fix power boost or just nerf it.

[Elthenar]

I just leveled a ninja-cold MM and had been waiting to get power boost. The idea being that it would get my pets a long way to the soft cap.

 

Apparently it wont work on cold shields because they have a bit of resistance in them. I haven't tested it, but I am wondering if the same thing applies to Force Fields since they have endurance drain resistance. This is the legacy of sloppy cryptic coding. If you guys could fix it, that would be amazing.

 

 

If you guys could fix this, that would be awesome. Alternatively, just make it so it doesn't work on defense at all. This is a part of why /time is so much stronger on a MM than everything else. It's defense buff not only works on the MM, but it's also possibly the only one that power boost works on.  Farsight not only gives nearly the same +def as both cold or FF shields together, but it also benefits from power boost AND gives +tohit.

[Trickshooter]

It does work on Force Field bubbles.

 

Power Boost's +Special effects are only prevented from working on powers that have enhanceable +Res(Damage) due to a (from what I understand) deeply rooted coding issue between Resistance and Damage buffs that would be very difficult to fix.

 

Since Force Field bubbles only provide an unenhanceable +Res(Toxic), they don't have to be exempt from outside buffs like Power Boost's +Special.

 

Cold Shields have enhanceable Cold and Fire resistance, so they can't allow outside buffs, otherwise +Damage buffs would also buff the +Resistance they offer. In order to allow them to be affected by Power Boost, you'd have to drop the ability to slot resistance, which some people might not be happy about.

 

If it's any consolation, this also means Cold Shields are immune to -Special, so they can't be weakened below their enhanced value.

[Adeon Hawkwood]

So I'll quote a post I wrote in response to another thread regarding this that gives a bit of detail as to why this weird interaction exists (does quoting your own posts make you blind?).

 

As for the second part of your post I disagree with the idea of nerfing power boost simply because Cold can't benefit from it, that really feels like sour grapes. However, I do kind of agree with the sentiment that power boost should probably be nerfed to not boost defense and I say that as someone with a soft-capped Time Defender. I like the interaction but being able to give the entire team 32% defense to all with just two powers is a bit overpowered. Part of the problem here is that the only sets that originally benefited were Force Field and Empathy and it wasn't that big of a deal for them since neither set is as strong as Time is so making them a bit stronger wasn't that big of a deal.

 

So this isn't technically a bug, it's an unfortunate consequence of the fact that the Cold Shields have an enhance-able resistance buff. You see, any power than accepts Resistance enhancements will not benefit from most types of global buffs (they do benefit from recharge, I'm not sure about endurance reduction).

 

If you think this sounds absolutely crazy you're right, but it's an unfortunate consequence of a coding decision made when the game was first released. So the key problem is that resistance enhancements and damage enhancements are (as far as the game is concerned) the same thing. This means that by default if you have a Damage buff on your character that damage buff will also increase the effectiveness of any powers you have that buff resistance.

 

Now obviously this would obviously be insanely broken so the devs took steps to prevent that from happening. Unfortunately they only had two options for doing this. The first is to tag the entire power as "Not affected by outside buffs/debuffs." while the second is to tag an individual aspect of the power as "Ignores Enhancements and Buffs".

 

Now in Force Field the resistance buffs in their shields aren't enhance-able so they used the second route and tagged those aspects to ignore buffs but let the power as a whole benefit from buffs, so Power Boost increases the effectiveness. However for Cold Domination the devs wanted the resistance buff to be enhance-able which means that the entire power had to be tagged as not benefiting from external buffs and debuffs so Power Boost doesn't enhance the defense.

 

So basically the answer is that this isn't technically a bug, it's a known feature of the power system. Now is this changeable? In theory yes, in practice maybe. The ideal solution would be to fix the behavior I described above but that's probably not practical, from what I understand it's a pretty major overhaul to the powers system which is probably a lot of work. On the other hand the old devs managed to fix the Hamidon mis-slotting bug which I thought was to difficult to fix as well so maybe this one is fixable.

 

The shorter term solution would be to change the Cold Domination shield so that like Force Field shields they don't accept Resistance enhancements. While this would probably be welcomed by a lot of players it is a violation of the Cottage Rule so I don't know if the devs would want to do it.

[Auroxis]

As an Empathy defender and Time corruptor main I'd be extremely pissed to see it nerfed.

 

Time isn't a perfect set, pretty much every power outside of Farsight and Chrono Shift is average at best. And if you get Soul or Power Mastery you're missing out on stuff like perma Soul Drain from Dark Mastery or Scorpion Shield from Mace Mastery. You can still get +Special from Radial Clarion Destiny, but Destiny has lots of good options for other powersets.

 

You think time is OP because of PB Farsight? Buff FF and Traps.

[Elthenar]

So I'll quote a post I wrote in response to another thread regarding this that gives a bit of detail as to why this weird interaction exists (does quoting your own posts make you blind?).

 

As for the second part of your post I disagree with the idea of nerfing power boost simply because Cold can't benefit from it, that really feels like sour grapes. However, I do kind of agree with the sentiment that power boost should probably be nerfed to not boost defense and I say that as someone with a soft-capped Time Defender. I like the interaction but being able to give the entire team 32% defense to all with just two powers is a bit overpowered. Part of the problem here is that the only sets that originally benefited were Force Field and Empathy and it wasn't that big of a deal for them since neither set is as strong as Time is so making them a bit stronger wasn't that big of a deal.

 

So this isn't technically a bug, it's an unfortunate consequence of the fact that the Cold Shields have an enhance-able resistance buff. You see, any power than accepts Resistance enhancements will not benefit from most types of global buffs (they do benefit from recharge, I'm not sure about endurance reduction).

 

If you think this sounds absolutely crazy you're right, but it's an unfortunate consequence of a coding decision made when the game was first released. So the key problem is that resistance enhancements and damage enhancements are (as far as the game is concerned) the same thing. This means that by default if you have a Damage buff on your character that damage buff will also increase the effectiveness of any powers you have that buff resistance.

 

Now obviously this would obviously be insanely broken so the devs took steps to prevent that from happening. Unfortunately they only had two options for doing this. The first is to tag the entire power as "Not affected by outside buffs/debuffs." while the second is to tag an individual aspect of the power as "Ignores Enhancements and Buffs".

 

Now in Force Field the resistance buffs in their shields aren't enhance-able so they used the second route and tagged those aspects to ignore buffs but let the power as a whole benefit from buffs, so Power Boost increases the effectiveness. However for Cold Domination the devs wanted the resistance buff to be enhance-able which means that the entire power had to be tagged as not benefiting from external buffs and debuffs so Power Boost doesn't enhance the defense.

 

So basically the answer is that this isn't technically a bug, it's a known feature of the power system. Now is this changeable? In theory yes, in practice maybe. The ideal solution would be to fix the behavior I described above but that's probably not practical, from what I understand it's a pretty major overhaul to the powers system which is probably a lot of work. On the other hand the old devs managed to fix the Hamidon mis-slotting bug which I thought was to difficult to fix as well so maybe this one is fixable.

 

The shorter term solution would be to change the Cold Domination shield so that like Force Field shields they don't accept Resistance enhancements. While this would probably be welcomed by a lot of players it is a violation of the Cottage Rule so I don't know if the devs would want to do it.

 

I read that. I was about to post in the bug forums but I stopped to do a search first.

 

The other question is how gamebreaking would it be for powerboost to work on +res effects. Off the top of my head, the effected powers would be the sonic, thermal and now cold shields, plus some castable auras like Acc metab and world of pain. It doesn't seem like it would be too bad to add a bonus to those effects. This would allow it to work on Cold while buffing a few sets that aren't considered top of the line, save for maybe Rad.

 

Of course, the flip side is that this would make Mace Mastery all but mandatory for most MM builds. It's already arguably the strongest set with Scorpion Shield and the current version of Power Boost.

[Elthenar]

As an Empathy defender and Time corruptor main I'd be extremely pissed to see it nerfed.

 

Time isn't a perfect set, pretty much every power outside of Farsight and Chrono Shift is average at best. And if you get Soul or Power Mastery you're missing out on stuff like perma Soul Drain from Dark Mastery or Scorpion Shield from Mace Mastery. You can still get +Special from Radial Clarion Destiny, but Destiny has lots of good options for other powersets.

 

You think time is OP because of PB Farsight? Buff FF and Traps.

 

Full disclosure, I made the OP about 3 minutes after finding out this cold thing, I was a little salty. Plus, I view all things as a MM player, and time is fairly definitively the strongest secondary IMO. For a MM, pretty much every power in the set is solid gold.

[Trickshooter]

 

I read that. I was about to post in the bug forums but I stopped to do a search first.

 

The other question is how gamebreaking would it be for powerboost to work on +res effects. Off the top of my head, the effected powers would be the sonic, thermal and now cold shields, plus some castable auras like Acc metab and world of pain. It doesn't seem like it would be too bad to add a bonus to those effects. This would allow it to work on Cold while buffing a few sets that aren't considered top of the line, save for maybe Rad.

 

Of course, the flip side is that this would make Mace Mastery all but mandatory for most MM builds. It's already arguably the strongest set with Scorpion Shield and the current version of Power Boost.

 

The problem isn’t Power Boost not affecting Resistance, it’s about powers with Resistance having to be exempt from ALL outside buffs, Power Boost being just one of them, or else things get crazy. A Brute’s Fury or a Kin’s Fulcrum Shift would, in addition to their huge damage buffs, would also buff any Damage Resistance on a character to their cap.

[Elthenar]

 

I read that. I was about to post in the bug forums but I stopped to do a search first.

 

The other question is how gamebreaking would it be for powerboost to work on +res effects. Off the top of my head, the effected powers would be the sonic, thermal and now cold shields, plus some castable auras like Acc metab and world of pain. It doesn't seem like it would be too bad to add a bonus to those effects. This would allow it to work on Cold while buffing a few sets that aren't considered top of the line, save for maybe Rad.

 

Of course, the flip side is that this would make Mace Mastery all but mandatory for most MM builds. It's already arguably the strongest set with Scorpion Shield and the current version of Power Boost.

 

The problem isn’t Power Boost not affecting Resistance, it’s about powers with Resistance having to be exempt from ALL outside buffs, Power Boost being just one of them, or else things get crazy. A Brute’s Fury or a Kin’s Fulcrum Shift would, in addition to their huge damage buffs, would also buff any Damage Resistance on a character to their cap.

 

Why would +dmg add to +res? That's some odd coding.

[Adeon Hawkwood]

I read that. I was about to post in the bug forums but I stopped to do a search first.

+1 inf for searching first, so many people forget to do that when posting bugs.

 

Why would +dmg add to +res? That's some odd coding.

My guess would be that it was a way to reduce the number of variables that the game needed to track. There are several places where they combined two different enhancement types into a single variable which is why it used to be possible to use Defense Debuff Hamidon Enhancements to buff Defense powers.

 

It may also have simplified the math for calculating damage. If you think about it final damage is equal to Base Damage * (1 + Damage Buff) * (1 - Resistance Buff). Having Damage Buff and Resistance Buff be the same thing internally would potentially simplify that calculation for the computer.

[Trickshooter]

It has to do with Strength modifiers, I believe, but after 7 years I honestly can't remember the specifics.

 

summoning circle, hope this works

 

                      ???

            ???              ???

      ???                          ???

 

  ???          arcanaville            ???

 

      ???                            ???

              ???              ???

                      ???

[_NOPE_]

Okay, 1?

 

summoning circle, hope this works

 

                      ???

            ???              ???

      ???                          ???

 

  ???          arcanaville            ???

 

      ???                            ???

              ???              ???

                      ???

 

That is AWESOME. I want to see more ASCII art/emoji art like that on these forums, and 2?

 

/JRanger

[Baney]

Thank you for this thread. I've been scratching my head for weeks why this particular mechanic didn't work.

 

As somebody who Mains a Cold Corruptor, Leave power Boost Alone.

If you can't fix it so that my shields get buffed, then just leave it be. It makes me sad, that it won't work for my Shields, but If it works on my slows and debuffs, its doing more then enough.

[nihilii]

I'm confused about Power Boost, and the enhanceable RES explanation.

 

Fade from controller's Darkness Affinity has an enhanceable RES component. Yet Power Boost boosts it.

 

What gives?

[Trickshooter]

I'm confused about Power Boost, and the enhanceable RES explanation.

 

Fade from controller's Darkness Affinity has an enhanceable RES component. Yet Power Boost boosts it.

 

What gives?

 

It's a bug. Fade is missing it's flag that makes it immune to outside buffs.

 

There are a few examples like this. Frostwork is another one I remember being on the Current Defender Issues list.

[nihilii]

Man, you just know everything don't you. Thanks :)

[senseichen]

Does that mean if they removed the tiny Psionic resistance from Dominator APP's Mind Link, it would work with Power Boost?  I thought there was some balance reason.  If so, please drop the 1.75% Psi resist!

[Adeon Hawkwood]

Does that mean if they removed the tiny Psionic resistance from Dominator APP's Mind Link, it would work with Power Boost?  I thought there was some balance reason.  If so, please drop the 1.75% Psi resist!

Well the Psi resistance is already unenhanceable so there's no reason it couldn't work with power boost now. It's likely an oversight where whoever did the proliferation originally went for the full on ignoring buffs rather than just tagging the resistance part as ignoring buffs.

[senseichen]

Does that mean if they removed the tiny Psionic resistance from Dominator APP's Mind Link, it would work with Power Boost?  I thought there was some balance reason.  If so, please drop the 1.75% Psi resist!

Well the Psi resistance is already unenhanceable so there's no reason it couldn't work with power boost now. It's likely an oversight where whoever did the proliferation originally went for the full on ignoring buffs rather than just tagging the resistance part as ignoring buffs.

Oh?  I thought the issue was the the whole power has to be marked to ignore outside buffs?  And that's why Cold shields are kind of weak in a power boost world?  If they could just mark the resist part of the cold shields as unbuffable, there's no problem, right?

[Trickshooter]

Does that mean if they removed the tiny Psionic resistance from Dominator APP's Mind Link, it would work with Power Boost?  I thought there was some balance reason.  If so, please drop the 1.75% Psi resist!

Well the Psi resistance is already unenhanceable so there's no reason it couldn't work with power boost now. It's likely an oversight where whoever did the proliferation originally went for the full on ignoring buffs rather than just tagging the resistance part as ignoring buffs.

Oh?  I thought the issue was the the whole power has to be marked to ignore outside buffs?  And that's why Cold shields are kind of weak in a power boost world?  If they could just mark the resist part of the cold shields as unbuffable, there's no problem, right?

 

It's either or. A power can have enhanceable +Resistance, but will have to ignore outside buffs OR it's +Resistance can be unenhanceable, but the other effects in the power can benefit from outside buffs.

 

Not allowing the +Resistance to be enhanced on Cold Shields would allow them to accept outside buffs, like Power Boost, but you risk upsetting people who have their shields slotted for Resistance or are using Resist Damage IO Sets.

[senseichen]

Ah, then maybe the APP Mind Link being unbuffable is a separate issue.  Mind Link doesn't take Damage Resist enhs/sets, but's still un-buffable. :(

[Trickshooter]

Ah, then maybe the APP Mind Link being unbuffable is a separate issue.  Mind Link doesn't take Damage Resist enhs/sets, but's still un-buffable. :(

 

It doesn't take Damage Resistance enhancements/sets BUT the Resistance effect itself isn't flagged to ignore enhancements, which means you could probably still enhance it with Hami-Os, I think. It wouldn't be worth it, but you could do it.

[Adeon Hawkwood]

Ah, then maybe the APP Mind Link being unbuffable is a separate issue.  Mind Link doesn't take Damage Resist enhs/sets, but's still un-buffable. :(

Well it's more a case of power design guidelines not being properly followed. It happens in a few places (like Fade mentioned up thread). Mind Link should be buffable, it's just implemented incorrectly. There's a number of places where the devs didn't follow best practices when implementing powers. For example don't get me started on the implementation of Holds in Epic pools, the damn things are all over the place. Of the issue with pseudo-pet powers and how they are or aren't changed during powerset proliferation.