Super Strength for Scrappers please

[UberRod]

It's well past time that Scrappers got access to the Super Strength power set.  it has long been a dream of mine to have a Super Strength/Invulnerability Scrapper. 

[UberRod]

Bump.  This really needs to happen please. 

[Player2]

I don't see a problem with this.  Yes, some powers might have issues with too much damage on crits... but we know they can balance that.

 

And just because...  we need Super Strength for stalkers.  I want a Knockout Blow assassin strike.  😎

Edited March 24 by Player2

[Haijinx]

we have a 4 year old thread for this I think lol 

[Major_Decoy]

And I'm still convinced that the reason they haven't done this is because they're not happy with the way Rage works.

[Haijinx]

14 minutes ago, Major_Decoy said:

And I'm still convinced that the reason they haven't done this is because they're not happy with the way Rage works.

And without rage you'd need to rebalance a big chunk of the set

[TheMoneyMaker]

2 hours ago, Haijinx said:

And without rage you'd need to rebalance a big chunk of the set

How hard could that be?

[Major_Decoy]

Well the last time they tried to fix Rage they gave up on it entirely due to the feedback they got.

[Saiyajinzoningen]

11 hours ago, Major_Decoy said:

And I'm still convinced that the reason they haven't done this is because they're not happy with the way Rage works.

iirc they are not happy with it and have been eyeballing it for a looooong time.

 

6 hours ago, Major_Decoy said:

Well the last time they tried to fix Rage they gave up on it entirely due to the feedback they got.

I refuse to believe they have given up entirely.

although folks may have not been happy with the proposed changes

even more folks are unhappy with its current iteration

fact is you can't please everyone, someone somewhere is gonna complain no matter what.

Maybe the devs are working on sets that need the love more like

kinetic melee or

regen......(yeah I went there)

[Daniel_R]

This is a very, very, very old discussion in the history of City of Heroes.

 

Without going too much into the specifics of that history (the other posters here will doubtless do that for me - this is Legacy Tech Debt dating back to the launch of the game), I believe that the principle reason for not doing this now has to do with the set's overreliance on Rage, and the current downsides to Rage. 

 

Put simply, all attacks in SS are balanced around Rage, and Rage is very strong offensively. The performance of SS without Rage is distinctly sub-par, to the point where it is essentially almost required. Porting Rage to Scrappers in its current form, however, would be problematic.

 

First off, Scrapper Criticals, when applied to double-stacked Rage, would be unbalanced, according to every numbers-based analysis of the idea I've read over almost two decades. 

 

Simply removing and replacing for it for Scrappers with, say, Total Focus, would also leave the Set underpowered, as the Set is balanced around a strong persistent Damage and ToHit buff. 

 

There's also the issue of the Rage crash - the defence debuff applied during the crash (which has only recently been applied in the game) already unfairly affects defence-based armour sets. On a character with Tanker hitpoints and Resistance values, this is arguably mitigatable; a Scrapper would be more severely affected.

 

From a Game Balance viewpoint, Scrapper Super Strength simply veers too far out of the acceptable bounds of performance on both ends - it would be overpowered offensively, with a periodic death sentence to certain Scrapper builds, or it would underperform.

 

The solution would involve a full balance pass prior to porting, boosting the DPS of every SS attack, maybe giving all attacks an intrinsic ToHit boost, while nerfing the Damage boost and perhaps the ToHit boost of Rage. Then, force Scrappers to take either to take Total Focus or a +DMG toggle similar to SD's Against All Odds or the Assault Hybrid power (in the case of Tankers and Brutes, give them the option to choose the Toggle or Rage). 

 

While I believe this would 'fix' the issue, during and following from this, the Devs would doubtless get a metric ton of abuse for doing so (as they did the last time). Whatever numbers they chose would not satisfy a lot of players.

 

As they're a volunteer team, with limited manpower, ambitions for the game, and who are basically giving me my Favourite Game of All Time for free (and probably saved my mental health during the Pandemic and Lockdown), I'm inclined to be understanding as to why they don't want to touch that particular problem with a bargepole the length of the Pacific Ocean. 

 

 

 

Edited March 25 by Daniel_R

[Herotu]

11 hours ago, Haijinx said:

And without rage you'd need to rebalance a big chunk of the set

I skipped it on my tanker.

[Herotu]

5 minutes ago, Daniel_R said:

Put simply, all attacks in SS are balanced around Rage, and Rage is very strong offensively. The performance of SS without Rage is distinctly sub-par, to the point where it is essentially almost required. Porting Rage to Scrappers in its current form, however, would be problematic.

 

 

Just now, Daniel_R said:

 

Cool.

Not so cool for your argument. My tanker is not sub-par without Rage*.

 

*I have, however, tricked it out with full purples. it is my only character with anything approaching a min/max build.

[SeraphimKensai]

I think I proposed super strength for scrappers back in 2004.

[Chris24601]

I’ve always just used Street Justice (skipping Initial Blows), sans the T1 all its attacks are beefy feeling.

 

Perhaps an easier to accomplish task would be a “Strength Tricks” ancillary pool.

 

Hurl, Hand Clap and Foot Stomp would fit the general Scrapper Ancillary pattern of ranged, AoE, and minor mezs. Figure out two other powers (a super strong yell, and maybe a cone damaging knockup with the spinning and punching the ground animation) and it’s good.

 

Pair that with Street Justice or maybe Energy Melee and voila… super strong scrapper without the mechanical headaches of porting SS with Rage.

[Saiyajinzoningen]

2 hours ago, Chris24601 said:

I’ve always just used Street Justice (skipping Initial Blows), sans the T1 all its attacks are beefy feeling.

 

Perhaps an easier to accomplish task would be a “Strength Tricks” ancillary pool.

 

Hurl, Hand Clap and Foot Stomp would fit the general Scrapper Ancillary pattern of ranged, AoE, and minor mezs. Figure out two other powers (a super strong yell, and maybe a cone damaging knockup with the spinning and punching the ground animation) and it’s good.

 

Pair that with Street Justice or maybe Energy Melee and voila… super strong scrapper without the mechanical headaches of porting SS with Rage.

i love the look of SJ

i love the combos of SJ

but it sounds like I'm breaking wooden planks

SS sounds very smashy smashy 🙂 

[Daniel_R]

3 hours ago, Herotu said:

 

 

Not so cool for your argument. My tanker is not sub-par without Rage*.

 

*I have, however, tricked it out with full purples. it is my only character with anything approaching a min/max build.

 

Honestly, like clockwork.

 

You haven't min-maxed, though, have you? You chosen to sacrifice an 80% Damage Boost, plus a significant ToHit bonus from just one power, and partially mitigated it with very expensive IOs, late-game. Your reasons (I'm guessing) were either: you were looking to avoid the -def penalty  (Super Reflexes?), you were playing on a Brute and relying on Fury, or just willing to hack around the issue by spending a billion Inf.

 

Which, honestly, is absolutely fine - CoH is a forgiving game:  we have a Hard Mode for a reason. You don't need to min-max. The SS Set, and the game itself, is still lots of fun, even if bits of it are a little broken here and there. 

 

None of that changes that the Developers still have to work within certain mechanical and mathematical restrictions, if they're serious about game balance, when building or changing power sets, and that given those restraints, the SS Set is just a little broken thanks to Rage.

 

 

Edited March 25 by Daniel_R

[Vanden]

5 hours ago, Daniel_R said:

The solution would involve a full balance pass prior to porting, boosting the DPS of every SS attack, maybe giving all attacks an intrinsic ToHit boost, while nerfing the Damage boost and perhaps the ToHit boost of Rage. Then, force Scrappers to take either to take Total Focus or a +DMG toggle similar to SD's Against All Odds or the Assault Hybrid power (in the case of Tankers and Brutes, give them the option to choose the Toggle or Rage). 

 

You're almost certainly overthinking it. Super Strength has built up almost a mythology around it thanks to Rage, but it's still just math, and our devs are good at math.

The fact is, Rage will not be included in any ports of the set. It's that simple. Then you buff the first three powers of the set somewhat; they're the only powers in the set that are actually intentionally weaker. I wrote out a proposed treatment for Super Strength ports a few years ago using this logic:

 

[Major_Decoy]

20 minutes ago, Vanden said:

 

You're almost certainly overthinking it. Super Strength has built up almost a mythology around it thanks to Rage, but it's still just math, and our devs are good at math.

The fact is, Rage will not be included in any ports of the set. It's that simple. Then you buff the first three powers of the set somewhat; they're the only powers in the set that are actually intentionally weaker. I wrote out a proposed treatment for Super Strength ports a few years ago using this logic:

 

Honestly, I think if there were a "No rocks" version of stone melee there would be a lot fewer requests for Super Strength on Scrappers.

[biostem]

Up the damage numbers on the attacks, replace rage with buildup.  How many would honestly be happy with that kind of "compromise"?

[Player2]

1 hour ago, biostem said:

Up the damage numbers on the attacks, replace rage with buildup.  How many would honestly be happy with that kind of "compromise"?

I think this would be ideal for a Scrapper and Stalker version of Super Strength.

 

There's too emphasis on Rage as a power tied to Super Strength, when in the comics world that kind of strength really is attributed to the Hulk and his side characters.  There may be others, but they're very obscure.  Meanwhile, super strength without rage is a staple in superhero lore... but if you don't make your character a "Hulk" then you're limiting yourself.  There needs to be a non-ragey alternative.

 

Edited March 25 by Player2

[Purrfekshawn]

9 hours ago, Player2 said:

I think this would be ideal for a Scrapper and Stalker version of Super Strength.

 

There's too emphasis on Rage as a power tied to Super Strength, when in the comics world that kind of strength really is attributed to the Hulk and his side characters.  There may be others, but they're very obscure.  Meanwhile, super strength without rage is a staple in superhero lore... but if you don't make your character a "Hulk" then you're limiting yourself.  There needs to be a non-ragey alternative.

 

 

Superman? Super strength not tied to rage.

[twozerofoxtrot]

12 hours ago, Vanden said:

You're almost certainly overthinking it. Super Strength has built up almost a mythology around it thanks to Rage, but it's still just math, and our devs are good at math.

 

You said it better than I could've. 

 

Even a lazy solution like giving Stalker/Scrapper SS crits that ignore Rage's damage enhancements, or half-damage crits, would work. It's not that complicated so as to require the entire set be reworked prior to a port.

 

And all this discussion on the set ignores the elephant in the room regarding Rage's enabling of aggressive procs in Haymaker, KOB, and Foot Stomp; mitigating the damage crash.

 

That's where the vitriol will really be focused around.

[Player2]

1 hour ago, Purrfekshawn said:

 

Superman? Super strength not tied to rage.

Exactly.  The amount of super strength characters without rage far exceeds those with it.  Basic super strength is a staple of the comics... but they made this powerset almost dependent on taking the Rage power.

 

Top tier super strength heroes without rage include:

• Aquaman
• Colossus
• Cyborg
• Hercules
• Iron Man
• Luke Cage
• Invincible
• Shazam (and his family)
• Spider-Man
• Starfire
• Superman (and every other Kryptonian)
• The Thing
• Thor  (and every other Asgardian)
• Wonder Man
• Wonder Woman

And while some super strength individuals may throw a tantrum or go on a rampage from time to time (Homelander, Juggernaut, Rhino, etc), they are just as strong as always and lashing out in anger... not getting stronger because they are in a rage.

 

The entire faulty premise of the super strength powerset is based on the Hulk.  And yes, people can and do play without using or even taking Rage, that's a hindrance they are taking for thematic reasons because the set is faulty.  When City of Heroes first came out, there was only super strength tankers, and we accepted a lot of shortcomings (lack of custom weapons, every invulnerable character glowing like a star, etc) back in the day because overall the game was great.  But when City of Villains was released, we got brutes which fills the niche of raging quite nicely...  but because only villains could be brutes, tanker super strength remained the same.  But when we got Going Rogue and the ability to have any AT on any side, they really should have fixed super strength to not have it be dependent on rage.  I said dependent again, so to clarify, I mean to keep the powerset competitive with other melee sets in terms of damage output.

 

I have two non-raging super strength tankers, and I dislike that my damage is weaker than it should be, but thematically I'm against glowing brightly (or darkly) with rage to empower my damage and there are numerous examples of comic book, cartoon, movie, TV show, video game, and other mediums that justify super strength being strong without rage while only a handful of examples (mostly centered around the Hulk) that justify having rage.

 

It is a continuing failing of this game to live up to the comic book genre.

[Haijinx]

18 hours ago, Herotu said:

 

 

Not so cool for your argument. My tanker is not sub-par without Rage*.

 

*I have, however, tricked it out with full purples. it is my only character with anything approaching a min/max build.

Not subpar for a Tank, maybe. 

 

But definitely doing less damage than that Tanker could.  

 

A Scrapper, however, would be subpar with a direct port sams rage.  The DPA for Haymaker, punch and jab would be pathetic. 

 

 

[Haijinx]

"Rage" is just a power.  Getting hung up on the name is meaningless. 

 

It could be called "Bunny foofoo go go time" instead and it would make no difference. 

 

It's the set's damage buff.  A buff that the 1st 3 powers in the set absolutely need to do anything like competitive damage. 

 

Or do you all skip build up, Soul Drain and Followup too?