Blueeyed

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Do we think that damage debuffs will be resisted or not? I have verified that debuffing the DR of a target increases the effect of a damage debuff on it. This strongly suggests to me that a target with appropriate DR would resist a damage debuff.

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Yes, and it's resisted by the type of damage done by the enemy.

For example, using Darkest Night on an Armored Rikti (who resist 30% of incoming Lethal and Energy damage, but doesn't resist Negative Energy damage) will only debuff damage by 26.25%. Dropping Tar Patch will increase that to ~34.1%, though.

It's not the aspect of the damage debuff, but an aspect of the enemy.

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EDIT: Hmm, so we know it's resisted for damage debuffs. What about DR debuffs (the thing I remember the devs talking about)?

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Damage resistance debuffs are resisted by damage resistance...

But they are resisted by the damage resistance by each individual attack type.

And it seems that damage resistance debuffs don't change how much they are resisted.

For example, say a Radiation/Archery and a Dark/Dark Defender are playing with Banished Pantheon of the same level.

Normally, the Archery Defender's attacks will do 105% of their normal damage, and the /Dark will do 50% (Banished Pantheon suck like that).

The Dark/ defender drops down a Tar Patch. Now the Archery Defender will do 136.5% of their base damage, and the /Dark will do 65%. Tar Patch's 'type' doesn't matter, and may not even exist. Each type of damage resistance is calculated and resisted individually.

Now, while the Tar Patch is still active, the Rad/ Defender drops En Field. The Archery Defender will now be doing 168% of their base damage, while the /Dark will be doing 80% of their base damage. Note that the first damage resistance debuff doesn't seem to affect the second.

<edit>Geko's Thread</edit>

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And if those two, why not toHit?

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Because in personal testing, I've yet to discover the level of huge honking difference that Banished Pantheon resisting half of my Darkest Night's tohit debuff would provide. The mechanic for tohit debuff currently isn't typed at all - I don't believe it can be resisted by damage resistance.

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Except that you have less resistance to resist the second debuff, hence it is more effective. About 1/3rd more, I believe.

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This does not seem to be the way the effect is calculated, at least for Archery's two resistance debuffs. While damage resistance does resist damage debuffs, at least for Disruption and Acid Arrow, the calculation is done before any debuffs are applied.
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All debuffs are considered "damage" or an attack and are resisted. Dark Miasma's are "Dark Energy" so things with high Dark Resistance are less debuffed, they "resist" it better. If you lower their resistance (like by debuffing their damage resistance with Tar Patch) you can debuff things better.

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This is assuredly not the case. Tar Patch works well against Banished Pantheon for my Dark/En. By comparision, a TA/Dark's Disruption Arrow would get reamed by them.

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Why must this be so very complicated? Having two different types of to-hits is a mess to keep track of, especially in terms of tryint to buff both.

If you fold Accuracy and ToHit into the same stat, and then divide the sum Accuracy by 1 minus the defense, would something like this

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Because then the single terms allows defense buffs and tohit debuffs to completely overpower accuracy buffs (or be overpowered by).
You can see an example like this when dealing with damage debuffs.

The correct recharge for that power is 4 seconds, which would make it permable even early in the game.

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Oh, are you kidding me? Stalkers are going to get a snipe attack that does critical hit damage....The same damage that's currently NOT resistable in game?

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I could've sworn it was stated that they can crit from Hide. Not that the entire thing was critical damage. So, yes. HALF of it will be the same damage that's currently NOT resistable in-game.

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1. Stalker crits don't appear to be unresistable. Only Stalker Assassination Strikes have that attribute.

2. It's based around their ranged damage scalar, and as a result, does much less damage than a Blaster Snipe. Even with a crit, it won't be OMGing you.

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How'd you shrug them off? Aren't Stalker criticals (including AS) unresistable?

And even if you did nothing else but *not die* how does that make you in anyway uber?

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Given that no other AT can survive such a thing, I'd consider it worth noting, at least.

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Yeah, I was PvPing for, like, the third ever time the other day when another (/Mace!) tank brought that to my attention. Frackin' hard to fight and keep moving tho! At least for me! LOL

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If you don't have support, and are getting clobbered by two stalkers, it's time to get moving and forget about fighting, IMO.

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Blaster: Fire Manipulation: Fire Sword
Blaster: Fire Manipulation: Fire Sword Circle


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dammit...lucky punks, I'd trade off some aggro for a toggle drop

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I wouldn't. FCS sucks for TDs - by the time the animation is done, chances are you've already gotten mezzed/given the enemy enough time to bring back their toggles.

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I gotta have your build then! One I can handle (DP usually sorts me out). A second...maybe. A third. No way.

Unless I'm running Unstoppable. But hell, the penalty for not being safe outside the 3 minutes is like banging an underwater electrical cable with a paddle with a Great White circling nearby.

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Just having Tanker level health gives you enough to survive ~two Assassination Strikes. The real trick is to keep moving fast, so enemies don't get a chance to do the placate/followup.

I still say having AS be unresistable was a damn stupid idea, but that's a topic for a different thread.

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Wait... Ranged doesn't toggle-drop? But I thought that was one of the Blasters' reasons why they wanted to keep TD in. I'm sure I've been blasted into shut-down....

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The only ranged toggle droppers are Trip Mine, Timed Bomb, and in the Defender sets.

Blasters want to keep toggledroppers because powersets with ~2 second animation time powers are a bit difficult to keep range with (particularly given that WhirlWind is getting blown away soon). There's also a smaller sentiment that, even if it were possible to kite tankers for long enough to kill them, it wouldn't exactly be fun even compared to the instant death currently existing.

For completion, the hero toggle-dropping powers are as follows :
Inherent: Brawl (33% chance of dropping one toggle)
Blaster: Devices: Time Bomb
Blaster: Devices: Trip Mine
Blaster: Electrical Manipulation: Charged Brawl
Blaster: Electrical Manipulation: Havok Punch
Blaster: Energy Manipulation: Bone Smasher
Blaster: Energy Manipulation: Energy Punch
Blaster: Fire Manipulation: Fire Sword
Blaster: Fire Manipulation: Fire Sword Circle
Blaster: Ice Manipulation: Frozen Fists
Blaster: Ice Manipulation: Ice Sword
Force Field: Force Bolt
Force Field: Repulsion Bomb
Force Field: Repulsion Field
Kinetics: Repel
Peacebringer: White Dwarf Strike
Storm Summoning: Lightning Storm
Storm Summoning: Thunder Clap
Warshade: Black Dwarf Strike

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Well, gee, those are excellent numbers.....that discount: range,

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Pointless since this debate is over toggledroppers that don't apply in range.
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damage type,

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I didn't give the Tanker any resistance or defense values, so damage type is kinda moot.
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un-resistable damage,

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Ditto
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defiance,

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My numbers assumed a) aim, b) build up, c) three damage SOs. The total maximum damage buff a Blaster can recieve from any source after this point would typically be minimal (given the first hit tends to be the last one in either direction).
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epic power pools,

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BWAHAHAHAHAHA!
Okay, you're going to compare a toggle shield on an AT that can not get mez protection is going to shift the tide more than say, a ranged mez?
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resists,

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See damage type.[ QUOTE ]
defenses,

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detoggling effects,

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mez effects,

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and many other variables.

[/ QUOTE ]which you couldn't name if pressed?

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But...please...go on telling me how the number 1 pvp AT in the game is gimped compared to tankers. I'm gonna go get some popcorn....brb...

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When did I bring up controllers or scrappers? Stalkers?

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This cracks me up. So you, as a blaster, are jealous of tankers in pvp?

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Nah, can't play blasters for a crap.

But I see what I see, and both experience and number crunching gives a scene far different from the "OMG BLASTERSKILLEWALL!"

But, hey, go on, keep telling us how that class with no mez protection keeps running up within Stun range and handing you your [censored].

EDIT :

To be more specific :
Tankers have 156% of Blaster HP.
Blasters have 125% of Tanker damage.

Even without your toggles, without DP/HF/EE, and with the Blaster having both Aim and BU active, compared to a tanker with only BU, a Blaster can only do 151% of a Tanker's damage if they had the same powerset.

Of course, they don't. Energy Transfer is a damn nice trade compared to Boost Range.

Screw you, Blasters! Go play a real AT, like a Scrapper or Tanker. Like the Energy Melee tanker that does 80% of the damage, has mez protection, and gets Energy Transfer, too!

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What I don't understand is why these numbers (and for all other powers, for that matter) are not in the game to see when you select ATs/Powers/Enhancement slots. If not in the game itself, why not on the website for those who want to look them up. Ultimately, I would like to see the numbers put into an offical hero planner.

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Some of them are available here.
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I have read in the past that States doesn't want the game to be 'numbers driven' where everyone goes cookie-cutter with their builds for optimization. But I just don't understand what is ok about people putting precious slots and enhancements into powers for practically no effect simply because they don't know any better, and simply saying that more than 3 slots of the same type becomes ineffective:

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From my understanding, Statesman played another game where all stats where given out, and those stats were completely useless. To paraphrase, it went something like "A Necklace of +4 Wisdom. What does Wisdom do, and why would I want more of it?".
In essence, CoH was supposed to get past that by making all mechanics very transparent and very organic. In some ways, it worked. Fire Tanker powers, for example, are extremely organic, as are current Regeneration powers. In some ways, it failed. Trick Archer or Storm Summoner, not so organic.

I think either the development team or the playerbase needs to band together and come up with a quick, easy way to present the basic statistics about current powers. Currently, the closest is Hero Planners, which aren't always up to date or perfect in concept.

What I'd really like to see is a revival of Featured Powers, but given that the page hasn't been updated since BETA, I doubt we could be so lucky. (seriously, "Lunge"?)

*meh.*

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I see...that doesn't make much sense to me...a power you can get a lv 4 as a tank or lv 2 as a brute that can drop 2 toggles is just silly yet your alpha can't do it...

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The brute and tanker versions don't drop toggles (outside of mezzing). Excluding Brawl, which everyone gets and drops toggles for everyone, ATs with higher levels of self-protection don't get toggledroppers.

As to why BC or EP take down toggles while TF doesn't, well, the lower level powers are supposed to be the ones used more often.

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You could easily go Fly x3, EnhDef x2 (might be overkill), and EndRedux x1.

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Hover's base endurance cost is less than one endo every ten seconds. This is not worth slotting. Likewise, its defense value is miniscule.

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I'm not trying to be mean, but you're totally ignoring what I'm saying in every other post. I was comparing damage scalars...which is to say, damage-per-hit, not damage over time. Damage over time is so fluid and difficult to discuss mathematically with any relevancy to the actual performance of any AT or powerset as a whole that I wouldn't even bother with it.

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Well, you said not long ago that you were comparing damage per hit. So which is it? Meaningless description A, or B? If your model is correct, it must be correct whether the Sonic Blast is in the hands of the Blaser or Defender.

Again, do you think a Sonic blaster does 112.5% - 125% of the damage of other blasters?

If so, we obviously have an overpowered set on our hands, and that'll be reined in anyway. If not, you're blowing smoke out your [censored] just to nerfherd.

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[*] Increased Defender’s Freezing Rain Slow debuff.
[*] To make it better than the Controller’s version. Defender’s increased more.

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So, if it's "by design", it's "bey design as of I5 or later".

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I'm not sure if I'd trust the patch notes. They seem to be maintained by NCSoft, not Cryptic, and as a result seem to be subject to some severe inaccuraries and people thinking that they're working for the best intentions, even if that's not really the case.

EDIT : yes, I'm griping about the NCSoft web team... on their forums. They've got good folks and bad folks, I assume, like everywhere else, but their patch notes so far have really not been too well done.

Okay, we're approaching two full months since the initial post, here. I'm keeping the CDI thread on hiatus til i7 hits test anyway, but there are a few things I'd like to know.
[*]_Castle says : "Looking at the power [slows], your observation is correct. It seems to be by design, though I've added it to my list of things to be reviewed."

Has this been reviewed? If so, what was the result and reasoning? If not, what's the relative schedule of it being looked at (pre-i7, i7-i8, "Soon™", post-Second Ice Age, hell freezes over, Monty Python group reforms, pigs fly, Circeus is content with Ice Tankers, "Sometime™", when geko makes his PM available again)?
[*]_Castle_ says : "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."

This may be an acceptable outcome if the same coding could be used to refund the recharge timer on the power - in fact, several players brought this up. Recharge is often slotted, while endurance seldom is.
Is such coding reasonable?
[*]_Castle_ says : "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. "

Clear Mind's current animation clocks in at 3.1 seconds. This makes the power dangerous if not deadly to use as a cure or quick preventative power. Increase Density has a resistance portion and animates in 2.07 seconds. Clarity is nearly identical to Clear Mind and animates in 1.5 seconds.
The short duration makes sense for a buff used mainly to cure players. The long animation, in a highly reactive set, does not.
[*]_Castle_ says : There isn't much that can be done about this [Detention Field's immobilize].

Can the magnitude of the immobilize, at least, be upped, preferably to the level of Rest?
[*]_Castle_ says : "It [Flash Arrow] is functionally the same power as Controller/Smoke and works identically to that power in terms of effect."

Personal testing shows Smoke and Flash Arrow to have the same or similar base values - a Controller seems to debuff tohit by the same value whether it be with the former power or the later. Comparatively, comparing Ice Arrow against Block of Ice gives a seperate result - the former, even when used as a controller power, takes significantly longer to recharge, has no damage portion, and has no accuracy bonus.

The first example seems to show that there is no powerset distinction for a power : it is only modified by the archetype using it. The second show a power seems to be given a bonus or penalty for being 'outside the set'.

Which is the case?
[*]_Castle_ says : 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.

Given that there are entire Defenders Primaries which work only marginally better as Controller Secondaries (or, in the case of Trick Arrow and Radiation Emission, work better as a Controller secondary), making an entire AT feel invalidated, can we at least get a timeframe estimate for this (pre-i7, i7-i8, "Soon™", post-Second Ice Age, hell freezes over, Monty Python group reforms, pigs fly, Circeus is content with Ice Tankers, "Sometime™", when geko makes his PM available again)?

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Bonecrusher....ugh...drops 2 toggles...how many does Total Focus drop? if it's 2, then I'm stabbing something...

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Total Focus doesn't drop toggles (other than if it stuns you, which it shouldn't unless you have your trousers down). Energy Melee's Toggle Drops are in Energy Punch and Bonecrusher.

Electric Blast provides sub-par single-target and AoE damage compared to even Energy Blast.

And I've said it once before, so I'll say it once again : Do you honestly believe that Sonic Blasters do 112.5-125% of the damage done by other blasters?

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So there's no hope for Hover then

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All they'd have to do to change hover back is put Flight Speed on a seperate schedule. We know that this is currently possible. It just may not be an acceptable result for the development team.

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And in those 10 seconds the blaster can do 1000 pts of damage, while the tanker can only do 500 pts of damage in his 15.7 seconds, so in a certain number of times the blaster has the advantage, being able to defeat his opponent before he dies, while the tanker can't.

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That's doubtful. Even if you compare click powers and attack chains, the difference between Blapper melee damage and Tanker damage is on the lines of 70~80%, far from the 31% that you brought up. Against a single target, that damage scale would be somewhere along the lines of the tanker doing ~1100-1300 damage during his 15.7 seconds. Obviously this degrades if the Blaster is focusing on large groups of enemies, but just as typically, Blasters don't tend to survive ten seconds against the massive spawns required for such an example. <nor can they reach such sizes solo, making the whole point moot since teams change the whole damn equation.>
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The overall picture is just too different between blaster/tanker ATs to view only part of it at a time like this. You can easily choose your numbers to seem to favor whichever you would rather favor.

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It's a good thing I wasn't trying to favor one AT or the other. The point of the comparision, as you might note if you read what I was replying to, was to compare the merits and faults of the current healing scalar system as it affects several different archetypes.

But thank you for bringing pointless and stupid bickering into the arguement just to make yourself feel better about your poor tanker. I missed it so much.

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I poked _Castle_ again and he found that the bow is marked auto-hit at the moment. He is working internally to decide if this is a bug. He suspects it may be.

-Teklord

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Someone let Mr. Fish get his hands on the server code?