Talesin
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Posts
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Quote:I agree that the discussion of powersets based on concept is pointless. For example people have explained to my why their petless mastermind is great. They usually explain it away with story and concept.Originally Posted by Draeth Darkstar
Golly, I guess I must have missed the point. Oh wait, no I didn't.
When the high end sets are closer to the pack (by a huge margin, in most cases) than the low end sets, no one wants to compare to the low end sets, because from a mechanical standpoint, that just leads you to comparing to something that's so mechanically inferior that you'd only play it for concept anyway, which isn't particularly relevant to a discussion of comparative power in the first place.
Perhaps I am not understanding your other point. Are you saying that the majority of sets in the game are in a pack together (toward the high end) and that there are only a few sets which are far below the others? Are you saying that you feel that the majority of sets are in balance with one another?
If I got it let me know. If I don't have it yet I am sure you will let me know with venom. -
Quote:Originally Posted by EnigmaBlack
a large majority of players aren't on the forums and many of them are casual (middle ground), not hardcore, and those are the ones the game needs to be balanced against.
I agree. -
Quote:Calling something nerf-herding is a way for you to not engage in a dialogue. People most hurt by calls for nerfing a set or power are those who have spent a lot of time or energy exploiting a game balance issue. Look at all the replies in threads which essentially admit as much.Originally Posted by Darth_Khasei
There is no benefit to nerf herding and it hurts the game.
Game balance issues lead to problems in the game. I think the harm they do is worse.
1. They reduce the content of the game to a trivial exercise instead of a challenging story.
2. They make players on teams which are not running "uber" sets useless or pretty superfluous.
3. They create a situation in the game where the devs have to engage in a constant war of escalation in order to stay ahead of the balance issues. Put in IOs which allow a player to reach high levels of defense on a non-defensive toon so you have to add mobs which can easily bypass those increased levels of defense (think Incarnates). Add a special mob to a villain group which will counter their use as a farm because you (the devs) allowed such high levels of resistance that players can easily overcome the damage (think of Super Stunners).
I know some might think that I am spouting a bunch of crap, and that is their right. I only hope that those with the power to make changes in the game are the ones who look at it with more reasoned eyes.
p.s. I know that Incarnates were added to the game to provide an end-game which largely didn't exist in this game before Incarnates. It is a vast improvement over the previous end game encounter, the Hamidon raid. At least now the powers you chose matter in the result. -
I appreciate the discussion so far. One additional thing to consider is that when we make comparisons using the outliers as the standard we also discourage players.
I am a consummate alt-oholic. I create new toons almost 2 times a week, get them to the mid 30s or 40s and then move on to other things. I have a few 50s but not more than 7 or 8 out of the 50-60 characters that I have at any one time. I want to be powerful and have fun in this game. I want to feel useful on a team. I want to contribute. I want to have some challenge and to know that the result of any encounter is the direct result of my skills and ingenuity (or a teammates). When I am playing the game and find a set (or combination) to be extremely powerful, so much so that the game becomes trivial I usually move on to another toon. Likewise when I am playing a set which under-performs greatly compared to members of my teams or with other characters I have played in the recent past I usually move on.
I come to the forums sometimes to research what people say about the sets or combinations I am considering for my new toons. It is sometimes discouraging to find post after post in which people disparage a set not because it is "un-fun" or even particularly under-performing. They disparage it because it is not the "uber" set that some other ones are. Sometimes I listen to their arguments and don't bother to roll that new toon. Other times I ignore them or I determine based on my own understanding that they are wrong and go for it anyway.
This is a free forum and people can post whatever they like (within reason). People can label others as "insane" or call them nerf-herders because they seek balance where it doesn't currently exist. People can ask for builds which allow them to plow through mobs like they weren't there and in the long run kill the game for themselves (like using a cheat code in a single player game). Others can come on the forum and use it as a public place for them to extol all their achievements in an effort to prove themselves worthy to the community or themselves.
My hope is that we can have a civil discussion about how we approach these issues on the forum. -
Quote:Bingo. This was the point of my post.Originally Posted by MisterD
I think you are missing the point Drae.
The OP isnt (at least I think) complaining about ANY specific sets, be it melee, blaster etc etc. They are talknig about HOW sets get compared. Such as in Claw's "Tweak SS' thread, were a few people dived in with huge examples of how SS, at max performance, is not 'that' amazing. Which as I said there..is really pointless, since how often do we play at max everything?
That is how I read the OP anyway..saying that comparing a set to another at max settings is just not really helping. There is always going to be outlier sets, but if one set, at 'base line' performance is X amount better than another at base, we can compare that. -
I did read your post, twice to make sure I understood it. I only used examples of Masterminds sets, but I could have easily used any powerset group in making a comparison. There are problems in support sets (see the other post in this sub-forum), blast sets, melee sets, armor sets, etc. Perhaps I shouldn't have used Masterminds as an example. It is the archtype I play least (except for maybe Defenders) and I base my example on the statements of others that I have read in the forums. I apologize. I should have used sets I have more personal knowledge of in making my examples. Then again, the examples were not the point of my post at all.
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Quote:Thanks for the thoughtful reply Hopeling. I agree for the most part, competence is a big indicator of success. However as a power gets more and more away from the norm, the role of competence becomes less and less relevant.Originally Posted by Hopeling
ftfy
Many of the most amazing steamroller teams I've ever experienced had nobody with Kinetics. Some of the most painful and ineffective teams I've been on had at least one Kinetics character. Fulcrum Shift can be awesome, of course, but in general use (even under good conditions) it's not incredibly superior to a good -res power. 9 out of 14 archetypes don't even have a high enough damage cap to get full benefit from a saturated Fulcrum Shift.
Also, holy cow Talesin, multi-quote or no (it's the little square button on the bottom right of each post, with a " and a +), you don't need to compose an individual rebuttal to every post in the thread.
A friend and I just discussed it and did a little math which made it clear to us that a -res power is generally twice as effective as a +dam power when fighting even lvl con mobs. That goes a long way to explain the -30% res power in Tar Patch or Freezing Rain when compared to the positive +40% base dam buff in Fulcrum. However, the reality of the way people play this game is that they rarely fight even level con mobs. At +2 the difference pretty much evens out. This still doesn't take into account that the +40% damage buff is the least amount of buff you will gain from FS. The buff doesn't scale by the level of the mob. The -res in Tar Patch and Freezing Rain, etc. is reduced by level scaling (aka Purple Patch) and by mob resistances. Therefore Fulcrum Shift still wins the contest in most situations. -
Quote:Originally Posted by Draeth Darkstar
Bots, Thugs, and Demons are relatively balanced with one another. They have feasible pros and cons and are fun and effective to play. By Median, these are the average performers, and they're also the most comparable to the performance of the other ATs, which makes them the best balancing point for Mastermind primaries.
Necromancy has a bit less raw power than those three, but is still pretty effective without excessive micromanaging and has a strong niche in debuffing tohit when fighting single targets.
Ninjas have some problems. They have stellar ST DPS, but their AoE is lacking, bad AI makes them struggle a lot more than the above sets more frequently, their Tier7 is inefficient, and they're really hellaciously squishy. They can be used effectively with intense micromanagement.
Mercenaries and Beast Mastery are your real outliers. Both of these sets have significant design problems that really hold back their capabilities. I'd really rather not get into the whys in this thread, because it's been done to death in various other threads, so if you're really curious, go look in the Mastermind forums.
I am not sure I made my intentions clear with my OP. My intent was to try to discourage the kind of comparisons people make. Its like this, when people compare powersets using the "uber" ones as the model, the ones they compare to invariably look crappy in comparison. Rather if you look to the middle (the average) you may be able to get a little better perspective on the relative value of all the sets. It might help us to recognize powersets that both deviate above the mean and those below. To be very specific with an example, if bots are considered extremely powerful and thugs are more towards the average (not bad by any stretch, just not as powerful) , then why should we compare using bots? Doing so only makes us think that mercs is worse. -
Quote:Ok. I agree Clarity is kinda on the suck side of things. How about Antidote? Or maybe Clear Mind? Or Thaw? Where does Increase Density lie on the spectrum? Still at the top based on my observations.Originally Posted by Mad Grim
Better than clarity isn't a large compliment.
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Quote:I know there is a way, I apologized above for not knowing how.Originally Posted by Mad Grim
Talesin, there IS a way to get multiple quotes in one message.
No, Kinetics doesn't have a complete lack of mitigation. But the majority is buffing damage and recharge. Those numbers you mentioned are almost worthless compared to other support sets.
Fulcrum shift is fine as is.
I agree that the mitigation from kin is less than that of other sets, but it is not nothing. In fact most debuff sets suffer greatly in this game due to the scaling of powers based on the level of the enemy. The same can be said of Dark Miasma, Poison, and dare I say it, Rad. If you fight +3, +4, or +5 mobs then most of what you do with debuffs is ruined by the scaling. -
Quote:Originally Posted by Disappearing Girl
The Mez protection isn't AoE, only the energy resist.
Wow that is news to me. I just checked on City of Data and the power is flagged the way you described. The Energy and Smashing resist components are AOE but the mez protections are not. I assume that is because the devs wanted the Kin player to use the power as a break from a mez as opposed to offering protection. Still it is better than Clarity. -
When I look over the threads in this section I am shocked and a little dismayed with a though I had about how people go about comparing sets in the game. I come at this from the perspective of a classroom teacher, and I deal with this particular issue all the time from parents of my students.
Why is it that when people compare powersets in the game and judge their relative effectiveness that they always use sets that are the outliers and not the averages to compare?
For example, people almost always compare the damage buff from Stacked Rage or from Fulcrum Shift when judging how well a set compares. People use the debuffs in Radiation Emission to judge the effectiveness of debuffs in general. The debuffs from Rad are especially effective vs. hard targets (think AVs, GMs, etc.) but based solely on their numbers it is not so exceptional. On the low end think of how people compare to sets that are seen as underperforming. Is Beast Mastery really so bad? When you compare them to Bots maybe, but when you look at them compared to Mercs or Ninjas they aren't so bad.
I think we need to change how we look at the powers in this game. When you compare between sets we should use the middle to judge not the high or low end. When you judge everything from the outliers, those which are OP/UP will skew the perceptions of the readers and make it difficult for them to accept other positions. -
Quote:Ok I understand now. The spectrum for Fulcrum Shift goes like this (on a controller, defender numbers would be higher)...Originally Posted by Garent
Worst case scenario with fulcrum shift is your team is nowhere around and you give yourself a damage buff and debuff the enemies a bit. It's hardly a bad scenario, but when you compare it to the ideal scenario, which is fulcrum shift coming off cooldown at the exact moment you engage each fresh group and damage cap your whole team through the whole mission, there's a really big gap.
Low End- Good single target buff for you. (40%)
Low Middle End- Good multi-player buff for you and others near you. (40%)
Middle- Great multi-player buff for you and others near you. (60-120%)
Middle High End- Great multi-player buff for you and others near you. (110-180%)
High End- Great Buff for everyone (240%)
There is a lot of difference between the high and low end on Fulcrum Shift. However, it hardly seems bad to me even on the low side. -
Quote:I apologize for not using multiple quotes. I am not that experienced at using this forum system. Still I think I had things to contribute. Please don't take my lack of acumen with the system to mean that I know little about the game.Originally Posted by Roderick
They did, but only in AE.
Ever heard of multi-quote, dude? -
Quote:Ok. Thats great. How much money/levels does a tank need to get there? How much money/levels does a kin need to get to achieve that for the ENTIRE team?Originally Posted by Roderick
A tanker with sufficient recharge to double stack Rage, a full set of level 50 damage IOs (I tested with Crushing Impact, but other sets would work too), Musculature Core Paragon Alpha, and 7% damage buff from sets (2-4 set bonuses needed to achieve this) has perma capped damage.
Don't get me started on Rage. The fact that it is perma-build up is ridiculous, and that you can self stack it is just piling on the ridiculousness. -
Quote:Awesome reply.Originally Posted by plainguy
Well with all due respect Darth. The OP is the Union leader of the Federal Coalition of NPC Bad Guys in MMO Games.
Thus being a representative F.C.N.B.G.M.M.O.G. it is in his duty to make sure all players are fair and impartial when engaging any member of F.C.N.B.G.M.M.O.G.
Being the Secretary of F.C.N.B.G.M.M.O.G. it is my duty to record complaints and bring them to the attention of leadership for review.
It has come our attention with a certain crowd which will not be named. But we can call them Balta that this said power Fulcrum Shift was decreasing the OMGWFTDIDIGETHITWITH Ownage lately.
So it only fair he report this in the attempt to bring about some mediation in regards to this situation for his membership.
So be warned, do wrong against F.C.N.B.G.M.M.O.G. and we will be there with our lawyers and respond back accordingly.
BTW we will be holding a petition in front of portal corps lasting for 1 hour then we are heading over to the beach by the Arena area for some fun. For those interested. -
Quote:I thought that devs are the ones who approve such changes. Since you are a dev I will defer to you.Originally Posted by Energizing_Ion
Yep, as my main is a Kinetics/Rad Blast Def. the changes where you can use Transfusion/Transference and Fulcrum Shift even if the mob dies and you still get the benefit was and still is one of the best changes/fixes EVER in the game, to me at least.
Oh and to the OP....NO! No touchy-Kinetics! No!
Mmmm...Kins....
You can only touch kinetics if you add two things to the Fulcrum Shift power....
1.) Add the heal radius effects for each target and make it heal for as much as Transfusion would on the target.
2.) Add the endurance heal radius effects for ecah target and make it give as much endurance as Transference would on the target.
That's about the only thing I'll approve change-wise for Kinetics (others may suggest things too but for me that's all I want)
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Quote:Originally Posted by Mad Grim
Kinetics doesn't really need a rebalancing. It is an enjoyable set and really not overpowered at all. Fulcrum Shift is amazing, yes, but Kinetics offers almost nothing in the way of survivability. The entire point of Kinetics is "offense is the best defense", to kill the enemy before they have a chance to kill you. Unlike other support sets (Time, Dark, FF, Sonic, Therm) which make it nearly impossible to kill you.
It is very well balanced to its brethren.
I would agree with you about the all offense and no defense thing if the set didn't have the following...
-20% damage debuff in Fulcrum Shift
-20% damage debuff in Siphon Power
Melee Zone of Denial with Repel
+18.75% resists to Smashing and Energy (for the Team not you).
+10 mez protection from Stuns, Holds, Immobilize (for the Team not you).
-40% endurance debuff in Transference
-10% endurance debuff in Transfusion
209.11 heal at lvl 50 in Transfusion
Sounds like no mitigation there at all! -
Quote:Calling for something to be fixed is hardly bad play. I thought that helping the devs make things in the game work better (balance) was a general benefit to the game.Originally Posted by Darth_Khasei
Oh yet another nerf Kinetics thread disguised as a "re-balancing" discussion. Cute, semi-effective and a better disguise than most of the recent nerf herder threads.
The answer is still no, but you get a golf clap for the college try.
I suggest you come up with an actual argument instead of just trying to shut someone down from making a point. Too bad you aren't up to the effort involved. -
Quote:WOW. Lets start at #1.Originally Posted by EnigmaBlack
I must not be "most" kin players because FS is no where near overpowered.
#1 It needs to hit it's target
#2 If the target dies you waste it
#3 It potentially draws tons of aggro on the caster
#4 Kins have very little other damage mitigation
#5 You must be in the radius for it to take effect
Also FS is best against large groups which teams cut through easily anyway and is less desirable against single targets such as AVs . I can think of east 3 sets that outshine Kins in this respect.
Also as far as increasing recharge times goes for FS or any other powers in Kinetics... stop it. It's KINETICS It's supposed to be fast!
On behalf of my 5 Kins, Leave FS alone!
#1 You need to hit. Thats undeniable. Many (but not all) debuffs in the game require to hit checks.
#2 If the target dies you still get your 40%. 40% is good especially on a perma capable damage buff.
#3 Many if not all debuffs in the game generate aggro. Put a snow-storm on someone, put a tar patch under their feet and they are gonna go after you. I can only think of one debuff in the game which generates no aggro (the one in the Bane Spider set).
#4 Kins get serious amounts of -damage. This is not as good as getting additional defense but then again it isn't nothing. If you fought even level mobs, the -damage portion of Fulcrum Shift alone would dwarf the strength of the shields offered by Sonic Resonance. Also don't forget that healing is mitigation and the -end in Transference can seriously neuter a boss.
#5 See my previous posts about the radius. 30ft for the debuff, 20 ft for the buff. Not too shabby. -
Quote:Originally Posted by _Klaw_
It is limited by tohit and radius. No need for any form of more balancing.
The radius on the debuff portion of the power is a 30ft sphere. That is hardly bad. Very few AOE powers are that good.
The radius on the buff portion of the power is a 20ft sphere. Also hardly something to use as an argument.
To hit limitations are a little ridiculous. You need to hit that's true, but its just the first guy you need to hit, and who doesn't slot sufficient accuracy at lvl 32 or 38 to make this possible. Sure at lvl 32 or 38 it might be less than great, but everything sucks with no slots (except maybe repel and IR). -
Quote:I agree with the first part partially. It can take some skill to make Fulcrum Shift reach the heights that it can achieve but even on the low end it is better. The 40% buff you get (which is the lowest you can go) is superior to the -resistance you get from a toggle on and forget power (like Enervatings -22.5%). It is also much easier to apply and sticks to you regardless of whether or not the target dies.Originally Posted by ImpulseKing
You forgot repel. Carnie bosses stacked in a corner ftw.
On topic, I think the OP is overlooking that Fulcrum Shift still requires some skill to use well. If it were a toggle that said "Everyone I know and their cat is now at the damage cap with a press of this magic button" then yeah many fewer would argue. He also assumes a team. -
Quote:Originally Posted by Dr Harmony
Damage buffs are easy to come by.
Did you know that any full team doing Hero Tips can achieve +320% damage for 30 seconds at the mere cost of a 3.67s animation?
That's Call To Justice, the alignment power, that applies a team To Hit and Damage buff.
But how many times have you seen a team do the "Avengers Assemble" before a group, or even an AV?
I find Kinetics to be a really well balanced set. It's fast and dicey and you never feel safe like you do with almost all other support sets, but Transfusion props it up in the early game. It offers Transference and Fulcrum Shift later on, and then in the late game performs surprisingly well against AVs due to the damage debuffs.
You are being a little silly here. You can achieve the same buff levels with other coordinated temporary powers/inspirations. Proving something else is broken does not magically make Fulcrum Shift "fixed". It just goes to show how the devs miss the ways that people can break their game. What is sad is that the devs created this broken thing (Fulcrum Shift) which is much easier to apply since it take absolutely no coordination from the team to achieve. -
Quote:IR is permable with no recharge in it at all. It lasts 60 seconds and recharges in 60 seconds. Since it is not a stackable buff(from the same controller/defender), overlapping it does nothing. It is far better to put additional jump enhancement in it as it will give all your team incredible jumping abilities. However most people don't require it since they have their own travel powers.Originally Posted by EmperorSteele
For IR, that makes sense, but I also kinda like that Kin has a few "skippable" powers. Makes it easier to construct a build. Also, since IR is very easily perma-able (like, one recharge enhancement), I doubt the defense bonus would be allowed to be too much. If it was substantial (like over 5%), the recharge on the power would have to be increased, which would mean that it would fail in its primary function: a travel power. Unless you think it would be fun to "run out" of IR halfway through a jump, land in a pit, then have to wait 30+ seconds before you could jump out.
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Quote:Originally Posted by NeverDark
Fulcrum Shift has the Psychic Shockwave problem: it's better than it should be, but the rest of the set needs help, so it gets ignored. Kinetics could use a couple of changes.
1.) Increase the recharge on Fulcrum Shift. 60 seconds base, in a set with Siphon Speed, for a power that can cap a team's damage is pretty ridiculous. It's available every spawn. Increasing its recharge clamps that down without removing the strength of the power.
2.) Improve the strength of Siphon Power. It's half as strong as each stack of Fulcrum Shift. Making it more potent would give the set better debuffing power and make the early levels easier.
3.) Give Inertial Reduction +Defense. The power is practically skippable as is, especially now that travel is so much easier. Giving it some mitigation makes it valuable in battle, and it shores up one of the weaknesses of Kinetics.
4.) Increase the duration of Increase Density. The reasoning behind the low duration on most grantable mez protection is that they're supposed to be used reactively. This doesn't work for Increase Density, because you can't reactively free someone from Knockback. Making it last longer means less reapplying, and as a bonus it makes the resistance last longer as well.
I don't understand how buffing Kinetics more will make Fulcrum Shift more balanced.
1. You would need to seriously nerf the recharge on Fulcrum Shift to make the rest of your suggestions more reasonable. I'm thinking 16 minute recharge. I know this is a bit over the top.
2. Siphon Power is stackable without any recharge enhancement and buffs you and the team for a reasonable amount especially considering its a low lvl power. It is only crappy when you compare it to the ridiculous buffs in Fulcrum Shift. Think about it this way (buffs are always better than debuffs since no one ever fights mobs below their level). People scream in joy at the additional damage someone does to a mob sitting on top of a Tar Patch (which debuffs resistance 30%). The buff from Siphon power is superior to the debuff from Tar Patch (at least for how much damage the enemy takes) unless you are fighting even level cons.
3. I agree that Inertial Reduction is largely skippable. That doesn't mean that you need to buff the set. There are many powers which make you wonder what the devs were thinking, although in this case it makes "thematic" sense.
4. I agree about Increase Density duration, but at the same time, if you increased the duration too much you will just turn the power into something which is better (18.75% on a controller) than the resistance shield from Sonic Resonance (15% on a controller). This also doesn't take into account that you can give them grantable mez protection. It is also superior to many other -mez powers in other sets (think Clarity from Sonic) since it can be applied to many people at the same time.