BellaStrega

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The goal of the game is to make sure there isn't an ideal team composition.

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WHAT!?!?!

I'm not even sure where to begin with his utterly absurd statement.

If that's the goal, you missed it by miles. You've created a sense of "balance" where if you don't have an absolutely ideal team composition, you'll get hosed. Your explanation then goes on to explain how any team can be "ideal" ONLY WHEN YOU HAVE DEFENDERS present.

And what good is "punchvoke" when he can't take the damage it brings down on him??

GAH!

What game are you playing Jack? It's not the same one.

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I don't agree that the current design demands a perfect team composition. I do feel that tankers don't add as much as they should.

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Here's the problem that I see. On heroic in a 5 man team during our testing I really didn't see the need for anyone to "tank" for the team.

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On Heroic, even with 5 people, there's barely a need for anyone other than the mission-owner and a buddy. I think higher difficulty settings for your missions really do make the game more fun.

Anyway, how about this:

Heals generating aggro.
Is that crazy?

I'm just wondering if the problem could be that the people who should need a tank most just.. well, don't need one?

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No, heals and buffs should generate some aggro.

I think they do, too. Just not very much.

While my answer is flip, and while it may be true from a certain point of view that ED was inspired by forum suggestions, I would also suggest that using it as an example that the devs listen to our suggestions and implement them is frelling insane. The announcement on the CoV beta forums provoked one of the nastiest prolonged responses to any change ever, that spilled onto the official forums in a wave of NDA-breaking posts that had to be deleted, and the whole plan had to be announced early because there was no way they could possibly keep the lid on the whole thing. The response once it hit the live forum continued to snowball, and as far as I can tell, has not stopped.

Had this been introduced at any time other than CoV's launch, I suspect that they would have seen people putting their money where their mouth is. To be honest, once the shine wears off, I think they'll be seeing it anyway.

If anything, it's a resounding example of how, when the devs make up their mind about something, they tune us out. They can point to how they offered an absurdly nerfed regen in issue 3 and said they rolled it back when we didn't like it...but they nerfed regen multiple times afterward, to the point that it iis actually weaker than it was with unstackable Integration and Instant Healing. Much weaker. The same with Burn and Taunt, and how they went ahead with the I3 change later on, after they moved status protection into the shields and addressed the main complaint - that Burn causing flee made it impossible to tank.

ED's scale isn't really as bad as it looks, but the impact of it hitting right on the heals of issue 5 was incredibly bad timing...except, as I said, City of Villains took a lot of the edge off. Had they waited until issue 7 the reaction would've been much, much worse.

I'm not saying this is unversally true - both Castle and Jonyu have been extremely responsive to player concerns. Castle's willing to offer all kinds of information and has taken feedback from the forum to change the game. Jonyu's arranged for changes to armor sets to make them much less annoying, among other things.

I'm also not saying that everything players on the forum want are necessarily good things. However, it seems that the devs are willing to implement changse that, admittedly, suck like a vaccuumx and only pay lip-service to the idea that they listen.

Also, happy with Vigilance? Do they even play the same game?

Ah, Statesman's just trying to blame the victim.

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I'm going to have to sympathize with the team. I did my eden trial on Pinnacle and we had 2 DA scrappers... they kept the toggles running until I finially asked them to shut them off while we were waiting for more people to arrive. (10mins on, ask 15 off before we started)

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Any reasonable DA scrapper or brute shuts shields off when they aren't needed.

This is because a) they're loud smoke, and b) you can't see your character very well.

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Unyielding. Please. FADE.

The throbbing bass of it through my sub-woofer is rendering me sterile.

While we're at it: Rage.

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Unyielding makes noise?

After 100+ levels of dark armor scrappers and brutes, I'm afraid I have no idea what people who complain about super speed or unyielding are complaining about.

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Ballista is a Toggle Dropping *******!

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Yeah, he is. He was designed to be as close to a Player Hero as we could make him. How do you guys like the Toggle Drop on him? Is it too nasty or does it add a nice challenge?

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Last night I was fighting a lot of longbow and was constantly having my toggles dropped. Is this intended? Ballista was bad enough with the toggle drops but if this is something that even normal mobs is going to get the game fun level is going to plummet for me.

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What level?

I noticed that Longbow bosses with FF and Storm Summoning were dropping my toggles during Statesman's Strike, bugged it then, but assumed (possibly incorrectly) that it had to do with making Mercy into a sort-of-PVP zone.

I even have it on a demo.

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It's happening in level 37-40 missions.

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I noticed it with level 40-50 Longbow bosses, but I don't recall seeing any in the mid-high 30s.

Not that anyone will see 41-50 Longbow very often until the next issue.

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lol the funny thing is quills has already had a sound fix, you think its horrible now you should have heard it back then in issue 1, imagine the sound for spine burst going off every second and thats the exact sound it used to make..

It was so loud it was like drums

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And this one time in Perez, there was an idle 40th level spines/something scrapper running quills sitting outside my mission door.

When I picked up quills on my spines/regen, I was pleasantly surprised.

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Ballista is a Toggle Dropping *******!

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Yeah, he is. He was designed to be as close to a Player Hero as we could make him. How do you guys like the Toggle Drop on him? Is it too nasty or does it add a nice challenge?

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Last night I was fighting a lot of longbow and was constantly having my toggles dropped. Is this intended? Ballista was bad enough with the toggle drops but if this is something that even normal mobs is going to get the game fun level is going to plummet for me.

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What level?

I noticed that Longbow bosses with FF and Storm Summoning were dropping my toggles during Statesman's Strike, bugged it then, but assumed (possibly incorrectly) that it had to do with making Mercy into a sort-of-PVP zone.

I even have it on a demo.

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So, after issue 5 comes and slashes defenses, and issue 6 comes and slashes defenses more, we still have toggle-dropping, and that discontent is boiling over.

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Err, you've stopped typing that you're not bitter....

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That wasn't a bitter post. I was pointing out that the anti-toggle drop thing is not a fad, it's been there as long as toggle-dropping has. The reduction in defenses and mez resistance have simply aggravated - people who didn't like it but lived with it are much less willing to live with it.

It's the primary reason my interest in PVP waned to nothing.

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You're wasting your time. Reason, fairness, and other silly things like that are foreign concepts to developers. Remember, such foes are the equivalents their characters, and they're not going to gimp their characters vs. the Enemy (players).

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I trust you'll be happy to learn that I changed Ballista based on feedback in this thread.

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Well, I am.

But then I didn't expect you to be blind to reason and fairness.

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The "do away with toggle dropping" thing is just the fad of the day. There's a new one every week.

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Fad... heh. Toggle Dropping is the single biggest reason I (and I'd wager a guess at a whole lot of others as well) have stayed away from the Arena and the PvP zones since they were released. Well, that and Inspirations.

I love PvP, I play alot of FPS games. But until these 2 things happen, toggle dropping is either eliminated or reduced GREATLY, and Inspirations are eliminated or you're only allowed to use a max of 8 slots or something like that, I will hate PvP in THIS game.

My opinions.

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It's not a fad. There's always been discontent about the concept, along with (usually) a grudging acceptance that with scrapper/tanker defenses being where they were that it helped balance things. So, after issue 5 comes and slashes defenses, and issue 6 comes and slashes defenses more, we still have toggle-dropping, and that discontent is boiling over.

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The "do away with toggle dropping" thing is just the fad of the day. There's a new one every week. Someone will start a "Nerf X" thread and everyone will go "YEAH, NERF X!" and it'll go around for a while and usually die down pretty quickly, never to be heard from again.

This, too, will pass.

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Just keep thinking that. You're wrong, but if it makes you feel better, you're welcome to it.

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Ballista's toggle dropping should switch to ONLY be from Force Bolt and nothing else. I hate when people whine "Keep PvP out of PvE" on something like this. Take a challenge for once and move on.

Having TD from multiple attacks hurts. If it was only Force Bolt, it'd be more tolerable challenge but not too easy

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A boss with just force bolt can and will spam it on you, dropping all of your toggles in a matter of moments and shutting them off faster than you can turn them back on.

Seriously. I got to experience that during the beta ending event.

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Ballista is a Toggle Dropping *******!

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Yeah, he is. He was designed to be as close to a Player Hero as we could make him. How do you guys like the Toggle Drop on him? Is it too nasty or does it add a nice challenge?

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I will deliberately and consistently avoid any NPC enemies who have toggle-dropping capabilities. I got to deal with that during the Statesman's Strike event, and it was completely not fun. It's a cheap kludge in PVP and putting it in PVE is pure pettiness.

Not that I'm bitter.

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I've seen a lot of complaints about this so I brought it up before we went live. We changed it so certain toggle effects fade out but it didn't make it into live. Dark Armor shouldn't be so bad anymore once this gets updated. The same goes for Mud Pots.

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I can attest that you guys will love this once it goes in. Glacial Armor has already had this treatment, and I swear its like magic to my eardrums.

Hmmm... actually, I'll love it too, as my next and line to make the climb happens to be a BS/DA Scrapper.

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Targeting Drone got it too.

Lots of QoL stuff getting taken care of.

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I've seen a lot of complaints about this so I brought it up before we went live. We changed it so certain toggle effects fade out but it didn't make it into live. Dark Armor shouldn't be so bad anymore once this gets updated. The same goes for Mud Pots.

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Guys, I totally told you all that Jonyu is the man.

Seriously. He's more awesome than Castle.

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I didn't notice this before the weekend, but the Tar Patch debuffs are now lasting long after the Tar Patch ends, and after the mobs leave the Tar Patch. Not all the time, but some part of the time, the debuff will stick to the mob, and not be limited to the Tar Patch duration/AoE. It seems to be working exactly like Freezing Rain now, w/ a chance the debuff will "stick."

I tested my Dark defender, and teh CoH Tar Patch was not working this way - AFAICT, I might not have been testing long enough. It seems to be just Corrupter Tar Patch, and maybe the Mastermind version (don't know offhand about Masterminds). So is this an undocumented change, or a bug? Or a documented change I missed?

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This has happened with my D3's tar patch for months and months. I've bugged it in the past, but stopped bothering. I used to tell when the icon disappeared from my buffs, but that seems to not be there anymore.

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We confirmed this is happening. No ETA yet on a fix.

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Yay.

Wish it could've had attention in beta, though.

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Hey, I'm the blaster that helped Soy test. I'm pure melee so thats why I expressed concern about the situation. This may not be the time fo a discussion on the PvP side of hurricane but not adjusting for blasters just cause they have ranged attacks isn't a good enough excuse for me.

Alot of Melee AT's get ranged attacks to (fire breath, claws, spines, stone melee, super strength immediately spring to mind) and all of the CoH ones have access to ranged attacks with app's. As a blaster there is inherent risks going into melee (which is where we are being pushed to with toggle dropping powers) already, why make it worse by having a single power negate our secondary.

Tho agree with all the stuff about brute melee changes in regards to hurricane anyways.



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I'm not really arguing against fixing it for all melee attacks - I want them to solve it. Just, without that solution, this is the best available, and should be implemented.

I'd suggest, until they fix it, get a ranged hold. The -range alone isn't enough to kill your secondary - you should still be able to hit them. Two will kill your range to zero, I think. The repel, though, does kill it.

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Kali, I usually agree with your opinions, but I have to disagree here. The point isn't what options blasters have that melee AT's might or might not have (remember, with several APP's, tankers and scrappers have the option to get ranged holds now too.- They HAVE that option) but rather that what is an option for one AT is not for another AT using the SAME POWER. It makes no sense from an immersion or balance standpoint that Total Focus works one way for a tanker and another for a blaster. It's the same power, they even kept the same name, so why the different effects when used by different characters? A -range debuff should hit all ranged attacks and leave all melee attacks alone. That's intuitive, that's what actually makes sense, and that is the way they should make it work.

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And if they could have made it that way, they would have.

Anyway, in PVE, you'll find very few hurricanes from 41-50. I mean, a Task Force AV, and a few portal missions against Banished Pantheon seems to cover it. The advantage doesn't mean much at those levels, or really past level 30 at all.

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So, what of peacebringers? Are they melee or ranged? What, intuitively, is the answer? And then, what do the devs say? Is this another spot where a player can easily make uninformed choices? Game mechanics should not require dozens of specific exceptions in order to be coherent. KISS as a primary design rule seems to be falling farther and farther away for the dev team (KISS- Keep It Simple Stupid, for those who don't know.) Keeping it simple, from a player perspective, would mean melee attacks are not subject to range debuffs, and melee attacks are. It maintains internal consistancy and means that the same set of rules applies at all times. I fail to understand why you're so set on defending a "fix" that just sets up a new set of mechanics with special exceptions, rather than implementing a real solution that keeps things simple for the players.

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Since Peacebringers have access to ranged attacks, they should be classified as ranged. if possible, the Dwarf should be immune to range debuffs, because it's all melee.

My Peacebringer relies most heavily on her melee attacks, fwiw.

I know what you want, and I agree that it would be a good thing. What you want is apparently not possible or easy with the engine, or they would have done it. Who knows, they may get around to it eventually? Until then, though, the best available solution - making melee ATs immune to range debuffing - should be used. If that means that characters with ranged options have their melee attacks debuffed...well, cry me a river. You have ranged attacks to get around that.

EPPs do give ranged ability to tankers and scrappers, but those are not available in the vast majority of situations where you'll face hurricane in PVE or PVP.

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Are you including Shadow Maul in this fix?, as although it's not a cone power, it does have the ability to effect more than one mob, and is behaving in the exact same way. If the target moves, even slightly, the attack will virtually always miss!

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Shadow Maul is in fact a cone power.

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i wasnt even aware shadow maul was a stalker power.
*;Glares at the Scrappers*

Step away from the Stalker AT Rep, this is one AT you do not want a war with

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Well, the guy was getting all paranoid about one power of all the powers in this category (all cones - ranged and melee - are affected) getting excluded from the fix. I figured setting his mind at ease before we got a riot was a good plan.

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Are you including Shadow Maul in this fix?, as although it's not a cone power, it does have the ability to effect more than one mob, and is behaving in the exact same way. If the target moves, even slightly, the attack will virtually always miss!

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Shadow Maul is in fact a cone power.

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Same with the reduction in status protection. Isn't this the kind of thing that should go to the Testserver first? There are not many Controllers out there in PvP zones that *can't* stack three holds on a Scrapper. Even in PvE it's noticable. I find this kind of 'change', whether accidently forgotten or not, to be despicable. When will you guys *finally* stop nerfing the hell out of all my toons?

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Scrappers and tankers being completely immune to mezzing in PVP was probably negating in large part controller purpose. Now, whether they should be able to easily break it is another matter. That it's supposed to be a defense should make it more difficult than against other enemies.

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so how about those claw fixes, eh?

what kinda cookies do ya like?

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As I said...Claws changes are in early planning stages. Might not be for a while, so...be patient! (Yeah, I know...I always hated hearing that around Christmas as a kid!)

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so your saying we will get changes near christmas? .

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Starting a betting pool on when this becomes a rumor.