That lion head!
That bull head!
I see male fox, dog, and hyena heads have customizable eyes, as does the bull head.
Though it pains me to not have unlocked some heads. Any pictures of the Kitsune 3-Tail tail?
Sorry I asked him only for Head pictures, no tails :S
Oh yeah! I just realized they have customizable eyes, talking about detail
Sooo, HW energy unlock when? I feel like we really should probably have one of those thrown in soon so everyone stops having existential crises. The whole, better in-set power pick reward/rotation thing kind of hinges on having our EU for the set we're using actually be in the set.
I agree here, Give heavy weapons their OWN Thematic Energy Unlock!
Don't use Fire Revarbation! NOT everyone want this FORCED fire synergy
The issue with MSA isn't just about framework, it's about something that simply outclasses so many other choices. The time of "must have powers" is coming to an end.
Tell this to people whose build contain MANY different frameworks and MSA is the only Neutral solution! OR to the people whose powerframes don't even have a thematic Energy Unlock
POWERFRAME REVAMPS, NEW POWERS and BUG FIXES > Recycled Content and Events and even costumes at this point Introvert guy who use CO to make his characters playable and get experimental with Viable FF Theme builds! Running out of Unique FF builds due to the lack of updates and synergiesPlaying since 1 February 2011 98+ Characters (7 ATs, 91 FFs) ALTitis for Life!
It would be nice for HW to have a dedicated energy unlock. Now, you need to pick something outside of set, like MSA or Thermal Reverb, or rely on Defiance or Enrage to give you energy. Even though it will be a little tougher to proc MSA with HW, it still can be used.
All of these are meant to be compared relatively, not in any absolute sense (gear dependent)
Tested against the SV-level Regenerating Test Dummy B, so i assume Annihilate is benefiting from knock immune bonus damage.
PTS having determination but not justice available is interfering with my sustained Skewer testing, because the Determination primary utility has an energy generating ability. (5% chance for 98 energy is really significant).
-Skewer is *not sustainable* with 10s cd Eruption (down to 8.7s with test gear, but as you may have noticed, e costs are *significantly down* too). Ie, the *effective e cost relative to other powers* of skewer is much higher than it looks on paper, because it depends on other powers to restore energy for it. That means its actual performance dps is a *lot lower*. Especially with Eruption's cd change. -Skullcrusher is *probably sustainable* by itself off enrage + unstoppable energy returns. -Annihilate is *definitely sustainable* by itself off enrage + unstoppable energy returns. -Brimstone is *definitely sustainable* by itself off enrage + unstoppable energy returns. It is also only barely behind Skullcrusher on dps.
A note about AoEs. -3' x 10' cylinders are virtually single target attacks. It's possible to aim up two enemies given a tank who can hold them in one place and some positioning, or enemies who don't move. This is only really practical in Fire and Ice and in the Duraclad battle in FM. Hitting multiple enemies otherwise requires some degree of luck (and for trash clearing up through even Master Villains, Brimstone is easily sufficient and a lot less hassle). -Even with that caveat, if we consider the AoE to matter at all (which cryptic seems to think it does for energy pricing of Skewer and Skullcrusher relative to Annihilate), Skullcrusher has a massive advantage over skewer here because it suffers no reduced damage on secondary targets. Skewer loses something like 33% of its damage on all but the primary target. -Skullcrusher's damage and energy cost is not competitive treated either as a single-target power, nor as an AoE (where Brimstone's massively larger AoE more than makes up for the rather mild dps hit - the problem here is definitely Skullcrusher, which could probably have its damage boosted and its e cost reduced up to 10% across the board. -Annihilate thrashes everything else on dps, and its effective e cost is *negative*.
Bug: Skullcrusher's fire damage is not increasing with ranks Bug: Skullcrusher's Put Them Down advantage doesn't seem to be doing anything.
Note: Despite similar performance between R3 Annihilate and R3+Follow Through Skewer, they're not strictly comparable because Skewer does not generate energy from Enrage or Unstoppable, so it requires another power to work. It also costs an extra advantage point. Comparing to Annihilate R2 + Scorching Blade is better (both require another power to work to full potential), but Annihilate is still 1 less advantage point *and* is less reliant on the other power. (It won't stop working if CF falls off, whereas Skewer absolutely needs something which builds enrage in its rotation to work - and on a 3-4s timescale at that, whereas CF only needs to be reapplied once every 10s *and* the Arc of Ruin you're definitely including in your rotation for No Quarter will refresh it anyway, so the effective dps of skewer is going to suffer more from having to work whatever knock into its rotation - and it's still down ~12% damage from Annihilate despite that).
And I want to emphasize that this was all done with really good gear (Determination primaries w/ R7s, OSV secondaries w/ R5s). Lesser gear and leveling toons will have far more difficult energy situations.
The issue with MSA isn't just about framework, it's about something that simply outclasses so many other choices. The time of "must have powers" is coming to an end.
MSA wasn't 'must have' because it was so good, it was because there was no other EU which was effective that worked cross-framework. The solution isn't to nerf *totally different powers* so people don't take MSA, it's to introduce more EUs which work cross-framework, and make the other one that exists work well enough people actually use it.
-Buff Overdrive's scaling. -Let KI and Steadfast work with any framework, or at least ranged/melee frameworks respectively. But better any so Ranged/melee hybrids don't feel like they're hated that much. -EU that works off knocks. Any knocks. Energy returns scale on better of strength or ego. -EU that works off roots and snares etc...
Basically, if you think MSA is too good, you've identified the wrong problem. It's that MSA is the only functional EU in its niche, and that niche is 'uses powers from multiple frameworks' - something the player base obviously wants to do.
Bug: Skullcrusher's fire damage is not increasing with ranks
Just wanted to re-highlight that, as its pretty important. SCrusher R1 -> R2 = 87-237 crushing and 87-237 fire -> 105-284 crushing and 87-237 fire. I assume the base dmg on the crushing and fire protions are meant to be the same per rank. Done on the same stat/gear less Hybrid.
I can't confirm the Put Them Down adv bug. The special adv seemed to be working for me after brief testing (Crushing dmg range on R3 went from about ~670-765 to about ~785-890 w/ Disorient and PTD adv, on a partial build).
Hyper Voice (all ranks) consumes energy on tap, but deals no damage. This bug was fixed in the previous build, but seems to have re-emerged now that Hyper Voice's rank-up F/X were added. Sonic Boom is still working properly.
Damn, I first reported this during the very first iteration...please fix this!..again
Bug: Skullcrusher's fire damage is not increasing with ranks
Just wanted to re-highlight that, as its pretty important. SCrusher R1 -> R2 = 87-237 crushing and 87-237 fire -> 105-284 crushing and 87-237 fire. I assume the base dmg on the crushing and fire protions are meant to be the same per rank. Done on the same stat/gear less Hybrid.
I can't confirm the Put Them Down adv bug. The special adv seemed to be working for me after brief testing (Crushing dmg range on R3 went from about ~670-765 to about ~785-890 w/ Disorient and PTD adv, on a partial build).
Damage I was seeing looked like the tooltip damage even w/ disorient and PTD, when it should be higher than it. I believe it should also affect both fire and crushing damage (otherwise splitting skullcrushers damage is an even more serious nerf - not split on live). But I said "doesn't seem" because I didn't rigorously test it. (15% should be large enough to notice though!) Since i was testing with gear, i may have been running into diminishing returns, but they'd have to be pretty crazy diminishing returns to make it virtually disappear. (And I definitely noticed the Follow Through damage on Skewer).
Bug: Skullcrusher's fire damage is not increasing with ranks
Just wanted to re-highlight that, as its pretty important. SCrusher R1 -> R2 = 87-237 crushing and 87-237 fire -> 105-284 crushing and 87-237 fire. I assume the base dmg on the crushing and fire protions are meant to be the same per rank. Done on the same stat/gear less Hybrid.
I can't confirm the Put Them Down adv bug. The special adv seemed to be working for me after brief testing (Crushing dmg range on R3 went from about ~670-765 to about ~785-890 w/ Disorient and PTD adv, on a partial build).
Damage I was seeing looked like the tooltip damage even w/ disorient and PTD, when it should be higher than it. I believe it should also affect both fire and crushing damage (otherwise splitting skullcrushers damage is an even more serious nerf - not split on live). But I said "doesn't seem" because I didn't rigorously test it. (15% should be large enough to notice though!) Since i was testing with gear, i may have been running into diminishing returns, but they'd have to be pretty crazy diminishing returns to make it virtually disappear. (And I definitely noticed the Follow Through damage on Skewer).
Yea, I didn't do an actual ACT parse or anything- just did a partial build w/ CoAP (for energy) + Rec + Str SS and R3 SCrusher w/ and w/o the special adv. Then went and looked at the base dmg (parenthesis #) in the combat log for the crushing portion on a regen dummy in the AH after bashing it for a bit. The base dmg range did seem to go up w/ the special adv w/ Disorient, but the dmg range for most attacks is pretty wide, so it can be tough to nail that down w/o longer testing and parses.
Put Them Down is 15% base damage. If you aren't seeing this, please provide detailed logs detailing it.
I'm not seeing energy issues regarding the Devastator archetype when using Skewer. Tried a variety of gear from random quest stuff to high end stuff while keeping a pretty balanced stat spread. Keeping up clinging flames and rotating in a knock occasionally, be it Cleave, Vicious Descent, Eruption etc fueled the power pretty handily.
Had to use my eb occasionally with low end gear, but I don't see an issue with that.
One issue I'm seeing is the difference between Skewer and Annihilate still, Skewer coming out ahead. The Follow Through advantage is a little potent for a 1 pointer that adds to base damage with basically no drawback.
I am curious what players are seeing, and would appreciate any detailed logs to be posted with what dps outputs you're getting and what sort of build/gear you're using.
Keeping up clinging flames and rotating in a knock occasionally, be it Cleave, Vicious Descent, Eruption etc fueled the power pretty handily.
Had to use my eb occasionally with low end gear, but I don't see an issue with that.
For some players, this is considered a big issue. Some players expect to never use their energy builder again once their character is past a certain level, or certainly at level 40. For me, using my energy builder every other rotation or so is totally fine--it drops DPS some. I can live with that.
Likewise, alternating between knock powers with different cooldowns is not acceptable for some players. To be fair, thatt does add complexity over and above many other builds.
It's not painful to adjust to, it's impossible to adjust to.
There's always people saying that with every single change to the game ever. It kind of makes it so it's pointless to respond since this idea has been proven false so many times.
It would be nice for HW to have a dedicated energy unlock. Now, you need to pick something outside of set, like MSA or Thermal Reverb, or rely on Defiance or Enrage to give you energy. Even though it will be a little tougher to proc MSA with HW, it still can be used.
Don't forget Unstoppable, it also gives energy on knocks. HW characters still have quite a few options to keep that energy churnin'. With Enrage and Unstoppable, spamming attacks as HW is likely to remain fairly easy ( and oh look what the Devastator has access to! ) even without an energy unlock - add in MSA or TR and HW characters will likely be nose-deep in energy. Hey maybe I should make a video?
For me the Devastator changes are having the exact opposite effects that the munitions changes did for the Specialist. The Munitions changes made the Specialist a much more versatile AT. The Devastator already had some issues (most notably low survival and redundant powers). These changes lock the Devastator into clinging flames mode. Choosing powers that don't use Clinging Flames won't make any sense with the Energy Unlock.
Of course that highlights another problem, the only EU that really works all that well with HW is MSA. So the choice was either use an overused EU or shoehorn an EU mechanic (CF & TR) into the build. And it does feel very forced... I'm still not 100% sold forcing fire damage into melee weapon set. So my steel blade is now a fire blade? Hmm ok.. than I'd like some firey looking weapons (or magma) to go with that.
At this point though -- it's pretty obvious that the forced CF synergy is a set direction that isn't changing. I think most of us just want to be certain that these changes don't break the Devastator AT and make it an undesirable one. We have enough of those already and it seemed like we were moving away from that.
Can we still at least rethink making fire so mandatory on all the HW powers? It feels like we are changing the whole powerset to highlight the spiffy new Absorb Heat healing power. And in doing so, we wreck theme versatility, and potentially cross-powerset versatility.
And on a separate note, I'm gonna repeat a suggestion I posted in the previous PTS thread: With Kitsune tails, add a color channel for the tip please, so we could have them look like foxtails.
The fire portion of Heavy Weapons is not changing.
Regarding the archetype - If you feel it has problems, please detail how the archetype is worse off than it was before the changes.
It had no energy unlock prior, but had energy management tools through Unstoppable and Rage. Now it has an energy unlock, and still has those two other sources of energy.
No powers lost the ability to knock and Cleave gained the ability. Skewer could never generate Rage if you didn't have multiple targets and relied on knocks from other sources to manage its energy. Now that's less of an issue as clinging flames will continue to give you energy and is available from several sources, all of which also knock.
Can we still at least rethink making fire so mandatory on all the HW powers? It feels like we are changing the whole powerset to highlight the spiffy new Absorb Heat healing power. And in doing so, we wreck theme versatility, and potentially cross-powerset versatility.
Likely the reason they went heavier with fire was because it was already there, meaning that power graphics wouldn't have to be messed with. Did they actually add any new fire graphics to these powers? Some of the ones that had fire damage added to them already had a fire effect, even when they were just crushing damage.
Personally I see more cross-powerset versatility than it had before. The thematic versatility seems to have stayed the same.
I've known more than a few Ice themed HW toons. Before it was easy to pick HW powers that didn't have fire, Cleave especially. I see less thematic versatility.
And before somebody says to color the power blue... Silver's can't do that.
Put Them Down is 15% base damage. If you aren't seeing this, please provide detailed logs detailing it.
I'm not seeing energy issues regarding the Devastator archetype when using Skewer. Tried a variety of gear from random quest stuff to high end stuff while keeping a pretty balanced stat spread. Keeping up clinging flames and rotating in a knock occasionally, be it Cleave, Vicious Descent, Eruption etc fueled the power pretty handily.
Had to use my eb occasionally with low end gear, but I don't see an issue with that.
One issue I'm seeing is the difference between Skewer and Annihilate still, Skewer coming out ahead. The Follow Through advantage is a little potent for a 1 pointer that adds to base damage with basically no drawback.
I am curious what players are seeing, and would appreciate any detailed logs to be posted with what dps outputs you're getting and what sort of build/gear you're using.
First: I have no interest in clinging flames or taking advantages that use clinging flames. Skewer deals no fire damage. I feel like I should be able to use skewer without sacrificing my build to clinging flames.
Second: I don't care about the half-fire/half-crushing. As far as i can tell, I can't really see it unless I take specific advantages, so as long as i'm wholly within HW (and Devastator pretty much is), it doesn't bother me. Arc of Ruin still affects all my damage, so i can just ignore the fact that the server is going 'this is half fire damage'.
But, there's no reason why old Devastator builds should stop working. Let people who are playing element-agnostic Devastators continue to do so. That means, minimally, not increasing the cd on Eruption.
Third: The non-fire-focused Devastator's power rotation should be fun, feel organic, look like a melee combatant, and not be more complicated than every other powerset out there. It also shouldn't require a tutorial. Eruption did that in it's current live state. It looks like a weapon strike, it was ready as often as you could stack enrage, and it wasn't particularly complicated. (Certainly when i was first playing my devastator, i easily intuited the eruption->skewer, skewer playstyle, and it was a lot of fun and has a great look).
All the alternatives are horrendously complicated (rotating Eruption and Vicious Descent), or don't look like a melee combatant (Brimstone, Earthsplitter).
And no, cleave isn't an option. (1) Takes too long to guarantee an enrage stack, (2) is slow and clunky as an animation, and doesn't look organic, (3) produces clinging flames stacks, which is visually fire-themed.
Freeforms can take Rising Knee or Uppercut. There's still no reason they shouldn't have a similar option in-set so they still look like a heavy weapon fighter instead of having their weapon magically disappear for a second every 3-4s just so they can make skewer work. Devastators don't even have that option.
Also, Vicious Descent isn't a real choice against Decimate. Devastators are melee characters, and need a lunge that's available often. Certainly not one that will be perpetually tied up in cd while they're *in melee* because they need to rotate something with Eruption to get knocks. And having to rotate Vicious Descent with Eruption is horrendously complicated compared to every other powerset and doesn't look like a melee combatant.
In short, non-fire-emphasizing Skewer-using Devastators need *one power* which is available *every 3 seconds* that *looks like a melee strike* and *guarantees a knock*. That power has always been eruption, and changing eruption ruins those builds.
Fourth: The Devastator who does choose to focus on clinging flames shouldn't be as offended by things that don't look like pure melee combat. They've obviously decided to emphasize the magical nature of what they're doing. And that includes powers that have always been half-fire and half-crushing, like Brimstone and Earthsplitter.
So if you really need to rework a power to also cause clinging flames to happen, why not Earthsplitter, instead of wrecking Eruption's old functionality. I find it hard to believe that there are more than 3 people even using the power on live right now.
Certainly changing Eruption's base functionality and cd because of an *advantage* is kind of ridiculous.
Fifth: Thermal Reverberations does not provide that much energy (with ~155 Rec it's ~20 energy per 3 secs), and no Devastator is going to use more than that, because they've reached the limits of the equilibrium returns on Rec (they've pretty much pushed their equilibrium to their energy max). And it requires use of the clinging flames mechanic. At the very least, Thermal Reverb should be an *option*, not something Devastators are required to take.
Sixth: Skewer does not seem to be coming out ahead of annihilate to me. It's behind even in the R3 vs. R3 + Follow Through comparison, even if only a little bit, and annihilate of course sustains itself, which trivially results in higher total dps when you consider necessary power rotations.
But if you really think the Skewer : Annihilate comparison favors skewer, give Devastators the choice between the two (instead of Skullcrusher) at level 17, and see what players actually do. I think you'll find the playerbase doesn't agree with you. (I know I'd take annihilate, especially given the changes to eruption).
Seventh: Follow Through does have a drawback - it requires a full charge to fully benefit because it doesn't increase tap damage, only charge damage. Skewer *roots you*, so you can't pursue fleeing enemies (or enemies who move away because someone else has aggro and they can't sit still. If you've ever done an alert with one of those str-primary ranged pvp builds that has CC on a common attack so they steal aggro, and then kites all the mobs around the map, this is really frustrating, especially in the Red Banner special alert where i frequently see ranged toons steal aggro and kite him all over the place).
And that also means it trades off, at least in theory, with initiative, which doesn't require you to stand in one place for 1.5s and hope your enemy is still there to hit. It's less damage, but it also has less drawbacks.
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I don't know how to produce the detailed logs you seem to want and get reliable total dps calculations. If there's some program I can use to record this, i'd love a link.
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Final Thought: I thought the Devastator *as it is* was sufficiently fun to play that I left my Devastator an archetype when i bought my LTS, despite being able to retrain it to freeform *for free* at that time. That's a success story in AT design. I don't understand why you feel the need to change the basic mechanics of a well-functioning AT that no one thinks is broken, and that people paid real money for.
Sure, adding options is fine. And there are useless or near-useless powers (ie, Earthsplitter, Vicious Descent) in it that you could modify without hurting any current builds. No one would care if you were just adding real options to it. But you're making the old way to play impossible by fundamentally transforming one of its bread-and-butter powers (Eruption).
I don't have access to server data, but I'd be willing to bet that change invalidates 80-90% of Devastator builds and playstyles on live right now. For no good reason.
So add your fire synergy stuff, but can't you respect those of us who aren't interested in it, and don't want to use those powers and advantages which obviously involve fire? Make it optional to emphasize the fire, not mandatory, because we've been playing for like ~5 years without fire themes and we like our Devastators the way they are.
ok trying my level 40 devastator on pts.
before retraining.
after partial retraining, grabbing powers, spec trees, no ADV on powers, no talents. same gear.Blues/greens/purple secondaries
even with the eb off,
with no form on(forgot to turn it on)
, i got up to 9 stacks of clinging flames.
Cost discount from gear is 159. so it's low, for one of mine.
only time I got close to no energy was spamming ARC of ruin.
On live? Eruption -> Tap Arc of Ruin -> full charge Skewer x2-3 -> repeat (depending on whether i'm still building enrage stacks or not)
On PTS? Eruption -> Tap Arc -> full charge Skewer x5 and i'm out of energy and Eruption isn't even off cd yet. (Totally out, not enough to even use eruption when it does come off like a second later).
Showing off my ice look too, for those who don't believe there are people running around with ice-themed devastator looks.
493 cost reduction. 203 cool down reduction. New eruption cd time ~8.7s. Old eruption cd time ~2.6s.
Not only do i run out of energy, but the time to building 8 stacks of enrage has gone from ~18s to ~47s. That's crazy.
I have no interest in clinging flames, and will just not play the character if Devastators are being forced to use it. (And not advocate anyone else play the AT either, while I have advocated Devastator as a fun AT in the past). And to the extent i have one, this is my *main character*. (Yes, I'm an LTS with an AT main, despite 16 level 40s, 13 of them FFs).
Edit: Pardon my dust while i try to figure out which image linking mode actually works Image works!
At least toss us a 1 point advantage to change Clinging Flames on Cleave to something else? A maybe Bleeding? Then that (along with Skewer) could maybe have some cross-set synergy with Aspect of Bestial.
It's a fun design. My own HW build is an Aquaman homage, based around his design from Injustice. I recolored the lava attacks blue to mimic water. I plan on selling Treverb as him drawing energy from thermal vents. It fits with his character as a low key hydromancer.
Its not ideal, and I'd have preferred electricity as an elemental choice, but that's the nature of the game.
I feel like your underlying issue is that you don't want to use thermal reverberation as an energy unlock. Unfortunately, I don't see that as being a viable option at this point. Not without sacrificing some of your DPS by utilizing your energy builder on occasion. Alternatively, you could dip into might or martial arts to suppliment your knock back attacks, though again that would mean sacrificing theme.
Adding a choice between Thermal Reverb and another power would be useful. The Clinging Flames aspect seems to be somewhat optional with the rocker - you can make a build with a very low chance of applying CFs. Adding the choice of brute strike for those who would not be utilizing CFs and thus not benefiting from Thermal Reverb may be a good idea.
I don't know if you absolutely need that extra energy - enrage and defiance may be enough.
I feel like your underlying issue is that you don't want to use thermal reverberation as an energy unlock. Unfortunately, I don't see that as being a viable option at this point. Not without sacrificing some of your DPS by utilizing your energy builder on occasion. Alternatively, you could dip into might or martial arts to suppliment your knock back attacks, though again that would mean sacrificing theme.
It's been working just fine for 5 years with never a complaint it was even remotely unbalanced (and if anything people saying its underpowered), i see no reason why they need to wreck it now. They can add clinging flames options in without making us play with them.
And I can't dip into Might. I'm a Devastator AT. Unless they're going to give us *retraining tokens* with this change so i can convert to FF. (The thing i specifically chose not to do for free previously because i enjoyed playing my Devastator so much).
Well, being an AT was a choice for you. You had the option of converting to free-form as a gold, or sticking with the AT. You elected to let the Devs pick your power choices for you, and now you're not happy with what they picked.
I'd suggest biting the bullet and buying a retrain token if this is going to be so much an issue for you.
Well, being an AT was a choice for you. You had the option of converting to free-form as a gold, or sticking with the AT. You elected to let the Devs pick your power choices for you, and now you're not happy with what they picked.
I'd suggest biting the bullet and buying a retrain token if this is going to be so much an issue for you.
No, i elected to use *what was already picked*. It wasn't supposed to change to make the entire previous playstyle impossible. (Even specialist was a net improvement with a similar playstyle afaict, this is just different for the sake of being different - there are no real buffs here and tons of nerfs to an underperforming powerset).
And why would i give cryptic more money because they're wrecking my character? You think this should *increase* my willingness to spend cash on CO? Really?
I suppose there are some fundamental questions that need answering:
-Why can't Earthsplitter, the power no one uses, be the one that gets reworked to always apply clinging flames, instead of Eruption, the power that everyone uses for a purpose which is completely invalidated by the change (and for which it is comparable to powers in other frameworks)?
-Why can't clinging flames mechanic be an *option* instead of *mandatory* for Devastators?
One of these sets of choices is friendly to existing Devastator players, and one of these sets of choices is not. Why are we making the choices which are not?
Follow Through being one point makes sense because targets move around a lot and the bosses in the game won't let you fully charge it without having to block in between. Otherwise you'll be heavily punished by taking a lot of damage.
the only clinging flames, I get , are from the base powers, I don't have any of the advs on them.Cooldown- 112.
i was using Brimstone instead of Cleave. that's where my CF were coming from
I usually have single, aoe, single , aoe, so I don't have 2 of the same next to each other
due to this. I now have single, aoe, aoe.
cleave, arc of ruin, brimstone, lunge , then erution due to cd.
with form on-eruption>arc tap> 3 full brimstones and eruption is ready plus I'm still at full energy wiht 3 or 4 stacks of enrage
ok tried eruption>arc of ruin> skewer charge- got to 3 before ran out of energy- with no form and no EB.
with Form- 4 and then Eruption was recharged
mines on 9.2 secs CD, yours should be on a lot lower since your CD is nearly double mine and your cost disc is 3 times mine.
There's something screwy about those numbers
I'm not particularly in love with the whole fire thing that Heavy Weapons is becoming. Personally I don't really get it thematically - big swords and hammers and fires have never held a particular connection with me, at least not any more than they have with other elements. I made a character once that I thought was really cool, who was an ice/HW character... with these changes, that character would now have fire forced into their attacks. Sure, I could color the fire blue, but it's still blue fire... boo.
Meanwhile, Kallethen, who was a poster in that thread, parrots most of these points in response to you, in this thread:
I've known more than a few Ice themed HW toons. Before it was easy to pick HW powers that didn't have fire, Cleave especially. I see less thematic versatility.
And before somebody says to color the power blue... Silver's can't do that.
the only clinging flames, I get , are from the base powers, I don't have any of the advs on them.Cooldown- 112.
i was using Brimstone instead of Cleave. that's where my CF were coming from
I usually have single, aoe, single , aoe, so I don't have 2 of the same next to each other
due to this. I now have single, aoe, aoe.
cleave, arc of ruin, brimstone, lunge , then erution due to cd.
with form on-eruption>arc tap> 3 full brimstones and eruption is ready plus I'm still at full energy wiht 3 or 4 stacks of enrage
ok tried eruption>arc of ruin> skewer charge- got to 3 before ran out of energy- with no form and no EB.
with Form- 4 and then Eruption was recharged
mines on 9.2 secs CD, yours should be on a lot lower since your CD is nearly double mine and your cost disc is 3 times mine.
There's something screwy about those numbers
Diminishing returns on cdr are pretty harsh. Dropping an extra .5s (to your .8s already dropped) for double the cdr sounds about right, actually. You didn't think the next 100 cdr was going to be as effective as the first 100, did you?
Yeah, Brimstone runs just fine. The moving firecloud is not how most devastator players saw their characters, i imagine. Also, doesn't Brimstone only produce clinging flames with the fire-related advantage? (The one that creates the flame patch). That's at least true on live - i haven't looked at Brimstone that closely on PTS, just its straight out dps.
There's no way Eruption + arc of ruin + 4x skewer is getting you to another eruption.
Arc of Ruin (i'm assuming tap) = .83s. Full charge skewer = 1.5s. That's 6.83s and you've got another 2.37s yet before Eruption is off cd, which is a skewer and a half (or realistically, 2 more full skewers unless you like standing around). And that's the kind of timing math problem I'm running into, because the extra .5s i'm dropping off eruption's cd still doesn't get it low enough that it's ready after 5 skewers, and even 5 skewers has already wrecked me for energy.
FWIW, the HW EB is slow and unwieldy, and having it on disrupts powers actually activating when you want them to. So no, using it is not really an option when there's stuff you want to use on tap. (Because if you happen to start an EB swing, half the time it won't do the tap power because your next power will interrupt it. Whereas if EB isn't on, you can hit your tap and then the next power, and the tap will go off as expected - basically, you can be one step ahead of the power you're using so you don't have pauses between attacks. Waiting to make sure the tap power triggers causes strange pauses in your power usage, so that's not a solution either, and just creates more openings for the EB to start swinging that further disrupts your power use planning. This is a problem with any character using tap powers who needs to use their EB, but it's much worse with EBs that have long activation times because the window 'between swings' comes up less frequently. Maintains and charges don't have this issue, because you need to hold the button down. And if nothing else, Arc of Ruin is basically a tap power for all intents and purposes, so devastators definitely have this problem).
Sounds like you guys need less QQ and more PewPew...well, more SmashSmash since we're talking about melee.
Seriously, just adapt your build. I don't wanna hear "But muh AT". Put some stat points into Endurance to better feed Thermal Reverb if you're really having energy issues.
MY build is ruined, 2gm is no good now. Sound familiar.
I'll have another check when I manage to get on again, currently doing the long slow STO patch, followed by timeout.
I don't have any advs selected , so it has to be from the base powers.
remembered the wrong lines.
cleave is doing it- you did say nobody uses cleave after level 17?
also the adv on Brimstone, arc of ruin and eruption, so easy to avoid the clinging flames.
mind you, putting a second adv on eruption, minus the clinging flames would solve that one, for people who don't want the flames.
ARC of ruin has 2 options for adv.
With good gear it's possible to do Eruption>Arc of Ruin>Skewer(x4) with only 1 EB hit now and then.
The problem with a 10 seconds Eruption is when you are switching targets fast (like in 99% of pve content) or when it missfires due to a mob suddenly deciding to move out of melee range just after you click, or you get knocked or stunned at the wrong moment, or your team kills your target from under your nose, you will have a hard time getting your EU to work well with it or be able to use Annihilate. Or if you want Eruption for other stuff like Crippling Challenge, or building Enrage. The reason Eruption needed a 100% CF is to remove the "you need to do everything just so, and things need to all go perfectly for the set to work" requirement on bossfights. But with the increased cooldown that has now been shifted (somewhat) to non-bossfights.
The only way to make the set work now is to use multiple powers to apply CF, but in my opinion there are more than enough requirements on what powers to use already.
I think The Devastator's new build functions well as a DPS AT. The build has the tools to overcome its new hurdles (increased energy costs, longer cooldown on Eruption). But what I see in the comments is that some people are refusing to use certain Devastator attacks, which puts self-imposed limitations on the AT's performance.
For example, Cleave received a damage buff. Running an attack cycle of Cleave(combo)>Skewer(charge), with occasional Arc of Ruin for the debuff/disorient, yields solid DPS for an AT with access to Setup, Slaughter, and Warden Mastery. It keeps up Clinging Flames, and routinely triggers Enrage/Unstoppable with knocks. But refusing to use Cleave (or other fire-graphics attacks), because of the animation and/or Clinging Flames, hamstrings that attack flow.
That said, I do understand the desire of some players to stick with a flame-free character concept. As has been mentioned, with Eruption on a longer cooldown, the Skewer-spam setup no longer has a "minor F/X" knock attack to thread between every couple Skewer charges (if you're dismissing Cleave and Brimstone as too F/X-heavy to fit the concept). So here's a suggestion...
SUGGESTION:
Alter The Devastator's power order to allow someone to choose both Skewer and Skullcrusher.
This would allow a Devastator to run a "flameless F/X" single-target attack cycle of Skullcrusher(tap)>Skewer(charge x2), with Arc of Ruin taps thrown in for the debuff. Skullcrusher is lower DPS than the current Eruption cycling on Live, but Skewer's new Bleeds should make up the difference.
Here's one possible power order that would cater to the above suggestion:
While HW is getting some attention, could the lunge please be improved. Decimate is one of the few lunges that has a noticeable delay before it starts moving you forward.
While HW is getting some attention, could the lunge please be improved. Decimate is one of the few lunges that has a noticeable delay before it starts moving you forward.
I was wondering about that too and mentioned it a few times in the previous PTS Threads
Now that Smoke Bomb Lunge got fixed, Decimate is the SLOWEST Lunge ingame
Please DEVs, make Decimate fast as well to be in line with other lunges
POWERFRAME REVAMPS, NEW POWERS and BUG FIXES > Recycled Content and Events and even costumes at this point Introvert guy who use CO to make his characters playable and get experimental with Viable FF Theme builds! Running out of Unique FF builds due to the lack of updates and synergiesPlaying since 1 February 2011 98+ Characters (7 ATs, 91 FFs) ALTitis for Life!
That lion head! That bull head! I see male fox, dog, and hyena heads have customizable eyes, as does the bull head. Though it pains me to not have unlocked some heads. Any pictures of the Kitsune 3-Tail tail?
Didn't someone post something a while back from Gravitar fights DPS showing Skewer being really popular? May be the power is getting the cost increase partly due to simple popularity. Which would probably have something to do with Devastator having been free so long via the old Alienware promo in addition to people seeming to like big arse characters swinging big arse weapons and Skewer being 'top dog' in HW.
Those same people would probably rather a more Swingy HW power be top dog anyway...
Didn't someone post something a while back from Gravitar fights DPS showing Skewer being really popular? May be the power is getting the cost increase partly due to simple popularity. Which would probably have something to do with Devastator having been free so long via the old Alienware promo in addition to people seeming to like big arse characters swinging big arse weapons and Skewer being 'top dog' in HW.
Those same people would probably rather a more Swingy HW power be top dog anyway...
What if, hear me, WHAT IF those numbers are from DEVASTATOR AT users?
Because the top damage move for this AT is, in fact, Skewer
Devastator is really popular AT and I see it very often in Gravitar Pugs, especially with the Free AT code
I almost never see any FF using Skewer, none
In fact I only use Annihilate in my currently only FF HW character because I dislike Skewer
POWERFRAME REVAMPS, NEW POWERS and BUG FIXES > Recycled Content and Events and even costumes at this point Introvert guy who use CO to make his characters playable and get experimental with Viable FF Theme builds! Running out of Unique FF builds due to the lack of updates and synergiesPlaying since 1 February 2011 98+ Characters (7 ATs, 91 FFs) ALTitis for Life!
Didn't someone post something a while back from Gravitar fights DPS showing Skewer being really popular? May be the power is getting the cost increase partly due to simple popularity. Which would probably have something to do with Devastator having been free so long via the old Alienware promo in addition to people seeming to like big arse characters swinging big arse weapons and Skewer being 'top dog' in HW.
Those same people would probably rather a more Swingy HW power be top dog anyway...
Annihilate has always been top dog in HW, Devastators just don't get it.
Didn't someone post something a while back from Gravitar fights DPS showing Skewer being really popular? May be the power is getting the cost increase partly due to simple popularity. Which would probably have something to do with Devastator having been free so long via the old Alienware promo in addition to people seeming to like big arse characters swinging big arse weapons and Skewer being 'top dog' in HW.
Those same people would probably rather a more Swingy HW power be top dog anyway...
Annihilate has always been top dog in HW, Devastators just don't get it.
And those comparisons are meaningless, because you can't just spam skewer for days by itself, while you can spam annihilate for days by itself.
-The effective e-cost of annihilate with enrage and unstoppable (and ~150 rec - that can probably go down to 100 or so) is *negative* -Skewer requires mixing lower dps powers into its rotation to generate e
So the effective dps of a skewer build will *always* be lower than the effective dps of an Annihilate build so long as annihilate posts even reasonably close dps numbers. Basically, effective e cost needs to be a critical component of the comparison, because it makes a huge difference in realizable dps.
(For whatever reason, her skewer tests are ~2% higher crit rate than her annihilate tests. That should probably be factored out, and it probably accounts for most of the dps difference. And i think the difference in base damage - favoring annihilate - would ultimately make annihilate better in top gear situations because of diminishing returns).
Even so, both skewer and annihilate are clearly behind next to Haymaker, Massacre, and laser sword, and unlike the others, they were tested with *another framework's* resistance debuff.
Powers that are slower but have a higher damage per hit get more out of higher tier gear than faster powers that do less damage per hit? You might want to rethink that.
Alter The Devastator's power order to allow someone to choose both Skewer and Skullcrusher.
This would allow a Devastator to run a "flameless F/X" single-target attack cycle of Skullcrusher(tap)>Skewer(charge x2), with Arc of Ruin taps thrown in for the debuff. Skullcrusher is lower DPS than the current Eruption cycling on Live, but Skewer's new Bleeds should make up the difference.
Here's one possible power order that would cater to the above suggestion:
This is better. (Skullcrusher is an acceptable knock tap for pure bruiser Devastators).
That said, I still don't see why we can't make Earthsplitter the 'guarantees CF' power and leave eruption alone, since literally no one uses Earthsplitter. (I'm sure there's some special snowflake somewhere that took it because no one else did, but when have you ever seen that power used in game?)
Leveling is still an issue. The live Devastator build has Eruption (with 3s cd) from level 6 onwards.
Suggestion: Make level 17 a choice between Skewer and something that interacts with Clinging Flames, probably Annihilate. Some other premium ATs, including the Rockstar (and the reworked Specialist i believe), have 4 choices. The build above is also forcing Skewer on fire-focused Devastator, when it's the only attack in HW that did not receive any fire theming. This choice would give fire-focused Devastators access to a power with a fire-themed advantage at least. (Both fire and non-fire Devastators should receive equal consideration in the build progression).
Suggestion: Skullcrusher could stay pure crushing damage. (1) Solves the bug where fire damage isn't ranking up, (2) No reason for the power to be fire themed - it's a massive sword/axe/trout chop, (3) It has no other interaction with fire or clinging flames, and (4) there's plenty of other HW powers splitting damage now. (This is not an opposition to the fire/crushing mixed damage in general, just asking for more than one power which stays pure crushing. Also, it makes every choice in my proposed modification of CarrionBaggage's suggestion - except the lunge one - a choice between a fire and a non-fire option).
Powers that are slower but have a higher damage per hit get more out of higher tier gear than faster powers that do less damage per hit? You might want to rethink that.
Well, even on live i'm seeing more raw dps from annihilate, admittedly from deep in diminishing returns land. I don't know what else it could be.
I have a feeling it isn't the slower vs. faster that matters here, but that *Follow Through* is a damage bonus and thus is on one of the diminishing returns layers. So when you push your bonus damage up enough, the returns from Follow Through go down *a lot* and Annihilate pulls out ahead.
If only there was a way to do testing with the live build that didn't require leveling a new toon or retconning an existing one...
Note: Follow Through only boosts charge damage. Half of Skewer's damage is non-charge damage, so Follow Through is effectively a 12.5% damage boost on full charge, and decreasing with lower charges. Put Them Down on Skullcrusher should actually be a larger damage boost.
That is not how it works. First of all the 1 point adv on Skewer add to your base damage, so there is no diminishing return. And secondly they apply their full damage bonus on either tap of full charge. It's not that they only apply to the damage that is added by charging.
If you think Skewer needs a buff, just go to PTS and do a few parses to show why you think it does.
Comments
Especially since the base damage is not getting buffed
and this Slighty Reduced Cost makes it more suspicious (if its like the Reduced cost the revamped TGM got...)
Sorry I asked him only for Head pictures, no tails :S
Oh yeah! I just realized they have customizable eyes, talking about detail
I agree here, Give heavy weapons their OWN Thematic Energy Unlock!
Don't use Fire Revarbation! NOT everyone want this FORCED fire synergy
Tell this to people whose build contain MANY different frameworks and MSA is the only Neutral solution! OR to the people whose powerframes don't even have a thematic Energy Unlock
Whoever you are, be that person one hundred percent. Don't compromise on your identity.
Skullcrusher (full charge): ~2k, 1.5s, dps: 1.33k, energy: 36, dps/energy: 37
Skewer (full charge): ~2.5k, 1.5s, dps: 1.67k, energy: 29, dps/energy: 57
Annihilate (full charge): ~4k, 2s, dps: 2k, energy: 33, dps/energy: 60.6
Brimstone (full charge): ~2.2k, 2s, dps: 1.1k, energy: 26, dps/energy: 42
All of these are meant to be compared relatively, not in any absolute sense (gear dependent)
Tested against the SV-level Regenerating Test Dummy B, so i assume Annihilate is benefiting from knock immune bonus damage.
PTS having determination but not justice available is interfering with my sustained Skewer testing, because the Determination primary utility has an energy generating ability. (5% chance for 98 energy is really significant).
-Skewer is *not sustainable* with 10s cd Eruption (down to 8.7s with test gear, but as you may have noticed, e costs are *significantly down* too). Ie, the *effective e cost relative to other powers* of skewer is much higher than it looks on paper, because it depends on other powers to restore energy for it. That means its actual performance dps is a *lot lower*. Especially with Eruption's cd change.
-Skullcrusher is *probably sustainable* by itself off enrage + unstoppable energy returns.
-Annihilate is *definitely sustainable* by itself off enrage + unstoppable energy returns.
-Brimstone is *definitely sustainable* by itself off enrage + unstoppable energy returns. It is also only barely behind Skullcrusher on dps.
A note about AoEs.
-3' x 10' cylinders are virtually single target attacks. It's possible to aim up two enemies given a tank who can hold them in one place and some positioning, or enemies who don't move. This is only really practical in Fire and Ice and in the Duraclad battle in FM. Hitting multiple enemies otherwise requires some degree of luck (and for trash clearing up through even Master Villains, Brimstone is easily sufficient and a lot less hassle).
-Even with that caveat, if we consider the AoE to matter at all (which cryptic seems to think it does for energy pricing of Skewer and Skullcrusher relative to Annihilate), Skullcrusher has a massive advantage over skewer here because it suffers no reduced damage on secondary targets. Skewer loses something like 33% of its damage on all but the primary target.
-Skullcrusher's damage and energy cost is not competitive treated either as a single-target power, nor as an AoE (where Brimstone's massively larger AoE more than makes up for the rather mild dps hit - the problem here is definitely Skullcrusher, which could probably have its damage boosted and its e cost reduced up to 10% across the board.
-Annihilate thrashes everything else on dps, and its effective e cost is *negative*.
With advantages:
Skullcrusher (R3 + put them down, target disoriented): ~2.9k (2.8-3), 1.5s, dps: 1.93k
Skewer (R3+follow through): ~4.2k (4.05-4.35), 1.5s, dps: 2.8k
Annihilate (R3): ~5.8k (5.6-6.0), 2s, dps: 2.9k
Annihilate (R2 + scorching blade, target on fire): ~6.4k (6.15-6.6), 2s, dps: 3.2k
Brimstone (R3): ~3.2k (3.1-3.25), 2s, dps: 1.6k
Bug: Skullcrusher's fire damage is not increasing with ranks
Bug: Skullcrusher's Put Them Down advantage doesn't seem to be doing anything.
Note: Despite similar performance between R3 Annihilate and R3+Follow Through Skewer, they're not strictly comparable because Skewer does not generate energy from Enrage or Unstoppable, so it requires another power to work. It also costs an extra advantage point. Comparing to Annihilate R2 + Scorching Blade is better (both require another power to work to full potential), but Annihilate is still 1 less advantage point *and* is less reliant on the other power. (It won't stop working if CF falls off, whereas Skewer absolutely needs something which builds enrage in its rotation to work - and on a 3-4s timescale at that, whereas CF only needs to be reapplied once every 10s *and* the Arc of Ruin you're definitely including in your rotation for No Quarter will refresh it anyway, so the effective dps of skewer is going to suffer more from having to work whatever knock into its rotation - and it's still down ~12% damage from Annihilate despite that).
And I want to emphasize that this was all done with really good gear (Determination primaries w/ R7s, OSV secondaries w/ R5s). Lesser gear and leveling toons will have far more difficult energy situations.
-Buff Overdrive's scaling.
-Let KI and Steadfast work with any framework, or at least ranged/melee frameworks respectively. But better any so Ranged/melee hybrids don't feel like they're hated that much.
-EU that works off knocks. Any knocks. Energy returns scale on better of strength or ego.
-EU that works off roots and snares
etc...
Basically, if you think MSA is too good, you've identified the wrong problem. It's that MSA is the only functional EU in its niche, and that niche is 'uses powers from multiple frameworks' - something the player base obviously wants to do.
I can't confirm the Put Them Down adv bug. The special adv seemed to be working for me after brief testing (Crushing dmg range on R3 went from about ~670-765 to about ~785-890 w/ Disorient and PTD adv, on a partial build).
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I'm not seeing energy issues regarding the Devastator archetype when using Skewer. Tried a variety of gear from random quest stuff to high end stuff while keeping a pretty balanced stat spread. Keeping up clinging flames and rotating in a knock occasionally, be it Cleave, Vicious Descent, Eruption etc fueled the power pretty handily.
Had to use my eb occasionally with low end gear, but I don't see an issue with that.
One issue I'm seeing is the difference between Skewer and Annihilate still, Skewer coming out ahead. The Follow Through advantage is a little potent for a 1 pointer that adds to base damage with basically no drawback.
I am curious what players are seeing, and would appreciate any detailed logs to be posted with what dps outputs you're getting and what sort of build/gear you're using.
Likewise, alternating between knock powers with different cooldowns is not acceptable for some players. To be fair, thatt does add complexity over and above many other builds.
Whoever you are, be that person one hundred percent. Don't compromise on your identity.
My super cool CC build and how to use it.
Of course that highlights another problem, the only EU that really works all that well with HW is MSA. So the choice was either use an overused EU or shoehorn an EU mechanic (CF & TR) into the build. And it does feel very forced... I'm still not 100% sold forcing fire damage into melee weapon set. So my steel blade is now a fire blade? Hmm ok.. than I'd like some firey looking weapons (or magma) to go with that.
At this point though -- it's pretty obvious that the forced CF synergy is a set direction that isn't changing. I think most of us just want to be certain that these changes don't break the Devastator AT and make it an undesirable one. We have enough of those already and it seemed like we were moving away from that.
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With Kitsune tails, add a color channel for the tip please, so we could have them look like foxtails.
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Regarding the archetype - If you feel it has problems, please detail how the archetype is worse off than it was before the changes.
It had no energy unlock prior, but had energy management tools through Unstoppable and Rage. Now it has an energy unlock, and still has those two other sources of energy.
No powers lost the ability to knock and Cleave gained the ability. Skewer could never generate Rage if you didn't have multiple targets and relied on knocks from other sources to manage its energy. Now that's less of an issue as clinging flames will continue to give you energy and is available from several sources, all of which also knock.
Personally I see more cross-powerset versatility than it had before. The thematic versatility seems to have stayed the same.
My super cool CC build and how to use it.
And before somebody says to color the power blue... Silver's can't do that.
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Second: I don't care about the half-fire/half-crushing. As far as i can tell, I can't really see it unless I take specific advantages, so as long as i'm wholly within HW (and Devastator pretty much is), it doesn't bother me. Arc of Ruin still affects all my damage, so i can just ignore the fact that the server is going 'this is half fire damage'.
But, there's no reason why old Devastator builds should stop working. Let people who are playing element-agnostic Devastators continue to do so. That means, minimally, not increasing the cd on Eruption.
Third: The non-fire-focused Devastator's power rotation should be fun, feel organic, look like a melee combatant, and not be more complicated than every other powerset out there. It also shouldn't require a tutorial. Eruption did that in it's current live state. It looks like a weapon strike, it was ready as often as you could stack enrage, and it wasn't particularly complicated. (Certainly when i was first playing my devastator, i easily intuited the eruption->skewer, skewer playstyle, and it was a lot of fun and has a great look).
All the alternatives are horrendously complicated (rotating Eruption and Vicious Descent), or don't look like a melee combatant (Brimstone, Earthsplitter).
And no, cleave isn't an option. (1) Takes too long to guarantee an enrage stack, (2) is slow and clunky as an animation, and doesn't look organic, (3) produces clinging flames stacks, which is visually fire-themed.
Freeforms can take Rising Knee or Uppercut. There's still no reason they shouldn't have a similar option in-set so they still look like a heavy weapon fighter instead of having their weapon magically disappear for a second every 3-4s just so they can make skewer work. Devastators don't even have that option.
Also, Vicious Descent isn't a real choice against Decimate. Devastators are melee characters, and need a lunge that's available often. Certainly not one that will be perpetually tied up in cd while they're *in melee* because they need to rotate something with Eruption to get knocks. And having to rotate Vicious Descent with Eruption is horrendously complicated compared to every other powerset and doesn't look like a melee combatant.
In short, non-fire-emphasizing Skewer-using Devastators need *one power* which is available *every 3 seconds* that *looks like a melee strike* and *guarantees a knock*. That power has always been eruption, and changing eruption ruins those builds.
Fourth: The Devastator who does choose to focus on clinging flames shouldn't be as offended by things that don't look like pure melee combat. They've obviously decided to emphasize the magical nature of what they're doing. And that includes powers that have always been half-fire and half-crushing, like Brimstone and Earthsplitter.
So if you really need to rework a power to also cause clinging flames to happen, why not Earthsplitter, instead of wrecking Eruption's old functionality. I find it hard to believe that there are more than 3 people even using the power on live right now.
Certainly changing Eruption's base functionality and cd because of an *advantage* is kind of ridiculous.
Fifth: Thermal Reverberations does not provide that much energy (with ~155 Rec it's ~20 energy per 3 secs), and no Devastator is going to use more than that, because they've reached the limits of the equilibrium returns on Rec (they've pretty much pushed their equilibrium to their energy max). And it requires use of the clinging flames mechanic. At the very least, Thermal Reverb should be an *option*, not something Devastators are required to take.
Sixth: Skewer does not seem to be coming out ahead of annihilate to me. It's behind even in the R3 vs. R3 + Follow Through comparison, even if only a little bit, and annihilate of course sustains itself, which trivially results in higher total dps when you consider necessary power rotations.
But if you really think the Skewer : Annihilate comparison favors skewer, give Devastators the choice between the two (instead of Skullcrusher) at level 17, and see what players actually do. I think you'll find the playerbase doesn't agree with you. (I know I'd take annihilate, especially given the changes to eruption).
Seventh: Follow Through does have a drawback - it requires a full charge to fully benefit because it doesn't increase tap damage, only charge damage. Skewer *roots you*, so you can't pursue fleeing enemies (or enemies who move away because someone else has aggro and they can't sit still. If you've ever done an alert with one of those str-primary ranged pvp builds that has CC on a common attack so they steal aggro, and then kites all the mobs around the map, this is really frustrating, especially in the Red Banner special alert where i frequently see ranged toons steal aggro and kite him all over the place).
And that also means it trades off, at least in theory, with initiative, which doesn't require you to stand in one place for 1.5s and hope your enemy is still there to hit. It's less damage, but it also has less drawbacks.
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I don't know how to produce the detailed logs you seem to want and get reliable total dps calculations. If there's some program I can use to record this, i'd love a link.
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Final Thought: I thought the Devastator *as it is* was sufficiently fun to play that I left my Devastator an archetype when i bought my LTS, despite being able to retrain it to freeform *for free* at that time. That's a success story in AT design. I don't understand why you feel the need to change the basic mechanics of a well-functioning AT that no one thinks is broken, and that people paid real money for.
Sure, adding options is fine. And there are useless or near-useless powers (ie, Earthsplitter, Vicious Descent) in it that you could modify without hurting any current builds. No one would care if you were just adding real options to it. But you're making the old way to play impossible by fundamentally transforming one of its bread-and-butter powers (Eruption).
I don't have access to server data, but I'd be willing to bet that change invalidates 80-90% of Devastator builds and playstyles on live right now. For no good reason.
So add your fire synergy stuff, but can't you respect those of us who aren't interested in it, and don't want to use those powers and advantages which obviously involve fire? Make it optional to emphasize the fire, not mandatory, because we've been playing for like ~5 years without fire themes and we like our Devastators the way they are.
before retraining.
after partial retraining, grabbing powers, spec trees, no ADV on powers, no talents. same gear.Blues/greens/purple secondaries
even with the eb off,
with no form on(forgot to turn it on)
, i got up to 9 stacks of clinging flames.
Cost discount from gear is 159. so it's low, for one of mine.
only time I got close to no energy was spamming ARC of ruin.
what order are you hitting powers in?
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On PTS? Eruption -> Tap Arc -> full charge Skewer x5 and i'm out of energy and Eruption isn't even off cd yet. (Totally out, not enough to even use eruption when it does come off like a second later).
Advantages: Eruption (R3), Arc (R2, No Quarter), Skewer (R3, Follow Through)
My build/gear:
Showing off my ice look too, for those who don't believe there are people running around with ice-themed devastator looks.
493 cost reduction. 203 cool down reduction. New eruption cd time ~8.7s. Old eruption cd time ~2.6s.
Not only do i run out of energy, but the time to building 8 stacks of enrage has gone from ~18s to ~47s. That's crazy.
I have no interest in clinging flames, and will just not play the character if Devastators are being forced to use it. (And not advocate anyone else play the AT either, while I have advocated Devastator as a fun AT in the past). And to the extent i have one, this is my *main character*. (Yes, I'm an LTS with an AT main, despite 16 level 40s, 13 of them FFs).
Edit:
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Its not ideal, and I'd have preferred electricity as an elemental choice, but that's the nature of the game.
I feel like your underlying issue is that you don't want to use thermal reverberation as an energy unlock. Unfortunately, I don't see that as being a viable option at this point. Not without sacrificing some of your DPS by utilizing your energy builder on occasion. Alternatively, you could dip into might or martial arts to suppliment your knock back attacks, though again that would mean sacrificing theme.
I don't know if you absolutely need that extra energy - enrage and defiance may be enough.
And I can't dip into Might. I'm a Devastator AT. Unless they're going to give us *retraining tokens* with this change so i can convert to FF. (The thing i specifically chose not to do for free previously because i enjoyed playing my Devastator so much).
I'd suggest biting the bullet and buying a retrain token if this is going to be so much an issue for you.
And why would i give cryptic more money because they're wrecking my character? You think this should *increase* my willingness to spend cash on CO? Really?
-Why can't Earthsplitter, the power no one uses, be the one that gets reworked to always apply clinging flames, instead of Eruption, the power that everyone uses for a purpose which is completely invalidated by the change (and for which it is comparable to powers in other frameworks)?
-Why can't clinging flames mechanic be an *option* instead of *mandatory* for Devastators?
One of these sets of choices is friendly to existing Devastator players, and one of these sets of choices is not. Why are we making the choices which are not?
-Ogre
i was using Brimstone instead of Cleave. that's where my CF were coming from
I usually have single, aoe, single , aoe, so I don't have 2 of the same next to each other
due to this. I now have single, aoe, aoe.
cleave, arc of ruin, brimstone, lunge , then erution due to cd.
with form on-eruption>arc tap> 3 full brimstones and eruption is ready plus I'm still at full energy wiht 3 or 4 stacks of enrage
ok tried eruption>arc of ruin> skewer charge- got to 3 before ran out of energy- with no form and no EB.
with Form- 4 and then Eruption was recharged
mines on 9.2 secs CD, yours should be on a lot lower since your CD is nearly double mine and your cost disc is 3 times mine.
There's something screwy about those numbers
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*facepalm*
Yeah, Brimstone runs just fine. The moving firecloud is not how most devastator players saw their characters, i imagine. Also, doesn't Brimstone only produce clinging flames with the fire-related advantage? (The one that creates the flame patch). That's at least true on live - i haven't looked at Brimstone that closely on PTS, just its straight out dps.
There's no way Eruption + arc of ruin + 4x skewer is getting you to another eruption.
Arc of Ruin (i'm assuming tap) = .83s. Full charge skewer = 1.5s. That's 6.83s and you've got another 2.37s yet before Eruption is off cd, which is a skewer and a half (or realistically, 2 more full skewers unless you like standing around). And that's the kind of timing math problem I'm running into, because the extra .5s i'm dropping off eruption's cd still doesn't get it low enough that it's ready after 5 skewers, and even 5 skewers has already wrecked me for energy.
FWIW, the HW EB is slow and unwieldy, and having it on disrupts powers actually activating when you want them to. So no, using it is not really an option when there's stuff you want to use on tap. (Because if you happen to start an EB swing, half the time it won't do the tap power because your next power will interrupt it. Whereas if EB isn't on, you can hit your tap and then the next power, and the tap will go off as expected - basically, you can be one step ahead of the power you're using so you don't have pauses between attacks. Waiting to make sure the tap power triggers causes strange pauses in your power usage, so that's not a solution either, and just creates more openings for the EB to start swinging that further disrupts your power use planning. This is a problem with any character using tap powers who needs to use their EB, but it's much worse with EBs that have long activation times because the window 'between swings' comes up less frequently. Maintains and charges don't have this issue, because you need to hold the button down. And if nothing else, Arc of Ruin is basically a tap power for all intents and purposes, so devastators definitely have this problem).
Seriously, just adapt your build. I don't wanna hear "But muh AT". Put some stat points into Endurance to better feed Thermal Reverb if you're really having energy issues.
I'll have another check when I manage to get on again, currently doing the long slow STO patch, followed by timeout.
I don't have any advs selected , so it has to be from the base powers.
remembered the wrong lines.
cleave is doing it- you did say nobody uses cleave after level 17?
also the adv on Brimstone, arc of ruin and eruption, so easy to avoid the clinging flames.
mind you, putting a second adv on eruption, minus the clinging flames would solve that one, for people who don't want the flames.
ARC of ruin has 2 options for adv.
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The problem with a 10 seconds Eruption is when you are switching targets fast (like in 99% of pve content) or when it missfires due to a mob suddenly deciding to move out of melee range just after you click, or you get knocked or stunned at the wrong moment, or your team kills your target from under your nose, you will have a hard time getting your EU to work well with it or be able to use Annihilate. Or if you want Eruption for other stuff like Crippling Challenge, or building Enrage. The reason Eruption needed a 100% CF is to remove the "you need to do everything just so, and things need to all go perfectly for the set to work" requirement on bossfights. But with the increased cooldown that has now been shifted (somewhat) to non-bossfights.
The only way to make the set work now is to use multiple powers to apply CF, but in my opinion there are more than enough requirements on what powers to use already.
For example, Cleave received a damage buff. Running an attack cycle of Cleave(combo)>Skewer(charge), with occasional Arc of Ruin for the debuff/disorient, yields solid DPS for an AT with access to Setup, Slaughter, and Warden Mastery. It keeps up Clinging Flames, and routinely triggers Enrage/Unstoppable with knocks. But refusing to use Cleave (or other fire-graphics attacks), because of the animation and/or Clinging Flames, hamstrings that attack flow.
That said, I do understand the desire of some players to stick with a flame-free character concept. As has been mentioned, with Eruption on a longer cooldown, the Skewer-spam setup no longer has a "minor F/X" knock attack to thread between every couple Skewer charges (if you're dismissing Cleave and Brimstone as too F/X-heavy to fit the concept). So here's a suggestion...
SUGGESTION:
- Alter The Devastator's power order to allow someone to choose both Skewer and Skullcrusher.
This would allow a Devastator to run a "flameless F/X" single-target attack cycle of Skullcrusher(tap)>Skewer(charge x2), with Arc of Ruin taps thrown in for the debuff. Skullcrusher is lower DPS than the current Eruption cycling on Live, but Skewer's new Bleeds should make up the difference.Here's one possible power order that would cater to the above suggestion:
Level 1: Bludgeon
Level 1: Cleave
Level 6: Unstoppable
Level 8: Arc of Ruin
Level 11: Vicious Descent or Decimate
Level 14: Enrage
Level 17: Skewer
Level 21: Guard
Level 25: Thermal Reverberation or Aggressor
Level 30: Earth Splitter or Skullcrusher
Level 35: Eruption
Level 40: Brimstone
I was wondering about that too and mentioned it a few times in the previous PTS Threads
Now that Smoke Bomb Lunge got fixed, Decimate is the SLOWEST Lunge ingame
Please DEVs, make Decimate fast as well to be in line with other lunges
And have a scorp tail
imo it looks pretty good
Those same people would probably rather a more Swingy HW power be top dog anyway...
What if, hear me, WHAT IF those numbers are from DEVASTATOR AT users?
Because the top damage move for this AT is, in fact, Skewer
Devastator is really popular AT and I see it very often in Gravitar Pugs, especially with the Free AT code
I almost never see any FF using Skewer, none
In fact I only use Annihilate in my currently only FF HW character because I dislike Skewer
-The effective e-cost of annihilate with enrage and unstoppable (and ~150 rec - that can probably go down to 100 or so) is *negative*
-Skewer requires mixing lower dps powers into its rotation to generate e
So the effective dps of a skewer build will *always* be lower than the effective dps of an Annihilate build so long as annihilate posts even reasonably close dps numbers. Basically, effective e cost needs to be a critical component of the comparison, because it makes a huge difference in realizable dps.
(For whatever reason, her skewer tests are ~2% higher crit rate than her annihilate tests. That should probably be factored out, and it probably accounts for most of the dps difference. And i think the difference in base damage - favoring annihilate - would ultimately make annihilate better in top gear situations because of diminishing returns).
Even so, both skewer and annihilate are clearly behind next to Haymaker, Massacre, and laser sword, and unlike the others, they were tested with *another framework's* resistance debuff.
That said, I still don't see why we can't make Earthsplitter the 'guarantees CF' power and leave eruption alone, since literally no one uses Earthsplitter. (I'm sure there's some special snowflake somewhere that took it because no one else did, but when have you ever seen that power used in game?)
Leveling is still an issue. The live Devastator build has Eruption (with 3s cd) from level 6 onwards.
Suggestion: Make level 17 a choice between Skewer and something that interacts with Clinging Flames, probably Annihilate. Some other premium ATs, including the Rockstar (and the reworked Specialist i believe), have 4 choices. The build above is also forcing Skewer on fire-focused Devastator, when it's the only attack in HW that did not receive any fire theming. This choice would give fire-focused Devastators access to a power with a fire-themed advantage at least. (Both fire and non-fire Devastators should receive equal consideration in the build progression).
Suggestion: Skullcrusher could stay pure crushing damage. (1) Solves the bug where fire damage isn't ranking up, (2) No reason for the power to be fire themed - it's a massive sword/axe/trout chop, (3) It has no other interaction with fire or clinging flames, and (4) there's plenty of other HW powers splitting damage now. (This is not an opposition to the fire/crushing mixed damage in general, just asking for more than one power which stays pure crushing. Also, it makes every choice in my proposed modification of CarrionBaggage's suggestion - except the lunge one - a choice between a fire and a non-fire option).
I have a feeling it isn't the slower vs. faster that matters here, but that *Follow Through* is a damage bonus and thus is on one of the diminishing returns layers. So when you push your bonus damage up enough, the returns from Follow Through go down *a lot* and Annihilate pulls out ahead.
If only there was a way to do testing with the live build that didn't require leveling a new toon or retconning an existing one...
Note: Follow Through only boosts charge damage. Half of Skewer's damage is non-charge damage, so Follow Through is effectively a 12.5% damage boost on full charge, and decreasing with lower charges. Put Them Down on Skullcrusher should actually be a larger damage boost.
If you think Skewer needs a buff, just go to PTS and do a few parses to show why you think it does.