New Powers or New Animations?

I had a discussion with Synapse about this not long ago. My stance was that we need new animations for old powers as much as we need new power sets. He didn't really agree, and said that it only takes about a week longer to make a full power set than it does to just do alternate animations.

I see powers like TW and Staff and get where he is coming from. Then I look at Street Justice, which is my all time favorite set, and wonder if those animations had been offered as alternates for MA if the set would have been needed? I think yes, and Street Justice was a good call.

I can also see where new power sets being made is job security for Synapse. I am good with that, he is my favorite dev, and I don't want to see him go anywhere.

However I am still looking at animations for BS, Claws, and several other melee sets, as well as the ranged sets, and what I see are weak and unimaginative animations compared to everything made after Dual Blades. Even when they did offer alternate animations, well, they were not very good.

So I am curious as to what others think. Would you want to see more all new powers, or alternate animations for current power sets?

I would even be willing to pay for alternate animation sets in the store. Say 600 points for a pack that has alternate animations for all of the claws powers, or power of your choice. Yes, yes I want to get stuff for free, but I also see where things are more likely to get done if we pay for it. That is just how the world works, sorry.

My take is purely selfish. I'm someone who only plays one character, a Broadsword user, so I would pay double the price of a new power set for a rehash of the Broadsword animations. They're currently good for what they are as brute chops and slices - But seeing the changes for Katana so long ago, plus the Titan Weapon and Staff animations, makes me feel we could do better by adding a bit more "flash" to the powers without taking away any "oomph."

I'd also prefer an alternate generic "magical" blast animation for the Blast/Ranged sets rather than a brand new powerset. I can't count how many magic users I've encountered on Virtue who would be happy to swap the animation for their fire or ice sets for some more magical looking attacks. Even the Banished Pantheon's Sorrow mobs, who use Radiation, look a bit.. I don't know, "tech-ish." It's a bit jarring to see them using the same animations as, say, Crey, or Anti-Matter. Now that we have Magical Burst as a model magical PBAoE, and Rune of Warding/Purification for ranged damage we've got a nice foundation of ideas to add a few magical alternative animations.

The major plus side to alternative animations versus new powersets is that you don't have to reroll your favorite character(s) when something more suited to their concept rolls along.

I'd pay 400 PP for new animation sets per power set. I'm a terrible, terrible altoholic and more than that would break me.

I find the newer powersets seem to be excuses to try out new gimmicks, because there isn't much new ground to cover mechanically that hasn't already been done. And since I find the new mechanics more than a bit tiresome, I'd prefer to see the new animations linked to an older set with less annoying (more straightforward) mechanics.

Right now, I'd say new animations.

Edit:


I say this because sometimes I go back and think about making a new toon with x power set but then remember/see the old boring animations and then I'm like...."mmm...maybe later..."





Like if I made a toon with the Axe power set and then wanted to make a new toon with the War Mace power set...oh look same animations for all the powers! How fun! NOT! hehe

there are only a few cases where I want alternate animations: swords and breath generally.

I either want a fire guy to use a fire sword or flaming fists, not alternate
and I want fire to come out of his hands or his mouth and not alternate

but choosing between 2 different punches doesn't really interest me.

And I can 100% guarantee that releasing alternate animations to fire melee will not cause Atlas Park to be flooded with new fire melee characters. Whereas each new powerset does generate a ton of new characters.

So I have to go with new powerset

I'd certainly like origin based animations for certain powers. This would certainly work for NPC foes as well as players. I kinda don't like how some of the Banished Pantheon seem to have radiation based attacks. It just seems to wrong!

I see it like this - make a new powerset and those animations are stuck there. Whereas if you make new animations then a lot of existing powersets can take advantage of them. For example, the animations in Street Justice could have been used for Martial Arts as well as individual powers in other melee, manipulation and assault sets.

No, I don't think they're a waste of time! I might actually enjoy using some of the blast sets other than Dual Pistols (which looses out to being such weak DPS) and even buy them if they're sets like Beam Rifle, if the animations weren't more than "stand there and hold out a hand" blasts.

I think New Animations are just as important as New Powers. You move forward, but you don't forget the older powers because like cars, they need tweaks, changes, and modifications to make them better. This obviously would be done over time, but it could be done given the expertise they have developed over 7 years of time.

I'm not a programmer, and I know it takes a lot of work, but there is experience there that hopefully could offset that.

The truth is, I'd pay for "premium" versions of old power sets if the animations and mechanics were improved.

SS, MA, Broadsword, Mace, Axe, all of these could use a facelift and modern mechanics.

I'd also pay for a pass to add "emanation points" to the old Blast sets: Be able to fire the all the attacks from your head, eyes, chest, from a gun, from a rifle, from a wand, etc.


.

Lots of old sets need to be looked at mechanically too; Synapse definitely has a job to do.

Energy Melee? Kheldians?

I have friends who love their characters and don't want to roll alts. I know this is something that would appeal to them as well. I feel it is something else that is going untapped in the Paragon Market.

Really I think how the players latched onto customization, and the fact that this game became the leader of character customization took the original devs by surprise.

We love our characters, and anything that makes them look different makes the game better to us. With new animations I could play through the game with old sets that seem new because they look different.

from the perspective of a Katana player who started his character when the set was still using borrowed animations from Broadsword let me emphatically vote for ANIMATIONS.

And I picked up my long abandoned ma/sr character when MA got its animation revamp and had a great time with him.


Great new animations completely rejuvenate the way characters play.
I like new powersets too, but don't underestimate the rejuvenating power of fresh animations.

Id like them to go back and do a few alternate options for almost every power that isnt melee or defense. So all ranged, control, buff and blast(minus Dual pistols, archery AR, traps etc). It doesnt even have to be terribly unique for each set. Basically id like to see an alternate that makes the power:

Shoot from a gun, both pistol and rifle
Shoot from a wand/staff

This would really open up alot of possibilities imo. Redraw could be reduced. For example if you wanted to be a Energy Rifle/Kin defender. If you could use your rifle to shoot the boffs and debuffs then you woudlnt have to redraw to shoot. Moreover it would give players more flexibility as to the origin of their powers.

Also, in addition to "rifle" it would be nice if we could get an alternate that mobs have, using the mminigun animation stance? Like the boomers etc. That way we can also open up some of the mob weapons we havent been able to get.

Also, I would love to see alternate pet models, but thats really reaching most likely.

I'll throw my hat into the New Animations vote. For me, new animations for current powersets can breathe new life into them, making them seem new all over again. Makes me wish the devs would dedicate an issue to revamping current material vs. adding new one content. Maybe call it "Everything old is new again"

Old powersets sucks when compared with newest. Visually.

The new powersets got awesome animations, more fluid, less tedious activations time, unique mechanics, customizable VFX even for weapons sets...

Old ones got ugly VFX (Blazing aura pixelated fart from hell, all the darkness powers specially with the skull...), same animations for most of the elemental melee sets (same basic punches with different FX), awful activations time and tedious animations (Thunderstrike,Total focus...) and cloned weaponed sets too (Broadsword,maze and axe are basicly the same powerset).

We definitely need some kind of revamp,update or power reskin for the older sets even if we have to buy it from store.
We been needed the new melee sets like StJ,TW and SF... But some of the older characters want some love too.

If they offered new versions of each elemental blaster primary but with different origination points and weapon customization (staff (tech/magic), pistol/wand, and optic), I would buy it on day one. Wouldn't matter if the powers are essentially the same as existing sets, the new origination points open up all sorts of character concepts. The original set of alternate animations for blasters were a major letdown.

Both, but...

...I am greedy and would like auras attached to projectiles too. Arrows that streak fire, lightning bolts that emit psi waves, etc. I'm not sure how well it would work but it would be most lovely.

My free points seem to be going towards costumes. I've actually only bought one power set: Beam Rifle. I'm having some fun with Dark Controllers though.

Yeah, Claws and the various weapons sets are kind of fixed.

Triumph: White Succubus: 50 Ill/Emp/PF Snow Globe: 50 Ice/FF/Ice Strobe: 50 PB Shi Otomi: 50 Ninja/Ninjistu/GW Stalker My other characters