Focused Feedback: Various Power Updates

[Gavlam]

I know this might seem off topic, but I’m not sure where else to put it.
 

I’ve been really hoping that every Battle Axe adjacent set (broad sword, war mace, etc) gets a literal copy and paste of Axe Cyclone. Every time I want to roll something other than Battle Axe, it seems really underwhelming and legitimately a copy and paste of Axe into those powers would be immensely beneficial to the sets. That’s all. 

[Kai Moon]

12 hours ago, Captain Powerhouse said:

 

Freezing Rain was intentionally buffed this page as a direct buff for Storm Summoning, it being stronger than Sleet is intentional.

Other than old pseudopets, I can't think of a pair of buff/debuff powers, pre-2012, where one is strictly worse than the other. Which leads me to believe that was intentional. I can imagine the old devs giving Sleet a lower endurance cost, or better slow, or larger radius, or some other minor benefit, vs. Freezing Rain's better resist debuff.

 

Perfect, no; surely player opinion would be Freezing Rain's better. But there'd be no strict inferiority, and an attempt at elegance.

 

Well, at least the story I'd tell future players would be more elegant. "Freezing Rain's better at resist debuffs, Sleet's better at XYZ". Not "Freezing Rain's better than Sleet at everything, because Cold was FotM for problematically difficult content back in '23, so Issue 27 Page 7 took a hammer to it."

[arcane]

7 minutes ago, Kai Moon said:

 

 

Not "Freezing Rain's better than Sleet at everything, because Cold was FotM for problematically difficult content back in '23, so Issue 27 Page 7 took a hammer to it."

Insane hyperbole like this just tells the whole forum you don’t know what you’re talking about.

[Lazarillo]

3 hours ago, Kai Moon said:

Well, at least the story I'd tell future players would be more elegant. "Freezing Rain's better at resist debuffs, Sleet's better at XYZ". Not "Freezing Rain's better than Sleet at everything, because Cold was FotM for problematically difficult content back in '23, so Issue 27 Page 7 took a hammer to it."

I mean, is that so surprising?  Powers don't exist in a vacuum.  If the idea is to make the sum total Storm Summoning balanced with the sum total of Cold Domination (and/or the sum total of any other set), that makes sense to me.

[Gorgar]

6 hours ago, Anem5 said:

I know this might seem off topic, but I’m not sure where else to put it.
 

I’ve been really hoping that every Battle Axe adjacent set (broad sword, war mace, etc) gets a literal copy and paste of Axe Cyclone. Every time I want to roll something other than Battle Axe, it seems really underwhelming and legitimately a copy and paste of Axe into those powers would be immensely beneficial to the sets. That’s all. 

 

I would greatly prefer that they *not* do that.  Different sets can play a little differently.  Makes things more interesting.

[Ice Ember]

I am not digging the change to telekinesis. Post ED it is already a skip power and now it is worse.

 

Going with your theme of drawing the targets to a central location I think is neat. Better than repulsion but you could pin enemies in a corner and they were held.

 

Immobile mobs can attack... Even when clumped together.

 

Make it a click attack.

Draw the spawn to target.

Add a - defense and -to hit de buff. The spawn was just violently moved to the target...

Or make it a disorient like Worm Hole. 

90s recharge. 

[Ice Ember]

On 1/21/2024 at 12:45 PM, arcane said:

Figures… for years here you couldn’t find a single soul that would stand up for Telekinesis, and now the old version is everyone’s favorite power. Beanbag Argument 2.0.

I stopped using it on live after the nerf then.

 

Have not used it since. 

 

Definitely will not used the new version.

[Random Robot]

Could we do something to increase Storm Cell's movement speed? I find I leave it behind pretty often and have to wait for it to catch up. Its movement speed could be increased (just being as fast as a player would help), it could maybe inherit movement speed -from- the player, allowing it to keep up even when the player has Speed Boost for example, or perhaps it could just teleport to the player once it gets too far away?

 

Additionally, is there any way to make Storm Cell proc when you use attacks from your secondary as a blaster? This is more of a "what if" than a request, but when Storm Blast came out I had visions of making a Storm/Elec blapper with lightning strike punches and I think it'd be pretty awesome. 🙂

[capricorpse]

On 1/22/2024 at 6:50 PM, WindDemon21 said:

This is good to have it get updated but this revamp really falls short. In general any auto-shut off toggles are just bad, but to have the issue with the recharge, end cost etc. This power should just be a regular aoe immobilize that offers -resistance instead of damage, so it won't wake up sleeping enemies but still allow for "damage" and containment. The -resist value wouldn't have to be huge maybe 10% but something to help it not having damage.

 

i agree that auto-shutoff toggles are bad.  but please, please, please, do not just turn telekinesis into a clone of the basic AoE immobilize.  i never understand why people want all of the powersets to be exactly the same??  telekinesis definitely needed the attention, not sure this fix is exactly the answer, but it's such a cool core of a power.  it rewards careful use by the player so some shred of its original design needs to stay in place!  however i definitely like this direction, because it narrows the margin for unskilled use dramatically hindering the team, and also sets up containment which has been an issue for Mind.  

 

I liked the idea someone else had above for a hold on the main target, and immobilize/reverse repel on the remaining targets.  Maybe the hold effect has a set duration, and the repel remains for the duration of the toggle?  So you target the lieutenant, hit TK, and he floats, held, and the other guys drift toward him.  After 12s or whatever is standard, he is no longer held, but the repel field is still on while you have endurance and anyone left alive at that point is still drawing in and being immobilized.  

 

I like the idea of gating the repel at a distance range, so you can still pin an enemy in a corner if you are close to them but they won't go floating off the map like they used to.

 

mob repositioning and actual battlefield control is one of the cool things about this game for a lot of people.  superhero characters with telekinesis are moving their enemies around in comics!  AoE mob melting is not the only combat experience we should cater to.

[WindDemon21]

2 hours ago, capricorpse said:

 

i agree that auto-shutoff toggles are bad.  but please, please, please, do not just turn telekinesis into a clone of the basic AoE immobilize.  i never understand why people want all of the powersets to be exactly the same??  telekinesis definitely needed the attention, not sure this fix is exactly the answer, but it's such a cool core of a power.  it rewards careful use by the player so some shred of its original design needs to stay in place!  however i definitely like this direction, because it narrows the margin for unskilled use dramatically hindering the team, and also sets up containment which has been an issue for Mind.  

 

I liked the idea someone else had above for a hold on the main target, and immobilize/reverse repel on the remaining targets.  Maybe the hold effect has a set duration, and the repel remains for the duration of the toggle?  So you target the lieutenant, hit TK, and he floats, held, and the other guys drift toward him.  After 12s or whatever is standard, he is no longer held, but the repel field is still on while you have endurance and anyone left alive at that point is still drawing in and being immobilized.  

 

I like the idea of gating the repel at a distance range, so you can still pin an enemy in a corner if you are close to them but they won't go floating off the map like they used to.

 

mob repositioning and actual battlefield control is one of the cool things about this game for a lot of people.  superhero characters with telekinesis are moving their enemies around in comics!  AoE mob melting is not the only combat experience we should cater to.

I get that, it's more about needing it for containment damage, and just damage in general between proccing it and spamming it, and also just general mob control to keep them from moving around. On big fast teams lots of controllers it tends to be one of the only controls really used/needed too for these reasons usually more than actual hard-mezzes.

 

I think what would better serve would be to have this power as the aoe immobilize, then put a similar positioning-only repel power in a pool power. It can still have TKs effectiveness, maybe less end cost since it wouldn't be holding.

 

Additionally, could just have TK be as it is but pull in instead of repel. Though the set still kinda needs the aoe immobilize for damage/proc/containment

[Monos King]

Hi, it's been a while. I greatly appreciate the work and sentiment behind the Frostwork re-evaluation, that power should be getting some love. However, I desperately despise the change from max HP to absorb. Now in spite of my feelings, it's not all bad, but if a buff was the intention it falls short - especially for Masterminds. I talked to a few others who may have echoed some of these points here a little while ago, but I think it's a good idea to go over the benefits and detriments so that everyone understands my perspective. 

 

Absorb Vs Max HP

• Both act a pseudo resistance; a 10% absorb or 10% HP buff will cause you to die 10% slower. Say you have 2000 HP and are struck with 2000 pts of solid dmg. At base, you will now have 1 HP (since players can't get one shot). If you are given a 50% absorb bonus, you now have an additional 1000 health and are left with the same. If you are given a 50% MAX HP bonus, the same happens.

Absorb Benefits

1. Allows you to expand your max HP

The absorb cap is equal to the base HP cap of whichever AT is being buffed (including pets, NPCs, you name it). Tanks can receive up to 5,408.028 HP with full absorb, something elite Bio builds will often find themselves with. For pet henchmen who have pitifully tiny max HP caps, absorb consistently offers better survival...on paper.

 

2. Protects you against Percentage Based Damage

This is pretty huge, and a strong argument in absorbs favor in any situation. Attacks like Marauder's Nova Fist, Tyrant's Flow Lightning, Diaboliques Earthshatter, Penelope Yin's psionic Drift and various other abilities from challenge content attack your HP directly, making HP buffs entirely useless. Nova Fist in particular sets players to about 1HP, as it does 99% of your health. Absorb will cushion this greatly.

 

3. Can be re-applied

Old Frostwork will offer you the big max HP, but further usages won't help you. Absorb offers a shield that can be re-added once it falters. This allows it to act like resistance, as well as like a heal.

 

4. Can come in small, reapplying DoTs

This is a testament to the versatility of absorb. Instantly reapplying absorb could prevent taking dmg below a certain threshold *at all*, but primarily the current state it is used in for powers like Spirit Ward is very helpful because

 

5. Absorb can be Power Boosted

Which, in the rare instances of such a power being added, allows for a good synergy permitting the small DoTs to become much larger absorb shields. However,

 

Absorb Issues

1. Absorb can be weakened

Attacks that deal -HP such as Crimsons abilities naturally weaken the strength of absorb as well. The only way to counteract Crimson and his godlike -HP is with HP buffs of your own. Once your max HP is set to 10, absorb isn't helping you at all. You'll get like 1 Absorb. Furthermore, in the instance you are fighting something with -special, should that exist, it's worth noting your absorb benefits would be affected as well - assuming it was your own click power. As far as I know, -special would not affect the buffs you receive from others.

 

2. Bodyguard mode and many other abilities bypass Absorb

You may have heard this on the discord, I was informing people of this fact for a hot second. It's my biggest gripe; absorb is not perfect. Hamidon's attacks, some of Crimsons, various many challenge abilities and zone/object triggered effects all ignore absorb outright. This is especially troublesome for masterminds who are already struggling to keep pets alive on a regular basis. But most importantly, Bodyguard mode damage split ignores absorb. If you are taking the brunt of the damage, using absorb on your pets literally does nothing. You've wasted a power. For the other mastermind secondaries like elec affin and Nature, yyou also have plentiful healing to circumvent this issue. Not so with cold domination. Running my demons/cold, I actually had to start clicking Rebirth occasionally when the pets health got low with this change. My pets personal survival was a bit better if I had them attack, but that's not exactly useful when I'm fighting AVs that will one shot them regardless.

 

3. Has to be reapplied

I'll reference Frostwork specifically here. While the benefits of reapplication were discussed earlier, the fact that it *has* to be reapplied is really no good for a single target power like Frostwork. Max HP offers a hands-off approach, you use it and then for the duration of the power, your target has enhanced regeneration and can be brought back up to the their new cap naturally. You can do this which each teammate, or pet. However, with absorb, once the benefit has been tacked off from damage, that is it. Frostwork is now useless until it next recharges, and since it is single target you are either forced to sit and use it on the person who needs it most like a heal, rather than drop it and move onto the next.

 

4. Faaar more common than +HP (Lengthier, check my math)

Spoiler

I found this to be interesting.  

Quote

 Additionally, Frostwork, while a unique power, often loses effectiveness in cases where allies are already at their maximum HP cap, rendering the power wasted. Hitting the absorb cap is a significantly rarer event, making it a potentially more useful buff effect.

I'll again highlight the situation with Crimson, where max HP buffs are your best and really only recourse. I think we should always try to keep diversifying enemy powersets, and more -max HP abilities should be found in game. As such, powers that are unique like Frostwork should be kept in simply because they would better permit that kind of avenue. That's more of my opinion though. What's certainly true is that hitting the absorb cap really isn't that much rarer than hitting the HP cap, at least not when it matters. At low level content you really aren't hitting either of these caps unless you are an Invuln, Ice, or Stone with amplifiers. Let's take level 20. In fact, if you aren't those three, you really aren't at all.

 

At level 20, a Tanks base HP is only 786. The strength of Frostwork by a level 20 Defender fully enhanced is going to be no more than +460 HP or Absorb. That's assuming they were even able to get 100% enhancement at level 20. This brings our base tank up to 1246 HP. If the tank were Invuln, they could Dull Pain themselves up by 629.2 HP to 1415, which is 67 shy of their max of 1482. This is about the case for any of the three powers from before. 

 

First, an extra 67 health from Frostwork to this Invuln isn't entirely useless; it would represent a >4% regen and resistance increase. Nothing I'd care about much, but y'know. Noted. More importantly, most powers are not Invuln, Earth, or Ice. Most armors are benefiting tremendously from a max HP buff, far more than any absorb. Super Reflexes has no source of +HP inherent to itself. Our SR Tank receives the full brunt of a whopping +460 HP, tantamount to a 59% resistance and regen bonus. It's big, and absorb does not offer the first beyond its initial application, nor does it offer the second at all.

 

What about at level 50? Frankly, at level 50 nothing cold dom has to offer even really matters, but the same applies. Earth, Invuln, and Ice will all benefit from Absorb more, and the other armors benefit from max HP more. As for squishies that don't even really have +HP sources, absorb is far more common in their case as they value +HP more to begin with.  Squishies offer themselves insulating circuits and wild bastions and wild growths etc. They need +HP more.

 

Now for Max HP.

 

Max HP Benefits

1. Is Permanent

Max HP bonuses do not need to be applied once you lose the extra health you were given. Until the duration of the power has expended, you simply keep the HP bonus. This is important when you are using, say, a Single target 1 minute recharge ability and have to apply it to over 7 pets, or have teammates split across that you cannot constantly attend to.

 

2. Allows you to overcome the regen cap

Essentially, whatever the percentage of HP you just gained, you also gained additional regeneration of equal amount. This is effectively allowing you to overcome the Regen cap.

 

3. Cannot be weakened or bypassed

This is very helpful when fighting debuff heavy enemies, or the likes of Crimson. There do not exist any debuffs as of now that weaken MAX HP buffs. This is super important for masterminds.

 

4. Unique

The simple fact is, Max HP buffs are extremely rare as support powers. They have extreme utility in the lower levels, and offer new avenues to face enemies that would be otherwise quite difficult. 

 

Max HP Issues

1. One and Done

You cannot make use of Max HP once it is applied more than once. They don't stack, and even if they did, the HP cap will have been achieved. Furthermore, unlike absorb, it cannot be used as a pesudo heal.

 

2. Percentage Based Attacks Ignore Max HP Buffs

Regardless of what you do, Nova Fist will take you to 1HP. 

 

3. Maxed out characters find themselves at the HP Cap

There are a lot of set bonuses and temps that increase your HP cap, so in end game content, absorb is seemingly better. It is worth noting, however, end game content is also where all of those powers that ignore and weaken absorb show up to begin with. Furthermore, most armors are still not reaching said HP caps. 

 

The Take-Away

I look at this through the lenses of a mastermind and a scrapper, but I do consider every AT in the game. Even so:

 

Absorb is better when used on a mastermind, but worse when used by a mastermind.

If an MM were to have Frostwork used on them, generally speaking, it will be better for bodyguard mode because now the pets don't take any damage at all. However, this is a rarer instance. If you are a mastermind, you are focused on supporting your pets, and so while the absorb will be stronger than max HP for them, they are literally benefitting nothing when BG damage hits them. They are taking Hamidon's damage raw, along with many others. 

 

Because this isn't purely an absorb vs max HP conversation, and is instead a "which is better for Cold Domination" conversation, I have to argue that the benefits this single target power of Frostwork are just much higher when as a MAX HP power. The current limitations of Frostwork and Cold Dom make it better tailored to be max HP, and not an absorb power.

 

It's also just mechanically misaligned. Cold dom's point is to make the team take less damage through defense, and debuffing enemies. It cripples enemies so the team can spread out and destroy. It has long last duration buffs to contribute to this task. Giving it a buff that inherently demands of the Cold Dom user 

to tail and reapply crushes the spirit of the independent playstyle that it cultivates. You're supposed to buff them, and then they go off and do their own thing. Absorb isn't allegiant to that mechanic. 

 

And again, Bodyguard mode ignores absorb. This is terrible for masterminds. Cold Dom has no healing to supplement. If nothing else, Frostwork is a screaming sponsor to the notion that Mastermind secondaries should get different treatment for certain powers than other Archetypes get, taking from the example of Detonator from traps. There is definitely a better way to address this power.

 

 

[csr]

Mind Control > Telekinesis

 

I think the doubled Recharge on this is a bit much given that it doesn't start recharging until toggled off.

 

I'd also like the change more if it retained a Hold on the main target, even Mag 2 with no Containment/Domination would be nice.  Just a little bit of a nod to the old Cottage Rule.

[csr]

Cold Domination > Frostwork

 

I can take this change or leave it.  It seems to be a change to avoid the trap of using the power on a target that doesn't benefit from +MaxHP.  So a net gain for casual use at the loss of high end performance for those who know how to use it well.

 

The power does seem to be about as good, as you can just recast it on the same target if the Absorb is destroyed.  It just loses some of its uniqueness in the process.  Maybe just leaving some unenhanceable +MaxHP or perhaps adding a DDR buff to couple with the shields would make it seem like a straight buff to the power and quell some misgivings.

Edited January 24, 2024 by csr
Clarity

[Monos King]

It'll definitely be worth testing again once the next mini patch is passed and Frostwork is properly re-applying instead of ignoring. The performance looks abysmal right now as a result of that, much worse than it should. Right now the absorb doesn't even have the advantage over +HP it should.

Edited January 24, 2024 by Monos King

[macskull]

On 1/22/2024 at 9:39 AM, Wravis said:

Sonic still needs help. Making Liquefy usable is a good step, but it still needs help. Clarity and Sonic Dispersion need to be combined, since Faraday Cage is better than both of those powers combined and having an AOE toggle that does the bulk of what Clarity does makes it a pretty useless choice.

And Sonic Repulsion costs 1.04 end per second for essentially the same function as Repulsion Field from Force Field which only costs .78 end per second.

Gonna hard disagree with a few of those things - Faraday Cage might have better stats than Sonic Dispersion but you have to be pretty much constantly casting Faraday Cage as your team moves where Sonic Dispersion comes along with you and requires no extra time to manage other than initially turning it on. Clarity plugs the sleep/confuse/terrorize holes from Sonic Dispersion and allows the teammate it's used on to leave your immediate area and still retain mez protection.

 

Sonic is a seriously slept-on set. I've been saying for a while whenever this sort of thing gets brought up is that the only real "help" Sonic needs is a recharge time reduction on Liquefy (which we are thankfully getting now), cast time reductions on Sonic Siphon and Clarity, and a serious revisiting of the endurance cost of Sonic Repulsion. As it stands, the only sets that can put out more -res than Sonic are Cold and Poison. Cold requires setup time and/or Burnout to achieve the higher numbers, Poison requires you to be in melee range of the target and strategically use Envenom such that you stack both primary target and secondary target effects (and if there is no other target to do this, Poison just barely edges out Sonic). Meanwhile, in order to apply that same amount of -res all Sonic has to do is put Disruption Field on the Scrapper or Tanker once at the beginning of the mission, and then throw Sonic Siphon every 30 seconds.

[Wravis]

5 minutes ago, macskull said:

Gonna hard disagree with a few of those things - Faraday Cage might have better stats than Sonic Dispersion but you have to be pretty much constantly casting Faraday Cage as your team moves where Sonic Dispersion comes along with you and requires no extra time to manage other than initially turning it on. Clarity plugs the sleep/confuse/terrorize holes from Sonic Dispersion and allows the teammate it's used on to leave your immediate area and still retain mez protection.

 

 

1 second cast time, negligible recharge time, protection for everything. You cast it once when your team gets to a new group. You never have to target a an individual player to hit them with Clarity. I waste more time having to target a teammate to hit them with Clarity than I do just recasting Faraday Cage in a new spot if people move.

[macskull]

5 minutes ago, Wravis said:

1 second cast time, negligible recharge time, protection for everything. You cast it once when your team gets to a new group. You never have to target a an individual player to hit them with Clarity. I waste more time having to target a teammate to hit them with Clarity than I do just recasting Faraday Cage in a new spot if people move.

If your team is staying together to the point where everyone's getting a benefit from Faraday Cage, they're also probably close enough that they'd get the benefit from Sonic Dispersion. I also don't think that Faraday Cage would have ever existed with the live dev team considering when they made ally buffs AoE they explicitly left out click mez protection buffs. That's probably something that could stand to be revisited, and I do agree that Clarity requires more work to manage than Faraday Cage, but those weren't the two powers I was comparing.

[Wravis]

10 minutes ago, macskull said:

If your team is staying together to the point where everyone's getting a benefit from Faraday Cage, they're also probably close enough that they'd get the benefit from Sonic Dispersion. I also don't think that Faraday Cage would have ever existed with the live dev team considering when they made ally buffs AoE they explicitly left out click mez protection buffs. That's probably something that could stand to be revisited, and I do agree that Clarity requires more work to manage than Faraday Cage, but those weren't the two powers I was comparing.

But my suggestion was to combine Clarity and Sonic Dispersion so they work as easily and hassle free as Faraday Cage. And provide the same level of protection. 😛

Edited January 25, 2024 by Wravis

[Kaballah]

9 hours ago, capricorpse said:

 

i agree that auto-shutoff toggles are bad.  but please, please, please, do not just turn telekinesis into a clone of the basic AoE immobilize.  i never understand why people want all of the powersets to be exactly the same??  telekinesis definitely needed the attention, not sure this fix is exactly the answer, but it's such a cool core of a power.  it rewards careful use by the player so some shred of its original design needs to stay in place!  however i definitely like this direction, because it narrows the margin for unskilled use dramatically hindering the team, and also sets up containment which has been an issue for Mind.  

 

I liked the idea someone else had above for a hold on the main target, and immobilize/reverse repel on the remaining targets.  Maybe the hold effect has a set duration, and the repel remains for the duration of the toggle?  So you target the lieutenant, hit TK, and he floats, held, and the other guys drift toward him.  After 12s or whatever is standard, he is no longer held, but the repel field is still on while you have endurance and anyone left alive at that point is still drawing in and being immobilized.  

 

I like the idea of gating the repel at a distance range, so you can still pin an enemy in a corner if you are close to them but they won't go floating off the map like they used to.

 

mob repositioning and actual battlefield control is one of the cool things about this game for a lot of people.  superhero characters with telekinesis are moving their enemies around in comics!  AoE mob melting is not the only combat experience we should cater to.

 

Agree with pretty much all of this except honestly I don't care wither the main target gets a hold or immob, I really like the current behavior of TK on the test server and I hope it stays very close to or the same as what it is now. I know that the ~design philosophy~ puts huge weight on hold vs immob but in practice, in a full team, this is an imperceptible difference so whichever, whatever, just keep the general behavior of TK the way it is, it's super interesting and fun and unique, Mind has needed something neat and fresh like this since Live.

 

ps: still a good time to get some parity between Mass Confusion and Seeds though

Edited January 25, 2024 by Kaballah

[Kaballah]

2 hours ago, macskull said:

Gonna hard disagree with a few of those things - Faraday Cage might have better stats than Sonic Dispersion but you have to be pretty much constantly casting Faraday Cage as your team moves where Sonic Dispersion comes along with you and requires no extra time to manage other than initially turning it on. Clarity plugs the sleep/confuse/terrorize holes from Sonic Dispersion and allows the teammate it's used on to leave your immediate area and still retain mez protection.

 

Yeah Sonic Dispersion is hands down much easier to use, it's a toggle you turn on and never touch again, no comparison to Faraday Cage.

e: I do agree that the concept of single-target status cleanses like Clarity has never been very fun or easy to work with, consider just making them have a moderate AOE radius

Edited January 25, 2024 by Kaballah

[Wravis]

43 minutes ago, Kaballah said:

 

Yeah Sonic Dispersion is hands down much easier to use, it's a toggle you turn on and never touch again, no comparison to Faraday Cage.

e: I do agree that the concept of single-target status cleanses like Clarity has never been very fun or easy to work with, consider just making them have a moderate AOE radius

Easier to use and significantly worse.

[SwitchFade]

On 1/22/2024 at 2:40 PM, Pazta said:

This is a pretty substantial indirect nerf to the Stalker's Guile: Recharge/Chance to Hide proc, and also indirectly hurts Placate powers, the latter of which are already unpopular due to how easy they are to get knocked out of, even by the enemy you're targeting with it. I suggest the proc and Placates lose their "Cancel On Damage" Flag, for the 'Hidden' portion of the effect, especially if Placate is expected to be used aggressively on the new SoAs.

Agreed. The way this looks is, a stalker in combat that has this slotted in assassin's strike and goes into hide, will now come right back out of hide without being able to get the critical

 

Currently, when I am fighting on my stalkers the assy strike will hit, crit and chance to rehide. If it procs I hide and the second attack is another crit from hide.

 

With this change, in combat, I will be taking damage and hide will be cancelled, so I will not get the follow up crit.

 

If this is accurate it is a substantial nerf to stalker damage output.

 

Look, HC team, I have been largely understanding and supportive of changes previously, but this proposed patch is too far in many areas.

 

Really, I'm hoping this gets rethought.

[Mezmera]

As a follow up to TK and the new Dark dom pool.  I spec'd back out of TK and back into the Soul pool and ran some more +4/8 Council missions. 

 

I had a much easier go of it this time around.  A good deal of that would be thanks to the Soul pool giving me that juicy aoe damage to finish off the minions and Lts fast enough for my initial Mass Confusion/Total Domination to last through to where I had only the bosses left to deal with which they are putty at that point. 

 

Not once did I feel the need for more aoe control beyond what I can already do with Mass Confusion, Total Domination and Terrify and since TK is very limited in what it provides I'm happy to have Burnout.  It's a fun/cute power but in application not all that useful since it doesn't really control a group like I could do by even picking up Mass Hypnosis as well.  Appreciate the effort and the willingness to listen to feedback.  

 

On a side note I stopped to watch what those new Council do to each other when Mass Confused and man they wreck themselves.  

[twozerofoxtrot]

I believe the new TK is WIA.

 

I do have assume intent here, a little bit though. My assumption is that this power now serves a function similar to Wormhole, Axe Cyclone and Fold Space in gathering disparate enemies together that might have been mezzed or scattered apart, onto the single focal point for Team AOE damage.

 

Other than that, it's a lot of fun dragging enemies 500 feet in the air and then letting them fall.

 

Agreed with the general sentiment on the recharge. I am unsure what the internal calculus for power resource cost balancing is, but TK is flat-out expensive in endurance and recharge in comparison to power that have similar utility functions.

[Random Robot]

3 hours ago, SwitchFade said:

Agreed. The way this looks is, a stalker in combat that has this slotted in assassin's strike and goes into hide, will now come right back out of hide without being able to get the critical

 

Currently, when I am fighting on my stalkers the assy strike will hit, crit and chance to rehide. If it procs I hide and the second attack is another crit from hide.

 

With this change, in combat, I will be taking damage and hide will be cancelled, so I will not get the follow up crit.

 

If this is accurate it is a substantial nerf to stalker damage output.

 

Look, HC team, I have been largely understanding and supportive of changes previously, but this proposed patch is too far in many areas.

 

Really, I'm hoping this gets rethought.

 

Agreed, the Hidden->AS->Hide Proc->Critical loop is what made stalkers fun again for me after hating them for years. I'd hate to see this removed.