Please turn all mez protection powers into toggles

[molten_dragon]

Most defense sets have their mez protection as a toggle.  A few have it spread out among the set's other toggles.  And a few of them have their mez protection as a click power.  As far as mez protection goes, click powers are strictly inferior to toggles.  To start with, it's not possible to make their duration permanent until you can slot SOs or level 25 IOs, meaning they provide less protection than a toggle power.  And you either have to remember to click them every two minutes or use your one and only auto-fire slot for them.

 

And there's not much about the click powers that really balances out these drawbacks either.  They don't provide a higher degree of protection, they don't come earlier in the sets, they're just inferior.  Making them toggle powers would be a (seemingly) simple quality of life improvement for the people that play these sets.

[MetaVileTerror]

Alternatively, putting something else in to the Power, like some coding that allows them to be used _while_ Stunned/Held/etc (like a Breakfree) or some other utility might go a long way to making them compelling choices.

[Steampunkette]

Put simply: Click Mez is superior.

 

Yeah. You don't have to remember a toggle. But a toggle is a constant end-drain, sucking away just a tiny bit of your power that could be spent on an attack. And a lot of enemy groups don't really -have- Mez until you're SO level (Circle of Thorns being the big exception because low-level Thorns are monsters)

 

But with a Click? It functions like a Break Free. Click it when you need it, and don't bother with it the rest of the time. Or click it right before you run into a fight where you're going to be dealing with me. Once it's SO slotted it'll always be ready either at the start of a fight with mez, or in the middle of it.

 

I love click protection. It's so -rare- and useful and people always poo poo on it 'cause it's different from the Meztoggle or Mez across toggles powers.

 

... that said. Master Brawler exists as a precedent. So maybe the Devs have different thoughts on the matter. Or at least think there should be room for both in a given set... So let's see how it shakes out.

 

Personally I'd rather have both options than only toggles.

 

1 minute ago, MetaVileTerror said:

Alternatively, putting something else in to the Power, like some coding that allows them to be used _while_ Stunned/Held/etc (like a Breakfree) or some other utility might go a long way to making them compelling choices.

It already works that way. Has for a long time.

Edited August 26, 2019 by Steampunkette

[MunkiLord]

Shield Defense being a click gives me extra DDR when it's double stacked, so I'm not a fan of this suggestion. At least for Shield. 

[Zolgar]

While it's really frustrating to have click Mez protection before you can slot Enough recharge to Perma it, once you have a solid build, you can keep it Perma double stacked, which is actually really strong.

 

I would like to see the duration increased or the recharge decreased, but that's it.

[molten_dragon]

I'd also be completely find with just allowing us to auto-fire a second power, but that seems like it's somewhat of a slippery slope.

[Errants]

17 hours ago, molten_dragon said:

Most defense sets have their mez protection as a toggle.  A few have it spread out among the set's other toggles.  And a few of them have their mez protection as a click power.  As far as mez protection goes, click powers are strictly inferior to toggles.  To start with, it's not possible to make their duration permanent until you can slot SOs or level 25 IOs, meaning they provide less protection than a toggle power.  And you either have to remember to click them every two minutes or use your one and only auto-fire slot for them.

 

And there's not much about the click powers that really balances out these drawbacks either.  They don't provide a higher degree of protection, they don't come earlier in the sets, they're just inferior.  Making them toggle powers would be a (seemingly) simple quality of life improvement for the people that play these sets.

All of them can be stacked, with SO slotting. That's stronger Mez protection, for cheaper EPS cost than the stand-alone toggle protections. All of them are usable as BF's prior to being perma'd.

 

Additionally, Shield gives DDR (stackable), and Ninjitsu gives Psi Resistance (stackable). SR kinda gets screwed, legacy of old design.

[Leogunner]

We should just turn all mez protection into passive. 

 

Heck, let's just turn all armor powers into passive. 

[Leogunner]

20 minutes ago, Eran Rist said:

Additionally, Shield gives DDR (stackable), and Ninjitsu gives Psi Resistance (stackable). SR kinda gets screwed, legacy of old design.

I'd want Practiced Brawler to have stacking res to -movement/-ToHit. There are a lot of debuffs that I'd want but this seem the most thematic. 

[MetaVileTerror]

I mean, not to hijack the specific purpose of this thread, but I'm unsure if Leogunner was being serious or facetious with the "all armour into passive" comment . . . but it gives me an idea.  Why not have them reduce the maximum Endurance instead of constantly ticking Endurance over time?  Wouldn't that also help reduce stress on the servers?

[Williwaw]

That's pretty much what Champions Online does, reduce maximum Endurance instead of having an End cost per second.  And as much as I don't enjoy CO as a game, I still think that's an interesting idea.

 

I do think a change of that magnitude is not in the cards for the game at this point, though.

[Steampunkette]

2 hours ago, MetaVileTerror said:

I mean, not to hijack the specific purpose of this thread, but I'm unsure if Leogunner was being serious or facetious with the "all armour into passive" comment . . . but it gives me an idea.  Why not have them reduce the maximum Endurance instead of constantly ticking Endurance over time?  Wouldn't that also help reduce stress on the servers?

It would!

 

But powers would never detoggle from running out of endurance. Neither would Debuffs. Or things like Telekinesis.

 

If we were going to do something like that we'd have to be -incredibly- careful as to how we went about it.

[MetaVileTerror]

Right, well, not /all/ Toggles, mind you.  Perhaps just a few select Powers which would thematically make sense not to detoggle.

[EyeLuvBooks]

Point 1) I hate click Status powers because, like many players, I make a lot of alts which means LOTS of characters in the teens and low 20s. In order to get your typical click status protection to perma you need 2 lvl 25 SOs or IOs. That means 20 levels with a hole in your status protection that Tanks, Brutes, Scrappers and Stalkers don't have.

 

Point 2) Any sort of -Recharge power widens this hole. My lvl 30 Shield Brute has been mezzed because he was Slowed and his timer ran out. This is something else that the other melee sets don't have.

 

Point 3) For those that say 'Mez isn't a problem until you're high enough to make it Perma anyhow' I cite Buckshot Hellions being able to knock you down at lvl 1.

 

Point 4) I would like to suggest the following change: Simply having the power grants a lvl 2 Status protection for the character as a passive. This means that Mez at or below Lt level will have no effect. The player will have to actually activate the power to have the full effect. With this change Bosses are still a threat (as they should be) but missing the activation of a power won't kill you when the last few Minions are running around.

 

I would be curious to see datamining on this to see if the sets with click status protection are measurably less popular than the other sets.

 

 

[MunkiLord]

40 minutes ago, EyeLuvBooks said:

I would be curious to see datamining on this to see if the sets with click status protection are measurably less popular than the other sets.

 

 

There are currently a few FOTM threads that show the number of ATs and powersets used, so the data is available. 

[Steampunkette]

42 minutes ago, EyeLuvBooks said:

I would be curious to see datamining on this to see if the sets with click status protection are measurably less popular than the other sets.

 

 

Super Reflexes, Ninjitsu, and Shield Defense represent 3 of the top 5 Scrapper Secondaries.

 

 

Super Reflexes and Ninjitsu are the number 1 and number 2 secondary powersets for Stalkers.

 

 

Shield Defense is the second most popular Tanker Primary.

 

 

Only Brutes don't favor SR or Shield, pushing them down to 6th place and 10th place.

Edited September 11, 2019 by Steampunkette

[GM Sijin]

5 hours ago, EyeLuvBooks said:

Point 1) I hate click Status powers because, like many players, I make a lot of alts which means LOTS of characters in the teens and low 20s. In order to get your typical click status protection to perma you need 2 lvl 25 SOs or IOs. That means 20 levels with a hole in your status protection that Tanks, Brutes, Scrappers and Stalkers don't have.

If you 'hate' it, then you have ~10 other armor choices to play. You also have the option of 4-5 slotting the power and putting DOs in there to get it permanent. Respecs are a-plenty in Homecoming. Also generally status protection isn't available until 8-12 so no it isn't 20 levels of a hole compared to toggles.

 

5 hours ago, EyeLuvBooks said:

Point 2) Any sort of -Recharge power widens this hole. My lvl 30 Shield Brute has been mezzed because he was Slowed and his timer ran out. This is something else that the other melee sets don't have.

This is true, however the flip to this is click powers are generally far less impacted by endurance drain/-recovery debuffs. Pros and cons. Different isn't necessarily worse. SR in particular also has resistance to slows. 

 

5 hours ago, EyeLuvBooks said:

Point 3) For those that say 'Mez isn't a problem until you're high enough to make it Perma anyhow' I cite Buckshot Hellions being able to knock you down at lvl 1.

I'd like to introduce you to Steadfast Protection and Karma knockback protection, available starting at level 7 and can be slotted in any power that accepts resistance or defense sets and can be unslotted or respec'd out of and resold to recoup the majority of any expense (or just kept for future uses). 

 

5 hours ago, EyeLuvBooks said:

Point 4) I would like to suggest the following change: Simply having the power grants a lvl 2 Status protection for the character as a passive. This means that Mez at or below Lt level will have no effect. The player will have to actually activate the power to have the full effect. With this change Bosses are still a threat (as they should be) but missing the activation of a power won't kill you when the last few Minions are running around.

This is a far better suggestion than homogenizing the defensive sets. I don't necessarily agree it's needed, but I still prefer seeing far more of this sort of solution, working within what the power is instead of fundamentally changing how the power works. (Hello, cottage rule)

 

4 hours ago, Steampunkette said:

Only Brutes don't favor SR or Shield, pushing them down to 6th place and 10th place.

And this probably has a lot more to do with the defense to resistance disparity on brutes/tanks than the fact those sets use active mez proteciton.

Edited September 11, 2019 by GM Sijin

[Steampunkette]

12 minutes ago, GM Sijin said:

And this probably has a lot more to do with the defense to resistance disparity on brutes/tanks than the fact those sets use active mez proteciton.

Oh, probably. But the Defense to Resistance Disparity is -why- those powers have Active Mez Protections.

 

A Resistance based set 'Needs' mez protections that are constantly active because they don't dodge mez. It almost always hits and thus the toggle or autopower Mez Protection is more needed.

 

In a Defense Based set, like Ninjitsu, Super Reflexes, and Shield Defense you can dodge incoming control effects whether Melee, Ranged, or AoE. Even sets that have split defenses, like Willpower or Bio Armor, use toggled Mez Protection. Because while those sets might have some Fire or Energy Defense most Mez is Psi or Energy or Smashing.

 

So having those sets be more "Vulnerable" to Mez at low levels (When mez is comparatively rare) is a part of making sure a level 15 Scrapper has about the same survivability whether they're SR or Bio.

[Yoru-hime]

Honestly, the one thing that gets me about the active protections in SR is the regularly recurring animation delay it inflicts when run as an auto-fire. It's not really a big set-breaking deal, but it is a hindrance that I wish wasn't there, particularly when it goes off right after Build Up or while I'm trying to track down a runner.

 

I'm going to give a more manual use-as-needed PB strategy a try tonight and see how that feels.

[Black Zot]

1 hour ago, GM Sijin said:

 

This is true, however the flip to this is click powers are generally far less impacted by endurance drain/-recovery debuffs. Pros and cons. Different isn't necessarily worse. SR in particular also has resistance to slows. 

 

 

I'm getting sick of seeing this argument in particular.  Newsflash: if you're end-drained to the point where toggles drop, you're dead regardless of being mez-shielded or not.  Because all the effects that were keeping the enemy's normal, non-mezzing attacks from smearing you across the floor?  Just.  Got.  Switched.  Off.  Which means all that incoming damage WILL hit you, at full force.  You're not mezzed, but it doesn't matter because you're still helpless.

[Steampunkette]

9 minutes ago, Black Zot said:

 

I'm getting sick of seeing this argument in particular.  Newsflash: if you're end-drained to the point where toggles drop, you're dead regardless of being mez-shielded or not.  Because all the effects that were keeping the enemy's normal, non-mezzing attacks from smearing you across the floor?  Just.  Got.  Switched.  Off.  Which means all that incoming damage WILL hit you, at full force.  You're not mezzed, but it doesn't matter because you're still helpless.

Run.

 

Super easy answer to the problem. An SR/Ninja/Shield character can run away to recover endurance and keep fighting. A mezzed Invuln Tank stands there and dies.

[Black Zot]

Just now, Steampunkette said:

Run.

 

Super easy answer to the problem. An SR/Ninja/Shield character can run away to recover endurance and keep fighting. A mezzed Invuln Tank stands there and dies.

 

If it were possible to outrun projectiles in this game, you might have a point.

 

It's not.

[EyeLuvBooks]

2 hours ago, GM Sijin said:

I'd like to introduce you to Steadfast Protection and Karma knockback protection, available starting at level 7 and can be slotted in any power that accepts resistance or defense sets and can be unslotted or respec'd out of and resold to recoup the majority of any expense (or just kept for future uses). 

 

And I'd like to point out that a significant portion of the players don't use Crafting or the Market AT ALL. This is not an option for them.

 

Also, unless you already have a sugar-daddy character to bankroll you, the sets mentioned are among the most popular (and therefore expensive) IOs in the game before getting into the PvP and purple sets. Sure...I can fix my problem for 10-20 million Inf...or I could IO out almost another whole character with it.

 

I have never thought that using recipes to solve flaws in the game's design to be a good solution.

 

Thanks for mentioning my other suggestion though. I really don't want to wholesale change parts of the game unless it's terminally broken. As has been discussed here, click Status ISN'T really bad, simply less desirable and more difficult than the alternatives. Small problem = small fix which was what I suggested.

[Steampunkette]

11 minutes ago, Black Zot said:

 

If it were possible to outrun projectiles in this game, you might have a point.

 

It's not.

If your endurance gets knocked out and your defenses detoggle you've got time to run. Ranged Attacks almost always do less damage than melee attacks from NPCs, for starters, and most NPCs have more melee attacks than ranged attacks.

 

Unless of course you've been standing there like a gormless tit letting enemies wail on you without fighting back. I suppose if the entire +4x8 spawn happened to have not been even thinned out and all fired their ranged attacks simultaneously at your backside you might actually -be- in danger. But that's not how it's going to play out 9.9 times out of 10, and I think we both know it. By the time a defense character's defenses are down there's some bodies on the floor and the ones remaining probably won't be combining to instantly take you down before you can run 60ft down a cluttered hallway to break LoS.

 

It is easy to run out of range of most enemies. And corners exist for the others. I've played SR and Shield to 50. Don't pretend like running isn't possible, Zot, I've had to do it more than a few times. Freaking Malta.

Edited September 11, 2019 by Steampunkette

[MunkiLord]

28 minutes ago, EyeLuvBooks said:

And I'd like to point out that a significant portion of the players don't use Crafting or the Market AT ALL. This is not an option for them.

 

Also, unless you already have a sugar-daddy character to bankroll you, the sets mentioned are among the most popular (and therefore expensive) IOs in the game before getting into the PvP and purple sets. Sure...I can fix my problem for 10-20 million Inf...or I could IO out almost another whole character with it.

 

I have never thought that using recipes to solve flaws in the game's design to be a good solution.

 

Thanks for mentioning my other suggestion though. I really don't want to wholesale change parts of the game unless it's terminally broken. As has been discussed here, click Status ISN'T really bad, simply less desirable and more difficult than the alternatives. Small problem = small fix which was what I suggested.

You can get KB protection for less than 10 million.