MA is NOT so strong


American_Dynamo

 

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Originally Posted by Werner View Post
I wouldn't suggest judging the capability of entire primaries and secondaries based on your experience with them through level 12 and 23. You've barely even scratched the surface of the sets at that point.
I based my comparison on how they played through the early levels - from fighting Contaminated in Outbreak to fighting CoT in Perez Park - obviously I can't compare them beyond that because the Electric/Electric isn't that far along.

The MA/Regen kicked butt and was *a lot of fun* to play through those levels - which is why I've kept playing her - whereas the Electric/Electric was *much less fun* to play through those levels - and more than once I considered scrapping him and rolling something else - which is why I have not played him as much.

Although he did hit 14 earlier today doing some ToTing, and he got the badges for Jack and Eochai. And still, thus far - much less fun than the MA/Regen.


 

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Originally Posted by Flarstux View Post
I based my comparison on how they played through the early levels - from fighting Contaminated in Outbreak to fighting CoT in Perez Park - obviously I can't compare them beyond that because the Electric/Electric isn't that far along.

The MA/Regen kicked butt and was *a lot of fun* to play through those levels - which is why I've kept playing her - whereas the Electric/Electric was *much less fun* to play through those levels - and more than once I considered scrapping him and rolling something else - which is why I have not played him as much.

Although he did hit 14 earlier today doing some ToTing, and he got the badges for Jack and Eochai. And still, thus far - much less fun than the MA/Regen.
I think Werner pointed that out as the OP is referring to Martial Arts/ at endgame and not lvl's 12-23.


 

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Originally Posted by taekoUSA View Post
I like this game but the biggest problem with this game over the years have been the whinny threads like this...All it has achieved over the years are powersets that all in general way to powerful and a game that keeps getting too easy and watered down.
Sorry. I didn't mean to sound whiney. Do you think you could give me some tips on how NOT to post whiney threads? Or wait, nevermind.

BTW. Thanks for bumping my whinny thread.


 

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Originally Posted by Imaheroe View Post
Why haven't you taken that spines and fixed the graphics? They have some very nice looking spines now.


This this this please go change your spines and you will love them there is like 3 or 4 different types to choose from


 

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Originally Posted by BlazingBlue View Post
I think Werner pointed that out as the OP is referring to Martial Arts/ at endgame and not lvl's 12-23.
Oh, well, I also have an MA/SR at 35 (still not endgame, but closer) and have no complaints about MA there, either.


 

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Once you start getting slots into the attacks that you want to use, SK, CAK, CK, DT, EC, the set actually gets to be respectable. Thunder Kick is, of course, complete garbage and something I don't even bother with from the get-go because I don't like wasting respecs. Dragon's Tail is fantastic mitigation, especially for 'weak on alpha' secondaries.

As far as not having a cohesive or standard secondary effect, I don't really see the need to get one. Especially if it's the 'chance to stun' everyone wants. I would like to see a change to Focus Chi by making it's damage bonus energy damage, or making all your damage energy damage for the duration although I doubt we'd see sweeping changes at this stage of the game.

As to Cobra Strike, it's just filler, a complete waste of a power as it is now. Clobberize it and be done with it. MA could really use another good attack to fill in the attack chain, especially early on.

As for end game, I only really had issues with Rikti bosses, and a few others. Flipping smashing res is ridiculous on those guys.


They ALL float down here. When you're down here with us, you'll float too!

@Starflier

 

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Originally Posted by Starflier View Post
As far as not having a cohesive or standard secondary effect, I don't really see the need to get one. Especially if it's the 'chance to stun' everyone wants. I would like to see a change to Focus Chi by making it's damage bonus energy damage, or making all your damage energy damage for the duration although I doubt we'd see sweeping changes at this stage of the game.
Considering what it would take (i.e. rewriting every power to have a special addendum specifically for Focus Chi), I doubt it would ever happen.

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As to Cobra Strike, it's just filler, a complete waste of a power as it is now. Clobberize it and be done with it. MA could really use another good attack to fill in the attack chain, especially early on.
Honestly, MA doesn't need more "real attacks". It's already suffering from the fact that it has 5 ST attacks whereas every other set except for Spines (AoE focus leaves it with 3 ST) and Fire (sacrifices the support power for an additional ST) has 4 (functionally; I count HS and GD as ST because they follow the ST damage formula as opposed to AoE). I might work to make the power a more effective support power, potentially giving it some kind of -res effect or other debuff, but making it a more powerful attack wouldn't really do much to performance considering it's rather redundant to give an attack to a set that is already using up its animation time on it's current slew of decent attacks already (unless you plan on making it better than the normal attacks).


 

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I have a lvl 50 MA/SR that I have sunk about 7-8 billion in so far and I agree with so much of what other posters have so eloquently stated relating to the problems of MA. I follow every thread about MA I can find and when the main attribute to MA is usually "its pretty" or "its thematic" you know you have a problem in keeping up with the other power sets.


American-Dynamo 50 MA/SR: Freedom
2 RWZ challenges, 4 AV's solo'ed no temps, no insp

 

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Originally Posted by Lucky666 View Post
This this this please go change your spines and you will love them there is like 3 or 4 different types to choose from
For the good of your soul, please *PLEASE* go to Icon/Facemaker and change up your spines. Or start making a new character to take a peek at the options. Thorns, Rock, Metal, Crystal. And they all look great. You can even color them!


 

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Originally Posted by Umbral View Post
Dark Melee is only the best ST damage set because of Soul Drain having such a high potential uptime ratio as compared to Build Up. Where the DPA of the various powers is concerned, MA is actually quite good, especially considering the sheer awesomeness of Storm Kick. The problem exists insofar as MA lacks the endgame potential of the other ST damage sets (re: Claws/DB have FU, DM has Soul Drain, BS/Kat/Claws/DB have Achilles' Heel, Fire is just pure facebeatery), the best attack chains for MA require the repeated use of a KB power (which inhibits ST damage considerably unless you've got a wall to back them up against), and MA only has a single standard strength sphere PbAoE (re: the standard allotment is a sphere and a cone).

Looking at the numbers, I wouldn't be completely against some kind of improvements to MA. The AoE issue wouldn't be particularly easy to solve since the devs have shown a certain recalcitrance to changing the IO set category of a power, which precludes simply changing one of the other powers into a cone (most likely Thunder Kick or Crane Kick) to address the AoE power discrepancy, and improving Dragon's Tail to the point where a single power is the AoE equivalent of multiple powers would probably be pretty problematic from a balance perspective.

Where ST damage is concerned, a reduction in Eagles Claw's animation time to such an extent that the power actually has a DPA that would make it useful (considering that tier 9 is supposed to be a capstone, not a largely redundant piece of flash) wouldn't be out of place (especially if they allowed BABs to do it by simply speeding up the "I'm hovering in the air while I get ready to kick you" part of the animation to make it look more natural). A blanket increase in crit rate would probably be a bit too strong, though, if base damage were reduced a bit to reduce the impact of the improvement slightly, it could work.

Of course, none of this really addresses the fact that MA doesn't even have a cohesive secondary effect. It's really just a grab bag of tricks that don't really work well together, and it's not really possible, without a complete redesign, to give the set one without either overpowering it or generating overlap with other preexisting sets.
I know MA has good DPA attacks.

And I understand it's the late game, let's put in some IOs, where other sets really start to outshine MA. But even with MA IOed like the other sets, it falls behind.

WIth just SOs, I'd say most sets feel about the same.

Though, a decrease in Eagle Claw's animation may be all that it really needs.


BrandX Future Staff Fighter
The BrandX Collection

 

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How many stun powers are there in MA/*?
3 ... TK, CS and EC. The stun on TK however is such an afterthought that it's more like an afterthought than an actual stun stacker. So effectively, there's only 2.1 stun powers ... both of which have exceptionally long recharge (CS especially!), making it difficult to leverage the stun potential of MA/*.

How many immobilize powers are there in MA/*?
1 ... CAK. The immobilize on CAK however is pretty much useless, since it's only MAG 2 with a 50% chance of getting +1 MAG. Minions die in just a few hits (Scrapper ... go figure) and LTs take not much longer to dispose of. The immobilize property also doesn't "do anything" to prevent incoming damage, since as a Scrapper you need to be in melee range anyway.

How many Knockback powers are there in MA/*?
1 ... CK. While many players enjoy the visceral thrill of "punting" targets (especially off high ledges!), the Knockback on this power is actually something of a turn-off for many players. This is because use of Knockback means that you're going to need some sort of environmental "containment" by terrain if you don't want to be chasing your target all over the place ... which in turn reduces damage throughput over time. Very annoying for messing up positioning. Changing this to KnockDOWN would make the power much more useful.

How many Knockdown powers are there in MA/*?
1 ... DT. This power actually gets it right. FINALLY.


It's the end. But the moment has been prepared for ...

 

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Originally Posted by Flarstux View Post
I based my comparison on how they played through the early levels - from fighting Contaminated in Outbreak to fighting CoT in Perez Park - obviously I can't compare them beyond that because the Electric/Electric isn't that far along.

The MA/Regen kicked butt and was *a lot of fun* to play through those levels - which is why I've kept playing her - whereas the Electric/Electric was *much less fun* to play through those levels - and more than once I considered scrapping him and rolling something else - which is why I have not played him as much.

Although he did hit 14 earlier today doing some ToTing, and he got the badges for Jack and Eochai. And still, thus far - much less fun than the MA/Regen.
The problem, really, is the secondary, not the primary. I have an MA/WP and now an ElM/WP, and I have to say...they're both pretty good! Where the MA does better on single targets, the Elec Melee far surpasses it in AoE when played smart. The fact that Elec also has Energy typed damage goes a long way to making up for the lower overall damage when compared to a set like MA or pre-Achilles Heel swords.

MA/Regen will, almost assuredly, be more fun during the lower levels, simply due to how powerful Regen is during this time. Having a recovery boost that surpasses Stamina from level 4, a heal and Dull Pain, as well as a mitigation type that doesn't care about damage type makes Regen a monster during those levels. It also has the benefit of having an enhancement type that doubles in effective strength instead of only adding up to 50% more--not an issue in SO range, but is significant in TO and DO ranges.

Also note that Elec Armour has zero--as in no resistance to Toxic damage outside of its T9. Before picking up Energize, it has no way to handle toxic damage outside of inspirations or team buffs. Facing Vahz on an Elec Armour Scrapper is pretty much suicide. As noted, Regen does not have that problem.

At higher levels, things balance out somewhat. In the right hands, a Regen is still amongst the best defensive sets out there, period (but in the hands of those not initiated in the fine art of Regen mastery, it blows without hefty built assistance). ElA, however, is a much steadier set, due to its significant resists. Energize makes all the difference, however, especially if it can be made to recharge as quickly as possible, as it gives up to 50% heal (enhanced), and 30 seconds of very significantly increased regen (unfortunately with nothing to stack it on) and end discount (which helps balance the set against Regen in one respect, though Energize alone doesn't do enough). At recharge cap, it can be made practically perma, but I don't think it's possible to stack.

In a long fight, ElA also has the advantage of being able to quickly drain an enemy's endurance. Against EBs and AVs, this can be used pretty well, especially in addition to ElM's end drain.


 

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Originally Posted by Failsight View Post
Facing Vahz on an Elec Armour Scrapper is pretty much suicide.
Yeah, pretty rough for an Electric/Ice Tanker, too.

Still, the thing that was really selling me on MA in the low levels was being able to count on the attacks actually HITTING. And they were hitting almost all the time on the MA, even when fighting higher level enemies, and missing way too much on the Electric guy vs everything, which was a BIG factor in his mastery of the faceplant. Jacob's Ladder - argh. I'm pretty good with lining up multiple targets with Sands of Mu (plenty of practice with lowbies in Outbreak) but Jacob's Ladder - I repeat, argh.

The MA is pushing level 24 and is missing attacks more often now vs higher level foes - like Crones and Vampire Lords - but still hitting consistently enough that I'm not sitting here cursing at the screen.

I only have a handful of Scrappers - DM/Regen at 46, MA/SR at 35, DB/WP at 25, MA/Regen at 23, a Fire/Fire at 22, Claws/SR at 21, BS/WP at 18, Katana/SR at 18, BS/SD at 16, and this Electric/Electric at 14 - (well, that's a 'handful' for me, with my raging altitis) so my experience with them is somewhat limited. So far the Electric/Electric has been the most frustrating. But I really like my Electric/Ice Tanker (now at 40), so I'm going to keep plugging away with the Electric Scrapper.

I know you're right - he will get better.


 

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Originally Posted by Redlynne View Post
How many Knockback powers are there in MA/*?
1 ... CK. While many players enjoy the visceral thrill of "punting" targets (especially off high ledges!), the Knockback on this power is actually something of a turn-off for many players. This is because use of Knockback means that you're going to need some sort of environmental "containment" by terrain if you don't want to be chasing your target all over the place ... which in turn reduces damage throughput over time. Very annoying for messing up positioning. Changing this to KnockDOWN would make the power much more useful.
Opinion only. Knockdown provides less mitigation than a good ragdoll knockback because the enemy recovers faster.

I really understand why AoE knockback can annoy people, but I don't get why anyone has a beef with single-target knockback -- especially from a hard-hitting attack like Crane. Most foes will be half dead after a Crane Kick, and you can just tap F and kill them in a moment anyway. It's only one guy, not enough to cause a crisis for Invulnerability or Willpower's mitigation.

There's terrain everywhere. And unless you're knocking the guy off a ledge or something, it doesn't slow you down much. Fine adjustments to DPS are really only important on AVs, and they don't get knocked back.

Crane Kick's knockback INCREASES DPS if used on a runner, who does go flying a short distance but you can then run him down and kill him before he rises. Crane Kick's knockback INCREASES DPS if used to boot people into Freezing Rain that missed them. Crane Kick's knockback INCREASES DPS if used as a hard-hitting finisher.

It seems to me that the negatives of Crane's knockback are very minor, somewhat offset occasional INCREASES in DPS, and fairly easily dealt with most of the time. I do not understand why it generates the level of complaint that it does.


If we are to die, let us die like men. -- Patrick Cleburne
----------------------------------------------------------

The rule is that they must be loved. --Jayne Fynes-Clinton, Death of an Abandoned Dog

 

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Originally Posted by Sailboat View Post
Opinion only. Knockdown provides less mitigation than a good ragdoll knockback because the enemy recovers faster.
I will agree with this. however I would argue that, If you can knock it back, then it probably can't really hurt you anyway. In other words, if you can knock it back, you probably don't benefit much from knocking if back. ...I Think I'm already starting to see this at level 32. I think KB is good mitagation only noticable in the early levels.

I have a ways to go of course. But, thats my impression at this moment in time.


 

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My fix for MA has always been to turn focus chi into a clone of Rage. It would give a power to scrappers that we've always wanted without porting the set that we'll probably never get. And I don't think any current MA users would disagree with the change. I don't know that it would immediately cause me to roll up an MA toon, but I'd think about it.


I gotta make pain. I gotta make things right. I gotta stop what's comin'. 'Least I gotta try.

 

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Originally Posted by JohnX View Post
I will agree with this. however I would argue that, If you can knock it back, then it probably can't really hurt you anyway. In other words, if you can knock it back, you probably don't benefit much from knocking if back. ...I Think I'm already starting to see this at level 32. I think KB is good mitagation only noticable in the early levels.

I have a ways to go of course. But, thats my impression at this moment in time.
Try playing against people's custom bosses in AE. A lot of them have Build Up or clones thereof, and when they set it off they follow up with Headsplitter or Total Focus or Thunderstrike or the like. I thought that the to-hit bonus from BU when used by NPCs only raised their chance to hit you a little bit if you were soft-capped (like when a minion has a 5% and a boss 7.5% to hit) but it seems to hit with terrifying precision, so maybe I don't understand it after all -- and it really hurts.

I started either running away for ten seconds when I heard the Build Up sound, or knocking them back. My MA/SR actually has Torrent -- the Dark Mastery version, not Energy Torrent (I know! You've never seen one before, have you?), which gives highly reliable knockback. So I started using it, and it's just great. When they pop BU I am in big trouble unless I knock them back, in which case everything is quickly under control again.

Stacked holds would work too, but you'd have to have two fast ones to hold a boss before Headsplitter hits you.


If we are to die, let us die like men. -- Patrick Cleburne
----------------------------------------------------------

The rule is that they must be loved. --Jayne Fynes-Clinton, Death of an Abandoned Dog

 

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Originally Posted by Shred_Monkey View Post
My fix for MA has always been to turn focus chi into a clone of Rage. It would give a power to scrappers that we've always wanted without porting the set that we'll probably never get. And I don't think any current MA users would disagree with the change. I don't know that it would immediately cause me to roll up an MA toon, but I'd think about it.
And then the set would be insanely overpowered. Just... no. Absolutely not. If you even begin to look at SS, you'd see that all of the attacks are balanced around the presence of Rage. Jab and Punch have pitiful DPA. Haymaker is better, but still mediocre. KO Blow is the only truly decent ST attack in the entire set, but it's crippled by the fact that it's on a 25 second recharge. The presence of Rage forces every attack within the set to be made worse to make up for it. Changing Focus Chi to be similar would demand that all of the powers within the set have their damage reworked to make up for the new ability to have BU active for 90% of the time.


 

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Originally Posted by Sailboat View Post
Opinion only. Knockdown provides less mitigation than a good ragdoll knockback because the enemy recovers faster.

I really understand why AoE knockback can annoy people, but I don't get why anyone has a beef with single-target knockback -- especially from a hard-hitting attack like Crane. Most foes will be half dead after a Crane Kick, and you can just tap F and kill them in a moment anyway. It's only one guy, not enough to cause a crisis for Invulnerability or Willpower's mitigation.

There's terrain everywhere. And unless you're knocking the guy off a ledge or something, it doesn't slow you down much. Fine adjustments to DPS are really only important on AVs, and they don't get knocked back.

Crane Kick's knockback INCREASES DPS if used on a runner, who does go flying a short distance but you can then run him down and kill him before he rises. Crane Kick's knockback INCREASES DPS if used to boot people into Freezing Rain that missed them. Crane Kick's knockback INCREASES DPS if used as a hard-hitting finisher.

It seems to me that the negatives of Crane's knockback are very minor, somewhat offset occasional INCREASES in DPS, and fairly easily dealt with most of the time. I do not understand why it generates the level of complaint that it does.
Yeah, the knockback in Crane Kick never bothered me. It's not even 100% So, it's not like it happens all the time.

In fact, while it doesn't bother me when it happens, it makes me sad when I want it to happen and it doesn't.

But I wouldn't want it to be 100% either. So I'll live with it.

And your right, the loss of DPS from the knockback is only meaningful on the enemies that don't get knockedback in the first place (AVs). So, the big deal on it, I have no idea.

I get more annoyed by the MA/ scrappers who slot KB into DT.


BrandX Future Staff Fighter
The BrandX Collection

 

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Originally Posted by Umbral View Post
And then the set would be insanely overpowered. Just... no. Absolutely not. If you even begin to look at SS, you'd see that all of the attacks are balanced around the presence of Rage. Jab and Punch have pitiful DPA. Haymaker is better, but still mediocre. KO Blow is the only truly decent ST attack in the entire set, but it's crippled by the fact that it's on a 25 second recharge. The presence of Rage forces every attack within the set to be made worse to make up for it. Changing Focus Chi to be similar would demand that all of the powers within the set have their damage reworked to make up for the new ability to have BU active for 90% of the time.
If all attacks follow the same DMG = RCH+END combo...or whatever the math. I would think it all comes down DPA.

Now assuming MA/'s best DPS attack chain of SK - CAK - SK - CK - Repeat (all slotted with 99% DMG), if it had Rage, it would do about 233 DPS when rage is up.

Considering, Rage drop means no dmg for 10 seconds, it would likely be less, but maybe putting in other sources for +DMG would raise it up.

Now...to even obtain that DPS you have to IO out, much like the other high DPS builds.

I don't see how that's over powered, when other sets get that high as well.

Dark Melee, on just one target, same conditions, using Soul Drain on 1 target = 194.9 DPS.

209 DPS with 3 targets for SD.

225 DPS with 5 targets for SD.

240 DPS with 7 targets for SD.

The only difference I see here...Martial Arts, the set that's all about Single Target attacks, would become the best at what it should be.

And unlike Dark Melee, it lacks the additional benefit of a self-heal in it's attacks.

Now all that said, if they did make Focus Chi into a Rage clone, I see no reason to port Super Strength over to Scrappers/Stalkers (I would assume Stalkers would get said change to Focus Chi as well).

MA can get super strengthy style animations for it's attacks, to have a more Spiderman/Scrapper super strength feel, rather than Superman/Tanker super strength feel.

MA would lack a hurl attack, which I don't see a Scrapper type Super Strengther doing. They'd have a more pick up something heavy and throw it style...that can put into a Epic pool however.

Just some thoughts on it.


BrandX Future Staff Fighter
The BrandX Collection

 

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Originally Posted by Umbral View Post
If you even begin to look at SS, you'd see that all of the attacks are balanced around the presence of Rage.
This is a very persistent myth. The devs did not balance SS attacks around Rage, because they had no tools to do so, and because the balancing methodology they did have *explicitly* gave them no latitude to do so.

In fact, with no small irony, the SS set shows signs that the devs intended its powers to deliver *more* damage, not less, probably to compensate for KO Blow (which originally did no damage). Thinking the way the devs did during initial development and at release, the fact that SS has attacks that do less damage per attack actually means they were deliberately attempting to give SS attacks that did more damage per cycle second because they recharged faster. The damage/recharge formula very explicitly (Geko attested to this) attempts to express the notion that frontloading has a certain benefit all its own, so attacks that do more damage per use take disproportionately longer to recharge, while attacks that do less damage per use recharge disproportionately faster. That way, hard-hitting attacks do less damage over time overall, while lighter attacks deliver more damage over time overall.

Right or wrong, that was the thinking at the time, and *if* you take that perspective, the evidence shows that Geko didn't try to make SS weak and then compensate with Rage, he attempted to make SS deliver more damage overall and then stack Rage *on top* of that, balanced against a Rage crash.

Also, keep in mind that the devs consistently thought that any power with a crash would be strongly incentivized to be used sparingly. They thought players would not perma-unstoppable. They thought players would not perma instant healing. I'm sure they thought that because it crashed, players would not (in general) perma Rage. By dev logic at the time, Build Up was just as good of a power as Rage, because Rage was intended to be used sparingly.


To the extent that SS has (in some cases) lower DPA attacks and perma-capable Rage, its a coincidence. And to be frank, if SS is supposed to be balanced around perma-Rage, it isn't anyway.


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Originally Posted by BrandX View Post
If all attacks follow the same DMG = RCH+END combo...or whatever the math. I would think it all comes down DPA.
All attacks (except for a few, such as Claws) follow the damage formula. Castle is supposed to be working on tweaks for it to account for DPA, which is the substantially more important variable where balance is actually concerned. The balance of Super Strength with Rage was actually a lucky heuristic balance generation because the basic attacks that fill up so much of SS's attack string thanks to the long recharges on the good attacks have such horrible DPAs. It has nothing really to do with the formulas. It has everything to do with the abysmal animation times of so many of the attacks.

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Now assuming MA/'s best DPS attack chain of SK - CAK - SK - CK - Repeat (all slotted with 99% DMG), if it had Rage, it would do about 233 DPS when rage is up.

Considering, Rage drop means no dmg for 10 seconds, it would likely be less, but maybe putting in other sources for +DMG would raise it up.
The loss of 11.22 seconds (animation time + downtime) every 120 seconds would result in an average loss of 9.35% DPS, giving an average result, from your numbers, of 211 DPS. What you're forgetting, however, is the additional benefit netted from having the additional 20% +tohit at all times.

[quote]Now...to even obtain that DPS you have to IO out, much like the other high DPS builds.

I don't see how that's over powered, when other sets get that high as well.

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Dark Melee, on just one target, same conditions, using Soul Drain on 1 target = 194.9 DPS.

209 DPS with 3 targets for SD.

225 DPS with 5 targets for SD.

240 DPS with 7 targets for SD.

The only difference I see here...Martial Arts, the set that's all about Single Target attacks, would become the best at what it should be.
MA being the set all about single target attacks is highly debatable. DM has a much stronger focus on single target attacks thanks to the lack of a real AoE (Shadow Maul isn't anywhere near the same level of AoE capability as a real AoE and neither SD or DC recharge fast enough or deal enough damage to generate real, consistent AoE functionality). MA actually has Dragon's Tail, which is a fully functional AoE.

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And unlike Dark Melee, it lacks the additional benefit of a self-heal in it's attacks.
That's because it already has the additional benefit of higher natural accuracy as well as additional control capabilities (albeit disparate ones).

You Soul Drain calculations are ignoring one very important variable though: recharge. With a similar level of +rech (225% total +rech, 130% global, 95% slotting), Soul Drain has a downtime of 9.468 seconds. With a 30 second effect, that's 76% uptime. Rage is permanent with SOs (and, thanks to the crash, actually generates roughly consistent benefit even with recharge increased past perma). Assuming that the additional damage that Soul Drain provides balances out the significant loss of animation time (2.508 seconds every 39.468 seconds would be a 6% loss of animation time, which is pretty intense considering the piss poor DPA on Soul Drain; especially when you consider that Rage only has to be used once every 2 minutes), the numbers would actually be more like this:

1 target: 38% +dam from SD, 178.5 DPS
3 targets: 60.8% +dam from SD, 195.4 DPS
5 targets: 76% +dam from SD, 206.86 DPS
7 targets: 91.2% +dam from SD, 218.51 DPS

Using the more accurate calculations that factor in the inhibiting factors, you'd make MA, which is already better at AoE than DM, better at ST than DM for all conditions except for when DM consistently hits 6 or more targets with Soul Drain and even better at AoE damage (thanks to your changes making Dragon's Tail even stronger as well). It wouldn't make the set balanced in the least. It would make the set stronger than the existing sets. DM and Fire only manage DPS in the 230 range thanks to procs, which the listed MA attack string actually gets greater benefits out of thanks to lower animation times. What you suggest would allow an MA/Shield with saturated AAO, assuming 100% chance to hit and 2 Heca and 2 Mako's procs per attack string, to generate more than 250 DPS (~283 DPS by my calculations, it was 313 before the Rage crash was factored in) and that would not be balanced.


 

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Originally Posted by Shred_Monkey View Post
My fix for MA has always been to turn focus chi into a clone of Rage. It would give a power to scrappers that we've always wanted without porting the set that we'll probably never get. And I don't think any current MA users would disagree with the change. I don't know that it would immediately cause me to roll up an MA toon, but I'd think about it.
I think that sounds fun and I do not believe it would be unbalanced.


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Tactics are for those who do not have a big enough hammer. Wisdom is knowing how big your hammer is.

 

Posted

Just to state my thoughts: I like MA how it is and feel it has decent synergy with any set. However, it doesn't really have much of a specialty or unique aspect to it and it basically falls middle of the road in everything except AoE dmg/control where it falls behind.

To give it a bonus synergy/specialty/unique feature, I've always thought making Focus Chi into a Power Buildup type power would be a great change for it. Besides buffing your dmg and ToHit, make it double the effect of the in-set effect (stuns, immobilize and slow) as well as slightly improving defense, heals, Tohit buffs you may have as well as debuffs/controls you may have from your secondary. Fits conceptually too (you're focusing your chi after all so some differentiation from Build up should be in order).