City of Heroes: Live Forum Archive

Buminaca

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  1. Buminaca
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Vel_Overload View Post
    Very cool find. I'm actually surprised it wasn't found earlier. But considering how much extra work you have to do to use this trick, it is really only good for AVs, Bosses etc. I'm sure a Starcraft pro can do this no problem though.
    While I no longer play Starcraft, I completely get where you're coming from. I could definitely see a SC player using their great micro and apm to do this easily in any situation

    I was a little surprised that this hasn't been discussed earlier as well. I do remember someone posting a video of dual pistols characters drawing a Nemesis Staff/Blackwand after using hail of bullets (I actually managed to track the video down).

    DispariScuro's Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RwqyAEktfh0

    At the time, I just though "Oh, that's a neat bug." Now that I've been running these tests, I realize what I had saw in that video is probably what I've been reproducing in my own demonstrations.

    I looked at a few other of DispariScuro's videos and found this as well:

    Instant redraw from pistols to bow: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=InI4trkLyTs

    So I think people have been definitely playing around with this before me, but I haven't seen anyone trying to weaponize yet so I thought I'd give it a shot.
  2. Buminaca
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Bronze Knight
    Yea I remember your other thread. And seeing as how no mod action was taken on it, this should be fine to.

    The issue I have with this is that 90% of the time I use tab targeting. Your method requires you to...

    1. Weapon attack
    2. Non-weapon attack
    3. Push Escape
    4. Ready weapon attack
    5. Re-target your target
    6. Re-Queue Weapon attack
    7. Repeat from 1.

    Good for lone AV's but not much else.
    TBH I'll just queu my attacks and deal with the redraw. I would even wonder if on my lag (ping of >2,000) Queuing attacks is better for my dps due to the way the server handles queued attacks.

    But that is my issue. Others may find this useful if for whatever reason redraw bothers you to the point of not playing weapon sets. (Bunch of crazys you lot are!)
    You're absolutely right; this method works easiest when dealing with a single target because it will always target the nearest enemy. Since I like to solo at x8, this can be tough. On my brute it isn't so bad, but with my SoA, trying to aim all my cones, AOE's, and single target attacks while avoiding redraw on the rifle and mace can be a nightmare.

    I've been playing around with binds to find the most comfortable setup. As of late, I've been using a combination of '`' and 't' to unselect my targets (with lshift+t bound to Blackwand so I can get rid of the root on long animations like Heavy Burst and Crowd Control).

    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Nihilii
    That is a pretty cool find, and nicely documented. Hilarious SOA video, too. Thanks!

    I don't think I'll actually use it, but it's always fun to learn new things like this about the game. I never got beyond the much more cumbersome "bunnyhop and pray" method.
    No prob . I've actually been playing CoH off and on for four years; it was by pure chance on my archery/mental blaster that I noticed that sometimes two tics of Subdual damage would go off before I fired Snap Shot instead of three. I kept poking around until I realized there were two types of redraw, then went nuts testing it on all my weapon characters.

    I've always felt my brute was too easy to play, so it was fun to add a new dimension to his gameplay. On the other hand, my SoA feels complex as is, so I'll likely use the instant redraw sparingly on him and just use the root cancel until there's only one target left.
  3. Buminaca
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by SmegHead View Post
    Is showing this against forum rules?
    While I didn't mean any harm, I've just realized that this could potentially violate "6. Do not post about exploits."

    I've visited the NCsoft support site and sent a question as to whether or not this would be considered an exploit. If it is, I will empty the thread of its content and ask that it be deleted.

    Is there anyone in particular I could PM who could clear that up? A moderator or developer?
  4. Buminaca
    I submit for your consideration a method to remove redraw time. Before going into specifics, a video demonstration may be helpful.

    In the following video, to establish a basis for comparison, my character first executes a chain of:
    Divine Avalanche -> Boxing -> Soaring Dragon -> Boxing -> Divine Avalanche -> Boxing -> Soaring Dragon.
    He makes no attempt to avoid redraw time and takes approximately 13.6 seconds.

    In the same video, he then executes the exact same chain using a second type of redraw which occurs instantly:
    Divine Avalanche -> Boxing -> Soaring Dragon -> Boxing -> Divine Avalanche -> Boxing -> Soaring Dragon.
    He takes approximately 9.5 seconds.

    Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IOG9I1_FT_U

    There is a difference of around 4.1 seconds; in both cases, he's forced to redraw 4 times, once at the beginning of the chain and once at the end of each Boxing.

    Here are more videos showing some of my other weapon-based characters experimenting with dodging redraw with a wide array of powers, including a different one of my Katana Brute.

    Mace/Rifle Bane Spider SOA
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M3ydCzcYa7A

    Archery/Mental Manipulation Blaster
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_kJwOV5VlM

    Katana/Electric Armor Brute
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m6UayEqVc0Y

    ~

    Brief Explanation:

    There are two types of redraw that I'm aware of, the conventional rooting, time-consuming redraw and an instant redraw.

    The instant redraw does not root you, can occur in the middle of any power's animation, and can actually remove the root from a different power's animation. Here's my Titan Weapons Brute using it to remove the root from non-momentum Arc of Destruction and Rend Armor.

    Video Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G7Q3gqf_3BY

    This is very helpful for long animating powers like Spine Burst, Psychic Scream, Fire Breath, etc., and vastly improves the mobility of those powers (even if it screws up the animation severely).

    This instant redraw can occur under a few different circumstances (such as when your target is blocked or out of range), but only one is important to me:

    It occurs when you have no enemy selected and you hit a non-PBAOE weapon power button.

    How to do it:

    In the above videos in which I perform instant redraw, all I'm doing is deselecting my target, hitting any weapon power (which causes instant-redraw and selects the nearest enemy), then activating a weapon power. After hitting any weapon power to perform instant redraw, I'm able to select any target I want and activate any weapon power I want, allowing me to target specific enemies and use PBAOE's with no redraw time.

    Even though the redraw time is completely eliminated, the animation attempts to play anyway or the weapon simply appears in the hand even if the previous power's animation is not complete. As seen in the Mace/Rifle SOA video, this can cause some strangeness such as firing bullets out of an Arachnos Mace when moving from Shatter to Heavy Burst, or striking with an invisible mace when moving from Shatter to Venom Grenade.

    What is it good for:

    I'm not a min/maxer, but I can definitely see the appeal in being able to fit in powers like Gloom into weapon attack chains without the guilt of losing DPS to redraw (my rifle/mace SOA has recently picked up Gloom for this reason). When popping a heal or drain in the middle of a heated battle, it's nice to save an extra second that could be spent smashing/slicing/shooting your foes. The secondary effect of cancelling root can be a real life-saver for squishy characters caught in long animations; being able to burn a giant mob with Fire Breath and reposition myself in the middle of its long 2.9 second animation on my fire blaster has prevented my foes from closing into melee many a time. It's great to be able to do this on any character with a vet weapon power like the Nemesis Staff or Blackwand.

    I'd love to hear if you think this method of skipping redraw time/rooting is great/neat/silly/tedious/etc., so any questions or feedback is appreciated!

    Thanks for reading and watching!

    ~Postscript~

    I had previous posted about this topic in a different thread as "Shensu," but didn't have access to this sub-forum on a premium account. I've chosen to let the other thread die seeing how this sub-forum is a more appropriate home for it; this thread also has two new videos that the old one did not.

    If you do find or have read/seen the old one, it goes through my slow process of discovery and isn't quite so short and "down-to-business."