Jibikao

So it begins...

You know what, I used to be against F2P because I always wanted to feel special and I wanted my voice to be heard. Paying customers tend to have more rights than non-paying ones. If I feel something is wrong, I'll voice my opinion and I hope my voice/concern is heard.


During the time I took a break from this game, I've tried two F2P games and in both of them, I ended up paying MORE per month because I had to buy extra slots, bag space and whatnot. Allods is one of the games I've tried. The bag space is so freaking small that I had to spend like $19.99 to buy extra bag. $19.99 is more than one month subscription!!!


I am also impatient. If I know there is a new powerset that can be unlocked by doing numerous grinding or can be locked by purchasing, I always choose purchasing. My business is growing and TIME is more valuable to me. I rather spend the money now to try new things than waiting to be unlocked.


It seems like most major games are switching to F2P. I won't trash it for now because if it happens, it happens. I am not so old that I want to resist any new changes. I am going to be open minded for now and see what happens. As long as the VIP portion of it is handled well, and it gives the company more money to develop the game, then I am fine with it.


The article mentions that new "powers" can be purchased? If that means I can buy a new power for an existing powerset, then I'll definitely do it. :P

Most of my MMs take at least one primary attack and it really depends on which set I am using.

For Merc, I took M3 Grenade because soldier's aoe is really lacking due to narrow cones and M3 Grenade has pretty large radius and it offers 50% knockback which adds more soft controls and I get to put two damage procs in (smashing and energy).

For Necro, I took Gloom and Gloom is an awesome attack even on MM. I prefer Gloom over Dark Blast because during the heat of battle, I may not have time to keep blasting so I rather use Gloom than fast recharging Dark Blast. I used to run a Necro/Storm that focus on blasting but that's before they nerf's Pet's Recharge. I used to put -recharge in Lich and Grave Knight and all 4 of us were shooting many dark blasts. It was fun while it lasts.

The only set that doesn't make sense (at least in my opinion) is Ninja. The two archery attacks deal way too little damage. The cone attack is ok I guess. You can slot for energy proc and eventually purple proc for knock down. However, I prefer throwing Smoke Flash on Oni as Oni's damage is better than me and I get to save more power slots and choice.


You are right about Active Participation though. Sometimes if I don't attack at all, I may feel bored.

I think part of the reason why some don't take any primary attack is that the master has useful/active secondary set that keeps them busy already. Between babysitting the pets and using secondary powers, they may not have time to attack themselves. I know whenever I am on a large team, I am so busy supporting my teammates and my pets that I barely have time to attack myself,. When I solo, I have a lot more time to blast.


If you take both ST attacks and slot them, you may be dealing just as much damage as 3 minions (minus the babysitting part!). If you find your minions die too quick for your liking, then don't slot them much and only use them for bodyguard mode and use attack powers yourself.

My main problem with knock back is pbaoe knock back like Solar Flare in Human Peacebringer. It scatters way too much.


I wish there were more Knock up than knock back.


In Champions, knockback and down can actually improve your damage because there is strong "fall" damage. That makes knock back/up way cooler as the target who gets knock backed to a wall so hard should be "hurt" more. :P I know it won't happen in this game but some knockbacks are just too annoying to deal with. Trying to reposition all the time can be very annoying.

Just want to let you know that of all the Ninja combos I've tried, Ninja/FF is the best one especially once you have Power Boost. Jounin's defense will be well over the soft-cap and Genins will be over the soft-cap too as long as they stay within your Dispersion bubble. You just need to follow them closer.

Part of the reason /FF works much better on Ninja is that two bubble shields stay on them! I've tried Ninja/Trap before and it's hard to keep the ninja within FFG range because they just run so darn fast and if any of Genin knocks back with Crane kick, you'll need to chase as well.

Ninja does not fit well with resistance sets like Thermal or Pain because the Ninjas themselves have almost no resistance (only Oni has some) to stack with. A fire shield that provides 20% resistance is not going to save Genin when it matters.

Trick Arrow's debuff values won't help much. Basically to ensure Ninjas survive longer, you are pretty much limited to bodyguard mode or /ff and /trap with team teleport so you teleport with FFG and ninjas together.


But after testing most of the pets on the weekend, I can tell you that Ninja set's damage potential is really quite high. Remember, it's the "potential", not the real numbers because Ninjas die the fastest.

Hey, at least this is a good news for Ninja because Stalker has the least survival in terms of HP cap and yet Stalker deals the least amount of damage of all "DPS" ATs. Stalker ranks behind Blaster, Scrapper, SoA, some Dominators and some Brutes.


One change I really want to see if giving Ninjas higher AoE defense. It's fine if they die by taking one single hit because at least they suffer for the team but it truly sucks that one aoe from a boss wipes out most of Genins.

I've been testing Ninjas a lot and their design is better when they "spread out". The benefit of spreading out is that Caltrops and Rain of Fire last longer. If you focus fire on the first target, your caltrops/roa may end too quick. Genin's Crane Kick also works better when they find their own target. The knockback helps their survival a bit. However, spreading out is also extremely dangerous because Ninja chases too fast! I almost never let my pets choose their targets on a large team (hence why I hate bodyguard mode) because I am so afraid Ninja is going to chase. When I am soloing, I don't really care if they spread out. Spreading out helps Oni's AI too as he tends to cycle other attacks on different targets.



Now the key question is, is Ninja's damage Horribly Strong to match their Horribly Weak Survival?:P

This is a re-post:

Man, I am bored at work and I keep posting! lol Anyway, I've been looking at Spec-Ops numbers and something doesn't seem right to me:

Burst (21.77) x 7 = 152.39
Heavy Burst (34.53) x 3 = 103.59
Brawl (25.70) x 3 = 77.1
Riflebutt (7.62, a stun) x 3 = 22.86
Snipe (49.05) x 2 = 98.10

Yes, it's that SNIPE!!!! Spec-Ops' Snipe has 16s recharge and I believe it has no interruption.

For a 16s long range attack, its base damage is pathetic at 49.05. This ratio just doesn't seem right to me. Clockwork boss pet has a Chest Beam that is going to have reduced recharge from 30s to 16s. Now that Chest Beam hits HARD and it's a small cone attack.

I don't want Spec-Ops to shoot faster or anything. I think Snipe just needs to be better. Snipe has terrible activation time at about 3.90s so making it recharge faster doesn't make it a good attack chain.

The dev refuse to give Spec-Ops Stealth Strike and that's fine. They just need to increase Snipe's base damage to match a REAL snipe brawl index. A real snipe on Corruptor like Moonbeam has base damage of 115.1 and Dark Blast has 41.7. Looking at this number, a real snipe's base damage is almost 3x higher than a basic 4s attack.


I am not asking much but can we at least increase Snipe's base damage from 49.05 to 69.06? Heavy burst has 6s recharge and double that is 69.06. Remember, Snipe has 16s recharge so double the damage from a 6s attack is still not that much.


Another idea I have is to add more damage in Riflebutt. Yes, your spec-ops probably rarely uses it but this attack has 16s recharge as well and it already does damage. I think Spec-Ops can use any damage increase they can get and I really hope the dev can increase Riflebutt's damage to 34.53. 34.53 is like a 6s attack.

I mean Riflebutt is situational attack at best. If the mobs dare to come close, spec-ops need to at least make them pay!

Man, I am bored at work and I keep posting! lol Anyway, I've been looking at Spec-Ops numbers and something doesn't seem right to me:

Burst (21.77) x 7 = 152.39
Heavy Burst (34.53) x 3 = 103.59
Brawl (25.70) x 3 = 77.1
Riflebutt (7.62, a stun) x 3 = 22.86
Snipe (49.05) x 2 = 98.10

Yes, it's that SNIPE!!!! Spec-Ops' Snipe has 16s recharge and I believe it has no interruption.

For a 16s long range attack, its base damage is pathetic at 49.05. This ratio just doesn't seem right to me. Clockwork boss pet has a Chest Beam that is going to have reduced recharge from 30s to 16s. Now that Chest Beam hits HARD and it's a small cone attack.

I don't want Spec-Ops to shoot faster or anything. I think Snipe just needs to be better. Snipe has terrible activation time at about 3.90s so making it recharge faster doesn't make it a good attack chain.

The dev refuse to give Spec-Ops Stealth Strike and that's fine. They just need to increase Snipe's base damage to match a REAL snipe brawl index. A real snipe on Corruptor like Moonbeam has base damage of 115.1 and Dark Blast has 41.7. Looking at this number, a real snipe's base damage is almost 3x higher than a basic 4s attack.


I am not asking much but can we at least increase Snipe's base damage from 49.05 to 69.06? Heavy burst has 6s recharge and double that is 69.06.


Another idea I have is to add more damage in Riflebutt. Yes, your spec-ops probably rarely uses it but this attack has 16s recharge as well and it already does damage. I think Spec-Ops can use any damage increase they can get and I really hope the dev can increase Riflebutt's damage to match Snipe's damage. That way Spec-Ops has two decent burst damage which will be different from Robot's and Enforcers. Since riflebutt is melee, the damage should be a bit higher than snipe. Maybe 74 or something?

I mean Riflebutt is situational attack at best. If the mobs dare to come close, spec-ops need to at least make them pay!

What do you think?

Something I've noticed when I was testing pets this week.

Under Pet Details, melee attacks still show range of 5'. It should be 7'. It's very hard for me to tell if it's just a typo or not. At any rate, a typo should be fixed.

Having 7' reach is important as it improves cone attacks like Golden Dragonfly and Zombie's Vomits.

My Ninja/FF hits 50 today. Power Boost + force field shields work wonderful for the Ninjas.

I know power boost can't increase buff powers that have +resistance or +damage component (hence can't improve sonic shields and world of pain).

But Force Field Generator is a pet and it only has +defense. Does anyone know if Power Boost can increase FFG's defense? That will be awesome!

So I went ahead and tested Jounins and Grave Knights since they are Lieut pets. During the tests, I've noticed something very interesting about Grave Knights.

Same test. One minute.

Grave Knights
Start at melee range:
Dark Blast (25.02) x 7 = 175.14
Gloom (44.06) x 1 = 44.06
Slash (30.59) x 3 = 91.77
Hack (50.17) x 2 = 100.34
Disem (59.96) x 1 = 59.96
Head (91.46) x 1 = 91.46
Life (30.59) x 2 = 61.18

Total = 623.91 (this is pretty bad!!!)

Then I start GK at long range
Dark Blast
Gloom x 6 = 220.3
Slash x 6 = 183.54
Hack x 4 = 200.68
Disem x 4 = 239.84
Head x 3 = 274.38

Total = 1118.74 (this is the highest I've got for 60s)

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Conclusion: Grave Knight, just like Oni, seems to have different "modes". When I started GK at melee range, I was expecting a lot more melee attacks but it turns out starting at melee distance messes his AI even more (same as Oni!)! I did two tests starting at melee range because I couldn't believe how bad the performance is. First time only 16 attacks used and second time 17 attacks used. Not good.

Then I started GK at long distance and all of sudden, GK came alive and used 22 attacks (mostly melee swords and Gloom) in 60s which result in 1118.74 base damage.


I did another test with Oni this morning and when you have a good mix of range and melee attacks, you have High and Low performances.


Now, Spec-ops' test run only produced 425ish damage which is 50% less than GK's damage. And mind you, GK has two range attacks just like Spec-ops. On a full team, GK doesn't always go melee. Yikes, spec-ops' damage is THAT pathetic.

I'll post Jounin when I get home.

Yes, I know Jounin and Grave Knight can use -defense sets too. I don't want to compare Spec-Ops to melee-oriented pets but I am very confident that both Jounin and Grave Knight can out dps Spec-Ops by a LARGE margin.

I mainly use Enforcer because Enforcer is primarily range.


I know Commando should be the main source of AoE damage and maybe that's why Spec-Ops have zero aoe but even in the Single Target damage department, they are lagging way behind Enforcers and other Lieut pets (minus Protector).

I rarely play Robots but I believe Protectors have photon grenades that can be used once every 16s and they have 50% to product mag 2 stun? And doesn't Seekers have stun and debuffs too?


I just want to point out just how bad Spec-Ops is. The design is flawed with two long recharge aoe controls. I can understand the restriction on AoE control because even for Dominator the aoe control has 240s recharge, but Soldiers only have S/L resistance and they lose out on other +defense/resistance because their form of "defense" is through controls, and their controls suck. And no, Medic's healing is only mildly useful outside of battle and Medic is usually the first one to die anyway. lol

For a simple 60s test against Dummy, the damage number difference is:

Spec-Ops 885.50 VS Enforcer's 1298.80 (Enforcer's damage is about 46% more!)

This is sad? Oh no, NOT YET!!!

Of 1298.50 Enforcer damage, 639.15 is Cone + Target AoE damage!!!!!!

Which means Enforcers can debuff with AH Proc way more efficient than Spec-Ops. For the same time spent, Enforcers (two of them) can probably debuff 3-5 targets and Spec-Ops can only debuff 1.
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Oh wait, Spec-Ops is not all about Damage. They are about controlling. You wanna talk about controlling?

I did 4 tests on Spec-Op this morning and in those 4 times, both Tear Gas and Flash Bang are used within 5s of each other. Twice he used them in a sequence. If they are truly about controlling, they should spread about the AoE because what's the point of adding a mag 6 Hold to a mag 6 Stun? If the target is already stunned, there is no point in adding Tear Gas's -damage/hold. If a target is held, there is no point in adding Flashbang's tohit debuff. Do you see my logic here? I am using mag 6 because I am going to assume both of them hit the same target.

Spec-Ops' design is simply bad. You never want to rely on your pets for controls because there is no way we can choose when to use those powers. As bad AI as Spec-Ops, it doesn't help that Flashbang recharge in 2 mins and Tear Gas recharge in 3 mins!!!


But wait, Spec-Ops has awesome Mag 3 melee Stun. Well, being a melee stun, this means 75% of the time they won't even use it because mobs don't get that close enough and I am not sure if Pet Window is wrong but melee attack in pets still show 5 radius. They should be 7 radius just like the rest of "melee".
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How awesome are Enforcers? To start, Enforcers have more time to deal damage because their form of "defense" is leadership Maneuvers. It doesn't require them to shoot Web or Tear Gas. At lvl 50, Maneuver gives 8.43 defense-to-all and two of them you'll have base 16.86. And if you use the theory that 1 defense equal to 2 resistance, then technically, the two Enforcers are buffing the gang with 33.72 Resistance.

Of course I know there's drawback. The drawback is that leadership radius is only 30' and that's why minions may die very soon if they run out of it (by the way Bruiser has standard S/L resistance with some Fire, Cold and Toxic).

With Enforcers being this awesome, who cares if one or two minions die? In fact, I would take at least one personal attack and say screw you minions.

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I mainly want to compare Spec-Ops VS Enforcers because both of them can use -Defense set and both of them are primarily range. I want to point out that Spec-Ops being able to take -Defense isn't the reason why Merc is balanced. It is not. Even with -Defense set, it is still lagging way behind Thug in terms of damage.


A more fair comparison would be Merc VS Robot, but we all know Robot is one of the best MM sets because the pets survive much better than Merc and Assault Robot has -regen so in an AV fight, he is going to contribute much greater than Commando.



Your thoughts?

Test 1: 60s : Melee Range
Burst (21.77) x 7 = 152.39
Heavy Burst (34.53) x 3 = 103.59
Brawl (25.70) x 3 = 77.1
Riflebutt (7.62, a stun) x 3 = 22.86
Snipe (49.05) x 2 = 98.10
Web x 2
Gas x 1
Flashbang x 1

Total base damage is 454.10 and with 95% enhancement = 885.50
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Test 2: 60s: Starting at long range
Burst x 6 = 130.62
Heavy Burst x 3 = 103.59
Brawl x 1 = 25.70
Riflebutt x 2 = 15.24
Snipe x 3 = 147.15
Web x 2
Gas x 1
Flash x 1

Total base damage is 422.30 and with 95% enhancement = 823.48
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I've always felt Spec-Ops is THE REASON why Merc feels under-performed. The set's damage is really low without AH Proc and Negative Proc. I've always thought sets are not balanced with procs in mind. Is Spec-Ops the only MM pets that can take -Defense procs?


Nope. Enforcers can take them too. Are you ready to see Enforcers' numbers?
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Enforcers
Starting at melee range (to get the most potential damage)

Uzi Burst (24.77) x 6 = 148.62
Uzi Heavy (40.99) x 4 = 163.96
Uzi Cone (40.99) x 3 = 122.97
Uzi Dual (68.92) x 2 = 137.84
AoE Clips (22.32) x 3 = 66.96
Brawl (25.70) x 1 = 25.70

Total base damaged is 666.05 and with 95% enhancement = 1298.80

Flashy? I would suggest:

1. Fire/Trap Corruptor. Man, nothing is more "graphically intense" than big green clouds and colorful fiery rain.

2. Sonic Resonance and Force Field. They are flashy alright.. more like annoying if you choose very bright color.


3. Earth/Storm: Earth is not only flashy, it also produces a lot of noise! Storm? You have Hurrican that blocks people's view and cool Lightning Cloud. :P

4. Plant's Creeper is also very flashy.

I find Weaken and Envenom's activation time a bit too long. They are only ST target. Freezing Rain takes about 2s but it hits like 10 targets.

For a ST debuff to work well and frequently, activation, recharge and endurance need to be reduced. And also, you don't need to put +accuracy in Tar Patch and Freezing Rain so I think these two ST debuffs need to have an innate accuracy bonus like Archery.

Freezing Rain only costs 22.8 endurance. If you put Weaken and Envenom on the same target, you already spent 26 end. T_T

I propose:

Envenom
9.75 end (like Gale's cost)
8s Recharge
Activation time 1.00s (currently 1.33s)
Accuracy Bonus 1.20x
Debuff S/L Resistance by 36%. I propose this because /Poison weakens the body the most. Your physical form is weaken so you take more Smashing/Lethal damage. Other resistance type remains at 30%.

Weaken
9.75 end
10s recharge
Activation time 1.33s (currently 2.07s)
Accuracy Bonus 1.20x

I agree that we should keep the Single Target oriented-theme but in order for Single Target attack/debuff to work well, activation time must be quick because of the same period of time, /Poison can only debuff one target while other debuffs are affecting several targets.
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Poison Trap - NEEDS TO BE RENAMED!!!!
1. Get rid of 4s interruption

2. The Sleep and -Endurance effect is too similar to Static Field. I was reading some of the suggestions and I, too, agree that /Poison should deal some damage. Whenever I think of poison, I think of DoT damage and debuffs. If we don't want to break the cottage rule, I propose this:

When "Poison Bomb" gets set off, the Green Clouds deal initial AoE 40.4 Toxic Damage and then the affected targets are put to sleep, just like how Frozen Aura function. 40.4 damage is like a 6s attack like Dual Pistol. Repulsion Bomb does 30.6 damage but that has 30s recharge. Poison Trap has 60s and it requires 5s casting time.

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Neurotoxic Breath

1. Allow it to accept Hold Sets. That's it. If it can, then at least you can put Chance to hold and proc damage to make it more interesting.

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Noxious Gas

1. Reduce recharge from 300s to 240s.