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Originally Posted by Chyll
I keep seeing this phrase being thrown around, and frankly I have no idea what it means or where it came from.
The game hasn't significantly changed.... What is is this 'modern' myth? |
I don't know what game you're playing but things have changed significantly since I started in I6. Inventions, Defiance 2.0, Incarnates, smoothing fo the XP curve, various buffs and modifiers to various ATs & sets... the game is massively different in many ways.
That's not to say those differences are bad, but they have changed as you'd expect. If the game was the same as it launched 8 years ago it would be positively dodo-like.
Blasters have slipped way down the hierarchy these days. I don't think I can ever recall any team looking for a blaster - because they're a waste of a space on a team. A Defender or Scrapper will generally get picked over a blaster because their attributes provide greater benefits to teams.
The glass cannon has always been something of a myth... glass, sure but never really delivering on the promise of the cannon. Some are better than others - an Ice/En blaster still packs a punch but some others less so.
Blasters are getting left behind - badly. Why play something that does high damage when you end up munching carpet half the time when if you play an SoA you can lay down a constant field of fire with a solid attach chain, and are virtually immune to many forms of mez and have good def & resist, for example.
The biggest problem with a blaster as I see it currently is that the damage doesn't compensate for the lack of mitigation.
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Originally Posted by Scarlet Shocker
I don't know what game you're playing but things have changed significantly since I started in I6. Inventions, Defiance 2.0, Incarnates, smoothing fo the XP curve, various buffs and modifiers to various ATs & sets... the game is massively different in many ways.
That's not to say those differences are bad, but they have changed as you'd expect. If the game was the same as it launched 8 years ago it would be positively dodo-like. . |
Yes, this was covered quite a bit between posts 8-26, and in another thread. The game has changed a lot since the game's introduction. The question was more why 'suddenly' there is the 'modern game' label. All this has been discussed, and I have moved away from needing it answered.
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Since you aren't looking for an answer, how about an anecdote?
I named my thread 'Blasters and the modern CoH' because I thought it sounded and fit better than 'Blasters roll in the future of CoX'.
I'd never really heard 'Modern' used all that much really, I thought about using 'Current' but that describes the present when I wanted to discuss the future.
*Shrugs*
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I think the reason is that, at this point, most other ATs that seem to have had a some broad dissatisfaction associated with them have had balance passes to improve them. Stalkers are one of the ATs that have had very vocal complains, and which the devs themselves have acknowledged some issues with. In I22, Stalkers get an extremely impressive (IMO) buff in their core role of melee damage dealing. But perhaps more significantly, this buff comes with a modification to their conceptual design: until now, Stalkers have been required to conflate their melee damage dealing with their stealthiness. While this option has not been removed, a completely new mechanic has been introduced that lets Stalkers ignore it.|
Originally Posted by Chyll
The question was more why 'suddenly' there is the 'modern game' label. All this has been discussed, and I have moved away from needing it answered.
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One theory (which I buy into) for why Blasters have suffered real, measured performance issues in the past is that they basically have an AT definition that calls for them to have team support to reach their peak performance. If you really need that support, then you are at risk if you are solo or if your team does not provide adequate support (due to team composition, skill, etc.). No other AT labors under a similar role definition that provides this limitation of scope - while they may need support on a powerset-by-powerset basis, they are allowed to have powersets they let them operate fine without support.
The I22 Stalker change is a trigger for me personally because it suggests that the devs are currently open to changes in such AT design assumptions. I believe that the Blaster's "role" is part of its issue, so I think now is a good time to see if that role revisited. It's not because I think the problems with the AT are new, or that they have suddenly come to a head. It's because now seems like a good time, strategically.
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I think its a lot of reasons that interconnect, but I think the biggest problem with the Blaster archetype definition is that it doesn't actually specifically proscribe having anything. Everyone knows what Blasters are not allowed to have: mez protection, significant defense or resistance, etc. But no one - not even the devs - can say what they are supposed to have.|
Originally Posted by UberGuy
One theory (which I buy into) for why Blasters have suffered real, measured performance issues in the past is that they basically have an AT definition that calls for them to have team support to reach their peak performance. If you really need that support, then you are at risk if you are solo or if your team does not provide adequate support (due to team composition, skill, etc.). No other AT labors under a similar role definition that provides this limitation of scope - while they may need support on a powerset-by-powerset basis, they are allowed to have powersets they let them operate fine without support.
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There is no other archetype for which this is true: every archetype has obvious and very specific things they are required to have, and proof a powerset combination did not have any of the items on the list would be proof that powerset combination was broken and required a fix. There is no such list that can be produced for Blasters.
Unless you say "damage" without qualification. But everyone is required to have damage. Saying Blasters are required to have damage says nothing at all. How would you know they had enough damage? There's no way to tell, except to say that just like everyone else they have enough to solo.
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I dunno. |
Originally Posted by Void_Huntress
What implication are you perceiving? There's no superiority, no 'slap' in the statement you quoted.
All she did was reiterate that she doesn't experience an issue playing blasters. That she isn't trying to get blasters fixed because she EXPERIENCES a problem that you do not experience, but instead because she's AWARE of a problem. |
This:
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| I've been playing Blasters since release, and I do fine. Statistically, probably better than 99.9% of all players given the underperformance data of I13. |
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Originally Posted by Dechs Kaison See, it's gems like these that make me check Claws' post history every once in a while to make sure I haven't missed anything good lately. |
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Which is why I tend not to concern myself over whether something will be perceived to be condescending in a text medium. That has everything to do with the reader, and virtually nothing to do with the text.
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Originally Posted by ClawsandEffect
I dunno.
This: ....was pretty damned condescending if you ask me. |
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You put in writing the assertion that you are better than practically everyone else playing this game at something. If it were to be assumed that you yourself are the 0.01%, you said that you are in fact better than everyone. |
Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Which is why I tend not to concern myself over whether something will be perceived to be condescending in a text medium. That has everything to do with the reader, and virtually nothing to do with the text.
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And furthermore, that "fact" was used to back up your reasoning why your word should be trusted in regards to whether blasters need attention.
That's pretty textbook condescension. The fact that you seem unaware of having done it says quite a bit as well.
*shrug*
I'm just calling it like I see it.
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Originally Posted by Dechs Kaison See, it's gems like these that make me check Claws' post history every once in a while to make sure I haven't missed anything good lately. |
If you were doing 'fine' on your blasters back before defiance 2.0 (by which I mean leveling relatively quickly and not dying) then chances are you're in that 0.01% she mentioned as well.
I wouldn't call what Arcana said condescending, but it did strike me as the same sort of unintentionally superior kind of thing one hears from those very confident of their abilities.
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To Arcana's point - I rarely die on my blasters. I know the limitations and weaknesses. However once in a while I tire of playing careful and just want to blow things up and I play like a crazed Fusionette on Jolt cola.
I surprisingly often survive those moments but not always and nothing says love like popping a breakfree run into a huge mass of enemies, nuke, pop a blue, self destruct and Return to Battle.
Your team stands looking at the wreckage wondering what just happened.
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Condescension would be pointing out you can't subtract. Pointing out that anyone who was playing blasters very well prior to D2.0 must have been at or near the top of all blasters in existence at the time because datamining showed blasters performing lower than everyone else is simply a fact. No moreso than claiming one's personal experience would grant them the ability to judge an entire archetype's performance, say, which I considered to be only a misunderstanding and not condescension, even though what was claimed was a skill I believe to not actually exist.|
Originally Posted by ClawsandEffect
You put in writing the assertion that you are better than practically everyone else playing this game at something. If it were to be assumed that you yourself are the 0.01%, you said that you are in fact better than everyone.
And furthermore, that "fact" was used to back up your reasoning why your word should be trusted in regards to whether blasters need attention. That's pretty textbook condescension. The fact that you seem unaware of having done it says quite a bit as well. *shrug* I'm just calling it like I see it. |
Completely separate from innumeracy, I could also objectively point out illiteracy, because that fact was not offered to show that my perspective was better, but rather the reverse: that everyone's individual perspective is likely to be skewed. I said in spite of my ability to play blasters well I can still see the problems overall, because I do not rely on my own personal experience to judge the archetype. That implies that being able to play blasters well is actually an impediment to correctly judging blasters, not a benefit, the same impediment I was claiming the poster I was responding to might have, given they claimed to play blasters well also.
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Repeating what Arcana said in another way: We know that blasters collectively sucked unbelievably badly prior to the Defiance redesign. We know that there were people who were able to excel very well playing blasters.|
Originally Posted by ClawsandEffect
You put in writing the assertion that you are better than practically everyone else playing this game at something. If it were to be assumed that you yourself are the 0.01%, you said that you are in fact better than everyone.
And furthermore, that "fact" was used to back up your reasoning why your word should be trusted in regards to whether blasters need attention. That's pretty textbook condescension. The fact that you seem unaware of having done it says quite a bit as well. *shrug* I'm just calling it like I see it. |
Here's the problem: If there were as many blasters succeeding well as the forums believe, then in order for blasters to collectively fail to perform to the extent they did, then there would have had to be a _VASTLY_ higher number of people sucking incredibly worse.
That sounds bad, but we have to look at the facts we've been given. All powerset combinations, on average, were outperformed by all defender combinations. With 'outperformed' meaning 'getting more XP and inf'. Considering the damage throughput deficit Defenders appeared to have before the damage buff to Vigilance, this warrants further consideration.
Defenders were, as a whole, outpacing blasters. Badly. Even solo. Not 'some defenders were outpacing some blasters', but 'collectively, defenders outpaced blasters'.
This leaves us with a limited number of conclusions. Either everyone who was able to succeed viably with blasters was a very small number of unlikely elites surrounded by others who could not manage the AT, or most people who THOUGHT they were succeeding weren't succeeding as well as they thought, or some combination of the two
Arcana's assertion wasn't condescending, it was acceptance of the reality so far in the interests of trying to fix it.
But hey, this exchange is more supporting evidence that the best way to get condescension from Arcanaville is to throw stones at her when she's being factual and objective.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Softcapping an Invuln is fantastic. Softcapping a Willpower is amazing. Softcapping SR is kissing your sister.
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The all around best way is for me to quote you, and then for you to claim I was constructing a strawman by quoting you.|
Originally Posted by Void_Huntress
But hey, this exchange is more supporting evidence that the best way to get condescension from Arcanaville is to throw stones at her when she's being factual and objective.
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On the other hand, I don't think I'm over-reacting when someone suggests that I'm unaware of anything besides numbers and calculations:
Are you willing to concede my proof by counter-example, or should we continue this debate further?
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Forgive me for trying to get back on topic but...
Do Blasters simply need a total overhaul? They underperform as an AT. Many of their nukes cause crashes so bad that players are reluctant to take them. They have fewer secondary choices than any AT in the game (except Doms with whom they are tied at 7). Many of their secondary powers seem to be counterintuitive to how the AT works within the game. Defiance 2.0 is better but hardly the best way to update them. Mez is still an over-heavy burden in many players' opinions. Yet the Players love them.
So...there it is. Does the AT need some sort of ground-up overhaul? Many in one of the other Blaster threads claim that VEATs got a lot of what players were suggesting for Blasters. Ok...well VEATs certainly are popular but it's not like everyone ran to them in exclusion of all else. This fact, more than anything, tells me that the Blaster AT could survive just fine with a little luv and attention. A little bit of Defense or Mez resistance (less than VEATs got) certainly wouldn't destroy the Blaster AT.
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People exist who love racial supremacy, enemas, and Baconnaise. And, possibly, racially supremacist Baconnaise enemas. That doesn't make them right.
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Originally Posted by Comicsluvr
Forgive me for trying to get back on topic but...
Do Blasters simply need a total overhaul? They underperform as an AT. Many of their nukes cause crashes so bad that players are reluctant to take them. They have fewer secondary choices than any AT in the game (except Doms with whom they are tied at 7). Many of their secondary powers seem to be counterintuitive to how the AT works within the game. Defiance 2.0 is better but hardly the best way to update them. Mez is still an over-heavy burden in many players' opinions. Yet the Players love them. |
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Originally Posted by Kyria_Shirako
People exist who love racial supremacy, enemas, and Baconnaise. And, possibly, racially supremacist Baconnaise enemas. That doesn't make them right.
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Thanks for the wildest visual ever lol.
However you emphasized my point. Even with all the luv players seem to have for them do they need rebuilt? If it were a small tweak or something I'd say no. But the AT seems to have so many problems wouldn't it be better to start over? Or would the player backlash be so bad that there's no way to re-do the AT?
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I've had multiple visions for what I thought would be good redesign for Blasters... At first, I figured they should get better control abilities since it would keep to the offense theme while still being damage-focused, and the CoV came out and Dominators were created. Then I looked at Dominator Assault sets and thought "huh, that'd be a good start... Assault/Defense would make for a good Blaster surrogate, where the epic pools could be the massive AoE damage we lack in Assault...", and then VEATs came out. :/
I would love to see blasters fixed. They have always been my favorite AT (my first 50 was an En/En, way back in the day, and I'm currently leveling a Fire/Dark), but I can't get over the fact that every single one of my alts is more powerful, in aggregate, than any of my blasters.
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Eight years in, I suspect that to be the case.
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Originally Posted by Comicsluvr
Or would the player backlash be so bad that there's no way to re-do the AT?
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The AT's problems are hardly intractable. If you look at what has been happening recently the new Devs have been doing things with the new powersets that greatly improve the AT, all that can be applied to existing power sets without even violating the cottage rule.|
Originally Posted by Comicsluvr
Thanks for the wildest visual ever lol.
However you emphasized my point. Even with all the luv players seem to have for them do they need rebuilt? If it were a small tweak or something I'd say no. But the AT seems to have so many problems wouldn't it be better to start over? Or would the player backlash be so bad that there's no way to re-do the AT? |
Take 1 Dual Pistols.
This is a primary blaster powerset that has an armor power !!! The armor power is on a non crashing nuke no less.
Take 2 Dark Blast.
AoE control
AoE guaranteed KB
-To hit (effectively armor)
Self heal
Look at that.
Its amazing what we can get when Castle isn't doing the work.
Some of what needs to happen is that blast sets for blasters need to be different than blast sets for defenders and corruptors. In the later cases you are balancing sets for ATs that have team buff and survival tools, in the former you don't have any.
Take AR for blasters
Buckshot, M30 Grenade, change the chance of KB to just KD or KB. Personally I'd prefer KD, seeing as it would be consistent with conservation of momentum.
Change Slug's 25% chance of KB to 60% chance of KD
Full Auto: Expand the arc to between 35 and 45 degrees, increase the target cap to 16, Either change the way the damage is applied so you aren't stuck rooted for 4 seconds while the enemies can beat on you, or take the dual pistols and grant ranged defense while firing.
Slug, burst: Cut the recharge in half. This is a no brainer the set doesn't have 3 single target attacks, it doesn't have aim, and it has redraw problems from going outside the set. There is no reason it's only 2 single target attacks should have 8 and 4 second recharge times.
Blasters are fixable but it's work and trying to take a cheap way out the way defiance 2.0 did isn't going to cut it. The sets need to be looked at, and blasters need either top end single target damage (they should be able to kill a boss faster than a brute or a scrapper(they have to, they can't survive a boss nearly as long)) Or secondary effects in the set that extend their lifespan.
The other thing that won't cut it was papering over a lack of understanding that Castle was so fond of. He would always say "he liked to err on the side of two little so he could add more later". The problem was of course he would err on the side of nerfing to little for melee and buffing to little for ranged. You have to think he wasn't comfortable with range because either he didn't understand it and or was just applying formulas that are invalid in this game.
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Yes and no. Conceptually yes. But look at Stalkers. They just had a major "overhaul" that actually amounted to only a very small set of mechanical changes - but a huge conceptual one ("stalker performance should not rely on stealth mechanics").|
Originally Posted by Comicsluvr
Do Blasters simply need a total overhaul?
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Change one relatively simple thought, and lots of things become possible.
Just for example, think of what becomes possible if the Blaster archetype was defined this way: Blasters are the offensive powerhouses that specialize in defeating enemies while interfering with their ability to counter-attack.
That one small addition says Blasters should have short-duration offensive mitigation (controls, soft control, debuff) that degrades the ability for attackers to shoot at the Blaster while the Blaster is in the process of attacking them first. Offense as best Defense without having to one-shot everything. It changes everything: right now its unclear how much control and debuff *all* Blasters should have, *if any*. That one statement says exactly how much they should have, and more important it says all Blasters should have it, or else be compensated significantly for the lack of it.
Adding it would not require a complete overhaul of Blaster powersets. Conceptual overhauls do not require implementation overhauls.
Conceptual overhauls ask why things are the way they are, and whether that logic actually makes sense. Why does Elude last three minutes while Nova lasts three seconds? Why do they both crash? Is the logic reasonable given each other's existence? I'm not the first to ask those questions, but I have asked them in the past and I think its long overdue they have answers. The answers don't necessarily mandate radical changes, though.
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And yet: the devs still went out of their way to make Touch of Fear in Darkness Manipulation have 50% less intrinsic fear duration, which coupled with the fact that Scrappers have a higher fear modifier (because who knows why) makes Touch of Fear for Blasters only half the strength of ToF for Scrappers. That's factoring in the fact they *also* increased the recharge from 8s to 10s for Blasters, while simultaneously lowering the duration.|
Originally Posted by Another_Fan
The AT's problems are hardly intractable. If you look at what has been happening recently the new Devs have been doing things with the new powersets that greatly improve the AT, all that can be applied to existing power sets without even violating the cottage rule.
Take 1 Dual Pistols. This is a primary blaster powerset that has an armor power !!! The armor power is on a non crashing nuke no less. Take 2 Dark Blast. AoE control AoE guaranteed KB -To hit (effectively armor) Self heal Look at that. Its amazing what we can get when Castle isn't doing the work. |
The question is whether Dark Blast and Darkness Manipulation is the exception or the rule. I think its a little of both, but given there is still a prejudice that Blasters must not have strong counter-mez in melee suggests that what keeps Blasters down is not attributable to any one person. They've had issues through three separate powers leads including this one, although I think Blasters have the best shot with this one yet.
And keep in mind that the same dev team that is allowing Blasters to have Dark Blast is also buffing everything else commensurately higher, and not just individual powersets. Dark Blast alone is not going to help Blasters achieve the performance they need to have to fit into the modern conception of what the archetypes are supposed to achieve relative to each other.
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The game has changed....or not....irrelevant. Players have been asking for changes to blasters for pretty much forever. And not just little changes, but core mechanics changes too. The devs tried a couple things that have changed blasters, but have not "fixed" them, or the constant stream of change requests would have stopped.
they have not.
In short, blasters have been.... goofy ..... for pretty much forever in the eyes of many as evidenced by the endless requests.
Whether the game has changed and how is a discussion for AFTER the devs decide that indeed, it is time to change blasters and make them un-goofy. Even at such a time, it is my hope people will not use the past of the blaster AT as a basis for changes, or more importantly as a limiting factor on what can be changed, but instead look at the current game standards of the other AT's and create changes to fit the blaster to them. In such a discussion, what a blaster did for the last 7 years will be worthless, it is what the blaster WILL do, what players want it to do, going forward that is important. Sometimes getting people to think outside the 7 year old rut they are in is exponentially harder then the actual discussion about changes.
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