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Please limit people to ONE active defense.
eva1988
Posts: 183 Arc User
I know a lot of people use multiple active defense in their build because it make everything in the game trivial, so i expect to see a lot of resistance in this thread, but here goes ..
(i am talking mainly about masterful dodge, and unbreakable rotation)
Why i think multiple active defense spoil the game
-Despite attempting to fix them with a cooldown, they can still remain active almost 100% of the time.
-While dueling/pvping, those who do not have an active defense are at a HUGE disadvantage to those who do, this basically excludes most ATs from participating in pvp against freeforms.
-If active defense were balanced with other powers in usefulness, they wouldn't be such game changers in terms of survivability; what i'm bascially saying is active defense are more useful than most other powers, in an ideal world they would be just as useful...
-It takes a power slot to use two active defense, that means one less power that could be spent elsewhere, i'm sure most would rather have the option to pick another power if they knew ADs were off limits.
-it trivializes almost everything in the game when you can have near endless active defenses.
- Active offense do not equal active defense.. I would assume to counter an active defense the active offense would bring your damage high enough so it more or less bypasses any effect of the AD, but it does not, not by a long shot.
- From a pvp perspective, there is NO counter to active defense; they cannot be removed, they cannot be locked out once they're on, you can lock it out by chain knocking, but that locks out EVERYTHING, and is not guaranteed, and can only be done three times; and given that AD have no real activated time, all they'll need is a tiny break in the knocks and it is on. (referring to MD and Unbreakable). Once it is on all you can really do is wait it out/run away, or use an AD yourself...
-In PVE, and PVP, it replaces thinking with just pressing a rotation to bypass all damage.
Solution ?
Either completely rework AD so they're actually balanced in usefulness to other powers, OR limit people to one active defense.. I'd prefer the former because i feel unbreakable, and masterful dodge vastly outperform the other ADs on the game; they need to be significantly toned down in my opinion.
I would really like to see the game become more than just "whoever has the most ADs most active wins"; and i see people complaining about the game being "too easy" constantly (mainly those using said active defense rotation mind you)..
I already know what i think some will argue "what about my theme, i'm able to dodge, and be invulnerable". To them i say if you want to be invulnerable, and dodge, take either masterful dodge, or unbreakable, and take invulnerability if you take masterful dodge, and take unbreakable if you take lightning reflexes; "but i want a different passive" then stat defense, or dodge to make up for it. You don't need multiple active defense to maintain a theme of being unbreakable, and able to dodge; so that isn't an argument that will hold up.
"But it will impact PVE in some way, and this is clearly a PVP request" Yes, it will impact PVE, but this isn't a request just for PVP. The game is too easy because of this rotation nonsense; it is like being able to cheat but you're allowed to do it, and honestly, i'm tired of it..I only wish i'd made this thread earlier..
(Also, a sidenote : ice barrier's cooldown is bugged when trying to use it again after the cooldown runs out.)
(i am talking mainly about masterful dodge, and unbreakable rotation)
Why i think multiple active defense spoil the game
-Despite attempting to fix them with a cooldown, they can still remain active almost 100% of the time.
-While dueling/pvping, those who do not have an active defense are at a HUGE disadvantage to those who do, this basically excludes most ATs from participating in pvp against freeforms.
-If active defense were balanced with other powers in usefulness, they wouldn't be such game changers in terms of survivability; what i'm bascially saying is active defense are more useful than most other powers, in an ideal world they would be just as useful...
-It takes a power slot to use two active defense, that means one less power that could be spent elsewhere, i'm sure most would rather have the option to pick another power if they knew ADs were off limits.
-it trivializes almost everything in the game when you can have near endless active defenses.
- Active offense do not equal active defense.. I would assume to counter an active defense the active offense would bring your damage high enough so it more or less bypasses any effect of the AD, but it does not, not by a long shot.
- From a pvp perspective, there is NO counter to active defense; they cannot be removed, they cannot be locked out once they're on, you can lock it out by chain knocking, but that locks out EVERYTHING, and is not guaranteed, and can only be done three times; and given that AD have no real activated time, all they'll need is a tiny break in the knocks and it is on. (referring to MD and Unbreakable). Once it is on all you can really do is wait it out/run away, or use an AD yourself...
-In PVE, and PVP, it replaces thinking with just pressing a rotation to bypass all damage.
Solution ?
Either completely rework AD so they're actually balanced in usefulness to other powers, OR limit people to one active defense.. I'd prefer the former because i feel unbreakable, and masterful dodge vastly outperform the other ADs on the game; they need to be significantly toned down in my opinion.
I would really like to see the game become more than just "whoever has the most ADs most active wins"; and i see people complaining about the game being "too easy" constantly (mainly those using said active defense rotation mind you)..
I already know what i think some will argue "what about my theme, i'm able to dodge, and be invulnerable". To them i say if you want to be invulnerable, and dodge, take either masterful dodge, or unbreakable, and take invulnerability if you take masterful dodge, and take unbreakable if you take lightning reflexes; "but i want a different passive" then stat defense, or dodge to make up for it. You don't need multiple active defense to maintain a theme of being unbreakable, and able to dodge; so that isn't an argument that will hold up.
"But it will impact PVE in some way, and this is clearly a PVP request" Yes, it will impact PVE, but this isn't a request just for PVP. The game is too easy because of this rotation nonsense; it is like being able to cheat but you're allowed to do it, and honestly, i'm tired of it..I only wish i'd made this thread earlier..
(Also, a sidenote : ice barrier's cooldown is bugged when trying to use it again after the cooldown runs out.)
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Unbreakable and Masterful Dodge are indeed overturned MASSIVELY... Field Surge has been a problem for a long time but on the opposite end of the scale... Unlike other ADs, Field Surge is almost required for anyone using PFF. On top of that, the AD itself is less than half as beneficial to anyone who doesn't have PFF, due to half of the total shielding provided being available only to PFF users and the shield regen rate buff only applying to PFF. If Field Surge's shield regen buff applied to it's own shield as well for the duration of the AD then it would actually be useful to non-PFF builds and a viable AD while not being overpowered. Similarly Resurgence has the same issue with it' Health Regen buff only applying if you have Regeneration, if that buff were to apply over the full duration of the AD regardless then it would also be more in line with other ADs in performance while not being over powered.
Ice Barrier has a bunch of issues still... None of which were resolved when it was turned into an AD... the issues it had as just a normal defensive power still exist with it as an AD, only now it has a longer CD and a glitchy CD counter (the actual CD is fine, the problem is that it displays its original CD counter when used and then resumes its actual CD when you try to use it again)... but the main problem is that unlike all other ADs it only provides a benefit if you are within proximity of one of the ice objects AND the strength of it is based on the number of ice objects you are within range of. Ranking the AD simply adds another ice object to the spawn and does nothing to increase the strength per object. This is a problem because the Ice objects themselves are destructible and rather easy to destroy.
In regards to the PvE/PvP validity of the suggestion... PvP is massively plagued with overpowered abilities and rotations, the loss of AD rotating won't have any sort of lasting affect on PvP, they will find something new and overpowered to abuse just like they always do. As for PvE, you don't even NEED an AD to be competent in any content. The primary function and intent of an AD is to provide a quick and powerful defensive utility for those "Oh $#%@!" moments. For DPS their usage should be so rare that the decision to add one was made simply because there were no other power choices left for your build. For Tanks they are more valuable, but they should never be a main focus on the build. They are there to allow you to turn the tides back in your favor when things take a turn for the worse.
Limiting everyone to 1 AD would help reinforce their intended purpose, though really they just need their shared CD bumped up to 45 seconds and unaffected by CDR. Along with having the issues with all of them addressed, be it because they are underperforming or overperforming.
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To say removing AD rotation would have no impact on pvp is completely false also. It would mean ATs would actually have more of a chance as opposed to no chance at all...You want to close the gap between freeform and ATs, reducing ADs will have a HUGE impact on that.
Also, they;ve tried the cooldown method, the only reason there is a cooldown presumably is to prevent people from rotating them; easier just to leave them one and achieve the intended purpose that way.
Not what I was insinuating at all, I'm stating a fact... PvPers will complain to hell about it in the short term, but after a week or two they will find something new and overpowered to abuse and move on. I in no way am saying that it won't have an impact on PvP either. It will have a big impact on PvP, namely in the fact that fights between two high end individuals won't last for hours with no victor anymore.
And yes, they did try the CD method, but they made a GIANT mistake with it that they have refused to fix. They allowed CDR to affect the shared CD on ADs. As a result it was possible to reduce the shared CD to slightly less than the ADs duration, the CDR nerf changed that to slightly longer than the ADs duration... the 3 second gap between an AD ending and being able to use another AD is hardly an opening for anything to be done. Unless you can outright destroy your opponent in 3 seconds through all of their other defenses you won't accomplish anything. What needs to happen is the shared CD needs to be a solid 45 seconds, this will result in a solid 30 second gap between AD activations that CAN NOT be reduced. You trigger an AD, you get it's benefit for 15 seconds, then for the next 30 seconds you are left to your own devices.
This in turn would cause a problem that players would see builds which may "need" two active defensives/offensives break.
I think a much better solution, if looking at Active Defensives at all, is to bring them UP to the same standard with Endgame content damage output in mind.
Masterful Dodge has always been a strong AD because of the mechanic it uses (dodge/avoidance) and how that works.
Resurgence has recently seen a good improvement but could probably do a bit more than buff Regeneration for 15 seconds as its secondary effect.
Unbreakable used to be very strong, it faltered and then is slowly coming back into fashion.
Field Surge, lol.
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I think it would be good to first flesh out each set to house its own Active Defensive and Active Offensive with in set synergies, this would likely reduce the amount of people using the same two or three AD's.
Once that is done, then you can think about limiting them. Right now there aren't enough Active Defensive abilities in game to warrant a limit.
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Maybe the problem is deeper with MD, and it is actually dodge that needs looking at..
Also, i'm fine with Active offense being limited to one; people rarely take more than one anyway because they're not as useful as ADs, and an AO doesn't prevent them from dying.
Anyone who duels regularly will know that winning the duel often comes down to outlasting and making sure the opponent has their AD down while yours is up; when they have two it makes it more than twice as difficult to attack them when they're vulnerable.. When they have one AD, as soon as it drops you know that they'll be vulnerable for a large amount of time; but with two not only is the time of vulnerability reduced to a few seconds, their defense is doubled against the person who only has one. The advantage this brings is huge.
ATs will most often be at a disadvantage to FF, but the question is to what degree should they be disadvantaged? Most AT don't even have an AD, and so they lose often to those who have one quite easily, with two AD it is stupidly difficult to win in a duel with an AT, nearing impossible depending on the AT and the other elements of the build of the FF.
I disagree that unbreakable is bad, maybe against a cosmic it isn't very useful, but in that case you can just stack it with block and you'll take next to no damage. I'll agree that rest of the game is trivialized for those who use defense builds with a lot of healing; but playing with a squishy with no heals, it is quite a different story.. Actually, it is using builds like this which makes me think that this is the game's intended challenge level, or what the developers think is how difficult the game should be/actually is..Although that last bit is just my opinion.
Masterful Dodge - Overperforming by a ton... at R1 this AD is far beyond the performance of any other AD at R3.
Unbreakable - Only slightly overperforming, realistically this AD is one of the only ADs that even comes close to where all ADs should be power wise.
Resurgence - Unless you have Regeneration as your passive it's nothing more than an emergency self-heal... It needs to apply a health regen effect for 15 seconds to anyone that uses it, not just boost health regen for those with Regeneration as their passive.
Field Surge - Unless you have PFF as your passive it's virtually useless... it should have the PFF healing separated out from it (that should be an extra ability with PFF itself) and instead provide 2x the shield it currently does AND has a rapid shield regen for it's 15 second duration.
Ice Barrier - Only slightly underperforming, like Unbreakable it's very close to the power level that all ADs should be at... it's only flaw is that the ice objects are destructible and that you have to remain stationary within range of all of the ice objects... but when you're in that range the defensive benefits it grants are EXACTLY where all ADs should be at power wise.
But we're not Blizz, who can survive the damage from making sweeping changes.
That being said, most of my toons don't have two active defenses. Perhaps you are stymied by folks that do in PvP?
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Compare that to Ice Barrier with a mere 63% resistance at R1, or Unbreakable that absorbs a flat ~2.5k + ~1k per attack at R1, or Field Surge that only provides a ~3k shield (+~3.5k PFF heal), or Resurgence which only restores +50% health and grants +800 bonus HP?
Let s actually compare this shall we...
Ice Barrier, 63% resistance is only 48% damage reduction... that's only slightly more than half of the damage avoided by MD at R1... Ice Barrier at R3 with 6 objects provides ~55% damage reduction, a mere 17% more than R1 and STILL only about half of R1 MD... on the bright side, the resistance value scales with your stats...
Field Surge's 3k shield almost never survives to the end of it's 15 second duration, in fact it's usually broken in 1 or 2 hits. Over the course of 15 seconds it's unlikely to attribute to even 50% of incoming damage.
Resurgence's milage is dependant almost entirely on your max HP. If you're at or around 5k HP then it's no better than Field Surge. If you're at the 10-15k range then it amounts to about 40% to 60% of incoming damage. 20K+ ~75%... at R1, at R3 the numbers for low HP are only slightly better ~40% mid range HP moves up to 50 to 70% and high end jumps to 90%+... benefit may vary depending on your resistances and the content you are participating in.
Unbreakable is very powerful in PvP and against low rank weak enemies. Move into the more recent content however and it's actually right about where it should be... providing roughly the equivalent to 70% damage reduction at R1 over its 15 second duration... but in most content it's providing nearly 100% reduction...
You're delusional or willfully ignorant if you believe MD is not over performing... and if you believe Unbreakable isn't overperforming at least slightly.
Without MD - [Combat (Self)] You lose 1268 (1500) Fire Damage from Blue Beam.
With MD - [Combat (Self)] You lose 351 (1500) Fire Damage from Blue Beam.
that's 76.6% actual damage reduction with MD active and she's not even built for dodge/avoid she only has 18% resistance so that means MD contributed to 61.35% actual damage reduction on her, at Rank 1.
However, she's a classic glass cannon... considering that the vast majority of builds out there have significantly more than 18% resistance, you're looking at an average of 90%+ actual damage reduction from just R1 MD.
I will admit I did jump the gun on my previous statement about a flat 90% reduction across the board, but regardless it is without a doubt the strongest AD available, and a significant amount of players will tell you that yes it is in fact overperforming.
A dodge reducing damage from 1268 to 351, means you have (1268*(1-avoidance)=351) avoidance=1-351/1268=72.3%
MD without any avoidance from gear/passive/etc gets your avoidance to about 45%, so this means there is quite a bit of avoidance on that build and probably quite a bit higher than 10% dodge chance.
So it's not really fair to claim that is all due to MD.
If you want to figure out how much MD itself actually does for you, you need to start with your (average) mitigation without MD and then compare that to your mitigation with MD.
For builds without any dodge/avoidance the default is 10% dodge chance and 20% avoidance, and that increases to something like 45% avoidance and >100% dodge chance.
Average mitigation from default dodge is 2%, average mitigation from dodge when MD is active is 45%.
So MD gives you 43% damage mitigation.
Builds with low dodge chance and higher avoidance can push that a bit higher, but there are always some concessions.
You can also make a good case for unbreakable being OP in certain situations.
When I play my healer in things like TA, I like to use unbreakable to activate the consoles in the 2 2nd floor rooms.
In those situations I am getting thousands of incoming damage, but take 0.
I am using unbreakable during Kiga's storms too, which again would do thousands of damage at his 3rd health bar, but my healer takes 0 damage.
Where AD's are concerned, there is a severe lack of them and this needs to be addressed. They should also provide reliable "defense" for a full 15 seconds as stated.
No Active Defense power should only apply a meaningful effect "if using X passive" currently, as we don't have that many. Such caveats would be fine if we had a range to choose from. You have to then consider...is it actually that serious that a player, if they so choose to, cycles AD's? I'll say this, I have several characters who have two Active Defensives, but I would never "cycle" them, there's just no point as far as I am concerned.
But that's just me. I think having two AD's is just a form of security for the build more so than anything else. Unfortunately, it's this kind of thinking that creates messes, especially (so far) in CO. Endgame content and higher level content in some instances are either balanced or being balanced with the thought in mind that players are running around with high end gear and builds with powerful active defensives on them.
If you were to nerf MD and Unbreakable to say...Field Surge levels, you would need to re-evaluate the damage output of certain mobs to make sure that players weren't just being slaughtered left right and center, because of such changes (over exaggeration I know, but I hope you see where I am coming from). I don't think CO could survive looking and messing around with dodge and avoidance again after the last major change to the mechanic and the feedback that got. Depending on how you use them, AD's don't always prevent you from dying.
I am curious, despite reading the OP, why this seems to burn you so much?
It sounds very much like this is coming from a PvP place, more so than a "balance" perspective.
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Infact, other ADs that are not MD are actually comparable to AOs in usefulness as they are; which to me suggests that is the correct standard ADs should be at anyway.
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If you did...then why is your response basically as follows:
"I understand that MD provides meaningful resistance against high damage that we see in end game content, as it should. This is why it needs to be nerfed."
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-It is serious in regards to how ADs remove their own weakness (a long cooldown) when you take two with cooldown reduction. It is more than security when it becomes an essential form of defense to the build, and when measured against a build that does not take two ADs, it will outperform them significantly (once again i'm talking mainly about MD and unbreakable).
-Most ATs are made without ADs; this suggests to me that endgame was made to be possible without any AD at all. Block is good enough in most cases when defending against cosmics..Yes, even if you're squishy; so with that in mind (obviously there are many intricacies that will impact your performance against a cosmic e.g. your team) I doubt ADs are in anyway a necessity to doing any content in the game; which just helps the point i was making earlier that the game then feels like you're cheating because of how much easier AD rotation makes everything.
- Those who are currently in CO will likely stay through almost anything at this point; cryptic made some terrible decisions over the years, i doubt any more real damage could be done. Yes, some might leave, but looking at this thread, there appears to be more support in favor of this change than against it; not that this thead is accurate in determining what the entire playerbase think, but it is all we can go on right now... Think of it as a microcosm; also, you're forgetting the people who join the game who then proceed to leave it shortly after when they find out how ridiculous build balance is. Making these changes will lose some, possibly; but it'll also push the retention up also by making the game fairer all around. This change is particularly beneficial to ATs who most newcomers will be using to try the game out before choosing freeform.
-If you don't use ADs to prevent you from dying, that means you're not using ADs; their only purpose is to buff your defense significantly for a few seconds when looked at on an individual basis. They don't always prevent you from dying, but that just suggests you either weren't using an AD at the time of death, or were using them poorly by pressing the AD when you were at 5% health, which i suppose could happen via a lapse of concentration, or more likely,trying to let yourself die.
=It "burns me" for the reasons in the original post, had i something else to add to that i'd have already said so.
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But as i mentioned before, this isn't exclusively a PvP issue for me; the game is just too easy in PvE also. Of course you're likely not going to paint it that way, because you have a vested interest in making it look like i'm exclusively talking about PvP, because you know all the PvEers, who for some reason are against anything PvP, think it in some way takes away from the repetitive mind numbing cakewalk that is current PvE.. What i want is a game where people have to think more, not just passively be able to deal with anything because they've taken all the easy powers. It spoils it for the people you're teamed with, and you're cheating them, and yourself out of any challenge.
Let me make this clear, this isn't just about PvP. I would really like to enjoy PvE also, but as it stands i don't really enjoy either right now; and there was a time i used to before people figured out all this AD rotation nonsense..
So, it's about PvP?
Riiiiiiiiight
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I'm not exclusively arguing from a point of PvP; but as i've already pointed out, it is in your best interest if you like AD rotation to paint it that way..
It is amazing the lengths people will go to preserve their crutches..
See, i can do it too!
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I guess i could put this question to you :
Did you win a duel or something?
You don't need your crutch, you just find it too difficult to hold shift every so often, or maybe you're too lazy..
Also, why so quick to give up on balance? You don't want the game to be fair? Even though this isn't required at all; i'd rather they altered the cosmics than leave the game balance in such a poor place.
The problem with a lot of people supporting AD rotation; they think it is normal that they should be able to survive everything at all times and heal themselves up constantly.. They think it is fine that they can be both tank, and not require a healer at the same time; some of them even manage to squeeze high damage on there as well.. It is just ridiculous.
The line "jack of all trades, master of none" comes to mind; but on champions online it is "jack of all trades, master of all".
How long a person has played doesn't really matter, it is what they've spent time looking into whilst playing that is important.
Oh, and i've been playing since launch, i'm not sure where you got the assumption that i was somehow new; and i've played a lot after the AD cooldown change. I believe i said something along the lines of "it may as well be permanent rotation as the gap between AD is only a few seconds"; yes i'm sure an AT is going to be able to kill some one in a few seconds, and also be able to survive through the first AD.. Oh wait, no, because AD rotation is STILL ridiculous. T
The weakness of an AD is supposed to be the long cooldown, taking two removes that weakness for minimal cost; this has been covered already so i'm just repeating myself at this point.
Someone might want to take MD for general DR and Resurgence for a spike heal for .e.g.. The option should be left open for them. However if the cooldown penalty was integrated for players to avoid easily cycling ADs consistently then the penalty should mean something and not be trivialized.