issue 27 Focused Feedback: Ice Control Changes

[kelika2]

6 minutes ago, Carnifax said:

Still don't understand why Ice Slick was given damage

To allow people more damage.  I recently stopped slotting my Controllers for control(mostly) and moved to damage.  While I have no experience with it yet I will eventually work up to slotting Frostbite and Ice Slick up.

 

Maybe adding a ticking damage portion to Arctic Air to roll 3 DoTs would spice up the set more

[ScarySai]

It's clear it was an attempt to address ice control's pathetic damage, even for a control set.

 

Could probably stand to bump that aspect of it up a bit, and I do agree that it should be able to take slow enhancements like every version of ice patch can, considering how ice slick is supposed to be a roided out ice patch. It's a good start though.

[WindDemon21]

22 minutes ago, ScarySai said:

It's clear it was an attempt to address ice control's pathetic damage, even for a control set.

 

Could probably stand to bump that aspect of it up a bit, and I do agree that it should be able to take slow enhancements like every version of ice patch can, considering how ice slick is supposed to be a roided out ice patch. It's a good start though.

And KD sets too.

[brass_eagle]

Is there a specific reason the fear in Shivers skimps on the duration?

 

Not familiar with scales but in-game power info reads 18.63s for a controller. All other AoE fears read 27.94s in duration. Including the new Symphonic fear. They also come with side-effects (damage/-tohit). To boot the Shivers fear covers less area than all of them -- Shivers (60 ft & 45 degrees) vs. Terrify (60ft & 90 degrees) vs. Fearsome Stare and Dreadful Discord (70ft & 45 degrees).

 

Is it because of the strength / wider area of the slow? The real valuable aspect of that in my mind is the -rech. And that's not enhanceable. I also consider slow Ice's secondary effect, but I guess it is a little stronger in this power.

Edited July 14, 2022 by brass_eagle
clarification

[oedipus_tex]

Thanks again for the updates to Ice Control.

 

Overall:

These changes are solid. Adding Terrify to Shiver is a significant bump in survivability, while mostly retaining Ice's identity as a softer control set.

 

 

What I'd keep:

Arctic Air Dominating means that power is finally competitive with similar controls used by other archetypes. While a lot of people will likely focus on it now affecting bosses, the real lift is the extra duration against minions and lieutenants, where previously Dominators using this power were heavily penalized. It's a noticeable, significant bump in usefulness.

 

The basic idea of Terrify in Shivers is solid. I wouldn't have guessed we'd ever get that effect, but it's a nice addition.

 

The reduction of recharge in Flash Freeze from 90 to 45 seconds is a very welcome change.

 

I'm not against the addition of damage to Ice Slick, but have a few comments about it below. The lower cast time to summon the slick is a very welcome change,

 

 

What I'd still consider changing:

RE: the scale of Terrify in Shivers and its arc. I think given the power's lower Terrify duration that you would be justified widening the cone to 90 degrees or even the full arc of 135 degrees. The slow portion of this power is mostly ignored by players, because Ice Control has so many other ways to slow run speeds, and has an immobilize in any case. Other Fear cones also have secondary effects (damage or -tohit) that is generally superior to Shivers. If it needs to stay a 45 degree cone, giving it full scale Terrorize is probably warranted. Size of the cone matters with Ice Control since so much of its control comes from hanging on top of enemies with Arctic Air running, making a narrow cone a bit less useful than it might otherwise be.
 

 

RE: Nature and amount of damage in Ice Slick. The damage is very, very low, not enough that I'd actually slot it for damage. I know you raised it a bit during closed beta, but it's still small. I still wish this power did damage as part of a linked effect to the knockdown. It's hard to say whether it should do more damage overall, but if the intent was that folks slot it for damage, for now I probably wouldn't. It would need to do damage more comparable to Caltrops, and the slick itself might need to recharge a bit faster. Bonfire for example recharges in 60 seconds and lasts 45.

Edited July 14, 2022 by oedipus_tex

[Peacemoon]

Also regarding the cone effect of Shivers, I’m a bit worried at how intuitive it is to have a power with 2 different cone widths?

I can’t think of any other cone power where part of the effect has a wide cone and the other part, a narrow cone. Surely this will be extremely confusing to anyone not in the know, and I imagine they’ll think the power is bugged.

On the damage front, is ice slick’s damage amplified by containment? It should be. Rooting enemies on the slick with Frostbite should amplify the damage I think, which would be a neat effect. 

[GlacialGadgeteer]

It might sound unintuitive, but I don't think adding damage to Ice Slick was for actual DPS purposes. It was just lagging far behind usefulness compared to every other power of its type (and honestly still kinda does).

 

The major boons for Ice Slick I see:

1. Now allows players to build toward set bonuses when slotting the power.
2. Now has potential for proc slotting (see below).

• Annihilation - Chance for -Res
• Positron's Blast - Chance for Energy Dam
• Bombardment - Chance for Fire Dam
• Ragnarok - Chance for Knockdown
• Javelin Volley - Chance for Lethal Dam
• Frozen/Superior Frozen Blast - Chance for Immobilize
• Overwhelming Force - Chance for Knockdown

I'm not familiar enough with the powers to know if knockdown procs eligible to be fired could activate if an enemy managed to not fall on the slick. Those are just the proc enhancements that can be slotted now. I'm personally excited to have a second -Res patch.

[WindDemon21]

1 hour ago, Peacemoon said:

On the damage front, is ice slick’s damage amplified by containment? It should be. Rooting enemies on the slick with Frostbite should amplify the damage I think, which would be a neat effect. 

Since no pseudo-pet benefits from containment I would imagine not.

 

34 minutes ago, GlacialGadgeteer said:

I'm not familiar enough with the powers to know if knockdown procs eligible to be fired could activate if an enemy managed to not fall on the slick. Those are just the proc
enhancements that can be slotted now. I'm personally excited to have a second -Res patch.

 

Unfortunately, procs on pseudopets especially with those with big areas like ice slick get TERRIBLE proc chances and still do every 10 seconds only. Enemy procs will do very little with ice slick.

 

Re-iterating, allow us to slot slow and knockback sets and enhancements into ice slick and patch. Procs won't do much, but it REALLY can use actual slow enhancements like any slow patch can, quicksand can, tar patch can, etc. For a set thats about slows, its so odd this and ice patch could never take slow enhancments let alone sets, and kb sets/enhancements too. (for those that wish to extend the kb over mag 1 to knocback, for example a blaster might want to as a keep away ice patch rather than "stay on and fall down" patch. And either form would benefit from the slow. I'd also like to see the slow sets revamped to actual have good bonuses and stats (less that have damage where most don't have damage on them for example, and with more acc/end/rech stats). A new slow set that has a recharge proc would be very beneficial as well.

[Arcadio]

I also like the soft control aspects of ice, and with shiver becoming a much more pickable power I'd like to see its secondary effect be more relevant too. In my experience, enemies that resist slow resist it by alot which makes ice feel a bit feast or famine. Which is why I'd like to see a percentage of the slow be irresistible similarly to how flash arrow in TA is now, so the set could lean a little bit more into its soft control niche.

[KaizenSoze]

2 minutes ago, Arcadio said:

I also like the soft control aspects of ice, and with shiver becoming a much more pickable power I'd like to see its secondary effect be more relevant too. In my experience, enemies that resist slow resist it by alot which makes ice feel a bit feast or famine. Which is why I'd like to see a percentage of the slow be irresistible similarly to how flash arrow in TA is now, so the set could lean a little bit more into its soft control niche.

I have a elec/ice blaster. Outside of wolves and EB/AVs things generally are not resisting Shiver.

 

ITF mobs are very weak to slows for instance.

[Arcadio]

11 minutes ago, KaizenSoze said:

I have a elec/ice blaster. Outside of wolves and EB/AVs things generally are not resisting Shiver.

 

ITF mobs are very weak to slows for instance.

Wolves and EB/AVs are exactly who I was thinking of 🙂. And it is the case that all control sets (besides illusion) are very weak against EBs & AVs, but maybe it doesn't need to be.

[brass_eagle]

7 hours ago, oedipus_tex said:

<blurb>

 

What I'd still consider changing:

RE: the scale of Terrify in Shivers and its arc. I think given the power's lower Terrify duration that you would be justified widening the cone to 90 degrees or even the full arc of 135 degrees. The slow portion of this power is mostly ignored by players, because Ice Control has so many other ways to slow run speeds, and has an immobilize in any case. Other Fear cones also have secondary effects (damage or -tohit) that is generally superior to Shivers. If it needs to stay a 45 degree cone, giving it full scale Terrorize is probably warranted. Size of the cone matters with Ice Control since so much of its control comes from hanging on top of enemies with Arctic Air running, making a narrow cone a bit less useful than it might otherwise be.
 

 

RE: Nature and amount of damage in Ice Slick. The damage is very, very low, not enough that I'd actually slot it for damage. I know you raised it a bit during closed beta, but it's still small. I still wish this power did damage as part of a linked effect to the knockdown. It's hard to say whether it should do more damage overall, but if the intent was that folks slot it for damage, for now I probably wouldn't. It would need to do damage more comparable to Caltrops, and the slick itself might need to recharge a bit faster. Bonfire for example recharges in 60 seconds and lasts 45.

 

On the Terrify--you said it better than I did. Thanks for that!

 

On the Ice Slick damage. I agree that it is low. And at least for Controllers, the source of damage cannot make use of containment even.

[Draeth Darkstar]

On 7/13/2022 at 12:35 PM, Captain Powerhouse said:

You are right. I pulled Fearsome Stare because, for some reason, my search brought Fearsome Stare when i filtered for Terrify. My brain did tell me that sounded wrong, but i trusted my eyes.

 

Would a nerf to the debuff on Shivers be able to justify an expanded arc? Ice Control doesn't really need another power in the rotation that has a bunch of slow, it stacks an absurd amount of it already.

[WindDemon21]

52 minutes ago, Draeth Darkstar said:

 

Would a nerf to the debuff on Shivers be able to justify an expanded arc? Ice Control doesn't really need another power in the rotation that has a bunch of slow, it stacks an absurd amount of it already.

I would have to hardily disagree there. especially with even the toggle change when mezzed, even if no suppression after its over, the slow mainly from AA can go off, but shivers can stay. And since you're in melee for it, the wider slow of shiver works a lot better. Though all things considered, it really should just be a really big area targetted aoe, like 30 or 35 feet, and have the fear do that as well so you can use it in melee too. In any rate as well, they really need to make the debuff from shiver last way longer than it does. Even before any ice control  changes, since you use it before jumping in and not as often after, it should have lasted way longer like a minute, not 18seconds (worse rech/duration stats than even the blaster version ugh)

[Carnifax]

6 hours ago, WindDemon21 said:

the slow mainly from AA can go off

Dear sweet jebus no. Need that to slow the scatter and keep things in AA as long as possible. 

 

I don't think the -Slow from either needs to be removed personally. "Slow as molasses" should be Ice's thing. 

[Blackfeather]

I do think it'd be nice if Shivers also had the longer slow duration that Blasters got in Ice Manipulation, alongside a wider Fear (probably 90 degrees to match Terrify's, given they match the same range). The -Recharge/-Movement aspect's definitely nice and something I'd like to keep (and make more long lasting even). Though if Ice Control goes out with just these changes I'll be happy; all it really needed was a reliable way to open up fights, and Shivers fits the bill even in this state.

[Peacemoon]

Terrify also has great damage (boosted by containment). A direct comparison of Shivers and Terrify leaves Shivers as quite wanting.
 

I actually think adding damage to shivers not ice slick would be a great boost for the set and a much needed damage increase for a set that is quite light on both damage and control.

 

Also just to repeat I think having two different cone widths in a single power is a very bad idea and will cause a lot of confusion and frustration. Anything hit by shivers should be feared AND slowed.

Edited July 15, 2022 by Peacemoon

[WindDemon21]

10 hours ago, Carnifax said:

Dear sweet jebus no. Need that to slow the scatter and keep things in AA as long as possible. 

 

I don't think the -Slow from either needs to be removed personally. "Slow as molasses" should be Ice's thing. 

No, i was saying it stops working when you're mezzed. NO way would i be saying to have them remove the slow in AA lol.

 

I'm saying that the people saying shiver's slow is useless is wrong and I want to be able to use it in melee for MORE slow lol

 

9 hours ago, Peacemoon said:

Also just to repeat I think having two different cone widths in a single power is a very bad idea and will cause a lot of confusion and frustration. Anything hit by shivers should be feared AND slowed.

Agreed. And again for a melee set really with AA, shivers should really just be a wide area ranged aoe 35ft or more. not a cone so it can be used in melee too.

Edited July 15, 2022 by WindDemon21

[tez]

Trying to recall if Jack takes slow sets, and if not why not?

[evetsleep]

16 minutes ago, tez said:

Trying to recall if Jack takes slow sets, and if not why not?

I don't believe so, which really made me sad the first time I got an ice controller high enough to slot him out.

[Generator]

16 minutes ago, tez said:

Trying to recall if Jack takes slow sets, and if not why not?

If the wiki is right, he takes slow enhancements, but not sets.

[tez]

2 minutes ago, Generator said:

If the wiki is right, he takes slow enhancements, but not sets.

Honestly Jack should. It just opens up more slotting options for a set that could use it.

[Frosticus]

Trying out my ice/sav dom

 I like these changes. I mean it is a buff in many areas so what's not to like?

 

Shivers+(faster) ice slick probably provide ok ranged control now for most ranged situations. The knockdown probably lets them retaliate from the fear a bit more often than one would like.

Ice slick+AA (dominating) probably provide enough melee control now for most melee situations

 

It's not total lockdown by any stretch, but it is definitely better.

 

What to improve:

Shivers could still use a little more punch

Block of ice is still a bit slow

 

Bug: Artic Air is still toggle dropping when mezzed

[TNT]

I have been playing around a bit and noticed that when I get mezzed Arctic Air drops and needs to be re-toggled.  Is this working as intended?   I know this patch allows for offensive toggles to suppress during mez. It isn't a big deal since it was ready to be turned on pretty quickly, I just want to be sure it wasn't an oversight.  

 

I was pairing it with Sonic Assault and the Disruption Aura was not dropping.  From what I see, Arctic Air is not a pseudo-pet like Voltaic Sentinel.  

[Arcadio]

I don't really like the terrorize in shivers being a different arc. Firstly I'm not sure it's possible to show in game that there are 2 different areas of effect, so it's a little bit esoteric what the mechanics of the skill actually are. Second, it's already a relatively short range so why not make the every-spawn control more reliable to hit?