Ask Anything: Ranged Blast and Blaster Manipulation Changes
By
Abysmalyxia,
Posted on: 2012-06-21 13:45 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
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I don't think you'll regret dropping Aid Self to pick up sustain. Aid self is a 1.96 scale heal on the HealSelf table, which means it's healing you for 19.6% of your base max HP on use, before enhancements. It has a cast time of 3.33 seconds and an interrupt time of 1 second, meaning in an average off the cuff build it has a cycle time of about 13 seconds. That's an average of 1.5% health per second if you use it every time it comes off recharge and are never interrupted - but it also takes up 4.33 seconds per 13 seconds of possible animation time. Sustain powers will enhance to just around the same value of health per second, but will only require one fairly short animation per 60 seconds for clicks, or one animation ever for toggles, allowing you to use those 4.33 seconds for offensive output and mitigation via your own status effects. In short, this power will grant you slightly less health over time than using an enhanced Aid Self would if you used it as often as possible, but is costing you much much less to use in terms of DPS, endurance, and interruptibility.|
Originally Posted by Miladys_Knight
1) I have Aid Self on a majority of my blasters. It has 2 purposes that I use it for. One is the stun resistance granted by the power the other is to heal damage taken after combat.
Will the sustain power be roughly equal in utility to Aid Self? (I guess the real question is, will I regret dropping Aid Self to pick up sustain? If they aren't roughly equal the answer is probably a yes). |
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| If they are roughly equal would you consider adding the same amount of stun resistance to sustain so that we can pass up the medicine pool and take our secondary powers instead? |
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| 2) Myself and blaster players like me see mez as the single most debilitating issue for blasters and it is by definition NOT FUN because while you are mezzed you don't get to play. |
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Lets just say I'm not worried about boost range at the moment.
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Originally Posted by Tater Todd
Boost Range will be fine.
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+1 to giving Fast-snipe to Dominators upon Domination.
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Executioner's Shot|
Originally Posted by Zombie Man
Q: What are the powers getting the range boost? Are they just the ST ones? Are they just for Blasters?
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Lancer Shot
Power Burst
Blaze
Bitter Ice Blast
Cosmic Burst
Shout
All versions of the sets, so blasters, defenders and corruptors.
I know I'm not AH, but was discussed earlier in the tread and taken from the stream.
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Originally Posted by Forbin_Project
Then it's time for them to get off the cross, use the wood to build a bridge, and get over it.
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Oh, here's a question:
Would you consider adding some sustain factors or greater values into Blaster APPs? Namely the armors?
I've been thinking about how I have Charged Armor on all the time and I'd love for it to have the new benefits (obviously, I understand we need the benefits at LOW LEVELS not just later on), but I was wondering if those Blaster APP armors could have further benefits along those lines? Or just higher values?
It'd be great if, somehow, those armors could just automatically turn on the new sustain benefits you've added. I imagine that is entirely unfeasible though.
@Zethustra
"Now at midnight all the agents and the superhuman crew come out
and round up everyone that knows more than they do"-Dylan
and round up everyone that knows more than they do"-Dylan
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As an example, say you had a blaster-general mod for +Recovery; all blaster ATs get a blanket 95% of any power that applied a +Recovery, compared to say 120% for defenders. (I don't know what the actual numbers, are, or if there actually is an AT-general mod for +Recovery, I'm just using this as an example.)|
Originally Posted by Kyriani
Can you explain that a bit more in detail? As in, is it not simply a matter of changing a number value for a specific power for a specific AT? And would it be so bad to up those values?
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So let's say you increased the +Recovery for blasters from .95 to 1.05.
Congratulations! You just made Drain Psyche even better!
A simplistic example, but the general point is that modifying an AT-general modifier changes every power in that AT, even if a power doesn't really need the modification. And if you're going to have to modify individual powers in addition to a general modifier, why not just eliminate the middleman and only modify the powers?
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Pauper
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Strictly hypothetically speaking, that's one option. That's what I opted to do with Resilience in Regeneration, for instance - a power that I felt was hard to justify using a build slot on AND in a powerset that needed some help. Part of me would rather find something to do with the power that makes it stand out/feel more unique, but this may ultimately be what we end up doing with it.|
Originally Posted by Kyriani
I have a few questions I hope don't get too lost in shuffle overnight...
1) Since Body Armor from the munitions APP is of much lower base value compared to the toggle shields in other APPs, would it be possible to make Body Armor cover all forms of damage and not just s/l? that would certainly give some incentive to take Munitions IMO. |
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2) Earlier you said: Can you explain that a bit more in detail? As in, is it not simply a matter of changing a number value for a specific power for a specific AT? And would it be so bad to up those values? Since you're trying to shore up Blaster survival, if Blasters generally had a higher mod for defensive/buff powers (stuff like combat jumping, maneuvers, tactics, etc) than they currently do, wouldn't upping the base values help a bit? The base numbers they have right now are so pitifully low that even enhanced to the ED cap they are very lackluster. |
Or that, too. 
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Pauper
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It will definitely take Heal sets. I believe the only sustain power which takes Accurate Heal IO sets is Touch of the Beyond, because all of the other powers work even if they don't land their hit roll (though it does have a high base accuracy of 1.2, and a recharge of only 10 seconds, so it's very easy to keep your buff up with it.)
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Originally Posted by StratoNexus
Will Cauterizing Aura take both Heal and Accurate Heal IO sets?
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The +Rec on the new powers is quite sizeable, and in many cases Endurance costs for the powers required have been reduced or eliminated. We felt it didn't make a ton of sense to spend endurance to get Recovery in these powers.
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Originally Posted by Kiriel
Please make sure the +rec bonus on the 'new' power is large enough to overcome the end cost, or lower the end cost on the powers. Adding a 0.78 end/s toggle for a modest self heal (blazing aura) isn't going to help most blasters.
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Death Shroud, like Electric's damage aura, comes at level 4, which is earlier than we wanted to put these powers within the cadence of the powersets. You only need to use Touch of the Beyond once every 60 seconds, and you may even find that the mitigation from Fear also helps you stay alive, especially now that you can use it at an 80 foot range.
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Originally Posted by Tannim222
Also Dark Manipulation should be able to use Death Shroud instead of a single target attack that could end up forcing the player to lose out on a good alpha strike attack, or lowering dps in prolonged fights due to interupting attack chains in order to make sure their buff is up. The down side of this is the current design may allow for those powers to have higher values that would go down due to being changed to an always available toggle buff.
Which is why we need to test it |
Another APP question: the blaster max max health cap is about +34.6% Hoarfrost buffs max health by +30% and is enhanceable. It offers very marginal benefit beyond its heal if you have +health accolades, and its +maxhealth enhanceability is essentially worthless with or without health accolades. Would it be reasonable to consider switching hoarfrost from a +maxhealth buff to an absorb shield so blasters could benefit from that power without having to tamper with the blaster health cap? As an absorb shield it could still be very strong, independent of maxhealth.
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This would be excellent, especially considering how the Ice Manipulation Sustain power will provide Absorb.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Another APP question: the blaster max max health cap is about +34.6% Hoarfrost buffs max health by +30% and is enhanceable. It offers very marginal benefit beyond its heal if you have +health accolades, and its +maxhealth enhanceability is essentially worthless with or without health accolades. Would it be reasonable to consider switching hoarfrost from a +maxhealth buff to an absorb shield so blasters could benefit from that power without having to tamper with the blaster health cap? As an absorb shield it could still be very strong, independent of maxhealth.
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"Dark Armor is a complete waste as a tanking set."
I posited this question in another thread, but I'll ask it here. Have you considered, (if at all possible) that instead of tying all snipes to to-hit buffs, which since blasters are more vulnerable to getting hit and thus getting debuffed, can cause them to lose their to-hit buff quick snipe, making them charge-up?
Say as long as a player has Snipe clicked down, the damage of Snipe will increase until it's maximum timer forces it to trigger. The power can remain interruptable, so it may warrant a slightly higher DPA than a quick click attack would.
Also, will the click-to-sustain powers be usuable prior to an attack? I know that Drain Psyche isn't changing, but what about the Lightning Clap change, and the ToF change?
For that matter, if ToF will require a target, can it be made corpse clickable too?
Will they be changed to fire through mez?
And finally, will the click powers still be equal to the toggles or have slightly higher values?
Thanks!
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According to the stream, Lightning Clap will be usable without targets to get sustain, and according to Arbiter Hawk above ToF will still need a target, but is becoming an 80 foot range attack.
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Originally Posted by Tannim222
Also, will the click-to-sustain powers be usuable prior to an attack? I know that Drain Psyche isn't changing, but what about the Lightning Clap change, and the ToF change?
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Hmm, so does that mean that ToF will be the only sustain power that simply doesn't work 5% of the time?|
Originally Posted by Arcanaville
According to the stream, Lightning Clap will be usable without targets to get sustain, and according to Arbiter Hawk above ToF will still need a target, but is becoming an 80 foot range attack.
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At least it's only on a 10 second recharge, so that isn't too bad.
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If you activate the power at 45 seconds, the clock starts back at 0. The Regen/Recovery attributes of the power Replace themselves instead of stacking, meaning they will still be applied if you use the power again, but overwrite the copies that were there before.
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Originally Posted by BigBlackAfrica
You said in the coffee talk that the sustainability powers would not stack. Does that mean that the click powers need to be activated every 60sec or will a new activation after 45sec restart the the clock at zero?
I only ask because some of the language used to describe how they work seems to imply that the power lasts for 60sec and then needs to be recast. Other times it seems like the counter will reset with each new casting regardless of whether the 60sec duration has expired. |
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Well Drain Psyche also requires targets to work (although personally I'm hoping that changes before this goes live).
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Originally Posted by Codewalker
Hmm, so does that mean that ToF will be the only sustain power that simply doesn't work 5% of the time?
At least it's only on a 10 second recharge, so that isn't too bad. |
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Someday, maybe. |
Originally Posted by St_Angelius
Oooooo, that seem interesting. Toggle on, Time bomb drops. Toggles runs for 15 second and Time bomb explodes and toggle ends. Drop toggle early, time bomb explodes. Maybe make it so the explosion hurts the caster to discourage toggling on and off straght away and at least having to retreat first.
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Edit - minus the self damage, I wouldn't inflict that on Devices.
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Originally Posted by Arbiter Hawk
Hi all!
Theres been a lot of discussion about the upcoming changes both to Blast sets and to the Blaster AT, and I wanted to try a fun kind of thread that can both centralize discussion about them and give you all some insight into when we make changes, and why we choose the changes we do. So, from now until 5 PM pacific today, Ill be here on this thread answering any questions you have about any of the upcoming changes! I probably wont be able to get to every single question, and I wont be talking about any additional unannounced features for Issue 24, but feel free to ask me anything about Archetypes, existing powersets, or game balance. Thanks, and looking forward to this discussion! -Arbiter Hawk |
Mind if I ask what those upcoming changes are? I haven't seen a written word about anything like that.
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Summary is here, or check out Wednesday's coffee talk on twitch tv:|
Originally Posted by Hydrofoil_Zero
Mind if I ask what those upcoming changes are? I haven't seen a written word about anything like that.
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http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=291665
This is my short argument for LAM being counted among the other snipes as insta if at 22% to-hit.
I've been told the point of the snipe changes are to make them useful while in combat, but LAM's recharge is tremendous anyway. Presently, unless you use it at the start of a fight, you don't really have any reason to use it in that engagement. Allowing it to be insta would be a small buff, but not much of one. Just enough to allow it's regular use in combat.
Though while we're talking about buffs to Munitions, if Sleep Grenade had its damage component removed I'd be pleased.
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Speaking of devices. Is it possible for the engine to tell specifically if you're in combat or not and redirect to a different power if you are? For example a faster animating trip mine or time bomb that just goes off when used but does far less damage than normal when in combat but you can still use them as normal out of combat?|
Originally Posted by Arbiter Hawk
Edit - minus the self damage, I wouldn't inflict that on Devices.
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Or do you have to use a a mechanic through another power like hidden and assassin's strike?
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Sadly, this is not possible within the scope of what our game can do. It's a cool idea - "The better my aim, the less time it takes to line up a shot!", but it's just not something our animation system is capable of.
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Originally Posted by Thunder Knight
I didn't see if this was asked or answered, so my apologies for repeating someone else's suggestion.... but any chance of making the Snipe activation scaling rather than all-or-nothing?
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Q: What are the powers getting the range boost? Are they just the ST ones? Are they just for Blasters?
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