Unanswered Pummit Questions
By
Adeon Hawkwood,
Posted on: 2011-11-19 19:03 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
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Mercs could use some attention too.
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Originally Posted by EvilRyu
I dont think mm as a whole need help, just ninjas. There is no reason for these guys to be like wet paper dolls all the time. They need higher survivability at this point. What good is having good damage if they do not survive long enough to do it? Also there needs to be some overall compensation for dealing with the headache you have for controlling them due to their wacky ai.
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Originally Posted by PRAF68_EU
Dispari has more than enough credability, and certainly doesn't need to borrow any from you.
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What do you define as a regular spawn? My Fire/Fire died occasionally, sure. I don't recall leveling her to be that much of a chore at all though. Granted, that was with the use of IO and set bonuses on the way up. +0/x1 may be a boring way to play, but I certainly didn't find it that hard. I think at 50 I can handle for certain x2, sometimes x3/x4. Depends on the foe. It's not +4/x8, but I never run that on anyone anyway.|
Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
After bringing three Blasters to 50 through blood, sweat and tears, that's precisely what I ended up learning the hard way. In theory, a Blaster can kill stuff so fast he's never in danger. In practice, a Blaster dies LONG before he has the time to pump out even a fraction of his damage. Even as fast as it is, a Fire/Fire Blaster trying to use Fire Breath + Fireball + Rain of Fire in any order against a regular spawn is dead long before the enemies succumb to the damage. And that's non-resistent enemies, unlike Malta, Crey, most Praetorians, Longbow, the Arachnoids, Arachnos, the Rikti, etc.
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As for an open, I always preferred Blazing Bolt -> Rain of Fire -> Fireball. BB for the boss or whatever mob was going to be troublesome, targeting RoF while it animates. RoF deters the mobs enough from hitting me back (and stops them from reaching me) to clean them up. Bonfire at 41 further helped in keeping trouble mobs away from me. If they got through, Burn and Hot Feet made them pay for it.
I will concede that I leveled her many issues ago, so she has not had to face the revamped Praetorians.
Defiance 2.0 probably saved my hide more times than I can count. I felt like I had more of an out than I did on my Energy/Kin corr (and now my Beam/Rad corr). If I got held or stunned there, it was over.
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Originally Posted by EvilRyu
I totally agree with you on blasters being hard to play. I have only leveled one to 50 and it was the hardest thing I ever done.
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Suggestions:
Super Packs Done Right
Influence Sink: IO Level Mod/Recrafting
Random Merit Rolls: Scale cost by Toon Level
A Blaster should not be able to kill off a regular spawn so fast he is never in danger. With the possible exception of the Tanker, all Archetypes should be able to consistently defeat a +0/x0 spawn of Arachnos (3 minions or 1 minion and 1 Lt conning white) while taking some damage (20-40%?) and using some endurance.
Probably most people actually fight above that, but I don't beleive that fact is taken into consideration in mission design.
Story Arcs I created:
Every Rose: (#17702) Villainous vs Legacy Chain. Forget Arachnos, join the CoT!
Cosplay Madness!: (#3643) Neutral vs Custom Foes. Heroes at a pop culture convention!
Kiss Hello Goodbye: (#156389) Heroic vs Custom Foes. Film Noir/Hardboiled detective adventure!
I just flat-out delete characters that can't handle either +1/x2 or +2/x1 with bosses - ie, the old 4th and 5th difficulties. Oddly enough, I had little trouble with my Blasters not being able to handle those difficulties because they could split spawns if needed or just burst something down if they couldn't split the spawn or mez the target(s).
My first Fire/Fire Blaster was created prior to Defiance 2.0 as an experiment to see how quickly I got debt while playing normally... and she didn't get much more than my Corruptors. I'm not opposed to a buff for Blasters, but they're not god-awful to play. Everybody without mez protection is in the same boat, and inspiration use is just as effective for Blasters as it is for Defenders and Corruptors. All of those ATs can get into trouble without playing intelligently, and I'll admit that Blasters are the easiest to get in trouble with since the secondaries encourage you to do dumb things.
But it's also a topic that's probably worthy of its own thread, as there are probably lots of ideas on the subject and this thread has several topics going on already.
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Originally Posted by PleaseRecycle
it has gone from unconscionable to downright appalling that we have no way of measuring our characters' wetness.
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Originally Posted by Brillig
It's hard to beat the entertainment value of Whackjob Wednesdays.
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As far as I know, the encounter design parameters of the game have not changed in a while.
Assuming a non-faceroll level of skill, anyone's build should be able to solo the legendary 3 even minions reliably. It's okay if even Bosses require Inspirations, or hands you a defeat or three.
Once you have all SOs, it is acceptable (but not standard) that you should be able to consistently solo 3 +3 minions. Again, Bosses and up should require Inspirations, and it should require some actual play skill to avoid defeat.
If you can consistently solo +4s or Bosses with pure SO build and not play skill, you are probably a little OP.
It should take 6 players to defeat an even AV.
If you are turning the difficulty above +3 x0, your play experience is not guaranteed. If you are performing as well as the above, your AT is probably fine.
With all that in mind, it stands to reason that an AT designed around single target burst damage should probably be able to take out an even lieutenant in one hit.
Beyond that, who knows?
Story Arcs I created:
Every Rose: (#17702) Villainous vs Legacy Chain. Forget Arachnos, join the CoT!
Cosplay Madness!: (#3643) Neutral vs Custom Foes. Heroes at a pop culture convention!
Kiss Hello Goodbye: (#156389) Heroic vs Custom Foes. Film Noir/Hardboiled detective adventure!
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I definitely agree with you about the prevalence of mezzes on NPCs but I think your suggestion on duration is a bit to far. In general I agree that minions should not have mezzes (baring one or two special cases such as Malta Sappers). However for Lts and Bosses I think that it's not so much the duration that's an issue as the fact that they can stack their own mezzes. I'd probably look at 10 second or so mezzes for NPCs but give them long-ish recharges (i.e. 30 seconds) so they can mez you for long enough to make break frees useful but they can't stack their own mezzes.
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Originally Posted by EvilGeko
Wouldn't it make more sense to look at encounter design when thinking about Blasters?
One of the things that I really think City of Heroes gets wrong is the prevalence and magnitude (using common meaning) of control effects. In most games I've played, a mez effect is something only a named or strong NPC would have (at least a Lt. here but usually a Boss or higher). And those mezzes last in the 2-5 second range. Here we have holds and stuns that last up to 30 seconds. That's just silly. Sleeps make sense because the NPC can't kill you (absent a one-shot) without waking you up. The duration there makes sense. But otherwise, it's just loony how long mezzes last on both sides in this game. I would take away every single minion mez in this game. Lt. mezzes would last at most 2 seconds, bosses 4, and higher perhaps 6. And it wouldn't be something that just about every high level villain group has access to either. |
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More sense than thinking about Blasters holistically, no. But:|
Originally Posted by EvilGeko
Wouldn't it make more sense to look at encounter design when thinking about Blasters?
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One of the things that I really think City of Heroes gets wrong is the prevalence and magnitude (using common meaning) of control effects. In most games I've played, a mez effect is something only a named or strong NPC would have (at least a Lt. here but usually a Boss or higher). And those mezzes last in the 2-5 second range. Here we have holds and stuns that last up to 30 seconds. That's just silly. Sleeps make sense because the NPC can't kill you (absent a one-shot) without waking you up. The duration there makes sense. But otherwise, it's just loony how long mezzes last on both sides in this game. I would take away every single minion mez in this game. Lt. mezzes would last at most 2 seconds, bosses 4, and higher perhaps 6. And it wouldn't be something that just about every high level villain group has access to either. |
I think its worth noting that when the City of Villains archetypes were being created, every archetype with significant melee attacks (stalkers, brutes, dominators) had some form of mez protection guaranteed and *no* CoV archetype is actually *barred* from having mez protection. Not all Masterminds and Corruptors have self mez protection, but *some* do, which means the archetype definition doesn't prevent them from having it.
As far as I know, only the blaster archetype as a whole is *barred* from having significant mez protection. The devs had to make a special exception just for Burn: its only immobilize protection, but they almost revoked it anyway.
And that means when you look at NPC mez, you have to consider its effects on blasters differently than any other archetype. A critter mez is something of limited or no importance to things with mez protection. Its a differentiator for archetypes that have scattered mez protection in some sets: some sets will do better than others in that setting. But that mez is something all blasters of all levels as a practical matter will be vulnerable to.
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I had a crazy idea about Blaster mez countermeasures:
Would there be a way to alter Defiance thusly: When attacking while mez'd, damage is reduced, but the duration of the mez is also reduced by a % for each attack?
Ideally, this effect would trigger only when attacking the mob that threw the mez.
(I don't know if the game engine can determine that, however - I suspect it can't. If not, perhaps just attacking any mob with the same type of mez would produce much the same effect.)
This would represent actual Defiance - the Blaster intimidating/damaging/etc the entity trying to render them helpless. Blasters would still have to fear mezzers, especially groups of them, but they'd have some recourse.
This would also help a bit with the binary nature of mezzing for Blasters - yes, you've been gronked, but you can un-gronk yourself more quickly by hitting the gronker.
Crazy talk?
"Strength of numbers is the delight of the timid. The valiant in spirit glory in fighting alone."
- Mahatma Gandhi
Still CoHzy after all these years...
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It might be simpler to return to an idea mentioned earlier in the thread: "breaking" out of mez using tier 1/2 attacks. Have those attacks provide a very large but very short mez resistance buff. Say +100% for three seconds. And actually this is not difficult to balance, because to a first order approximation what that does is reduce the mez duration by three seconds. So each time you shoot, any mez effect on you has its duration drop by about three seconds. It sounds like it should be more complicated than that, but if you think about recharge the way I think about recharge then its pretty obvious that a +100% mez resistance buff is basically the same thing as a recharge buff that speeds up the expiration of mez, and a 100% mez resistance buff burns an extra second off the clock for every second its up.|
Originally Posted by Tetsuko_NA
I had a crazy idea about Blaster mez countermeasures:
Would there be a way to alter Defiance thusly: When attacking while mez'd, damage is reduced, but the duration of the mez is also reduced by a % for each attack? Ideally, this effect would trigger only when attacking the mob that threw the mez. (I don't know if the game engine can determine that, however - I suspect it can't. If not, perhaps just attacking any mob with the same type of mez would produce much the same effect.) This would represent actual Defiance - the Blaster intimidating/damaging/etc the entity trying to render them helpless. Blasters would still have to fear mezzers, especially groups of them, but they'd have some recourse. This would also help a bit with the binary nature of mezzing for Blasters - yes, you've been gronked, but you can un-gronk yourself more quickly by hitting the gronker. Crazy talk? |
Doing this exacerbates a problem, though, that D2.0 already creates. You aren't required to take both attacks: you're only required to take one. But the more archetype-survivability tools we stack into those powers, the less optional they really become. If you intend to solo a blaster at all, I don't really think they are all that optional now. If they are not just the mez-avoiding powers, but also the mez-cracking powers, I can't see not just plain giving blasters both powers right from the start.
Which would be interesting, actually. Give blasters the tier 1 for free, make them then automatically take the tier 2 at level 1, and blasters effectively get an extra ranged attack right out of the gate. Which *would* be a very significant offensive advantage for blasters clear into the 30s when attack chains fill up solidly.
I can already see the problems that would cause though, not in the blaster archetype but in other archetypes that would scream for similar free power choices to support their "inherent."
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Nitpick: You're required to take 2 of the 3; you can use the t1 secondary power as well. In most secondaries, this is a ranged attack (specifically, an immobilize). Energy Manipulation has Power Thrust and Web Grenade doesn't do damage, but the rest are pretty standard.|
Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Doing this exacerbates a problem, though, that D2.0 already creates. You aren't required to take both attacks: you're only required to take one.
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The idea I had was actually to give them some small magnitude of protection allowing them to blast their way out of it and a permanent resistance, though - Wolf Spiders get an auto power that provides mag 2 protection and seems sufficient for most single mezzes, so I was aiming at trying to get a moderately sustainable mag 2 just in the attacks that D2.0 allows you to use but you'd still be affected by stacked mezzes for a shorter duration. t1 primary, t2 primary, t1 secondary would give you at least 2.42 protection for around 4 seconds due to the ~9 second duration on the buff; as long as you're not Energy Manipulation you can cycle t1s in primary/secondary and break mag 2 on the 3rd power activation.
Resistance could work as well, but this would provide active Blasters a way of having a short, low-mag mez protection buff between spawns allowing them to use all of their powers; you could also use effects that provide higher Defiance +dam buffs to open with before retaliation to have protection initially.
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Originally Posted by PleaseRecycle
it has gone from unconscionable to downright appalling that we have no way of measuring our characters' wetness.
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Originally Posted by Brillig
It's hard to beat the entertainment value of Whackjob Wednesdays.
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Magnitude is exploitable. My energy blaster would have that magnitude protection up all the time. I have more than 150% global recharge *and* slot the force feedback procs: when I say "all the time" I literally mean all the time.|
Originally Posted by Siolfir
Nitpick: You're required to take 2 of the 3; you can use the t1 secondary power as well. In most secondaries, this is a ranged attack (specifically, an immobilize). Energy Manipulation has Power Thrust and Web Grenade doesn't do damage, but the rest are pretty standard.
The idea I had was actually to give them some small magnitude of protection allowing them to blast their way out of it and a permanent resistance, though - Wolf Spiders get an auto power that provides mag 2 protection and seems sufficient for most single mezzes, so I was aiming at trying to get a moderately sustainable mag 2 just in the attacks that D2.0 allows you to use but you'd still be affected by stacked mezzes for a shorter duration. t1 primary, t2 primary, t1 secondary would give you at least 2.42 protection for around 4 seconds due to the ~9 second duration on the buff; as long as you're not Energy Manipulation you can cycle t1s in primary/secondary and break mag 2 on the 3rd power activation. Resistance could work as well, but this would provide active Blasters a way of having a short, low-mag mez protection buff between spawns allowing them to use all of their powers; you could also use effects that provide higher Defiance +dam buffs to open with before retaliation to have protection initially. |
Because power thrust is melee only, balancing the defiance mez breaker around using all three D2.0 use while mezzed powers is problematic for energy manipulation blasters: by balancing around just the tier 1/2 attacks as in ranged primary attacks, you eliminate that problem. Which is why I referred specifically to those powers, and not to the secondary tier 1.
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I don't know that it's "exploitable" so much as "possible to just maintain" - which was a deliberate decision I made in the proposal; given the discussion at the time of wanting mez protection in general I felt it would accomplish it while still leaving them susceptible to stacked mezzes. It wouldn't provide as much as the Stalker, Scrapper, and Brute mez protection toggles and clicks (roughly mag 10 @ level 50), nor reliably provide as much as Domination can provide (slightly over mag 8) - but it would probably fluctuate between 2-5 fairly regularly, which is either more or less than Banes get depending on armors chosen. Building to over 2 to break out of mez was if the spawn led with a mez while you didn't have anything else going.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Magnitude is exploitable. My energy blaster would have that magnitude protection up all the time. I have more than 150% global recharge *and* slot the force feedback procs: when I say "all the time" I literally mean all the time.
Because power thrust is melee only, balancing the defiance mez breaker around using all three D2.0 use while mezzed powers is problematic for energy manipulation blasters: by balancing around just the tier 1/2 attacks as in ranged primary attacks, you eliminate that problem. Which is why I referred specifically to those powers, and not to the secondary tier 1. |
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Originally Posted by PleaseRecycle
it has gone from unconscionable to downright appalling that we have no way of measuring our characters' wetness.
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Originally Posted by Brillig
It's hard to beat the entertainment value of Whackjob Wednesdays.
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I'm going to disagree with your second part just a bit here. As I see it, so long as they are clearly described, there's no reason to force a player to build a character with their mez protection power. No other AT forces a mez protection on the character as a mandatory power pick, that I know of.|
Originally Posted by Arcanaville
(snipping good points about simpler mechanics)
Doing this exacerbates a problem, though, that D2.0 already creates. You aren't required to take both attacks: you're only required to take one. But the more archetype-survivability tools we stack into those powers, the less optional they really become. If you intend to solo a blaster at all, I don't really think they are all that optional now. If they are not just the mez-avoiding powers, but also the mez-cracking powers, I can't see not just plain giving blasters both powers right from the start. Which would be interesting, actually. Give blasters the tier 1 for free, make them then automatically take the tier 2 at level 1, and blasters effectively get an extra ranged attack right out of the gate. Which *would* be a very significant offensive advantage for blasters clear into the 30s when attack chains fill up solidly. I can already see the problems that would cause though, not in the blaster archetype but in other archetypes that would scream for similar free power choices to support their "inherent." |
Clearly, creating a character while skipping their mez protection is not a particularly survivable idea, but I don't feel that that's a good enough reason to force it upon someone.
I don't assume the Devs balance MM's around petless MM's, so I don't see balancing issues about a Blaster not wanting as much mez protection as they can get.
That being said, I really like the multi-tiered powers/multi-tiered mez concept.
"Strength of numbers is the delight of the timid. The valiant in spirit glory in fighting alone."
- Mahatma Gandhi
Still CoHzy after all these years...
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Arachnos Soldiers are required to take a mez protection power as their first tier secondary power, regardless of whether they're a huntsman, bane, or crab. Crabs get a toggle to boost it further, Banes get higher mag protection (4), and both later branches can take the initial power to stack the mag 2 protection it provides on its own.|
Originally Posted by Tetsuko_NA
I'm going to disagree with your second part just a bit here. As I see it, so long as they are clearly described, there's no reason to force a player to build a character with their mez protection power. No other AT forces a mez protection on the character as a mandatory power pick, that I know of.
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That's the only time you're forced into taking mez protection that I'm aware of, though; it doesn't negate your point but answer an implied question.
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Originally Posted by PleaseRecycle
it has gone from unconscionable to downright appalling that we have no way of measuring our characters' wetness.
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Originally Posted by Brillig
It's hard to beat the entertainment value of Whackjob Wednesdays.
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Mostly true, but the issue is not forcing the player to take a mez protection power, but making sure that a buff intended to buff the entire archetype is something the entire archetype actually gets. If we're doing it because we think the entire archetype is underperforming, and this buff is something all blasters should have, are we going to force all existing blasters to respec, and possibly lose one of the powers they already have, in order to get the full benefit of the buff?
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Originally Posted by Tetsuko_NA
I'm going to disagree with your second part just a bit here. As I see it, so long as they are clearly described, there's no reason to force a player to build a character with their mez protection power. No other AT forces a mez protection on the character as a mandatory power pick, that I know of.
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Meh. Respecs are easy to get.|
Originally Posted by Arcanaville
If we're doing it because we think the entire archetype is underperforming, and this buff is something all blasters should have, are we going to force all existing blasters to respec, and possibly lose one of the powers they already have, in order to get the full benefit of the buff?
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On the other hand, one way to semantically avoid a problem with jealousy from other classes and also dodge the respeccing problem might be to roll the 'break out of mez' feature into Defiance.
Add the mez-breaking to every Blaster primary attack with an appropriately lower effect. Only the first two powers would retain the 'blasting in my sleep' effect (which I hate but oh well) and the other powers could still be activated while mezzed, but would have no effect other than a mini-break free.
Story Arcs I created:
Every Rose: (#17702) Villainous vs Legacy Chain. Forget Arachnos, join the CoT!
Cosplay Madness!: (#3643) Neutral vs Custom Foes. Heroes at a pop culture convention!
Kiss Hello Goodbye: (#156389) Heroic vs Custom Foes. Film Noir/Hardboiled detective adventure!
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That would be ... potentially problematic to implement. I can see all sorts of potentially ugly race conditions happening there.
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Originally Posted by Kitsune9tails
Add the mez-breaking to every Blaster primary attack with an appropriately lower effect. Only the first two powers would retain the 'blasting in my sleep' effect (which I hate but oh well) and the other powers could still be activated while mezzed, but would have no effect other than a mini-break free.
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"What do you mean it let me use my nuke, drained all my endurance, and did no damage because I just got hit with a stun?"
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
That would be ... potentially problematic to implement. I can see all sorts of potentially ugly race conditions happening there.
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Originally Posted by PRAF68_EU
Dispari has more than enough credability, and certainly doesn't need to borrow any from you.
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...sure hope that broke you out of that stun...
I can see the objection there.
Story Arcs I created:
Every Rose: (#17702) Villainous vs Legacy Chain. Forget Arachnos, join the CoT!
Cosplay Madness!: (#3643) Neutral vs Custom Foes. Heroes at a pop culture convention!
Kiss Hello Goodbye: (#156389) Heroic vs Custom Foes. Film Noir/Hardboiled detective adventure!
Just "giving" Blasters status protection presents a particular problem. If we assume that melee ATs are "supposed" to have status protection, then we end up in a situation where I, as a Dark Scrapper, for instance, would have to spend at least two power pics - Obsydian Shield and Cloak of Darkness - just to gain status protection, and even then it's incomplete. On the flip side, a Blaster just sort of HAS that status protection as his inherent power. What I'm saying is that if anyone should be inheriting status protection, Blasters don't seem like the first candidates.
The original game's design was that status protection, like other defences, was something you spent a power pick or two to take, and was one part of a larger set. Putting that into an AT's inherent seems problematic. And, yes, I'm aware that Dominators have status protection in Domination, but that's gated by no less than two separate factors - a metre AND a recharge time.
From where I'm standing, the best Blasters can get is either something much more limited than Domination, or otherwise something as hard to attain, or even harder. Ideally, I'd just scrap their secondaries entirely and build them sets with at least one direct defensive shield and at least one status protection power, but that's not going to happen at that point.
If it seems like I'm coming up with problems but not solutions, that's because I spent so long trying to come up with one from 2005 to 2010 and simply failed. I don't have a solution. I'm not convinced there IS a solution which doesn't either change the AT from the ground up or mess with existing sets in a big way.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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Again, I don't think that all character of an AT being equally effected by a change to that AT is a terribly vital issue.|
Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Mostly true, but the issue is not forcing the player to take a mez protection power, but making sure that a buff intended to buff the entire archetype is something the entire archetype actually gets. If we're doing it because we think the entire archetype is underperforming, and this buff is something all blasters should have, are we going to force all existing blasters to respec, and possibly lose one of the powers they already have, in order to get the full benefit of the buff?
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Scrappers who have differing numbers of attackes taken from their primary are experiencing Criticals differently.
Brutes who have more or fewer attacks in their selections - or their attack chain - experience Fury differently.
...and so forth.
So long as I have good information, I as a Blaster player, can weigh the benefits of the (single optional) Defiance power versus what other power I might want alternatively.
As an example - I have a Fire/Fire Blaster who I only play as part of (at least) a duo with a Earth/Emp Controller. So long as the Controller is on the ball, I pretty much don't have to be concerned with being mezzed. Therefore, the addition of anti-mez to Defiance would not alter his power selections to any extent.
On the other hand, I have a Def-capped soloing snipe-based Blaster who often has to go to annoying lengths to avoid mezzes. Considerations of anti-mez capabilities would factor heavily into his power selections.
My point is that in neither case would I be forced into a respec - it would simply be more likely in the place of one character than the other. Actually, it would be an issue for neither character, as they both have their Tier 1 and Tier 2 attacks.
The only characters who would have a difficulty with anti-mez Defiance changes would be those both lacking their Tier 2 attacks and who feel that the increase in their ability to mitigate mez had not increased enough. I'm not certain how large that overlap would be, but I have trouble believing it would be a large enough segment to be terribly concerned about. But maybe I am underestimating the number of Blasters that routinely skip their Tier 2 Primary attacks - is this a large number?
Especially when the benefit to Blasters (inherent anti-mez) would have to be weighed against the possibility of some players desiring to respec their characters after AT changes (presumably with the freespec granted after all major rule changes like this). That seems like a very, very small price to pay for a highly desired benefit.
As we have seen, changes presuming that all Defenders are primarily heal-based are bad as they ignore a large number of AT-typical Defender playstyles. I don't think the same thing applies to assuming that Blasters are attack-based.
"Strength of numbers is the delight of the timid. The valiant in spirit glory in fighting alone."
- Mahatma Gandhi
Still CoHzy after all these years...
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Well, I did specifically leave holes in protection with what I was suggesting, and Arcanaville's idea involves absolutely no "protection" at all but high levels of mez resistance to break out of it faster.|
Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
Just "giving" Blasters status protection presents a particular problem. If we assume that melee ATs are "supposed" to have status protection, then we end up in a situation where I, as a Dark Scrapper, for instance, would have to spend at least two power pics - Obsydian Shield and Cloak of Darkness - just to gain status protection, and even then it's incomplete. On the flip side, a Blaster just sort of HAS that status protection as his inherent power. What I'm saying is that if anyone should be inheriting status protection, Blasters don't seem like the first candidates.
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But low mag mez protection (or high resistance) doesn't have to be all-encompassing like the newer armor sets provide - it could just as easily only affect holds and stuns, which are the ones that prevent you from really doing anything. Sleeps break the first time you're hit, and fear is weird by letting you act sometimes, and not others (and fear is also something that's not covered by most of the armor sets - only the newer ones truly provide blanket protection, but that's a separate discussion).
As for the last part of this paragraph, why not Blasters? As mentioned, the other "melee" ATs have entire armor sets. Blasters have the lowest hit points (tied with Stalkers), and until epic/patron pools don't get any more self-protection than anyone else. You can make the justification for it for any of the ATs, really, but given the lack of other personal defenses and number of melee/PBAoE powers in the AT you can make the case that it's warranted.
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Originally Posted by PleaseRecycle
it has gone from unconscionable to downright appalling that we have no way of measuring our characters' wetness.
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Originally Posted by Brillig
It's hard to beat the entertainment value of Whackjob Wednesdays.
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I wonder if it would be possible for a particular AT or power to be able to downgrade Mezes instead of resisting them. So an Immobilise becomes a slow, a stun becomes an immobilise, a hold becomes a stun (or maybe a fear). Sleeps would probably still be sleeps.
Always remember, we were Heroes.
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If you mean the lowest hit points of all the melee ATs, then yes, they do. But believe me when I say this - if Blasters were treated as a melee AT, this would actually help them tremendously. And again - personally, I'd like to see a root reimagining of their secondaries, with some defensive powers and some status protection put in there like in a de facto melee AT. That's what they should have had all along. That's what all combat specialists should have irrespective of their specific role.|
Originally Posted by Siolfir
As for the last part of this paragraph, why not Blasters? As mentioned, the other "melee" ATs have entire armor sets. Blasters have the lowest hit points (tied with Stalkers), and until epic/patron pools don't get any more self-protection than anyone else. You can make the justification for it for any of the ATs, really, but given the lack of other personal defenses and number of melee/PBAoE powers in the AT you can make the case that it's warranted.
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Status effects may be Blasters' biggest weakness, but it's far from their only one. Trying to think up elaborate, unreliable status protection to give them by retrofitting them into existing inherents just strikes me as putting a bandage on a gunshot wound. I suppose for those who have already accepted the AT's failings, this might just be enough to make things GRRRATE! but for me, it just half-fixes one problem out of the many that I have.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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I've been trying to argue a meaningful change to Blasters pretty much since Defiance 2.0 (which helped a lot, just not enough), and I've just about given up on the AT, having rerolled all three of my level 50 Blasters as other, less suicidal ATs. I get what the idea behind Blasters' design was, honestly, I do. But for the life of me, I will NEVER understand what the person designing the AT's power selection and stats (Geko?) was thinking. Blaster primaries are sometimes suspicious, with nukes and ESPECIALLY snipes being of questionable value vs. their drawbacks, but Blaster secondaries in particular are just a complete, frightening mess that I don't ever foresee being straightened out.
If we're being realistic, my list of ATs that need a revamp would have Blasters in spots 1 through 10, and probably have Kheldians on spot 11 and Stalkers on spot 12. However, BECAUSE my list looks like this, I simply do not play either of the ATs most in need of help, but I do play Stalkers because they don't die all the time, hence the first AT I actually want to see beefed up is Stalkers, which is what's happening.
Bump and Grind Bane/SoA
Kenja No Ishi Earth/Empathy Controller
Legendary Sannin Ninja/Pain Mastermind
Entoxicated Ninja/PSN Mastermind
Ninja Ryukenden Kat/WP Scrapper
Hellish Thoughts Fire/PSI Dominator
Thank You Devs for Merits!!!!