FoTM as a tool to decide what sets and powers to tweak.

[Razor Cure]

I just found the FoTM (flavour of the month) threads in the Announcements section, and encourage anyone who has not, to go have a look!

There is also this super awesome table, that shows the % that a specific power is taking, in a specific power set (like Repel in Kinetics for example).

https://forums.homecomingservers.com/fotm-powers/

 

From a fairly brief look through this mass of data, some pretty clearly conclusions can be drawn about what Sets are the most popular for the ATs, and what powers are being used, in those sets. I am not going to summarize it all here, as that is a LOT of work and you should look for yourself. It is really interesting.

Some things are pretty obvious, like Ice Melee being way way down, or Scrappers not taking Taunt/Confront powers, but others, at least to me, came as a surprise. I would never have guessed Regen was still so popular, for one.

Naturally, there is always going to be outliers, and perceived 'best' powersets, as well as combos and powers that get picked from an enjoyment or RP reasoning, and that is ok. But when 17000 people have made Spines on a brute, and not even 1500 have made Ice melee..well, something is certainly wrong with that set. Naturally I cherry picked one of the most extreme example, and the numbers will never be equal, but that is a huge difference! 27k Fire armour, to 1870 Ice Armour, as another example.

This could almost (almost) be seen as a reason to nerf FA, but we have to consider that at least (maybe) 75% of those are being made as farmers, along with fire/kin trollers etc etc. So instead of looking at ways to 'nerf' the generally considered top tier sets, I'd view this data as a way to work out what underperforms, and even flat out sucks.

 

Again, it is easier to do that on a Powerset basis, as some people just wont enjoy AT X or Y, no matter what powers they can have. As an example, search that table for FireBlase..96% of people take Fireball and Blaze, so I think we can safely say those powers are at the very very least Well performing. Likewise, only 26% of fire uses and taking Fire Breath (cause it sucks imo) so maybe that could use a tweak. But Fire Blast as a WHOLE is regarded as a great set and near the top in most categories, so should the single 'bad' power in it get attention before an entire Powerset that is seen as Bad? Tough Call for sure.

As I said, I think the data should be used (ideally, there is a lot to look at) to identify the BAD sets and powers (as opposed to teh less good ones) and look at ways to bring them back up to par. Of course, this also brings the HUGE issue of changing some power that a few people totally love to death. Which, as an old energy melee player (ET, RIP) I totally get. And so..the following suggestion:

 

     In teh same way SR on Sentinels has an OPTIONAL power, rework some of these less used sets with options, rather that just changing them. This would let established players of said build continue using what they enjoy, but would encourage new people to try out stuff they might never have bothered with.

 

As a side benefit, things like:

 Optional powers for ALL energy blast or PB powers, to flat out change any KB into KD (no need for an IO, if you LOVE pb's but hate the kb, its gone).

 Armour sets with NO self Rez for those who hate that, and a decent tier 9 thrown in

 Weapon sets like dp/db/staff with a Build Up power, rejigging as needed

 Sets like AR (which..there really is nothing like AR) having normalised cone ranges, or sets like DB for blasters getting a ranged AoE (cause energy blast, archery, and ar, all have cones + an aoe)

 Possible alternate animations for things like Aid Self/Other, attacks (MA already got a lot of alternate animations, Id LOVE some for Rad Blast..neutron bomb for example is so slow)

 CLick Mez protection being opional/exclusive with a toggle mez prot.

 

 

[PaxArcana]

And this sort of effort, is exactly why I wanted to see those same statistics, split up across several level ranges.  Robotics, as a Mastermind primary, looks ridicuously popular overall, and is stil quite strongly dominant at level 50.

 

But when you get down into the 2-32 level range, it barely has a lead over the second-place Primary (Demon Summoning IIRC).  So, the popularity you see in those statistics, is an early surge, not an ongoing trend.  🙂

[MetaVileTerror]

Would there be a way to add a column with "Average hours played" perhaps?  That way one might be able to see the popularity of certain builds by means of time investment in to them?

[PaxArcana]

Level advancement should do that, Meta.

 

Otherwise ... if that data is even in the database, it'd a whole hell of a lot of work to ask of Cipher.  He originally didn't even want to break it down into multiple legel ranges (currently 2-31, 32-49, and 50+) ... except several other people echo'd my original suggestion to do that, and I explained why doing so could be useful (e.g., to spot changing trends in Powerset and/or AT popularity, so as to avoid over-correcting if something seems to have overwhelmingly runaway popularity).

[Razor Cure]

25 minutes ago, PaxArcana said:

And this sort of effort, is exactly why I wanted to see those same statistics, split up across several level ranges.  Robotics, as a Mastermind primary, looks ridicuously popular overall, and is stil quite strongly dominant at level 50.

Very true...but before AssBot (and by extension, Tier 9 attacks and buffs) Robotics kinda lags. It is pretty safe, with bubbles and ehals, but not amazing. Likewise, SuperStren is average to good, pre FootStomp, then just becomes awesome. Same as Fire Armour has average performance TO 50, then with IOs and incarnates, can become a farming machine.

Again though..as a tool to work out what powers need tweaking, the focus should be on the lowest, not the best few.

[GM Sijin]

4 hours ago, PaxArcana said:

Level advancement should do that, Meta.

Not necessarily. Couple hours nets a 50 if you really want it to. Maybe even less than a couple hours. That combined with a whole lotta character slots means it's pretty easy for people who powerlevel to get a number of 50s they don't really play much. How common this practice is I can't fathom a guess.

4 hours ago, PaxArcana said:

if that data is even in the database

It is.

6 hours ago, Razor Cure said:

Possible alternate animations for things like Aid Self/Other, attacks (MA already got a lot of alternate animations, Id LOVE some for Rad Blast..neutron bomb for example is so slow)

Just noting that alternate animations don't actually change the activation time of a power. If the animation is faster than the cast/activation time of a power I believe you end up just standing there unable to do anything for the difference.

 

And there's the issue of aesthetics to consider. A fair number of people build what they think is cool, or looks good. Is ice armor as bad as it looks in the popularity chart? Or is it just that people think it doesn't look good? Popularity of a power does not necessarily dictate its performance relative to other sets on the same popularity chart. Although, perhaps it warrants a different form of discussion if aesthetics is the primary reason a power is unpopular.

 

Finally there is the phenomenon of a bad reputation. Outside of PvP stalkers were considered generally fairly underperforming for the majority of their time on live. I would say that they are no longer underperforming much, if any in team content. Yet they're still the least picked AT after EATs by a notable margin. Is this due to them underperforming? Or is the AT play style just undesirable to the majority? Or is it the reputation that they were just bad nudging people's choice away? Some combination of the last two more than the first, I'd wager.

 

Long story short, numbers aren't everything when it comes to popularity. Better to examine why something is unpopular before jumping to the conclusion that it's purely performance.

[Zodai]

I generally agree that the numbers aren't the only factor, you need to look deeper to understand and interpret the data to get the full picture.  Numbers alone are more like a tool - it's knowledge to use but you should use it to uncover more information, not to act on it alone.

 

In response to GM Sijin's point on stalkers though - since a new powerful build for them seems to be recently discovered, I'm wondering if stalkers will rise in popularity in the near future.  I'm curious to see what happens to their playrate in a month or two if that remains the way it is, whether or not that will push them into jumping popularity-wise or not.  I will admit Scrapper is more appealing to be flavor-wise though.

[Zepp]

While it is true that, in general, popularity is not necessarily a measure of whether an AT or specific powerset is good or not. However, for the powers selected within sets (outside the first power of the secondary) it may be a better measure. There are some powers that are used in less than 50% of builds with that powerset, that may be a redflag... although a surprising number of Tankers take the T9 from their armor set, so it is not a perfect measure...

[Razor Cure]

If something still feels meh by teh time you get your big attacks or support powers, few people are gonna spend more time on it. Also, we must consider that a large portion of the played base are OLD players, and as such, most likely tried a heap of combos on Live. If they found it poor there, and know no changes have been made, why would they bother doing it again? Conversely, if you had toon X on Live, and it was awesome, they would be remaking it .

Look at AR, in regard to Aesthetics and performance. Lotsa people love guns (look at DP) and yet Dp is one of the most made..AR isnt. The animations are old and boring, and the performance isnt anything great, even more so before the snipe changes.

[Rylas]

While the FotM charts are fun to see and, to a certain degree, informative, using them as a basis to see which powers need adjustment is a poor basis for decision making. It's just an appeal to popularity which isn't a logical way to determine if a power is broken or needs adjustment. 

 

Empathy is by far the most popular set for defenders. I like Empathy. I'm always happy to have an Empathy defender on the team. I don't have anything bad to say for the set. But it isn't the strongest set out there in my opinion as far as capabilities go. I'll upset some Empathy fans with that, but it's not a diss towards the set. I'm just pointing out that popularity, doesn't really mean anything on its own. 

[Zepp]

Five of the ten least popular powers are confront (1, Widow Training 4.18%; 3,  Scrapper War Mace 9.23%;5, Scrapper Rad 9.62%; 6, Scrapper Titan 9.64%; 9, Scrapper Elec 10.04%) which suggests that maybe removing confront from Scrapper primaries may be a good idea...

[Steampunkette]

CONTROVERSIAL OPINION TIME

 

I generally do not play characters under level 22 outside of a PLing farm or the DFB. I don't consider my characters to be 'fully formed' until that point, largely because at that point you get your attack chains going, some decent AoE, and the ability to slot SOs.

 

I have 30 characters on Everlasting. Almost all of them are in the level 25-36 range. I have one who is 50 and two in the high 40s. I've been playing for months.

 

I love pretty much all of them, mechanically (Except Supernaturelle, my Petless Demon MM 'cause shit I did not realize just how little damage MMs do). They're all fun to play and I run around Paragon with them at different times 'cause I loves me some Variety. (Brutes and EATs are where my focus is, recently, but outside of Tanker/Scrapper/Defender I have characters of every AT)

 

I'm 900% certain I'm not the only person who plays like this. Mainly because I have friends who do the same thing.

 

Not everyone slams their "Main" to 50 and continues relentlessly playing that character. Not everyone PLs a stable of characters to 50 so they can cover whatever role a given party needs. Not everyone faffs about in Pocket D at level 15 or less forever 'cause they only leveled far enough to get a couple of RP-Centric powers.

 

But a lot do. And we should consider them all in these decisions.

[justicebeliever]

@Steampunketteyou are losing your edge...there was nothing even slightly controversial there.

[quixoteprog]

As a thought, just because a power is not represented on a lvl 50 does not mean it is not worthwhile. Some people may take a pool power or something to fill out their attach chain until they get a better primary power set power at higher level then respec out of it.

 

Someone may have had a power, and gotten good use out of it at some level, then respecced into a different power pre-50 because they changed their build once they got access to the Ancillary Power pool powers.

 

Not saying the list is not valuable. Just that, as Inego Montoya might say, "it may not mean what you think it means".

[justicebeliever]

I think there is utility in using the popularity data to evaluate sets...I don't think we should assume that always means that set is fundamentally broken...but in an ideal state, you would want a lot of parity between AT's, and Powersets...it would mean that people are finding them equally fun, and it means the game has a lot of room to keep people engaged, and playing, over the long term...

 

I also agree that lack of popularity does not equal "this set/AT is broken".  As @GM Sijinsaid, there could be a lot of reasons, but each of them has some remediation...Crappy animations/doesn't look cool means some animation/art work...People don't understand how it works?  Start some Q&A with a developer on the forums, get those promoters on board and you'll see an uptick...Caters to a small niche?  Increase the need for that niche...

[oldskool]

3 minutes ago, justicebeliever said:

People don't understand how it works? 

The one thing that the Power Percentages @ 50 list tells me is player behavior does not equal knowledge.

That might sound harsher than I mean it to, but that Sentinel list of powers taken really shows a trend on behavior vs game mechanics. 

For example, in Dual Pistols the power Dual Wield is taken more often than Pistols.  Its pretty close, and people probably take both more often than not due to the inherent.  However, there is a trend of assumption that the very first power of any given set is weaker than the second option.  This just isn't true in the case of Pistols vs Dual Wield.  So either people do not realize the potential of Pistols, or they just don't care for the animation.  Either way, Pistols doesn't necessarily need a buff just because more people take Dual Wield.  Hell, Dual Wield could probably use a buff as it is unnecessary in a lot of level 50 builds for Sentinels.  

Another interesting and extreme one is Assault Rifle.  More people take Burst or Slug over Disorienting Shot.  Disorienting Shot doesn't need a buff.  Its the highest DPA power in the entire version of the Sentinel AR set.  Slug is, in my opinion, hot garbage but people take it 92% of time per that list.  Slug honestly needs the buff or the damage of Disorienting Shot moved to it or something.  

Dark Blast... Blackstar is taken 63% of the time.  I'm willing to bet this is because the power is PBAoE and most people want their Sentinels in ranged combat only.  I seriously doubt the performance of that power is the reason why it is picked so infrequently because it is a monster at debuffing.  People also Life Drain more often than they take either Umbral Torrent or Dark Obliteration.  That is just absolutely confusing.  I get that Life Drain has a heal component, but the two AoE's of the set do considerable damage.  Where Life Drain is actually kinda pathetic for its Tier as it does less DPA than Gloom and its heal is only 6% vs 10%+ on other ATs.  So I'm going to make an assumption its popularity is due to the utility/gimmick of the heal despite that heal doing very little for most builds.  

I could go on and on, but it looks a hell of lot like for Sentinels there is a big trend of behavior that stems from how those sets perform as Blaster/Defender/Corruptors than the how they are in practice.  People only take Stunning Shot in Sentinel Archery 62% of the time?!  That has to do with how the tool tip reads at power selection or how that power does virtually no damage on others.  Stunning Shot for Sentinels is pretty great.  I can understand some not liking the look of the arrow itself, but the effectiveness of the power is there.  

[Zepp]

3 hours ago, oldskool said:

The one thing that the Power Percentages @ 50 list tells me is player behavior does not equal knowledge.

That might sound harsher than I mean it to, but that Sentinel list of powers taken really shows a trend on behavior vs game mechanics. 

For example, in Dual Pistols the power Dual Wield is taken more often than Pistols.  Its pretty close, and people probably take both more often than not due to the inherent.  However, there is a trend of assumption that the very first power of any given set is weaker than the second option.  This just isn't true in the case of Pistols vs Dual Wield.  So either people do not realize the potential of Pistols, or they just don't care for the animation.  Either way, Pistols doesn't necessarily need a buff just because more people take Dual Wield.  Hell, Dual Wield could probably use a buff as it is unnecessary in a lot of level 50 builds for Sentinels.  

Another interesting and extreme one is Assault Rifle.  More people take Burst or Slug over Disorienting Shot.  Disorienting Shot doesn't need a buff.  Its the highest DPA power in the entire version of the Sentinel AR set.  Slug is, in my opinion, hot garbage but people take it 92% of time per that list.  Slug honestly needs the buff or the damage of Disorienting Shot moved to it or something.  

Dark Blast... Blackstar is taken 63% of the time.  I'm willing to bet this is because the power is PBAoE and most people want their Sentinels in ranged combat only.  I seriously doubt the performance of that power is the reason why it is picked so infrequently because it is a monster at debuffing.  People also Life Drain more often than they take either Umbral Torrent or Dark Obliteration.  That is just absolutely confusing.  I get that Life Drain has a heal component, but the two AoE's of the set do considerable damage.  Where Life Drain is actually kinda pathetic for its Tier as it does less DPA than Gloom and its heal is only 6% vs 10%+ on other ATs.  So I'm going to make an assumption its popularity is due to the utility/gimmick of the heal despite that heal doing very little for most builds.  

I could go on and on, but it looks a hell of lot like for Sentinels there is a big trend of behavior that stems from how those sets perform as Blaster/Defender/Corruptors than the how they are in practice.  People only take Stunning Shot in Sentinel Archery 62% of the time?!  That has to do with how the tool tip reads at power selection or how that power does virtually no damage on others.  Stunning Shot for Sentinels is pretty great.  I can understand some not liking the look of the arrow itself, but the effectiveness of the power is there.  

With Sentinels, because of the Damage/Defense mechanic of the T1/T2 with the inherent, it is likely that Dual Pistols may be preferred by the more defense-oriented crowd, whereas Assault Rifle may tend towards players that prefer offensive tact. In such a case, the skipping of the juicy T2 may be to prevent defensive opportunity from triggering. As for Life Drain, it is at the thematic core of the set moreso than UT or DO, as such it makes sense that people would take it.

Finally, Sentinel is a new AT, so there may be a great many players learning it by transferring half their builds from Blasters, Corruptors, or Defenders. Also, Stunning Shot is the best single target attack in Archery, and one of the highest DpAT attacks that Sentinels have access to, but its version in Blaster, for example, is kinda less than wonderful.

[Megajoule]

One other factor that may or may not be at all significant in a data set this size:

I have actually not remade many (most) of my old characters from live, despite more than adequate room to do so, and even though I enjoyed playing those powers and probably would again. The main reason, for me, is that those characters are done.  This new server, this second chance, is for trying new things and seeing if I like them or not.

[Fan Mail]

16 hours ago, Razor Cure said:

Likewise, only 26% of fire uses and taking Fire Breath (cause it sucks imo)

You of course are quite welcomed to have an opinion but I'm nit-picking here/disagreeing.  Fire Breath is awesome if you don't mind repositioning.

[Razor Cure]

9 hours ago, Rylas said:

Empathy is by far the most popular set for defenders. I like Empathy. I'm always happy to have an Empathy defender on the team. I don't have anything bad to say for the set. But it isn't the strongest set out there in my opinion as far as capabilities go. I'll upset some Empathy fans with that, but it's not a diss towards the set. I'm just pointing out that popularity, doesn't really mean anything on its own. 

What amazes me about EMp being so popular..is how rubbish (according to my view of how an emp should be played of course) nearly all emp fenders are!

7 hours ago, justicebeliever said:

I think there is utility in using the popularity data to evaluate sets...I don't think we should assume that always means that set is fundamentally broken...but in an ideal state, you would want a lot of parity between AT's, and Powersets...it would mean that people are finding them equally fun, and it means the game has a lot of room to keep people engaged, and playing, over the long term...

 

I also agree that lack of popularity does not equal "this set/AT is broken".  As @GM Sijinsaid, there could be a lot of reasons, but each of them has some remediation...Crappy animations/doesn't look cool means some animation/art work...People don't understand how it works?  Start some Q&A with a developer on the forums, get those promoters on board and you'll see an uptick...Caters to a small niche?  Increase the need for that niche...

Exactly! There is clearly two sides..hence the idea for alternate powers..rather than wholesale changes.

[justicebeliever]

2 hours ago, Razor Cure said:

Exactly! There is clearly two sides..hence the idea for alternate powers..rather than wholesale changes.

I wasn't saying there are 2 sides, though sometimes there are...just that the data is useful to start investigating why sets/AT's are unpopular, and that not all solutions involve power changes...

 

Regarding your specific suggestion of alternate powers, it's been veto'ed already (clearly Rage is still popular, but it's this comment that matters, not the Rage debate, which sadly is still all the rage)

 

[Haijinx]

I think using anything as subjective and fickle as players' choice of what to play as some sort of balance feedback loop is Cray.

 

With an a, sorry Countess.  

 

The reason there is so many spines/fire brutes for example, is that there is a general feeling that those are a good way to make in game money.  

 

 

[daveyfiacre]

i think, more than anything listed, alternate animations might be the easiest and least invasive of all the changes, since it's basically just an addition... in the sense that Dark Servant from the support set now has two options, all other control pets should have alternate options. and if possible, mastermind pets also. these would only be cosmetic changes by summoning the same pet and attributes, but using a different in game model [again similar to how Dark Servant currently does.]  And also adding things like dual pistol's animations to the MM dual pistols, or beam rifle to bot's attacks as alternate animations. again, cosmetic addition only, not an erasure or numbers change.

 

a lot of the other suggested changes seem too specific, and some optimizations would actually reduce a set's uniqueness, which i dont see as a bad thing.

 

there are some good suggestions in here though, and im not knocking them, i just think some need some serious evaulation, and balancing considerations.

[Andrewvm]

On 9/4/2019 at 12:25 PM, GM Sijin said:

And there's the issue of aesthetics to consider. A fair number of people build what they think is cool, or looks good. Is ice armor as bad as it looks in the popularity chart? Or is it just that people think it doesn't look good? Popularity of a power does not necessarily dictate its performance relative to other sets on the same popularity chart. Although, perhaps it warrants a different form of discussion if aesthetics is the primary reason a power is unpopular.

 

Finally there is the phenomenon of a bad reputation. Outside of PvP stalkers were considered generally fairly underperforming for the majority of their time on live. I would say that they are no longer underperforming much, if any in team content. Yet they're still the least picked AT after EATs by a notable margin. Is this due to them underperforming? Or is the AT play style just undesirable to the majority? Or is it the reputation that they were just bad nudging people's choice away? Some combination of the last two more than the first, I'd wager.

 

Long story short, numbers aren't everything when it comes to popularity. Better to examine why something is unpopular before jumping to the conclusion that it's purely performance.

I completely agree with this. 

 

Popularity is a poor way to measure balance. For one the arguments above stand, for another some powers are staples because of their functionality. 

 

Asking why a set or power is impopulair is valid, but be wary of the easy conclusions...