Increase Full Auto Target Cap to 16

[PoptartsNinja]

Back in the day, Full Auto's target cap and damage were reduced to compensate for it being the fastest recharging Ranged Attack T9. It's the only T9 that can only hit 10 targets, all the others can hit 16

 

Even though comparing powersets to other powersets is an apples to oranges situation, I still feel compelled to make the comparison: Full Auto has 50 lower base damage than Rain of Arrows (~179 vs. ~225), less inherent accuracy (101% vs 120%), a longer animation and root time (2.5s vs. 2s), and it's a comparatively difficult to use narrow (20 degree) cone instead of a fairly forgiving radial AOE. Full Auto's only real advantages over Rain of Arrows is a tame end cost (15.5 end vs. 20.8 end) and the fact that you don't need to write a macro to fire it off quickly.

 

Comparing Full Auto to the rest of Assault Rifle, I don't see any compelling reason why Full Auto and Flamethrower should have similar target caps. I can't really envision a scenario where increasing Full Auto's target cap suddenly pushes Assault Rifle up to an S-Tier powerset, especially if you bump up its end cost to 18-20 or so to compensate. I do feel the extra target cap might make it a more attractive power for Defenders and Corruptors trying to squeeze a little extra AoE damage in between buff/debuff cycles.

 

What are your thoughts on Full Auto? Am I missing something obvious?

[TheZag]

I think it would be easier to convince the devs to bump the cap to 16 than it would be to get 16 enemies lined up in a 20 degree cone.

 

*insert Quigley Down Under waiting all morning for 2 idiots to line up meme here*  i looked and couldnt find one.

 

[Yaliw]

I'm of the serious opinion that assault rifle needs a full revamp. It's such an awful powerset that is a product of its time.

[Outrider_01]

1 hour ago, Yaliw said:

I'm of the serious opinion that assault rifle needs a full revamp. It's such an awful powerset that is a product of its time.

So if you nerf regen by .01% , Assault Rifle is buffed. Like, both sets are the bottom standard of suck; so if you nerf one,  every set in game gets buffed higher on the awesome scale.

[Zect]

Full Auto (and assault rifle) are fine, for reasons that you yourself admit: you're comparing apples to oranges. When built and played competently, AR is a highly effective, aoe-heavy powerset, to the point that its T3 blast itself is a location aoe; a standard nuke on top of all that would clearly be overpowering.

 

More generally, power creep is one of the biggest issues facing the game right now, and the current meta is already heavily biased in favor of aoe damage. Such a change would only worsen both problems, and that's reason enough not to implement it.

[BrandX]

But I want a 180 degree cone!

[Sirius.Games]

I would like to see the set play faster instead of apply to more targets. To limit all power sets converging placing a strength to each set is important.

[srmalloy]

On 11/29/2022 at 12:02 AM, PoptartsNinja said:

Back in the day, Full Auto's target cap and damage were reduced to compensate for it being the fastest recharging Ranged Attack T9. It's the only T9 that can only hit 10 targets, all the others can hit 16

Full Auto also had the distinction of being the sole original Blaster T9 that didn't nuke either your End or your End recovery or both, and is the only Blaster T9 that isn't a full-circle AoE; with the removal of the crash for all the Blaster T9s and the effect delay on Rain of Arrows (I'm sure players from Live remember firing off Rain of Arrows on a group of targets, only to see them move out of the target area before the attack landed), it leaves Full Auto having both a restricted area of effect and a restricted target cap within that area, disadvantaging it against the other sets. It is also, despite the reduction in animation time, the only Blaster T9 that roots the attacker for the duration of the DoT (anecdotally, my AR/EM Blaster, back on Live, could, with Build Up or Aim, expect to take out a double-row spawn of even-level Nemesis with Full Auto and only lose about half her HP in the process from the return fire while she was locked in place).

 

The changes that have been made to the Blaster T9 powers have significantly increased their utility in their respective powersets, but I feel that the single change to reduce the animation time for Full Auto does not constitute an equivalent increase in utility for Assault Rifle; increasing the target cap to match the other T9 powers would address that.

[Outrider_01]

4 hours ago, srmalloy said:

(anecdotally, my AR/EM Blaster, back on Live, could, with Build Up or Aim,

just BU in secondary, AR has no Aim in the primary.

 

I remember lagging out from NUMBERS!!! spam before the hard cap. Good times, good times 

[Zect]

5 hours ago, srmalloy said:

The changes that have been made to the Blaster T9 powers have significantly increased their utility in their respective powersets, but I feel that the single change to reduce the animation time for Full Auto does not constitute an equivalent increase in utility for Assault Rifle; increasing the target cap to match the other T9 powers would address that.

 

You're looking at this the wrong way round: rather than Full Auto being too weak, it's the other blaster T9's that are too strong.

 

The patch that made all other blast nukes crashless, i24, never made it to live. It was on Beta for less than a month before news of the shutdown was released and development stopped. These changes may not have been subject to proper testing and review, and in any case, sorely need a balance pass.

 

The appropriate change would be to reduce the damage of other blaster nukes to match Full Auto. This would go a long way towards addressing some of the power creep caused by such a change, while helping to diversify away from the current aoe-heavy meta.

Edited November 30, 2022 by Zect

[Rudra]

I don't know about the timing, but the crashless nukes not making it to Live is wrong. I played on Live only. And I was using crashless nukes before shut down.

[srmalloy]

2 minutes ago, Rudra said:

I don't know about the timing, but the crashless nukes not making it to Live is wrong. I played on Live only. And I was using crashless nukes before shut down.

Not all of the Blaster primaries had nuke crashes, but AR was the only one from the initial powersets that was crashless. Archery, Water, Dual Pistols, and Beam Rifle all had crashless nukes.

[Rudra]

41 minutes ago, srmalloy said:

Not all of the Blaster primaries had nuke crashes, but AR was the only one from the initial powersets that was crashless. Archery, Water, Dual Pistols, and Beam Rifle all had crashless nukes.

I was using Fire Blast's Inferno on Live before shut down without crashing. I even respec'ed into it because it no longer had a crash.

[MTeague]

I would not be opposed to this. 

Originally, Full Auto could hit fewer targets, but was a crashless nuke. All the way back to the beginning, crashless.

Now everyone's T9 is crashless, and Full Auto.... is just sorta, there.

 

I don't consider it a critical-must-have item. I know lots of people hate on AR becasue it's not top-tier, but it still gets the job done plenty well, unless it truly deep-down matters to you if you finish a fight in 30 seconds vs 38 seconds. I know i've never cared, but for some people it's all about performance vs towers, and any other metric that they can spreadsheet.

[Zect]

On 12/1/2022 at 6:44 AM, MTeague said:

I know i've never cared, but for some people it's all about performance vs towers, and any other metric that they can spreadsheet.

AR does pretty well vs a tower. Towers don’t walk out of burn patches, and they are long fights so the lack of an aim clone is not an issue. A non-munitions (ie, no surveillance) AR blaster should do at least 250 dps vs a tower. No lores, of course. That’s not top of the line (>300), but it’s also not terrible (<200). 
 

To do this dps in a real combat situation, the AR user must be able to stop the target from walking out of the ignite patch. For blasters, they can use their T1 immob from the secondary, which itself is a damaging blast, and slot it so that using it in the attack chain is not a dps loss. For corrupters and fenders, who are support characters, they rely on armored and control AT’s to keep the enemy in place. So AR is not underpowered; even by the metrics of munchkins, the data amply debunks that notion. Rather, it requires the player to correctly understand how its powers may be used to best effect. It’s equally powerful, but different. 

 

I’m bringing this up because it is related to the real reason people want buffs to Full Auto. Due to a variety of changes, including crashless T9’s, the addition of incarnate powers, the PPM system and how it interacts with the Gaussian proc, general power creep etc. the current meta for blast sets is to load up on buffs, broadside, and delete most of a pack in an instant. AR, as a set without aim, does not fit well into this meta as it is not designed for a single apocalyptic salvo of damage.

 

What AR does feature is a complete ranged aoe attack chain right out of the box, when most blast sets struggle with tension between aoe powers of different shapes and ranges (having ranged aoe’s but a pbaoe nuke, or vice versa) and need complementary powers from other sets to assemble such a chain, or just do without. AR is designed to stand at range and lay down a continual withering barrage of aoe firepower. To give it a nuke comparable to the (arguably, overpowered) ones other blast sets currently have would just homogenize the set and make it overpowered. It’s equally powerful, but different, and that should be seen as an asset, not a problem.

Edited December 2, 2022 by Zect

[Arc-Mage]

On 11/30/2022 at 1:55 PM, Zect said:

 

The patch that made all other blast nukes crashless, i24, never made it to live. It was on Beta for less than a month before news of the shutdown was released and development stopped. These changes may not have been subject to proper testing and review, and in any case, sorely need a balance pass.

i25 never made it to live but it was ready for release. It was scheduled for release the week after the shut down was announced. NCSoft nixed the release however after it the announcement.
 

i25 subsequently was released on the secret server and then the game basically had 6 years of QoL and balance changes. 
 

We are playing i25 changes now. This is why the game is currently in i27 page 4.

Edited December 2, 2022 by Arc-Mage

[twozerofoxtrot]

Nitpick but, i27, page 4.

 

 

Edited December 2, 2022 by twozerofoxtrot
I'm all for increasing the cap to 16. Good luck getting more than 3 mobs in that cone anyway.

[Luminara]

On 11/29/2022 at 3:02 AM, PoptartsNinja said:

Even though comparing powersets to other powersets is an apples to oranges situation, I still feel compelled to make the comparison: Full Auto has 50 lower base damage than Rain of Arrows (~179 vs. ~225), less inherent accuracy (101% vs 120%), a longer animation and root time (2.5s vs. 2s), and it's a comparatively difficult to use narrow (20 degree) cone instead of a fairly forgiving radial AOE. Full Auto's only real advantages over Rain of Arrows is a tame end cost (15.5 end vs. 20.8 end) and the fact that you don't need to write a macro to fire it off quickly.

 

Rain of Arrows is 1.0 Accuracy, 75% chance to hit +0 foes.  Full Auto is 1.35 Accuracy, 101.25% chance to hit +0 foes.

 

Full Auto has a 10% chance to deal bonus damage... though, looking at the CoD page, that may be bugged, since the chance occurs at 3.3s and the duration of the power is only 2.64s.  That should be tested.  Rain of Arrows doesn't have any bonuses... it doesn't even have Archery's +Acc, or a basic +Acc for being a weapon attack.

 

Full Auto recharges in 60s, Rain of Arrows recharges in 65s.

 

Full Auto's DoT is a single attack, it makes one hit roll for all DoT ticks on an enemy.  Rain of Arrows makes a separate hit roll for each tick.

 

Full Auto's 20 degree cone is 80' in length, giving it a 25.038' width at 71', comparable with Rain of Arrows' 25' radius.  At 80', the width is 28.212', and since extending a cone's length widens its terminal width, it benefits from a wider terminus when enhanced for Range (a single +0 Range SO, for example, would increase the length to 96' and the terminal width to 33.855'), whereas Rain of Arrows is locked at 25'.

 

Mids' database hasn't been properly updated in years, and it doesn't look like it ever will be at this point.  Use City of Data for accurate power information.

 

On 11/29/2022 at 3:02 AM, PoptartsNinja said:

Comparing Full Auto to the rest of Assault Rifle, I don't see any compelling reason why Full Auto and Flamethrower should have similar target caps.

 

Because they're both cones.  Ranged cones are capped at 10 targets.  Powers were standardized in this manner when the aggro and AoE caps were introduced in Issue 5, and Full Auto wasn't limited to 10 targets because it recharged too quickly, it was limited because it's a ranged cone.

[srmalloy]

12 hours ago, Zect said:

For blasters, they can use their T1 immob from the secondary,

... if you picked a secondary with a T1 immobilize. Sonic, Martial, and Energy all lack a T1 immobilize, and their T1 would punt the target out of the fire. And with the recent change allowing the T1 power in the secondary to be skipped, even a Blaster with one of the other secondaries may not have it. So that sweeping generalization is invalid.

[Yaliw]

Even if we were playing without incarnate content, IO's or other powercreep, full auto is still hot fucking garbage

[Zhym]

On 11/29/2022 at 10:22 AM, Outrider_01 said:

So if you nerf regen by .01% , Assault Rifle is buffed. Like, both sets are the bottom standard of suck; so if you nerf one,  every set in game gets buffed higher on the awesome scale.

Now I almost want to make an AR/Regen Sentinel, just to pile all the suck into one character.

 

Almost.

[Zect]

11 hours ago, srmalloy said:

... if you picked a secondary with a T1 immobilize. Sonic, Martial, and Energy all lack a T1 immobilize, and their T1 would punt the target out of the fire. And with the recent change allowing the T1 power in the secondary to be skipped, even a Blaster with one of the other secondaries may not have it. So that sweeping generalization is invalid.

 

That is simply part of the build design process. If you knowingly pick a 2ndary that does not have a T1 immob, then you are either weighing whatever benefits that particular secondary brings you against the loss of the immob, or you have come up with alternative strategies. Perhaps you have judged that the +range from /energy is worth the loss, for example, and decided to rely on armored AT's in your team to hold the enemy still instead. Or, you are deciding to get an immob from elsewhere, such as an APP (ring of fire etc.). You may even be trying out some wonky new strategy, such as slotting frozen blast's immob proc in Ignite so that Ignite itself glues the enemy to the spot (no idea if this actually works, but now I want to try it).

 

The fact that these sets lack a T1 immobilize is not the argument against my point you think it is. In fact, you have proven the complete opposite: because it demonstrates how such differences between sets give rise to different viable strategies, different builds, and hence different play experiences, increasing the replay value of the game and increasing fun. Diversity is strength, and variety the spice of life. Yet one more reason why Full Auto must stay the same it is.

[Techno]

I was thinking of Rolling an AR toon today and cant decide between Blaster/Corruptor/Sent.

 

i was looking at all the damage numbers in game and corruptor damage is higher than blaster. is this just a bug does any one know?

 

[Zect]

6 minutes ago, Techno said:

I was thinking of Rolling an AR toon today and cant decide between Blaster/Corruptor/Sent.

 

i was looking at all the damage numbers in game and corruptor damage is higher than blaster. is this just a bug does any one know?

 

The corruptor version probably includes scourge damage, which in actual combat is only a % chance.

 

Some powers do not play nicely with real numbers. The most accurate source for power data is city of data, as mentioned above.

 

CoD shows the damage of each tick individually. Note that there are 4 ticks even though the duration is "every 0.3s for 0.91s" because there is a tick at 0s.

 

Blaster - 67.57 damage

https://cod.uberguy.net/html/power.html?power=blaster_ranged.assault_rifle.burst&at=blaster

 

Corr - 45.04 damage

https://cod.uberguy.net/html/power.html?power=corruptor_ranged.assault_rifle.burst

 

 

[srmalloy]

56 minutes ago, Zect said:

The fact that these sets lack a T1 immobilize is not the argument against my point you think it is. In fact, you have proven the complete opposite:

False-to-fact. You made the sweeping declaration "for blasters, they can use their T1 immob from the secondary" with no qualification, as if all the secondaries had one. And this ignores the fact that the T1 secondary immobs are single-target, while Ignite is an AoE, so using one reduces your potential damage as the other mobs in the patch run out; the only AoE immobs Blasters get are in the patron pools, although you could use an AoE hold for the purpose.