Feedback: Stimulant too SHORT!!

You just aren't using the correct stimulant. Try Starbuck's first.

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CoH exists because there's a little hero in all of us.
Ridolfo 50 DM DA.
& far too many alts

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But to claim you need this protection to survive these encounters simply indicates an unwillingness to adjust your tactics against varying enemy powers. I assure you....you CAN take on these villians, even solo, in relative "safety" without the use of bugged powersets

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Hey, i hunt there myself, as a fire/ice tanker, i got enuff crowd control and resistance buffs that i can take on Riktis.

The point is that currently, you can take on Status mobs with a minimum of strategy, or take on mobs without that hastle (Nemesis for exemple).

Making Stim, ID, or CM longer would just help make the stunning mobs more in line with the non-stunning mobs.
They are doable, but would be easier with certain group members having certain powers. Just like a monster-type mob is easier with a tanker, the respec trial is easier with a bubbler, well, make it that Status-mobs would be easier with ceratin powers too.

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Hey, i hunt there myself, as a fire/ice tanker, i got enuff crowd control and resistance buffs that i can take on Riktis.

The point is that currently, you can take on Status mobs with a minimum of strategy, or take on mobs without that hastle (Nemesis for exemple).

Making Stim, ID, or CM longer would just help make the stunning mobs more in line with the non-stunning mobs.
They are doable, but would be easier with certain group members having certain powers. Just like a monster-type mob is easier with a tanker, the respec trial is easier with a bubbler, well, make it that Status-mobs would be easier with ceratin powers too.

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And that's the point of Update 2...to provide more challenge to those players that seek it. If the game's challenge level is lowered to the least common denominator, those of us who have 50 will just cancel our accounts and move on....nothing left here. But varying AT's provide varying degree's of challenge. I leveled a Defender to 50, and it was QUITE challenging, especially solo. I'm levelling a blaster right now...and it's ridiculously easy to level. The differing AT's offer very diverse "game difficulty" settings.

The same goes for mobs....they all give out equivalent XP, so there's no reason to take on "harder" mobs versus "easier" mobs. You can level from 40-50 taking on nothing but cons -1 or -2 to yourself....it's not very challenging, but then again, some folks don't WANT a challenge it would seem. It's also quite slow, but then again, risk=reward, right? You want an easy time levelling? Fine, take on Nem's from 40-50, throwing about 25 werewolf herding missions into the mix. Heck, I enjoy an easy kill myself to help alleviate the grind, so no problems there. But if I want to feel challenged, like putting the game on "hard" setting, then go solo RCS or duo it with a friend. It's a blast....much more so than if they dumbed the mobs there down to the level of Nem's who just line up and wait to be slaughtered.

I for one don't want the "stunning" mobs brought into line with the non-stunning mobs, as I for one enjoy a challenge for my $15 a month. Why everyone wants to dumb the game down across all levels, making every single AT exactly equal to one another, is completely beyond me.

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Radiation's buff Accelerate Metabolism protects from all status effects. How is that "zero defense"?

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Wrong!

Accelerate Metabolism does not protect you from status effects, it only shortens their duration. It may be only for a second or two, sometimes not long enough to even notice it, but you can still get stunned/held/slept and have your toggles drop.

Last night three of my SG members and myself, all rad defenders, where combatting DE. With four AMs running I got stunned/mezzed plenty, though it was never for more than a second or two.

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The thing is, usually, for a multiplayer game to work, grouping should provide more security.
Safety in group.
Effectiveness in group.
Right now, with the poor buffs we have, grouping just makes thing harder. Really.
My Fire/Ice tanker is a Tanker, has scrapper/blaster damage, has controller CC, and defender self buffs.
In the current game setting, grouping has 2 effect:

- The mission gets a lot harder, since i get a load more of mobs, specially LTs. Going from 3 Carnie Juggler to 6 Jugglers + 4 illusionist, 1 Master illusionnist and a ring mistress because i brought 3 friends along

- My teamates do NOT provide compensation for the increased difficulty, except healing, or controlling.

I just think that beeing in a group should provide more define advantages, like, in this case, better stun resist.

Take an invisibility tanker. He can: be an unmoving solo object, or be an unmoving grouped object... /yawn. With a good Stim, he could be a grouped moving object

This is City of Solo Heroes. There is no benefice to group, specially since mission exp got better. The Devs are creating missions forcing us to group, lol. Just:

-Make single target buffs better.
-Make group buffs better.
-Make Group XP better.

Right now, grouping needs love. I felt stimulant was it. Alas it's a bug, and will stay a crappy power.

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Here's a sort of weird idea...What if buff duration scaled somehow with team size?

Right now when duoing my kin def, buff casting really isn't that much of a problem. But the increase in percentage of time spent buffing with each additional team member is steep enough as to pretty much discourage adding anyone else to our little team. Large teams can become distinctly un-fun, very quickly...

What if each person in your team at the time acted as a sort of multiplier on the base duration? This way the powers and ATs that are supposed to be the most attactive to a team wouldn't have to pay such a large penalty to join one...

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There are 6 types of players that do not have status protection.

All 5 Blaster Primaries and the Dark Miasma primary for Defenders. That's it.


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Just for clarification, though empaths can cast Clear Mind we cannot use it on ourselves; we're as helpless against status effects as everyone else.

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As for the Buff Bot issue, just make it like Grant Invisibility: a group-member only buff.

As for a power beeing "too good" and making defender useless... Mmm, out of all the defenders ability, only 2 can be compaired (clear mind and ID), and 2 ressemble (AM and O2) so it's not like it replaces what defender already do.

Power pools are already very strong. Hasten? Stamina?
You don't see tankers complaining about Thought and Weave.

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What about Dispersion Field? The only *group toggle* that *prevents* status effects in the game. Except for sleep which Stimulant easily makes up for for a bubbler.

And if your toggles do go down, who gives a d*mn since you still have your bubbler's shields on.

My bubbler did a little dance of happiness when the Stimulant change was announced.

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I have a bubbler too. Bubblers are god.
That's not a reason to stop others to enjoy an effect. Imagine if you need a kinetic defender to get superspeed...

Fact is:

20 sec Stim: Worth having? No. Overpowered? No.

60 sec Stim: Worth having? No. Overpowered? No.

6 minutes Stim: Worth having? Maybe. Overpowered? No.


Let me explain the third affirmation:
Exemple: Last night, me (fire/ice tanker) and 2 friends (Ice/ice blaster, Grav/Rad controller) hunted in Peregrine. We hunted everything. Not just Nemesis, we only attacked nemesis for the Fake Nemesis Bosses. We attacked Malthas, Carnies, Riktis. Anything moving got attacked.

We did not have Stimulant. We did not really need it. With my Ice touch, Frozen Aura, our Controller, his AM, and the Blaster's freezing, we had mobs pretty much covered. Even Master Illusionist were quickly pinned down.

Was a good night, was a fun night. We totalled 3 deaths: One on me directly related to stun-effect, and 2 on the blaster, also stun related.

Now, would changing the blaster for my OTHER blaster friend, the one with Stimulant, made us better?
Well technically, since he can't buff himself, we would have saved ONE death (in 3h of play).
We would have killed at the same rate. We would have accumulated the same XP. Gotten the same loot.

It wouldn't have changed a thing but save 1 death.

Does saving 1 death in 3h make that power worth it??? Some will say YES, if, using that power, you do know that this death would have been prevented. But on a 1 minutes timer, meaning that saving that death means a recast of a minimum 180+ times and that there is a good chance it would have dropped anyways (red Carnies Dark Ring Mistresses are long to fight, well over 1 minute), no, it's not worth.

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Responding to an earlier comment. Grouping in CoH can be extremely beneficial depending on your group composition.

I have a blaster friend that I frequently group with. My sum defenses and damage mitigation are staggering. My damage output is piss. He's exactly the opposite.

As a duo we do massive damage and take very little back. Between the pets and myself a fairly constant stream of 800pt heals are jamming out while the enemies wiff over and over.

Comment in another blaster group I joined:
"Are they fighting back?"

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Isn't the fact that Stim is INTERRUPTIBLE and you have to administer it at melee range (where you really likely would rather not be) two things that would balance Stim as weaker than Clear Mind? Give them the same duration, yeesh.

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A no attack "Group-Friendly" Defender is like a "Team Friendly" basketball player who won't dribble, run, or shoot, under any circumstances. "I'm a PASSER."

Verry good post indeed. Ok, I understand that stim cannot and shoudnot be as good as clear mind; however its absoulty usless now. It does not stay on long enough to protect and reapplying it mid battle is out of the question... super short range, able to be interupted. Thoes 2 things alone make it subpar to clear mind. Now we come to its other use, romoving the effecct once its applied. Again stim cannot be used because u will be interupeted or your target will move out of range. With clear mind, your can reapply it mid battle and it can be used for both pre-battle buff and mid battle buff. with both powers exactly the same effectiveness, stim is still only half as useful. Please fix this, why in the world would they nerf this thing? i think its just to piss of the few people that did take stim :/ i am verry displeased

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This change moved stim off my power trays and changed it to being a useful power to a heal self gateway power.

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it used to be 20 seconds. I meant to change it to 60 seconds, but accidently made it like 600 or something. That made it 5 times better than the Defender Clear Mind power. Clear mind was 60 seononds, and it is now 90 seconds. Stimulant must not be as good as clear mind.

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Geko,
As one of your empathy defender L35 bumps in beta I long ago (on the beta forums) annnotated the large number of AoE disorients, sleeps, immobilizations, and holds in the game -- and the distinct lack of group/team status protects for them. That seemed to draw no attention or response from development. To me it seems a design flaw to have many ways of making people sit and stare at their monitors as their teams just sit there dying ... and no way to counter or protect from this for a whole group (without just becoming a status protect spammer of a single target status protect, which let's face it, is rather droll).

Recently I was made aware that Accelerated Metabolism has a very weak group/team protection to a large number of status effects -- but as far as I know it is the only group/team status protect that does, it's terribly weak, it cannot be enhanced up, and isn't that in the wrong line anyway? (i.e. shouldn't an empath be better at that sort of thing?)

Some might cite force fielders as having one, but dispersion field is not truly a group/team status protect; it's an area status protect. (A subtle but important distinction.) The protection is hefty, but we all know that many fights require moving outside the bubbles ... and your tankers who likely need to be ahead of the team, the ones who need the bubbles giving status protects most, are most-likely to be outside them.

Empaths call team healing the 'HP mini-game' for a reason; they spend their time targetting this or that player within the team display and delivering PBAoE heals, fortitude, targetted heals, and clear mind as needed. It'd help minimize the mind-numbing effects of the 'HP mini-game' immensly if clear mind were simply made PBAoE and its END-cost increased appropriately.

Part of what drives this sentiment about CM being bumped to a PBAoE is the painfully slow animations of it. Refreshing clear mind on someone in combat is, in fact, dangerous for those an empath is healing specifically because clear mind's animation leaves the empath 'momentarily rooted' -- can't move, can't deliver a heal, can't do much of anything except rotate in place until the slow animation completes. It's a lot like the 'must stand still for 5 seconds' problem anyone activating powers that use the phase shift animation have, and it's a problem if clear mind is to remain single-target.

With the increased number of status effects we're seeing ... and PvP coming ... group/team status protects seem necessary, as do longer durations on ALL single target status protects.

90 seconds on increase density, 02 boost, and stimulant do not seem out of line. Making clear mind 90 seconds (same as all the others) AND making it group/team affecting (much like leadership powers) or PBAoE seems reasonable, as group healing/support are supposed to be an empath's gig.

IMHO, 60 seconds is far too short for any of them (stimulant included, as stimulant already has next to no range and interruptibility as -severe- penalties, so why have it be shorter in duration, too); most battles go for more than 2 minutes, hence why 90 seconds seems reasonable, as it does leave room for risk.


Do you think you can do something about the animation times on Clear Mind? Would you please weigh making clear mind a PBAoE or a group/team status protect given the large number of AoE status effects with only 1 weak group/team status protect in the game (which isn't even in the healer's line!)?

-- Xurbax

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I wrote this on another post before I found this one. BTW: I'm not 100% certain I have the exact #s, but it's close to this.

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This power already had issues. It's interruptible, melee range, with a long activation and recharge time, fairly high end cost, and only usable when facing some foes, and not usable on yourself.


Before I could put it on everyone before a battle (if they had the patience to wait 70 sec for it), and get some good milage out of it. Now if the group is more than 2 people (as in myself an 1 other) I have to pick whom I put it on and it will generally wear out on someone before the battle ends if there are more than 3 of us. I can't use it in battle because of the combo of being interruptible and melee range.


So you made it almost unusable, especially when in larger groups. Your patch notes say this fixed a bug so it wouldn't be longer than clear mind.


Wanna tell me why in the world it has to have a shorter duration than clear mind?


Umm.. Before your change, clear mind vs Stimulant:
uninterruptible vs interruptible
7.5 end vs 15 end
70 vs 10 range
3 vs 4 sec activation time
4 vs 10 second recharge time
60 vs 360 seconds - now it's (90 for CM, 60 for Stim)


So stimulant has to be worse in every category before it's acceptable as a pool power? This makes no sense. Couldn't it have had the same duration?? If you have some special reason why you want it to have less time fine, but then make it ranged like clear mind so I can at least use it during a battle. Otherwise it's basically a pointless power. Good thing I respec'd to get it

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I couldn't let it rest with just my earlier re-post.

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it used to be 20 seconds. I meant to change it to 60 seconds, but accidently made it like 600 or something. That made it 5 times better than the Defender Clear Mind power. Clear mind was 60 seononds, and it is now 90 seconds. Stimulant must not be as good as clear mind.

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This power used to be 20 seconds and you chanced it to 600? Maybe you did that on purpose. 20 seconds is pathetic.

You seem to be under the impression that stimulant even at 90 seconds, this would be a better power (or equal). Please disabuse yourself of this thought. It is very wrong.

I will give you that 360 seconds may have made this power more powerful than clear mind. Though I'd agree to this, I don't see why this is unacceptable. Every other power in the Medicime pool is drasticly weaker than anything empathy has already. It's not like it's against some law to have 1 power in a pool better than 1 power in a single AT. In fact most pools have at least 1 power that's more powerful than ones in an AT, or are more useful than most other powers in any AT. See rant below for more specifics if you can deal with a little melodrama.

** REM: Start rant **

Are you saying pools can't have any powers that are better than characters primary or 2ndary powers? If so you'll want to look into nerfing all the travel powers. They are better than siphon speed after all. Maybe superspeed could be a 5 second power with a 10 second activation so it works 1/2 the time, dropping you in and out of superspeed if you have it on auto. That sounds about as fair as lopping off the usefulness of stuimulant. Flight and Superjump could have the same thing, so you plummit out of the sky, and teleport should obviously have that way overpowered hover effect taken out to cause similar falls.

Hasten should of course be completely removed or nerfed into oblivion. It is after all useful now even after 2 nerfings. Lets not forget Provoke. That can be much better than Taunt. Of course Teleport Friend also would need a severe nerfing, there's nothing any AT has that's anything as useful as this. Making it only recall people who are 300 yards away or less should do the trick. It's just enough to have a tiny bit of use to it (like if someone can't get over X wall or similar). Don't even get me started on Stamina, and some of the other 4th powers in some pools. These are madly unbalanced and clearly need to all do nothing for a few months to make up for all the time they were very useful powers.

Well I think that would be a good start. Anyone else have any suggestions?

** REM: End Rant **

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Some thoughts:

You know, if we had duration enhancements, this problem could be really, really reduced. 3 enhancements to double the duration? Sounds pretty good to me. And there's no way that even a 6-enhanced, 4.5 minute clear mind would be game breaking. No way. It'll make life easier without breaking the game. Even a 12 minute bubble wouldn't be insane (remembering that the bubble would then have zero def buff enhancers in it). Of course, things like AoE increaser enhancement, damage buff enhancers, cone angle enhancers, and recharge reduction enhancers would be nice to have too.

If they aren't going to do the above, they need to increase the buff durations. I have a new FFer, and it is oh-so-nice not to have to deal with the short buff durations that my empath, stormer, and kineticist have. It would remain ok if they increased clear mind to 3 minutes and stimulant to 2 minutes. Clear mind is still better, both are still usable, and my 6 key won't break as quickly.

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Quick post to agree that Stimulant should be longer than 60sec. Sometimes you need to re-evaluate your original design in light of new information. It definetly seems like Cryptic should re-evaluate status protection and the benefits to be gained from deeper gameplay and more diverse enemies to hunt. Make stimulant 4 minutes.

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If anything at all, please make similar buffs from the same power set last the same duration - there is enough for us to do without having to keep multiple timers in our heads on when to do buffs.

I'm mainly talking about Increase Density and Speed Boost.
2 or 3 minutes would be nice. 5 minutes and I'd be really happy.




Make a Buff Duration enhancement or something even, so that we have to choose between duration and effectiveness... +% to duration and endurance cost. +300% duration for +300% the cost...

A Buff Duration Enh could apply to any click buff even... such as the aforementioned Stim, Grant Invisibility, FF bubbles, Practiced Brawler, Unstoppable, Inertial Reduction etc.

Some of us are tired with having to constanty reapply buffs, on team-mates or ourselves, that we would be willing to take a hit on performance to get longer durations.

And it would provide a reason to slot up some of those powers that we would otherwise never slot up, like Practiced Brawler or Inertial Reduction.

Upsen.

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Or just create A Buff Duration Enhancement.

.. Anyone ever thought that might work? I only read the first two pages worth, skimmed past the rest.

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Stimulant can take Heal Enhancements, what does that do exactly? Maybe it should increase the duration of the protection. At least that way you actually have to slot it up to get the better benefits.

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The heal enhancements do nothing from what I've heard on other posts.

Tried to use Stimulant several times since my last posts. Yes, it's just about worthless.

Interruptibility + short duration + melee range to use = worthless

Using this in battle is about as fun as trying to Brawl a tanker to death as a controller.

Here's the excerpted minutes of battle using it: (From minutes 0-120) Oops, I was still drifting from flight so the power was interrupted, oops I'm still not close enough, oops it wore off again, oops area damage interrupted it, oops after holding two of my teammates aggro shifted to me while I was using the stimulant on someone so interrupted again. (from minutes 121-end) No attempts at stimulant use.

At least if I could increase it's duration with enhancements this could be made into a useful power (but you can't). If it were ranged it'd be useful (but it isn't). If it's recharge time were 4 seconds, it'd be useful but set me back on endurance before a battle (but it isn't)

The point of this gigantic nerf (has any power ever been cut down to 1/6 of it's original duration/power since launch?) was to make this power weaker than Clear Mind. Could you then at least bump the time back up to 90 seconds or 120 seconds? There'd be no doubt this power would still be weaker at 90 seconds (or 120 sec IMO), but hey it'd be useful again.

In all fairness, there is a use for stimulant in it's current form. Put it on 1 guy before a battle, and it will last through the whole battle if it's an easy battle and not if it's a tough one. If you have a provoking tanker in the group, they are probably the best target unless they have protection already. For me particularly, since my character with this power is a controller (grav/storm), I generally draw the Alpha strike aggro when we don't have a tanker because I have good defense (Steamy mist, hasten and Hover), and can toss out GDF to minimize the Alpha strike, so I get held/slept by the bosses (who are only slowed by my first hold). In this scenario, stimulant becomes completely useless (since I can't use it on more than 1 person before battle, and am now held throughout the battle so can't use it again).

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Definitly could benefit from an increased duration. Currently I use it on the one guy who will take the first pop shot to keep him from being mezzed to death. I will then try to use it periodically in battle but not much. I have to agree this power is really not all that great but for the all AR/whatever blaster group I am in on Virtue its the best we got.

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Has Stimulant changed since the last post in this thread or has it simply been passed over as new things to argue about came along?

My proposal for a solution to Stimulant's meh-ness is this: Make it a PBAoE power that does not effect caster.

To bring it more in line with the other powers in the buff/debuff line, it should also have other changes, so it's useful, but not overpowered.

Stimulant
PBAoE, Team Res (Disorient, Hold, Sleep, Immobilize)
Activation: 6-10 (Interuptable)
End: 40-60
Duration: 60
Rechange: 600seconds/10 minutes
Range: PBAoE

Stimulant with 6 SO++ recharge and perma-hasten can still only be fired off once every 127 seconds. Without Hasten, it can only be used a maximum of every 181 seconds (1 up, 2 down). You won't be spamming Stimulant, nor will you be able to stack it.

This would make Stimulant easy to apply before a fight, but very, very difficult to apply during combat. (10 seconds and it's interuptable? Sniper powers currently have the longest activation with 6. Good luck trying to be immobile and not damaged for 10 seconds in the middle of combat.)

Endurance cost of 40-60 again limits it to pre-combat use or if you must use it in the middle of combat, you better be able to take the endurance hit.

On the downsides:
*You could have 2 people with Hasten and Stimulant slotted for recharge that alternate applications.
*You could also have the two +def tankers/scrappers in PvP who are able to stand in the middle of all combat for 10 seconds and take no damage, while buffing the whole team against status effects.
*Massive Endurance hit? What about all those ATs with access to Conserve Power now and, of course, everybody's friend, good ol' Stamina?

Hmmmmm. I've just started thinking about Stimulant, but I think it the power needs some Dev love/attention.

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@Cannonfodder
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Does anyone take this power anymore?

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