Photon Seeker issues - discussion and suggestions

Since I see two things - a mention of PBs being "looked at" and someone wondering about PS agressiveness (a "fix" that seems a side effect of AI... which might get "fixed" inadvertantly at any time,) I thought this might be a good time to start up this discussion and possibly see about getting a dev's eye pointed at it.

Photon Seekers take the "pet" slot for a Peacebringer. They have, I think we'll all agree, always been... *lacking* as a "pet." Wonky AI has followed them from issue 3 (well, I'll say issue 4, since I wasn't 50 yet in 3,) and they in general seem to be used solely as another mini-nuke.

Perfectly valid use, yes - but I would draw attention to a comment made in another thread (one of the many "PB vs WS" discussions, I believe) where it was mentioned part of the WS's "amazingness" comes from the damage output of Fluffy. Anyone who's had the mini-gunships blasting away while they sit in Dwarf and keep them alive (being a sort of mini-team of their own) would have to agree.

But - we don't want to lose that "mini nuke." Or do we?

The "Cottage rule," as is typically brought up when it comes to power modification/replacement suggestions, is this - the basic use of the power cannot be changed. Electric and Energy armors, for instance, are often brought up as "changed" powers that invalidate this rule - but those powers didn't lose their endurance management powers (conserve power/energy drain) to get a heal - the heal was layered on top of the existing power. The cottage rule, then, is preserved. There are perhaps two (one gets brought up that I can't recall) times that rule has been violated - only one I can recall is when Fold Space was removed from Gravity, Wormhole shuffled and Singularity added, and that was quite early in the game.

I don't think anyone that's seen me argue about power changes would disagree I'm a firm adherent of said cottage rule. It's sensible.

So one of the questions that has to be answered is - what is the "base purpose" of Photon Seekers that cannot be changed?

If we look at the use in game? It's a source of damage.
If we look at enhancements, especially set recipes, it's a pet (that has a knockback component) - it takes Pets, Recharge Intensive Pets, and Knockback sets.

This, if we use it as the basis, gives us a wide area to play in to improve the power.

The other questions, of course, are "What is wrong with the power/how can it be improved," and "How are people using it now?" I think we've answered the second - people don't seem, after short exposure, to use it as a "pet" but as a mini nuke. What's wrong with it, though, goes across many areas:

- Subject to AI, and AI is wonky, sometimes not seeking or detonating on a target.
- It's a one (or three) shot power. This is more "bad in comparison to Extracted Essence," which sticks around for some time, can (without anything past reasonable SO investment in recharge) be stacked and is an ongoing contributor of damage (and diverter of aggro.)


So, to me, this means we:
- Must have something distinctly a pet
- Must keep that frontloaded "mini-nuke" damage, as people use it for that, but
- should find a way to add an ongoing benefit (of damage or some other sort) for a reasonable amount of time.
- Shouldn't be reliant on the sometimes surprisingly-changed AI system to select a target, get into melee range and detonate. Prior AI fixes have been "improvements," but not enough to shake the bad reputation of Photon Seekers as "pets."

If anyone thinks I've missed something, do speak up. The suggestion that's started rattling around in my head is in the next post.

See my Guides and Tutorials

Tossing this out for consideration:

Change photon seekers into a two part (or two stage) pet.

Part one maintains the "mini nuke" status. However, instead of three seekers, it's one. (Alternately, it's visually three, spreading out into a fixed area - I'm not sure how doable this is with the system.) What we'll basically have here... is the Omega Maneuver from Crab Spiders. It taunts things in an area, draws them in and explodes.

This fits a few points:
1. Still a pet. Current slotting is not invalidated.
2. Still a mini-nuke. Current use is not invalidated.
3. Draws aggro. As mentioned in the last post, dealing with EE, one of their benefits is that they CAN draw aggro away from the warshade as well as contribute damage. This is a survivability benefit.
4. Since it draws aggro to IT via taunt, it can ignore the often wonky pet AI. It doesn't have to find an enemy to float at and risk looking like outsize dandruff if it decides not to explode.

This handles several issues with photon seekers - but it misses one where the Warshade has a benefit. Namely, the ongoing damage of multiple seekers. This is where "part 2" comes in.

When the main Seeker body explodes, it spawns a new pet. This pet has (say) a minute to 90 second lifespan, and acts like an Extracted Essence, adding ranged damage. In addition (and as part of the tradeoff for the short life,) either as it exists or when it expires, it buffs the team (including the casing Peacebringer) - damage, defense, no I don't know what just yet, but it provides a buff.

Why the short life? Because we can cast it regardless of environment. I believe the Warshades deserve the longer-lived Essences as they can't just summon one on command (recharge aside) - they must use a defeated enemy. That seems to be a fair tradeoff, to me. Plus, of course, the Peacebringer *does* get the front-loaded "mini-nuke," which the Warshade does not (relying on another power which, again, needs a defeated enemy for that effect.)

I think this would cover the current issues with Photon Seekers rather well, making it a more desirable power (and also helping address some peoples complaints, with the "secondary pet buff," that PBs "don't bring anything to a team." While the buff would be on and off, as well as somewhat later level, it would still be a plus.)

See my Guides and Tutorials

Counter-proposal.



Photon Seekers summons as a single puffball pet (same animation as legacy).

Summoned Photon Seekers Pet can be controlled via Mastermind/Lore Pet Controls (major upgrade in functionality!) and summons with default behavior of Defensive/Follow. Summoned Pet is named in the Pet UI as "Photon Seekers" (plural), even though only a "single pet" is summoned.

Summoned Photon Seekers Pet "detonates"/self-destructs upon entering melee range of selected target. Spherical PBAoE Radius: 15 ft. Animate "detonation" as a "photon seeker particle/projectile GFX" being launched from the point of origin towards every hostile target within the Area of Effect. Each hostile within the 15 ft Spherical Area of Effect is given a Grant Power Effect (as a "result" of being hit by the particle/projectile GFX).

Grant Power Effect (on each hostile target) is a Spherical PBAoE that deals Damage and 0.67 Mag KnockUP around the affected targets. Spherical PBAoE Radius: 10 ft, Max Targets: 10. Grant Power Effect intentionally designed to permit overlapping of AoEs of Damage and KnockUP so as to yield variable throughput performance depending on the situation. Animate as "bright flash" explosion using legacy Photon Seekers Detonation animation.



In-game performance and behavior:

This would convert Photon Seekers into something of a "fissionable" damage/knockUP effect, dependent on how many targets are "available" to power the damage cascade, rather than on the number of Seeker Pets summoned. It would be a 2-stage effect, where the "detonation" of the Pet itself determines the Primary PBAoE location. Every hostile within that Primary PBAoE gets affected with a Grant Power which then causes the Secondary PBAoE(s, plural!) that actually inflict the damage.

The net result would be that Photon Seekers would be more powerful against tightly packed groups of enemies, and less powerful against single foes (such as AVs). This would put the power more into the role of being a "pet based, deployable room sweeper" rather than a nuke or "mini-nuke" type power. With use of Mastermind Controls, it could even be used as a Scout or as a player controlled(!) Alpha Strike (assuming the initial summoned Pet doesn't get destroyed en route to target).

The simple fact of the matter is that we've already GOT a "one-size fits all NUKE" power on Peacebringers. It's called Dawn Strike, and it's a 25 ft PBAoE, so we don't exactly need a "second nuke" power that's really trying to be a copy of the first, except without the END crash. And if we're going to be deploying Photon Seekers as a Pet Based Nuke ... then by all means, let's make it a Pet Based Nuke power that the players CAN CONTROL!

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

If the dev doesn't want to be creative about it, then they should really consider:

1. Allow Nova/Dwarf to cast Photon Seekers because WS Human can summon Essence that lasts 240s. PB's Seekers only last like 1s and then it's gone for 300s recharge which is longer than Essence's base recharge at 240s.


2. Reduce recharge from 300s to 90s.

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Do these two and I'll call it "balanced".

But I really hate the fact that:

1. You can't drop Seekers the way you drop Seeker Drones in /Trap. If I can drop them out of sight, I can use them to soften a mob first.

2. 3 AoE knockbacks is bad overall. Do you really need 3 drones that all chase the same target and knockback 3 times? It's not like the seekers are smart enough to "spread out" and sometimes you don't want them to spread out because you want all of them to hit a Boss. 3 knockbacks is just bad.

---------------


I've posted my idea before.

Seeker one: AoE Damage + knockdown
Seeker two: AoE damage + Resistance Debuffs for 30s (20%)
Seeker three: AoE damage + Damage Debuffs for 30s (20%)

With this version, I can live with 300s recharge. There is no mini-nuke power that does all 3 things and I wouldn't mind giving PB something more unique than a simple "aoe knockback nuke".

Just one of those crazy random ideas...

Photon Seeker summons 1 puffball, it has about the same AoE radius as it does now, same damage. When it goes off, it summons 3 other photon seekers. Their AoE radius is larger, less damage, and when they go off they each have a fairly good chance to summon 2 more Photon seekers...AoE Radius goes up, damage goes down, each one gets a chance (less than the previous batch) to summon more that have a wider AoE and again less damage. Luck can keep the chain going, and the explosions going off. Keep the knockback, lessen it each time. Just wouldn't look right if you didn't see seekers darting about to find their targets.

I totally blame my friend who plays too much Touhou for this idea...keeps linking me video's of the game with bullets splitting into more bullets splitting into more bullets till the entire screen is filled with little multicolored things that'll kill you if you touch them.

Hopefully this thread grabs some attention, since we have scorpion in charge of powers now maybe Seekers will get the attention they greatly need!!!

On terms of editing the power itself:

1. Three seekers that hover around your character like a shield; If any enemy reaches mele range, they fire off a pulse that pushes them away from you and deals minor/moderate damage (there's the high knockback of the power)

2. If the lifespan was to be, maybe 60 seconds...in the last 5 seconds of the lifespan the active power below your health begins to blink and when their lifespan ends, they explode outward like a PbAoE attack having the same damage that the pets have as before. (there's the mini-nuke function that everyone loves) ]

I thought of this idea because I usually use these seekers to throw a rather large group away from me, and deal high damage. (as I said before, like a second human flare with HIGH damage)

3. For someone who likes the power as a small "bombardment" technique, have the seekers spread out away from you and detonate, to maximize the range of the boom. Or, revert them back to "heatseeker" mode.

On terms of changing just the Stats:

90s or even 120s recharge would be greatly appreciated

In the end, even a "goto" type of control would be nice to have if the other options are out of the question

I think this is actually assuming too much of the current functionality is protected by the Cottage Rule. So long as Photon Seekers continues to summon damaging pets, the Rule is preserved - it doesn't demand that PS continue to be used as a mini-nuke. That is a player-derived convention stemming not from the fact that PS is a good nuke, but from the fact that it is bad at being used for anything but a nuke.

The ELA change from Conserve Power to Energize may have retained some of the old functionality, but it dramatically changed the way the power was actually used. We could use some o' that. I would much rather Photon Seekers became a genuine pet power - which presumably it was intended to be at one point - rather than a poor nuke masquerading as a pet power.

I'm a little of two minds on this. On the one hand, I agree with Teflon (can I call ya Teflon?) with regard to the cottage rule. Very good point.

HOWEVER, I'm still with Bill's suggestion. Just because it isn't necessary to cater to a playerbase who've learned to work around a crappy power doesn't mean the whatever workaround we've come up with (in this case, using it as a mini-nuke) needs to be totally discarded when suggesting changes to the power.

I would absolutely hate to see photon seekers turned into brightly colored copies of warshade extracted essences (which is where arguments against the cottage rule where it's applied to photon seekers seem to inevitably lead). Yes, the essences are awesome. Yes, they account for roughly half the warshade's dps.

If I want essences, I'll play a warshade. With the forms being color-shifted copies of each other, and with many of the animations and attacks being shared between the two archetypes, I'll take whatever I can to keep Peacebringers as unique in as many areas as possible.

THIS is the chief reason to preserve as much of the flavor of Photon Seekers as we can IMHO. Shorten their recharge, sure. Have them do something different when they explode, why not? Give them a taunt aura, hell yes.

But don't make them hover-blasting wisps.

I'd like to see Kheldians get the new "power tree exclusion" mechanics added to them, especially because they are denied epic pools AND patron pools.

What I mean by that is how VEATs can pick one power, and that locks them out of picking another power.

How this would translate to my PB for example is, the Devs create 2 or more different pet powers and if the player selects pet A, then pet B and C are locked out.

Now onto what I would like to see for Pet choices:

A) Photon Seekers (The current existing power), with whatever fixes are needed like improved AI etc. To maintain the cottage rule

B) Photon Spitter: A ranged damage platform. A glowing ball of energy resembling a Photon Seeker hovers around you like a targeting drone and periodically spits out a small globe of energy at the nearest target in range (say 60 feet max), which explodes as a small AoE doing modest damage.

C) Photon Aggressor: A melee offensive defense. What the heck does that mean!?!
You are covered in a nimbus of energy that lashes out at any foe that gets into melee range doing modest energy damage. How often it attacks and how much damage it does I leave up to the Devs to hash out.

All of these powers are clicks with a decent recharge, but not ridiculous like 300 seconds. This way it can be used in forms, simply click the pet power then transform into squid or dwarf and go to town.

P.S. I don't think any of these pets should get the Mastermind's ability to actively control them, that's the purview of Masterminds and the Devs have always said that's what separated the Masterminds from controllers and everyone else. But ideally these pets as presented should work just fine under the direction of their A.I because their function is limited enough to be easily controlled by the A.I.

P.S. part two: The same power exclusion can be used to add more forms to Kheldians, for example picking the existing Dwarf form would lock out other melee/tank forms that have slightly different powers, perhaps less tankish and more scrapperish, or picking the squid form would lock out other ranged damage forms that might specialize more in higher single target damage instead. Just some ideas to mull over.

Thanks for reading.

Agree that the pay off and recharge rate are way out of whack for this power. I have it but rarely trigger it at all and basically use the slots to mule IOs. I would love to be able to conjure them up like my Electrical blaster does voltaic sentinel. Pick a spot, summon them, and let them put the hurt on the area where they appear.

Another Counter-proposal:

What about re-conceptualizing Photon Seekers as (essentially) Pet Based Trip Mines?



Trip Mines in the Devices and Traps powersets are stationary proximity bombs, which have a duration well in excess of their recharge time. The most common way to deploy Trip Mines is to lay a "Flower Garden" of them, stacked, and then either drag aggro across them or use TP Foe to drop a hostile into them. When stacked up in large quantities, Trip Mines *can* operate as a location based crashless nuke power.

So what if Photon Seekers were reworked into being a "mobile" Trip Mine styled power? They'd be doing Energy Damage, instead of Fire Damage. They'd still be doing Knockback. You'd be able to summon more than one Photon Seeker at a time, limited only by the recharge+animation time cycle measured against the "duration" of the Pets before they start to reach their self-destruct limit.



So I ask you ... what's a good argument for NOT reworking Photon Seekers into being a mobile pet-based version of Trip Mine?

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

Nother random idea...demon summoning gets a power that buffs one of their pets and every little bit will summon an imp...

Why not give Photon Seekers that treatment? Buffs the PB (or perhaps a target of his choosing) and every little bit out pops a photon seeker.

BRILLIANT! I love it, but i have suggestions(:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Redlynne Another Counter-proposal: What about re-conceptualizing Photon Seekers as (essentially) Pet Based Trip Mines? Trip Mines in the Devices and Traps power sets are stationary proximity bombs, which have a duration well in excess of their recharge time. The most common way to deploy Trip Mines is to lay a "Flower Garden" of them, stacked, and then either drag aggro across them or use TP Foe to drop a hostile into them. When stacked up in large quantities, Trip Mines *can* operate as a location based crashless nuke power. So what if Photon Seekers were reworked into being a "mobile" Trip Mine styled power? They'd be doing Energy Damage, instead of Fire Damage. They'd still be doing Knockback. You'd be able to summon more than one Photon Seeker at a time, limited only by the recharge+animation time cycle measured against the "duration" of the Pets before they start to reach their self-destruct limit. So I ask you ... what's a good argument for NOT reworking Photon Seekers into being a mobile pet-based version of Trip Mine?

I like your idea, although they wouldn't be as beneficial as a WS fluffy BUT it totally eliminates the A.I problem with the seekers. I can't really see any drawbacks, since it removes the problem of the A.I and on top of that you can create your mines at a distance, and not worry about them "derping" behind you while u rush into a mob.

on that thought i would advise having them act as a type of aura, so we wouldn't have to worry about them lagging behind if i decide to fly into a mob and bomb them; and on that note:

Would it be considerable for the bomb to drop like a standard AoE mele? around the first target that it's triggered on, so i can literally fly THROUGH a mob then go nova for AoE mop up?

BRAIN BLAST!:
Maybe we can take this idea and combine it with Joe's idea of the damage buff. (QUOTE BELOW)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Smiling_Joe As an alternative to spawning a second pet you could give the exploding seekers a pbaoe ally damage buff that lasted for 90 seconds. (or an energy damage component added to attacks ala fiery embrace) But I love, LOVE the omega maneuver idea!

So as a PB, you would bring alot more damage to the team by being a self guided-vengence bomb, that can let the team jump in & fire away, and it would be totally worth the 300s recharge

It's a bit more indirect than simply buffing the seekers themselves, but adding a PBAoE ally damage buff would bring damage to the ENTIRE team, like how multiple WS Fluffies can bring in massive damage; accept here you're helping everyone, so PBs would, in turn, be more desired on a team, and also, as a solo player I won't have to worry about the seekers crapping out when i need them to hit a single target. I can just pull a boss/lt away so that the seekers hit the guy i want!

Think about it, Who doesn't love a team-mate with vengence? Seekers would be REALLY close to that, w/o needing a dead mate.

I would name it "Photon Shield"

Well, I think he implied you summoned one at a time but you can have several out at a time, like trip mine... so you could have say 6 following you if you have high enough recharge.

I'll probably be easiest to simply quote Red Tomax, in this case.



Photon Seekers
Cast time 2.03 seconds
Recharge time 300 seconds
Endurance cost 31.200001
Summoned pet duration 60s
Photon Seeker Pet
Impact
Attack types AOE_Attack, Energy_Attack
Effect area Sphere
Radius 10 feet
Max targets hit 10
91.2 Energy damage
+2.077 Knockback (50% chance) PvE only
+2.077 Knockback (50% chance) If target is a player, Suppressed when Knocked, for 10 seconds (WhenInactive)

Trip Mine (Blaster */Devices)
Interrupt time 4 seconds
Cast time 5 seconds
Recharge time 20 seconds
Endurance cost 13
Summoned pet duration 260s
Buff to Self: DMG(All Types) +26.4% for 11.5s [Ignores Enhancements & Buffs]
Trip Mine (Pet)
AOE_Attack, Lethal_Attack, Fire_Attack
Effect area Sphere
Radius 12 feet
Max targets hit 16
111.22 Lethal damage
55.61 Fire damage
55.61 Lethal damage (50% chance)
+2.077 Knockback (50% chance)



Photon Seekers ... cast 2.03s ... recharge 300s ... duration 60s (each) ... radius 10ft ... max targets 10
Only 3 seekers summoned per casting (because recharge is punitively high).

Trip Mines ... cast 5s ... recharge 20s ... duration 260s (each) ... radius 12ft ... max targets 16
No fixed upper limit to how many Trip Mines can be active simultaneously. Max number of Trip Mines possible dependent on +Recharge.



Proposed Photon Seekers "as mobile Trip Mines Pets" rework:

Cast time 2.03 seconds
Recharge time 20 seconds
Endurance cost 13
Summoned pet duration 60s (1 Photon Seeker per casting of power) (can have more than 1 active simultaneously)

Attack types AOE_Attack, Energy_Attack
Effect area Sphere
Radius 10 feet
Max targets hit 10
91.2 Energy damage
+0.67 Knockup PvE only
+1.407 Knockup (50% chance) PvE only
+0.67 Knockup If target is a player, Suppressed when Knocked, for 10 seconds (WhenInactive)
+1.407 Knockup (50% chance) If target is a player, Suppressed when Knocked, for 10 seconds (WhenInactive)



Comparison:

Casting time for Photon Seekers is shorter than Trip Mine (2.03s vs 5s, no interrupt vs 4s interrupt).
Recharge time for Photon Seekers is same as Trip Mine (20s).
Endurance cost per casting for Photon Seekers is same as Trip Mine (13 END).
Duration of summoned pets is shorter for Photon Seekers than Trip Mine (60s vs 260s).
Trip Mine buffs caster's +DMG(All). Photon Seekers does not.
AoE Radius for Trip Mine is larger than Photon Seekers (12ft vs 10ft).
Max Targets for Trip Mine is higher than Photon Seekers (16 vs 10).
Photon Seekers deal less raw damage than Trip Mines per Pet.
Number of simultaneous summons of Photon Seekers and Trip Mines determined by Recharge, not by a pre-determined cap, allowing stacking of multiple summons (both Photon Seekers and Trip Mine).
Photon Seekers Knockback *changed* from KnockBACK to KnockUP, with a "guaranteed" +0.67 Knockup regardless of target type, and a 50% chance of a "critical" Knockup.

Photon Seekers are mobile and Follow the caster. Trip Mines are stationary.



PURE DATABASE CHANGE OF POWER ONLY!

There would be no need for a new animation, since Photon Seekers would continue to use the same legacy animation to summon, and the summoned Pets themselves would be unchanged as far as their animation and sound and GFX are concerned.

Enhancement Types Accepted would remain unchanged.
IO Sets Accepted would remain unchanged.

Photon Seekers Power changes TWO power parameters (Recharge and Endurance Costs) and deletes TWO power effects (summons only 1 Pet instead of 3 per casting, permit multiple pets to exist concurrently).

Photon Seekers Pet's Impact Power adds only TWO power effects (+0.67 KnockUP) and modifies TWO already existing power effects (+2.077 KnockBACK changed to +1.407 KnockUP).



Trick Question: how "hard" would it be for someone of Black Scorpion's caliber to implement the changes I'm proposing here to Photon Seekers?



Note to Smiling_Joe: Think changing Photon Seekers like this would help go a long way towards closing the DPS gap between Photon Seekers and Extracted Essence(s)?

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