Focused Feedback: VEAT Updates

[balor]

3 hours ago, Random Robot said:

Minor thing, could we get Bayonet and/or Pummel alternate animations for the crab backpack?

 

edit: also going to add to the opinion that Heavy Burst's crab animation needs some work. It's too short at the moment.

Like I said above Pummel is a very good support power.  Bayonet is the second strongest melee attack in the full set of powers and even has a better damage per activation than Shatter. 

If they were able to work out an animation swap for the crab legs that would be cool.  I still want to see Pummel have a mace animation. 

[balor]

Omega Maneuver feedback!

 

Well, 7 pages into the thread, and this is the only feedback post on this power from someone taking the time to test it. Yikes!

 

Can someone who used/uses Omega Maneuver jump on here and explain when you use it, how to best use it, and what are you giving up to take this power or slots with it? I'm looking for an analytical breakdown, not justification, as that is basically useless.

 

The current Omega Maneuver on the live server is very bad, and even a twelve-year-old has enough math skills to work that out. I'm glad it is being addressed, but I'm a bit stumped after trying it out on the beta server.

 

I was able to get the cooldown to 71s from the 240s default, so you can use it once or twice in a fight depending on what you are up against.

 

The range of deployment is fine as you can place it without being aggroed. When deployed, it does an AOE taunt with a short duration until it explodes (5 seconds timer). But the cycle time here is about the same as if you knocked back a target, and they stood back up or firing venom and frag grenade as another point of reference (tested it). It has a 3 mag stun for 11.92 seconds for me, enough to cycle a few attacks. But it is only a Mag three, so you will have enemies moving in on you as only part will be stunned. This is very similar to Pummel with Mag 3 and 12s on my Bane/Huntsman.

I get the concept on paper, but this is poorly executed by NCSoft. Now, the Homecoming page 7 update, at first, I was excited about this, but now after trying it out, leaves me very concerned. Who else has tested this?

Even with the base time change from 360s to 240s and down to 71s for me, the damage is a joke of a skill that is 6 slotted. The Omega bomb's taunt works if you have not attacked, but if you land a few hits, I still have most of the enemies on me vs the bomb. Again, the stun is only Mag 3, so some will resist. BUT if everything works perfectly like on paper along with the buff, I would have about an 18s window of control/disrupting the enemy. Sadly, that is the theory on paper and not the reality happening in the game.

 

I understand the NCSoft likely overvalued a combo AOE, control, stun and damage power but even after the Homecoming team's update in the beta it is still very bad.   

 

I see two three options of addressing this.

1: Get more people to test these changes please.

2: Make it a major Nuke for the extreme timer as it will be competing against good powers.

3: Alter the recharge reductions of this power. In the current state of damage and control it should have a recharge between 20s to 30s after bonuses.

 

Please make some changes you have at least one person testing here and giving feedback.

 

 

Attached below is the build I used to test but it is in the version for page 6.

I'm also adding my numbers from my combat log for +4 x8 for the Omega Bomb and Frag grenade as reference. 

 

Arachnos Soldier Solo Crab (Crab Spider Soldier - Crab Spider Training).mbd

[csr]

8 hours ago, Random Robot said:

Minor thing, could we get Bayonet and/or Pummel alternate animations for the crab backpack?

 

The choices of Slice as an alternate for Pummel and Arm Lash for Bayonet seem to fit, but they're such obvious options I'd guess they've already been considered and rejected for some reason.

[Gobbledigook]

27 minutes ago, balor said:

Omega Maneuver feedback!

 

Well, 7 pages into the thread, and this is the only feedback post on this power from someone taking the time to test it. Yikes!

 

Can someone who used/uses Omega Maneuver jump on here and explain when you use it, how to best use it, and what are you giving up to take this power or slots with it? I'm looking for an analytical breakdown, not justification, as that is basically useless.

 

The current Omega Maneuver on the live server is very bad, and even a twelve-year-old has enough math skills to work that out. I'm glad it is being addressed, but I'm a bit stumped after trying it out on the beta server.

 

I was able to get the cooldown to 71s from the 240s default, so you can use it once or twice in a fight depending on what you are up against.

 

The range of deployment is fine as you can place it without being aggroed. When deployed, it does an AOE taunt with a short duration until it explodes (5 seconds timer). But the cycle time here is about the same as if you knocked back a target, and they stood back up or firing venom and frag grenade as another point of reference (tested it). It has a 3 mag stun for 11.92 seconds for me, enough to cycle a few attacks. But it is only a Mag three, so you will have enemies moving in on you as only part will be stunned. This is very similar to Pummel with Mag 3 and 12s on my Bane/Huntsman.

I get the concept on paper, but this is poorly executed by NCSoft. Now, the Homecoming page 7 update, at first, I was excited about this, but now after trying it out, leaves me very concerned. Who else has tested this?

Even with the base time change from 360s to 240s and down to 71s for me, the damage is a joke of a skill that is 6 slotted. The Omega bomb's taunt works if you have not attacked, but if you land a few hits, I still have most of the enemies on me vs the bomb. Again, the stun is only Mag 3, so some will resist. BUT if everything works perfectly like on paper along with the buff, I would have about an 18s window of control/disrupting the enemy. Sadly, that is the theory on paper and not the reality happening in the game.

 

I understand the NCSoft likely overvalued a combo AOE, control, stun and damage power but even after the Homecoming team's update in the beta it is still very bad.   

 

I see two three options of addressing this.

1: Get more people to test these changes please.

2: Make it a major Nuke for the extreme timer as it will be competing against good powers.

3: Alter the recharge reductions of this power. In the current state of damage and control it should have a recharge between 20s to 30s after bonuses.

 

Please make some changes you have at least one person testing here and giving feedback.

 

 

Attached below is the build I used to test but it is in the version for page 6.

I'm also adding my numbers from my combat log for +4 x8 for the Omega Bomb and Frag grenade as reference. 

 

Arachnos Soldier Solo Crab (Crab Spider Soldier - Crab Spider Training).mbd 42 kB · 0 downloads

I just skipped it on the test serrver on my final build after trying it for a while. It just isnt worth it to me. There are other AoE's that give better returns.  It still needs more.

 

Nice if they lowered the recharge on the soldier pets a little or gave them better sustain. Pets that can't be control and die so easily with a very long recharge on a pet class is a bit rubbish.

Edited February 2 by Gobbledigook

[balor]

Just now, Gobbledigook said:

I just skipped it on the test server. It just isnt worth it to me. There are other AoE's that give better returns.  It still needs more.

Even that feedback is good to put on here.  They need more points of view than what they currently have. 

 

We are 7 pages of discussion on a archetype that is a little bit of a mess and you look over at the arsenal control thread and they have 10 more pages of activity over there. 

 

But that is feedback. 🙂 Thank you for adding to it.

[Gobbledigook]

1 minute ago, balor said:

Even that feedback is good to put on here.  They need more points of view than what they currently have. 

 

We are 7 pages of discussion on a archetype that is a little bit of a mess and you look over at the arsenal control thread and they have 10 more pages of activity over there. 

 

But that is feedback. 🙂 Thank you for adding to it.

I've given plenty of feedback in the past and was mostly ignored so rarely give it now. At this point they are probably pretty much decided and just want to release it. Let discord decide.

[balor]

1 hour ago, Gobbledigook said:

I've given plenty of feedback in the past and was mostly ignored so rarely give it now. At this point they are probably pretty much decided and just want to release it. Let discord decide.

I get your point here. It can feel like they have their mind set and don't really want input.  But on the other side they are the ones in control and doing the work.

 

It is not how I would like to run things but I'm not getting paid for this and they likely are taking on to much at a time with not enough people. 

Edited February 2 by balor
added opinion

[Booper]

3 hours ago, balor said:

adding my numbers from my combat log for +4 x8

After reading your feedback, I see now you were testing against +4s. Did you factor in the purple patch when it comes tonthe performance of the power?

 

I was unable to open your build from my phone, but I was curious on how you slotted the power.

 

Also, was this testing with Build 3? I believe it was in build 2 or 3 that we increased the base accuracy to help with hitting higher level foes. I take it from the feedback that you did in fact hit quite a bit of the targets.

[balor]

39 minutes ago, Booper said:

After reading your feedback, I see now you were testing against +4s. Did you factor in the purple patch when it comes tonthe performance of the power?

 

I was unable to open your build from my phone, but I was curious on how you slotted the power.

 

Also, was this testing with Build 3? I believe it was in build 2 or 3 that we increased the base accuracy to help with hitting higher level foes. I take it from the feedback that you did in fact hit quite a bit of the targets.

You are correct I shared at a +4.  But I'm attaching the data from a +0 with AIM active down below. 

 

I tested late last night and at 5am today and the power was hitting, so that would be build 3. The frag grenade was also at +4 but the two images from earlier I can not remember if I had AIM active or not.  

 

It looks like I might have been pulling more agro than the bomb's taunt when it was used mid combat.   

 

I seem to be having a user error as this version of mids is not giving a friendly clean way to post the build as a text wall.  I must be missing the correct option here. I added a screen shot my build if it is at good enough ppi to see. 


I also posted the other day about a range of suggestions there from the new powers to idea about the Bane.

[Booper]

6 minutes ago, balor said:

You are correct I shared at a +4.  But I'm attaching the data from a +0 with AIM active down below

I am mostly wanting to focus on your feedback about the taunt and stun durations. Can you tell me if you saw the taunt not working prior to the explosion? Or did the taunt stop after the explosion?

 

As for the Stun, how long exactly did it last, and did it end before or after the bomb vanished?

 

There is a chance the power is not working as designed, and if that's the case, I'd like to know what potential root causes there could be. But there's also a chance it was merely purple patch that caused the durations to be far shorter than you hoped, especially if you hadn't enhanced them. Might be worth retesting with Stun IOs in the power. If it does not extend the Stun duration, then we know something is wrong, and I might know where to look.

[balor]

5 minutes ago, Booper said:

I am mostly wanting to focus on your feedback about the taunt and stun durations. Can you tell me if you saw the taunt not working prior to the explosion? Or did the taunt stop after the explosion?

 

As for the Stun, how long exactly did it last, and did it end before or after the bomb vanished?

 

There is a chance the power is not working as designed, and if that's the case, I'd like to know what potential root causes there could be. But there's also a chance it was merely purple patch that caused the durations to be far shorter than you hoped, especially if you hadn't enhanced them. Might be worth retesting with Stun IOs in the power. If it does not extend the Stun duration, then we know something is wrong, and I might know where to look.

So the taunt triggers seems to be halfway through the animation at about 2.5s. I turned it down to a +2 and just ran around the mobs to get agro.  Then drop it through the large group as they pathed to me.  I tried it another time landing a few AOEs and only 1 mob out of about 6 that should have been in range agroed it.

 

If seems like if you drop the bomb out of agro it counts as an pet so an enemy to the mobs when it spawns.  At that point they turn and attack it right away but that is not the taunt it seems.

 

The stun un-modified does seem to work correctly at the 12 ish seconds and modded it also worked up to the low 20s 

 

When should the taunt be triggering and does it trigger more than once?

 

[Booper]

10 minutes ago, balor said:

When should the taunt be triggering and does it trigger more than once?

The taunt is a click power, that ideally will trigger immediately when the pet is summoned, but it may take a few moments to activate. I may tweak it into an auto power that applies the taunt periodically. Hopefully it keeps the attention of the baddies a bit longer 

[WindDemon21]

On 11/22/2023 at 11:45 AM, The Curator said:

All Mace attack's cast times reduced to 1.67s

Can this PLEASE apply to the mace patron pools for all ATs too? 2s doesn't sound like that much more but with the weapon too it always feels like so much of a slog i don't wanna use these powers a lot.

[KaizenSoze]

I think this has flown under the radar a bit. In build 3 this change is a huge deal for VEATs and stalkers.

• Placate (stalker, bane and widow versions) These powers now grant Hide for 5s that cant be broken by damage in addition a 10s hide that cancels if damaged.
• Stalker Guile: Now grant Hide for 3s that cant be broken by damage in addition a 10s hide that cancels if damaged.

I have been testing both and it makes getting crits a lot easier. You now have a 3-5 sec window to start another attack even if hit.

 

This has been a boon for AOE attacks that are usually fired off in the middle of large groups. Bane: Crowd Control has benefited a lot for instance when combined with WAWG. Also, Spin has been helped a lot, but not as much because Night Widows lack the tools to keep mobs in place. My staff stalker AOEs feels like they are landing more crits and it makes it worth taking placate.

[csr]

20 hours ago, Booper said:

The taunt is a click power, that ideally will trigger immediately when the pet is summoned, but it may take a few moments to activate. I may tweak it into an auto power that applies the taunt periodically. Hopefully it keeps the attention of the baddies a bit longer 

 

I think a taunt aura like that would work better.  It would also be nice if the taunt part had a larger radius than the explosion and some -Range to help draw stuff in.

 

With the 60' range on the summon part you have to be careful not to aggro the Bosses (with their 54' perception) in a spawn when trying to place it near the middle.  So upping the summon to 80' would help too.

 

The description says it causes "massive damage", which it certainly doesn't do.

 

Without some sort of additional buff beyond what is in the current patch I think Omega Maneuver is still just a gimmick power you take for style points, not for effectiveness.

 

 

[Thezanman]

Since Heavy Burst is getting buffed, I would like to see some improvement to Suppression as well. It has the same target cap and nearly the same damage as Heavy Burst, but with a longer cooldown, cast time, and higher endurance cost. Its only advantage is a higher arc, but that doesn't do much when it only hits 10 targets. I think a target cap increase would help differentiate Suppression from Heavy Burst as a power to deal with large groups, especially since other Soldier abilities like Venom Grenade and Frag Grenade still only hit 10 targets.

Edited February 3 by Thezanman

[Rimerat]

Hey! Just whipped up a Night Widow build on the Beta server and mucked around in a 50+4 PI newCouncil Radio mission. Here's my feedback, though I'm not sure if it'll help at all.

 

1) Pain Tolerance on Night Widow spec adds about 25% maxHP and 8% resists to my widow (when slotted). Honestly, in the Council mission this felt just right. I don't think I or anyone else would complain if you tweaked the base numbers a little or added an extra unenhanceable buff, but for me compared to my widow on live, it basically means I can way more comfortably solo +4x8 groups and take the punishment that slips by my capped def without using inspirations. Great!

 

2) The sped up mind link is the star of the show. You REALLY notice it when you have to pop one off mid-combat. Awesome!

 

3) The placate recharge buff and the 'hidden' status changes in regards to DOT damage etc is very welcome. I think there's now actually a compelling reason to play a Widow over a Fortunata at last just in terms of DPA.

 

Overall, I'm really pleased and think everything is in great shape. Widows haven't ever felt this good! I wouldn't call them top of the line or OP or anything, but I really do get the 'melee support' vibe from them.

 

Now that the positive is out there, what's the deal with Fortunata's Fate Sealed level 1? I think you'd be silly to take it in 99% of cases. IMO, it really feels like 'Widows are getting a shiny toy, so Forts have to get *something*'. Am I wrong here?

 

The balance seems skewerd in favor of NWidows now with placate/stealth/pain tolerance, but maybe someone else more knowledgeable with Arachnos can put me in line. For clarity, at the moment I haven't tested newFortunata aside from theory and I know that's really not going to win me any thumbs-ups, but I do feel I'd be disenguine if I didn't point out that Fate Sealed seems pretty lackluster.

 

Maybe give it a slow resist?

Edited February 4 by Wiseguy

[ZekeStenzland]

Made a L1 Soldier, boosted to L20 for testing out Striga at level.

 

So, during character creation, and if you are L23 or less, you can choose the bane mace or crab arm animations for some attack powers. If you pick bane mace, it looks like you draw an invisible mace, and then the attack comes from the end of that invisible mace. If you pick crab arm, you kind of hunch over and the attack comes from somewhere in front of you -- probably where a crab arm might end, if you had one.

 

Maybe don't allow people to pick the alternate animations until they've committed to either bane or crab, sometime on or after L24? Maybe just live with the fact the animations are totally goofy? Maybe allow people to select mace and guns in costume screen even at L1 just on the off chance they want the bane mace animations? No easy answers I'm guessing.

 

Also haven't tested yet what happens if you're crab and pick bane mace animations, or are bane and pick crab animations. Note that choosing the bane path you may or may not have crab arms, based on whether any of your other builds are crabs.... 

 

The tinted power option seemed to work as expected.

 

[csr]

Regarding Fate Sealed:

 

I've been trying to figure out a build where this power is really worthwhile, but one of the issues I run into is that Dominate is not available until level 12, so I end up with one more ST non-mez attack than I want or need, or I have to take Fate Sealed early on when I have nothing much for it to buff.  You have only 1 mez power (Subdue) available before level 12.  Your mez powers come at 2 (Subdue), 12 (Dominate), 18 (Scramble Thoughts), 24 (Confuse), 26 (Total Domination), 28 (Aura of Confusion) and 30 (Psychic Wail).  So taking Fated Sealed early in the build isn't very helpful.

 

It would be nice if you had a mez power you could take at level 1 in a Fortunata build.  It would also be helpful to have an AoE mez available at the level 24 respec.

 

The simplest reorder I could think of was to move Dominate to level 1, Total Domination to level 12 and Fate Sealed to level 26.  Remembering, of course, that you can't actually get Dominate or Total Domination before level 24 anyway, so that it's mostly a build order change, not a leveling power choice change.  The only difference there is making Total Domination available at 24 instead of 26 and swapping Fate Sealed the other direction.  It would affect Exemp play a bit when you go down below level 21.

 

Fate Sealed just continues to underwhelm.

Edited February 5 by csr
punctuation, misnamed power

[Sovera]

14 minutes ago, csr said:

Regarding Fate Sealed:

 

I've been trying to figure out a build where this power is really worthwhile, but one of the issues I run into is that Dominate is not available until level 12, so I end up with one more ST non-mez attack than I want or need, or I have to take Fate Sealed early on when I have nothing much for it to buff.  You have only 1 mez power (Subdue) available before level 12.  Your mez powers come at 2 (Subdue), 12 (Dominate), 18 (Scramble Thoughts), 24 (Confuse), 26 (Total Domination), 28 (Aura of Confusion) and 30 (Psychic Wail).  So taking Fated Sealed early in the build isn't very helpful.

 

It would be nice if you had a mez power you could take at level 1 in a Fortunata build.  It would also be helpful to have an AoE mez available at the level 24 respec.

 

The simplest reorder I could think of was to move Domination to level 1, Total Domination to level 12 and Fate Sealed to level 26.  Remembering, of course, that you can't actually get Domination or Total Domination before level 24 anyway, so that it's mostly a build order change, not a leveling power choice change.  The only difference there is making Total Domination available at 24 instead of 26 and swapping Fate Sealed the other direction.  It would affect Exemp play a bit when you go down below level 21.

 

Fate Sealed just continues to underwhelm.

 

I'd ditch the level 1 power that gives melee defense. Without it melee/ranged/AoE are at the same values and with it Melee is 15%ish ahead. So if we work at softcapping melee is grossly ahead.

 

I ended at 45% to all three without it and without Mind Link and thus picked Fate Sealed.

[Wavicle]

In my opinion fate sealed out to grant the same scaling damage resistance that the melee defense passive grants, but make it mutually exclusive so you can’t get it from them both.

[csr]

4 hours ago, Sovera said:

 

I'd ditch the level 1 power that gives melee defense. Without it melee/ranged/AoE are at the same values and with it Melee is 15%ish ahead. So if we work at softcapping melee is grossly ahead.

 

I ended at 45% to all three without it and without Mind Link and thus picked Fate Sealed.

 

That's a good idea, but I'm still not convinced Fate Sealed is worth taking even in such an optimized case.  It does seem to have value at 33+ when you have slotted AoE mez powers.  With high recharge at 50+ I have about an 80 second cycle where I can use 2 Psy Wails, 1 Total Dom and 1 Aura of Confusion so that I can use one AoE mez per spawn.  But the buff isn't that useful for AoC as it has plenty of duration already.  And not great for Psy Wail since everything that would be mezzed is dead before the normal mez would have expired.  Its value appears to be mostly stacking Dominate (which I slot for Damage first) and extending the duration of the very mediocre Total Domination.

[Sovera]

2 hours ago, csr said:

 

That's a good idea, but I'm still not convinced Fate Sealed is worth taking even in such an optimized case.  It does seem to have value at 33+ when you have slotted AoE mez powers.  With high recharge at 50+ I have about an 80 second cycle where I can use 2 Psy Wails, 1 Total Dom and 1 Aura of Confusion so that I can use one AoE mez per spawn.  But the buff isn't that useful for AoC as it has plenty of duration already.  And not great for Psy Wail since everything that would be mezzed is dead before the normal mez would have expired.  Its value appears to be mostly stacking Dominate (which I slot for Damage first) and extending the duration of the very mediocre Total Domination.

 

I'm in no way shape or form a VEAT expert, but your points seem valid and the logic is sound. Also, I think that power I mentioned swapping has scaling resists which might be a lot more important/interesting than a bit more CC duration.

 

Then again a bit more CC duration might makes mobs not attack a few seconds more before finding themselves defeated which....

 

Too much thinking, brain hurts. One of you VEAT experts figure it out!

[Major_Decoy]

I was wondering if there was any chance to speed up Poison Dart. I don't know if there's anything wrong with it, per se, it just seems really slow whenever I use it.

[Booper]

8 hours ago, csr said:

Regarding Fate Sealed:

 

I've been trying to figure out a build where this power is really worthwhile, but one of the issues I run into is that Dominate is not available until level 12, so I end up with one more ST non-mez attack than I want or need, or I have to take Fate Sealed early on when I have nothing much for it to buff.  You have only 1 mez power (Subdue) available before level 12.  Your mez powers come at 2 (Subdue), 12 (Dominate), 18 (Scramble Thoughts), 24 (Confuse), 26 (Total Domination), 28 (Aura of Confusion) and 30 (Psychic Wail).  So taking Fated Sealed early in the build isn't very helpful.

 

It would be nice if you had a mez power you could take at level 1 in a Fortunata build.  It would also be helpful to have an AoE mez available at the level 24 respec.

 

The simplest reorder I could think of was to move Dominate to level 1, Total Domination to level 12 and Fate Sealed to level 26.  Remembering, of course, that you can't actually get Dominate or Total Domination before level 24 anyway, so that it's mostly a build order change, not a leveling power choice change.  The only difference there is making Total Domination available at 24 instead of 26 and swapping Fate Sealed the other direction.  It would affect Exemp play a bit when you go down below level 21.

 

Fate Sealed just continues to underwhelm.

 

You can't actually take Fate Sealed at level 1, it'll become available at level 1 after respec, but you'll still have an assortment of powers you'd be taking along with it. Unless you really want the mez resistance, you can get away with taking it later depending on what your exemplaring play-style dictates.