Castle

[ QUOTE ]
Does each AT have a rep or is each AT supposed to be getting one? I think I've heard of _Castle_ as being the Stalker AT rep, though he does a lot of communicating to the community. Are there any other reps or are there going to be? Does anyone know?

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That was the plan. As everyone knows, though, plans only work until you actually engage the enemy.

I'm not sure what the status of this is, but we've not forgotten about it.

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Then its back to your boring old lunch breaks where you're not buried under power bugs!

[/ QUOTE ]

Naw, then I'll just go back to making PCGen .lst files for my own fun and amusement.

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Has anyone addressed the 2 second wait time after Ranged shot (where you can't attack) in Archery/ yet? I know it's in Concern and Redzero's reposts of the old consolidated issues thread, but I think it's worth repeating. No other snipe has that downtime to deal with, and I'm pretty damn sure it's a bug.

[/ QUOTE ]

I *think* I fixed that when I fixed it for Defenders. I tested it and it's better, but not perfect. I'll wait 'til it reaches you guys before making a final determination.

[ QUOTE ]
Also let me add that I'm in total agreement with Concern about one specific thing: The snide question about us having a thread with our complaints. There have been more than enough of these threads posted since 2004 without a single Dev response. Players have spent hours testing and posting numbers that prove Blaster powersets are broken. Those types of threads are not uncommon in this forum and it's in very taste to even make a remark that suggests otherwise.

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More than enough, sure. And thus, very scattered. I asked for a consolidated list so I would not have to sort through multiple threads for it. Was I flippant about it? Yes. Was it meant as an insult? No.

I try to keep a light tone in my posts, and I meant that post as a gentle ribbing over something that was untrue. I am sorry if you took that as an insult.

More to the point, I grabbed Red Zero's list and Revolver Laws list and will be going over them. Thanks for reposting them (both here, and in the other thead.)

[ QUOTE ]
Sorry if this has been mentioned many times, but if controller are better with the control power secondaries then defenders are with their primaries why is it that a debuff in a defender primary isn't stronger then the one in a controller primary even though debuff is one of the main focuses of the defender class.

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Power values are the same. AT mods are different, except for the Perception debuff which is hard coded at -90% for all of these powers.

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_Castle_ seemed to confirm CoD with his last post

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Seemed is the operative word there. I confirm nothing.

Couple things:
While I do this on my lunch break for the most part, I also do it in between "Get all" and running data generation scripts. It *is* part of my job -- the only difference here is I do part of it while at lunch to keep myself from getting bored, and the fact that I share info with you guys. Plenty of folks here read the boards and deal with issues; they just don't spend much time reporting on it.

So, while I appreciate the praise, don't let it degenerate into disparaging the other folks here and the work they do.

[ QUOTE ]
Well, yeah. But hide stacks with pretty much every other stealth power out there, I think - or does it? I'm not really sure myself. Doh.

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Concealment: Stealth and Cloak of Darkness are Mutually Exclusive.

I think you'll all be pleased with Dark/Dark for Stalkers.

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Also keep in mind they're dealing with the loss of Lord Recluse (and it seems Mako as well) so they're going to be up to their neck just trying to keep up with the schedule.

[/ QUOTE ]

Mako is still here. He's just sequestered and more busy than you would really want to know about.

A quick note on what I can and cannot do.

I can fix data bugs. I can explain why some things work the way they do. I can even advocate changes to folks above me.

Programming bugs or changes, Animation bugs or changes, Power FX or Sound FX bus or changes and overall design philosophy are things I have to kick over to others 99% of the time. When that happens, it means I get's put on the stack of things to do and someone other than me prioritizes them.

A great example is the Assault Rifle Smashing/Lethal damage being overly resisted complaint. It is, however, a much more pandemic problem than just AR. Claws, Katana, Super Strength, Ice Blasters to a lesser extent, Mace, Axe and Broadsword all have the exact same complaint (I might have missed a couple, this was off the top of my head.) That means, it is something that needs to be addressed globally, and is not an AT specific issue.

Possible fixes include going through all the various critters in the game and adjusting their resistances, modifying the base damage values for powers based on the 'standard resistance index' (a term I just coined) or by modifying individual powers.

The first is a tremendous amount of work, which should probably be done at some point. I'd guess it would take me a full 5 weeks to do. The second requires new design, new code and would probably mean a direct nerf to all Negative Energy, Fire, and Cold attacks, since those resistance types are less common than Smashing, Lethal, Energy and Psionic. That means it would be unpopular with a large percentage of the playerbase. The third, and short term easiest version involves tweaking individual powers of effected sets -- which would almost certainly nerf some powers, buff others and cause a whole slew of new imbalances.

It's not as easy to get things done as you might think.

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This is the most disheartening developer post I've ever seen. The lack of an apology, even while addressing the issue of a lack of an apology to the defenders who tested Enervating Field, is an appalling absence of manners. Explaining why you made a mistake does not excuse the fact that you flat out told prominent members of the community that they were lying. A simple "we're sorry we treated you poorly" would go a long way, and would cost you nothing - but it will probably never be voiced.

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Ok, I'll address this, though I really don't want to. After doing fairly extensive research into three "Enervating Field has been nerfed" calls with faulty testing/logic behind them over several months (one, which took hours to find, had the tester being buffed between his two test casts, so the 'proof' was completely incorrect) I frankly dismissed it as yet another in the series. That made me have poor diligence in looking into it, which is my fault and for that, I apologize to the community.

Quick notes:
We've reproduced the Knockback bug (thanks, folks!) and sent it to the programming team to deal with. So, it's on the list as of today, though I expect it is not very high priority.

Freezing Rain: Well, the POWERS were right. The problem was the Defender version was calling the Controller Rain, while Controllers were calling Defenders. My bad...it's fixed in I7.

I've not read most of your responses in this thread yet (I've been busy dealing with the deluge of PM's I got today -- a new record!) but I'll get through them by the end of the day.

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This may have changed without our knowledge, then. It's been known information for a while that, pre-ED, Tar Patch can and did regularly stack. Will attempt to test that power, but it's not exactly easy to find enough Kineticists.

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Ah! Tar Patch is an exception. Well, no, it isn't but it's tricky. A single Tar Patch will not have the Debuff stick with itself. However, multiple Tar Patches, even from the same caster, will stack with one another. This is because each Tar Patch is actually a seperate "source" from the caster, and buffs from multiple sources stack.

[ QUOTE ]
...yet another unkept promise.

The Devs haven't said boo about getting Community Representatives for Archetypes other than Stalkers. Oh, and before you mention that _Castle_ picked up the Defender issues--he dumped them a few weeks later.

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I did? Funny, I still read them every day.

Oh, and I'm going to look at Blasters now that I've gone through the consolidated Defenders bug list. You guys got one?

First, a quick note. Many things I refer to as 'fixed' in this post may be fixed only in I7. It's taken me long enough to go through this list, that I honestly don't know which fixes are in which builds.

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* Bug: All disorient powers cause enemies with flight to move away at rapid speeds, even while under its effects. Individual powers with this problem are noted within their sets below. I6 has made this less common, but it still does occur.

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Should be fixed.

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* Bug: When an attack misses its target, aggro is generated when the attack begins. This is problematic when using a power with a long activation time (such as Ice Arrow); aggro is generated and you are subject to "return" fire before the attack is actually launched. The character is rooted in place until the animation finishes. (If the attack actually hits, no aggro is generated until the attack lands; this is when a miss should generate aggro as well). This bug is not limited to the Trick Arrow set, but impacts the set more than others due to its many powers with long animation times. (Concern, Goofy_Parrot)

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This is the way the combat engine works. Fixing this would require rewriting the whole thing. This is not likely to change.

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* Bug: If the enemy walks well outside the original cone of the power after it's activated, then the cone won't hit. I've been able to reproduce it a lot with enemies that are walking right past me, causing me to turn about 180 degrees during the animation. (MrQuizzles)

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Fixed.

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* Bug: Power Build Up from the Energy Mastery APP does not appear to effect many powers in the Storm, Dark, and Kinetics primary sets. (MagPie)

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This should be resolved.

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* Balance: Single target ressurection powers should not be expended and the associated endurance used unless the target accepts the resurrect. (LadyMage)

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This is an odd one. Endurance is paid as part of the casting of the power, which is calculated before any attributes of that power take effect. So, the power system has to pay for the power to go off then the target gets to choose whether or not to accept the Rez attribute. We can't do this without a lot of changes to the system. Well, technically we could, but then you would not be able to slot for Endurance Reduction.

[ QUOTE ]
* Quality of Life: Now that rez effects give XP debt protection, is it possible to rethink the rez confirmation process? This can be removed entirely, or made an option, as with team gifts and team teleports. (Rigel_Kent)

[/ QUOTE ]
It's going to have to remain as it is for now.

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* Quality of Life: Currently all powers that prevent status effects last between 60 and 90 seconds, making them impractical for team buffing. Is this intended?

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Yes. Things like Clarity and Clear Mind are meant to be used on players as a cure or quick preventative measure for status effects. Maintaining the buff on a full team is not the goal of these powers.

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* PvP: Slows and -recharge from Lingering Radiation and Snow Storm have been shown to be resistable in PvP. Conflicting evidence suggests that defense debuffs may be resisted in PvP, as well. Aren't defender debuffs supposed to be unresistable?

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Looking at the power, your observation is correct. It seems to be by design, though I've added it to my list of things to be reviewed.


[ QUOTE ]
Primaries:

Dark Miasma

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* Bug: Petrfying Gaze power description and combat messages suggest that the power reduces the targets defense, which does not happen. (Dysmal)

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This is apparently fixed.

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* PvP: Darkest Night debuffs base damage rather than enhanced damage, crippling it in PvP. A power that does a 100 base damage would do 195 with 3 damage SOs. With Darkest Night, the damage would be debuffed to 145, which is a reduction of only 25.6% instead of 37.5% or 50.0%. (LastHumanSoldier, wording by Quason, corrected by WhatRoughBeast, i6 information found by Blueeyed and KaliMagdalene)

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All Buffs and Debuffs throughout the game are applied to the Base effect, not the Enhanced Effect.

[ QUOTE ]
* PvP: Darkest Night is debuffing 50% of base damage, as opposed to the 37.5% it debuffs in PvE.

[/ QUOTE ]
Yep. Handy, no? In other words, by design.

[ QUOTE ]
* PvP: Using Black Hole is effectively the same as giving your enemy phase shift for a few seconds if he or she has any immobilization protection or break frees. Given the short duration, high endurance cost, and long recharge, why is this power so weak?

[/ QUOTE ]
It's a very situational power. It can take an cause havoc on enemy teams unprepared for it -- imagine a group of 6 who suddenly don't have a Tanker and a Defender. It becomes a 6 on 4 battle, assuming equal sides. Basically, if your team is aware of it and works it into a strategy, it can be effective.

[ QUOTE ]
Empathy

[/ QUOTE ]

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* Bug: Absorb Pain inflicts the user with the inability to be healed, even if the target had been defeated before the power could go off. (Rigel_Kent)

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The two effects are only linked in the fiction of the power. In reality, each effect is put on its target (Healer for Self Damage, Heal for TargetPlayer) as soon as the power is 'paid for.' It probably won't change, since we would have to do some fairly major gymnastics with the powers system to get it to work properly.

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* Balance: Clear mind's animation (4 seconds) makes prebuffing a large team prohibitive, and using it as a release deadly. (LadyMage)

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See note above.

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Force Fields

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* Bug: Knockback enhancements have no apparent effect in knockback powers in some powers of the FF set and in other sets. The effect is very random. Are enhancements/powers working as intended?

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The amount of Knockback generated is modified by Level, Resistances and Rank of the Target. That said, there was a bug in the system which should now be resolved.

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* Bug: Detention Field's Immobilization effect is easily resisted. (Rigel_Kent)

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There isn't much that can be done about this.

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* Balance: Repulsion Bomb has an approximately two to three second animation time thus generally failing to save people from any melee attacks unless it is acitvated/chained before it is needed. (Telok)

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It's about 3 seconds (a tad over, actually.) That probably won't get changed. We made functionality changes to the power not too long ago, and reactions seemed very mixed about the results.

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* Balance: Currently the last three powers in the FF set are highly situational and generate a great deal of aggro, all of which is drawn on to the least defended member of the team -- the FF Defender. (Telok)

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Drawing Aggro only applies in Teams. If you are teaming, try to get someone with Taunt to be on your team. So long as you aren't hunting +4's, Taunt should last long enough to mitigate this. As far as situational, that is by design.

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* Balance: Force Bolt has the exact same effect for Controllers as Defenders.

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Not true. Defenders do slightly more damage, unless the controllers Containment is in effect. Knockback is not a Debuff, and Controllers have the same modifier as Defenders for this.

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* Balance: Detention Field has the exact same effect for Controllers as Defenders.

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Actually, the math shows Controllers being slightly more effective with this power compared to Defenders. Since it is a Control power, that is by Design.

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* Balance: Repulsion Field has the exact same effect for Controllers as Defenders.

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Knockback is not a Debuff, and Controllers have the same modifier as Defenders for this.

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* Balance: Force Bubble has the exact same effect for Controllers as Defenders.

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Knockback and Repel are not debuffs, and Controllers have the same modifier as Defenders for this.

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* Balance: Repulsion Bomb has the exact same effect for Controllers as Defenders.

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The knockback portion is the same. The Damage is higher for Defenders. The Stun lasts longer for Controllers.

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* Balance: Enhancement Diversification will leave Force Fielders with only three powers with effects generally considered worth slotting, totaling to 6 non-base slots. Is it part of 'The Vision' for Force Fielders to have more slots in a single Power Pool than in their primary?

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With ED, Force Field Defenders have a greater role in teaming than ever before. It is also arguable that they only have three powers worth slotting.

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* Balance: The ForceField powerset does one significant thing in battles - provide damage mitigation through defense buffs or knockback. Without any heals, debuffs, or secondary buffs, it should do this one thing remarkably well compared to other Defenders in all situations. ForceField Defenders should also not be obligated to take the Medicine Pool just to complete a normal team's Heroic mission. Both of these do not currently seem to be the case.

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No other Defender set provides the level of Defense as a Force Field Defender. The built in Status Protection is invaluable, especially with Scrapper and Tankers Status Protections reduced. Also, Defenders are more than Healers -- consider your 'Healing' the fact that your team is taking considerably less damage as a result of your protections. I do know that many of you will disagree with this, but short of rebuilding the powerset completely, it is not likely to change in the near future.

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* Graphics: The power icon for Detention Field does not match its effect. The icon suggests this power buffs an ally's resistance to energy and negative energy damage.

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Added to the bug list. We'll get to it, but it is low priority.

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* Quality of Life: Detention Field's graphic needs to be more obvious -- currently teammates can't tell when an enemy is detained and waste attacks on it. Are there any plans to either make the graphic more obvious, or to otherwise make it more difficult to waste attacks on a DF'd enemy?

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This is something that is a good idea. In fact, it is on geko's whiteboard for "when we get to it." Since it is art time, getting something like this done is problematic -- the artists are overbooked already.

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* PvP: Knockback suppressed players, or players with knockback resistance, can stand near a Repulsion Field for a long time without ill effect, draining the Defender of endurance.

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This is by design. It is to prevent Repel from locking enemies in a corner.

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Kinetics

[/ QUOTE ]

[ QUOTE ]
* Bug: When Transfusion is fired off on an enemy that is defeated before the power activates, there is no heal, though the animation fires. However, if Twilight Grasp goes off on a dying enemy, it heals the recipients. There are also reports of the same issue occuring if the enemy moves out of Line of Sight during Tranfusion's animation time. (Rigel_Kent adds: To be more technical, this seems to be a problem with all AoE effects generated around the single target of a power. Illusion Control->Blind's AoE mez effect also has this problem; if the Blind damage defeats the target, the AoE mez will not happen. AoE's generated around the user don't have this problem.)
* Bug: When Transference is fired off on an enemy that is defeated before the power activates, there is no endurance regained for those in the AOE, though the animation fires. (Dark Pyroblast)
* Bug: If Fulcrum Shift is fired off on an enemy that is defeated before the power activates, you get the single 50% caster buff, but NOT the 25% effect from the dying mob OR any mobs around him. (Quason)

[/ QUOTE ]
I'll put this on the bug list. I think it takes animation time. See above for problems with that.

[ QUOTE ]
* Bug: Fulcrum Shift and Siphon Power. If a mob has a resistance, or vulnerability, to a certain type of damage AND that mob has an attack that is based on that type of damage, the amount the damage will be debuffed is altered by the mobs resistance. For example -- a villain has a 25% vulnerability to energy attacks. His energy damage is debuffed an extra 25% beyond the base 25%, making the final debuff 31.25% (25% of 25 is 6.25). This works in reverse as well. A mob, such as Hamidon, with 90% resistance to all attack types would only be debuffed 2.5%. (Ladioss_Sopp)

[/ QUOTE ]
Hmm. Yeah, I can see that. It is not fixable without major changes, though.

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* Quality of Life: Inertial Reduction, when expiring in mid-air, will drop all players like rocks, causing falling damage. (MadScientist)

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A partial fix to this is coming in I7. Can't say much more than that.

[ QUOTE ]
* PVP: Siphon Power and Fulcrum shift debuff base damage rather than enhanced damage, crippling them in PvP. A power with a base damage of 100 would do 195 damage with 3 SO damage enhancements. Using Siphon Power or Fulcrum Shift would only reduce this damage to 170, a decrease of 11.5% rather than 25%. (LastHumanSoldier, wording by Quason)

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See note above.

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Radiation Emission

[/ QUOTE ]

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* Graphics: The power icons for Radiation Infection and Enervating Field are reversed. (Rigel_Kent)

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It's on the bug list (and has been for quite a while.)

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* Quality of Life : Neither Erratic nor the Defender community have been given an apology, formal or informal, for the Developer behavior regarding the I5 Enervating Field changes. (Concern, Blueeyed, et all)

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That was my mistake. Statesman asked me to look into it so I looked at the powers. The power itself did not change, so I told Statesman that and he then told you. When you folks pressed on the issue, I went back and found that the Archetype modifier had been reduced. I told States, and he passed it along to you guys.

[ QUOTE ]
* PVP: Enervating Field debuffs base damage rather than enhanced damage, crippling it in PvP. A power with a base damage of 100 would do 195 damage with 3 SO damage enhancements. Using Evervating Field would only reduce this damage to 165, a decrease of 14.5% rather than 30%. (LastHumanSoldier, wording by Quason, corrected by WhatRoughBeast)

[/ QUOTE ]
See above note.

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Storm Summoning

[/ QUOTE ]

[ QUOTE ]
* Bug: Hurricane, when used to push an enemy who is under the effects of a hold by another player, sometimes pulls or pushes the enemy in a different direction than intended. (Theory: Hurricane repels enemies Immobilized by another player as if that other player (caster of the Immob) were the origin of the Hurricane.)

[/ QUOTE ]
This is on my buglist, but I've not been able to reproduce it. In any case, it is almost certainly a code issue, which means until I get a reproducable case, it is problematic that it will be corrected.

[ QUOTE ]
* Bug: If another hero is under a Disorient effect but protected by 02 Boost, and I re-apply O2 Boost on that hero, the Disorient graphics appear over that hero's head for an instant. During that time, the hero is detoggled. (Rigel_Kent)

[/ QUOTE ]
This should be fixed.

[ QUOTE ]
* Bug: Lightning Storm will target enemies under the effects of Dentention Field.

[/ QUOTE ]
Pet's aren't very smart. I've reported it to our AI guys, but I am uncertain if any change is forthcoming.

[ QUOTE ]
* Balance: Snowstorm's recharge debuff is more effective for Controllers than Defenders. ( It appears the defender version is 80% as slowing as the controller version, seems they were reversed. Dark_Pyroblast)

[/ QUOTE ]
Controllers AT modifier for Slows is higher than Defenders. I'll talk to geko to make certain this is by design.

[ QUOTE ]
* Balance: Freezing Rain provides a greater resistance debuff for Controllers than it does for Defenders. (Stormbringer, Dark_Pyroblast)

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This should have been fixed a while ago. Retest, please.

[ QUOTE ]
* Balance: ThunderClap's disorient lasts the same duration for Controllers as it does for Defenders, and may crit.

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This should not be the case. The Disorient value is the same for both ATs and the Controller has a 1.25 modifier, while the Defender has a 1.00 modifier. Controllers Disorient should last a bit longer by default.

[ QUOTE ]
* Balance: Tornado does the exact same damage and secondary effect for Controllers as it does for Defenders.

[/ QUOTE ]
Defenders should do slightly more damage with Tornado, while Controllers Disorient should last a bit longer. It sounds like a wash, but I'll run it by geko to see if we want to change this.

[ QUOTE ]
* Balance: Lightning Storm does the exact same damage and secondary effect for Controllers as it does for Defenders.

[/ QUOTE ]
Fixing now.

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* Balance: The hero version of O2 Boost cancels its own buff, even though it does not grant +def or +damage resistance buffs. Its function and duration are similar to Clear Mind and Clarity, so it should be allowed to self-stack. The villian version of 02 Boost does self-stack, and is not overpowered for doing so.(Rigel_Kent)

[/ QUOTE ]
Fixing now.

[ QUOTE ]
* PVP: Hurricane does not debuff the ranged attacks (APP, Claws/Focus) of Scrappers and Tankers as it should. (Stormbringer) It also debuffs the range of Blaster melee attacks to zero. (Soyuz)

[/ QUOTE ]
The current system is working as designed. We may eventually get code put in that more adequately handles Melee AT's with Ranged attacks and Ranged ATs using Melee attacks, but it is fairly low on the priority list.

[ QUOTE ]
Trick Arrow

[/ QUOTE ]

[ QUOTE ]
* Bug: When keying up a TA or Archery power that targets an enemy while moving, if you land out of reach of that power (ie. too far away from your target), your character will perform an animation of drawing the bow, though without an arrow and the power will not trigger. Annoying since it locks you in place for the duration of the animation. No other set behaves like this to my knowledge. Keying powers outside of their range only readies them until you move into range for all other sets. (Eisregen)

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Known issue. It is on our bug list but requires a lot of animation work to fix. It's fairly low on the priority list.

[ QUOTE ]
* Bug: Flash Arrow gives a perception debuff. However, when the power is recast from within enemy's normal perception range, the Defender will be spotted, regardless of whether the second Flash arrow hits or misses, and regardless of how much time is left on the first Flash Arrow. (Voiced by Concern, several others)

[/ QUOTE ]
I wasn't able to reproduce this. Is it still happening?

[ QUOTE ]
* Bug: Flash Arrow's -accuracy does not stack with itself. (Concern)

[/ QUOTE ]
Correct, it does not. It is functionally the same power as Controller/Smoke and works identically to that power in terms of effect.

[ QUOTE ]
* Bug: Acid Arrow's -resistance does not stack with itself. It is the only -resist power to do so. (Concern)

[/ QUOTE ]
Looking at the other -Resistance powers (Enervating Field, Sonic Siphon, etc) none of them stack with themselves. The only ones that do seem to stack are Sonic Attacks debuffs, which have very short durations.

[ QUOTE ]
* Bug: Pets (such as Phantom Army) will often attack the Oil Slick target. (Concern)

[/ QUOTE ]
This *should* be fixed. Let me know if it is still happening.

[ QUOTE ]
* Bug: Oil Slick causes knockBACK on underlings, making it hard to use the offensive aspect of the power on them. (Somberero)

[/ QUOTE ]
If the target is lower level than you, or if it has a weakness to knockback, then knockdown powers will knock the target backwards. Knockdown is a low magnitude Knockback.

[ QUOTE ]
* Bug: Oil slick seems to have gotten a boost to defense. (Concern)

[/ QUOTE ]
I've removed the erroneous help data.

[ QUOTE ]
* Balance: Entangling Arrow, a Defender primary power, is less effective than Devices/Web Grenade, which is in a Blaster secondary set.

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Known issue. The original version of Entangling Arrow was funtionally identical to Web Grenade. This gave the set too many stacking slow abilities. This is one power in the Trick Arrow set that we are looking at improving at some point in the future.

[ QUOTE ]
* Balance: Flash Arrow, a Defender primary power, is no more effective than Devices/Smoke Grenade, which is in a Blaster secondary set, and has a toHit roll.

[/ QUOTE ]
Smoke Grenade requires a To Hit check. Flash Arrow has a greater base range, can hit 60% more targets and has a greater To Hit debuff than Smoke Grenade.

[ QUOTE ]
* Balance: As a general design issue, too many Trick Arrow powers have been balanced directly against similar Control powers. They are intentionally weaker than their Control counterparts. This makes it appropriate for a Controller secondary, but it underperforms as a primary in its own right. (Rigel_Kent)

[/ QUOTE ]
Trick Arrow as a set needs a bit of work. There are a few issues with making the desired changes at this time, but at some point in the future, we will be revisiting this set.

[ QUOTE ]
* Balance: Entangling Arrow and Ice Arrow have 25% longer durations as Controller secondaries than as Defender primaries. (Rigel_Kent, Concern)

[/ QUOTE ]
As they should. Controllers are better at control type powers. The point you want to make here is that a Controller Secondary power is outperforming a Defender Primary power. We are aware of that and want to correct it at some point in the future.

[ QUOTE ]
* Graphics: The area of effect for Acid Arrow does not match the animation graphic when firing at a normal sized target. Please fix the Area of Effect to match the graphic. (Concern)

[/ QUOTE ]
Filed as a bug for Art dept.

[ QUOTE ]
* Graphics: Oil Slick's description says that it provides a defense debuff, however, there is no enemy graphic to indicate this. (Concern)

[/ QUOTE ]
The Defense Debuff was removed before the power went live. The referrence in the short help is a mistake.

[ QUOTE ]
* Power Description: Poison Gas Arrow's description is not very clear, making many people believe the 'choking effect' is a hold, instead of the current implementation, which is a sleep. (Concern)

[/ QUOTE ]
Cleaned up the text a bit.

[ QUOTE ]
* PvP: Trick Arrow/Archery proves very ineffective in PvP, unable to kill a detoggled and unmoving Regen scrapper.

[/ QUOTE ]
Regen Scrappers are very difficult to kill for low damage characters. I *was* able to kill one, but it took several minutes, which is a highly unlikely "real"-world situation. This is a more general concern than just with Archery, but it is most visible here. No solution I can discuss, yet.

[ QUOTE ]
* PvP: Entangling Arrow does not prevent people from jumping (Concern)

[/ QUOTE ]
I was unable to reproduce this.

[ QUOTE ]
Secondaries:

Archery

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* Bug: When keying up a TA or Archery power that targets an enemy while moving, if you land out of reach of that power (ie. too far away from your target), your character will perform an animation of drawing the bow, though without an arrow and the power will not trigger. Annoying since it locks you in place for the duration of the animation. No other set behaves like this to my knowledge. Keying powers outside of their range only readies them until you move into range for all other sets. (Eisregen)

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It's on the bug list, but very low priority.

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* Balance: Archery seems underpowered in groups due to lack of enemy debuff.
* Balance: Archery seems underpowered in solo due to low base damage compared to other sets, largely due to animation times and reliance on lethal damage.

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Archery has long animations so that it looksas good as possible while trying to keep the set playable.

I did a pass on all the End Costs of the Archery Powers and reduced the cost of Snap Shot, Aimed Shot, Fistful of Arrows and Blazing Arrow.

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Electrical Blast

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* Bug: Voltaic Sentinal does the same damage for Defenders as Blasters.

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Fixed.

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* Bug: Some defenders have gotten 'trapped' in the Voltaic Sentinel summoning animation, and could not use other powers until Voltaic Sentinel recharged and was cast again. (Reema)

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I put this in the bug database, but I've not been able to reproduce it.

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Psychic Blast

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* Balance: Mental Blast does little damage for its animation time. It costs more end, does the same damage, and has 150% of the animation time of charged bolts. It is 1/3 the dpa of Dark Blast for the same cost. Its animation time should be reduced significantly.(LadyMage)

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Charged Bolts is a bit over twice the Activation time of Dark Blast. Mental Blast is ~25% longer Activation Time than Charged Bolts. All do the same base damage. Mental Blast, however, does Psionic damage, which is among the hardest to defend against in the game. Mental Blast also has a 25% longer Max Range compared to the other two sets. Is this 100% balanced? Possibly not, but we don't want to simply make every power a complete clone of another.

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* Balance: There is only one villian group which has vulnerabilities to psi damage and it's only in the early game when the set is weakest. By the time the set can actually do damage, most villian groups (nemesis, praetorians, Council, Carnies, Malta just to list a few) are not only not vulnerable, but have a high precentage of members with either sizable resists or defense to the entire set, save telekinetic blast, making the set feel underpowered throughout the game. (LadyMage)

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While few enemies are especially vunlerable to Mental attacks, comparatively few have defense against it, either.

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* Graphics: An enemy immobilized by Subdue will have the Psychic Blast debuff sticky graphic on his head, complete with the generic green tinted -recharge cloud. Subdue does not appear to actually have any debuffing effect.

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I've bugged it, so it will get fixed at some point in the future. It is very low priority, however.

I think I see myself in there.

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I love playing this game, but I often get strange reactions from people when I tell them I play MMO's. How do you guys justify/explain playing the game/use of the game?

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Tell them it is your entertainment. Compare the fact that going to a movie with a date ($20-$40, depending on concession stand usage) for 3 hours is roughly the same amount you pay for 20+ hours of entertainment a month.

And if that doesn't work, put them on /ignore.

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Whirlwind has always done knock up, now it is doing knockback. I did not see any patch notes on this change. I do recall some discussion about the changes being made to the way knockdown works because of ragdoll physics but understand it was suppose to be reversed. Is this an unnoted patch change or a bug?

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Yes, the change was done purposefully. No, a patch note was not generated -- my fault, sorry! I simply forgot to note the change down.

Why? There was a PVE exploit involved with it, and this fix takes care of 90% of the issue.

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It's suppose to work like this:

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Smoke now has slightly different functionality. In PvE, the power is unchanged and automatically hits foes. In PvP, however, the power requires a To Hit check

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Nope, right now it seems to require To-Hit checks in PvE too. I certainly see misses (plenty of them!)

So, what's the story?

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There was a bug I fixed last week, so it should reach test server Soon(tm). Basically, it would Autohit anything but 'good' aligned critters. Thus, Longbow and various others required Hit checks.

Hover: We might buff it some, at some point. However, it should never be an effective travel power.

Flight: I'll talk to geko about it. No promises. (I got spoiled by the Holiday Jet Pack, too!)

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I was doing the Renault Strike Force (CoV) yesterday, and throwing all my assorted temp powers on the Eye. One of them was a Stolen SMG, and when I looked through the combat log, each damage message for the SMG (each tic I mean) was accompanied by another damage message claiming to be a bonus due to my origin (Natural in this case).

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Natural heroes get a bonus with the Stolen SMG. Tech folks get bonuses with High Explosives. Blackwand gives bonuses to Magic types. Minor Mutation is more effective for Mutants. The Psionic Activator is more effective if you are a Science origin.

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I know the Blaster APP version of EM Pulse has always been a Disorient - did the Controller version get mistakenly changed? What5 about the Defender one? Has it ALWAYS said it was a Disorient in the combat tab, but not in the actual Power Description? (I really wouldn't know, I don't monitor that tab often.)

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It's a Hold, the descriptive text for the hit is just a bit more colorful than many others.

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Pretty cool to have a mob with a 100 mag stun in the game. When will this be fixed to a normal stun magnitude to avoid toggle droping even if you are running Unyielding and have Thaw, Antidote, Increase Density, and Clarity on you. Yes I saw where Castle said their stun is being replaced...how about a time frame, or implementing it sooner than fixing badges ?

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It was fixed awhile ago. It should reach you guys in the next patch or two.

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OK, it's far enough down the list that I doubt anyone will read now...so I'm safe

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No, you're not.

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8. Fushigi Yuugi- Yo Akeru Maeni

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Nice track!

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I grabbed a copy of the "Defender Issues" post a couple weeks ago and am working through it in my spare time. Considering the length of it, I will probably have gotten through it sometime in Janurary.

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Just a quick update: It's probably going to take longer than expected for this. I'm sorry, but things are busy, busy, busy here. I'm pretty much booked solid, but I'll find time to get through this as soon as I can.

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[Castle - Hong Kong Phooey ? as in the title music for that cartoon ?

Kudos dude thats wonderful.

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It's from the "Saturday Morning: Cartoons Greatest Hits" CD that came out in '95. Some great stuff on there.

Oh, and thanks for the compliments folks. (BTW, "39" is my all time favorite Queen song.)