Focused Feedback: Tanker - Archetype Inherent Changes

[Shin Magmus]

   I really think that if you're going to post test times, it should be the same powerset but on different ATs: to assess whether the Tanker performs better or worse with Broadsword than the Brute with Broadsword etc.  Also, you will never convince the dev team (or even Shin) that Tankers are in trouble just because their solo clear time is slower than the other 3 ATs, because Tankers are also tougher solo than the other 3 ATs.

 

   On large teams you have buffs flying left and right, so the main time that Tanker increased bulk is really noticeable is... on small teams or when soloing.  The devs will see the tankiest AT dealing the least damage as WAI.  You need something else to make your case.  That's why I hone in on the AoEs because it is a literal quote from design statements and devs that "Tankers are AoE specialists", but the way I see them after these changes they are not... and in fact reduced to being AoE shittylists.

[ExeErdna]

6 minutes ago, Shin Magmus said:

   I really think that if you're going to post test times, it should be the same powerset but on different ATs: to assess whether the Tanker performs better or worse with Broadsword than the Brute with Broadsword etc.  Also, you will never convince the dev team (or even Shin) that Tankers are in trouble just because their solo clear time is slower than the other 3 ATs, because Tankers are also tougher solo than the other 3 ATs.

 

   On large teams you have buffs flying left and right, so the main time that Tanker increased bulk is really noticeable is... on small teams or when soloing.  The devs will see the tankiest AT dealing the least damage as WAI.  You need something else to make your case.  That's why I hone in on the AoEs because it is a literal quote from design statements and devs that "Tankers are AoE specialists", but the way I see them after these changes they are not... and in fact reduced to being AoE shittylists.

 

Yeah, I can agree, Tankers were never really AOE specs unless you were running Elec, Staff, and Titan which can reach out pretty well. Yet most secondaries have 1 really good AOE and the rest are ok. It's why to me at least Primaries with damage always stood out. 

 

[tricon]

My problem already begins with whether it makes sense to use the trapdoor mission to test performance of Tanks, the whole thing is not exactly challenging. I understand why it is used in the community to compare the performance of the offensive forces but we got into this situation because you can't also forget how tough this class is compared to eveyone else.

 

As an example I like to test performance on my chars on e.g. the last Mission from Sister Solaris at +4/x8 without npc help, where you fight groups of  Talons of Vengance and full groups of Boss Minos & Cyclops. So you have a mix of mobs that can nuke you, fly, summen you, are immune to cc and have a T9 like Unstopple and then you fight 2 EB/AV at the end. 

 

My EM/Psy Brute and Dark/Fire tank got never ever in trouble not a second, did not even need insperations. Playing this on a squishy is a lot more unnerving and results sometimes in defeats. Playing the Dark/Psy sets on a Scrapper and Stalker vs Brute and Tanks was very eye opening and thats before we even talk about damage potential. 

 

 

Well, I don't have a solution at hand that would be fair. IMHO just find it very difficult to find a good way to really balance the whole thing out

 

[Erratic1]

58 minutes ago, ExeErdna said:

 

Yeah, I can agree, Tankers were never really AOE specs unless you were running Elec, Staff, and Titan which can reach out pretty well. Yet most secondaries have 1 really good AOE and the rest are ok. It's why to me at least Primaries with damage always stood out. 

 

 

Or you built up your +Recharge and took Epic area powers.

[Erratic1]

46 minutes ago, tricon said:

My problem already begins with whether it makes sense to use the trapdoor mission to test performance of Tanks, the whole thing is not exactly challenging. I understand why it is used in the community to compare the performance of the offensive forces but we got into this situation because you can't also forget how tough this class is compared to eveyone else.

 

If your goal is to test damage output, then why does challenge matter? More challenging content is going to favor a Tanker because they are more survivable, but that does not address the way you end missions--by dealing sufficient damage to defeat targets.

[Maelwys]

1 hour ago, Erratic1 said:

If your goal is to test damage output, then why does challenge matter? 

It doesn't; as long as comparing damage output (or even mission completion times) between different Archetypes and Tankers is the goal here.

But is it only damage output that we're being asked to test?
  

22 hours ago, Player-1 said:

Something that would be beneficial now that we have a wide array of testers is to compare results between Tankers and their contemporaries (Brutes and Scrappers). This latest patch readjusted cone attacks to be more comparable to other melee archetypes, leading to better direct comparisons. The more data we can get with actual mission results between these archetypes, the better we can adjust values to help everyone have a fun role to play.

 

The bit about Cone attacks makes me think that yes; this is mainly about comparing damage output and/or clear times across different ATs.
And if so then Pylon times, Trapdoor times, AE Office Mission Simulator times (Galaxy Brain's still got it published on Test as Arc ID 23878 and on Live as 57885) all work.
Therefore Uun's +2x8 Trapdoor should be grand too - I assume that would have been as a Lv50+1 character if the Alpha and Interface slots were active.

I'm happy to do some runs over the next few evenings as/when I can find the time; but it'd probably be best if we can all agree on a common test case.

[Uncle Shags]

If we're just comparing damage it should be a mission with wet noodle enemies that run to melee and stay there. 

[Erratic1]

52 minutes ago, Maelwys said:

But is it only damage output that we're being asked to test?

 

Payer-1's request was:

 

Quote

Something that would be beneficial now that we have a wide array of testers is to compare results between Tankers and their contemporaries (Brutes and Scrappers). This latest patch readjusted cone attacks to be more comparable to other melee archetypes, leading to better direct comparisons. The more data we can get with actual mission results between these archetypes, the better we can adjust values to help everyone have a fun role to play.

 

I think it is understood Tankers are more survivable than Brutes are more survivable than Scrappers. Not saying testing more challenging content is meaningless just the most salient factor, given what has changed for Tankers, is damage.

[Uun]

8 hours ago, JayboH said:

Jeez...  5 minute difference between builds is huge btw

Agreed, although I'll note that the Dark/Dark has Cardiac Alpha (not Musculature).

[twozerofoxtrot]

Would like to test more but really gated by time available this week.

 

Used Galaxy Brain's Office Mission Simulator on Beta at +4/8, Bosses, No Insps/Destiny/Active Hybrid. Will try to ensure all tested characters have Musc Core, Reactive Radial, and Assault Hybrid (Core/Radial doesn't matter inactive).

Not doing exact 1-for-1 tests because some of these characters aren't fully leveled on Live. Some are, some aren't. I took what I had that felt relevant and ran them.

Warning: there is music and you might hate it. I put it on repeat because I like it and it helps me track how long I'm taking.

 

BA/Nin Scrapper - 9:37
 

Spoiler

Elec/Fire Tanker - 8:20
 

Spoiler

MA/Bio Brute - 6:40
 

Spoiler

Fiery/BA Tanker - 7:06

 

Spoiler

 

Claws/Bio Scrapper - 6:18

 

Spoiler

=================

 

Edited 12 hours ago by twozerofoxtrot
Current Lead: Claws/Bio Scrapper 6:18

[stryve]

Have some extra time today, so I've been trying out my Tankers in Galaxy Brain's Office Mission Simulator.  Nothing valid as a comparative test yet, mostly just familiarizing myself with the mission (so I don't was time hunting for a missed group) and re-familiarizing myself with a few toons I haven't been playing lately.  My major initial impression is the performance differences between cone radius and arc.  In general, I find arc is more important than radius for consistently hitting more targets in the middle of combat.  I had a decent selection of cone sizes between Ice Melee, Dark Melee, Kinetic Melee, and Titan Weapons:

• Ice Melee - 10ft 90°
• Dark Melee - 7ft 120°
• Kinetic Melee - 40ft 45°
• Titan Weapons - 10ft 120° 

Even with a shorter reach, it was easier to hit 5 or more targets with Dark than Ice in the middle of combat.  The extra reach wasn't useless, especially on approach, but even with active repositioning I was more likely to hit fewer than 5 targets with Ice.  Titan Weapons had the best of both worlds, but still required active positioning to consistently hit more than 5 targets once mobs started moving.  Kinetic Melee is an outlier in multiple ways, and requires jumping entirely out of a group to leverage the cone; I was lucky to get more than 2-3 hits while surrounded.  These were all run at x8 to be clear.

 

I'll try to run some more controlled tests later, with comparisons to Scrappers and Brutes.

[Excraft]

7 hours ago, tricon said:

My problem already begins with whether it makes sense to use the trapdoor mission to test performance of Tanks, the whole thing is not exactly challenging.

 

Not only that, it doesn't represent actual team play where a tank isn't doing the highest DPS.  In a team setting, Tank DPS is minimal, if any at all due to the overwhelming DPS coming from the damage dealers on a team.  There are Hami raids running all the time on Excel where melee are discouraged in favor of bringing blasters or corruptors.  Those kinds of things are an indication to me that tanks aren't doing too much DPS.  My TW brutes and scrappers can do great DPS soloing.  Those same toons on a team can struggle to keep Momentum going due to lack of targets unless I hotdog it and split off from the rest of the group to solo.  

 

I understand that Trapdoor and Pylons are used as a test.  I just don't think that their results are all that meaningful.

[Erratic1]

51 minutes ago, Excraft said:

I understand that Trapdoor and Pylons are used as a test.  I just don't think that their results are all that meaningful.

 

People do solo and solo play is meaningful.

[Player-1]

1 hour ago, Excraft said:

I understand that Trapdoor and Pylons are used as a test.  I just don't think that their results are all that meaningful.

 

Hello Excraft,

 

There will never be a "perfect" test, but running the same mission across similar characters is the best way to isolate variables down to just the differences between those characters. Its possible to add teammates and do a repeated test as well, but that requires much more overhead and is not as controlled as the same player taking the relatively same actions.

[Heatstroke]

I'm concerned that none of the Devs have commented on how hard this hits SS, which without rage running full time is a woefully underperforming set, and limited in its AoE.. 

 

 

This tanker change hits that set really hard IMO

[Player-1]

8 minutes ago, Heatstroke said:

I'm concerned that none of the Devs have commented on how hard this hits SS, which without rage running full time is a woefully underperforming set, and limited in its AoE.. 

 

 

This tanker change hits that set really hard IMO

 

Individual powersets, particularly melee, will be reviewed seperately from archetype changes as they can impact other archetypes.

[Uun]

12 hours ago, Auroxis said:

If these were characters you copied from live, could you run trapdoor with those tankers on live to compare?

	Beta	Live
Fire/Fire tank	10:07	11:15
Dark/Dark tank	14:56	11:30
SR/Staff tank	14:20	13:14

 

Rezzing bosses are a bit of wild card, hence the increase in the Fire/Fire time. Dark/Dark clearly benefits from the larger radius and target cap on Shadow Maul.

 

[R jobbus]

I am not really a fan of none of(or not alot of) the testing being done at +4x8. hopefully that's not the case.

 

As the difficulty gets higher, what is going to work for it will lessen. By nerfing tankers considerably, it's going to make people who like +4x8 (and harder difficulties) gravitate towards things less hurt by this nerf, battle axe, fire melee, and the best performing sets. Things that are hurt more from it, like tanker broadsword, db, tw, claws, em, savage, katana to a degree, war mace's aoe, and on and on, become quite a bit less fun to play on harder difficulties. The harder difficulty makes the differences between performance show up very clearly, and suddenly all these minions who either heal/add defense debuffs/add a little more damage/ranged damage aren't dying when they normally should. This is the sort of thing that should be tested, at +4x8.

 

And I know that it's been said that 'individual powersets will be looked at' but that's alot of them to look at. There's alot of stuff that is hurt by this nerf when you turn the difficulty up. I think city of heroes is at it's best when alot of powers are viable, and this nerf is surely testing the fun factor if you play above +3 for many tanker secondaries

[Uun]

1 hour ago, Uun said:

	Beta	Live
Fire/Fire tank	10:07	11:15
Dark/Dark tank	14:56	11:30
SR/Staff tank	14:20	13:14

 

Rezzing bosses are a bit of wild card, hence the increase in the Fire/Fire time. Dark/Dark clearly benefits from the larger radius and target cap on Shadow Maul.

Did another Dark/Dark run on Beta with Alpha switched to Musculature: 11:16

[Uun]

23 hours ago, Uun said:

Staff/Innocuous Strikes has the incorrect arc. It's currently 135 degrees and should be 90 degrees. The arc change was applied when p2 was released to beta and wasn't reverted with Build 6, This power never received a radius change.

Despite the patch note to the contrary, this was NOT fixed in today's patch.

[Excraft]

2 hours ago, Erratic1 said:

People do solo and solo play is meaningful.

 

I never said it wasn't or even suggested it wasn't.  You've completely missed what I was saying.

 

2 hours ago, Player-1 said:

Hello Excraft,

 

There will never be a "perfect" test, but running the same mission across similar characters is the best way to isolate variables down to just the differences between those characters. Its possible to add teammates and do a repeated test as well, but that requires much more overhead and is not as controlled as the same player taking the relatively same actions.

 

Thanks for the response and your understanding.  It's appreciated.  Don't get me wrong, I understand why these are used as test scenarios and that they provide data based on how individual characters with individual sets will perform.  I just don't know that I really think that these results are what should be used to determine adjustments.  Soloing one mission over and over or standing in one place punching a pylon isn't really standard activity in a game where people are teaming up for missions, TFs/SFs, iTrials, raids etc.  Again, using my TW scrapper as example, it performs much better with much higher DPS when solo.  That goes for any of my characters regardless of AT/set choices.  If I go by those solo results, the TW set is way overpowered and vastly outperforms other sets, like my Kinetic Melee scrapper.  With that said, put either one of them in a team setting and both aren't doing anywhere near the same DPS and performing poorly compared to soloing.  How much DPS you're generating is highly dependent on what enemies are being fought as well.  

 

I guess the best way to describe is that tests like this seem to want to make adjustments/nerfs to "correct" spreadsheet numbers at the expense of team play and how the game actually flows.  I personally do not care if Tankers do 2% better DPS than a brute in a solo mission or standing idle punching a pylon.  

 

I understand why you all want to use these as test cases.  No need to change that.  You all make whatever changes you like based on whatever spreadsheet criteria you like.  Nothing I or anyone else here will say can change that.  I just thought I'd offer my 2 inf on it.  Thanks for all the work you all put into the game.  It's appreciated, even if I disagree with some of the changes you all make.

[Erratic1]

45 minutes ago, Excraft said:

 

I never said it wasn't or even suggested it wasn't.  You've completely missed what I was saying.

 

No you didn't, but you excluded it from having any worth of consideration. Trapdoor is a test of solo play and it removes a lot of variables which can obscure and muddle understanding of results.

 

And for the record, it is poor form to assume what a person understands. I addressed what was not being covered, nothing more.

 

 

 

Edited Wednesday at 11:09 PM by Erratic1

[Uncle Shags]

19 hours ago, Lazarillo said:

Does it?  Or should that not be counted as an inherent leg up that all Tankers get that not all Scrappers have access to?

Does it skew the results?  Honestly, I think so, but can't say how much,  as I don't solo, and don't run tests (until recently for this patch). But I know it was a significant issue when I ran my blaster, compared to my tanks. And I've read that other people have mentioned it in speed test threads. Chasing runners takes time. Baddies moving out of your aoes slows you down. 

 

All I'm saying is that if we're trying to compare damage from one AT to another, a taunt aura is a confounding variable.

 

For example, scrapper Burn causes baddies to run in fear. Tanker Burn they just stand in and melt. Is the fire tank doing more damage, faster? Maybe. But I'd argue that's more of a test of a game mechanic (taunt) than it is a test of damage. 

 

If you're suggesting that taunt auras be ignored in testing, I'd disagree.  It would be like doing pylon testing where the pylon stood still for some builds, and everyone else had to chase it down.

[Erratic1]

57 minutes ago, Excraft said:

That goes for any of my characters regardless of AT/set choices.  If I go by those solo results, the TW set is way overpowered and vastly outperforms other sets, like my Kinetic Melee scrapper.  With that said, put either one of them in a team setting and both aren't doing anywhere near the same DPS and performing poorly compared to soloing.  How much DPS you're generating is highly dependent on what enemies are being fought as well.  

 

The point it not comparing apples to oranges (or golf balls) but apples to apples--that is what testing (a) the same build live versus test server on the same mission and (b) testing ATs on the same mission are giving. It is not meant to be some, overarching, this is how powerset compares to powerset (in this case) but rather how the AT is performing. The context is how the changes are impacting Tankers performance and Trapdoor is a controlled setting. Physics is taught to students in context of simplified systems (see the meaning of 'spherical cow'). You consider trajectories being parabolas by ignoring air resistance. You consider elliptical orbits of planets by ignoring the impact each of the planets have on each other. Trapdoor is a simplification and objecting that it isn't real or encompassing of the totality of the Tanker experience is ignoring what the question is context of what the data is providing.

[ivanhedgehog]

9 hours ago, Erratic1 said:

 

Payer-1's request was:

 

 

I think it is understood Tankers are more survivable than Brutes are more survivable than Scrappers. Not saying testing more challenging content is meaningless just the most salient factor, given what has changed for Tankers, is damage.

damage is, after all, what is being nerfed