to be negated by these sudden changes?

[KaizenSoze]

42 minutes ago, EPGAH2 said:

This is a superhero game, we're supposed to be OP. But this will not change how much damage you can DO but rather how much you TAKE.

Kudos on making a Blaster that does lots of damage. Do you have Tough and Weave? They'll be useless if the enemy attacks are MOSTLY non-S/L.
Previously attacks checked for types of any damage involved in the attack, then would check whichever Defense you had that was highest.

Now it will be based on the defense against the attack's highest damage type. Ice Blast or Ice Bullet are mostly Cold Damage, and your S/L defense will be ignored.

https://cod.uberguy.net./html/category.html?pcat=event

Here's some hard numbers just for Christmas Event monsters.

And that's ignoring that Red Caps do far and away more damage than player Archer Blasters, even though they're both allegedly Archers.

 

As someone else pointed out, this does NOTHING to change your outgoing damage. The outgoing damage will still be dodged or not based on damage types present, not which is highest. This is a nerf only to the players, not the monsters.

I was the one that posted that link. I created a AE mission on Brainstorm called Frozen Hell if you want to test against the Winter Horde. It's very quick and dirty, so don't expect much except being able to fight Snowbeasts.

 

Now, the Winter horde only appears during the Winter Event. So, it is not a enemy group will be running into regularly. So, if you get chewed up by them, it's specific to that one group. In general most enemy groups are the same, except for a few powers.

 

The Winter Horde appears to be an exception, not the rule.

 

 

[SwitchFade]

4 minutes ago, EPGAH2 said:

What part am I "misunderstanding"? You survive because enemy attacks are dodged with your S/L defense. You put a lot of time, effort, and Inf into that Build, right? Do you want it to be negated by these sudden changes?

Someone asked why the change, I replied, you're misunderstanding in that you think I'm complaining or care either way. I was explaining and commenting that it is quite OP that I can survive as well on a blaster as a sentinel or scrap, with blaster damage, which was why this change happened, in part. I'm ok being OP or with the change and less OP, I'll still have fun.

 

You seem to be focusing on me as someone who has a stance on this, I don't care if they leave it or change it.

[EPGAH2]

4 minutes ago, KaizenSoze said:

I was the one that posted that link. I created a AE mission on Brainstorm called Frozen Hell if you want to test against the Winter Horde. It's very quick and dirty, so don't expect much except being able to fight Snowbeasts.

 

Now, the Winter horde only appears during the Winter Event. So, it is not a enemy group will be running into regularly. So, if you get chewed up by them, it's specific to that one group. In general most enemy groups are the same, except for a few powers.

 

The Winter Horde appears to be an exception, not the rule.

 

 

But it is an example and a good one, it is a nerf only to PLAYER defense, not to enemy defense, against enemies using non-standard damage. Crey is another good "exception" and even everyone's new favorite punching bags, the Council, use freezing bullets and a punch with so much Darkness in it that it has no Smashing component anymore!

The problem is, players spent hundreds of millions of Inf to dodge these attacks that previously always had a S/L component, now it ignores that hard-earned defense.

[EPGAH2]

5 minutes ago, SwitchFade said:

Someone asked why the change, I replied, you're misunderstanding in that you think I'm complaining or care either way. I was explaining and commenting that it is quite OP that I can survive as well on a blaster as a sentinel or scrap, with blaster damage, which was why this change happened, in part. I'm ok being OP or with the change and less OP, I'll still have fun.

 

You seem to be focusing on me as someone who has a stance on this, I don't care if they leave it or change it.

I am not OK with it, it is a nerf to player defense without a corresponding nerf to monster defense. If they're going to put this much effort into changing the way defense works, why not both ways? Or why make this change at all, rather than raise up weak powersets?

There isn't even the IO "We had to make you weaker to make you stronger" argument here.

You're right, I "misunderstood" because you were arguing with me, I thought you were taking the stance that you want this nerf, you want everyone to be less powerful.

 

Edited July 16, 2022 by EPGAH2
Emphasis on Opportunity Cost

[Vanden]

2 minutes ago, EPGAH2 said:

But it is an example and a good one, it is a nerf only to PLAYER defense, not to enemy defense, against enemies using non-standard damage.

 

Player powers are going to be getting the same treatment in a later pass, this first one just targeted mob powers.

 

Enemies with defense that isn't equally distributed across all damage types are quite rare, anyway. I can't think of any examples off the top of my head.

[KaizenSoze]

2 minutes ago, EPGAH2 said:

But it is an example and a good one, it is a nerf only to PLAYER defense, not to enemy defense, against enemies using non-standard damage. Crey is another good "exception" and even everyone's new favorite punching bags, the Council, use freezing bullets and a punch with so much Darkness in it that it has no Smashing component anymore!

The problem is, players spent hundreds of millions of Inf to dodge these attacks that previously always had a S/L component, now it ignores that hard-earned defense.

As usual I am going to ask. Have you tested it? One person with having issue with their corruptor, but the blasters that have tested are not reporting a huge change.

 

And you ask why, I will not speak for the developers, but why should two defense type smash and lethal invalidate the need for six other types of defense. Not even including the three positional defenses.

 

I have faith that the player base will easily adapt to the changes.

[EPGAH2]

3 minutes ago, Vanden said:

 

Player powers are going to be getting the same treatment in a later pass, this first one just targeted mob powers.

 

Enemies with defense that isn't equally distributed across all damage types are quite rare, anyway. I can't think of any examples off the top of my head.

Who said they would be getting the same treatment in a later pass? And why nerf players first?

Why do this at all instead of fix things that actually are a problem? This is a "solution" without a problem to fix.

Pathing is a non-starter, so let's not go there, but there is the complete weakness of AR and Dual Pistols vs. pretty much every other Blaster/Corruptor Powerset.

OR put IH back to a toggle so Regen is viable again?

 

As to enemies with defenses against particular damage types, Sky Raiders make FFGs (If you leave them unmolested long enough for that) which boosts S/L, and Carnies defend against Psi but are surprisingly weak to Lethal. There was a spreadsheet that I can't find now that said who was weak against what.

[EPGAH2]

2 minutes ago, KaizenSoze said:

As usual I am going to ask. Have you tested it? One person with having issue with their corruptor, but the blasters that have tested are not reporting a huge change.

 

And you ask why, I will not speak for the developers, but why should two defense type smash and lethal invalidate the need for six other types of defense. Not even including the three positional defenses.

 

I have faith that the player base will easily adapt to the changes.

I did test it, that's why I'm bringing these particular points up. That's why I'm able to point to particular groups and even powers OF those groups?

 

I will turn your question inside-out: Why should S/L defense be ignored if an attack has more than one component? Let's take the Cold Bullet: It has to pierce you first. Somehow you can't dodge it anymore because it's mostly Cold damage? Does that make any sense?

 

As to the player base adapting to the changes: HOW? What IO Sets give Defense against something OTHER than Smash/Lethal?

You have to six-slot for those right? Or should everyone just abandon their long-term characters and go for ones that are protected against attacks?

 

Some have even suggested this will "force more diversity in teams", as if that's a good thing, let alone something people wanted.

Let's say you need more support characters. How many people want to play those vs. a damage-dealer, or even a Tanker?