Discussion: Intrepid Informer 24: Nature Affinity

Introduction

Hello City of Heroes community! Today I'm going to be introducing a new support set: Nature Affinity! This power set is a Primary powerset choice for Defenders and a Secondary powerset choice for Controllers, Corruptors and Masterminds. Nature Affinity focuses on providing mid range support for both the user and their team mates. They even empower the healing power of everyone on their team. I'd like to go into greater detail with the powers found within the Nature Affinity set, but first I'd like to explain this set's new mechanic.

Bloom

Nature Affinity brings a new secondary buff to the table. All of Nature Affinity's buffs and heals put a stack (or stacks) of Bloom on the target. Each stack improves the effectiveness of healing powers on that target by 4% per stack. Bloom can stack up to 5 times (for a total of 20% additional healing). This means an Empathy Defender or Controller's heals are more powerful on targets affected by Bloom. Additionally, characters that rely on self healing (like Regeneration) can benefit from Bloom when they use self heals like Reconstruction and Dull Pain.

Bloom in a nutshell:

• Buffs/Heals in the set grant affected targets a stack (or multiple stacks) of Bloom
• Bloom stacks up to 5 times
• Each stack improves healing on that target by 4% for 30 seconds

Powers

Below is a detailed list of all the powers contained within Nature Affinity along with their short and help descriptions as well as some designer comments for each of the powers within the set.

Nature Affinity

You have command over the forces of nature and are able to call forth primal energies to aid your allies and hinder your foes. Many of your powers place a Bloom effect on you and your allies. Each stack of Bloom boosts healing effects on the affected targets by a 4% for 30 seconds. Bloom can stack up to 5 times.

Corrosive Enzymes
Ranged, Foe -Res(All), -DMG(All)
You spray a target with toxic, corrosive Enzymes reducing the damage they deal as well as their damage resistance. Recharge: Slow
Designer's Comments: This power is a useful debuff for guaranteeing that your target will suffer additional damage and will deal less damage. It combined with the other damage mitigation tools can really add up.

Regrowth
Ranged Facing Cone, Minor Ally Heal, Ally Moderate Healing Over Time, +1 Bloom
By channeling the energies present in nature you are able to immediately heal yourself and allies in front of you for a small amount of health and cause them to recover a small amount of health over time. Regrowth places a stack of Bloom on its target. Recharge: Moderate
Designer's Comments: One of my goals with Nature Affinity was to make sure you could use nearly all the powers within this set when playing solo. Regrowth is an example of that. It allows you to heal allies within a broad cone in front of you and also heal yourself. It also grants a stack of Bloom.

Wild Growth
PBAoE, Team +Res(All), +Regen, +2 Bloom
You channel the power of nature into your allies allowing them to more easily shrug off damage and causing their wounds to heal more quickly. Wild Growth increases the damage resistance and boosts the regeneration rate of all affected allies. This power also grants 2 stacks of Bloom. Recharge: Very Long
Designer's Comments: Wild Growth is a survivability boosting power. It grants a significant boost to regeneration and a pretty hefty boost to damage resistance as well. Firing this off before a tough fight can guarantee some increased survivability over time.

Spore Cloud
Toggle (Targeted AoE), Foe -Dmg(All), -To Hit, -Regen
You create a large cloud of toxic spores around your targeted foe. The target and all nearby foes will have their damage output, chance to hit and regeneration rate reduced. Recharge: Long
Designer's Comments: Spore Cloud adds additional survivability to your team by causing the targeted foe and nearby foes to have their damage and to hit reduced, ultimately reducing incoming damage. As an added perk the targets' regeneration rate is decreased moderately.

Lifegiving Spores
Toggle (Location AoE), PBAoE +Minor Heal Over Time, +Endurance
When activating this power you cause all allies at a selected location to recover a small amount of health and endurance every few seconds as long as they remain within the Lifegiving Spores. Recharge: Very Fast
Designer's Comments: Lifegiving Spires is a pretty unique power. It allows the player to designate a location where players can stand to receive a small amount of healing over time and a boost to endurance every few seconds. What is especially nice is that this power's recharge is quick enough to make sure you can use it every encounter. Its endurance cost is also minimized or removed altogether provided the caster stands within it.

Wild Bastion
PBAoE, Team +Absorb, +Heal Over Time, +3 Bloom
You encase yourself and nearby allies in a protective barrier that will absorb a moderate amount of damage. Additionally, affected allies will heal for a portion of their health over time. Wild Bastion places 3 stacks of Bloom on all affected targets. Recharge: Very Long
Designer's Comments: This power is intended to help a team recover from a tricky situation. Your team will receive a good amount of damage absorption and a pretty sizeable heal over time.

Rebirth
Ranged, Ally Rez, +Heal Over Time, Special, +3 Bloom
Rebirth can either greatly heal a conscious ally for a large amount of health over time or it can revive a fallen ally with a large amount of health and endurance and cause them to recover health over time. This power also grants 3 stacks of Bloom. Recharge: Very Long
Designer's Comments: Rebirth is another unique power. It functions as both a mega heal and a revive power. Its recharge is fairly long though, so you should be thoughtful regarding its use. Rebirth is the only power in the set that cannot be used while solo.

Entangling Aura
Toggle, Foe Hold
While this power is active there is a high chance that entangling vines will grasp nearby foes and render them held for a short time. Recharge: Fast
Designer's Comments: Entangling Aura is intended to help mitigate damage when enemies inevitably come charging your way. Primarily Nature Affinity was designed to heal and buff from a distance, but if things go awry Entangling Aura can help prevent some damage from weaker enemies.

Overgrowth
PBAoE, Team +Damage, +To Hit, +Endurance Discount, +5 Bloom
Becoming a conduit of nature itself, you greatly boost the damage, to hit and endurance discount of nearby allies for a long period of time. Overgrowth also grants the affected targets 5 stacks of Bloom. Recharge: Very Long
Designer's Comments: Not only does Overgrowth make sure you give all affected targets 5 stacks of Bloom (which translates to +20% healing), but it also grants a sizeable damage and to hit buff as well as a good endurance discount to all nearby allies. Use it before a big fight to make sure team mates don't run out of endurance and deal plenty of damage.

Tips and Tricks

Below are some tips and tricks for Nature Affinity users that will hopefully get you started. As always this section isn't intended to be the definitive method for playing the power set, but will hopefully give you some insight into its design. I'm sure you'll find your own ideal way of playing this set over time.

• Mid Range Support!
  • Nature Affinity was originally conceptualized as a mid range support set. This means you place your yourself within maximum range of Regrowth (45 feet) and your allies, and fire that heal off whenever you can. Meanwhile in between Regrowth you can blast or control (depending on your archetype), weaken enemies with Spore Cloud and Corrosive Sap and deploy Lifegiving Spores in the thick of combat.
• Know when to use your cooldowns
  • Nature Affinity has a few incredible powers that have a very long recharge time. So, you'll need to know when to use Wild Growth, Wild Bastion and Overgrowth.
  • Wild Growth is typically best to use before a dangerous encounter, but there may be situations where it is needed mid combat as well.
  • Wild Bastion is great before and after combat. It can be used to prepare for an intense battle or used to recover from a large amount of sudden damage.
  • Overgrowth is intended to be used before a fight where burst damage is key to victory.
• Tricky Powers
  • Regrowth: This power is a little different than you're likely used to. It's a player facing cone, much like Vorpal Judgement, it will heal allies in the direction you're facing. As an added bonus, it also heals you! So make sure you're facing your intended allies before using it.
  • Lifegiving Spores: This power can be used to make sure you are less likely to run out of endurance, or it can be placed in the thick of combat where your allies might need a little healing over time. Fortunately its recharge time is very short, so you can move it around as needed. Its healing over time and endurance healing effects might seem small, but over time its benefits can add up.
  • Rebirth: Do you use it to revive a fallen ally? Or do you use it to heal a seriously wounded team mate? The choice is yours. Keep in mind though that is has a fairly long recharge time. Use it carefully.
  • Entangling Aura: You might be thinking "What is a Choking Cloud-like power doing in a Mid Range Support set?" The answer to that is self preservation. Rarely do battles go exactly as planned. Sometimes enemies might slip past your stalwart Tanker or the controlling powers of your Dominator or Controller team mates. You might end up face to face with a horde of minions and lieutenants. That's where Entangling Aura comes into play. It can hold your foes long enough for you to withdraw to a safer location.

Conclusion

I had a lot of fun designing this power set. The goals here were to create something new and different, but not introduce an overwhelming amount of new mechanics. I also wanted to make sure you could play well solo or with a team. Also our FX team really outdid themselves on this powerset. The visuals are top notch and nothing like you'll currently see in game. On these points I feel Nature Affinity truly delivers. We've wanted to make a Nature themed support set for a long time now, and we're pleased we finally get to deliver it to you in the Paragon Market soon! As always I look forward to the new themes, character concepts and insane builds you're likely to come up with. See you in City of Heroes!

Phil "Synapse" Zeleski

Oh my. Can this come out for Double XP Weekend...pretty please, with a cherry on top????

Lisa-Still dazzled by the issue 24 overview page.

Probably not. They like to give us a weeks warning of new powersets, and DXP is this weekend.

Blood Widow Ricki * Tide Shifter * T-34 * Opposite Reaction * Shaolin Midnight * ChernobylCheerleader

Entropy Legion * Hyperion Force * Hero Heights

...where are you seeing it's coming in 24? it says coming tot he market 'soon', it doesn't mention I24 anywhere.

I think he misread part of the title, "Intrepid Informer 24," as "Issue 24".

Meanwhile... I didn't realize Nature Affinity was considered "finished" in beta testing.

Last we heard in the beta feedback thread was to try out changes to Lifegiving Spores to make sure it was useful and that we could expect more feedback/discussion once Bio Armor's thread calmed down. There was still plenty of discussion after that point on the usefulness of Lifegiving Spores and Entangling Aura. I mean... I would have appreciated being told that the set was considered "ready for live" long before then.

Trickshooter's Characters | @Trickshooter @Brightside

I thought those heals are flagged as unresistable so they wouldn't be affected by bloom. Are those flags being removed or does bloom work differently?

I THINK Rebirth is the only power that effects only an ally. Everything else is AoE or PBAoE, though I am not positive about Wild Growth. So drop the patch on top of yourself.

Bio Armor went through extensive discussion and changes on beta. We were even told when it was considered "ready for live."

The only changes we saw in the Nature Affinity thread were brought up June 22, and the last time a red name really posted in the thread was on June 28, and that was Synapse saying he would get back to the Nature Affinity thread once Bio Armor wasn't keeping him busy.

I'm not saying Nature Affinity isn't good enough to go live. It was probably 80% there the day it became available for testing. But if those changes we were told about late-June were going to be the last changes, I would have liked to have been told they considered the set "ready for live" as well, because many people, myself included, were under the impression that there was still time for changes to be made.

The set's great, I just wish there had been more communication for those of us more interested in this set, rather than Bio Armor.

Trickshooter's Characters | @Trickshooter @Brightside

No Informer article on it yet, the last powerset to get one was Water Blast. It's possible Nature got moved up for exactly the reason you're describing... because it needed less revision/tweaking in the first place.

Corrosive Enzymes - Affects enemies. Usable while solo? Yes.
Regrowth - Affects allies and caster. Usable while solo? Yes.
Wild Growth - Affects allies and caster. Usable while solo? Yes.
Spore Cloud - Affects enemies. Usable while solo? Yes.
Lifegiving Spores - Affects allies and caster. Usable while solo? Yes.
Wild Bastion - Affects allies and caster. Usable while solo? Yes.
Rebirth - Affects allies, but not caster. Usable while solo? No.
Entangling Aura - Affects enemies. Usable while solo? Yes.
Overgrowth - Affects allies and caster. Usable while solo? Yes.

8 yes, 1 no.

Nik Tesla would like to have a word with you...

That said, I was expecting Bio Armor before Nature Affinity, or at the same time. I daresay Bio is just as or more ready for live than Nature Affinity.

-Rachel-

I agree

I also think this is great news.