Castle

We confirmed this is happening. No ETA yet on a fix.

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Now if we could just lure him into our forum...

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I read the Scrapper forum, too. Just only about 10% as often as I read the Stalker forum. I also glance into the general AT, Tanker, Corruptor and Brute forums, but those even less often than the Scrapper forum.

Yes, I spend a lot of time at home reading.

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_Castle_ you rock. Can we assume you're the Scrapper rep? If not, will you be? We need someone like you. We're an unruly lot.

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I was a fan long before I started working here, so I like being able to participate with the community in a meaningful manner. I was on the boards as a fan within days after they went up a few years back and got used to posting on ocassion.

No, it is PvP only. It should have no effect at all on PvE.

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so how about those claw fixes, eh?

what kinda cookies do ya like?

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As I said...Claws changes are in early planning stages. Might not be for a while, so...be patient! (Yeah, I know...I always hated hearing that around Christmas as a kid!)

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After checking out all of the stalker secondary sets I noticed that Hide from the energy aura set is the only one that doesn't have Psi defense. Any reason for this? Shouldn't all the hide abilities have the same defense values?

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Not entirely correct. It has no specific +Def vs. Psionic, however the +Def to Melee, Ranged and AoE in Hide cover the hole nicely. The set simply has no other powers that specifically stack with Hide for additional protection. This is by design. I'll talk to geko and verify that Energy Aura is as effective as we want.

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As of I6, Super Reflexes is not giving defense to certain controller sets. Namely, Mind control (Dominate and Levitate), Illusion control (Bind), and Gravity control (Crush seems to have unnaturally high accuracy, Singularities as well).

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I'm looking into the Mind Control issue. The high accuracy of certain Controller powers is intended and unlikely to change.

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Mezz Prot Changes: Many players are reporting a major change in the amount of resistance to Mezz powers provided by anti-mezz toggles (UYS and Integration in my experience). Reports are on the order of a 40-60% reduction in MAG of protection offered.

No patch notes or other information relative to these changes have been observed.

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Scrapper Mez protection abilities were reduced somewhat by intent. I was not involved in the change, so I don't know the specific reasons behind it, so I won't comment further at this time.

No Patch note is an oversight, nothing more. Just a quick note on how this works on the powers team, specifically: Each day, we make anywhere from a dozen to hundreds of changes to the Powers data, whether it is adding new creature and object powers, adjusting things in player powers, fixing bugs (it is amazing how many grammatical errors slip by!) When we put all of the changes into source control, we add comments on each and every change we made. That's the theory. In practice, sometimes we'll be in the midst of a series of things and get interrupted, causing us to forget to write down that particular change. Then, when we check in a batch of changes, we add a tag that tells the Patch note guy whether it is an internal change only or if it needs to go into the Patch Notes. This is where the vast majority of 'Stealth Nerfs' happen -- a change gets tagged Internal that should have been tagged Release. Lastly, sometimes the fellow who generates the Patch Note file just plain misses something.

I hope that helps you all understand why 'Stealth Nerfs' happen. To the best of my knowledge, we have never intentionally not given Patch Notes on a change.

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Accuracy: Base accuracy for Hero v. Hero in Warburg seems to be floating around 50%. Due to the nature of the equation, this is a serious defense against anyone who does not have +to-hit buffs, and a minimal defense against those who do have such buffs. This does not trouble me, as the resist based sets offer little-to-no mitigation in many cases now, so balance is not implicated. But is that 50% number an 'intended condition', that we can expect to see propigating throughout PvP? Or is it a bug?

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We've reduced base To Hit from 75% to 50% for PvP purposes. This change was made to give Defense sets more effectiveness. With the ED changes, coupled with the prevalence of +To Hit buffs it was necessary.

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A combo I like to use is Soaring Dragon, it knocks my oponent in the air, then follow up with a Golden Dragon Fly, but it misses everytime, I have to wait for the target to settle and move directly next to him to land this attack.

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There is a bug with certain Cone powers which cause them to always miss moving targets. We're working on a fix, but have no ETA.

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Other Mobs can break my Placate Hide. I lose all chance to critical if someone else hits me while I'm placate hidden, additionally anyone(including the placated mob) can interrupt my placate if they get off an attack that activates during my placate animation.

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That is by design. Placate gives a Hide attribute, very similar to the Hide power. That similarity extends to damage breaking Hide, whether that damage comes from a DoT, Damage Aura, the placated entity finishing an attack it already started, or another critter successfully attacking you. Learning how and when to use Placate is an important skill for Stalkers.

I misinterpreted your original message as other critters were breaking the Placate effect on the Placated critter.

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My +Heal Enhancements aren't working properly!

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Known bug and fixed internally. Not certain where the fix is in the queue to reach the servers, though.

Are you positive these events were not Ambush related? Some reports sound like that could be the case, others I am not so certain about.

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You know the interesting thing is they are saying we're lying by saying that it never had Psi Defense aren't they? I mean I've yet to see a regenner post anything but that it most certainly did have Psi defense and yet here they are saying it never did. Interesting.

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Just popping in to clear up a misconception. This bit is really a semantic issue. We have an Attribute that applies +Defense to Psionic. We usually refer to this as "Psionic Defense" and do not consider other forms of +Defense that MAY cover Psionics. Turning on The Way Back Machine (thanks to Mr. Peabody and Sherman for allowing its use!) to the very first Live version of the data, I see that Moment of Glory did, in fact, offer +Defense to EVERYTHING because it modified Base Defense. Smashing, Lethal, Ranged, Hamidon -- everything. That was TOO effective. So, at some point (I'm not going through hundreds of revisions to fin out when) MoG was changed so that it only covered the bits desired.

So, if we were lying to you, it was an error of omission, rather than an act of malice. When we get a PM saying "Why did you remove Psionic Defense from MoG?" we check specifically for +Psi Def. Sometimes we have the time to do more in depth reseach into changes, but most often we do not.

Whether or not the 'Hole' in Psionic protection makes the power 'gimped' isn't a discussion I am going to get into, however.

I just tested all the Ninja Blade powers.

Sting of the Wasp: Enhancement worked as expected.
Gambler's Cut: Enhancement worked as expected.
Flashing Steel: Enhancement worked as expected.
Divine Avalanche: Enhancement worked as expected.
Soaring Dragon: Enhancement worked as expected.
Golden Dragonfly: Enhancement worked as expected.

Looks like it is working properly. If you can find a specific instance where it does NOT, PM me -- but make certain it is reproducable, please.

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I find that as I level more and more it gets harder not to AS those lone bosses you see outside on your way to your missions. I guess this would be a kin to the whole brutes got to smash everything in site thing. I think 1 shotting a boss outside of a mission is like greatest rush to me. The sad part about it is I know that if I miss this hit and try to scrap I know I am good as dead but yet I still AS anyways.

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I do this all the time. If I miss, I hightail it out of there. What can I say? I'm an opportunist.

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Castle old buddy, will these upcoming reworkings of Claw and Spine powers make the leap to the Hero versions of the sets as well?

Just wondering if this'd be identical to the recent Martial Arts changes.

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Probably. I haven't done comparisons for Scrapper sets, yet, and it is entirely possible any changes made would be different between the two AT's.

That said, remember this is all a long way off. I've been playing with numbers and still have to get it all to the way I like it. Then, I talk to geko and he and I go over everything to make sure he agrees with my assessments (and we are never 100% in agreement on this sort of thing!) After that, we need to get animation time, which is in very short supply. It will *probably* be in the next Update, but it may be sooner, and it may be much later.

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This is a great annoyance for my Blapper too - any chance to help out on that?

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Not likely. You have Ranged options. Many Scrapper, Stalker, Tanker and Brute builds do not have Ranged options. The exclusion to the Range debuff only applies to those AT's for that reason.

Quick note:
I verified the Golden Dragonfly bug. We'll get a fix hopefully "soon(tm)."

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I posted a screen shot of how this move usually ends up looking like I'm performing a colon examination. Well whether you saw it or not, I'm wondering if it is in fact feasible to change an AS graphic or not? It doesn't _have_ to be something new, but how about something less.... intimate?


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Just shout "Kanchou!" when you do that attack.

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Now THAT is funny.

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Other mobs can break my placate on another target. Or that a mob can attack while placate is animating, still be placated and I lose my chance for a crit.

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Any more detail on this so I can get QA to try and replicate it for me? Are there certain critters that do this, or is it a general case? Do any special circumstances need to be met?

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All of the secondary sets should include powers similar to Ninjutsu's "crowd control" abilities, to give the Stalker something to do that lets him stay close, while waiting for hide to reactivate. In short, increase the tactical options for stalkers to more than just "Stand 'n' Scrap" and "Run 'n' Hide."

[/ QUOTE ] Not likely to happen. Ninjitsu has the most 'toys' but pays for it by having the weakest overall defenses Stalkers have available. It's a heck of a fun set to play, though.

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We should not draw aggro/suppress when we miss our strike from hide

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This isn't likely to change. It would require fundamental changes in our combat engine that could/would have far reaching effects. It's a nice idea, but chalk it up to a big Wishlist item.

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Claws does not have any 5+ BI damage attacks to use after placate. This is very important because of how much Stalkers rely on their Hide/AS/Placate/Attack combo.

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Claws is a very good set for stalkers. On paper, it is is never the best, nor the worst DPS set Stalkers have (No, I will not release the list, for the simple reason that it would be too long to post and explain all the variables I used.) It is also the set I played most in Beta testing, since there were so many player complaints about it being unviable. There are a few improvements planned based on my experiences, however, giving them a "5+" damage power PROBABLY won't happen.

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This sets major secondary attack is classed cone/aoe and hence will not always critical, This is important because Stalkers depend on the bonus damage from crits.
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Golden DragonFly should be changed to almost always critical because its cone is almost always single target.

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Both of these powers are working as designed. It is certainly possible the design idea is not as strong as we intended, so we'll continue to watch this to see how it plays out.

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Stun is very weak when compared to Total Focus and Bone Smasher. Can the magnitude of the disorientate, or the damage be increased on this power?

[/ QUOTE ] Possibly. I'll talk to geko and examine the numbers. I don't think there is any problem with the power offhand, though.

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Thunder Kick appears to have been "adjusted" from the CoH MA version. It now does less damage than air superiority, takes longer to recharge than air superiority, and its secondary effect triggers much less often than air superiority. Supposedly, this sort of inversion (a power pool attack being in all ways superior to a primary attack) shouldn't actually happen.

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When I was working with geko to get CAK to a better balance point, we noticed that Thunder Kick was doing damage based on it having a one second longer recharge time than it actually had. We corrected it at that time, despite it being a "nerf." We were pretty sure the other improvements in the set more than made up for us correcting what was essentially a bug.
Now, comparing it to Air Superiority is interesting. AS is a favorite power of mine, precisely because it is so effective. If it is true that it is 'better' than Thunder Kick, I'll talk to geko about getting TK's animation time shortened (if possible) or returning TK's damage, but increase its recharge time. In other words, I'll look into it.

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On some spine attacks there's the long barb that comes out and extends forward from the palm. For even the attacks that don't have that long barb the barb is appearing, but ONLY while the attack animation is going. So all of a sudden you have these huge arm length spines coming out of your hand that weren't there before and aren't there after the attack. They don't appear to be completely synced with the attack animations either.

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I think a code fix for this happened in the last week or two before Beta ended, but I'm sketchy on details. Let me know if this is still happening and I'll pass it over to the graphics team to look at.

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Barb Swipe, thanks to its DOT it is not as subpar as Claws:Swipe, but it still needs looking at.

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This will be addressed at the same time Claws/Swipe assuming we can get the balance numbers to line up.

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Unlike the other Def sets Energy Aura has no AoE defence to Stack with high AOE bonus of unsurpressed hide. Has this been taken into account?

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When I spoke to geko about this, he said it was working as designed.

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Word of "Ninjitsu" is wrong. Word of "Ninjitsu" does not exist in Japanese. "Ninjutsu" is right.

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A quick web search shows the spelling as virtually interchangeable, even by schools which specialize in the form. Not likely to be changed.

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Bug: Enemy ambushes in missions start aggro'd on the Stalker, negating much of the effectiveness of Hide. Instead,In-mission ambushes should be targeted on the *location* of the PC at the time the ambush spawns. The enemies should basically be given a 'Goto Aggressive' order. - EntropyAvatar, 6/10/05
Castle: We're working on a fix for this for post launch. This isn't just a Stalker issue, either. It affects Master Minds as well, though in more subtle ways.

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I've sen the "fix" for this in-game...and I'm not that impressed.

Now, instead of spawning and aggroing towards you, they simply spawn right next to you (If you are out of the line-of-sigh of their normal spawning point).

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That sounds like a bug. The fix is not live, yet, to my knowledge. I am not positive it has made it past the design stage, since it requires code and each and every mission that uses that code to be altered.

Bug. We neglected to give Stalkers and Brutes the immunity to the Range Debuff that Scrappers and Tankers get. I fixed it internally yesterday...it'll hopefully make it to you folks "Soon(tm)"

This was from my last batch of Responses on the Beta Forums:
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Placate issues

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There is a bug with placate (which I did not know was a bug, until geko told me!) in that it is supposed to completely remove you from the targets hate list. That means, if you placate and get out of the critters visual range, they will not chase you when Placate wears off -- they no longer know about you. I'll be working with Supermartin and his AI team post launch to get this working properly.

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So, that will take care of part of the problem. As for the rest, it isn't likely to change, until one of the AI guys gets a substantial amount of time scheduled for it. In other words, it is something I want to see fixed, but there is no ETA as to when or if it will be dealt with.

Two Hand Crit Shadowblade build followed by a Shadowzerker build after that got nerfed.

I made a special Guest Appearance playing one of the Big Guys.

Weave doesn't stack with any Ice Tanker +DEF abilities. It would only protect vs. Toxic and Psionic damage.

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A couple sg mates tested Ice tankers defense in i5 and with all his armors on as well as an application of EA, the tanker was hit consecutively by brawl (slotted with one acc SO). Build up/focused accuracy were not used.

That is just sad.

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bit of a typo there. he had EA double/triple stacked and was hit 19 out of 20 said brawls.

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So, 95% accuracy or more. Methinks more was wrong with this test than Ice Armor!

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This doesn't speed up the fight, and, in most cases, changes the level of risk for the tanker from 0.0002% chance of dying to 0.0001% chance of dying.

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I strongly suspect this is going to change in the not so distant future.

Anyone remember Oni from Beta and the infamous "Sprint got nerfed!" thread. Oy. THAT was some first class "DOOOoooooMMMM!!!!!"-saying.

Edit: Oh! Or his "Scrappers don't have Ranged Attacks? This game SUX!" posts. Man, I argued with him FAR too much over that one.

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I want to believe this.

I have many doubts about this atm because of the SJ nerf. Could you please explain for me the reason for changing SJ in such a way that melees will be required to have Hover to fight Mitochondria?

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You may have answered your own question.