Westley

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I PMed Castle to see if he would look at this thread and consider it. Here is the PM I sent him:

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Could you please take a look at this thread and maybe pop your head in and say something there? Even a "No" would be something. We just want to know that YOU know that we're alive!

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And here is Castle's response:
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Read through it, just have nothing to add at the moment. Some nice ideas in there, but nothing I can immediately work with (not for lack of ideas, but the datawork on buff/debuff sets takes a LOT longer than making alterations to damaging sets.)

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So he HAS read through the whole thread, he HAS seen the ideas, he KNOWS what we want and he has plenty of things to work with. Now it's just a matter of time before he and the other devs can get around to looking at it. Even when they GET the time to look at it, it looks like it will still take quite a bit of time for internal testing and programming before we see anything even on the Test Server.

Thank you all for your input, I think it was a very constructive conversation. And now you know that the "seed" is planted. We might just have to wait till next season for harvest.

Note: I did get permission to post his PM here before doing it

Sounds interesting. Are you talking about adding this as another effect or changing the power to this exclusively?

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Force Bolt should be a -20% DMG -20% RES, with the recharge increased.

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Nonononononono. No.

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Repulsion Field, maybe a negative Power Boost effect? Would lend FF something completely unique, at least to hero side.

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Not quite sure what that means exactly, can you explain?

You know, a Defender can make a pretty good Scrapper too if they take all of the Fighting pool along with Leadership and Fitness. Does that mean that they should? Probably not. Because then they would no longer be a Defender.

As far as whether or not it makes a better secondary than primary, I can disagree to that with the numbers alone, I don't need anything other than that to prove that idea wrong.

And FF only requires minimal slotting if you want to be a "buffbot". REAL FF Defenders use just as many slots in their primaries as any other set. And makes GOOD use of them.

And how many FF Defenders would have the ability to GET that high a mag? None, unless they sacrifice other slots and/or power picks specifically to get it. Then they might as well just roll a Controller, because it would be easier.

I'd rather leave the power as it is right now than to change it to a sleep. I think sleep is one of the most useless powers in the game, unless you play mostly solo or stealth through missions. There's just simply too much AoE damage on most teams for that to work.

I personally LIKE the Glass Bottle of Doom. I just wish people wouldn't waste their attacks on it. I think a Placate type effect is just the thing for it.

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Don't they stack? I remember at some point getting knockback with Force Bolt on a mob normally resistant because the mob was standing on an Ice Slick. I always thought KB stacked, it's just really hard to time it right without a constant power as one of the stackers.

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Yes, they stack, I make a point of this in my guide specifically. Even most knockback resistant mobs (like CoT ghosts and Rularuu warriors) get knocked back after several "pulses" of the Repulsion Field. Even WITHOUT using Force Bolt. Force Bolt chaining just makes it work faster.

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Off topic: I just discovered I am completely uncomfortable with referring to Philotic Knight as Phil, and will, in the future, do PK if I have to abbreviate.


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Well since Philotic comes from "Philos" which is the Greek word for the form of love shared between friends, it's more of a title than a name. When I think of "Phil" I think of a NON-Italian New York plumber, not a superhero. But people ingame call me whatever they want, and I don't make a hassle about it. I prefer PK, but I don't care. As a side-side note, click the link there to see where the origin of "philotic" comes from and a basic idea of where the Knight gets his powers.

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Anyway, Sonic does sacrifice some damage mitigation for its offensive boost. The +Res it offers isn't exactly equivalent to FF's +Def.

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I'll say this over and over again. Defense is OVER two times better than Resistance. The simple reason why? Status Effects. Sure, Sonic has Clarity to wake people up from status effects, but Defense means that you don't get HIT by the power, which means that the status effect doesn't take effect in the FIRST place.

Defense > Resistance. All the time.

I'm playing a Sonic now, and it's fun, but my team feels ALOT squishier and less safe then when I'm playing my FFer. And I really don't like that.

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You're really only going to get use out of both powers if your foe is resistant to Repel and not Knockback.

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I've found this to be true on quite a LOT of mobs. I don't know why, but there are alot of mobs that can just walk through Force Bubble like it's not even there, but when they get close enough, Repulsion Field knocks them back like it was nothing. Yes, I do use them both, all the time, and sometimes at the SAME time.

So no, I REALLY don't think that they are redundant, I think they are completely different powers that have a similar final goal: to keep enemies away from you. The fact that they do it in two ENTIRELY different ways I see as a BENEFIT. In this case, I WOULD say that the powers are redundant, in the same way that a backup generator is redundant to the power grid. If something is Repel resistant, at least half the time it's NOT knockback resistant. The only exception to this being AVs and some Elite Bosses.

So again, I don't think that the powers work against each other, or that one makes the other useless. I think they both have their places on my toolbelt. I think we will have to agree to disagree on this point Jade.

You have alot of valid points there Jade, and I won't argue most of them, except this:

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Now, personally I feel that the only problem with this arrangement is that Repulsion Field and Force Bubble are redundant.

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The powers are certainly NOT redundant. Not at all. One does Repel and one does knockback. One only knocks enemies that are near you and one can aggro the entire ROOM. Let me post here another post that I made in my guide's thread:

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Force Bubble is good, but in most cases, Repulsion Field is better. Like I said in another thread a long time ago, where Force Bubble is a sledgehammer, Repulsion Field is a chisel. They both have their places, but I've personally found RF to be more useful in more situations because of the FINESSE that the power provides. You only knock back what you want to knock back, and at the same time, it gives you some small degree of protection of melee attacks. Some melee attacks still get through, but with RF on, you'll never be surrounded by giant grunt breathing down your neck. The endurance cost is minimal when no one's on you, and the effect is very nice.


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I think Repulsion Field is a VERY good power. I'm sorry that you don't seem to think so. Everything else you said is more or less valid, this comment just stuck in my craw. That doesn't mean the powers can't be tweaked. Like I said though, no cottages, I REALLY don't want to completely lose ANY of these powers.

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The problem is all variables are good; the powers that are lacking are lacking in function more than power. Thus, asking for changes that are not to some degree cottages is basically pointless. The task at hand is asking for reasonable, pre-packed cottages that are already available in the company catalog, not outrageous architect-planned condos with three garages and two swimming pools.

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I lawled. Thanks for the analogy and the laugh, I needed that. I'll try to be more open to pre-packaged condos. I REALLY wish a redname would come in here and at least say something like: "We'll look at these ideas and consider them for sometime in the future" or even "We like where the set is, don't expect any changes anytime soon."

It would be nice to know if I am wasting my breath here or not.

Better example? Okay, I don't WANT people to see Dispersion Bubble AS an "aura" and I fear that if the numbers were swapped, they WOULD see it as more of an aura, which means we'll be more like second-rate Empaths that can't heal at all. That's what I'm afraid of. I don't want to have ForceFields become something other than ForceFields. I don't want people to be able to compare it to another set and say that it does the same thing as that set only worse. Right now the set does something UNIQUE that other Defenders don't really do (even if alot of people don't want to "do" that thing), and I don't want to lose that.


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If you want that to change, you're going to have to open up not only to changes, but to believing the playerbase can adjust in a positive way to those changes.

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I'll TRY to change my cynicism about my fellow players and trust them to change as well, but you'll have to give me some time. I don't exactly have the highest opinion of the playerbase, which is why I've been trying to "father" them into slow changes over time. I DID spend the last three years running entirely in pick-up-groups in Freedumb.

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I agree. I think we're better off brainstorming, trying to improve and refine ideas, and letting the developers do the rejecting.

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No.™

...Just kidding.

I'm trying to keep myself open, it's just hard when you've become so jaded. Dammit now I have that song stuck in my head.... DAMN YOU AEROSMITH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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Continuing on the placible Force Bomb idea; I think this is pretty realistic. It allows the devs to keep the basic animation, and most of the effect can be stolen from Bonfire.

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You don't know how hard it would be to "steal" the code from Bonfire. Neither do I. It could be really hard, or it could be a simple cut and paste job. The fact is that we don't know what their code looks like. All we DO know is a basic law of programming: less change in concept = less change in code. Just try to keep that in mind, unless you can get a red name to come in here and say "it's easy and definately a viable option for the near future". This is why I'm trying to restrict the conversation to "tweaks" rather than total power changes. That's why there are "no cottages", because we simply don't KNOW how hard or easy it would be to make any change, all we do know is that the smaller the change, the easier it will be.

Changing a single variable is alot easier than stealing code from another power, I can tell you that for sure.

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I confess I'm not really sure how to respond to those posts. You shoot stuff down with statements like "I will not be a buffbot" and then say "What I DO want is for more bubblers to stop thinking of themselves as "buffbots"". So are you saying that you don't think of yourself as a buffbot but most other FFers do?

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That is what I'm saying, so we are in agreement.

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The problem is that if you shoot down ideas from your seemingly almost unique point of view (even according to yourself) we're never going to get anywhere. The same thing happens if you're allowed to define absolutely what "fits" and "doesn't fit" into the set. I think you realize that, and that's why this second post is such a disclaimer.

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I have no power to "define" anything. All of my post are just simply my opinion. I have absolutely no influence with the devs whatsoever. Hell, they won't even return my calls. I'm no Arcanaville. I can't change anything about the sets, only the devs can. That's what this thread and this discussion is for. All I can do is give my opinion. And that's all that it is.

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What has to happen is that we have to look for the more wide area good of the set. Something that would pull more people to FF (Defenders in particular). Something that would appeal to a larger audience than just you, or just me.

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True. (Though I'm still trying to figure out what "wide area good" means).

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The "feel" of a set is so purely objective that it shouldn't be a large part of the idea limitations.


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I think you mean subjective, but I get your point.



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The ease of implementing said ideas is much more relevent. Obviously you and I have differing ideas about the "feel" of the set, and I'll bet there's a thousand other ideas about the "feel" of the set out there. Rejecting ideas based on "feel" isn't productive.

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I just think it's very important that the set not change into something that it's not. I don't want to be a Kineticist and debuff or buff damage. If I wanted to do that, I'd MAKE a Kineticist. That's just one example. I think you get my point there.

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The defense the small bubbles would provide to the squishies would still be good, and you might be even BETTER at what you do because your self protection is higher. But right now the FF Defender is poorly protected, and that limits how some people perceive and play the set.

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I agree with this. But that's me.

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My opinion is that this change would open up playstyles, not limit them.

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And here is where I disagree. I think it WILL limit how most people CHOOSE to play FFers because I think most people DO think of themselves as "buffbots". Because of this, I think most people will choose to sit in the middle of the team and not move, wasting all the rest of the powers in the set and making them dusty. That's why I think the "big three" powers should either be left alone, or actually REDUCED in Defensive capabilites as a sacrifice to the Gods of Powerset Balance to allow us more utility in the rest of the set.

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Four out of nine is not one third.

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But three out of nine IS a third. I don't count PFF as a "Defense" power because the Defense is SO high that it's basically a Detention Field for yourself, practically speaking. It doesn't help your team whatsoever except in keeping you alive. So I don't count it at all. I see three Defense giving powers in the set, three knockback powers, one repel power and TWO "phasing" powers. But that's just the way that I rationalize the set. Again, my opinion.

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In my post the defense debuff was brought up to try and deal with the issue of FF defenders and AV's. Right now I think almost any defender is more effective against an AV than FF, and to try and add utility in that situation is, I think, going to require a little bit of a rewrite.

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I would be open to the idea of a "Defense Debuff" in the set, but what I was opposed to was the idea that "ForceFields is about manipulating Defense" as a JUSTIFICATION for that. I don't buy that justification, because adding Defense is not the same as making someone hold still better so they lose their Defense. Now with all of our "Force" powers you COULD justify adding some Defense DeBuffs in there and say thematically that the enemies are "easier to hit" because they have to "push through the force" (like Force Bubble). You could also justify adding -Slow to enemies with the same justification. I just didn't like that you tried to justify it by saying that FFers are "Defense Manipulators" when we are not really. That's all.

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You still will have to keep casting Deflection and Insulation every 4 mins, the buff from Dispersion will still only work while teammates are within the radius and dispersion will still always have to be on.

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I think what you just said explains it right there. You're talking about taking AWAY about 5% in Defense effectiveness from the "smaller" bubbles from all the teammates. The teammates now only get the bonus when they ARE inside the "big bubble". To respond to Dromio's post up there, that will encourage bubblers to "stay in the middle" of the team rather than "jump all over" using positioning to make their knockback more effective and useful. That's how I see it. And you're right, it's entirely opinion, not fact. I can see where a bubbler might feel more "safe" jumping around and aggroing everything with his other powers with the added person Defense (I certainly would), however, I think MOST people will just see the fact that they "have" to sit in the middle of the team so that most of the team gets the same bonus that they used to before the proposed change. Again, it's all opinion, and in my opinion, that's how most people will see it.

Can't you see where they might act that way?

I'd like to add an addendum to my comments in this thread, because I'm sure anyone that looks at them will say "who is this dill-weed and who does he think he is?"

The short answer is this: I am nobody. I have NO authority, I do not work for NCSoft, never have, probably never will. I also have never had any personal relationship with any NCSoft employee and as far as I know, have never had ANY of my PMs responded to. The title under my name was given to me by a forum moderator. It MEANS nothing. That's the short answer.

The long answer is that my first hero was a Mind/FF Controller that lasted for about 14 levels, my second was a Gravity/FF Controller that lasted for about 14 levels too. My third, fourth, fifth, and SIXTH characters were all The Philotic Knight. PK was first a level 50 FF Defender on Justice. I deleted him. I then remade him on Freedom, got him to 50 and deleted him. I did it a third time. I didn't delete the third PK. Instead, I created a copy of him on EVERY server and have him at various levels on all of the other servers. All in all, I have over 200 levels of ForceField Defending experience over a three year period. I've also played almost exclusively in pick-up-groups. This means two things: that I've been on alot of bad AND good teams, and that I've had the freedom and opportunity to test ALL the powers in the set in almost EVERY given situation with almost EVERY team makeup imaginable. I probably have more experience and game time playing as a ForceField Defender than any other person in the game. My only authority whatsoever comes purely from those experiences. You can judge my comments based on that, you can judge my comments purely on the value of the comments themselves, or you can throw them out the window. The choice is yours.

I LOVE this set, if that wasn't obvious. I would love to see more and more bubblers come out of the woodwork and more and more newbies try out bubblers and enjoy them the same way I do. That being said, I'm open to change, but the change that I'm open to has two restrictions: it has to be REALISTIC minimal change over time otherwise there is little chance of it ever happening, and it has to maintain the "flavor" and the "essence" of the ForceFields set. ForceFields is ENTIRELY about damage MITIGATION, and that's IT. It doesn't add damage, it doesn't debuff mobs. All it does is provide Defense so that enemies that attack your allies miss most of the time, and provides "soft control" to prevent the enemies from attacking in the first place. That's all the set does, and in MY opinion, it does that one thing better than any other set.

I'd like to see that continue, but I'd like to see our current powers "tweaked" so that people will be MORE interested in using the other 2/3rds of our powerset actively the same way I do. I play in a very unusual manner that makes use of ALL the tools in my toolbelt to their full advantage. I DON'T expect everyone to play like me, I don't WANT everyone to play like me. What I DO want is for more bubblers to stop thinking of themselves as "buffbots" and realize that they have alot more powers that do alot more things than just "give Defense buffs".

Any changes that encourage FFers to explore using their other powers I commend. But it has to be realistic and it has to maintain the flavor of the set. That is my FF Defender Manifesto.

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Also, this would be a straight swap. The FFer gets much better soloability and survivability while essentially being just as effective in groups. I admit this is one of those things where I can't understand why anyone would NOT want this to happen, but that's probably a limitation on my part. I'd love to see this specific change discussed further.

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I'll discuss it further. It completely goes against 2/3rds of our set. Knockback, Repel, and "Phasing". It will cause FFers to NOT want to use MOST of our powers, because we won't be free to run around or reposition ourselves. We'll be firmly established as "buffbots". Dispersion Bubble will then be our new "aura" and we will be required to "rock" it just like our sisters the Empaths are. I say a very STRONG no to this. I am not and refuse to be a buffbot. And I am strongly opposed to anything that will solidify that as "The Way, The Truth, and The Light".

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FF after all is all about Defense, and there's nothing saying it has to all be buffing defense.

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Again, FF is NOT "all about Defense". At least not with a capital D. FF is all about defense, with a lowercase D. What's the difference? Defense is just one number, whereas defense is ANYTHING that you can do to stop your enemies from hitting your allies, with capital Defense being included as a PART of that. Lets take a look one more time at this supposition that "FF is all about Defense".

Personal Force Field - Defense to the bubbler only, turns OFF the Defense from Dispersion Bubble while it's up.

Force Bolt - No Defense, but provides plenty of defense.

Deflection, Insulation and Dispersion - Defense all the way.

Detention Field - No Defense, provides defense.

Repulsion Field - No Defense, provides defense.

Repulsion Bomb - No Defense, provides defense.

Force Bubble - No Defense, provides defense.

FIVE powers do NOT provide Defense. ONE power provides Defense to the bubbler and turns OFF other Defense to the rest of the team. Only THREE powers in the set provide Defense. That's ONE-THIRD of the set. Which means that the other two-thirds aren't primarily about providing team Defense. Instead, they are all about defending your team in other ways.

So once again, is FF really "all about Defense"? I don't think so.

P.S. Anything that I DON'T comment about in anyone's post, that doesn't mean I don't value your comments, it just means I see nothing wrong with them. Things that I think are good or even feasible ideas, I won't comment on. I will let them stand on their own. Anything that I have a problem with, I will comment on and tell you exactly what my problem with it is. So if I don't comment, good for you! If I do comment, good for me! If Ultimus makes a new thread about it, good for him!

Defender Bonfire = Cottage.

The final "goal" of the two powers is the same, but one is a placeable "object" and the other is a targeted AoE "bomb" that disappears as soon as it hits. They would basically have to completely take out the original Repulsion Bomb code and put this new code in.

It's a nice idea, but it's still a cottage. No cottages.

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I'm not clear on what situations Kin has better damage mitigation...maybe you could explain that to me.

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Lt. Sefu (Longbow hero in RWZ) in particular, and many (most?) AVs in general. In a nutshell, I had to swap my FF defender for my fire / kin corruptor because Sefu was mopping the floor with us, and we couldn't dent his regen.

-Damage, a big AoE heal, and the rest of the goodness kin brings meant Sefu dropped in a couple minutes with no one's health dipping past green for long. Boy, did that encounter make me bitter FWIW, Castle responded very nicely to my late night rant about that one.

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That's funny, because if I remember right, Sefu IS an FF/Energy Defender... I remember because I whooped his [censored] solo as an FF Defender myself... I thought it was pretty funny actually, lol. I never expected to be bubbled when I was playing solo, and then I REALLY never expected to have to fight another bubbler when he turned on us.

Oh yeah... SPOILER ALERT! Heh.

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I have no clue what you mean by no cottages.

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Try actually READING the full original post. Then you'll know why there are no cottages.

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Adding "Affecting others" ability to PFF isn't asking for a cottage. It doesn't change the "Core function of the power".

Which is to provide high personal defense at a trade-off.

A -To-hit, or -Dam, or -Acc, or other effects, would still be a trade off.

Unless you'd like to say that the "core function" of PFF is to prevent you from affecting others, and that the +Def is a side effect that we could remove or change entirely.

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EDITING: (Just woke up, let me rethink what I wrote)

The "core function" of PFF is that you SACRIFICE affecting others for "ultimate defense". It's both, not one or the other. If you take one away, you have to take away the other. Allowing someone to still attack and still affect the outside world, even with adding a -ToHit -Acc or -Damage along AND still giving the person 15% Defense..... how is THAT as much a sacrifice as losing the ability to do ANYTHING at all? PFF is now a thinking man's power, you have to make some tough decisions to use it and to use it will requires making the right decisions at the right time. I like that. I wonder if that was the reason why they took away the "suppression" during Beta? Maybe they considered it overpowered even WITH the debuffs. We'll never know unless a dev comes in here and tells us.

Either way, we have to keep in mind the fact that the simplest changes are the ones that are most likely to actually happen. All sorts of fantasy changes to the powers are nice, but I don't think that they are all that helpful. That's just my opinion.

And I REALLY need to refrain from posting as soon as I get up in the mornings, man I'm BITTER when I first wake up!

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These changes are all for the Defender version of the set, I think the rest are fine as-is. I LIKE seeing a little more differentiation between the sets for different archetypes.

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^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

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Wow. Terrible ideas all around.

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Hey! Get out of here!

*speaks with a tone of disgust* conTROLLer....

You're the reason why people would rather play */FF than FF/*.

These changes are for us, you go home!

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Meh... take care eh.


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Wow... Canadians actually TYPE "eh" too!

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I have no clue what you mean by no cottages.

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Try actually READING the full original post. Then you'll know why there are no cottages.

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Regardless I don't see that there would be any harm in changing PFF for Defenders to be able to affect outside targets again (yes I SAY again...) just reduce the defence and res of it whilst the Defender is taking outside action.

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No cottages.

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Add -res and -regen to Dispersion bomb. Something to do while the GM or AV or Hero (vil side) is facing your team and you've already bubbled. (shrug... something to do anyway...)

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I think that's asking for a bit too much. Also, it makes no sense thematically, how would you justify it? You've also completely forgotten about "equivalent exchange". You have to give something up to get something.

Most of this post are the "pie in the sky" ideas that won't happen, as much as we may want them to.

Please refer to the OP. Thinking "outside the box" is sure fun, but Castle has already said that we NEED the box.