That's why I've basically lost every bit of attachment I've had to the game. I can regain it just as I did when I started playing again a year and a half ago or something like that, but all things considered, it seems my path will continue as planned. Thankfully, I've found a game to play, and it's basically a Tribes Ascend clone, so now I can confidently say this:
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silverkeltMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 4,235Arc User
tree climber.. that isnt how it works.. players use whatever gives them the biggest bonus.. if say the bonus is 3% more and its 100% more difficult to come by.. they may skip that.. but if its 15% more hard.. well then they might go for it.
its the whole time ratio vs output ..
it really doesnt matter how meta is set up.. its just the way it works..
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treesclimberMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,161Arc User
edited September 2017
I don't like augments appart from BI ioun, got to be honest, but if eldritch gave something close to 50% (around 45% less overall effective bonuses) i would totally use a battlefield medic that is a unreliable bonding companion but has a locate->walk->heal system that enjoy, to me it's more important visible things and wisdom of the game (even if this attitude of battlefield medic it's stupid in terms of efficiency it's stupidity to use something i like), so not everyone follows meta rule, not everything is about a number in a chart, not everything is about everyone thinking i am super good.
To add another prospective. We can understand that players will choose the the way that brings them the most benefits. That's a given tho what really is a "benefit" may vary. We also know, since the dev said it that the bondings aren't nerfed due to excessive stat share. So the change is not about bonding being overpowered. Good so far.
So in the spirit of balance and if the % of stat points they offer isn't a problem but the problem is the relative utility and stat difference between bonding and others, what exactly is the problem of bringing the other enchants "up" and make more viable options for the players, or more interesting combos like the ones we saw proposed by other players.
Why shouldn't all ruins offer similar behavior and stats and why lower bondings % when there isn't a problem with what the bonding offers in the first place. Why shouldn't every ruin offer % stat share? Arcane can offer stat share % and recovery, Eldritch can offer stat share % and armor pen and so on and let the people choose the stat they need? Every ruin now is equally useful and people will use them based on their class/build/need (though I think we all know the real answer).
I would understand as per devs example that its not a good idea when we have a "buff/item" that high and others down low to increase the others, but clearly (and once again) as stated by the devs, the "high" is not the problem or an issue in the case of bonding.
Unless.... that's not the real reason
@oria1 I've asked the same. We would love diversity but taking stats isn't the way to do it, unless of course you like pissing off your players. Make all runes +95% at R12, make the stat curve the same as Bondings so R13/R14 for runes only add a bit of extra stats. If they redo the % bonus curves though it's still taking stats away so if they did that people would be very unhappy. Remove power share on companions. Then people would use all the runes vs just a small handful. Make more rune combos, and reduce the effectiveness of the "companions gift" on augments to make them more viable (Maybe that's 50% or 55% or 60% each on an augment, IDK but it would mean slotting an augment wouldn't be trash like now).
"Bonding runestones were not adjusted due to power creep. They were adjusted due to being so far out of line with the rest of runestones/companions"
Sounds great - so buff the other options instead, everyone's happy
You just couldn't do that. They have to generally keep R12 in line with R12 Enchantment or Runes. The fact the Bonding R12 provides +840 not +700 isn't much different from a Cruel, Draconic or Demon Enchantment; however, where it differs is the fact it gives 95% augmentation boost as well. That alone is 7.9x the benefit of a R12 Eldritch and doesn't factor in you're getting both buff's not one or the either like all other Runes.
Even after the changes Bondings are still 5x more powerful - but despite that the GAP has been closed where other Runes depending on your Class/Feats/Companion choices in your build using the other Runes can be viable in some cases now...
Previously, all other Runes were basically JUNK, used solely for RP to upgrade Artifacts. I'm very glad they limited the bonding Augmentation it will prevent powershare *mostly* being taken advantage of because of Bondings...
Although perhaps they will in future also need to limit Powershare to players; however, that would greatly reduce bondings benefit further. Unless they limited powersharing benefit's to companions by 50%.
I think its worth noting that someone in a rank 20 guild makes this observation. That is someone who has access to the highest levels of boons, and most likely a fairly large player base from his guild and/or alliance. No shade being thrown here at all.. just noting that even someone at very high levels whose actually playing this game can see the wrench this is throwing into people's gameplay.
Lol, yeah I can play the high end dungeons and that's not the point i'm making. I was talking about newer players that don't have that option. They are kinda screwed, since content even for some high level players can be kinda tough. So you would be fine with a couple of players selling those stones for the price they want?
and just because i'm a endgame player doesn't mean I can't see what it possibly would be like for others and then again lets just assume every endgame player couldn't care less if that's the point you are trying to bring across...
Yes I know, and thats what I was highlighting in my comment. Just because you're an endgame player certainly does not mean you have to forget, but unfortunately most do. It is a rare and valued personality trait to be able to stay in touch with the 'common man' once one has moved beyond that struggle.
Thats one thing that bears repeating. This does effect high end and BIS slot players badly. It ALSO effects newer players as they come up and attempt to join the ranks of BIS slot players that have come before. There is no good here.
The fact that the stats from Bonding are less than the stats from all the other gear combined is hardly an argument that they are not overpowered.
And again, from my perspective they are not re-selling me something I already own. My actual cash purchases were for Rank 7 and Rank 8 Bondings, which would now be as good or better after the change. If I hadn't already upgraded them. Any wards I bought during the upgrade were merely for convenience. I bought the convenience, not the upgraded stones.
It is also not a statement that they ARE overpowered either. That measure is completely subjective and relative to the game that we play and the areas that we are using those items in. Running MSP of T9G without rank 12 bondings and you have a progressively worse time the further away from ideally available stats you fall. We play in a game that has a large legacy of areas and dungeons that are drastically outclassed by new eq. But within that same game we have content that is difficult for the vast majority of users.
Your puchases were indeed for rank 7 and 8 bondings, which had a specific capacity. They are of a specific strength in relation to the rest of the existing game. A game will naturally progress which grows the content and difficulty of that content relative to your static purchase. That is how a game grows without degrading the item that you have already purchased. This is in fact how the majority of equipment progression happens in this game as well. The blackice armor I purchased long ago simply is no longer valid. Not because its stats have been degraded, but because other stronger content has been released since then.
Instead the proposed changes take items that we purchase and make them weaker in relation to the rest of the existing game. At the very same time a large percentage of those stats can be repurchased at great expense, with no new content, and an overall loss of stat strength. This comes directly after nearly a year of focused attempts by cryptic to advertise and sell bondings specifically and the upgrade materials to increase them. This puts the goal of a strong item of a known relative strength front and center, and focuses players effort and time towards achieving this goal as a foundation of their eq improvements.
Not only is this outright theft they caused a significant detrimental reliance through their sales practices before hand.
"Bonding runestones were not adjusted due to power creep. They were adjusted due to being so far out of line with the rest of runestones/companions"
Sounds great - so buff the other options instead, everyone's happy
You just couldn't do that. They have to generally keep R12 in line with R12 Enchantment or Runes. The fact the Bonding R12 provides +840 not +700 isn't much different from a Cruel, Draconic or Demon Enchantment; however, where it differs is the fact it gives 95% augmentation boost as well. That alone is 7.9x the benefit of a R12 Eldritch and doesn't factor in you're getting both buff's not one or the either like all other Runes.
Even after the changes Bondings are still 5x more powerful - but despite that the GAP has been closed where other Runes depending on your Class/Feats/Companion choices in your build using the other Runes can be viable in some cases now...
Previously, all other Runes were basically JUNK, used solely for RP to upgrade Artifacts. I'm very glad they limited the bonding Augmentation it will prevent powershare *mostly* being taken advantage of because of Bondings...
Although perhaps they will in future also need to limit Powershare to players; however, that would greatly reduce bondings benefit further. Unless they limited powersharing benefit's to companions by 50%.
"You just couldn't do that." Yes you can. See that? Just as valid a point, with just as much support.
Yes the numbers are different, with bondings providing a greater benefit. Hence why everyone who can, that cares about performance, uses them. That is not in dispute.
They wish to make runestones and augments competitive. Then solve THAT problem and buff them. Which as stipulated b4 they absolutely CAN do. Actually believing in the product that they have created before this they could go even further to increase the variation and detail that is available instead of changing from one BIS to another. Something will be in BIS, and whatever that is calculated to be will be the new solution that is universally accepted, and nothing else.
Back to adding more detail and believing in your product. One nice and/or bothersome thing about bondings, depening on who you ask, is that you get to continue use of your summoned companion. This is a benefit and hindrance that you dont get with an augment. In fact in the previous system before the 295% upgrade to bondings this was a commonly played with set of details. Was the active worthwhile? Was the aggro worthwhile? Was your companions lifetime selflimiting? How about how fast it reanimated, was that helpful?
Augments/runestones could be brought up to strength with the bondings. Add something to them like alternative additional stats or bonuses that increase their utility instead trying to limit yourself to playing with parts of the old system that the devs have arbitrarily decided to mess with.
This is very common end of life business behavior. For those that didn't take business classes, the general gist is that early in a business, you focus on gaining customers. Then as time wears on, you provide upgrades to your existing product base to grow your business while retaining your original customer base. At some point you cease growing, and begin declining. You then have two options, 1) do something huge to hit another first stage growth spike (acquire a competitor, whole new product line, etc) or 2) you cut your losses and get as much out of your remaining customer base as possible before all your HAMSTER breaks. They have opted for #2. Get what they can and get out. In this case "letting the game die". I have spent a grand total of $40 on this game, and I certainly received a ton of fun for my dollar in the meantime, but I won't be spending any more. No more investment into a game with a clearly foreseeable decline in player base. That said, I can see why so many of you are so angry. Most people have spent far more than $40 on this game.
Am i correct in assuming no one from the Dev team actually came here to talk to us from yesterday ? HAMSTER ! ...freaking change.. with freaking consequences.. i think i may have a polar bear somewhere in my inventory.. somewhere...
Thank you both for replying. I was expecting at least someone coming in here and saying a few words after so many posts. And while i do know some of us sounded a bit brutal, this is not something we take lightly.
My guildies started buying eldritchs and looking for augments . Even though they still plan to use bondings for the team-play content like dungeons.
I am kinda worried about people leaving. My guild did experience some loss when key change was done. And we still did not get everyone in guild to open TO9G.
The ones who did are struggling. I keep explaining to them that it does not matter they have the IL , it is hard content,it takes planning and concentration to do it and no mistakes at the last boss. But , honestly i am kinda afraid how it will look, once bondings are nerfed and we need to level our ench through TO9G. It is my own personal fear. Maybe i am overreacting, that can happen sometimes. I am becoming more paranoid as changes keep rolling out.
"Bonding runestones were not adjusted due to power creep. They were adjusted due to being so far out of line with the rest of runestones/companions"
Sounds great - so buff the other options instead, everyone's happy
You just couldn't do that. They have to generally keep R12 in line with R12 Enchantment or Runes. The fact the Bonding R12 provides +840 not +700 isn't much different from a Cruel, Draconic or Demon Enchantment; however, where it differs is the fact it gives 95% augmentation boost as well. That alone is 7.9x the benefit of a R12 Eldritch and doesn't factor in you're getting both buff's not one or the either like all other Runes.
Even after the changes Bondings are still 5x more powerful - but despite that the GAP has been closed where other Runes depending on your Class/Feats/Companion choices in your build using the other Runes can be viable in some cases now...
Previously, all other Runes were basically JUNK, used solely for RP to upgrade Artifacts. I'm very glad they limited the bonding Augmentation it will prevent powershare *mostly* being taken advantage of because of Bondings...
Although perhaps they will in future also need to limit Powershare to players; however, that would greatly reduce bondings benefit further. Unless they limited powersharing benefit's to companions by 50%.
"You just couldn't do that." Yes you can. See that? Just as valid a point, with just as much support.
Yes the numbers are different, with bondings providing a greater benefit. Hence why everyone who can, that cares about performance, uses them. That is not in dispute.
They wish to make runestones and augments competitive. Then solve THAT problem and buff them. Which as stipulated b4 they absolutely CAN do. Actually believing in the product that they have created before this they could go even further to increase the variation and detail that is available instead of changing from one BIS to another. Something will be in BIS, and whatever that is calculated to be will be the new solution that is universally accepted, and nothing else.
Back to adding more detail and believing in your product. One nice and/or bothersome thing about bondings, depening on who you ask, is that you get to continue use of your summoned companion. This is a benefit and hindrance that you dont get with an augment. In fact in the previous system before the 295% upgrade to bondings this was a commonly played with set of details. Was the active worthwhile? Was the aggro worthwhile? Was your companions lifetime selflimiting? How about how fast it reanimated, was that helpful?
Augments/runestones could be brought up to strength with the bondings. Add something to them like alternative additional stats or bonuses that increase their utility instead trying to limit yourself to playing with parts of the old system that the devs have arbitrarily decided to mess with.
Honestly people that state Bondings didn't need a correction are in denial--my Corellite it offered far better than a 9 to 1 advantage. You can't FIX other runes by giving them greatly expanded benefit's when Bonding benefits are far too high as it is. Also you're limited to keeping most R12 Rune just like R12 Enchantments at +700 buff except for those that offer 2 or 3 offense or defense buffs which offered a combined higher buff--like Cruel enchantments.
Some try to argue the issue is powershare. Yet if we had at best a R12 Eldritch at 12% Augmentation and no bondings this would never be an issue! The problem is mostly created as Bonding gave a 7.9x higher augmentation boost while also being the only to give +840 (Offense or Defense) too!
By correcting bonding they achieve two objectives at the same time.
Brings Augment boost to reasonable level (2.5x a R14 Eldritch) yet only to give a dual +1040 buff.
Expands other Runes non buff values by 1/3rd like HP, Augmentation, etc... to make them viable.
I don't think we'll see any further changes to Bonding. But those trying to argue powershare is the cause aren't doing themselves any good. This argument won't see Bonding returned to their former offering. They still offer almost 5x the benefit to almost every other Rune!
The only thing blaming Powershare might do further limit powershare to companions by 50% given their a companion not a player. But that would only extend the correction you're seeing made to Bonding, even though it wouldn't be as bad as reducing UPTIME to 50%. Regardless limiting powershare is still mostly a nerf to bondings.
Post edited by strathkin on
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gabrieldourdenMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,212Arc User
Sorry @strathkin, but the the main issue I have is not the total amount of stats. It's the approach. If bondings are too powerful they are right in nerfing them and I have no objections (even if I have two sets of rank 12s). And upping other types of runestones to match is ok. What I can't stand is that at the same time they resell us the same power level we had (wasn't it broken?) by adding enchant ranks. Either bondings are too powerful or they are not. Period. What they are telling us is: bondings are broken, but if you give us 500 bucks they are not broken anymore...
Le-Shan: HR level 80 (main)
Born of Black Wind: SW Level 80
"..but still you just couldn't ignore the fact Bonding provided almost a greater than 9x advantage!"
Sure you can. Its easy. The other runestones are not a consideration because they are less powerful. End of story. Whatever is found to be slightly lacking in power is relegated to obsolete status. This is absolutely the case unless there is more detail added that makes one best for some and others better for the rest.
By correcting messing with bonding runestones they accomplish 1 thing and 1 thing only, stealing back stats relative to the rest of the game that we players have concentrated time, effort, and money on. Augments and runestones are not ' 'boosted' to any reasonable level', they are left as 1 dimensional and useless as they were before.
It would be simple and non - controversial to boost augments and runestones to a reasonable level, leaving bonding runestones as they are, that would be comparable but still different then bonding runestones. With that they could even adjust content to match the new power if it was deemed necessary.
Limiting powershare would be to limit powershare, a problem made worse with bondings in this state, and in the new state after the nerf. This is a waste of time that improves nothing and angers many if not most of the players that have spent significantly.. and would continue to spend if it werent for tactics like this.
These changes are not being made in a vacuum. We have these bonding changes, the change to rank 14s, the queue system change, the SW nerf, and the potion nerf all occuring at the same time without even any new content or content adjustments. No thanks.
Sorry @strathkin, but the the main issue I have is not the total amount of stats. It's the approach. If bondings are too powerful they are right in nerfing them and I have no objections (even if I have two sets of rank 12s). And upping other types of runestones to match is ok. What I can't stand is that at the same time they resell us the same power level we had (wasn't it broken?) by adding enchant ranks.
Either bondings are too powerful or they are not. Period. What they are telling us is: bondings are broken, but if you give us 500 bucks they are not broken anymore...
Well I certainty appreciate your feedback as you mostly seem like a respectful individual. But I don't think they are saying they are broken but require a correction which is what a NERF attempts to do. Attempting to BUFF everything else to that level only makes the problem bigger rather than address the cause.
I know you disagree but honestly a 9 to 1 advantage over every other stone is clear candidate for corrective action. Also no where have they said give us money will we overlook the issue. All new Bonding stones at R7 start at a higher 30% augmentation (not 20%) and while the dual higher buff remains (the only one to offer it) it then increases the augment boost at a more level 5% per rank increased.
There still 5x more powerful than every other Rune which is in my opinion still a very impressive advantage over almost every other Rune. Perhaps in time maybe we'll also see hybrid Rune's that offer 2 or 3 combined offensive or defensive traits similar to Cruel, Brutal or Demonic Enchantments.
having been in business roles in "the middle" before it's possible there isn't much communication with us yet because there is so much internal negotiation going on yet that there just isn't anything concrete to tell us. (well other than the suck it up comment from no worries) I personally can't imagine that with this kind of backlash there isn't some serious discussion going on. this WILL hurt their bottom line. it's got to be evident. coalgate hurt them. they still went forward but they also gave everyone some reimbursement. tbh i'd probably settle down for 20 coal wards and 20 of those greater stones needed to upgrade (can't remember what they're called, the ones thru tong only) this is at least as vitriolic as coalgate was and I believe it to be much more so. (I'd wager heavily on more so) and the change hasn't even hit yet. once they actually implement this the protest is going to be undeniable. (but I think it is already..) I don't think it's over yet.
but maybe it is. dunno. just saying.. there could be a good reason we havent' heard more.
It's funny, 1st it's mod 6 that HAMSTER everything up, now it's mod 12. So every 6 mods they want to screw everything up, it seems. Tho this is much worse.
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gabrieldourdenMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,212Arc User
> @strathkin said: > Sorry @strathkin, but the the main issue I have is not the total amount of stats. It's the approach. If bondings are too powerful they are right in nerfing them and I have no objections (even if I have two sets of rank 12s). And upping other types of runestones to match is ok. What I can't stand is that at the same time they resell us the same power level we had (wasn't it broken?) by adding enchant ranks. > > Either bondings are too powerful or they are not. Period. What they are telling us is: bondings are broken, but if you give us 500 bucks they are not broken anymore... > > Well I certainty appreciate your feedback as you mostly seem like a respectful individual. But I don't think they are saying they are broken but require a correction which is what a NERF attempts to do. Attempting to BUFF everything else to that level only makes the problem bigger rather than address the cause. > > I know you disagree but honestly a 9 to 1 advantage over every other stone is clear candidate for corrective action. Also no where have they said you give us money will we overlook the issue. All new stones R7 start at a higher 30% augmentation (not 20%) and while the dual higher buff remains (the only one to offer it) it then increases the augment boost at a more level 5% per rank increased.
What I meant is that you can basically buy back your power by buying RP, marks and wards. Marks from TONG will be unbound according to a dev statement in the other thread so they'll flow to the auction in a few days as soon as top end players will have enough marks for their characters. So within a few days, with cash you can buy back everything you had before or you can grind ad and do the same. This means that either way you'll get back to the same level you have today (which is supposedly too high for the content...).
Le-Shan: HR level 80 (main)
Born of Black Wind: SW Level 80
You're wrong when you say nobody will get augments, take for example https://neverwinter.gamepedia.com/Bulette_Pup, even if only granting 176,5% (no legendary bonus) against, let's say 190% from bondings (in a very good companion in a full run), it's a reliable full time bonus. While a DPS would have no doubt choosing for a tank on the other hand may want that reliability.
Well sure some gona pick augments after that patch - those who use them already - its about 1% of players if not even less, and they gona be true benefiting form those changes. You can add some new players to that picture but only to the point when they will be able to switch for bondings r11-12 witch would be much easier/cheaper to get then it is now.
No one else will bother to waist time and money on them. 176,5% vs 195% =18,5% more, and that is a lot. Add power share to that, add buffs/debuffs normal comapnion adds, add some dps (even if its nearly insignificant), add proccing insignia bonuses. Thats a lot. Heck, powersharing alone is what make bonding first choice. And not for DPS classes only. You trying to say that augments are more reliable to tanks. Just becouse DR is capped and power is not? And who said tanks need only a defence? Sure HP boost is worth considering, but only after tanks gona raise all stats they will be missing after that patch.
Like I said before augments to be resonble choice need much more then that patch will bring, like their active bonuses rework and buffing other runestones even higher then they are planning atm. And even then they gona be hardly comparable to bondings due to that power share issue.
It's funny, 1st it's mod 6 that HAMSTER everything up, now it's mod 12. So every 6 mods they want to screw everything up, it seems. Tho this is much worse.
I highly doubt there will be another 6 mods given the current state of things
Well there is another solution that i just think about (maybe someone already talk about it, idk i can't read each and every post here ...) and that would be to give other runes extra special stats in addition with the current stats they are giving
For exemple giving the player of that companion a % of the player stats as bonuses, could be recovery, arm pen, def, defl, etc ... (working on augments too)
Being a % of his stats would mean that a 6K or a 16k player will still see an interest in them, it can help with calculation of power player for cap and stuff (i'm one of them but for my own play style)
It can help making the other rune interesting for some peoples ...
And we have currently 1, 2 and 3 stats enchantment, why not create soon 2 and 3 stats runes too ? i know it'll be a pain to do probably but if you make them with the type of extra stats i told it could allow player to fine tune their final stats ... Maybe ...
That was just a though of mine ... I know balancing is hard but just maybe why not creating a true test zone on preview with an npc that can give pretty much anything that is in collections + Zen market for 1 copper, ennemies what can hit with fixed damage for testing proc then hit, DR, reflect damage, debuff, etc ... Ennemies with fixed DR for testing arm pen ... Pretty much everything that we could encounter in the game and that you could implement in the future ... I remember some module update where 2 day after there is an emergency patch for a broken new thing that could have been seen on preview with said zone ...
Has anyone on test server tried to run FBI, MSPC, or TNG with rank 12 bondings and enchants (not 14)? I haven't been able to find any links of people doing it and was curious if it was even possible for an average player to do anymore.
Going in with rank 12's would be same the as trying it with rank 9.5's in current - or two rank 9's and a rank 10. It's definitely undergeared.
I suspect most players will avoid it until they've ranked most of their enchantments (inc bondings) to r13 at least.
Please Do Not Feed The Trolls
Xael De Armadeon: DC
Xane De Armadeon: CW
Zen De Armadeon: OP
Zohar De Armadeon: TR
Chrion De Armadeon: SW
Gosti Big Belly: GWF
Barney McRustbucket: GF
Lt. Thackeray: HR
Lucius De Armadeon: BD
I have no problem backing down the power on Bondings, it was apparent from the first month I began playing (around a year ago) that having maxed bondings was more important than pretty much anything else. Your companion shouldn't be the most important part of your build...
Now, that said, I assume many people like myself use companions to balance stats. This is because they come with an excessive amount of crit and arm pen and it is foolish NOT to accommodate the stat bonuses when this is the case. But, when I have a Bonding with a 50% uptime, I might as well pretty much IGNORE all benefit I am getting from my companion in the Crit and AP departments, because it is not a reliable number. That is, if I max AP based on when bonding is UP, then I am going to lose significant DPS when bonding is down, because now both my power and AP will drop (meaning enemy defense kicks in). The same is true for crit, especially if you are crit sev stacked and have powers that trigger off of crits.
So you can: a) overbuild your crit and AP and waste all those stats when bonding kicks in, b) try to finish all fights in 15 seconds, or c) wait 15 seconds between pulls.
Even if you cut the presently intended bonding buff in half, and make it 100% uptime, at least the stats outside of power and recovery are not useless then. Or please let us better balance the pet stats, so I can gear my pet to have basically 0 crit and 0 AP if I want, it's not like the pet is adding significantly to our damage at this point. We can mitigate this somewhat through gearing, but that means there are literally 1-2 items only that are worthwhile for each pet slot (down from the current several handfuls). And all enchantements into pet gear should be Power or Recovery, as anything else will flex you up and down above the cap. All of this logic applies to people defensively capping as well.
Since a lot of fights are junk fights, and thus your bonding has essentially 100% uptime in those fights, a more reasonable adjustment might be something along the lines of 75% of the currently intended bonus, but with 100% uptime. Otherwise people are going to have to spend insane amounts of time hunting down the few pieces of gear that give stats that aren't stacked to the max. So DPS are going to be stacking Power and Def rings (or Power and Rec, at best) and vice versa for tanks. Except that those rings (or whatever) do not then have the double offensive/double defensive slots you want for your role.
This is not a pure numbers game about augment companions values vs. anything else, because the augments have 100% uptime, meaning that you will use ALL the stats from the augment all the time, meaning you can better balance crit and AP and are not completely wasting those stats when bondings proc. So when you do the math for bondings, after calculating the net effect of bondings, go ahead and subtract the total percentage of stats (Excessive crit and AP for DPS) that are completely useless.
Sorry @strathkin, but the the main issue I have is not the total amount of stats. It's the approach. If bondings are too powerful they are right in nerfing them and I have no objections (even if I have two sets of rank 12s). And upping other types of runestones to match is ok. What I can't stand is that at the same time they resell us the same power level we had (wasn't it broken?) by adding enchant ranks.
Either bondings are too powerful or they are not. Period. What they are telling us is: bondings are broken, but if you give us 500 bucks they are not broken anymore...
I have a very very simple solution to this problem - simply have bonding runestones not get to rank 14. So while we wouldn't spend any more RP etc on them that's fine in terms of the game generating cash - by buffing the other runestones so you can get to the same power level using other builds.
I just logged onto the Preview server for the first time in a while. First though: You have to be kidding me right??? My CW was almost 15k and very useable/fun to play. The bonding nerf kills her. The 50% up time I could deal with if I had to, is a monumentally unfair change to those of us who have based our toons around the use of bondings. However, the 40% shared stat drop for R12 bondings equates to a 120% loss in shared stats with 3 bondings, which is just flat out insulting. It DESTROYS game play on my CW, which I have logged THOUSANDS of hours to get to this point. All the gear I've put time into getting becomes obsolete, because it will not work to get the required resistance ignored, critical strike, defense or life steal. I can deal with power loss (although i shouldn't have too), but losing these other stats is just flat out unacceptable.
With these huge changes, it may be the end of my Neverwinter days. If these changes go to live, you are really HAMSTER over you loyal customers.
Sorry @strathkin, but the the main issue I have is not the total amount of stats. It's the approach. If bondings are too powerful they are right in nerfing them and I have no objections (even if I have two sets of rank 12s). And upping other types of runestones to match is ok. What I can't stand is that at the same time they resell us the same power level we had (wasn't it broken?) by adding enchant ranks.
Either bondings are too powerful or they are not. Period. What they are telling us is: bondings are broken, but if you give us 500 bucks they are not broken anymore...
I have a very very simple solution to this problem - simply have bonding runestones not get to rank 14. So while we wouldn't spend any more RP etc on them that's fine in terms of the game generating cash - by buffing the other runestones so you can get to the same power level using other builds.
Or, another thing so they still get their money - make them NOT HAMSTER INCREASE IN % OF STATS. It's that simple. Increase the power they give to 1k power max, and people will still get them because this is an MMORPG, and everyone's a completionist (what basically drives us to get to BiS). And that's it. There's NO need for any of this, but they decided to take the rocky path because "lol we wanna test our luck in the most extreme way that could literally affect every employer's life"
> @armadeonx said: > Going in with rank 12's would be same the as trying it with rank 9.5's in current - or two rank 9's and a rank 10. It's definitely undergeared. > > I suspect most players will avoid it until they've ranked most of their enchantments (inc bondings) to r13 at least.
Where's the fun in that though? Why do I want to bust my butt and/or spend money just to be able to run stuff I normally run? That isn't progression and I thought progression was the point of MMOs. I play to either be able to do stuff I can't do at the moment or be able to do the things I can't do too well a lot better.
> Going in with rank 12's would be same the as trying it with rank 9.5's in current - or two rank 9's and a rank 10. It's definitely undergeared.
>
> I suspect most players will avoid it until they've ranked most of their enchantments (inc bondings) to r13 at least.
Where's the fun in that though? Why do I want to bust my butt and/or spend money just to be able to run stuff I normally run? That isn't progression and I thought progression was the point of MMOs. I play to either be able to do stuff I can't do at the moment or be able to do the things I can't do too well a lot better.
Yep we know, that's the main thrust of the argument against reducing bonding capability.
Please Do Not Feed The Trolls
Xael De Armadeon: DC
Xane De Armadeon: CW
Zen De Armadeon: OP
Zohar De Armadeon: TR
Chrion De Armadeon: SW
Gosti Big Belly: GWF
Barney McRustbucket: GF
Lt. Thackeray: HR
Lucius De Armadeon: BD
Comments
Thankfully, I've found a game to play, and it's basically a Tribes Ascend clone, so now I can confidently say this:
its the whole time ratio vs output ..
it really doesnt matter how meta is set up.. its just the way it works..
Even after the changes Bondings are still 5x more powerful - but despite that the GAP has been closed where other Runes depending on your Class/Feats/Companion choices in your build using the other Runes can be viable in some cases now...
Previously, all other Runes were basically JUNK, used solely for RP to upgrade Artifacts. I'm very glad they limited the bonding Augmentation it will prevent powershare *mostly* being taken advantage of because of Bondings...
Although perhaps they will in future also need to limit Powershare to players; however, that would greatly reduce bondings benefit further. Unless they limited powersharing benefit's to companions by 50%.
Thats one thing that bears repeating. This does effect high end and BIS slot players badly. It ALSO effects newer players as they come up and attempt to join the ranks of BIS slot players that have come before. There is no good here.
And again, from my perspective they are not re-selling me something I already own. My actual cash purchases were for Rank 7 and Rank 8 Bondings, which would now be as good or better after the change. If I hadn't already upgraded them. Any wards I bought during the upgrade were merely for convenience. I bought the convenience, not the upgraded stones.
It is also not a statement that they ARE overpowered either. That measure is completely subjective and relative to the game that we play and the areas that we are using those items in. Running MSP of T9G without rank 12 bondings and you have a progressively worse time the further away from ideally available stats you fall. We play in a game that has a large legacy of areas and dungeons that are drastically outclassed by new eq. But within that same game we have content that is difficult for the vast majority of users.
Your puchases were indeed for rank 7 and 8 bondings, which had a specific capacity. They are of a specific strength in relation to the rest of the existing game. A game will naturally progress which grows the content and difficulty of that content relative to your static purchase. That is how a game grows without degrading the item that you have already purchased. This is in fact how the majority of equipment progression happens in this game as well. The blackice armor I purchased long ago simply is no longer valid. Not because its stats have been degraded, but because other stronger content has been released since then.
Instead the proposed changes take items that we purchase and make them weaker in relation to the rest of the existing game. At the very same time a large percentage of those stats can be repurchased at great expense, with no new content, and an overall loss of stat strength. This comes directly after nearly a year of focused attempts by cryptic to advertise and sell bondings specifically and the upgrade materials to increase them. This puts the goal of a strong item of a known relative strength front and center, and focuses players effort and time towards achieving this goal as a foundation of their eq improvements.
Not only is this outright theft they caused a significant detrimental reliance through their sales practices before hand.
Yes you can. See that? Just as valid a point, with just as much support.
Yes the numbers are different, with bondings providing a greater benefit. Hence why everyone who can, that cares about performance, uses them. That is not in dispute.
They wish to make runestones and augments competitive. Then solve THAT problem and buff them. Which as stipulated b4 they absolutely CAN do. Actually believing in the product that they have created before this they could go even further to increase the variation and detail that is available instead of changing from one BIS to another. Something will be in BIS, and whatever that is calculated to be will be the new solution that is universally accepted, and nothing else.
Back to adding more detail and believing in your product. One nice and/or bothersome thing about bondings, depening on who you ask, is that you get to continue use of your summoned companion. This is a benefit and hindrance that you dont get with an augment. In fact in the previous system before the 295% upgrade to bondings this was a commonly played with set of details. Was the active worthwhile? Was the aggro worthwhile? Was your companions lifetime selflimiting? How about how fast it reanimated, was that helpful?
Augments/runestones could be brought up to strength with the bondings. Add something to them like alternative additional stats or bonuses that increase their utility instead trying to limit yourself to playing with parts of the old system that the devs have arbitrarily decided to mess with.
This is very common end of life business behavior. For those that didn't take business classes, the general gist is that early in a business, you focus on gaining customers. Then as time wears on, you provide upgrades to your existing product base to grow your business while retaining your original customer base. At some point you cease growing, and begin declining. You then have two options, 1) do something huge to hit another first stage growth spike (acquire a competitor, whole new product line, etc) or 2) you cut your losses and get as much out of your remaining customer base as possible before all your HAMSTER breaks. They have opted for #2.
Get what they can and get out. In this case "letting the game die".
I have spent a grand total of $40 on this game, and I certainly received a ton of fun for my dollar in the meantime, but I won't be spending any more. No more investment into a game with a clearly foreseeable decline in player base. That said, I can see why so many of you are so angry. Most people have spent far more than $40 on this game.
HAMSTER ! ...freaking change.. with freaking consequences..
i think i may have a polar bear somewhere in my inventory.. somewhere...
Thank you both for replying.
I was expecting at least someone coming in here and saying a few words after so many posts.
And while i do know some of us sounded a bit brutal, this is not something we take lightly.
My guildies started buying eldritchs and looking for augments .
Even though they still plan to use bondings for the team-play content like dungeons.
I am kinda worried about people leaving. My guild did experience some loss when key change was done.
And we still did not get everyone in guild to open TO9G.
The ones who did are struggling.
I keep explaining to them that it does not matter they have the IL , it is hard content,it takes planning and concentration to do it and no mistakes at the last boss.
But , honestly i am kinda afraid how it will look, once bondings are nerfed and we need to level our ench through TO9G.
It is my own personal fear. Maybe i am overreacting, that can happen sometimes. I am becoming more paranoid as changes keep rolling out.
Some try to argue the issue is powershare. Yet if we had at best a R12 Eldritch at 12% Augmentation and no bondings this would never be an issue! The problem is mostly created as Bonding gave a 7.9x higher augmentation boost while also being the only to give +840 (Offense or Defense) too!
By correcting bonding they achieve two objectives at the same time.
- Brings Augment boost to reasonable level (2.5x a R14 Eldritch) yet only to give a dual +1040 buff.
- Expands other Runes non buff values by 1/3rd like HP, Augmentation, etc... to make them viable.
I don't think we'll see any further changes to Bonding. But those trying to argue powershare is the cause aren't doing themselves any good. This argument won't see Bonding returned to their former offering. They still offer almost 5x the benefit to almost every other Rune!The only thing blaming Powershare might do further limit powershare to companions by 50% given their a companion not a player. But that would only extend the correction you're seeing made to Bonding, even though it wouldn't be as bad as reducing UPTIME to 50%. Regardless limiting powershare is still mostly a nerf to bondings.
Either bondings are too powerful or they are not. Period. What they are telling us is: bondings are broken, but if you give us 500 bucks they are not broken anymore...
Born of Black Wind: SW Level 80
Sure you can. Its easy. The other runestones are not a consideration because they are less powerful. End of story. Whatever is found to be slightly lacking in power is relegated to obsolete status. This is absolutely the case unless there is more detail added that makes one best for some and others better for the rest.
By
correctingmessing with bonding runestones they accomplish 1 thing and 1 thing only, stealing back stats relative to the rest of the game that we players have concentrated time, effort, and money on. Augments and runestones are not ' 'boosted' to any reasonable level', they are left as 1 dimensional and useless as they were before.It would be simple and non - controversial to boost augments and runestones to a reasonable level, leaving bonding runestones as they are, that would be comparable but still different then bonding runestones. With that they could even adjust content to match the new power if it was deemed necessary.
Limiting powershare would be to limit powershare, a problem made worse with bondings in this state, and in the new state after the nerf. This is a waste of time that improves nothing and angers many if not most of the players that have spent significantly.. and would continue to spend if it werent for tactics like this.
These changes are not being made in a vacuum. We have these bonding changes, the change to rank 14s, the queue system change, the SW nerf, and the potion nerf all occuring at the same time without even any new content or content adjustments. No thanks.
I know you disagree but honestly a 9 to 1 advantage over every other stone is clear candidate for corrective action. Also no where have they said give us money will we overlook the issue. All new Bonding stones at R7 start at a higher 30% augmentation (not 20%) and while the dual higher buff remains (the only one to offer it) it then increases the augment boost at a more level 5% per rank increased.
There still 5x more powerful than every other Rune which is in my opinion still a very impressive advantage over almost every other Rune. Perhaps in time maybe we'll also see hybrid Rune's that offer 2 or 3 combined offensive or defensive traits similar to Cruel, Brutal or Demonic Enchantments.
but maybe it is. dunno. just saying.. there could be a good reason we havent' heard more.
> Sorry @strathkin, but the the main issue I have is not the total amount of stats. It's the approach. If bondings are too powerful they are right in nerfing them and I have no objections (even if I have two sets of rank 12s). And upping other types of runestones to match is ok. What I can't stand is that at the same time they resell us the same power level we had (wasn't it broken?) by adding enchant ranks.
>
> Either bondings are too powerful or they are not. Period. What they are telling us is: bondings are broken, but if you give us 500 bucks they are not broken anymore...
>
> Well I certainty appreciate your feedback as you mostly seem like a respectful individual. But I don't think they are saying they are broken but require a correction which is what a NERF attempts to do. Attempting to BUFF everything else to that level only makes the problem bigger rather than address the cause.
>
> I know you disagree but honestly a 9 to 1 advantage over every other stone is clear candidate for corrective action. Also no where have they said you give us money will we overlook the issue. All new stones R7 start at a higher 30% augmentation (not 20%) and while the dual higher buff remains (the only one to offer it) it then increases the augment boost at a more level 5% per rank increased.
What I meant is that you can basically buy back your power by buying RP, marks and wards. Marks from TONG will be unbound according to a dev statement in the other thread so they'll flow to the auction in a few days as soon as top end players will have enough marks for their characters. So within a few days, with cash you can buy back everything you had before or you can grind ad and do the same. This means that either way you'll get back to the same level you have today (which is supposedly too high for the content...).
Born of Black Wind: SW Level 80
No one else will bother to waist time and money on them. 176,5% vs 195% =18,5% more, and that is a lot. Add power share to that, add buffs/debuffs normal comapnion adds, add some dps (even if its nearly insignificant), add proccing insignia bonuses. Thats a lot. Heck, powersharing alone is what make bonding first choice. And not for DPS classes only. You trying to say that augments are more reliable to tanks. Just becouse DR is capped and power is not? And who said tanks need only a defence? Sure HP boost is worth considering, but only after tanks gona raise all stats they will be missing after that patch.
Like I said before augments to be resonble choice need much more then that patch will bring, like their active bonuses rework and buffing other runestones even higher then they are planning atm. And even then they gona be hardly comparable to bondings due to that power share issue.
For exemple giving the player of that companion a % of the player stats as bonuses, could be recovery, arm pen, def, defl, etc ... (working on augments too)
Being a % of his stats would mean that a 6K or a 16k player will still see an interest in them, it can help with calculation of power player for cap and stuff (i'm one of them but for my own play style)
It can help making the other rune interesting for some peoples ...
And we have currently 1, 2 and 3 stats enchantment, why not create soon 2 and 3 stats runes too ? i know it'll be a pain to do probably but if you make them with the type of extra stats i told it could allow player to fine tune their final stats ... Maybe ...
That was just a though of mine ... I know balancing is hard but just maybe why not creating a true test zone on preview with an npc that can give pretty much anything that is in collections + Zen market for 1 copper, ennemies what can hit with fixed damage for testing proc then hit, DR, reflect damage, debuff, etc ... Ennemies with fixed DR for testing arm pen ... Pretty much everything that we could encounter in the game and that you could implement in the future ... I remember some module update where 2 day after there is an emergency patch for a broken new thing that could have been seen on preview with said zone ...
I suspect most players will avoid it until they've ranked most of their enchantments (inc bondings) to r13 at least.
Xael De Armadeon: DC
Xane De Armadeon: CW
Zen De Armadeon: OP
Zohar De Armadeon: TR
Chrion De Armadeon: SW
Gosti Big Belly: GWF
Barney McRustbucket: GF
Lt. Thackeray: HR
Lucius De Armadeon: BD
Member of Casual Dailies - XBox
Now, that said, I assume many people like myself use companions to balance stats. This is because they come with an excessive amount of crit and arm pen and it is foolish NOT to accommodate the stat bonuses when this is the case. But, when I have a Bonding with a 50% uptime, I might as well pretty much IGNORE all benefit I am getting from my companion in the Crit and AP departments, because it is not a reliable number. That is, if I max AP based on when bonding is UP, then I am going to lose significant DPS when bonding is down, because now both my power and AP will drop (meaning enemy defense kicks in). The same is true for crit, especially if you are crit sev stacked and have powers that trigger off of crits.
So you can: a) overbuild your crit and AP and waste all those stats when bonding kicks in, b) try to finish all fights in 15 seconds, or c) wait 15 seconds between pulls.
Even if you cut the presently intended bonding buff in half, and make it 100% uptime, at least the stats outside of power and recovery are not useless then. Or please let us better balance the pet stats, so I can gear my pet to have basically 0 crit and 0 AP if I want, it's not like the pet is adding significantly to our damage at this point. We can mitigate this somewhat through gearing, but that means there are literally 1-2 items only that are worthwhile for each pet slot (down from the current several handfuls). And all enchantements into pet gear should be Power or Recovery, as anything else will flex you up and down above the cap. All of this logic applies to people defensively capping as well.
Since a lot of fights are junk fights, and thus your bonding has essentially 100% uptime in those fights, a more reasonable adjustment might be something along the lines of 75% of the currently intended bonus, but with 100% uptime. Otherwise people are going to have to spend insane amounts of time hunting down the few pieces of gear that give stats that aren't stacked to the max. So DPS are going to be stacking Power and Def rings (or Power and Rec, at best) and vice versa for tanks. Except that those rings (or whatever) do not then have the double offensive/double defensive slots you want for your role.
This is not a pure numbers game about augment companions values vs. anything else, because the augments have 100% uptime, meaning that you will use ALL the stats from the augment all the time, meaning you can better balance crit and AP and are not completely wasting those stats when bondings proc. So when you do the math for bondings, after calculating the net effect of bondings, go ahead and subtract the total percentage of stats (Excessive crit and AP for DPS) that are completely useless.
With these huge changes, it may be the end of my Neverwinter days. If these changes go to live, you are really HAMSTER over you loyal customers.
> Going in with rank 12's would be same the as trying it with rank 9.5's in current - or two rank 9's and a rank 10. It's definitely undergeared.
>
> I suspect most players will avoid it until they've ranked most of their enchantments (inc bondings) to r13 at least.
Where's the fun in that though? Why do I want to bust my butt and/or spend money just to be able to run stuff I normally run? That isn't progression and I thought progression was the point of MMOs. I play to either be able to do stuff I can't do at the moment or be able to do the things I can't do too well a lot better.
Xael De Armadeon: DC
Xane De Armadeon: CW
Zen De Armadeon: OP
Zohar De Armadeon: TR
Chrion De Armadeon: SW
Gosti Big Belly: GWF
Barney McRustbucket: GF
Lt. Thackeray: HR
Lucius De Armadeon: BD
Member of Casual Dailies - XBox