Power Pool selection

[WumpusRat]

I was looking through the power pools last night, as I was doodling up a new character, and something occurred to me. For most of the pools, you can select one of the first three powers at 4th level, while for four of the pools, you can only choose one of the first two. I know that the travel powers were changed to allow people to select an actual travel really early, which IS handy, but the remaining pools have certain things people might want without "wasting" a choice of the lower two powers as well.

 

Now, to be honest I'm not entirely convinced this would be a good idea -- I can see WHY the travel powers were changed, but then I realized that Concealment was the same way, and it's not exactly a travel power/pool. It has Infiltration in it now, which does give a move bonus, but it's not exactly a "travel power" per se.

 

The four pools that you're restricted to the first two powers in are Medicine, Presence, Fighting, and Leadership. 

 

For most of those, if you're taking powers in the pools it's because you likely WANT one of the first two powers. Medicine, for instance, is almost mandatory for a lot of Mastermind builds, due to many of their secondary sets not having an innate way to heal the pets. While other people might only want to take the pool for Aid Self, and don't want or need Aid Other or Stimulant. Similarly, Fighting is the most glaring "offender" of this category, as Boxing and Kick are often just "wasted" power choices in order to get to the powers that you wanted the pool for in the first place: Tough and Weave.

 

So I suppose for the moment this isn't really saying "Hey, the devs should change these four pools", but mostly wondering who thinks it might be an idea that they could consider. I'm kind of half and half on it myself, as the only pool that I really see as having "wasted" power picks is Fighting, and only for certain characters -- Cross Punch with the bonus damage from having Boxing and Kick IS a very nice power, after all, though it does require two other choices. 

 

But would it be too much to allow people to pick one of the first three powers from Medicine, Presence, Fighting and Leadership rather than the first two?

 

I'm not entirely sure myself.

Edited November 14, 2022 by WumpusRat

[MTeague]

My personal take is we've had enough power creep, and yes, freeing up an entire power selection or two is power creep. 

That said, I'm not a dev. Devs are gonna do, or not do, whatever they think is best, for reasons they think are best. 

[Zepp]

I may have posted about this a couple times. That being said, there are three types of sets.

 

"Standard" [Fighting, Leadership, Medicine, Presence]
T_1a: No prerequisites, available at level 4

T_1b: No prerequisites, available at level 4

T₂: One power prerequisite, available at level 14

T_3a: Two power prerequisite, available at level 14

T_3b: Two power prerequisite, available at level 14

Travel [Concealment, Flight, Leaping, Speed, Teleportation]
T_1a: No prerequisites, available at level 4

T_1b: No prerequisites, available at level 4

T_1b: No prerequisites, available at level 4

T_2a: Two power prerequisite, available at level 14

T_2b: Two power prerequisite, available at level 14

 

Origin [Experimentation, Force of Will, Gadgetry*, Sorcery, Utility Belt*] {* marks currently unreleased sets}
T_1a: No prerequisites, available at level 4

T_1b: No prerequisites, available at level 4

T_1b: No prerequisites, available at level 4

T₂: Two power prerequisite, available at level 14

T₃: Two power prerequisite, available at level 20

† Only one Origin Pool can be selected

 

Would it be better if they followed a standard pattern, yes. Would adjusting them to follow a standard pattern cause power creep, a little.

Edited November 15, 2022 by Zepp

[Sylapsis]

Alternatively, what do you think about making taking several powers from the same pool more attractive?

I feel like the Fighting pool is doing something really neat, giving synergies as you pick more and more from it.

What if having both Aid Other and Aid Self reduced the activation time by a small bit, or making Injection give a greater range to Aid Other? Like having Field Medicine removes the interrupts.

What if having Stealth and Grant Invisibility increased the stealth radius of both? And adding Phase Shift increased the +defence by a bit?

What if, for each leadership power you picked, you get an increased area of effect of those powers?

What if having both Pacify and Provoke added a small -defence and -resist to those powers?

 

I like synergies, and like the idea of giving a small reward to heroes and villains who invest deeply in a pool.

Edited November 14, 2022 by Sylapsis
Stimulant is apparently called Injection now!

[srmalloy]

Force of Will and Sorcery both give you a travel power as the third option, so they fall under the travel pools for categorization.

[Rudra]

9 minutes ago, srmalloy said:

Force of Will and Sorcery both give you a travel power as the third option, so they fall under the travel pools for categorization.

So does Experimentation with Speed of Sound. So that breaks the pools down to Travel and Non-Travel with Fighting, Leadership, Medicine, and Presence being the only Non-Travel pools.

[Disruptor]

12 hours ago, Sylapsis said:

Alternatively, what do you think about making taking several powers from the same pool more attractive?

I feel like the Fighting pool is doing something really neat, giving synergies as you pick more and more from it.

What if having both Aid Other and Aid Self reduced the activation time by a small bit, or making Injection give a greater range to Aid Other? Like having Field Medicine removes the interrupts.

What if having Stealth and Grant Invisibility increased the stealth radius of both? And adding Phase Shift increased the +defence by a bit?

What if, for each leadership power you picked, you get an increased area of effect of those powers?

What if having both Pacify and Provoke added a small -defence and -resist to those powers?

 

I like synergies, and like the idea of giving a small reward to heroes and villains who invest deeply in a pool.

 

 

I really like the synergy between boxing and kick.

 

What I dislike about the synergy in Medicine pool is you're required to go deep into the pool for Field Medic to get the synergies. I often feel it isnt worth to take field medic to get the synergies for aid other/aid self. I would much prefer if you take aid other + aid self they each get a bonus.

 

Alternatively give more incentive to take Field Medic, my first reaction is to make FM give Injection and Resuscitate bonuses as well. Example Field Medic would remove the interrupt from Resuscitate an add small endurance (20%?) when revived. Injection would get a run speed buff for allies and ms slow for enemies.

Edited November 14, 2022 by Disruptor

[Luminara]

15 hours ago, WumpusRat said:

Now, to be honest I'm not entirely convinced this would be a good idea -- I can see WHY the travel powers were changed, but then I realized that Concealment was the same way, and it's not exactly a travel power/pool. It has Infiltration in it now, which does give a move bonus, but it's not exactly a "travel power" per se.

 

How, exactly, is Infiltration not a travel power?

[biostem]

12 minutes ago, Luminara said:

How, exactly, is Infiltration not a travel power?

Fly, (as early as level 4 now), has spoiled people.  Back in my day we navigated Perez park with only CJ + hurdle!

Edited November 14, 2022 by biostem

[Psyonico]

2 hours ago, biostem said:

Fly, (as early as level 4 now), has spoiled people.  Back in my day we navigated Perez park with only CJ + hurdle!

And that was two power picks!

[WumpusRat]

42 minutes ago, Psyonico said:

And that was two power picks!

We 6-slotted Stamina and liked it!

 

 

2 hours ago, Luminara said:

How, exactly, is Infiltration not a travel power?

 

I consider it to be more of a "pseudo-travel power" than a full-fledged one. You can only jump about 25% as high/far as superleap, and only run about 25% as fast as superspeed. While it does make  you invisible, so does Superspeed. It's kind of a slightly upgraded prestige run power that you can get for free from the p2w vendor.

 

That's why I used "per se", rather than just flat out stating "it's not a travel power". It is, but it isn't. It would be akin to Sorcery giving Hover instead of Mystic Flight. Would it still be a "travel power" at that point? Technically, yes, but also no. 

[Rudra]

Super Speed: Run speed: +350%

                     Threat level: -100%

                     Stealth: 35 ft.

 

Super Jump: Jump speed: +249%

                   Jump height: +2780%

 

Infiltration: Run Speed: +154% (44% of super speed, a bit more than 25%)

                 Jump speed: +150.645% (60.5% of super jump, a bit more than 25%)

                 Jump height: +764.5% (27.5% of super jump)

                 Stealth: 36 ft.

                 Defense: +1.75% all

 

Ninja Run: Run speed: (0.4 x melee speed running )% (I'm guessing +40%)

                Jump speed: (0.55 x melee speed jumping)% (Best guess is +55%)

                Jump height: (0.25 x melee leap)%  (I think is +25%)

 

Looks like a pretty good travel power to me. Infiltration looks like an actual travel power to me. Pretty competititve with Super Speed and Super Jump.

 

*- All data pulled from City of Data.

[twozerofoxtrot]

16 hours ago, Rudra said:

So does Experimentation with Speed of Sound. So that breaks the pools down to Travel and Non-Travel with Fighting, Leadership, Medicine, and Presence being the only Non-Travel pools.

 

The third pool category exists but it's not the powers availability that defines it.

 

Only one of the Origin Power Pools can be selected per character.  I'm fairly certain that as of i27p5 this is still the case. 

 

That is what distinguishes them from the other two categories. 

[Rudra]

Point was that pools with a travel power have 3 available powers at level 4, one of which is the travel power, and pools without travel powers have 2 powers available at level 4.

[Zepp]

23 minutes ago, WumpusRat said:

I consider it to be more of a "pseudo-travel power" than a full-fledged one. You can only jump about 25% as high/far as superleap, and only run about 25% as fast as superspeed. While it does make  you invisible, so does Superspeed. It's kind of a slightly upgraded prestige run power that you can get for free from the p2w vendor.

Infiltration caps at 92.5 while Super Speed caps at 120.24, so that's 76.9%. 87.652 to 101.802 for Infiltration v Super Jump, so  86%. Jump height on infiltration, expect around 85, and on Super Jump expect about 200, so around 42.5%.

 

It can also mule LotG: +75% Global Recharge, which makes it popular. Also, with the stealth changes, it can now be used with Stealth.

 

With SS+SJ I generally use three slots (one for the stealth proc) and two power selections and expect around .68 endurance consumption. With Infiltration I generally use five slots (3 Winter's Gift, 1 stealth, 1 Thrust, and 1 LotG), and one power selection and expect around .34 endurance consumption.

 

It is viable, but like Flight (post-Travel Speed Update) it feels left behind because they are both so much slower than the the super-pimped out Super Speed with Stealth, Phase, & Momentum while also being almost 20% faster than Super Jump and almost 40% faster than Flight or Infiltration.

[Zepp]

37 minutes ago, twozerofoxtrot said:

 

The third pool category exists but it's not the powers availability that defines it.

 

Only one of the Origin Power Pools can be selected per character.  I'm fairly certain that as of i27p5 this is still the case. 

 

That is what distinguishes them from the other two categories. 

Also the fifth option requires level 20...

 

Edit: I went to Test, to test mutual exclusivity, and yes, it is still a thing.

Edited November 15, 2022 by Zepp

[twozerofoxtrot]

Shows how much I go deep into the Origin pools!

[Zect]

19 hours ago, MTeague said:

My personal take is we've had enough power creep, and yes, freeing up an entire power selection or two is power creep.

 

To add to this very valid point, boxing and kick are potentially valuable slot mules for KC, biting cold, AA, and FF (My 90% res to all 45% def to all except psi invuln tanker would like to remind you that 3x FF = 3% EN res).

 

People who ask for buffs often neglect to consider the full potential of the powers and sets under discussion!

[Luminara]

41 minutes ago, WumpusRat said:

You can only jump about 25% as high/far as superleap, and only run about 25% as fast as superspeed.

 

Super Jump doesn't buff Run Speed at all, and Super Speed doesn't buff Jump Speed/Height as much as Infiltration does.  Saying that it's not a travel power is as unqualified as saying that Teleport isn't a travel power because it doesn't buff Jump Speed, or Fly isn't a travel power because it has no Run Speed increase.  It's designed to be good at multiple forms of movement, not directly comparable to travel powers which specialize in one thing.

[plainguy]

4 hours ago, biostem said:

Fly, (as early as level 4 now), has spoiled people.  Back in my day we navigated Perez park with only CJ + hurdle!

Back in my days I had to jump a mile to school !

These kids don't know what they have !.. They have it too easy I tell you !

[biostem]

Bit of a tangent, but I think part of the issue with infiltration is that, despite the numbers, it doesn't feel as fast or effective as other travel powers.  I'm not disputing the values, just that it doesn't quite get you over those buildings or across those chasms the way flight, SJ, or TP does...

[plainguy]

Personally I would like the option for all of these power pools combined into one GIANT pool. 
It follows the same restrictions they have on number of powers before picking a higher level one and such.
They would also block powers combinations that seemed unreasonable in the realm of power creep. 

So in my example. 
You pick Experimental Injection from Experimental 
You pick Arcane Bolt from Sorcery
You can now pick Corrosive Vial, Enflame or Wall of Force. 
Once you pick one of them, the others are locked out.. Otherwise I can see everyone just going for a bunch of AOEs.
But then maybe you could pick up Tough or Weave or both as you made the requirement with Experimental Injection and/or Arcane Bolt. 
Basically Experimental Injection and/or Arcane Bolt took over the requirement for Boxing or Kick.

Again to be clear anything that seems overpowered would blocked combination wise. 
I am sure the powers have some sort of value system. 
As an example there is a reason why Full Auto is at 26 and not Level 6 where M30 Grenade is.

Edited November 15, 2022 by plainguy

[Rudra]

You pitched this before. It got fought for being power race instead of just power creep.

[Zepp]

42 minutes ago, biostem said:

Bit of a tangent, but I think part of the issue with infiltration is that, despite the numbers, it doesn't feel as fast or effective as other travel powers.  I'm not disputing the values, just that it doesn't quite get you over those buildings or across those chasms the way flight, SJ, or TP does...

or Super Speed with practiced use of Momentum...

[WumpusRat]

Since most people are largely against the idea (and as I said in the original post, I wasn't entirely convinced it would be a good idea, but was rather posting it to gauge how other people felt about it) I'm just going to ask the mods to nuke this topic.