Regarding recent changes
By
AbuliaDon,
Posted on: 2004-05-13 19:13 in Archetypes and Powers General Discussion
AM = unusable.
Haste = nearly so.
_______________
Why do devs think downtime is fun? I certainly don't. Being able to use all your powers in a fight (strategically) is cool. Helping your teammates is cool. When your powers cycle at an extremely high rate, you can't use them (obviously).
Do I get to choose a new powerset now or do I keep playing the same now-gimped design for the next two weeks? I was planning on playing this for months more before the nerf and now I'm just wishing I could get my money back -- it seems a cynical calculation to do a nerf on this scale JUST after people buy your product/it gets reviewed.
Do you actually enjoy just leveling over and over again when your character is nerfed (in short, do you actually play this game)?
Have you quit other games because of similar things happening to a character you put time and effort into? Quite a few people do.
Lots of us started CoH because other MMORPG's gave us this kind of thing over and over and you seemed different. Lots of us have now cancelled our subscriptions (mine was formerly for several months) because practices like this make it appear that you aren't.
I just want the game I actually paid for back. That's what it takes for me, and those like me, to resubscribe.
Geko just said AM was going to be adjusted. I use Hasten and don't find it useless. It effectively adds 2 recharge SO's to all my powers and hasten itself can be enhanced to be almost always on.
[ QUOTE ]
I see nothing wrong with Rad Blast and RAd Emmision END cost. It is comperable to all other sets, and identicle to their counterparts on others sets.
[/ QUOTE ]
Quick Summary: I don't think that the usage levels of Rad powers are equal to the usage levels of the equivalents in other Defender primary sets, and the bias is leading to higher overall end usage under field conditions.
*****
Hmm, interesting. Experience has suggested otherwise. Maybe the low end usage powers in Rad Primary are underused for some reason, leading to a tendancy towards using a lot of high end usage powers? Running Ennervating Field and Radiation Infection simoultaneously while attacking is pretty much standard fare for a Rad Primary, and that will kill your endurance in no time flat, in fact I can't even solo a blue con minion and a white con lieutenant (they were Tsoo, standard ninja type and an Ancestor Spirit) without running out of endurance half way through the fight, and taking more than a negligible amount of damage.
I'll keep playing Adam Smasher, and pay closer attention to how I stack up against other Defenders, it might be just perception, but the experience is pretty common from the people I've talked to.
Also, I don't think AM is better than Stamina. I'm trying to find the hard numbers to calculate, but the fact that, unenhanced, AM is only running about 22% of the time offsets its approximate 30-something percent advantage in terms of end regen. Better to have a less effective power that's always on than a slightly more effective power you barely get to use. I know the hard numbers are out there somewhere to do the calculations, I just can't seem to find them. I suppose that once you are using SOs, the higher base regen on AM would drive a sizable wedge between it and Stamina in terms of peak effectiveness, but the downtime is very unwelcome, I prefer my power to be consistent rather than spiking erratically.
[ QUOTE ]
Yes, I actualy had that, and accidently edited it out. But that is a very significant part of the power. But that sorta is my point. AoE END REcovery is very powerfull. Only Emapthy has another AoE Recovery boost, and its the second to last power and has a 500 second recahrge. Nothing is more powerful than END. It is probably more important than HP. That is what makes AM so powerfull, and why its recharge was increased. Other defenders dont have that advantage. It was unbalanced. But again, the RT tie will be reduced, but not to the way to used to be.
[/ QUOTE ]
I feel like Rad defenders are being punished because thier buff comes at lvl 2 and empaty defenders get thier buff at level 18.
I can get to lvl 18 in a week of play, so that to me makes no difference.
Recovery Aura is like having 5 or 6 Am's on at once, no matter what you can't dent your end pool. With AM on all the time I still cratered my end pool every single fight. I was on the way up the fitness pool to get more end because AM was not nearly enough.
Right now AM is on a longer timer than Recovery Aura. AM is not near the buff that Recovery Aura is. Even if you take into account the extra damage and all the other stuff AM gives, the damage output of the team is far greater with end recovery on than with AM.
Rad defenders (I have a lvl 21) need the End to even function, I was able to keep AM up all the time before patch and I didnt feel it was anymore powerfull than say hurricane and steamy mist from the storm set. The storm and force feild defenders can keep their powers up non stop and the bonuses to the team are always availble. AM should be a toggle or revert back. It should not stack with another AM either, thats the only time it starts getting out of hand.
AM is a MINOR buff in many things. There is Nothing Major about the buff.
Defenders pay 25% more to blast for 35% less damage than a blaster. Not having the one single buff Rad gets availble seriously gimps that AT. I tried to play mine and gave up. The end costs are just too high, I stand around and watch while everyone else plays. Many Rad defenders are Rad/Rad and the Rad attacks are very low damage and low end cost. Rad defenders who took another secondary run out of End so fast its pathetic.
When you compare all the other defender AT's benifits that can be availble all the time to Rads AM which is only 4 times an hour it's clear something is very wrong.
AM is the Backbone of Rad defenders, buff and debuff. Without the buff half the Rad defender is missing.
If I cast slow, one ball lighting and 2 heals thats my entire end pool right there. As a Rad defender thats 120 points of healing at lvl 21 and about 50-80 aoe damage and a slow that wears off and wont take accuacy enhancements.
The best buff is enervating feild but that stops all end recovery due to its high cost of toggle. So if I toss 2 debuffs, one ball lighting and heal 2 times I am out of end and not getting any more till I turn off enervating feild.
At lvl 21 many fights can last 4-10 minutes (like the Tsoo, darn sorrcers(great coding btw)). In fights like those without AM running on me my team would be better served by anyother AT. This is wrong. My whole guild now shuns Rad defenders and everyone who had the Rad set defender or controller has rerolled. Everyone agrees anything else is better and more fun.
Moving Hasten to the last power in the Super Speed set makes more sense than reducing the effectiveness of the power. I suggest to the devs that the END cost be moved upfront (not after the power expires) and it's time be reduced to 5 minute recharge. That'll give us 2 on/3 off without ENH. 30+ level heroes should be able to keep it running 24/7 if that's their hero design.
[ QUOTE ]
I see nothing wrong with Rad Blast and RAd Emmision END cost. It is comperable to all other sets, and identicle to their counterparts on others sets.
[/ QUOTE ]
What about the fact that Defenders are just plain weak? I'd be happier if you made AM single target than make it a situational group buff. No other AT *needs* the buff, to be honest. Watching a Blaster outperform me by such a vast amount that I wonder why I even bother using any power except Enervating Field isn't what I call "fun". When I say outperform, I'm talking the damage I do, the additional damage I empower others to do, and the damage I heal/prevent vs. their damage. I'm not even in the ballpark compared to Full Auto and Trip Mine, let alone the rest of the AR/Devices sets.
I'm not saying go nerf Blasters, but I was simply stunned on Monday to find out that DEFENDERS got hit with the nerf bat. As if doing only 65% of blaster damage in our secondary AND being the only AT who pays 25% more End for every single power in the secondary wasn't bad enough...
I realize this probably comes across as a "grass is greener" post, but I already played Blaster in beta. I found there to be basically no challenge in the game, and I wanted to play an AT which was more suited to a group. I was content was my abilities, both solo and in a group, until the patch hit this week even though I knew that my powers paled in comparison to pretty much anyone else but a Scrapper's. Now I just feel like an idiot for changing my mind about what AT to play in release.
I love the game and have no issues with the changes from the last patch, 
But this caught my eye 
[ QUOTE ]
*I will not make a change to the game simply because it is popular.
[/ QUOTE ]
This statement is rubbing me wrong, Ive been sitting here for about a half hour trying to state my feelings on this one, yet cant find the right words to not offend anyone.
It just feels like your saying, I will listen to what the mass's want, but just because most of the player base "most of the people paying to play' wants something, i wont give it to them. No compromises, Just a flat out Your out of Luck
Then its followed by,
[ QUOTE ]
*I will do my best to continue to make this game fun.
[/ QUOTE ]
How can you do this by denying what the magority of the people playing the game want?
Im sure im just reading your post incorrectly and appoligize in advance, just would love some insight into this.
Geko wrote:
[ QUOTE ]
For those of you who were in Beta, you know I always do my best to listen to the community, as does the rest of the Cryptic team. As always, we are all listening and watching. Nothing is permanent in an MMP. New features will be added, and things will change. Not every change will make your Hero more powerful, but it is our goal to make it more fun. Those are not always the same things. It is not fun if it is not challenging (that is, easy is not always fun).
[/ QUOTE ]
The changes, I feel, are acceptable, especially if you're re-evaluating them and there's not a finality about them...
What I feel is unacceptable is the manner in which they are implemented. Your recent changes have left many customers in a position where their primary characters are substantially gimped. They wouldn't be if they could shift powers, slot layout, and/or enhancements around -- at no influence cost (which implies full-value sell-back, else it does cost) or time/effort cost to them -- but that's not been granted to them. This gives people one of 5 options (excluding combinations, thereof):
- Tough, deal with it
- Re-roll and re-level a character now that the dev changes have made what they were playing no longer fun to play
- Grind through with the "gimped" version of their characters long enough to scrape up the influence necessary to change their enhancement loadouts or acquire slots to place into things that need them (that didn't prior to the dev changes)
- Grumble a lot on the forums and do nothing
- Grumble a lot on the forums and unsubscribe
None of these seems to be promising options for you to leave your customers. I've asked before and I must ask again: Why is it some of your customers are being punished for Cryptic/NCSoft's mistakes?
It is my firm opinion that:
<ul type="square">[*] It should not cost a character influence to adjust for one of your after-the-fact changes.[*] It should not cost a customer time/effort to adjust for one of your after-the-fact changes.[*] A means should be provided for the customer to right whatever s/he feels has negatively impacted his/her character at the time the dev-induced, after-the-fact change goes into the game (i.e. at login)[/list]
This would seem to be the path to keeping your customers happy. And yet, it's not done. The changes went in with no means provided for the customer to react short of the ones listed, earlier.
Does that seem fair to you? If so, why? If not, what is being done about it? And if it's going to cost the customer time/effort and/or his/her characters influence, how do you justify that (short of failure to provide a complete adjustment solution that allows both Cryptic to make adjustments and customers to adjust in response)?
I ask these things because many people put time, effort, and planning into their characters. When you shift something that breaks synergies they planned upon (using available information and their own testing) -- and fail to provide a means for people to adjust to your shift -- you are effectively rendering their time/effort pointless.
I look forward to your response...
-- Xurbax
P.S. I'm someone who agonizes for 2 hours over how to apportion 3 slots within my progression -- merely to try to achieve a desired effect (not necessarily a more powerful one, either). And let's just say that the Hasten change has my character very broken. It wouldn't be if I could alter slot layouts or alter enhancement loadout at no cost -- but I can't. I'm stuck with re-rolliing or 4-6 levels of grinding in this gimped state, minimum, to rectify the issue; and I certinaly do not have the 300k-400k influence it'd take to re-config all my enhancements. I personally have a problem with this state of affairs... I feel punished, for a mistake that certainly wasn't mine...
geko said:
"About AM. I hope it has not gone unnoticed that AM is a good buff. It buffs your attack speed AND your run speed AND your fly speed AND your damage output AND protects you from sleep, hold and immobilize. 2 rad defenders could keep this buff on the team permanently. Even 1 could do the same thing wiht a few recharge enhancements. That really is too much buff time for an AoE buff that is this powerful. Again, I negelcted to account for the fact that AM hasted itself, so that added to the problem. We will probably reduce the RT time on it a bit. I am not happy with how long it is now, but it was too fast before."
a few recharge enhancers? 6 green SOs doesnt qualify as a few then i guess. because you CANNOT keep this power on non stop. with 6 green SOs you have 1 minute 47 seconds after effect ends and recast is available.
this is what is bothering many of us. we were told hasten can be recast with a 14.1 second downtime with 6 SOs. this is also untrue, hasten has a base recharge of 10 minutes, not 9 minutes. now you are telling us a "few" recharge enhancers will allow a rad user to "keep this buff on the team permanently". well this is simply untrue. im not accusing you of lying, but its obvious you are wrong.
now the real crux of the issue. most of us that were "nerfed" or "balanced" dont really mind the power changes. we mind that we are STUCK with these powers we would NOT have taken if during picking them they acted as they do now. i for one am out 6 slots and 2 powers that i could really use elsewhere but cant now.
This is long; Ill put the tech stuff up front. I still cant believe how much you guys respond to the community. Geko, please read later if you can. -GB
Hasten should be the level 20 power in the Speed set. Replace it with a defense toggle (and get rid of the weird tornado thing).
Long recharge timers are more frustrating than reduced effect, especially when we can modify the power later.
Strip all other effects off of AM, and let us buff the Endurance regeneration of our party, all the time (at low levels).
Dont make powers, even really good powers, dependant on 6 of the best enhancements that game can offer just to use them frequently.
I was beginning to worry the DEVs were going to ignore AM in the hopes it would fade away.
Forgive us Geko, many of us still have scars from one or two SOE games where things like this happened, and we were told to toughen up, or walk it off.
Other than the fact you guys said Hasten was working as intended, I have no serious beef with Hasten getting the big nerf in timer recharge. Honestly I only ever used it on my Defenders, to get heals off faster, and reduce the timer on AM. It should be made the level 20 power, as it is the holy grail of the Speed set. Most people never take tornado; youd make the Speed freaks happier if you put a defense toggle in the line instead, like many other movement powers give.
I think I can explain to you why people abhor long recharge times Geko. It seems to be the only aspect of the game you have a hard time understanding from a player standpoint.
It like getting the nice computer for Christmas that you had been wanting for so long and then finding out that you can only play with it on Wednesday's. You can earn the right to play with it more often, but still it sits there, taunting you to use it.
Hasten lets you use the computer (used to) Sunday through Wednesday, and with recharge reducing enhancements, let you use the Computer all the time.
The end result being you could use what you had, simple as that.
It is something you have had a hard time understanding from the point I joined the game and saw the recharge timer on Temp. Invulnerability (pre-toggle). You guys had good reasons for what you did, but the power still didn't work often enough to be depended upon. The same arguments apply for any buffing power in this game.
Endurance in a group is by far and away the most important thing in the game, absolutely no argument from me.
Most Rad AM users will agree you could strip every other recovery component from the power if you wished, as long as we could provide this one, extremely important service to the community. Personally, I would even be ok with it not affecting me anymore, as long as it could affect my group.
You've seen allot of panic posts up recently, some have been from me. It's because many of us grew up with some old war-horse MMO's and quite frankly they hid behind the users agreement, and just did whatever they wanted, as long as the beaten, addicted players would play just a little longer, or TAKE longer, to play the game.
When we got here, Utopia. DEVs talked to us, and responded to our data. This in and of itself almost frightened me: It just seemed too good to be true (the level of interaction).
I was stoked. Two weeks into live play I had figured out the best way to help just about any team. I focused on the line (Tankers and Scrappers) because they have it the hardest in the beginning from my perception.
I even made a guide so others could use my base template.
24 hours later, the character's main purpose in life had been removed from the game, until I hit level 22, and could slot 6 SO enhancements into the power, just for timer recharges.
No DEV explanation, and a lot of quiet air on the subject from the DEV team, and suddenly I'm getting SOE flashbacks. I'm hearing ugly, ghostly words like, "Vision."
Hopefully this will explain some of the panic you may have seen in the last few days.
As for AM, take out every other effect, and give us an Endo regen we can keep up on our party. Make it single target like early FF powers if you need to. That way FF defenders keep a team up, RAD keeps them kicking, and Empathy keeps them alive.
an addendum to my previous post.
AM with 6 green SO = 1m47s downtime.
AM with 6 green SO AND hasten = 1m10s downtime.
I am very happy with Geko's posts of information and reasons. I'm not sure I agree with them all, but what was said was honest and far better than not hearing anything at all. I also cannot deny that some long thought has been lurking behind the hard decisions that the Devs have made.
That said and acknowledged, I also have to agree that the Radiation Metabolism buff needs adjusting, badly. Please consider reducing the strength of the buff overall in whatever format is acceptable, and drop the timer down to about 4 or 5 minutes.
A power that you can use for every serious fight, one right after another, is fun. It's a psychological thing. I don't know how to sum it up any better than that.
As for Hasten, it sounds like you did what you had to do in comparing what the older version of Hasten could do for a character against what careful slotting of recharge enhancements could do for a character. If Hasten was making recharge enhancements obsolete and inefficient, which I think it did, then a change had to happen.
As long as the math stacks up to Hasten being a usable alternative rather than a waste of a power, then the right thing was done.
Iduno also had a very good list of concerns and facts backing them. Thank you, Iduno and thank you Geko.
i want to say one more thing. i was one of the people pestering geko for a response on the AM issue. i did not believe i deserved a response, but im glad it came. i never denied that it was a great buff, and im satisfied with the reasoning.
once again, kudos to geko and the rest of the devs. you guys communicate with the community way more than anyone could expect you to.
these posts can and will go on and on....
What it comes down to is any FOTM will get mashed. Scrappers and radiation def/cont took it this round as their "need to have to be competative" powers got spanked. Blasters and tanks should be next since mid range (insert above classes here) had there functionality cut due to additional down time and lowered productivity. I'm sure when the blasters start getting there recharge times extended on their mid to high range attacks this will start all over again. I mean all these things were balanced in beta right? Well since scrappers were "balanced" allowing for hasten I'll enjoy the soon to be smack coming to all the blasters that can't figure out why having a power with 6 DO enhancements after patch is worse then the power was unenhanced pre patch.
Guess when they need help killing yellow non LTs they might just see the world without there rosey little glasses. The hasten/AM nerf was a kick to the teeth of all mid to low range charecters. The skills are worthless till high level yet there level 8 or lower skills.
I went from soloing lonely orange bosses to getting my *** handed to me by an orange LT. why? well my damage out put doesn't keep up with what i deal out and i only heal 1/2 as often. Since an orange boss is the end of a solo mission i would assume i should be able to actually i don' tknow solo him? There was something some where about this game being soloable wasn't there? And no i didn't have any End left after those orange bosses i ususally had to wait for end to recharge enough to heal. For END beign the end all "more immportant then HP" (Geko) Hasten helped you burn more of it I rarely finishe da fight with END and i'm a regen scrapper with 3 green Trainers as i cant seen to get a DO for that.
well thats my 3 am rant. I'm not overly enjoying my charecters lately but at least i get a good laugh out of the boardes......
[ QUOTE ]
What it comes down to is any FOTM will get mashed. Scrappers and radiation def/cont took it this round as their "need to have to be competative" powers got spanked.
[/ QUOTE ]
I don't understand this part of your post... Scrappers and Defenders definitely weren't a FOTM, ever. Almost every scrapper I've played with switched to Blaster instead, and aside from myself, one Kinetics guy (who frequently says he hates it because he spends all his time casting Speed Boost over and over and over, but doesn't want to reroll), and a couple Empaths, none of our Defenders are left either.
And that was before the nerfs to Hasten and AM. Talk about kicking people when they're down.
Now, scrappers are the class of choice for the bored L40s who are waiting for the rest of us, and want to play something that isn't like turning on God mode when they log in. Defenders, well... apparently no one is *that* bored yet. 
[ QUOTE ]
geko said:
this is what is bothering many of us. we were told hasten can be recast with a 14.1 second downtime with 6 SOs. this is also untrue, hasten has a base recharge of 10 minutes, not 9 minutes. now you are telling us a "few" recharge enhancers will allow a rad user to "keep this buff on the team permanently". well this is simply untrue. im not accusing you of lying, but its obvious you are wrong.
[/ QUOTE ]
I don't know where you are getting this 10 minute number but I just made 2 characters and powered them up to get hasten. I checked on both of them and got 9 minutes with no enhancers from the time I hit the button til the time I could hit it again. I activated the power 3 times on each character in 27 minutes. Where are you getting this 10 minute recharge time?
base number then may actually be 9, thanks for the added info. the reason we have been bandying the 10 minutes about is because the calculations for recahrgers is off from geko's info.
it does fit a 10 minute recharge though. read geko's post, or rei_momo's or do a search for hasten recharge times. many of us are doing some pretty in depth tests (at our own expense of fun and influence) to hammer this stuff out.
Wow what a cool post Geko! And people can see why we love the Lizard
Thank you Geko!
Say, is it a bad thing when you go to the pet store and look at the gekos and start to think that that might be a nice pet? 
(Disclaimer: I was there to buy turtle food.)
Ok not that all the people here testing this are gonna see it but I just found out some interesting information through testing. When testing the recharge time of hasten DO NOT leave your mouse pointer over the icon to activate it. If you do it give a false reading of when it is ready to be reused. The icon will stay greyed out looking longer than it actually is. However it is not 10 minutes it is 9 minutes.
ROFL... Geko's posts are truely a breeze of fresh humorous air in these our usual worlds of dev-spins. Only guy who dared to post fun stuff like this that I remember was Stormy in AC
I'm also sure that Geko knows that his great work would be made a TON easier if this level/class based game had a freaking RESPEC in...
[ QUOTE ]
Now, scrappers are the class of choice for the bored L40s who are waiting for the rest of us, and want to play something that isn't like turning on God mode when they log in. Defenders, well... apparently no one is *that* bored yet.
[/ QUOTE ]
Lol, it's possible that some Scrapper builds are overpowered, I have no idea about that, but most Scrapper builds are hardly overpowered, including most of those that included Hasten in some form. Are there scrappers at 40? Probably some MA/Invlunerabilty Scrappers or something, but I doubt there are more Scrappers up there than Blasters.
Don't go spreading unfounded rumors like that, it just even further throws off the AT balancing efforts.
So I was correct in saying the AM increase was a knee jerk reaction and unfairly lumped in with hasten. AM haste increase is about half of what Hasten and its not available to everyone like Hasten was.
That being said your post "glossed" over the reasons. Sure its a good buff, sure it has many + elements. But look at the Radiation line hard and tell me we dont need it. Maybe fix the stacking, or decrease the %'s or take out some of the useless + elements such as fly.
I say either correct it properly or leave it the way it was, increasing the recharge timer until you could figure out what to do with it was lousy.
I'm a late poster to this thread but having just read through it, I again am very pleased with the Devs here. Having played EQ for over 4 years now, still going, it is VERY refreshing to hear real information straight from the horses mouth, so to speak, than having to scour the 'Net and find out what was changed/added/removed/upgraded/Nerfed/etc... .
For those that haven't read the EULA of this or any other online game, it does state that content is subject to change. An online game is not Static! It is Dynamic! It can and will change as needed.
I look at it as a learning process a lot like real life. Real life can and will change and no matter how much you complain about it or point out that it was unfair to you, there is not much you can do about it but adapt, learn, and then go on.
COH is a very good game. It is not nor will it ever be perfect. Ask yourself this simple question. Do you have fun playing it? If you do, keep on playing. If not, leave it.
It really is that simple.
Feedback about the game and its changes to the Devs is good. Constant complaining is not.
And a personal thanks to Geko, Aura, and others for keeping the COH gaming communtiy at large informed of what is going on. Good and bad.
Fight crime but have fun doing it!
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I know I'd sure like an up front answer whether or not stamina is being looked at for "balancing." Otherwise I'll skip the rad powerset entirely and just pick up stamina like 90% of the rest of the population.
[/ QUOTE ]
There is not present plan to modify Stamina. It takes 14 levels, and 2 powers to unlock stamina. Then it takes 2 DO enhancements for Staminas END Recovery buff to be as effective for one player as AM gives to your whole team. Yes it is Auto, but it stil does not give all the other buffs AM does.
[/ QUOTE ]
Thanks Geko, much appreciate it. Will scrap my radiation controller and try another secondary set and pick up stamina. Others may like strong and occasional powers, but I'd rather have weaker and permanent or almost permanent. Just personal preference I guess, but I can't stand powers with long timers.