Focused Feedback: Power Level Availability Changes

[Armaaz]

Wow, can't say this is a change I was expecting to see in the game. It isn't unwelcome though! I have a few toons that will have some wiggle room in their builds now and that will be fun to tinker with when MIDS gets updated. It does feel bad to pick a power that I will never or rarely use so nice to do away with that. I also feel like this will greatly encourage me to play more "late blooming" sets as I often lose interest in a set if the key powers are way at the end. This removes a lot of the disparity I often have felt between more front loaded sets and those late bloomers. Some powersets feel pretty much complete by level 20 or so, while others are hitting epic levels before the build comes together. Very welcome change in my eyes.

[ivanhedgehog]

10 hours ago, Wavicle said:

Level 50s will have their 6 slotted nukes as low as level 21. I think there’s some enhancement devaluation though, right? I’m not really worried about it. Turn up the difficulty!

Is it game breaking? What is the solution? Kneecapping every AT with a nuke? stopping exemplaring? I dont think it is as big a problem as that. Try taking a squishy on one of these fast +4 ITFs at level 35. You will taste floor early and often.

[Laenan]

In the builds I tested on the test server, having the powers available sooner felt great. 

 

Synapses will be less painful now, and that alone makes this a big win.

 

I like that late bloomer builds get to come online a little earlier and I 100% love the changes. A lack of slots for these powers will remain an issue, so a blaster six slotting their nuke will be lacking elsewhere on level up. Exemplared, well-slotted toons of any AT make TFs easier, so I'm not overly concerned that this is going to be a hugely impactful change. 

 

I think that blaster nukes and other great "high level" powers being available sooner will make teams in those mid-levels move a little quicker, but I think maybe now those teams can turn the difficulty sliders up a notch higher than before to compensate. Plus, blasters with nukes in those mid-levels don't get their epic pool resist/defense powers in those levels, so they may have survivability issues. If the team can support them, as teams tend to do, then they were gonna be great anyway.

 

The best change of all? Power choice in the secondary at level 1. Whatever else happens, please keep this change in. (I also wouldn't mind the t3 in the secondary being available at level 2, but that's just greedy 🙂 )

[Riverdusk]

19 hours ago, Zect said:

On the other hand, the ability to skip the T1 from the secondary disproportionately benefits some sets over others. Corruptors (which are already an S-tier AT) can now skip weak T1 powers from their secondary eg. infrigidate, time crawl and essentially gain a power slot. Hopefully, the developers will take note of which AT/powerset combos benefit the most from being able to skip T1 powers, and balance them appropriately so that they do not become too powerful.

 

Interesting, I was thinking more that defenders benefited by being able to skip a weak tier 1 blast if they wanted.  Personally I like infrigidate and time crawl (both are also nicely procable).  I don't see a clear winner from this change between those two AT's myself.

 

Tanker/brute is the one that jumped out to me, as you almost always want your tier 1 armor set power anyway, but people like to skip a lot of tier 1 melee attacks if they can and now finally tanks can do so (winner: tank).

[ivanhedgehog]

6 hours ago, Laenan said:

In the builds I tested on the test server, having the powers available sooner felt great. 

 

Synapses will be less painful now, and that alone makes this a big win.

 

I like that late bloomer builds get to come online a little earlier and I 100% love the changes. A lack of slots for these powers will remain an issue, so a blaster six slotting their nuke will be lacking elsewhere on level up. Exemplared, well-slotted toons of any AT make TFs easier, so I'm not overly concerned that this is going to be a hugely impactful change. 

 

I think that blaster nukes and other great "high level" powers being available sooner will make teams in those mid-levels move a little quicker, but I think maybe now those teams can turn the difficulty sliders up a notch higher than before to compensate. Plus, blasters with nukes in those mid-levels don't get their epic pool resist/defense powers in those levels, so they may have survivability issues. If the team can support them, as teams tend to do, then they were gonna be great anyway.

 

The best change of all? Power choice in the secondary at level 1. Whatever else happens, please keep this change in. (I also wouldn't mind the t3 in the secondary being available at level 2, but that's just greedy 🙂 )

I am looking at stone tanks getting granite at 26 and drooling. The hated climb to 32 is no more!

[electric_emu]

2 hours ago, Riverdusk said:

 

Interesting, I was thinking more that defenders benefited by being able to skip a weak tier 1 blast if they wanted.  Personally I like infrigidate and time crawl (both are also nicely procable).  I don't see a clear winner from this change between those two AT's myself.

 

Tanker/brute is the one that jumped out to me, as you almost always want your tier 1 armor set power anyway, but people like to skip a lot of tier 1 melee attacks if they can and now finally tanks can do so (winner: tank).

 

I agree.  I think Tankers and Defenders are the big winners, insofar as archetype-wide impact.  Flexibility in choosing your first power in an armor set isn't meaningful since virtually every build I can think of wants both T1 and T2 sooner or later. 

 

This is much less pronounced with Defender primaries, as there are some dud T1s that Corrupters and Controllers may be keen to avoid.  But that's an issue with individual sets and even then both powers are usually useful to some extent (like Infrigidate).  Blast sets, like many melee sets, typically have a clear winner between T1 and T2, which discourages you from picking the inferior option since higher tier powers will eventually replace one of them in your ST attack chain (why would you take Flares and Fire Blast when you'll eventually be spamming Blaze, Blazing Bolt, and even Fire Ball?).   

 

But to the point, the builds I tested on beta (leveling 1 to 15ish with 2XP), this change is amazing.  Tankers in particular feel like they can actually do more than just stand around.

[Frosticus]

you guys don't 5  proc infrigidate? It is one of the best powers in the game with near perfect proc chance.

 

Not waiting till 38 for heatloss? yes please.

Dominator t8, and 9 attacks at a useable level? thank you

[BrandX]

1 hour ago, Frosticus said:

you guys don't 5  proc infrigidate? It is one of the best powers in the game with near perfect proc chance.

 

Not waiting till 38 for heatloss? yes please.

Dominator t8, and 9 attacks at a useable level? thank you

 

Well, I don't recall, but I believe 5 Proc Infrigidate may not be the best DPS attack on some builds.  That said, I have it on my Ice/Cold Corr, but if I recall, it's the worst DPS attack 😛

[Wavicle]

I don’t like to use things for Procs that I wasn’t already going to use otherwise. I’ll be dropping infrigidate, shock, pff, alkaloid, and web grenade. Maybe Gale too.

[Yaliw]

8 minutes ago, Wavicle said:

I don’t like to use things for Procs that I wasn’t already going to use otherwise. I’ll be dropping infrigidate, shock, pff, alkaloid, and web grenade. Maybe Gale too.

 

Hey! This guy is talking shit about Gale! We should beat him up!

[Wavicle]

When you have Lightning Storm, Tornado, and Hurricane, you don’t really need it.

 

I like it. I just don’t need it.

[Frosticus]

9 minutes ago, BrandX said:

 

Well, I don't recall, but I believe 5 Proc Infrigidate may not be the best DPS attack on some builds.  That said, I have it on my Ice/Cold Corr, but if I recall, it's the worst DPS attack 😛

 

ok? it's actually one of your best DPA attacks.  avg 258 dmg w/ 1.118 sec cast, but I said power, not attack. It also paints them, grinds them to a halt and applies -20%*.9 = 18%  res debuff.

 

An ice/cold corr should prioritize it over every other attack unless scourging and/or under the buff of aim+guassian (freezeray and bib) when using single target attacks.

 

To each their own though.

[BrandX]

15 minutes ago, Frosticus said:

 

ok? it's actually one of your best DPA attacks.  avg 258 dmg w/ 1.118 sec cast, but I said power, not attack. It also paints them, grinds them to a halt and applies -20%*.9 = 18%  res debuff.

 

An ice/cold corr should prioritize it over every other attack unless scourging and/or under the buff of aim+guassian (freezeray and bib) when using single target attacks.

 

To each their own though.

 

You're right.  It's better than Ice Blast in terms of DPA without Scourge (had scourge on when looking at the numbers), however, it still falls short of Freeze Ray and Bitter Ice Blast, but it can also take the -Resist Proc which the other attacks can't.

[LQT]

On 10/13/2022 at 5:09 AM, BrandX said:

Isn't Time Crawl needed to apply the delayed effect, that enhances other abilities?

Yes, it's possibly one of the worst T1 powers to consider skipping from any of the support sets because of the synergy built around it.

[Troo]

On 10/13/2022 at 9:29 AM, ivanhedgehog said:

Try taking a squishy on one of these fast +4 ITFs at level 35.

 

That's your baseline?

[ExeErdna]

On 10/13/2022 at 7:19 PM, Riverdusk said:

 

Interesting, I was thinking more that defenders benefited by being able to skip a weak tier 1 blast if they wanted.  Personally I like infrigidate and time crawl (both are also nicely procable).  I don't see a clear winner from this change between those two AT's myself.

 

Tanker/brute is the one that jumped out to me, as you almost always want your tier 1 armor set power anyway, but people like to skip a lot of tier 1 melee attacks if they can and now finally tanks can do so (winner: tank).

The main Corr secondaries that are "better" now are Poison, Traps, FF and TA. You could toss in Rad too if you just wanted to debuff yet that's still better as defender.

[ivanhedgehog]

6 hours ago, Troo said:

 

That's your baseline?

people were complaining about feeling useless on tfs. Its nothing new. and its no reason fornerfing at's or getting rid of sidekicking/exemplaring.

[LQT]

22 hours ago, ivanhedgehog said:

people were complaining about feeling useless on tfs

Non 50s doing a +4 anything are going to be -5 to either half or all the mobs present on a map depending on what the upper limit in question.

 

As far as examples go not only is this completely irrelevant to what kind of AT someone plays under those conditions, [squishy or otherwise], but it's also entirely misleading because none of the issues a player encounters will have anything to do with it being a taskforce. Normal paper missions would mean sidekicks were facing +5s if not +6s due to 0/+1 mechanics that can happen on maps.

 

One of the most frequent encounters like this is the very first group on the Mortimer Kal SF which is always the +1 group so running that on +4 means it's +5 to the team lead and anyone being sidekicked will face +6s!

[Spectre7878]

Love this Nuff Said

[ivanhedgehog]

5 hours ago, LQT said:

Non 50s doing a +4 anything are going to be -5 to either half or all the mobs present on a map depending on what the upper limit in question.

 

As far as examples go not only is this completely irrelevant to what kind of AT someone plays under those conditions, [squishy or otherwise], but it's also entirely misleading because none of the issues a player encounters will have anything to do with it being a taskforce. Normal paper missions would mean sidekicks were facing +5s if not +6s due to 0/+1 mechanics that can happen on maps.

 

One of the most frequent encounters like this is the very first group on the Mortimer Kal SF which is always the +1 group so running that on +4 means it's +5 to the team lead and anyone being sidekicked will face +6s!

people were saying that blasters getting nukes at 26 was going to make them feel useless as the blasters ran around destroying mobs. I say that everyone has some point in the game that their help is only minor. at some point. I love this change btw. I think it is spot on.

[Wavicle]

1 minute ago, ivanhedgehog said:

people were saying that blasters getting nukes at 26 was going to make them feel useless as the blasters ran around destroying mobs. I say that everyone has some point in the game that their help is only minor. at some point. I love this change btw. I think it is spot on.

 

If the Blaster is making you feel useless then the difficulty is too low.

[Dreamkeeper]

I think this is major quality of life win and hope this change goes live! I really think this will add much improved enjoyment for those of us who level lock characters at times--there's so much fun content pre-level 30 that can feel like a slog with limited powers and I think this will make running Ouro arcs a lot more enjoyable too for the same reason. 

 

p.s.

 

while i know this is off topic, would love to see contacts level range expanded beyond 4levels before you out level them someday! 

[ivanhedgehog]

24 minutes ago, Wavicle said:

 

If the Blaster is making you feel useless then the difficulty is too low.

exactly

[ivanhedgehog]

18 minutes ago, Dreamkeeper said:

I think this is major quality of life win and hope this change goes live! I really think this will add much improved enjoyment for those of us who level lock characters at times--there's so much fun content pre-level 30 that can feel like a slog with limited powers and I think this will make running Ouro arcs a lot more enjoyable too for the same reason. 

 

p.s.

 

while i know this is off topic, would love to see contacts level range expanded beyond 4levels before you out level them someday! 

I am looking forward to doing the croatoa zone missions with this change. one of my favorite zones

Edited October 16, 2022 by ivanhedgehog

[tidge]

TL;DR: I'm thinking biggest effects will be on the defensive side of lower-levels TFs, and that some PvP zones like Blood Bay may become interesting.

 

ATs that rely on pets (not henchmen) from the secondary to help out in solo play should definitely benefit by getting those pets earlier.

----

 

I don't use the Homecoming launcher, so this post is theory-crafting, not theory-tested. I'll roll with whatever we end up going with, so this is all about planned respecs of lvl 50s who exemplar down. I imagine that I will still level many ATs up as I have always done, because of the fewer slots available while leveling. I'm ignoring Masterminds, except to say that the specific changes for Robotics will have a peculiar effect on the order of my favorite build that isn't worth detailing here.

 

The biggest planned changes (starting at level 1) will be on my Rad/Dark Defender/Offender. I'm going to shuffle up the powers from 1-22, and take advantage of the 22-41 power options to get as much Offense as possible. The cost of this choice will be this: The Fighting pool will be taken at then end-build. One of my "cornball" Controllers will absolutely shuffle late-game powers to earlier picks.

 

Generally: I have been squeezing the Fighting pool into builds such that Tough/Weave is taken by level 32. For me: Tough has almost always been a Mule, but Weave's base 5% Defense has been very important for a lot of content. I'm casually wondering if delaying Weave is going to have a larger effect on exemplared  TFs/SFs (ehem, Penny Yin) than I realize.

 

My Dominators are a mixed bag: I only have a couple, each is rather fine-tuned to get perma-Dom. Each of them will probably swap the Secondary T1/T2 but for different reasons. One doesn't really use the T1, so it is a swap to a slightly more damaging T2 that is otherwise skipped. The other takes the T2, so the swap is ultimately between the T1 and the T3. This will have zero net effect on slotting or choices. on each of these, I think I will keep Tough/Weave at mid levels as they draw plenty of aggro. One of the two will have a slight shuffling of powers at levels 20 through 28.

 

I haven't tackled my Tanker yet, but it looks as if that will be a LOT more fun to play at mid-levels. I've never enjoyed Brutes, but I expect even more "why play Brutes?" threads to appear with Tankers now getting the hardest-hitting attacks by level 30. I don't see major changes to my Scrappers and Stalkers, except that one of my Stalkers will have a preferred couple of powers for lower-level content. I'm keeping Hide, thanks!

 

My VEATs will take some experimentation. I'm not sure my Widows/Fortunata need to shuffle their power picks. I can definitely see revamping my Crabbermind, as that has been such a late-blooming build. I'm skeptical how effective the Crabbermind will be with the pets at lower levels; at casual glance it looks like I might have to delay some power picks that make the pet powers effective (Hasten, Team supports)