I'm angry about Staff Fighting!!

[Polecat]

Yes, you read that title right, but no, not the power. If anything I've been pleasantly surprised by how GOOD the set is. No, what I'm mad about is the lack of good costume options for the weapon! Seriously, it desperately needs more weapon models. Now don't get me wrong, I think ALL the weapon based powers could use more models, but Staff is among some of the smallest number for such models (I think the actual smallest is claws, but bear with me). What's more, there really needs to be some more elemental options for these weapon sets. We have decent elemental options for most of the other sets (again, claws could use some elemental models too), but staff is really missing some good ones.

 

So...  why did I get mad about this? I made a Staff/Ice Stalker, and was desperately trying to make the staff look like an extended icicle, and I just couldn't make it work. Honestly, I think it'd be a slam dunk to see some weapons with just a see through ice/crystal look, some with a fire effect tossed on them (even if for the staff the effect is just at the tips like one of those Polynesian fire batons), and even some stoney looking ones for more options. Now...  here's the rub. I have ZERO idea if the HC crew have anyone that can do modelling on staff (pun fully intended). I assume they do, since they've made some totally new powersets for us to use, but I don't know if they might just be borrowing things found elsewhere in the game and repurposing them. But I really do hope they've gotten some folks who can do this sort of thing. And I'll admit I'm not asking for a ton of new options, but I really would appreciate a few new weapon models added here or there, if only to bulk up the repertoire we have. Maybe you can borrow bits and bobs from Titan Weapons for staves?

 

Anyway, thank you for running this place guys. The fact I even WANT more expanded options means I'm actually playing and enjoying the game you saved from the brink. Even without my 'perfect' solution, I'll still be thwacking bad guys over the head with my staff (and other weapons, I have a lot of charas).

[arcane]

The set is actually really bad though so if we could look into that too, that’d be cool.

[Maelwys]

IMO Staff's fine performancewise on Stalkers and Tankers, and the Utility of self-buffing both Resistance and Defense makes it passable on Brutes too. But if they're prepared to speed up the animations I'm not gonna say no 😉

 

In terms of the weapon model options though? Yeah 100% agreed. A lot of the existing ones aren't even symmetrical which really grates on my OCD... I'm essentially left with a choice between a bandaged twig or a double sided Q-tip.

[EDIT] - FWIW I just checked the Wiki's page on Staff Weapon Customization and it's only got 9 out of the possible 21 options listed; so some folk may be mistaken about the current range of options. There are a few good ones; but unfortunately only two which are symmetrical (other than the standard 'plain bland narrow cylinder' in various levels of shininess) - "Studded" and "Wrapped". I'm not expecting fully animated Staffchucks here; but would a Darth-Maul-esque double sided lightstick really be too much to ask for? 😜




 

Edited November 27 by Maelwys

[Etched]

4 hours ago, arcane said:

The set is actually really bad though so if we could look into that too, that’d be cool.

 

I've never tried it myself but I have a good friend that tried it and he ended up deleting it.  

He never deletes a toon. Lol

[Ghost]

7 hours ago, arcane said:

The set is actually really bad though so if we could look into that too, that’d be cool.

I hear this complaint from time to time, and I’m guessing it’s about number crunching?

 

I love playing my staff/WP scrapper - probably my 2nd favorite toon.

[Gobbledigook]

9 minutes ago, Ghost said:

I hear this complaint from time to time, and I’m guessing it’s about number crunching?

 

I love playing my staff/WP scrapper - probably my 2nd favorite toon.

What's your favourite? lol. we needs to know 🤪

 

 

Edited November 27 by Gobbledigook

[Maelwys]

31 minutes ago, Ghost said:

Quote

The set is actually really bad though so if we could look into that too, that’d be cool.

I hear this complaint from time to time, and I’m guessing it’s about number crunching?

On a Scrapper and a Brute, Staff Fighting suffers from particularly poor Damage Per Activation (the animation time of the attacks takes too long for the damage they deal!)

The powerset as a whole has lower damage potential than (most) other sets; which rubs a lot of people the wrong way. However it also has greater utility than (most) other sets... because it buffs both Defence and Resistance, has an AoE Resistance debuff and gets a Ranged attack.

It's "better" on a Stalker, because they get Build Up and Assassin's Strike which shores up their Single Target damage considerably... and it also gets an automatic built-in copy of Perfection of Body (almost always the best stance) rather than you having to "waste" a power pick on Staff Mastery.
Also on a Tanker; the Gauntlet inherent shores up their AoE damage considerably (Eye of the Storm rises from 10ft+10 Targets to 15ft+16 targets; and both Innocuous Strikes and Guarded Spin drastically increase their Cone width and double their Target Caps) so it's actually pretty decent there assuming your goal is AoE woodchippering.
 

Edited November 27 by Maelwys

[Polecat]

7 hours ago, Maelwys said:

IMO Staff's fine performancewise on Stalkers and Tankers, and the Utility of self-buffing both Resistance and Defense makes it passable on Brutes too. But if they're prepared to speed up the animations I'm not gonna say no 😉

 

In terms of the weapon model options though? Yeah 100% agreed. A lot of the existing ones aren't even symmetrical which really grates on my OCD... I'm essentially left with a choice between a bandaged twig or a double sided Q-tip.

[EDIT] - FWIW I just checked the Wiki's page on Staff Weapon Customization and it's only got 9 out of the possible 21 options listed; so some folk may be mistaken about the current range of options. There are a few good ones; but unfortunately only two which are symmetrical (other than the standard 'plain bland narrow cylinder' in various levels of shininess) - "Studded" and "Wrapped". I'm not expecting fully animated Staffchucks here; but would a Darth-Maul-esque double sided lightstick really be too much to ask for? 😜

 

I won't argue that the anims could use a slight tweak, when the "assassin strike" animation is long enough the game frequently cuts it off to restore the normal standing animations you know it's on the long side. Hell, the preview of the animation never shows the actual strike, just the warm-up.

 

That said, I agree totally about the options not being symmetrical and mostly focusing on spear or weighted variants. If I recall, the original version didn't unlock a lot of other staves that the HC crew made available to us (Staff of the Nemesis and the Carnival of Light trio, for example). But that focus from the original game on using the staff in a lop-sised manner also comes through on the animations. For those of us looking for a Donatello or Nightwing/Robin type of fighting, this ain't it. But honestly, the animations were set by Cyrptic way back when, so I wasn't gonna complain about that.

 

So yeah, I just wanted to air some grievances about the single most important aspect of the game, at least for me: The costume. As I said, staff technically has more choices than some others (Claws, for example, has far less options than staff does), but it really does feel much more thin when it comes to what it does.

[ZacKing]

2 hours ago, Ghost said:

I hear this complaint from time to time, and I’m guessing it’s about number crunching?

 

It's from the set being pure crap on a Scrapper.

[Yomo Kimyata]

No doubt that we could use more staff skins.  Full support on that.

 

As far as improving the set, I'm still against it.  Guarded Spin is an absolute monster for survival, and you can focus on things like Experimentation for additional damage.  Will other sets give you more damage?  Sure, but staff is amazing for survivability.  Staff and Titan weapons are the only two scrapper sets that enable an AoE +defense buff, and I'll still take staff over the on again off again nature of titan weapons.  For brute and especially tankers, whose survivability is rarely if ever in question, yeah I see how you would not want to play staff.  

 

So I guess I'm continuing to call for a tanker nerf.

[Ghost]

1 hour ago, ZacKing said:

 

It's from the set being pure crap on a Scrapper.

Yeah, but in what way?

 

I enjoy playing it, but I am also not the person who stares incessantly at the stats.  
If a power works, and is enjoyable - that’s enough for me.

 

Is it missing something?

does it lag behind other set when it comes to DPS?  If so, how far behind?  
 

[Zect]

5 minutes ago, Ghost said:

Yeah, but in what way?

 

DPS. The scrapper forums have always had a notable bias for sustained ST dps, especially of the kind measured by pylon tests, because this is the most easily quantifiable kind.

 

How much it lags behind the other sets isn't really the point, because this is a symptom of a broader problem with balance. The coh meta has generally shifted towards dps to the exclusion of everything else. There is very little tolerance in the community, especially among its most vocal members, for sets that do not offer good dps regardless of what other benefits they bring. The changes that players support are ones that either add dps, or add dps with extra steps (e.g. procs, -res).

 

It is fairly common to hear people opine that "reducing (dps) differences between sets will improve balance". Such utterances sound reasonable at first, until you use your brain and realize what they really mean: there is nothing a power set can offer that is worth a hit to dps.

[Ghost]

7 minutes ago, Zect said:

 

DPS. The scrapper forums have always had a notable bias for sustained ST dps, especially of the kind measured by pylon tests, because this is the most easily quantifiable kind.

 

How much it lags behind the other sets isn't really the point, because this is a symptom of a broader problem with balance. The coh meta has generally shifted towards dps to the exclusion of everything else. There is very little tolerance in the community, especially among its most vocal members, for sets that do not offer good dps regardless of what other benefits they bring. The changes that players support are ones that either add dps, or add dps with extra steps (e.g. procs, -res).

 

It is fairly common to hear people opine that "reducing (dps) differences between sets will improve balance". Such utterances sound reasonable at first, until you use your brain and realize what they really mean: there is nothing a power set can offer that is worth a hit to dps.

So by that standard, should all dps be the exact on scrappers, regardless of powers?

 

Dorsnt that go back to bring a “number cruncher” issue?

To me, pure crap means unplayable to everyone.
It is playable to the average player.  
The only people who deem it unplayable are those that need every last ounce of damage on every strike - correct?

I get it.  High end elites and speed runners will nitpick the DPS, and need everything they can get.  So for them, it’s no good.

For those of us that enjoy playing without worrying if it’s doing Maxx plus super damage on every shot - I don’t see a problem.

[arcane]

6 hours ago, Ghost said:

I hear this complaint from time to time, and I’m guessing it’s about number crunching?

 

I love playing my staff/WP scrapper - probably my 2nd favorite toon.

It feels a lot like Kinetic Melee in terms of feeling sluggish due to long activations and low DPA. The Sky Splitter mitigation buffs are a nice bonus, but I don’t think they quite justify how bad the damage is.

 

When I log into my Ice/Staff Tanker, I don’t assume I’ll be contributing any significant amount of DPS to the team.

Edited November 27 by arcane

[Ghost]

1 hour ago, arcane said:

It feels a lot like Kinetic Melee in terms of feeling sluggish due to long activations and low DPA. The Sky Splitter mitigation buffs are a nice bonus, but I don’t think they quite justify how bad the damage is.

 

When I log into my Ice/Staff Tanker, I don’t assume I’ll be contributing any significant amount of DPS to the team.

Thanks for the reply.  
It’s weird how different players have different perceptions of the same power.

I tried Kinetic Melee, and it was painfully slow too me.

I don’t feel that with staff.

 

I also don’t feel that I’m not contributing to damage.  Admittedly I’ve never tried staff on a tank or brute, so I might feel differently about damage with them.

My favorite TF is the ITF, and I’ve never had an issue taking down one of the Minotaurs when I’ve found myself alone.

we must be looking at things differently.
Oh well.  I’m sure there are powers or toons I hate that others on here love.

 

Edited November 27 by Ghost

[Wavicle]

3 hours ago, Zect said:

It is fairly common to hear people opine that "reducing (dps) differences between sets will improve balance". Such utterances sound reasonable at first, until you use your brain and realize what they really mean: there is nothing a power set can offer that is worth a hit to dps.

 

While I think that some members of our community excessively devalue the contributions of non-dps class features, I also think that non-dps class features are often overvalued by the devs. I agree that dps differences should be Reduced but not Removed. Someone with no CC or Buffs SHOULD be doing more damage than someone who has those abilities, but not by SO much that the CC and Buffs are deemed valueless.

[Rudra]

13 minutes ago, Wavicle said:

 

While I think that some members of our community excessively devalue the contributions of non-dps class features, I also think that non-dps class features are often overvalued by the devs. I agree that dps differences should be Reduced but not Removed. Someone with no CC or Buffs SHOULD be doing more damage than someone who has those abilities, but not by SO much that the CC and Buffs are deemed valueless.

That is a highly subjective topic. What some deem valueless, others find highly valuable. It boils down to the individual player and his/her/their play style preferences.

 

(Edit: Personally, I'm glad there are sets for each AT that cater to different play styles. It gives us the ability to play to our own play styles instead if all having to be the exact same just because we are playing the same ATs.)

 

Edited November 27 by Rudra

[Yomo Kimyata]

2 hours ago, arcane said:

It feels a lot like Kinetic Melee in terms of feeling sluggish due to long activations and low DPA. The Sky Splitter mitigation buffs are a nice bonus, but I don’t think they quite justify how bad the damage is.

 

I believe the reason that people hate on KM is not because it's a bad powerset.  It's great.  But it has two things working against it:  the safety it provides via -damage to foes is disregarded because who gives a flying fuck about protection in this meta?; and it tends to have an uncharacteristically long lag when you look at animation time before effect.  You want to click a button and kill everyone instantly.  Shoot, Smashing Blow has a longer animation time before effect than animation time!!!  

 

If you don't eat your meat, how can you have any pudding?

[srmalloy]

14 hours ago, Maelwys said:

I'm not expecting fully animated Staffchucks here; but would a Darth-Maul-esque double sided lightstick really be too much to ask for?

I'd have to go back and run Sovnya through her attacks in the Vanguard base, but I'm pretty sure that for at least one of the attacks -- the ranged attack -- the animation would have you holding the double-ended lightstick by one of the blades, which doesn't work in "canon". Working from memory, several of the animations have you taking a wider grip on the staff than would be feasible from, say, bodging two of the 'Event Horizon' broadsword models together. So this would need animation changes as well as a new custom weapon, which I'm sure pushes it way down on the priority list for a costume 'want'.

[Maelwys]

33 minutes ago, srmalloy said:

I'm pretty sure that for at least one of the attacks -- the ranged attack -- the animation would have you holding the double-ended lightstick by one of the blades, which doesn't work in "canon". Working from memory, several of the animations have you taking a wider grip on the staff than would be feasible from, say, bodging two of the 'Event Horizon' broadsword models together. 

 

If you take the second screenshot in my post further up as a reference point, at no stage in any of the attack animations do either of the character's hands touch the staff outside of the "wrapped" middle area. The Ranged attack (Serpent's Reach) does involve them holding the staff pretty close to their body then letting go with their "offhand" as they extend it out... but they're still grasping it in the middle with their main hand.

 

Actually even on a huge model body the edges of the Staff never actually make contact with the head or torso, the worst that might happen is a bit of "clipping" with bulkier costume pieces and capes. So IMO there's actually a good bit of wiggle room for variants that are "sharp at both ends"... 🔦⚔️😉

[Polecat]

5 hours ago, Maelwys said:

 

If you take the second screenshot in my post further up as a reference point, at no stage in any of the attack animations do either of the character's hands touch the staff outside of the "wrapped" middle area. The Ranged attack (Serpent's Reach) does involve them holding the staff pretty close to their body then letting go with their "offhand" as they extend it out... but they're still grasping it in the middle with their main hand.

 

Actually even on a huge model body the edges of the Staff never actually make contact with the head or torso, the worst that might happen is a bit of "clipping" with bulkier costume pieces and capes. So IMO there's actually a good bit of wiggle room for variants that are "sharp at both ends"... 🔦⚔️😉

 

I'd actually call out two powers in Staff that have you hold it from one of the ends. Very specifically "Serpent's Reach", which holds the staff near one end to extend the staff fully. The models I see have it hold the staff about 3/4s towards the end, and the staff lurches forward in their grip during the animation. This is seen very clearly if you use the "Staff of Stheno" on a female hero, as the staff will literally leave the characters hand for a moment. The other animation for "Sky Splitter" has the character hold the staff once again in that last quarter of the staff and slam it down on the ground. Again, if you use a female model,  the staff of Stheno literally will come out of her hands at the point of impact.  So yeah, the staff can't be 'sharp' at both ends, because one end, especially for female avatars, are where the staff is held.

 

EDIT: Just going over the animations, seems the 3rd high level staff ability I overlooked. "Innocuous Strikes" has a female avatar grab the staff right near the base for a series of pokes at the enemy's feet. So that's another animation ruling out having a staff that's "sharp" at both ends....   And Confront, the animation for females holds the staff very close to the end as well. Even Precise Strike and Mercurial blow have the right hand stay at the lower quarter of the staff. This causes female toon's hands to clip into anything near the base (Re: the Studded staff).

Edited November 28 by Polecat

[arcane]

7 hours ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

 

I believe the reason that people hate on KM is not because it's a bad powerset.  It's great.  But it has two things working against it:  the safety it provides via -damage to foes is disregarded because who gives a flying fuck about protection in this meta?; and it tends to have an uncharacteristically long lag when you look at animation time before effect.  You want to click a button and kill everyone instantly.  Shoot, Smashing Blow has a longer animation time before effect than animation time!!!  

 

If you don't eat your meat, how can you have any pudding?

Hasn’t DPS testing objectively proven that both KM and Staff are terrible at least in that department? For non-stalkers, that is. I don’t feel like finding the threads.

 

Now, there can be reasons to have bad single target DPS. Like good AoE DPS or good mitigation. Spines or Staff, for example, have some of that, but KM is just bad at every category.

[Maelwys]

5 hours ago, Polecat said:

 

I'd actually call out two powers in Staff that have you hold it from one of the ends. Very specifically "Serpent's Reach", which holds the staff near one end to extend the staff fully. The models I see have it hold the staff about 3/4s towards the end, and the staff lurches forward in their grip during the animation. This is seen very clearly if you use the "Staff of Stheno" on a female hero, as the staff will literally leave the characters hand for a moment.

Looks like this differs depending on the model gender and size - the character model I've been using never grasps the "unwrapped" bit.








The staff of Stheno looks particularly ridiculous; even if it's a shorter weapon model than the rest...




Anyways; the discrepancy ought to be easy to rectify by stretching the weapon model a bit - see some of the currently "pointy at both ends" albeit asymmetrical options:



In this case whilst the male model is holding it closer to their chest; the female model still has their hand firmly on the central shaft (stop giggling, you at the back!)

 

This can be seen more clearly during the extend/retract stage of the thrust (I said STOP IT!)
 

To me it still looks like there's nothing wrong with the pose itself, only the points at which the model's hands are making contact with the weapon; which AFAIK is quite tweakable. It also ought to be possible to extend the "left" portion of the staff here a bit too (although admittedly there may be a bit of a balancing act between that and not accidentally cutting off their own feet during a Guarded Spin!)

[Maelwys]

5 hours ago, arcane said:

Hasn’t DPS testing objectively proven that both KM and Staff are terrible at least in that department? For non-stalkers, that is. I don’t feel like finding the threads.

Yep. Like this one:

Now, Ston's data is to be taken with a big grain of salt because they proc out the attacks and mix a lot of Epic Pool powers in (Gloom + Dark Obliteration/Zapp + Ball Lightning); but you can still observe how Staff's Pylon (ST damage) position is best on a Stalker and its Trapdoor position (mix of ST and AoE damage) is best on a Tanker.

I don't believe there have been (m)any comparative tests done purely on AoE damage output in a saturated horde of mobs (e.g. AE farming or ITFs). However my own experience is that Staff Fighting is actually pretty damn good in that dept on a Tanker because the AoE damage potential of the set gets drastically increased by Gauntlet (unlike other powersets which have fewer AoEs and/or don't get the full benefit of both the radius AND target cap buffs)... and the +Defence buffs and -Resistance debuffs that get thrown out whilst it's spamming its AoEs certainly don't hurt.

As a very very rough example: my Bio/Staff Tanker regularly runs America's Angel's S/L damage Meteor Farm Map solo on +4x8. They complete that map comfortably in well under 5mins with no epic powers taken at all and with their healthbar hardly budging; despite the below base stats (note the poor Melee/S/L Defense and only 75% resistances; this becomes Softcapped + Hardcapped whenever they actually start actually spamming attacks!)



So I actually consider Staff to be one of the better performing Tanker melee sets, providing you're playing on +Nx8 and not constantly soloing pylons.
 

Edited November 28 by Maelwys

[Wilky]

I'm HUNGRY FOR THE POWER 💯