Focused Feedback: High-Level Council Revamp

[Kaika]

BUG: I got FREEMed! in the face while fighting a Eclipse Warwolf, big "FREEM!" pop up and everything. I'm guessing something isn't set right here. NM apparently this is intended

 

 

FeedBack: I love the changes in general, but I do feel a few things are a bit annoying. I think the Galaxy Archons should be limited to 1 per spawn, in high team size missions it's not uncommon for there to be two in a fight and it just causes things to drag on a bit. The fact that their res is auto hit for Heavy damage also can make things kinda dicey for pure def sets like SR or shield since it does not even interact with their main mitigation, most of the AT that have these are melee focused, so killing them from range can be difficult, and if two of them die around the same time, it can bring you very low. Limiting the spawn to 1 would mitigate this issue, and even help make the groups a bit more diverse.

 

Edit: Honestly after fighting them a bit more with my Ice/shield stalker, the entire group seems to now come with ALOT of +to-hit; Tactics on normal bosses, Mire on all the Nictus boss varients, and the mentioned auto hit on the res, make the group very punishing towards Def focused armor sets. I would mind seeing that diversified a bit so its not as punishing to specific play styles

 

 

 

 

 

Edited January 23 by Riot Siren

[KaizenSoze]

13 minutes ago, Riot Siren said:

BUG: I got FREEMed! in the face while fighting a Eclipse Warwolf, big "FREEM!" pop up any everything. I'm guessing something isn't set right here.

 

 

FeedBack: I love the changes in general, but I do feel a few things are a bit annoying. I think the Galaxy Archons should be limited to 1 per spawn, in high team size missions it's not uncommon for there to be two in a fight and it just causes things to drag on a bit. The fact that their res is auto hit for Heavy damage also can make things kinda dicey for pure def sets like SR or shield since it does not even interact with their main mitigation, most of the AT that have these are melee focused, so killing them from range can be difficult, and if two of them die around the same time, it can bring you very low. Limiting the spawn to 1 would mitigate this issue, and even help make the groups a bit more diverse.

 

 

 

 

 

A little trick for Galaxy Arachnos. If you have a ranged attack, whittle them down and kill them with a ranged attack and break LOS. There is a .5 sec or so delay before they rez, which gives you time to break LOS.

[Kaika]

3 minutes ago, KaizenSoze said:

A little trick for Galaxy Arachnos. If you have a ranged attack, whittle them down and kill them with a ranged attack and break LOS. There is a .5 sec or so delay before they rez, which gives you time to break LOS.

I appreciate the tip, but I'm aware of how to handle them, just that it has added difficulty for most of the ATs effected.

[lemming]

26 minutes ago, Riot Siren said:

BUG: I got FREEMed! in the face while fighting a Eclipse Warwolf, big "FREEM!" pop up and everything. I'm guessing something isn't set right here.

Working as intended:

On 1/22/2024 at 10:51 AM, ViridianDev said:

This is a working as design change; the Council have a new mechanic for chance for critical knockback, the popup text chosen was FREEM.

[Kaika]

5 minutes ago, lemming said:

Working as intended:

As cute as that is, "Freem!" does really seem fitting for a claw swipe, It's why I (and apparently others) assumed it was some kinda bug.

[Coyotedancer]

Just tossing out another bit of "experience seeing these in the wild"-

 

I went into a scanner at +1/x6, which is the usual "cruising speed" setting that I use for Amtes, my Demons/Time MM. She's a full Incarnate with what I'd call a decent, but not seriously Min/Maxed uber-high-end build. (She's probably pretty close to an average "finished" Homecoming character that belongs to someone who's serious, but not necessarily a MIDS-master.)

 

Over-all, she handled it pretty well. The spawns were absolute HELL on the minions, though... I eventually gave up resummoning them and just went through the rest with her two lts, the Prince and our little Hellfire implings, plus her Lores when they cycled. It wasn't worth the END to try to keep the little guys around and upgraded. They died too fast.

 

That worries me a little. If I was having trouble keeping the minions alive at +1, which is usually a low enough difficulty not to make life impossible for them, the revamped mobs may prove to be an absolutely non-starter for Mastermind pets at +3 or +4.

[KaizenSoze]

43 minutes ago, Coyotedancer said:

Just tossing out another bit of "experience seeing these in the wild"-

 

Over-all, she handled it pretty well. The spawns were absolute HELL on the minions, though... I eventually gave up resummoning them and just went through the rest with her two lts, the Prince and our little Hellfire implings, plus her Lores when they cycled. It wasn't worth the END to try to keep the little guys around and upgraded. They died too fast.

 

That worries me a little. If I was having trouble keeping the minions alive at +1, which is usually a low enough difficulty not to make life impossible for them, the revamped mobs may prove to be an absolutely non-starter for Mastermind pets at +3 or +4.

Another round a Beta PI radios completed tonight. Plowed through mostly with just 4 players.

I do think the galaxy rez AOEs should *not* be auto-hit. As Coyotedancer noted it's really hard on pets.

To be clear they should continue to rez as design, but the damage portion should have a chance to miss.

Edited January 24 by KaizenSoze

[Lazarillo]

3 hours ago, Riot Siren said:

BUG: I got FREEMed! in the face while fighting a Eclipse Warwolf, big "FREEM!" pop up and everything. I'm guessing something isn't set right here. NM apparently this is intended

Apparently it is (as was noted in the topic I posted in the bug forum), but I can't say I'm fond of it.

The game has too much poptext as it is, honestly, and it's not like you won't know you were knocked back.

 

  

26 minutes ago, KaizenSoze said:

I do think the galaxy rez AOEs should *not* be auto-hit. As Coyotedancer noted it's really hard on pets.

Doesn't feel too unfair to me.  I compared it to Super Stunners earlier in this thread, who are also auto-hit and do comparable damage, and also inflict a massive debuff (the Galaxy version is purely damage as far as I could tell).  They're rough on pets too, but 'tis what 'tis.  If Pets are the problem then maybe they're what needs to be buffed to be resistant or something (similar to how they are unaffected by Battle Maiden's fire in Apex, or something).  Or just buff pets. I think keeping the autohit in itself, is fine. Its problem for pets is a symptom of a different issue.

Edited January 24 by Lazarillo

[KaizenSoze]

23 minutes ago, Lazarillo said:

Doesn't feel too unfair to me.  I compared it to Super Stunners earlier in this thread, who are also auto-hit and do comparable damage, and also inflict a massive debuff (the Galaxy version is purely damage as far as I could tell).  They're rough on pets too, but 'tis what 'tis.  If Pets are the problem then maybe they're what needs to be buffed to be resistant or something (similar to how they are unaffected by Battle Maiden's fire in Apex, or something).  Or just buff pets. I think keeping the autohit in itself, is fine. Its problem for pets is a symptom of a different issue.

There are rarely more than Super Stunner in a spawn. I run a lot of PUG Yins, so I have lots of experience.

 

My pets rarely get hit by Super Stunners, the result of recall binds and situational awareness. Council, especially galaxy only spawns have multiple rezers, some Lts, some bosses. It is much harder to guess when pull the pets back in that kind of fight.

[Apian]

The Council with these current changes are tedious and a slog to fight simply due to the new Galaxy units that I'd almost prefer fighting Arachnos at this point. The sheer amount of -rech stacking the Galaxies do now is far too much, the self-heal and autohit rez drag things out and the rez itself is extremely punishing to squishier ATs due to its autohit nature. Mastermind players in particular will suffer tremendously because a single Galaxy Archon rez can wipe out nearly their entire group of pets at +4x8. The spawn limit for Galaxy units absolutely needs to be addressed and the damage portion of their rez should have a chance to miss or have its damage value reduced. Aside from the changes to Galaxies, I think the new Dark Equinoxes and improved normal Council enemies are fine in their current state.

[Coyotedancer]

If I have time this afternoon, I may have Amtes take one for the team, so to speak. I'll take her in at +4 just to see how quickly those higher level spawns shred her pack of howling monstrosities. Just guessing from what I've seen so far? The mobs will eat them alive.

 

The Prince *might* hold out a little better than the others if I focus absolutely everything on keeping him alive, but I suspect he'll get worn down faster than I can counter sooner rather than later. And without the rest of the pack running along in bodyguard mode, there's only so much that my MM herself can survive.

 

'Should be interesting... 

 

(My only other MM is a Necro/Thermal, but I haven't shifted her over to the test server yet. I'm curious how more fragile minions than demons handle the new Council and Circle mobs, though. Anyone got a Ninja/  or Necro/  they're willing to throw out of the frying pan and into the fire to find out?)

[lemming]

I think this  happens with any group that creates bosses, but if you have your notoriety settings at "I don't want to fight bosses when soloing", you will get a boss werewolf instead of the lt.

[KaizenSoze]

I think how MMs perform against 4x8 Council solo is going to vary widely depending on power sets.

 

I took my Ninja/Trick Arrow/Mace for a spin. Lost about 5 minions in let's call 7 fights.

 

Two of those fights had double Galaxy bosses. Which accounted for 4 of the 5 minions deaths, never lost a LT or Boss, it was close once or twice.

 

The major damage was caused the Galaxy auto hit boss rezes. I couldn't get the pets out the way in time and two rezes pretty close in time.

 

But Trick Arrow is a very good debuff set, it has -dmg and resists. Plus, it goes well with Ninja's high pet defense and Flash Arrow -toHit.

 

Also, my incarnates is heavily focused on protecting the pets, using Barrier and Void Judgement.

 

[Andreah]

I would prefer a high-accuracy attack to an auto-hit. Give people a reason to time using a large insp or casting a strong short lived defense buff, or let them rationalize there's at least a chance of it missing even if they stay close.

[SwitchFade]

Absolutely not a fan of this change, bordering on loathing it. Is there a reason we have to make everything harder? Sure, people asked for harder, me included, but who asked for everything to be harder? I'm a fan of having tougher content, but this is a game, some of us want to ... You know... Sometimes just relax?

 

I don't run council radios continuously, I mostly play all content. I do not want every faction to be hard or the same; council was more vanilla and that's ok, because there are times I want to zone out and just mash stuff and this removes that. The caveat that it's end game only, is silly. Sometimes I want to just zone out on my 50s, too.

 

Auto hit, huge debuffing, recharge nuking, multi spawning is not fun when I want to chill. If you're going to turn council into hard content, where's the vanilla SO only chillbuild content?

 

No thanks.

[Monos King]

My only gripe with this is that I don't think enemies running on nictus fragments should be as powerful as or act as counterparts to the PPD dudes, who are actually fully merged with Kheldians. Also War wolves are already like...failed nictus fragment infusions, so it's kinda weird that they could also get the nictus powers here. That's all, could probably just change their descriptions if anyone cares enough to be aligned with the lore there. I don't have a lot of stake in the council conversation. 

 

Edit: Also, the AoE rez might be better off on a chance per person hit basis. It's still auto hit, but only 20% chance to damage and heal or something. If it hits an entire group it's still very like to revive, but it could be better received. It would also be in line with making them a PPD analogue.

 

Edited January 25 by Monos King

[ParagonKid]

14 hours ago, SwitchFade said:

Absolutely not a fan of this change, bordering on loathing it. Is there a reason we have to make everything harder? Sure, people asked for harder, me included, but who asked for everything to be harder? I'm a fan of having tougher content, but this is a game, some of us want to ... You know... Sometimes just relax?

Very much this. If this change to Council and CoT has been made because it has become obvious most people choose to engage with content like Council radios, ya know, that should be an undeniable indicator of what most people want. Because I'm sure most people don't want to fight a boss twice because it rezzed and then have it transform into a wolf so you can fight it a third time. And do it multiple times each spawn it seems. The alternative being, they're forced to lower the difficulty settings they've always used because one day someone else arbitrarily decided to change the existing content out from under them. But that's only if one cares what most people want. Personally, I know defacto nerfs to my characters aren't what I look forward to in upcoming patches.

[Indystruck]

Turning the difficulty from +4/x8 to +3/x8 is asking a lot, yeah.

[ParagonKid]

The onus should not be on anyone to justify why an arbitrary change to existing content that most people didn't ask for, should not be made.

[KaizenSoze]

1 minute ago, ParagonKid said:

The onus should not be on anyone to justify why an arbitrary change to existing content that most people didn't ask for, should not be made.

A lot of people have complaining about feeling useless in high teams. A lot. I rarely join PI radios, because they are so boring. What fun is being able to fire only 2-3 powers per spawn.

 

There is another round of unofficial PI radio beta testing tonight at 7:30 EST. Every test we have run 4-5 50s can *still* rip through pretty any group in terms of speed. The only difference is that player say they actual have to play attention now. Use more of their powers. Depending on your AT/build they are noticeable harder solo. Folks might have to turn down difficultly.

I have been comparing my Fortunata against Council live vs beta. Live Council is a joke at 4x8. Even solo. On beta I actually have to think a little.

[PeregrineFalcon]

29 minutes ago, arcane said:

You guys should’ve probably not talked shit for years about what a joke Council radios are if you didn’t want this….

Remember when folks spent nearly a year flooding the forums with "Game too easy, bruh!" threads?

 

Well, if they're now complaining that just a bit of challenge has been added to the game then it looks like the developers hit the target spot on.

[Coyotedancer]

My own Zen Mode content is throwing a fire-farming claws brute into a round on Cult's Demon City map, so I don't really have a dog in the "Council as bash-fodder" race, but having done some more running around with my Mastermind on a couple of different difficult settings now, I'm pretty much convinced that the auto-hit really is rougher on pets than it needs to be...

 

It's not a disaster with smaller spawns where you have less rezzing going on, or if your pets can be controlled well enough to get them out of the way, but those are situations you can't really count on... Controllers can't order their pets to retreat. My demons' animation times and response times saw them caught flat-footed fairly regularly, even with my dedicated keybinds to move them around. That can be trouble with how hard that attack hits, especially given that even at lower difficulties, multiples are possible and they're each autohit.

 

The consensus may be that the outsized impact that has on Masterminds doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things... They're not the most popular or most common AT out there, so the impact on the general player population may be seen as an acceptable trade off for having the Council as the City's new Danger Dudes.... But that does need to be an intentional trade-off made with full awareness. 

 

 

 

Edited January 25 by Coyotedancer

[FupDup]

In regards to the "left out" thing, what I wish for is difficulty scaling like Diablo games: More players on the team = tougher/stronger enemies (and by players I don't mean the difficulty settings for +8 or whatever, I mean actual player count). Of course there'd have to be a limit somewhere so leagues don't get wrecked. 

 

These revamps have a strong effect on solo play but seem to usually be just a mild speedbump for a full team, which I think defeats the purpose. Solo play being "too fast" matters a lot less because nobody is feeling like they couldn't contribute (the NPCs aren't gonna complain). Teams are where this stuff matters so that's where the target should be. 

[Doc_Scorpion]

1 minute ago, FupDup said:

These revamps have a strong effect on solo play but seem to usually be just a mild speedbump for a full team, which I think defeats the purpose.

That's why we've been doing some team testing.  If you can help, please drop by!

[ParagonKid]

14 minutes ago, FupDup said:

These revamps have a strong effect on solo play but seem to usually be just a mild speedbump for a full team, which I think defeats the purpose. Solo play being "too fast" matters a lot less because nobody is feeling like they couldn't contribute (the NPCs aren't gonna complain). Teams are where this stuff matters so that's where the target should be. 

We have content specifically intended for teams; Taskforces. And we have hard Taskforce modes now specially for teams where support ATs want to feel needed.

So there is obviously where these mobs belong.

 

But don't be surprised if not a ton of people engage with that content. Because as much as some people want the claim the masses are crying out for greater difficulty, the clear popularity of  Council PI Radios as they exist Live currently betrays what most people actually go for.

 

Edited January 26 by ParagonKid