Jibikao
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Posts
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Quote:Oh, you've tried CO? lol I played that game when it came out and I couldn't figure out the design purpose behind the whole "Martial Arts" tree. That's one classic example of how a "create your own" powerset should not be. Martial Arts tree is full of overlapping melee powers with bad synergies. Yes, that game's melee powers suck hard. I haven't paid attention to CO for a long time. Quite frankly, I don't really care what have improved because none of my friends like that game. lolOriginally Posted by Arcanaville
On the one hand, you can pick almost anything. On the other hand, once you're done iterating you're usually left with a ranged scrapper. Every CO character I made either became a ranged scrapper, or an unplayed character. All those choices eventually funneled into ranged attacks, maybe a PBAoE or two, a defensive passive, and a block.
Don't even get me started on Martial Arts / Reflexes over there. Both sets sucked at launch in City of Heroes. They outdid themselves the second time around by making both sets inexplicably worse. Unless you paid someone in China to level the thing to 30 for you, and even then that only fixed Reflexes.
But yeah, I brought up CO because I think that's one good example of what "not to do" if City Of is going to have its own creative sets.
I have to say I spent more time in Powerhouse than actually playing the character....
I think they can start by letting you choose existing Powersets within the same AT because at least the player already made a choice on what type of AT he/she wants to be? -
Quote:I didn't know until recently. I put my Ninja/FF on shelf for 2 years because at that time Upgrade is still one-at-a-time and I need to apply 12 bubbles. I am amazed that I even level ninja/ff to 45 two years ago... I had a lot of patience back then.Originally Posted by Catwhoorg
I literally just hit power boost + ff shields
It hadn't occurred to me that power boost just got a whole lot more effective now for FFers.
Now with power boost + ff, my Ninjas are running well over soft-cap with my Dispersion. I've checked Defender's power boost + ff values...it's SICK.
Edited: Power Boost FF Shield is a bit tricky. You won't get the power boost effect if you put PB + FF after a set of FF is already on the target. I've tested this before. Say you cast non-power boost shields first and then you remember power boost. The target will not get power boost value even after the first set of shield has expired. This means if you cast non-pb shields first on accident, you have to wait until the first set wears off and then you do pb + ff. -
Quote:I want to elaborate a bit on this. I have a lvl 50 Sonic/Pain Corr and a lvl 50 Ninja/FF. I brought up /Pain because Pain is mostly resistance set with constant healing to back it up. I brought up Ninja/FF because I use power boost to boost my force field shields even more.Originally Posted by DrGemini
However, I would not count Empathy or Force Fields out of the contest just yet. Due to their ability to be quite self-sufficient in terms of their own survival, they, too, can boost their damage (indirectly). There are many ways that an Empathy or Force Field defender can increase their damage output (though not quite as much as others can). In fact, my own Empathy/Dark defender is no sloth in damage when I want/need it.
And, when you consider the boost defenders get from their buffs/debuffs coming as a primary, stick them on a team and a defender's impact is amazing. Just add one Empathy or Force Field to a team (where no support is present) and the effectiveness of the entire team multiplies by leaps.
Well, to make a long story short, people who post stuff like the OP did clearly show how much they do not understand what defenders can do...
While it is true that /FF doesn't bring any "direct" +damage or any debuff, the fact that you can now cast and "forget" actually INCREASES your dps. I don't know how many times I play sonic/pain in trials, I get into this "healing lock". There are always some non-level shift lowbies who get hit a lot and being a nice teammate, I always try to keep the healing on which HURTS my Sonic Blast. Of course I have the choice to use mostly sonic blast and ignore healing but that may defeat the purpose of me choosing /Pain.
With the recent aoe group buff, /FF has become more "offensive" because you spend way less time on bubbling. I literally just hit power boost + ff shields before every spawn and rarely need to re-bubble again during the fight.
I am not saying Defender has high damage. I just think Defender's buff value is so high that the need for constant healing is less than on MM/Corr.
Edited: Another reason why SoA is so good because their buffs are mostly coming from leaderships. You put them on and just focus on fighting. No need to click teammates to support. -
Flash Arrow and Glue Arrow are two that you don't need acc at all in pve but you need in pvp.
I think you are more interested in powers that can take acc but it is unnecessary to slot for acc because it hits so often?
Besides the auto-hit powers in pve, Ignite could be one of them but I would still put one acc if I am fighting +2 level.
Ignite, Rain of Fire, Freezing Rain may not need much +acc. -
Quote:Well, Martial Arts is decent for ST damage with team criticals. Without team bonus, I think even my Bane can beat MA Stalker and that's sad. And I am sure Night Widow can beat MA Stalker too.Originally Posted by oreso
Why focus on our weaknesses (sustained AoE damage) when we can big up our strengths to make the game more diverse? (burst Single target damage). AoE stalkering is an option already, but it isn't what draws me to the AT.
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I need to see what's in Time Manipulation first to see if Time Control is good.
Time Control sounds pretty good though. "Time" doesn't seem "elemental".
I don't think the dev would just create a control set specifically for Dominator. That sounds counter-productive. If they create a new one, they create for both. Dominator does get unique Assault set. -
Quote:The so-called "integrity" or "should and should not" will be tested once Freedom goes live. The majority of the profit will be from cash shop. If sales are bad, the company may have no choice but to create the "should nots".Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
I don't see why that's even relevant here, though. It's not a question of what I feel the developers will or will not sell, but rather a question of what I feel they SHOULD and SHOULD NOT sell. It's a statement of opinion from one player to another. If a developer (or, much more likely, a community rep...) reads this and goes "By golly! We shan't sell powers!" then so be it. If a developer looks at this and thinks "Well, then are you gonna' be pissed when you see the store..." then too bad for me. I'm not trying to force the development team's hand. None of us could. About the only thing I can do is state my position as firmly as possible.
The company is set up to earn profits. Integrity or Loyalty is just luxury. I do feel this game treats subscribers way better than other games I've tried. It's a luxury but not a necessity in my book. I enjoy my subscription and I will continue to do so. And if they ever have the time to set up a system for "Create Your Own Set", they sure will get more money from me. I enjoy creating a powerset than actually "playing" it. Costume pieces do not do much for me. The arts of creating a powerset for certain play-style intrigues me more.
I am not really looking forward to create an over-powered set. In fact, I think unique sets should be lower in % because uniqueness costs.
I used to work at the bank and my boss kept telling us that "We are not a charity!" People complain that they should deposit/withdraw money for free because they "lend" us money but the company isn't set up "for free". It is setup to get as much profit as possible. This is why I don't feel an "entitlement" that this game should follow what's considered "Loyal". This game should follow what earns the most profit while having fun doing it. The announcements I've read so far sounds pretty "loyal" to the current subscribers. -
Quote:There you go! It's my ultimate "Freedom" in this game. It's worded "ultimate" for a reason because it will be super hard to achieve but if they can do it right through "cash shop", I can't imagine why it won't be profitable. I know I would pay to create my own set. It doesn't have to be overpowered. In fact, I find some of the most powerful sets very boring (ie: /Radiation).Originally Posted by Arcanaville
And that reason was that they had no way to balance this, and no easy way to warn players they were doing something dumb.
Not to get anyone's hope up, but I thought about this problem about two years ago, in a serious (and not just musing) fashion. I came to the conclusion it was possible to do, but would require a significant amount of restructuring of how the powers system worked to really do it right.
It would take me about six months to set the system up properly, which translates into about eighteen months of total development time. Maybe more including playtesting. But I believe every technical and balance barrier has a solution that would work in practice. You'd probably start with the easy stuff, and allow the construction of melee and ranged offensive sets, then dominator assault sets, manipulation sets, and defensive sets. The hard ones would be the buff/debuff sets, the control sets to some degree, and the mastermind primaries would be a nightmare.
Theoretically speaking, by the way, mitigation sets would actually be one of the easier ones to balance (easier, not easy), because for most power mechanics we have ways to calculate mitigation strength to within a high degree of accuracy. Its not as simple as allowing players to mix and match powers from different sets indiscriminantly, but its calculable. And if its calculable, its balanceable.
Pure offense is actually even easier to value. The AE custom critter system has an extremely primitive system for doing so, and it gets surprisingly close to doing it well enough for custom powerset construction.
Valuing buff and foe debuff powers and sets, now that's the really hard one.
The only game that is "similar" to creating your own set is Champions. Well, I don't think that game is doing well now... so.
Hey, at least that game may give the dev an idea on "what not to do". hehe
Edited: After reading through most posts, I do notice that when I created my powers in Champions, there wasn't much of "choice limitation" and yes, you could gimp yourself by picking all Martial Arts powers with little to no defensve, healing, support. And guess what people do after they found out they suck? They re-create until they are somewhat satisfied. I don't anticipate CoX's version of "Creative Set" is going to be that "Free" because if it's a cash item, you don't want customers to pick something that totally just don't make sense (ie: 9 x Build Ups). Each choice should bring you to certain "direction" (more debuff, more buff, more controls, etc) and each choice has a meaningful consequence.
In reality, I was only imagining Create Your Own Set within AT. I wasn't really imagining creating your own set with every power in the game. That seems too much work to me. A simple example is: I want Gravity control but I hate Dimension Shift with a passion. I will pay to get rid of it and pick something what the dev would consider "a similar value" like... Spirit Tree. That power is more meaningful to me than an extreme Situational Power. Spirit Tree isn't that great but at least it has its use whenever it's used. -
Quote:I am not too excited about /sonic MM. I have a lvl 42 Rad/Sonic Corr that I almost delete. Resistance shields just don't seem to do that well. Resistance is best with some kind of healing (ex: Pain Domination or Thermal).Originally Posted by Deacon_NA
For lord knows what reason, I've taken Sonic Resonance characters to 50 for all 3 ATs that offer it. Usually I avoid flatout statements like "Powerset X is best on AT Y" but in the case of Sonic, it's best on Defenders. 54% vs 40% resistance buff isn't trivial.
MM will have a fun time trying to back up /sonic with Aid Other... one by one. :P And with MM's support value being the lowest, I wonder how /sonic performs.
And yes, I think /sonic is a lot better on Defender because I think the % difference makes it you either continue fighting or you have to keep hitting Aid Other/Self. -
I think we may get:
1. Whip Control: They already did 3 new animations for MM so naturally they can finish off this Assault set. This is the most likely new set IMO.
2. Crowd Contro/Riot Control: The first non-elemental control set. I just hope all the controls are not tied to a "rifle" because I would hate to keep drawing out a gadget to shoot grenades or taser. I don't think Dom is getting Illusion because if they take out the "useful" pets (due to too powerful) then it's not really the kind of Illusion Control we want.
However, Whip can also be used as a "control device". Maybe we'll see Whip/Whip. :P -
Even with 1.125 damage modifier, Stalker still has the old problems. Some sets have limited aoe or have zero aoe. If you have limited aoe, you are at disadvantage.
I think Stalker has enough damage with team critical. I may increase base critical rate from 10% to 15% because Stalker, as an Assassin, shouldn't rely that heavily on teammate's buff. Himself should deal more damage.
I prefer having higher critical rate than straight damage up because I enjoy seeing Criticals. This just means they need to add more critical damage in Energy Melee. -
Quote:I've tested Kinetic's -damage on pylon. It actually makes quite a bit of difference but if you fight regular mobs, you may not notice. You do need to stack a few of them to see the benefit and you need some resistance to back it up. /Nin has no resistance so a simple 5-15% damage debuff (before level difference is calculated) won't make much difference.Originally Posted by Stryph
I really don't see the -neg damage take that much affect. Though I run with /nin on my current main. When I get hit, it still stings.
I do notice it on my Kin/Dark when I fight a boss like Freakshow Tanker.
I have not played Ice Armor but I think Tanker has 14% damage debuff in chilling embrace so it may be less on Stalker. Not bad considering Blaster and Dominator version doesn't even have -damage part. The -slow shall be decent to keep mobs together. So yeah Kin/Ice is a good combo. -
And for your information, I do think human Peacebringer is the worst thing in this game. No synergies in forms, knockbacks everywhere, and no mez protection. I don't hate all knockbacks but at some point you gotta stop knocking back all the time since it doesn't really add more safety. And what's worst is your Ninjas chasing mobs that just get knocked back. :P
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If /FF is not available, I think I'll go with either /Dark (hooray on the increase radius of healing) and /Storm.
/Storm's tornado allows you to slot one more set of +5% defense and +10% resistance and Hurrican is very good for soloing or small team.
I have tried Ninja/Trap once until lvl 20. Ninjas run extremely faster and it's a bit hard for FFG to buff all the times. You may need team teleport.
I will not make a ninja/ta or ninja/pain. Pain has good +resistance but it offers no +defense on its own. The 18% resistance is not going to make any meaningful difference on the pets since they have no other resistance to stack with (only Oni has some resistance but Oni is always the last to die anyway). /TA just doesn't debuff hard enough to help the pets survive. You can try bodyguard mode with /ta but I hate letting ninjas run on their own. They chase and they chase super fast.
Honestly, I am not a fan of Robot/Thug because I just see them too much. Ninja/FF makes Ninja very good IMO. It's not as good as Robot/Trap but it's enjoyable. -
Quote:I only want Illusion Control now because I thought it's just a straight up port. There is really nothing else they need to do for the set. Most of the good powers are just pets. No need for new animation/graphic.Originally Posted by Airhammer
This thread just rings of waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah I want Illusion Control..
Personally I want them to continue to develop NEW powersets rather than just porting over stuff I have already played.
Some think it's going to suck and some think it's going to be too good. We'll never know because the current version is not up to their "standard" obviously.
If it sucks too hard, then troller's version may ask for a buff.
If it's too good, then what does it say about the current Illusion Control like illusion/rad/cold that can already solo AVs? If you adjust one, you may need to adjust the other.
Quite frankly, the dev could have just said Dominator is not getting one this time because Illusion can't be ported but Dom is getting TWO new sets later. All these guessings on when Dom will get Illusion is annoying. I thought it's already ready...
I am excited about Whip Assault as long as it does not have weapon-draw because Dominator switches between primary and secondary powers all the time. If they are going to come up a new "Non-Elemental" Control set, I am pretty sure Controller will get it as well, which isn't exactly a exciting plan cartered for Dominator. -
Looking at some of the "features" in Electricity Melee (Lightning Rod doesn't reveal. Not really an intended feature but it is a feature nevertheless) and Kinetic Melee's 100% Burst + Build Up refresh, maybe all they need to do is to add some features to old sets. They don't need to take a power out for a pbaoe.
Some ideas I have:
Claw
Revert Eviscerate back to pbaoe, keep the same damage and make it 50% critical. Even with the current Single Target damage, it is still LOWER than Scrapper's pbaoe version. I think this is quite sad. I was going to suggest 100% critical but then I realized that they already increased its base damage a bit. This should reduce the need for Spin, which is one of the better pbaoe in the game.
Dual Blades
With melee range increasing from 5' to 7', the current 1K Cuts' 10' range doesn't seem that big of a deal. Don't get me wrong. It is nice but Typhoon Edge is nice too and Stalker doesn't have it. I would suggest making 1K Cuts 12' range.
Ninja Blade
Golden Dragonfly's cone arc from 20' to 40'. This will ensure you can easily cover 2 targets. The current version is quite narrow and sometimes you lose dps just by trying to align yourself.
Broadsword
Head Splitter's cone arc from 20' to 40'.
Dark Melee
Shadow Maul's reach from 7' to 12'. Keep the same arc.
I am not too sure how we can improve Energy Melee and Martial Arts more but these two do need some aoe, or some interesting features. -
Quote:The sad thing is Stalker isn't even the ST specialist king with AS. Stalker is only ST specialist on the first target, or the first 10s. After that, Stalker's performance is below average.Originally Posted by Zem
There's more than enough AoE in this game. There is room for a single-target specialist. You have only to look at the relative difference in hit points between a boss and a minion to know that.
When set bonuses are taken into account, Stalker probably solos AV at the worst rate. AV is supposed to be the biggest threat and yet Stalker's mechanism isn't very AV friendly. It is only AV friendly when you have other teammates surrounding you to give you that critical edge.
Yes, I don't want Stalker to become another Scrapper. I am always against giving Stalker more survival because we already have scrapper/brute/tanker. I just want Stalker to do more damage and do more "tricks". -
Quote:I think proliferation "should" include every "core" AT but I don't think it's a "must". They call it a "major round" of Proliferation 3.00.Originally Posted by BrandX
Nothing in Proliferation means, every AT should get something. In fact, the opposite is true, as some ATs could easily get every option available before other ATs, which would require additional rounds of proliferation for them to obtain all applicable sets.
So no. Wrong.
You can buy candies for all your kids but one. It's nothing wrong. You won't go to jail for it but It's just that one kid is unhappy, especially one of the kids get two new sets (dark/dark) and one set /poison is going to get a lot of buffs.
Dom did get Electricity Control just like other ATs got Dual Pistol, Electricity and Kinetic Melee. What Dom get isn't exactly a "special treatment". I do know Dom's sets require more testing/work and that's why I am surprised they did not include Illusion Control this time. I can understand no Assault.
And then again, I am not "protesting". I am just surprised that Illusion isn't included. I can understand where the "bitterness" comes from. I don't even play Dom that much now. -
In hindsight, Assassin Strike should have been an inherent power that doesn't "replace" an existing attack in the powerset. This makes balancing/creating new sets for each melee AT difficult and in some cases boring as they have to take out a good attack for it.
Assassin Strike also shouldn't cost that much endurance and require slottings.
If Stalker is designed to choose to open the battle with AS or not, then Assassin Strike doesn't really have an 'advantage'. Stalker sacrifices for less health, less base damage than Scrapper and less pbaoe for this Attack.
The good thing is the dev knows that Assassin Strike + Build Up + Placate is too restricted and they made a great improvement on Kinetic Melee by giving it "build up recharge" feature.
I just wish they had more time to go back to the older sets and add something "features" to them because I really think some of the sets are missing out on very important pbaoe. AoE is the KING in this game.
The key problem to me is still Assassin Strike. It is too slow with too much restriction/cost/slotting. -
At least we know that Illusion Control isn't ready for Dominator or isn't going to happen because that's the only set left that doesn't require any new animation/graphic. It could have been a straight port and Dominator could have got one new set.
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Quote:You do have a point that those that are new to the game may gimp themselves too hard by choosing powers that don't have much synergies (although they can force them to choose tier 1, tier 2 and tier 3...etc)Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
Um... What's more free than a cash shop powerset? How about a powerset I don't have to pay for and, you know, get for free?
Selling power in the most abstract sense is never a good idea.This defeats your entire purpose in suggesting it. Player-created powers always come down to a handful of "best" options and a sea of "horrible" options, so rather than giving people more choice, you give them even less by introducing unambiguously "best" options. This is exactly the sort of thing that failed spectacularly in City of Heroes' pre-beta and delayed the game's release by two years. It let people who knew what they were doing create massively overpowered characters while letting people who didn't know what they were doing gimp themselves hard. ATs and powersets exist for a reason.
Additionally, selling power or real money just creates an environment where those with the most disposable income are always the strongest, and class struggle is not why I come to games. Selling cosmetics and novelty items, sure. Those are just trinkets. But selling actual powers is a no-win situation. You end up either having to pay more, which is not a good prospect, or being less powerful, which is not a good prospect either.
In short: Mechanically difficult, impossible to balance and devoid of any kind of business ethics.
What I envision is picking existing powers WITHIN the same AT to form a set yourself but there will be penalties of course. You are not going to get the full value because your strength will be the diversity in your own powerset and simply being "unique". Yes, I will pay for that uniqueness if I have access to it. That's the kind of cash shop I really pay for it and no, I don't like creating overpowered toons and I dislike AE farms.
This is why I suggest "cash shop" powersets because to get this "freedom" in creating your own, you gotta pay more for it. Yes, "freedom" does cost money and that will be a big draw for me in Cash Shops. Those costume pieces have almost zero attraction to me.
That will be my "ultimate freedom" for the F2P model. What's yours? -
When Freedom hits live, what is the ultimate FREEDOM in your opinion?
To me, it's not the "free membership" part. I have money and I want a good game to play.
I've been playing this game for quite a while now and I've posted many messages as well. I think about this game all the time at work. It is sad but true. lol I think about set balances and improvement ideas and even get into fights all the time. :P
The Ultimate Freedom this game can achieve, in my opinion, is to allow you to create your own powerset through Cash Shop.
Will it ever happen? What's more FREE than creating your own powers or at least allowing you to choose existing powers to form a powerset? Of course there's going to be limitations and loads of play testing but it will be worth a lot of "cash points" if it ever happens. Dev, can you see the $_$ face?
I think it's one thing that this game will never allow to happen because we have ATs and how do you balance with "free" powersets? Or maybe we can at least choose the powers within the same AT to create a unique primary/secondary? This is probably more doable?
What's your Ultimate Freedom in this game? Design your own costume piece for sale? I am not a role-player and I even use Random button when I create characters but I know some of my friends can spend HOURS in costume shop. :P -
I've come up to the conclusion that two of Stalker's biggest problems are:
1. Assassin Strike's activation time in pve. Too long, not enough damage, and interruption is annoying. They can keep the interruption but lower the activation time or up the damage.
2. The most serious problem is in the sets themselves. I think the newer ones like Electricity, Kinetic and even Dual Blade are "good". Not "great" but they have ways to let you forget about "Assassin Strike". If you focus on only using AS in every fight, you'll find yourself not contributing as much especially if the team is killing fast already. So in the situation where you don't need AS, what else do you have? Electricity as awesome Lightning Rod. Kinetic has 100% Burst. Dual Blade can open battle with 1K Cuts. (Spines has Throw Spine but its single dps is very low)
The old problem I am talking about is the older sets that don't have pbaoe. If they insert or even modify one of the powers to deal some aoe, then the complaint won't be as much.
I am talking about Energy Melee, Martial Arts and even Ninja Blade and Broadsword.
If your Stalker has survival issue, then it's because you are not killing as fast. For the same time frame, other ATs can hit 2-3 targets and you are only hitting one and what's worst is if you miss that important Assassin Strike in the beginning.
Stalker is very playable. I've made many to lvl 50 and still play them but their main problem has a lot to do with Assassin Strike. They took out a pbaoe for it so if you feel your performance is lacking, blame for it!
And also, Stalker needs to be the king of ST damage but it's not. This does bother me. I know my Soldier and Night Widow can easily out damage any of my Stalker while providing excellent team buffs and debuffs. I am sure there are many ATs that can solo AVs better than Stalkers. -
I would rank Energy Melee as the worst set on Stalker. Total Focus only criticals a small portion and Energy Transfer doesn't even critical and the set has zero aoe.
I am not sure why Scrappers want Energy Melee that bad. Kinetic Melee wins by a large margin.
Energy Melee with the old ET... sure. -
Quote:Oh really? Interesting.Originally Posted by Necrotech_Master
however other anomalies i have noticed is the weapon caches/containment chambers in the lambda trial and the obliteration beam in the keyes trial can hurt the decoys as well