[OPEN BETA] Patch Notes for February 12th, 2024 - Issue 27, Page 7 - Release Candidate 1

[Player2]

35 minutes ago, PeregrineFalcon said:

I will be respecing a lot of characters to remove the Ancillary power pools from them once this goes live.

I'll be dropping telekinesis from my mind controllers, so I can relate.

[MoonSheep]

40 minutes ago, PeregrineFalcon said:

I will be respecing a lot of characters to remove the Ancillary power pools from them once this goes live.

 

me too - i'm really not looking forward to the downgrade patch. there's some minor positive changes in the patch notes, but nothing to get overly excited about, e.g. does a superhero game really need another gun based power set?

 

the downgrade of mastery powers is really disappointing and feels like an unnecessary change with no benefit

Edited February 13 by MoonSheep

[Lunar Ronin]

6 minutes ago, MoonSheep said:

e.g. does a superhero game really need another gun based power set?

 

I have been waiting to make an Illusion/Arsenal Dominator, so yes.

 

[Lockely]

41 minutes ago, MoonSheep said:

 

me too - i'm really not looking forward to the downgrade patch. there's some minor positive changes in the patch notes, but nothing to get overly excited about, e.g. does a superhero game really need another gun based power set?

 

the downgrade of mastery powers is really disappointing and feels like an unnecessary change with no benefit

 

Yes, another gadget/devices based set is much needed for technology and natural origin characters.

[arcane]

1 hour ago, PeregrineFalcon said:

I will be respecing a lot of characters to remove the Ancillary power pools from them once this goes live.

You’re just gonna run around without an Ancillary shield toggle because you’re protesting Bonfire? Seems ill-advised.

[GS4-Shield]

Has anyone tested the Cold Domination/Sleet change to be a real pseudopet and how procs can be slotted in it?  My understanding from forums and discord was that proc effects were broken.  Not only was the damage proc percentage underperforming (as compared with formula for pets/toggles/auras), but other proc effects like Achilles -res would be removed instantly.

 

Also, was the real pseudopet treatment applied to the epic pool variant of Sleet?

[PeregrineFalcon]

Yes, I am aware that "this game is maintained by volunteers and I get to play for free." There, now that I've said the magic words here's my feedback on this release candidate:

 

Piecemeal's Personal Story - I really dislike missions (in any game) where my character is transformed into someone else's character, so I won't comment on this.
Co-Op Striga Isle & New Story Arcs - I like this and I really like that Striga Isle is being opened up to villains. Now we just need a Strike Force where we help the 5th Column take the isle back from The Council.
Rikti War Zone Revamp - I see the point. Infrastructure is important, but not exciting. It seems to work.
Advanced Mode - Lady Grey's Task Force - I don't play AM so I'm not qualified to comment, except to say that I do like that it appears that more D-Synchs will be entering the marketplace.
Team Badges - I don't care about badges, but I do like that you (mostly) listened to the players.
New Player Experience Improvements - I like all of this except removing XP from exploration badges. So now combat is the only way to get XP. We're not allowed to get XP from anything that isn't combat?
New Powersets: Arsenal Control & Arsenal Assault - Didn't test these, and won't play them.
New Epic / Ancillary Power Pools and Epic Balancing Pass - I don't believe that nerfing the most useful ancillary powers in order to get players to try your new ancillary pools is going to work. Also, why spend the time to rename the ancillary pools? Ok, whatever, it's your time. So why won't you remove 'Epic' from the pool names as well? It's clearly a misnomer at this point.
Arachnos Soldier / Arachnos Widow Updates & Power Customization - I like this. Well done.
Sheathed/Holstered Weapons - Great! Thank you.
Storm Blast - I mostly like the changes
Devices - Time bomb > Remote bomb - Wow! This power might actually be useful now. Good change!
Other powers - I like the changes to Thunderstrike, really hate the nerf to Bonfire (again). I really like the change to Shadow Fall, Steamy Mist and Arctic Fog!
High-Level Council & Circle of Thorns Revamps - I really like this!!!
Giant Monster Balancing Pass - Seems like a good idea, but I didn't test. I reserve the right to whine about this at a later date.
New Vanity Pets - Apparently I am the only person on the internet who does not like non-combat pets.
Costume additions/improvements - Always a good thing. I especially like the customization to Teleport & Combat Teleport, very nice.
New Supergroup Base Items - Yay! It's really nice to finally see developers working on SG bases. Thank you.
Loads of bug fixes - I especially like the change to the sound volume. It was so ridiculous that I consider this a bug fix. Thank you!

[SwitchFade]

3 hours ago, PeregrineFalcon said:

I will be respecing a lot of characters to remove the Ancillary power pools from them once this goes live.

I'll probably not be logging in again for quite some time, if ever.

 

Time to hand off to the new guard.

[PeregrineFalcon]

2 hours ago, arcane said:

You’re just gonna run around without an Ancillary shield toggle because you’re protesting Bonfire? Seems ill-advised.

Oh I think Tough and Weave will do just fine.

 

And I'm protesting anything. I'm not interested in having a power in my build that I consider worthless and won't use.

[arcane]

1 minute ago, PeregrineFalcon said:

Oh I think Tough and Weave will do just fine.

 

And I'm protesting anything. I'm not interested in having a power in my build that I consider worthless and won't use.

Suit yourself. Agree to disagree.

[Hitback]

I was hoping for full claws customisation for widows, since its the VEAT patch and all, but can't we at least get the Fury claws as an option? They are just a longer version of the default.

[Aracknight]

15 minutes ago, PeregrineFalcon said:

Oh I think Tough and Weave will do just fine.

 

And I'm protesting anything. I'm not interested in having a power in my build that I consider worthless and won't use.

 

LoL.  Except the one you have to take to get Tough and Weave, I guess.

[PeregrineFalcon]

9 minutes ago, Aracknight said:

LoL.  Except the one you have to take to get Tough and Weave, I guess.

I was wondering if anyone would catch that.  😁

 

[RunoKnows]

Bonfire?! Adjusted, nay, NERFED down to more reasonable levels so an Ancillary power can no longer outperform another power from a dedicated primary or secondary? This is unthinkable!

 

Bonfire, my love, you have not been struck with such fervor and force since Overwhelming Force! It's almost as if... Perhaps... SOMEHOW... unexpected interactions with other powers or IOs brought you over the top?!

 

But how could this be? Oh, Bonfire, if only we had access to damage numbers in-game so we could review the disparity ourselves! Surely then we would see that you aren't OP, you're simply built different! 😭

Edited February 13 by RunoKnows

[Aeolus]

Great job on the overall costumes and base items.  It would be nice to have pieces from Pandora's Box, Paragon City's magical themed store, and the glowy models from radio/paper missions as well.  I made this request way back in 2019.  We did the radio/paper mission to get the Gem of [X] or the Tiara of [Y], why can't we display it in our base after nearly 20 some years?  And I'm just referring to the generic glowies that appear in missions.  Not specially made models for each random item.  The animations for teleport look wonderful!  A wind teleport?  Fancy!  Whatever could you do with that?  Oh, yes...wind control powerset.

 

We've got Christmas lights, graffiti, and cellphones.  Gimme some display cases!  😄

 

Arsenal themed sets look good.  I don't know if this was addressed, but when I made a Arsenal/Trick Arrow 'troller, the animation to pull out the gun was for the Dual Swords?  One powerset I think wouldn't have any animation problems: wind control...

 

As for some of the power changes...ehh.  My main is a Mind/Psi perma-dom, and I didn't take Telekinesis.  None of the other Mind/Psi doms I know have it either.  Some of the changes are good, such as pulling the targets towards the anchor.  However, putting an auto-shutoff on it seems weird.  It might help with melee herding.  What would really be fun would be making a melee toon an anchor!  It'd make that power actually useful (in my eyes).  One thing that will not is bonfire... my fire perma-dom will be fine.  Immob and holds will help with bonfire.  However, it is now pretty worthless for my blaster.  And it will only make (some) melee players irritated with the scattering.

 

Thank you for the hard work!  In closing: wind control for Page 8.

 

Wind control.

[Captain Fabulous]

2 hours ago, SwitchFade said:

I'll probably not be logging in again for quite some time, if ever.

 

Time to hand off to the new guard.

Can I haz ur stuf?

[Captain Fabulous]

9 minutes ago, Aeolus said:

Wind control.

Do you even Gale, brah?

[ZamuelNow]

On 2/8/2024 at 9:28 AM, The Curator said:

Fixed four glowies that were inside geometry in the AE version of the Smelting Cauldron warehouse map.

 

Something got fixed instead of broken in AE?  Color me shocked (and pleased).

[PeregrineFalcon]

4 minutes ago, ZamuelNow said:

Something got fixed instead of broken in AE?  Color me shocked (and pleased).

Yeah, it's actually pretty impressive when you realize that Cryptic shut down their AE (the Foundry) entirely in both Star Trek Online and Neverwinter (two games that use basically the same engine) because it was too difficult for them to keep with all of the changes that kept breaking their version of the AE. 😁

[Maelwys]

29 minutes ago, PeregrineFalcon said:

Yeah, it's actually pretty impressive when you realize that Cryptic shut down their AE (the Foundry) entirely in both Star Trek Online and Neverwinter (two games that use basically the same engine) because it was too difficult for them to keep with all of the changes that kept breaking their version of the AE. 😁

I played STO, and this always cracks me up.
How on earth was anyone on that Dev team surprised? The holodeck misbehaves on the shows almost every other episode!

 

Edited February 14 by Maelwys

[Kaballah]

5 hours ago, Player2 said:

I'll be dropping telekinesis from my mind controllers, so I can relate.

 

this is going to be an overwhelmingly popular change, sorry you're not on board but I predict there's going to be a huge number of new mind control users

[Player2]

10 minutes ago, Kaballah said:

 

this is going to be an overwhelmingly popular change, sorry you're not on board but I predict there's going to be a huge number of new mind control users

It is definitely not for me.  Depending on how my build works out without it, I may stop playing my mind controllers altogether.

[scottocamp]

On 2/8/2024 at 9:28 AM, The Curator said:

This should create more diverse and viable build options available to players instead of them feeling funneled towards the “best” ones even if it is against their chosen theme.

With regard to the Epic Power Pool adjustments - I believe your philosophy and intent are absolutely correct.  But the solution being implemented (lengthening recharge times, increasing endurance costs, etc.) will only serve to push players more strongly toward already established secondary options like Hasten, Tough, Weave, (Kick or Boxing) Combat Jumping, Hover, Maneuvers & Tactics.  Which will create less rather than more diverse build options.  I doubt there is any willingness to reduce the effectiveness of these core Pool Powers as that would disrupt every build.  So a player with 24 power choices will now pick 15 or 16 primary and secondary powers, 7 or 8 of the core Pool Powers mentioned and maybe 1 or 2 Epic Powers like a shield toggle.  The rest of these Epic Powers (which number in the hundreds) will be largely ignored.  

 

The "power creep" baseline is already established with powers like Hasten and Weave.  Without changing those powers, the only real option to move players toward more diverse builds would be to make Epic Powers nearly as attractive.  Moving a power choice from Weave to an equally decent Epic Power doesn't make the build any more over-powered than it already is.  But reducing the appeal of Epic Powers will absolutely ensure no one considers not choosing Weave or Hasten or Tactics nearly all the time.

 

Your solution is working directly against your stated goal of not making players feel "funneled toward the best" option.

[Monkeyking]

4 hours ago, PeregrineFalcon said:

Yeah, it's actually pretty impressive when you realize that Cryptic shut down their AE (the Foundry) entirely in both Star Trek Online and Neverwinter (two games that use basically the same engine) because it was too difficult for them to keep with all of the changes that kept breaking their version of the AE. 😁

The Foundry was made of spaghetti code and literally every patch broke it in some way. The dev who built it is long gone from the company so there's no way they can fix it either. Eventually they just couldn't keep up with trying to fix it every patch. Part of this is because Homecoming may very well have more active devs than Star Trek Online at this point...

[ScarySai]

On 2/8/2024 at 8:28 AM, The Curator said:

The first time the game is launched, existing volume settings will automatically be mapped to their equivalent level on the new sliders. Sorry beta testers, if you adjusted the settings in a previous beta build it will probably be too loud now.

 

I'd pin this part so people skimming the notes don't blow their ears out lmao