BrainBrillo

Is this a meme I missed? I wish to remain aware of all internet traditions.

Been a while since I stuck my neck out in this thread, so here's an idea - double the damage on all snipes, and increase the base recharge to 45s. This makes them better as alpha strikes, better as spike damage (when insta'd), and (about) half as important to sustained DPS - in other words, a useful but situational ability. Plus, it means a blaster can alternate popping Aim and Build Up to always make it instant whenever it comes off cooldown - Corruptors and Defenders get to decide if they want to tie themselves in knots for half of the time the snipe will be up without Aim. Damage-wise, this makes snipes a bit less than 90% as effective as a stealthed Assassin strike, and almost 25% better than a critical unstealthed Assassin strike - but on three times the cooldown.

I know this undoes a lot of the individual set-balancing this change would make (like salvaging AR and Dev from the dustbin), but the devs could do that separately without altering how most blast sets play.

This was in response to my comment on this giving a "noticeable, binary advantage" to min-maxers. And you know what? I can't think of another case where something so significant is tied so closely to a hard cap. See my comment about 21.85% +hit versus 22.03%.

Even on AVs?

Look, I agree that AoE damage rules most of the game, but the argument here seems to be "single target damage is irrelevant." By that standard, the devs could just give us instant-cast snipes automatically, since any non-AoE power has been deemed not worth the effort to balance.

Half the arguments I'm seeing for the +22 hit fast snipe cutoff are "the hard cap cutoff doesn't matter because it's gonna fly past most players." If it's not gonna affect most players...why are they making it?

So, do you know a lot of optimized FB builds that skip Blaze? Since it's one of those single target powers that are apparently useless.

One single power is what puts Fire Blast substantially ahead of every other set for DPS. When one power is on a short enough cooldown to be 30-50% of your damage, it absolutely does change things.

This is overall damage from rotation, yes?

OK, now reduce that somewhat due to aim giving fast snipe some of the time, and likewise Build Up.

Still, a 15-30% boost for Blaster and 20-40% for the others seems a little steep.

Yes, but other target numbers (perma-hasten, defense softcaps) could be deduced from data in-game. And none altered anything as central to the character as their attack rotation.

I'm aware that people who study resources available outside the game itself will always have the edge. They just usually aren't handed advantages this big and this easily attainable.

Thought experiment - acknowledging that this is an advantage in DPS, how much is too much? I'll admit, if after all my hemming and hawing adding perma-snipe only means 5% more damage, I'll drop my argument as a false alarm. At 15% I'd feel vindicated, and 10% I'd still argue something should be done. Where do other people stand on this?

That gets around the Blaster and Dom difficulty achieving +22% to hit, but not the "+30% damage for reading the forums" issue. It also undoes, or at least massively reduces, the buff to Devices. I'm also afraid of people seeing some groups with 101% to hit ("Let's go kill Captain Mako!"), speccing out of Tactics, and then having the whole thing turn into a round of Buff-Bringer blame game when nobody has fast snipes.

Yeah, I'm paranoid, but I figure this is the kind of paranoia to bring up when the change is in pre-beta.

An excellent, excellent approach to have as a player. But not as a developer, the people I'm hoping may get this opinion forwarded to them at some point. (No, I don't expect all my whims to be fulfilled, but they seem to want feedback, so I'm giving it.) I think the developers should be concerned about how everybody plays the game, and very specifically about the fact that (IMHO) this change will create a distinct break between folks who read the forums and folks who just play the game. The relative ease with which +22% hit is achieved (on Corruptors and Defenders), plus the comparatively high power of perma-fast snipe, means folks who hit an arbitrary target become substantially more powerful.

And since the breaking point is a hard cap with no indications or documentation, it very, VERY heavily favors wiki and forum readers. A guy who just looks at abilities and set bonuses could figure out that perma-hasten is good and work towards it (plus it'll get better as he gets closer). A Super Reflexes tank can look at his combat stats and compare it to some enemy scans to figure out that he is, in fact, stacking too much +def. But this all-or-nothing, undocumented change simply cannot be deduced from data in-game. And the benefits for achieving it, based on Arcanaville's numbers, seem really substantial. *shrug* I think that's the kind of situation the developers are hoping to avoid.

Pillory me for this if you like, but...I'd actually prefer that. Nethergoat is talking about how casual players will only encounter this as an occasional fast snipe when they hit Build Up or Aim. If that's what the devs want it to be - please make it that way. (And clarifying - plus perma fast-snipe for AR, since that also seems to be the goal.)

If they want it to be perma in parties of, say, 4 or more, make it that way. Don't trust things to sort themselves out, because people will be irate when they do not. Kyriani was mentioning the idea of Blasters taking tactics themselves and stacking that to achieve perma fast-snipe - which two or three Blasters could indeed do. But I'm getting a vision of everybody taking Tactics to achieve this, then a bunch of people dropping it because "everybody has it", then a bunch of complaining about parties no longer giving the buff.

If the plateau were some stupidly high number (say, the 40% that Aim gives), then it would be a much simpler matter. The amount of +hit needed would be substantially beyond any readily achievable or, frankly, useful number, and snipes would revert to the intermittently-useful attack the devs intended. Again, feel free to hate me for saying it, but I'd rather see that than people shaking there heads at newbs using non-snipe rotations or people getting angry when a party doesn't give them perma-snipe.

See? We've actually located our point of disagreement here. You don't think that the developers should be concerned about powerful options in a build becoming mandatory (for optimization purposes, at least). I do. And I don't think there's anything either of us could say to change the other's mind.

Thank you for getting to the heart of the matter so quickly.

The snipe change amounts to the strongest attack. In every power pool that has one. And with a ~6 sec recharge, it is an attack that will be used very, very often. I would, indeed argue that using your set's best attack is "required" and "game changing," at least for builds with any airs of being optimized. Put it this way - Blaze is, far and away, the best DPA in Fire Blast (the best DPS set in the game right now). Would you concede Blaze is "required" and "game changing" for Fire Blast? Because every set with a snipe just picked up something on par with Blaze, provided they hit the (also useful) +22% to hit.

Not disagreeing that this is not as far-reaching as fitness - for starters, it only affects three archetypes. But the matters are ones of degree and not kind. The arguments you made against this - choices should be available, just because it's good doesn't mean you need it, think of what you're giving up - can be used to argue against any overly-useful combination of optional powers. At what point does the combination become too useful? I think tying it to your most powerful rotation attack, the one that will be cast 9-10 times per minute, is too much - and you disagree.

OK. So they can use their best rotation attack, with a ~6 sec recharge (slotted), maybe...20% of the time? (10 sec of aim with a 45 sec recharge) Oh, but Blasters will also have Build Up on the same cooldown. So 40% there. Power Build Up is...10 sec every 120 seconds. 30% for that guy. And this is *after* stacking a bunch of hit but missing an arbitrary cutoff.

Yes, I suppose they can just huff yellows constantly. But there is no other ability, anywhere in the game, that changes my core rotation based on inspiration usage. And how has the suggestion "just be constantly inspiration-buffed" been received in other situations it's been offered as an answer?

Oh, and teams? You mean the team that is now full of Blasters who are now counting on my Corr/Def/Controller to bring the +hit that makes their snipes perma-fast? I'm arguing that this change will make Tactics mandatory on Defenders and Corruptors - bringing the party aspect of +hit bonuses into it does nothing to allay that fear.

Here's where I differ with you, for reasons mentioned in the post that began this thread. The blaster with 44% defense, the controller with a 97s recharge on Indomitable Will, the Illusionist with Phantom Army on 70s cooldown, and the character with 130s-recharge hasten are all doing pretty good. They have a gap in their awesome ability, but having it up a lot is still very useful even without permanence.

The Corruptor or Defender (or Blaster) with 21.5% +hit gets...a hit bonus. That's it. They will not gradually see something get better as they play and maybe choose to focus on it more, they will either see their snipe turn into their best attack - or not.

This change amounts to a very noticeable DPS bonus for forum readers, and a concomitant penalty to people who just play the game without reading up on it.

Power slots? 3 - the snipe, Assault or Maneuvers, and Tactics.
Well, what I *gave up* will vary from player to player and build to build.

What I *got*, for my three power choices, is a substantial to hit bonus for my entire party (and Confuse protection, FWIW), a substantial damage or noticeable defense boost for my entire party, and the deadliest attack in my chain.

Look at it this way - what one primary/secondary and two pool powers could you pick up that are *better* than what is offered by the preceding paragraph?
Here, let me throw those paragraphs into the Issue 18 Wayback Machine and see what comes out:

"Those are questions whose answers will differ from player to player. Performance may degrade in some areas so that you can take Health and Stamina. It's give and take and one must really take a hard look at what's being given up to achieve that extra +recovery and +regen. Sure some combos and AT's will have an easier time getting to it. Others may have to work harder but may see bigger returns because of the nature of their AT or powerset.
(removing bit about this being a change)
...It may be just as "viable" to continue to skip the Fitness Pool and THAT I believe is INTENDED. I do not believe the devs want to force us into taking Fitness Powers just because they are the end all be all. But they do want them to be tempting."

Save for the bits about it being a change, and perma-ing, the argument you presented also invalidates Inherent Fitness. If you thought Inherent Fitness was a mistake, you're entitled to your opinion, but the Devs disagreed with you. If you don't think perma-snipes will be mandatory in every solid build the way Fitness was...there's our disagreement.

What he said. And let me make my complaint more specific - the problem isn't that you *have* to take the snipe. Stalkers *have* to take Assassin's Strike, and I am be part of the vast majority who seem to have no issue with that.

The problem arises with the fact that once I take the snipe, I (as a Defender or Corruptor) must then go two deep into a specific Pool set in order to get full access to this incredibly potent attack that will be available every ~6 seconds. Plus, as a corruptor, I will be stacking 87% +hit in Tactics, violating an otherwise near-universal maxim of intelligent build design (don't keep stacking a stat once you reach the 15% return level of ED) because the last .6% hit I get from stacking a 4th +to-hit takes me past the magic number that makes my snipe fast cast. And a +hit Kismet is now mandatory...but I'm less irritated about that, one slot somewhere on my build irks me less than two mandated powers.

Sure, I *can* skip this whole mess - the same way you *could* skip Stamina when Fitness was a pool. But it was so good that it became mandatory, and I and Oedipus and others are arguing that reliable fast cast snipes are so good and so central that they *will* make Tactics mandatory for every Corruptor and Defender - especially since the Blaster version is apparently being balanced around the assumption that they'll have perma-fast snipes in parties. (Woe betide the post-I24 Defender who's in an 8 person party with a blaster who isn't receiving perma-fast snipes. I assure you the whining will be audible from orbit.)

TLDR - mandatory primary/secondary powers are OK, mandatory Pool Powers are bad, and perma-fast snipes are sufficiently potent that Tactics will become mandatory for any Def or Corr who aspires to play a halfway optimized build.

Right, but for those of us who read the forums it will mean:
-"Stack 22% +hit, or lose your best attack."

And I predict that people who end up in large parties that DO NOT provide them the necessary buffs for +22% hit to get surly in short order. Are you concerned that this (and the self-buff to snipes for Corruptors and Defenders) might push Tactics into must-have, Fitness Pool territory?

Seconding this, as a player whose only 40+s are a Corruptor and a Defender, and who has never played a Blaster to 10.

If the idea is to give Blasters access to a quick, hard-hitting attack whenever they Build Up or Aim...code it that way. (And just give the ability to Devices' targeting toggle.) Hell, double the cooldowns and damage of snipes if you have to make it more attractive as an intermittent ability - it'd make them better at the one thing people can use them for now anyway. Instead, they turned it into a buff that hinges on perma-ing in ways that are far, FAR easier for Defenders and Corruptors than Blasters. ((And on the Defender/Corruptor front - christ, as if Mace Mastery wasn't mandatory enough, now we'll need it for both our only +def shield AND focused accuracy.)) Plus, it's something nonintuitive (much less obvious than, say, Assassin's Focus charges) that completely changes the way your character plays - once I hit the magic +22% hit, my entire rotation changes.

I think they were trying to replicate the facelift they gave to Stalkers' AS - turn the opener-only ability into a potent longer-cooldown attack during sustained fights. But without something comparable to Stalkers' hidden/not hidden status to decide whether the attack is an opener or not, they've opted (at least at the current, alpha/pre-alpha stage) for a kludge that's just going to result in another power break between min-maxers and the rest of the playerbase.

"A few weeks" might be optimistic, but the devs have said they were anticipating a big response to "Design a Costume Set" at this year's Pummet and had actively set aside time in the release schedule to publish whatever came out of it well in advance.

Dear God.

That would be possibly the worst option - outing not a peripheral character, but a joke character who started as a parody of then-current comic trends.

Or you could see "Lobo comes out" as a meta-gag on the trend of random characters spontaneously coming out in media. Though that joke seems a little complicated to be making with, well, Lobo.

So either have something that lets you break down existing powers for threads (as suggested earlier), or have transmute recipes that let you "sidegrade" a completed power to a different power of the same tier for some cost (probably hundreds) in threads.

Asking for a character to be able to abandon one Incarnate ability to work towards another one seems reasonable to me. Asking that one character be free to make Incarnate abilities for the rest of your account is...not gonna happen.