Focused Feedback: VEAT Updates

balor · January 24

39 minutes ago, SaxyGuitar said:

With Widow getting powers to boost up some playstyles. I thought it would be cool if crab got something to boost tank playstyle. Something like Fate Seal where it's an auto that gave crabs attacks a taunt would be cool.

It would be cool to expand on the crab in some way but the Homecoming team is not doing a full pass on Arachnos right now via some of the other posters. It is mostly fixes, quality of life and a few buffs for a select part of the community they feel they can address.

I think VEAT are likely more challenging than working the other archetypes. Plus VEATs players are a smaller part of the community with less overall feedback vs like what we saw with the Tanker review. I still feel it would be nice to get one of the team member working on these changes to jump into the conversation. There also might be some major limitation on what they can do with the system. Plus we need to know what they want to work on as it really does not matter what we want because they are the ones in control and have to do the work.

KaizenSoze · January 24

9 minutes ago, balor said:

It would be cool to expand on the crab in some way but the Homecoming team is not doing a full pass on Arachnos right now via some of the other posters. It is mostly fixes, quality of life and a few buffs for a select part of the community they feel they can address.

I think VEAT are likely more challenging than working the other archetypes. Plus VEATs players are a smaller part of the community with less overall feedback vs like what we saw with the Tanker review. I still feel it would be nice to get one of the team member working on these changes to jump into the conversation. There also might be some major limitation on what they can do with the system. Plus we need to know what they want to work on as it really does not matter what we want because they are the ones in control and have to do the work.

Since, I spend a lot of time with VEATs. They are very difficult to balance, because it would be really easy to make the overpowered. This is always an issue with hybrid classes, plus the limited amount of powers available to VEATs. For instance, Forts didn't get much, because they are ridiculous good now. Smaller incremental changes let the devs avoid having to rip them over later. Night Widows are just one or two full crits powers away from competing with scrapper/stalker DPS. SoA are already better than most Sentinels. It's very tricky, so slow is a good approach.

Side note, my understanding is that the code around VEAT costumes is bad, very bad.

Sovera · January 24

30 minutes ago, KaizenSoze said:

Since, I spend a lot of time with VEATs. They are very difficult to balance, because it would be really easy to make the overpowered. This is always an issue with hybrid classes, plus the limited amount of powers available to VEATs. For instance, Forts didn't get much, because they are ridiculous good now. Smaller incremental changes let the devs avoid having to rip them over later. Night Widows are just one or two full crits powers away from competing with scrapper/stalker DPS. SoA are already better than most Sentinels. It's very tricky, so slow is a good approach.

Side note, my understanding is that the code around VEAT costumes is bad, very bad.

Well, it's a really low bar 😄

balor · January 24

Jokes aside, I understand we are injecting some humor into the game. But it is never useful to bring up the topic of 'my (insert nerd topic here) is more deserving than yours,' and we have seen this theme several times on here already. I have worked in tabletop game design, and while it's different from video games, in many ways, the world of game design is the same.

When and if Homecoming gets to those classes, that's great, and I hope they get balanced well, as it will help the game. However, they are outside the range of the topic here.

I've given my feedback on here and will likely be done until we get someone with control engaged in the topic because right now, it's just an empty sounding board for us to express our opinions. It is a small team with a large update coming, trying to cover many different areas, including whatever ongoing work they have to do

LastHumanSoldier · January 25

Can someone explain to me the balancing logic between the Fortunata and the Nightwidow Psychic Screams?

Fort, Narrow cone, 20ish DPA, 12 Second Recharge, 13 end cost.
Night Wider cone, 40ish DPA, 20 Second Recharge, 20 end cost.

Is it crazy that I would much rather have the Night Widow one?

Am I supposed to weight in the fact that the Fort also has (the terrible) Psionic tornado?

Wavicle · January 25

1 minute ago, LastHumanSoldier said:

Can someone explain to me the balancing logic between the Fortunata and the Nightwidow Psychic Screams?

Fort, Narrow cone, 20ish DPA, 12 Second Recharge, 13 end cost.
Night Wider cone, 40ish DPA, 20 Second Recharge, 20 end cost.

Is it crazy that I would much rather have the Night Widow one?

Am I supposed to weight in the fact that the Fort also has (the terrible) Psionic tornado?

I think you’re supposed to weigh in the fact that the Fortunata has psychic wail, total domination, and aura of confusion.

not saying I think it shouldn’t be changed, but it seems likely that was the reasoning in the first place.

ScarySai · January 25

2 minutes ago, Wavicle said:

total domination

This one's kinda whatever.

Also, after some crab testing, the most notable buff is probably the spirit shark buff + longfang for crabs. You get all the pros of Leviathan, but you no longer lose single target from doing so, really. It's kinda funny.

Wavicle · January 25

Just now, ScarySai said:

This one's kinda whatever

I know, but it's the general idea that Fort's don't need their attacks to be quite as high dps as widows because they have ways of holding off the enemies response.

ScarySai · January 25

1 minute ago, Wavicle said:

I know, but it's the general idea that Fort's don't need their attacks to be quite as high dps as widows because they have ways of holding off the enemies response.

I'd rather have psinado buffed than scream, either way. It really needs to be changed.

Thing is, Forts are the best SoA, or at least tied with crab for the honor - but they aren't the best spec in the game, they can stand to get a buff on their main filler aoe.

Scream could really use it too, but I mean, if I had to pick one...

LastHumanSoldier · January 25

9 minutes ago, Wavicle said:

I think you’re supposed to weigh in the fact that the Fortunata has psychic wail, total domination, and aura of confusion.

not saying I think it shouldn’t be changed, but it seems likely that was the reasoning in the first place.

Yeah, I want to be clear:

Not really complaining just trying to understand how things are supposed to be balanced against each other.

So, yes you do have to consider all available tools in the balance conversation.

With the Power customization + New Scramble thorughts I am going to go full on Ranged on My fort once this goes live.
Still skiping Psi Scream though, and will just live with Psi Nado for the easy FF+Recharge.

Edited January 25 by LastHumanSoldier

LastHumanSoldier · January 25

Bug - (Maybe?)

I potentially don't understand the under the hood code but isn't fate sealed supposed to be a 34% resistance to Mez on self at 50?

Wavicle · January 25

37 minutes ago, LastHumanSoldier said:

Bug - (Maybe?)

I potentially don't understand the under the hood code but isn't fate sealed supposed to be a 34% resistance to Mez on self at 50?

An increase in your resistance of 34% reduces duration by that much.

Lost Deep · January 25

So... while I do applaud all the changes to Arachnos Soldier, I feel like they're not addressing the issues I have with the archetype. For context, I've yet to try IO set slotting. I just don't feel like it yet, and to that end I don't sweat over not being the best. I usually play on -1/x2 and have fun in that band (recently I've been flirting with -1/x3, which feels daring!) My point of view is not endgame and not optimized, I have lots of characters in the mid levels and with basic IOs. Within that admittedly narrow band, here's my experience with Soldiers:

I feel like Soldiers of Arachnos don't work.

I slot the control powers and they don't control quite enough to work. I slot the defense powers and I feel squishier than sentinels. I usually run -1/x2 when playing solo, up to and including with the Blaster, but with the Soldier I sometimes have trouble with -1/x1. Leveling up an Arachnos Soldier is Not Fun. You're constantly having problems, constantly hoping that the next power in the list will solve the problems, and then either it doesn't or you instead get new, worse problems. Despite having a passive that is +regen and +recovery, I always have survival and endurance issues. The resistance bonus from Crab Armor and Wolf Armor are both so bad that they feel less like a viable choice and more like a tax. They have good mez protection by all means, but really if there's one thing a soldier has plenty of it's Mez protection. Bane Armor is better about that, but ultimately whenever I feel like being sneaky I play my /ninjitsu stalker. Web grenade is a great control but it's the only one in the set so if it doesn't work your only option is pop clickies and pray.

Other people in this thread say that Soldiers are just better Sentinels, but my experience is the opposite: sentinel has all the upsides of soldier and none of the stress. If Soldiers of arachnos are great in the endgame... that's great and I hope you have fun, but I have trouble seeing people getting soldiers there short of boring, optimized exp farming. And it's great to say that Set IO slotting will fix my problems, but from my point of view that's not a solution; that's giving up and accepting it as broken.

I don't have a solution. I don't fully know what the problem is, all I know is the feel that I'm consistently getting, and it is that I've never been able to get Arachnos Soldier to feel good. It's been close many times, but there's always something that makes it frustrating. Do I really need to get tough and weave on an archetype with defensive toggles? Do I need to get Aerial Superiority to get enough controls? All I know is that Soldiers of Arachnos make me frustrated, and these changes (while, again, definitely nice!) aren't enough to change that,

GM ColdSpark · January 25

Tidying up a little. Keep it to feedback, not commentary on others style or perceived ability please.

KaizenSoze · January 25

11 hours ago, LastHumanSoldier said:

With the Power customization + New Scramble thorughts I am going to go full on Ranged on My fort once this goes live.
Still skiping Psi Scream though, and will just live with Psi Nado for the easy FF+Recharge.

One thing about going full ranged. You're going to have to be in melee range anyway due to Psychic Wail. And Forts get both Aim and Follow up which makes being in melee even more useful. Also, most Fort attacks work in an out of melee ranged. And to be a bit more on topic, Scramble Minds now being a quicker casting, damaging, 4 mag stun, makes being in melee even safer. I slot Scramble for stun duration, the damage in just gravy. Then CoT boss cannot nuke you, throw debuffs, or run that shield power. Council bosses cannot transform, etc....

Fate sealed is nice to have if I when running my ranged 4* Hard Mode build. Fort a just too squishy to live in melee in 4*, at least in Aeons.

Night Widow AOE are mostly cones are not as easy to use in melee. Unless you use the Epic pool AOEs. Psychic Scream was a horrible T9, now it's decent. Combine Psychic Scream with new Leviathan and now you have a very viable AOE chain.

ScarySai · January 25

1: I don't get why Night Widow BU is still mutually exclusive with follow up, despite the fact the much stronger widow spec with a nuke can take fu+aim.

2: Bane builds are extremely tight due to the sheer amount of "mandatory" picks you need to take to justify being a bane over a crab, so your room for mediocre ranged attacks that essentially only serve to flop a pack over rather than do meaningful damage is very, very minimal. So why is it that the beams are still so undertuned?

You can play a mace volley + mace beam blast bane and tell me "oh it's so good because it knocks things and keeps them in crowd control range" but the problem is MBB and volley do piss for damage, while crowd control does a pretty good job of keeping things in CC range.

Compare it to rotating venom>disruptor>frag>cc, I'd much rather have frag grenade kill everything that survived disruptor than bounce them. Mace Beam blast wouldn't even be on my radar if it wasn't for procs. As it stands, p-ray is the only mace blast worth taking.

Buff the shit out of mace beam blast and if you're worried about excessive AoE or something, make it exclusive with frag grenade, like the Crab Spider grenade was.

3: Crab, despite having probably the least meaningful changes, is probably the best right now on the condition you play leviathan, just due to the very strong synergies, and the fact leviathan single target burst ain't bad anymore.

If you don't play leviathan, it's still kinda limp. I'd still say suppression needs a big buff, and that arm lash should be a shorter, but wider cone.

Edited January 26 by ScarySai

Booper · January 26

On 1/23/2024 at 1:52 PM, balor said:

Hello! A little insight, please? It would be great if one of the team members working on this or some of the people who helped provide feedback to generate these changes could please take a few minutes and talk with us here.

Hello, and thanks for asking. I won't have much to add, as Koopak has already provided you with an excellent answer. Koopak has been involved with the beta testing for these changes and has tracked the discussions quite well in giving you their response. In short, this effort was a collaboration between multiple developers with a vested interest in VEATs. Between bug fixes, customization, and low-performing powers, we wanted to bring an update that is across-the-board performance buffs that raise the floor of VEAT performance without raising the ceiling too much. We also wanted to separate some of the branches' identities to better diversify play-styles and build options.

This goal is why Night Widows received buffs that improved their survival stats (increased resistance, health, and placate dancing) and their stalking play-style (stronger hide, stronger crits, and again placate dancing). Fortunatas already were strong in all forms of DPS, with single-target nearly on par with Night Widows while having superior AoE options. They also did this with similar survival stats and plenty of control options that didn't sacrifice their DPS (Psi Wail, Dominate). For this reason, damage improvements were minimal for Fortunatas; instead, we improved upon their controller play-style to offer viable and different options. Total Domination and Scramble Thoughts were made more potent for this reason, and it is why Fate Sealed buffs those types of powers with very little investment (acts as a free S.O. for all your mezz powers, without the concern of enhancement diversification).

As for Banes and Crabs, much of the player's complaints stemmed from their branch of attacks being worse than the default attacks. However, those default attacks are still available for use by each branch, so even if we buffed the branch of attacks, they had to be tempered because they would still be paired up with the default options. Considering that, we improved many branch powers to be viable options via increased damage and/or cast time reductions. Finally, we wanted to improve on some of the play-style options, so Banes received the same "hidden" buffs that Night Widows received, offering up the old-school stalker play-style that players wanted. Crabs received a considerable, but not meta-making, buff to Omega Maneuvers allowing it to be more reliable and usable in typical gameplay.

But don't take my word for it, nor take the patch notes' word for it. Please test it out; try different build styles for each AT and let us know how it performs and compares with Live.

Frosticus · January 26

As a big proponent of placate this change is welcome. I'm a bit miffed that they get such a better (banes especially) version than Stalkers considering stalkers are the ones placate was designed for.

I'm happy for veats as I play them too, but in fairness trollers wouldn't be stoked if forts got better controls. Tanks prolly wouldn't like if crabs could out taunt them. Etc.

Draeth Darkstar · January 26

I really, really wish that this touch up did something to make a pure-ranged damage Fortunata build better. I know the melee build is strong, and I would have no problem taking some kind of kiss/curse power that improved the ranged damage powers while locking out or nerfing the melee powers in some way. I find it very frustrating that - by far - the strongest way to build a Fortunata is basically just an alternate take on Night Widow instead of what the Fortunatas in the game world actually are.

ScarySai · January 26

Slice needs more damage and maybe a higher recharge to make up for it per whatever the formula suggests.

As it stands, why would I take melee attack that does pure lethal damage over channelgun - a pure energy alternative that's ranged and has the same stats besides marginally less damage? Damage you'd probably lose on the approach to slice someone anyway.

Edited January 26 by ScarySai

FupDup · January 26

Making Slice hit hard but slow would also fit with the concept of Crabs being more range-oriented than Banes, acting as a sort of "get away from me" button to punish enemies who think you're defenseless in melee.

Psi-bolt · January 27

Did a bit of testing on a Bane and I can't tell you how much more fluid and enjoyable both Banes and Widows are. It really feels like this is how they should have been all along. Everything seems to be working, so I don't have any other feedback to offer than great job.

Gobbledigook · January 27

I like the changes, but I think Shatter for Bane spiders could have a little less activation time for better Dpa. Nightwidows Slash for example is much faster with better Dpa. Whether that would mean increasing the recharge time a little also?

Rimerat · January 27

Excited for the Widow changes. I think people are really sleeping on the new Night Widow passive. With enhancements, it's going to be pretty beefy. Placate, mind link and sneak attack buffs are just insane; don't think I need to explain that.

I don't know a situation where I'd be excited to take the new Fortunata level 1 ability in my builds, but they're already in a good place so I suppose it's fine.

Haven't really checked out the bane spider changes yet but everything points to them being great; which is nice. I have a dormant bane somewhere in my roster.

twozerofoxtrot · January 28

On 11/23/2023 at 1:45 AM, The Curator said:

Scramble Thought's damage is now a growing DoT. It will do 5 ticks for a total of 1.75 scale damage, with the tick's damage sequence set to 0.25, 0.30, 0.35, 0.40, 0.45. Also, this power now does PvP damage.

Has anyone done the testing on this to see how it stacks up among the other single target ranged/psi powers for Fortunatas?

I'm not confident in my methods (bad at math, lack a good constant variable) to confirm for myself. But curious.

IMO it still seems like if you want to go for a Ranged Fort build, Soul Patron Pool is still a must-pick for at least ST damage and with 2 of the options on the table being buffed, that's a shame.

But again. I'm not confident in my tests.

Edited January 28 by twozerofoxtrot

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