Diellan_
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Posts
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Quote:Originally Posted by Tyranny_NA
I've been using Mids for as long as I can remember. To me it is a necessary part of the game. So much so that it is no different to me then not having a decent biography for each and every single one of my characters. I've actually lost the desire to play any new powerset on a new character without having that clear cut path of what my power choices will be from 1 - 50. Just the same as not knowing who that character is as defined in a bio. Why? Because it lets me focus on the things we love the most. Actually playing the game. I don't have to make a decision that might cost me a respec later down the line when I've already made that decision prior to ever playing the powerset.
Because of Mids and my playstyle I "KNOW" my character is going to be badass. It gives me more incentive to get to those new powers. To level the toon up. I don't "think" or "hope" it is going to be badass or just be "ok" at the end. This utility changed the way I approach the game. As much as it's appreciated, all the hard work that goes into development of this fine program, it's a frustration that when a new issue comes out mid's isn't right there with it. We all know it will be updated....but to leave the game for a bit, see a new issue was released with new powersets, immediately check to see if Mids is updated and see that the last update was all the way back in December. One can't help but be filled with a sense of disappointment.
Then you have to wait for weeks on end for the new release. Then you realize you're not really interested anymore and go back to playing your other toons. *shrug* I know I'm being silly. This scenario isn't always the case but this illustrates the difference one little tool makes for a lot of us. I'm as appreciative as anyone else who has ever used Mids. Keep up the good work, I'll just have to find something else to do until the update drops =D
http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showt...92#post4159492
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Happy holidays from the Titan Network!
Mids Hero/Villain Designer 1.954 - March 2012
New features:- Archetype Enhancements!
- Dark Control, Dark Assault, Darkness Affinity!
- Stalker changes!
- Gravity Control buffed?!
Fixes & changes:- More random bug fixes!
Known issues:- Windows Vista and Windows 7 have issues with the updater due to UAC interfering with writing to the Program Files folder. Many of these problems can be resolved by (a) installing as Administrator, (b) running Mids as Administrator, or (c) installing Mids to a location other than the Program Files folder.
- Diminishing Returns for PvP mode have not yet been added; all buffs currently show their full, unmodified values.
- The Power Graphs for the current build do not display effects for pseudo-pet powers like Ice Storm. This does not affect the Powerset Comparison, which is now fully aware of pseudo-pets.
- Power Boost affects some powers that should ignore its buffs, such as Ice Shields.
- Temporary and Accolade powers are not being affected by buffs such as recharge rate.
- Some powers are still enhanced by HOs that shouldnt be (like Active Defenses Res(Def))
- Archetype Enhancement procs do not give the correct chance in some powers this is due to the Devs not providing the formula for their calculation. We have 99% confidence in single target powers, 99% confidence in 16 target targeted aoe powers, but cone powers are inaccurate. Hopefully Synapse or Black Scorpion or somebody can slip us the formula.
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Quote:The AOEmod formula seems to work out for PPM when it comes to sphere aoe powers, so whatever we're missing is probably tied to the arc.Originally Posted by Kosmos
As stated, it's NOT what the PPM code is using. Also, the calculated value for Tremor isn't actually what is used for it; it has a DS of 1 instead of the calculated 0.8. I tried using both the DS AoEMod formula and (0.16*Rech + 0.36)/DS to account for tweaks such as Tremor received, and neither worked well. I'd just started to try to figure out alternatives when I22 launched and I lost interest in testing.
Anyway, I've always hated that messy formula you listed. I can't imagine anyone wouldn't hate it; so if you're going to code it in anywhere you may want to use this instead...
AoEMod = 1 + radius * (11 * arc + 540) / 30000
... it's the same thing but with the variables collected and the constants scaled to use integer values. -
Quote:Yeah, allowing +3 level shifts in an environment where the enemies don't also have +3 level shifts is causing things to be ridiculously easy. My "ubertoon" brute has a challenge running the content solo at +4x8, but can still do it. When you're in a situation where the solo character can already beat it at the maximum difficulty, then any amount of teaming will make things ridiculously easy (and I like to do 8 man teams with my SG).Originally Posted by Oedipus_Tex
Level shifts were broken in incarnate trials and are more broken in teams of 2-8. The zone feels like fighting level 47s in Peregrine Island and in practice that's exactly what it is. But you've heard that from me already, so that's all.
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Quote:Their area modifier for damage:recharge ratios is area modifier = 1+(0.75*(RADIUS/5))-(((0.011*(RADIUS/6))*(360-ARC))/5). For Tremor, that's 3.25. I wonder if that's it? I'd love to get confirmation from a Dev, because I'm putting this in Mids right now.Originally Posted by Kosmos
My tests with the Tanker attacks are not working out to MaxTargets. For example, in 134 hits against a single target with Tremor (14s Rech, 3.3s Cast) using a 5 PPM proc I saw a 43.3% proc rate, despite a 10 target cap. That's an error of a whopping 9.5 sdev assuming the MaxTargets modifier (11.4 sdev if you use the incorrect Rech only formula). The AoE mod for a 15', 360 deg, 10 tgt attack appears to be pretty close to 3, not 10.
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Quote:Thank you for humoring me, but you're right, it still doesn't answer my question of "how do we know for certain that it isn't possible to give Blasters enough soft control" - especially since I'm asking about what you think re:stepping on toes, not what the Devs think... I think we can agree that the reasoning for the Total Focus nerf was a silly one, and I often feel like it was just Blasters getting caught in the "we need to nerf Energy Melee" mess. Furthermore, I think that there is still room to discuss the issue of mag 4 controls with the devs and convince them that, no, it doesn't step on Controller toes - the fact that Seismic Smash still exists as it does is evidence of that.Originally Posted by Miladys_Knight
I wasn't being curt. I have all ready given the answers to your questions. I doubt restating them will give you more clarity but:
The total Focus nerf that was being discussed is that a mag 4 control was taken away from blasters BECAUSE IT STEPPED ON CONTROLLER TOES. Yet the Mag 4 Hold in Seismic Smash remained for Brutes and Tanks. We know for certain that the devs don't care if tanks, brutes, scrappers step on defender/controller toes only blasters. We also know that it doesn't matter if any other AT steps on blaster toes so that blasters have no unique tools.
One of the big things we need to do is convince the Devs that their perception of what steps on the toes of defenders and controllers is a mess when it comes to Blasters.
You should definitely try and get this with the hours logged. That's from talking to Civilians whose name begins with M. Those are some pretty serious numbers up there, especially given that the various levels of the mez badge are exponentially bigger than the previous.Quote:I thought of a possible measuring stick that we can use as comparison. A way to self data mine as it were. All the characters are mine so there is no variance in skill.
Here is a sample of my level 50s listed in order of creation (I know there is a way to find out how many hours a charcter has logged. I don't remember how though. If someone can remind me I'll resort the list in order of hours logged):
Character -- Debt Badge -- Mez Badge
Defender Emp/Dark/Dark -- Level 6 (Max) -- 61.46% of level 3
Defender FF/Psi/Psi -- Level6 (Max) -- 67.89 of level 2
Scrapper Dark/Regen -- Level 6 (Max) -- 72.11 % of level 2
Controller Earth/Storm/Fire -- Level 6 (Max) -- 73.83% of level 2
Blaster Energy/Energy/Force -- Level 6 (Max) -- 73.66% of level 5
Controller Earth/TA/Primal -- Level 6 (max) -- 96.36% of level 2
Blaster Arch/Dev/Munitions -- Level 6 (Max) -- 80.40% of level 4
Tank Fire/Fire/Pyre -- Level 6 (Max) -- 47.11% of Level 1
Scrapper BS/Shield/Body -- Level 6 (Max) -- 91.67% of level 1
Controller Plant/TA/Fire -- Level 6 (Max) -- 96.96% of level 2
Blaster Sonic/Ice/Elec -- Level 6 (Max) -- 67.42% of level 4
Blaster Energy/Elec/Fire -- Level 6 (Max) -- 40.91% of level 4
Controller Ice/Rad/Ice -- Level 6 (Max) -- 68.56% of level 2
Dominator Mind/Ice/Fire -- Level 6 (Max) -- 97.47% of level 1
Blaster Rad/Fire/Mace -- Level 6 (Max) -- 33.63% of level 4
Now that I look at it I realize just how shocking the differences are and I wonder just how many of those mezzes were cut short because they resulted in my defeat. The results here might show that I was less affected by mez than I actually was. I was clearly hit by far more mezzes on my blasters but if they were cut short by my defeat then the problem is even worse than these numbers show. -
The opposite is also a thing: once we're an official offering, then people will start looking at things like "Mids doesn't support pvp DR" as a conspiracy of the Devs. Right now, if something doesn't happen, you can be sure it's simply "Dylan doesn't have time".
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Quote:I did before, and I just did again (and the curt non-answers aren't particularly helpful towards having a discussion). You talk primarily about a handful of data points (Blaster without pools, Blaster with pools, Blaster with mag 4 mez protection, other ATs), and give a lot of analogies for why you feel as you do about the suggestions given, but I do not see what I'm asking for. I mean, if, for example, every Blaster was suddenly granted Darkest Night as a bonus (and nothing else in addition), would that (a) prevent a sufficient amount of mez, without (b) stepping on Defenders' toes? (b) is highly unlikely, since nobody has accused Soul Mastery Brutes from taking over from Defenders, even though they get the debuff in addition to their own survivability - because Defenders have a lot more to them than just what that one power can provide. As for (a), well, that depends upon the discussion of just how much mez is acceptable - given that we've stated that Defenders and such are doing "fine" in terms of mez, even though they still get mezzed, that amount is something above zero.Originally Posted by Miladys_Knight
Read the whole thread. It's in there.
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Quote:For reasons that are too complicated to get into, Mids is going to have to treat them the same as IOs. I looked into overhauling the enhancement database so that it could handle attuned enhancements and so forth, but it's way too complicated to do in a reasonable amount of time, so no go there.Originally Posted by Aggelakis
That was a direct reference to the linked post by Diellan, where Diellan called them ATIOs. (Which is wrong. Preemies can use them without an IO license, therefore they should not ever be called IOs.)
Luckily, it won't ever refer to them as Archetype Enhancements or some abbreviation thereof anyway, so I'm safe.
My bathroom is being renovated next week, which means I'm out of the house for about 10 days, hence the pressure is on - I want to release this new version before I'm stuck out of the house!Quote:Originally Posted by Luscinia
Meh. The complainers will complain regardless of what you can do. Take it easy, get it right and do so without adding any undue stress. The grand majority of the users (us silent but grateful masses) will appreciate it! -
I'm guessing it was a lot easier back in the days of the Fab 15. Issue 15, for example, was pretty much "we're tweaking the numbers on dominators powers and that's it". If the Devs did that, 24 hours wouldn't be a problem. :P
Meanwhile, this Issue has the Assassin Strike change (a retooling of a mechanic that requires me to make changes to how I implemented the Power Override), the AT IOs, a complete overhaul of the Interface procs, extension of enhancements to Lore pets, etc. etc. Amazingly enough, this is the first time in a while that new powersets don't have new mecha... oh, wait, Beast Mastery is coming soon and I'd like to throw that in, too. >.<
And, for the record, even though I'd love to get paid for this, I couldn't give up my current job for anything that wasn't full time and equivalent pay (and part time isn't an option, given my position), and I can't see the Paragon Studios people doing that just for Mids - admittedly, if I could work 40 hours a week on Mids, you'd have a brand new thing that worked on all devices within a month or two.
The Devs are pretty supportive, though, and we do get access to the data during beta, but it's been a sort of "unspoken agreement" that we don't release anything that isn't on the live servers. I don't think we'd change that without some kind of conversation with the Devs, especially Black Pebble, for reasons that are obvious.
I wanted to get in some of this stuff ahead of time, but the Devs didn't confer with me when making their plans, so I got stuck in a confluence of "SXSW is coming soon and the CEO wants to show something off there", "exams for my night classes are in late February", "Purim = no weekend programming", and, just for fun, "five days of random virus!". I've got Mids opened in my other window right now, and while it isn't ready yet, I'm trying really hard to get it to you guys asap. The new powersets are in, I'm currently tweaking some issues with the Assassin Strike update, and then its on to finalizing the AT IOs. -
Quote:Um, what you did was list what everybody had in terms of mez mitigation. You didn't say anything about (a) what was necessary in order to provide the mez mitigation we feel is sufficient, and (b) where that point lies in comparison to Defenders.Originally Posted by Miladys_Knight
All ready been done in post #12 of this thread
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Quote:Only clipped in the quote box because I don't like massive quote repeats. The "..." is meant to imply all the stuff in between. I can assure you, I read the whole thing.Originally Posted by Miladys_Knight
Not surprised since you clipped the middle out and the chain that lead there.
This is what I'm saying doesn't gel. If a Blaster has the soft control necessary to deal with a spawn that has mezzers, he's got a long way to go before he can be as good as a Controller or Defender. For example, if he was able to stack enough -ToHit to floor the accuracy of an entire spawn (which is quite a strong effect, and not even necessarily what ArcanaVille was talking about, I'm using it just for example), that's something that a Radiation Defender can do with one power (which also applies a similarly sized Defense debuff) - and then the Radiation Defender has 8 other powers in his primary on top of that.Quote:I'm not a math whiz like Arcanaville is. I can't see the math in it but even I can see that if this mechanic gets the number of mezzes that affect my blasters down to the same level as those that affect all my other toons that the blaster will then be a better debuffer than a defender could hope to be and a better controller than a controller could aspire to be.
There's a long way to go from "useless debuff" to "Defender level", and the onus on your part is to demonstrate that anything less than Defender level would not be sufficient.
Again, false dichotomy. There's no in between?Quote:With that in mind I can see one of 2 possibilities:
1) We don't get it because it treads not only on controller, defender, and corruptor toes but on their arches as well.
2) We get a watered down version that still leaves the blaster too vulnerable to the combined lack of mez protection and meaningful mitigation and the next pass is another 2+ years out and we continue to suffer through the same issues we suffer through now and have since I2.
I don't think the idea of "when I attack things, they and their friends get debuffed" is complicated at all. In fact, it's incredibly simple because it doesn't require you to do anything different than you currently are. It's certainly no more complicated than "Assassin Strike now does two different things depending on the situation, and you get stacks of a buff that makes you go into hide during combat", which was a playstyle changer for most Stalkers and includes extra mechanics for you to keep track of during combat.Quote:I am not in favor of complicated solutions. The blaster learning curve is all ready too steep for the average player. Making the fix as complicated could easily make the new player just throw their hands up in frustration and continue to abandon their blasters just as they do now.
The blaster AT should be as intuitive to play out of the box as all the other basic ATs are. For those of us that are good at playing blasters we should be able to find efficiencies that still allow us to stand out (even by a large margin) when compared to the average player.
To give a metaphor - adding a complicated solution to a complicated problem is like hiding a key to your house somewhere outside that is so counter intuitive to your thought processes that if you lock your key inside the house you'll only be able to remember where you hid the outside key 5% of the time. Then worrying that it might be too easy for someone else to find by accident and locking the key inside a box with a combination lock that you won't be able to remember the combination to before putting it in the hiding spot that you won't be able to find in the first place.
For the record, I'm not married to ArcanaVille's idea in the least. The Huntsman VEAT method of "moderately good personal defense and low level passive mez protection" works pretty darn good, too. At the least, we need for the design of Blaster powersets to no longer have a "but it has to suck" rule for anything that isn't damage. -
Blasters stopped being the single target damage kings awhile ago, and their AoE damage superiority is regularly tread upon by ATs that are better at everything else. Even without going into the ridiculousness that are the VEATs, even the melee ATs are able to put out sufficient AoE damage from time to time (Elec/Shield/whatever, anybody?).
Back when Beam Rifle was in beta, I spent most of my time looking at it from a Blaster POV, and I spent a long time trying to explain that it was uniquely problematic for Blasters because it just so happened to exaggerate Blaster problems - the chief most Blaster problem being the inability to deal with mass aggro (the secondmost one being terrible powerset design: if a Scrapper got a primary that only had three ST attacks at 4s, 8s, and 12s recharge, one or two moderately long recharging AoE powers, and a bunch of situational powers, everybody would agree it sucks, but that's the par for Blasters). This is often why mezzing is a huge problem for blasters, since even with your Defiance powers, being mezzed takes away your AoE tools and detoggles/suppresses your defensive powers.
I really don't see why Blaster mods have to be so abysmal. Most of our ST mez powers aren't even perma with 100% duration slotting, let alone stackable enough to keep bosses down. Our debuffs and self-buffs are terrible (barring Build Up, but I personally feel that everybody should get the same strength build up, since you already have you damage modifier backed into your powers, so you get double penalized).
Quote:This dichotomy confuses me. On the one hand, you say that every other AT is able to handle mezzes, but then you say that giving blasters the debuff/mez effects to handle mezzes would make them overpowered. Is blaster damage really that high compared to the others? The kind of things that ArcanaVille is listing are a drop in the bucket compared to the tools that Controllers, Dominators, Defenders, and Corruptors have at their disposal.Originally Posted by Miladys_Knight
Just like I can achieve with EVERY OTHER AT I PLAY.
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I really don't see how you can get the % of mezzes down to an acceptable level with this idea without making the thing hideously overpowered while unmezzed. -
Quote:Most of the new stuff is ready, actually... All I've got left are the HO changes, a few bugs with the Assassin Strike changes, and the ATOs.Originally Posted by Crysys
I will be surprised if we see a MIDS update for quite awhile. They have ATO's, multiple new power sets and a host of power changes to update.
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I've had multiple visions for what I thought would be good redesign for Blasters... At first, I figured they should get better control abilities since it would keep to the offense theme while still being damage-focused, and the CoV came out and Dominators were created. Then I looked at Dominator Assault sets and thought "huh, that'd be a good start... Assault/Defense would make for a good Blaster surrogate, where the epic pools could be the massive AoE damage we lack in Assault...", and then VEATs came out. :/
I would love to see blasters fixed. They have always been my favorite AT (my first 50 was an En/En, way back in the day, and I'm currently leveling a Fire/Dark), but I can't get over the fact that every single one of my alts is more powerful, in aggregate, than any of my blasters. -
Quote:Current plan is to focus on I22 stuff and release the next version only then, with ATIO support.Originally Posted by Tater Todd
They will be busy for quite some time LOL.
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Quote:This.Originally Posted by Joviwan
Thank you, thank you, thank you. You've made these packs really worth owning, and I'm anxious for their Live release.
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Quote:Hm... I'll look into it. I don't think it should be too difficult...Originally Posted by Ashlocke
First, I want to thank you Mids Programmers for the excellent work you do on it, I honestly couldn't play at this point without the ability to plan my character builds. I remember back in the day even before Invention Enhancements wracking my brain just to pick powers and slot them in the best way possible without making a horribly playing character as I leveled up.
I was wondering if I could make a feature suggestion?
I find that every time I open Mids it doesn't remember how I last had it displayed on the screen. What I mean by that is, the main window returns to it's default size and location, as well as the other two sub windows that I use regularly (view active sets and view totals) also they are defaulted to "Keep on top" toggled on.
Is there currently a way to make Mids remember it's size and position as well as how you left it when you closed the program down? If not, could this be a feature in some future version?
P.S. It's not a huge problem to have to set the windows up how I want them every time I load the program, was just thinking it would be a nice QoL feature.
Thank you.
Keep up the awesome work. -
Quote:It's actually on our list, after PvP DR and Mastermind Pets.Originally Posted by Metatron_NA
I would like to submit a feature request, but I don't know where one does that for MIDS?
The request is as follows:
It would be awesome if after completing a MIDS build, there were two buttons to let you increment and decrement the level, showing you the build as it would be for that level - all powers and slots from that level down. That way you could, for example, dial in to level 38 (if you wanted) and see the powers and slots you would have at that level, with everything that comes after in that build not displaying.
Thanks! -
Thanks for stickying this, Z!
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Quote:I updated the version on the server about 5 hours ago... Update to the newer version, and this should go away.Originally Posted by JayboH
Getting a weird problem - I manually downloaded and installed it, but now that you have the update feature working, it notices a new version and asks if I want to update every single time. I've said yes and downloaded it, and reinstalled it, but it goes right back to saying there is a new version every time.
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Quote:Damn, I already fixed the IO proc issue. I guess I could go break it again... :POriginally Posted by OmniNogard
No need to rush on the IO procs. while the Alpha stuff may need to be fixed sooner for people who use those types. As many have said before and im sure they will again and again say "Thank you for your hard work". Hope you have a happy new year.
A new version is available on the server now! Do an auto-update or download from the link above! -
Quote:I forgot to increment the internal variable that identifies the version, so it says it is 1.952 but it is actually 1.953. When I release my bugfix this week, I'll fix that.Originally Posted by Vanum
I have the same thing going on. Double check though, in my case it says 1.952 but I do still have Titan Weapons in the list. It's like the client side thinks it's still 1.952 when it's not.
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Some changes I made to the Grant Power code appears to have broken (a) damage enhancements from Alpha slots (damage and damage resistance are the same enhancement, actually), and (b) IO procs. I'm going to try and get a fix for it out within the next couple of days.
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Blah. Looks like a problem with the procs...