Enhancement Proc Changes

Releasing a new issue is a completely different animal than changing a system that's been in place for 5 years without (significant) complaint and you know it. Don't try to pretend they're the same thing.

I stand by what I said. Generally when something in the game is 'fixed' the community has a pretty good idea that it's coming. Either because the developers have mentioned it (the recent change to HOs for example) or because it's something people have complained about. The change to procs is the exception to the rule.

Are the devs required to change only things we knew about beforehand? Of course not. But most of the time we do know about them, so when something comes out of left field like this, I can understand why people want to know why it's being changed, when for 5 years, as far as the players were concerned, procs were working fine.

within a week or so after the patch that supposedly fixed it i heard it was broken again, i havent recently tested to see if it is still broken though (cause this proc was supposedly fixed 2 other times but it never was)

That's a pretty straightforward summary of the situation, yes.

In addition, considering no official thread exists regarding complaints about the SBE proc changes to those who spent money on them, all of those here who are telling others to leave this thread and go talk to Black Pebble are behaving no differently than someone telling a homeless person to get off the streets and if they got a problem with their situation to go talk to the president, all the while knowing fully well that neither of those things can be achieved, at best, easily. If this scenario were even a glimmer in Black Pebble's eye, he'd have said something by now and there would be an official topic for that discussion already created. Truth be told, they just want the people with those complaints to leave so they can disperse them enough to get away with doing nothing. So yes, Synapse has nothing to do with the market. But the one who does clearly doesn't care about this situation, largely because caring will only make it far worse.

Sorry, BP - I have nothing against you but it's pretty much a given at this point that I'm not making this up. Clearly it is easier to do nothing and accept future losses by a vocal minority than to draw attention to the matter by getting involved, since most of the players out there don't even know about this, and causing a PR disaster. Yes, I remember Lighthouse. I am only too aware about what kind of a powder keg these scenarios can turn into by acknowledging a concern and, quite honestly, I feel sorry for you because there is no way to be a good guy about it right now.

So if everyone plans on continuing to attack each other, then let's at least be honest about the situation and quit sugar-coating it with falsehoods.

My own position stands - I am going to take advantage of whatever loophole is left unaccounted for in this new system that Synapse is putting together, so I any losses I incur at this point are acceptable. For many others, that is not the case and I sympathize with them.

They wanted to. The original version of PPM would have nerfed more people than the one they're working on now, so they didn't do it. They told us this. So they attached PPM to attuned procs instead, and left the existing ones alone.

Then people in the beta forums in particular complained about how much better PPM was than standard procs, and started requesting a middle-road solution. This combination apparently compelled them to go back and look harder at how to both tone down PPM and make its low end look more like flat-rate procs.

Go ahead and post your mids data chunk for me. I already did an example at the most extreme example of recharge, let's see how a real PvP build will be effected.

I've already worked it out for myself, but thanks for the offer. I'd like to see Synapse himself none the less post a version of how this change will affect things negatively.

One of us is confused here. The only process in hecatomb is the 6th IO that gives a 33% chance to cause moderate negative energy damage to your targets.

There are no other processes in the set. So I'm understanding that your upset that that 33% chance for extra damage will be limited to happening only some unknown number of times per minute after this change? Note it was only a 33% chance to fire anyway a good chance ye 1/3 chance every hit. Nice but ....

Thing is, this wasn't an entirely altruistic endevor.

Just about every Fire blast build I've seen, for PvP, would lose between 3%-10% in combined proc rates between Flares and Fire Blast. They'd gain in the area of 20% proc rate for Blaze.

That appears to be a net-positive to me.

I'm really not sure that explains it. I'm not arguing that they would try to develop pay to win strategies. It's clear that they will. But why waste the development effort on developing a whole new proc system just to implement pay to win procs in the real money store when they could have just put the same flat chance procs we have now in there but increased the chance to trigger. Same end result, lots less work.

If he bought it from the store, it's a PPM proc, not a flat 33%. And today, the proc rate is a function of base recharge, where in I24 it will be based on enhanced recharge. PPM procs are being nerfed, no doubt, and Paragon as a whole hasn't done a very customer friendly job of mingling sale of these items with feedback.

Feedback was posted in the I22 beta forums saying that things like purple PPM procs seemed too good to be true, yet they went on into the Paragon Market unchanged, and now a future downgrade is pending.

Why is it so hard to imagine that they wanted to improve the overall behavior of the proc system? Especially when they told us they were trying to.

Because Pay to win isn't the intent, no matter how much people scream it.

They wanted a type of proc that was effective, regardless of the cycle time of the power it's put into. There it was intended for the procs (PPM and flat %) to be roughly equal in performance, but when it was obvious that wasn't going to happen, they had to drop one of them.

Because the PPM mechanic was specifically intended to be comprable in performance to the flat %, they couldn't both exist if that wasn't the case. PPM is more fair to more powers and appears to have fewer balance idiosyncrasies, so the flat % procs get the boot.

Sure, why not.

Which sure sounds like you're working based on the model in Synapse's first post, where global recharge affects proc rates. Which isn't a part of the current proposal, among other changes.

Or, to put it another way, when you sound like you're making the same arguments again that Synapse already heard, *agreed with*, and made changes based upon, people aren't likely to be impressed.

Oh, and people do have a problem with the old formula. Namely that some procs were totally worthless under it. This system will make procs more powerful in all sorts of places. (Including, but not limited to, any single-target power with a without-global-recharge cycle time much longer than 3.2 seconds. Oddly, I seem to recall having such powers in a lot of my builds.)

-Morgan.

We really have no idea what the overall intent is. While it is really nice that Synapse was wiling to address our concerns and soften the impact of the changes, thinking that we know the overall intent or this wasn't part of other changes coming down the pike is nothing but wishful thinking.

The fact that they have a strong sense of ethics is why they make the changes. It would be bad to not go through and fix problems and potential problems when found.

Oh and I suspect that less than 10% of the people buying SBE's do so for the proc. Most have other reasons so little will change with their sales.

Just wanted to say thanks! This thread has me really looking forward to the changes - a 'proc overall' was something we needed but I never dared think would happen.

Any chance while you're at it you could convert the stupefy proc from knockBACK to knockDOWN ?

Energy Manipulator: Chance to stun is also a 10%, IIRC.

Tempest: Chance of End Drain could use some balance love (not on rate, but on effect, iirc).

Pounding Slugfest: Chance for Stun is another 10%er I think.

Also Triumphant Insult: Chance to Stun.

I'd love to see a lot of these low level "trash" procs become useful and/or desireable... it seems to me like a proc in general should always have a compelling reason for usage. Otherwise, why make it?

Synapse stated in this thread that was how he was planning to have it work.

By that logic, Recharge SOs shouldn't affect the proc rate either, because Damage SOs don't alter the damage, and Accuracy SOs don't alter the proc cap.

He's saying he bought the sbe version which has 4.5 ppm in the power he slotted it into it would have gone off 100% of the time but imo a 4.5ppm is wasted in KO blow a 2.5 ppm proc would go off 100% of the time as well I would pput that 4.5ppm in a power with a base recharge of 13.33 seconds instead not that it will matter after i24...

Huh. Thanks. I missed that.

*Sigh*

Me:

Synapse responding to that post of mine:

Certain procs being worthless under the old formula is a kind of fair argument for the change, I guess. Some procs were bad with the old system because of how weak they were designed, but as you said, longer recharge powers made procs less worth slotting. That gives me more reason for why there is a good change to the system with this.

However, the old system was a lot more clear and easy to follow. PPM and how it is described with procs is terribly done and confusing, and not all entirely because of the language associated with them. "Procs 20 or 30% of the time" is a lot easier to grasp than all the formulating going behind this change. I suppose it's inevitable to balance how differently recharged things are, but I guess I didn't have an issue with procs going more in low recharge powers and less in long recharge ones.

Is there any worry that this change will make procs TOO powerful? I see some of the rates being quoted using the formula, and they seem ridiculously high. Maybe it's just my background with procs, but having a better chance for it to go off than not (or almost 100%) seems a bit on the strong side. Just curious.

LOL. I have some nice bottom land in the everglades for you. Real reasonable prices