Ya know, this thread gives me real hope for the future...
Not because TK is a powerset I'm hoping becomes awesomesauce or that Cryptic will buy me a pony or anything.
But finally we have found something that has brought both the PvP and PvE communities together. Both groups of players are in full agreement that telekinesis needs a lot more work before it's ready for prime time. More than that, I suspect that they're even really close in agreement that maybe the dev team should finish up Resistance (which is starting to shape up into a pretty cool pack) and then focus all their attention on TK.
Next time I pass a carebear in the Caprice VIP lounge, I might even buy him or her a drink...
Hold off on finishing it. Pull it from the Resistance patch, give it another month - right now you're at what I'd consider the early-mid point of a good pass; ie: there is simply no feasible way for this to go live as-is and be well done. It just isn't possible.
All that's happened is the addition of a lunge, and some twiddling with energy costs (mostly nerfs) and fiddling with ego leech. That... doesn't really solve anything. At all. It ignores a lot of the important issues people have brought up again and again and again - including new powers the set really could use that other sets during reviews have gotten.
So yes, that's my feedback on the pass so far: Hold off, give it another month. Better to do it right than to do it to keep a schedule.
I'm in agreement with everyone else here, Pull the disciple and TK changes from resistance, add something else to it in it's stead (hack together a costume set or something)
Im beginning to feel like a masochist. My two mains are an Archer and a TK Blader. :eek:
A character built around a set designed for a very squishy, "get them before they get you," play style needs truly overwhelming damage to succeed. This means attacks that destroy targets (plural, all at once) almost instantly and tougher single targets very quickly. This requires decent energy efficiency so that you do not allow foes free attack time while you use your EB.
The current trend in the Ego Blades pass actually moves away from those needs. Currently, using in set tools, an Ego Blader doesnt really do any more damage than other melee sets do using their own in set synergies. At the same time Ego Blades is significantly weaker defensively and isnt as energy efficient. So currently we have a glass cannon whose gun isnt really significantly bigger than those carried by tanks.
Some suggestions:
Rebuild Ego Leach so that it counts as a buff on the Ego Blader for energy gain (so that the effort of building stacks isnt lost when one defeats a foe) and as a debuff on the target to increase the Ego Blader's damage. Perhaps this could be additional ego damage resistance reduction, or perhaps a rupture effect (as others have suggested).
Make the ID blades Ego based damage boost inherent to the EGO stat (and not tied to the double blade animation).
Add a toggle that increases Ego damage and, to a lesser extent, ranged physical damage. (Honestly I would prefer that other offensive passives worked like quarry by providing a two tiered damage buff for core and secondary damage types so as to reduce the gradual evolution toward class-like building)
The current trend in the Ego Blades pass actually moves away from those needs. Currently, using in set tools, an Ego Blader doesnt really do any more damage than other melee sets do using their own in set synergies.
Not really a useful comparison; there is really no reason not to take a form on an ego blades toon (usually tempest form). It's best to just compare the powers, using whatever buffs appeal. Let's look at basic powers (live, not test):
EBB (tap): 0.67s, 35 energy (52 eps), 158x2 (316) damage, 5% debuff stacks 3x. Adds Ego Leech.
With 35% crit chance and 100% severity, initial hit dps is 668, 3rd hit dps is 731 (counts debuffs).
DC (tap): 0.67s, 36 energy (54 eps), 343 damage, +0.5 crit severity
With 35% crit chance and 100% (base) severity, dps is 780.
EBB (charge): 2.00s, 71 energy (36 eps), 449x2(898) damage, 5% debuff stacks 3x. Adds Ego Leech.
With 35% crit chance and 100% severity, initial hit dps is 636, 3rd hit dps is 697.
DC (charge): 1.50s, 61 energy (41 eps), 731 damage, +0.5 crit severity, grants rush.
With 35% crit chance and 100% (base) severity, dps is 743.
So, EBB (tapped, assuming an average of 2 stacks debuff being applied) is about 10% worse than DC (tapped), with very marginally lower energy cost, and is two hits rather than one. Charge attacks are not as directly comparable due to different speeds, but overall have similarly poor reduced performance. Note that DC is something of an overperformer, so arguably EBB is competitive with a number of other top tier attacks. However, even if we accept that, we're missing the second part of the equation: Way of the Warrior is dramatically superior to Ego Form. It has a substantially higher damage bonus, and it grants a significant quantity of dodge and avoidance; WotW tanks with 50% dodge/avoidance aren't that rare. Ego Form, by comparison, just gives physical damage resistance, and not terribly much of it.
Not really a useful comparison; there is really no reason not to take a form on an ego blades toon (usually tempest form). It's best to just compare the powers, using whatever buffs appeal. Let's look at basic powers (live, not test):
EBB (tap): 0.67s, 35 energy (52 eps), 158x2 (316) damage, 5% debuff stacks 3x. Adds Ego Leech.
With 35% crit chance and 100% severity, initial hit dps is 668, 3rd hit dps is 731 (counts debuffs).
DC (tap): 0.67s, 36 energy (54 eps), 343 damage, +0.5 crit severity
With 35% crit chance and 100% (base) severity, dps is 780.
EBB (charge): 2.00s, 71 energy (36 eps), 449x2(898) damage, 5% debuff stacks 3x. Adds Ego Leech.
With 35% crit chance and 100% severity, initial hit dps is 636, 3rd hit dps is 697.
DC (charge): 1.50s, 61 energy (41 eps), 731 damage, +0.5 crit severity, grants rush.
With 35% crit chance and 100% (base) severity, dps is 743.
So, EBB (tapped, assuming an average of 2 stacks debuff being applied) is about 10% worse than DC (tapped), with very marginally lower energy cost, and is two hits rather than one. Charge attacks are not as directly comparable due to different speeds, but overall have similarly poor reduced performance. Note that DC is something of an overperformer, so arguably EBB is competitive with a number of other top tier attacks. However, even if we accept that, we're missing the second part of the equation: Way of the Warrior is dramatically superior to Ego Form. It has a substantially higher damage bonus, and it grants a significant quantity of dodge and avoidance; WotW tanks with 50% dodge/avoidance aren't that rare. Ego Form, by comparison, just gives physical damage resistance, and not terribly much of it.
Exactly my point. Thank you for providing the numbers to back it up.
I dont mind the idea of Ego Blades being a glass cannon set. It provides variety if this set plays dramatically differently than other melee sets. But if glass part is in place then the cannon part is needed as well.
I actually think the best fix for EBB would be to change the debuff back to 10% per stack. It was nerfed down to 5% per stack because it had a bug where the debuff was it was scaling with damage buffs, and 30-40% per stack was out of control, but with the bug fixed 10% per stack doesn't seem unreasonable, and actually gets across the point of the power: it's not really supposed to be the best possible dps, it's supposed to be the 'breach mental defenses' power.
I feel gratitude on some level, but really this broken gear situation has gone on too long, with too little comment by Cryptic, and these latest changes to scaling on elite just make me say "bleh."
I mean I understand that it's in the nature of MMOs to invalidate a lot of our past effort by "raising the bar", i.e. level cap raises or new more powerful gear replaces the previously best gear we might have spent a lot of time collecting. I'm not complaining about this basic process. On the other hand Cryptic seems to lack appropriate care and concern when they make those types of changes.
The most recent live example is the complete and sudden devaluing of VB costume unlocks. "Hey guys, we suddenly decided VB unlocks would go from some of the most valuable items in our economy to being dirt common, enjoy!" The immediate gratification crowd did enjoy it for a few days, but of course now they are bored again (I literally watched people go from "I've been farming for two hours and NOTHING, this SUCKS" to "OMG I got a waist cape!" to "sigh, nothing left to do in this game anymore").
This latest change to elite scaling is "Hey guys, we've heard your feedback from 8 months ago that elite gear should be better gear than Very Hard, and the way we've decided to handle it is by introducing better gear that's enough of an improvement over all the gear you've collected so far to devalue it all, but isn't better enough to really excite you into wanting to repeat all the farming you've done this whole past year, enjoy." "Oh, and we still haven't fixed that fact that purple gear has lagged behind adventure pack blues for over a year, but don't worry soon we'll have an unexciting fix for that, or not, we're still deciding how best to waste your time with these new elite blues."
I'm pretty disappointed that this is how Cryptic values the CO end-game.
Would anyone object to making a form for TK blades similar to Form of the Tempest, but grants ID blades with the damage increase?
Currently, all melee sets get their 20% from str without having to invest any powers in it. So basically, it looks like this:
TK blades Form:
Gets up to 20% increase in damage from ID blades(Ego scale), 8 stacks of a damage buff, likely building stacks off crit since most build dex/ego. Could possibly grant stacks everytime you infect a target with Ego Leech, can only happen every 2 seconds?
Get rid of ID blades off the offensive passive and give it damage boost based on super stats and a better defensive boost based off super stats.
This would put it on par with Martial arts, who gets the exact samething. Might and Heavy weapons also get their 20% from str, a toggle, and 8 stacks of enrage. I believe they get this because nobody builds them for crits, so it helps them stay on par.
Whatever you do, please don't remove a mechanical purpose for ID blades. It's what keeps me to this set. Just let us change the appearances.
Delay the TK pass until you have time to do it right. I may change my mind on this if your next iteration includes some serious revamping; but as things stand, the proposed changes aren't even close to being worthy of going live.
Id Blades as a Toggle. I can't tell you how happy I'll be to be able to wield Id Blades without having my character shrouded in the Ego Form sfx, and vice versa.
Buff Ego Form. This is needed even if Id Blades remain tied to it; if they're pulled out as a separate Toggle, it becomes even more important. Set up Ego Form so that your survivability scales with Ego; this boost in survivability can and should be biased toward Paranormal damage; but it should apply across the board.
Decouple the various TK Blade appearances from Rank, either by adding an Ego Blade option to the Costume Editor or by allowing power customization such as is done for Controllable Pets. The former is preferred, because multiple powers use the blades.
Find some way to let me use the TK power in a fight without having to shift my targeting focus away from the bad guys.
More abstractly, find a way to make this set work as a melee/ranged hybrid: we already have plenty of solid pure-melee and pure-ranged sets; but we have a shortage of sets that can do both (Might being one such example).
Hey guys! Sorry I haven't been active in these TK threads, been pretty heads down on Resistance polish. But, since Ame is off getting married (the nerve of that guy), here I am!
Simply put, you all are 100% correct: TK needs more work. I feel the changes so far are in the right direction, and we're releasing the changes thus far as well as The Disciple along with Resistance, but we are not considering this to be the TK review.
I am going to head up a more comprehensive TK review myself once Resistance is out the door. We've definitely seen your top concerns and have talked about what we can do. Hopefully I'll be able to say more soon.
Thanks again for your feedback so far. I'll be looking for more soon. I'll likely start an in-game chat channel like we did with the melee review, for those of you that remember that. Looking forward to working through these issues with you guys again.
Simply put, you all are 100% correct: TK needs more work. I feel the changes so far are in the right direction, and we're releasing the changes thus far as well as The Disciple along with Resistance, but we are not considering this do be the TK review.
I would strongly consider delaying the disciple until playing it won't be an unpleasant experience -- not only is TK somewhat subpar, the Disciple is bad even within the limits of the TK framework. At the current state of the game, a Form is really not optional on a melee build.
Hey guys! Sorry I haven't been active in these TK threads, been pretty heads down on Resistance polish. But, since Ame is off getting married (the nerve of that guy), here I am!
Simply put, you all are 100% correct: TK needs more work. I feel the changes so far are in the right direction, and we're releasing the changes thus far as well as The Disciple along with Resistance, but we are not considering this to be the TK review.
I am going to head up a more comprehensive TK review myself once Resistance is out the door. We've definitely seen your top concerns and have talked about what we can do. Hopefully I'll be able to say more soon.
Thanks again for your feedback so far. I'll be looking for more soon. I'll likely start an in-game chat channel like we did with the melee review, for those of you that remember that. Looking forward to working through these issues with you guys again.
Might it be a mistake to release The Disciple before the TK pass is complete?
+1. If you have to push the current TK changes out the door with Resistance, fine; the promise of a more thorough TK review afterward allays my concerns there. But please postpone the Disciple AT until you get to the TK review; you really don't want it going live while it's in a state that will cause Silver players to question why they wasted good money on it.
it's really good to know that you guys are going to keep on this one. I wish you could push the deadline, since I worry that this review won't get as high a priority once it's off the PTS, but an extended review will hopefully work out, if it doesn't get pushed back too far after Resistance drops.
There is definitely the worry of buyer backlash on The Disciple though. Right now it seems to be shaping up to be by far the worst of the ATs, and I can't imagine people will be too happy if they find that out after actually putting down money for it.
I worry that you're trying too hard in the wrong directions with Ego Leech. As a baked-in component of most of the powers, it ought to be either more broadly useful, like Enrage has become, or minor enough that it doesn't cause so much cost-inflation that the powers are unattractive when it can't be fully exploited. Clinging Flames, Fear, and Disorient, are all good examples of how such "rider effects" manage both. Right now, Ego Leech is shaping up to be neither.
I wonder if it couldn't be moved off of the powers themselves and onto something more global, like a Toggle or Passive. Pestilence seems to work in this kind of fashion, as a kind of semi-permanent version of an "on-next-hit" power. Maybe you could shift Ego Leech to Ego Form or something similar? That, coupled with a Form-Toggle that activates dual-blades (and provides a Focus-like stacking damage buff + energy return) might solve the problems of poor energy management, cost-inflated powers, and visual choices being chained to the passive choice.
Yeah, I'm going to have to go with the consensus here that the TK changes and the Disciple need to be pushed back. Taking these changes live is going to launch a ****storm no one wants to deal with. Especially with those that pay real money for the Disciple AT. Please reconsider this.
I would also strongly recommend that you do not release the Disciple until you have done the TK pass.
No company ever did well by selling a substandard product with the promise that it would be improved after the customer bought it, yet that is precisely what you would be doing.
Nor would most players hear or believe any comments that more changes were coming (many don't even read patch notes). The pattern of Archetypes being released simultaneously with a review of that framework is now firmly established. If you release an Archetype first, the vast majority of players will assume that the TK review is done, and will see any post-AT changes as attempts to compensate for incompetance. You simply cannot win this PR fight. Your only recourse is to delay the Disciple until it has the TK review to back it up.
Thanks for chiming in Akinos. I look forward to you working with the community on this, since TK could potentially be a really big undertaking (the Mentalist tab itself could use the equivalent of the Melee pass).
I need to echo the sentiment that pushing out a half-baked Disciple is really a poor decision, and there will definitely be backlash over silvers purchasing an incomplete AT -- especially considering it's possible that changes to TK could serious impact how the Disciple plays. Unless, of course, you're completely rooted in how Ego Leech is currently functioning, in which case I will be extremely disappointed.
Thanks for chiming in Akinos. I look forward to you working with the community on this, since TK could potentially be a really big undertaking (the Mentalist tab itself could use the equivalent of the Melee pass).
How true. And I wouldn't mind seeing the lines between the two power sets blurred, through shared and parallel powers (as was done for Martial Arts, Brick, and Supernatural).
Indeed, there was a thread on the Suggestions forum some time back that proposed setting up three Mentalist power sets: a melee-oriented "psi blades" set, a range-oriented telekinesis set that conforms more closely to what most people think of when they hear "TK", and the existing support-oriented Telepathy set, with enough overlap in their powers that hybrids of the three are easier to manage than, say, a hybrid of Munitions and Dual Blade. I think that such a move should be given serious consideration.
Just curious,
What are the specific issues or bugs with the Disciple?
Do you guys have any feedback from playtesting with the Disciple?
From what I am seeing, the feedback is leaning towards the Disciple being squishy. Does this mean it is not viable? This may seem like a simplification of the feedback but I am looking for more info.
The feedback so far has been great. I'm just prodding for more
I like my TK blades character BUT need a lot out of framework powers to make it viable:
Energy shield with laser knight
Martial arts form (the dual blades one)
Protection field
Bionic shielding
While I have fun playing the character, it is my only character that ever dies on a Unity mission on normal difficulty. NemCon is almost funny. Even with the form character doesn't compare to the others. When the debuff on EBB occurred the character just got even weaker. I think others have done a good job already of describing the issues with some of the powers (e.g., dividing the hit from EBB into 2 his so flat mitigation applies twice).
I really can't imagine the masochism required to play this archetype without a form or any kind of defens. It's especially disappointing after the (wonderful) changes to archery, electricity, etc.
Mind Knight is a lot of fun for me, but when I think about it the only TK powers he has are the energy builder, ego form ego blade breach and ego blade frenzy. Others have already detailed problems with the ranged abilities.
Just curious,
What are the specific issues or bugs with the Disciple?
Do you guys have any feedback from playtesting with the Disciple?
From what I am seeing, the feedback is leaning towards the Disciple being squishy. Does this mean it is not viable? This may seem like a simplification of the feedback but I am looking for more info.
The feedback so far has been great. I'm just prodding for more
Look at the other Dex/Ego superstatted AT, the Soldier. It does less damage, but it doesn't have to close to melee range to do damage, it gets a few control tools, and Munitions' powers are a great deal cheaper than the Disciple's.
Even if Disciple gets into melee range, it doesn't have high enough damage to end fights before it runs out of energy. And if it can't end a fight before it runs out of energy, it's stuck in melee range using an end builder with no defense to speak of.
The control powers it has (mainly TK Eruption) are too expensive for it to use, or too limited in use (Ego Choke).
And I can't believe I'm making a case for The Soldier being a better AT than...well. Anything but Marksman.
Hey guys! Sorry I haven't been active in these TK threads, been pretty heads down on Resistance polish. But, since Ame is off getting married (the nerve of that guy), here I am!
Simply put, you all are 100% correct: TK needs more work. I feel the changes so far are in the right direction, and we're releasing the changes thus far as well as The Disciple along with Resistance, but we are not considering this to be the TK review.
I am going to head up a more comprehensive TK review myself once Resistance is out the door. We've definitely seen your top concerns and have talked about what we can do. Hopefully I'll be able to say more soon.
Thanks again for your feedback so far. I'll be looking for more soon. I'll likely start an in-game chat channel like we did with the melee review, for those of you that remember that. Looking forward to working through these issues with you guys again.
Do you know how nearly impossible it is to break a bad reputation on something you are trying to sell?
You're going to release a product (the Disciple AT) that virtually every single person who has tested it says is incredibly weak. The few players who buy it without asking are going to be underwhelmed versus the other toons they have. Both these groups will be actively warning off other players from making the purchase.
More than that, it's unlikely you'll get all of them to try it again later which means even after you fix it, you'll still have a significant number of players telling other potential purchasers to avoid buying. Heck, I have friends who still warn people off CO as a whole because of the dramatic nerf-everything that happened at release which was almost two years ago even though the game bears little resemblance to that travesty.
Contrast this to the Tempest which when released was a "WoW! This is fun!" because while squishy, could put out very respectable DPS. I'm not sure how many Tempest AT's the store sold, or how that AT compared with others released after F2P, but I do know that zone chat was overwhelmingly positive about it, and I suspect anyone on the fence about making the purchase went ahead and did so based on the near universal recommendation.
Moving from a sales to PR standpoints...
You'll generate more good will by stepping up and saying "We care about not selling sub-par products to our customers more than we care about making a few extra dollars by shoveling half-baked new shinies into the store" than you'd ever lose by disappointing people who want stuff now.
I mean, look at the response to the delaying of Mass Effect 3...overwhelming positive by the gaming community (side note: ya, I'm gonna be missing from CO for a couple months when that game comes out). That doesn't mean you should go all Duke Nukem Forever on the Disciple, but a couple extra weeks isn't going to bankrupt Cryptic or Atari, and it will help Cryptic begin to build a reputation as a developer who puts quality first.
Just curious,
What are the specific issues or bugs with the Disciple?
Do you guys have any feedback from playtesting with the Disciple?
From what I am seeing, the feedback is leaning towards the Disciple being squishy. Does this mean it is not viable? This may seem like a simplification of the feedback but I am looking for more info.
The feedback so far has been great. I'm just prodding for more
The Disciple has horrible energy problems, lacks damage other melee ATs have(Forms,Toggles,Enrage), is a horribly squishy melee character, has the worst advantages in the game, Ego Blade Annihilation is a horrible finisher move, and the set gets access to it's only debuff and ok damage at level 40, weakening it's ability to deal decent vs bosses for such low survivability. Until level 40, it can only rely on Ego Weaponry and Ego Annihilation as single target attacks, lol.
This AT is far from viable, and will almost 100% cause an up rise in paying customers expecting more. Please please please take into account your customers.
The same thing can be said about freeform version, except it can get Internal Dampening field/Bionic shielding/Clickable defense power/Form of the Tempest to make up for those disadvantages to an extent, and even free form TK users have major problems. This should say something about how bad the AT is.
Here is a starter list of things that will help both the AT and framework:
1. Lower energy costs, especially on TK eruption. It already does low damage for the amount of endurance it cost, and the damage boost gives like 100 extra damage at rank 2.
2. Give Ego Form an all damage resistant buff. Nothing too insanely OP, but enough to address how squishy the Framework/AT is.
3. Give it a TK specific toggle like Form of the Tempest and move ID blades to the toggle.
4. Since the 20% ego melee damage boost is likely going into the powers themselves, allow ID blades to attack quicker than the single blades to provide a reason to want ID blades. This would help both the AT and framework in terms of DPS while not being too overpowered.
Just curious,
What are the specific issues or bugs with the Disciple?
Do you guys have any feedback from playtesting with the Disciple?
From what I am seeing, the feedback is leaning towards the Disciple being squishy. Does this mean it is not viable? This may seem like a simplification of the feedback but I am looking for more info.
The feedback so far has been great. I'm just prodding for more
Here's one big issue; building a melee toon without Enrage or a Focus Form is pure foolishness. How can you say no to +150% dmg (pretty much double an offensive passive)? Please give the Discple form of the tempest or a new TK toggle.
I wonder if putting Parry and Form of the Tempest into the AT would be a viable stopgap measure, with an eye toward replacing them with set-specific Toggle and Block powers when TK gets its full review? Though if you're going to be changing the AT when the TK review is conducted, you might as well, ahem, hold off on the AT until you do the TK review.
It ain't a "TK pass" until TK the POWER (not the framework) get's an overhaul.
So, thanks for the delay Akinos :cool:
My $.02G on TK changes:
Fix the steaming pile that is TK (the power) using the current "pick up and throw" tech (how hard could THAT be?)
Make Ego Lunge a "reverse" lunge (using Force Snap's tech or something), bringing your target to you.
Disconnect "Id Blades" from Ego Form, and use Agressor as a template for an Id Blade toggle
Remove the graphical changes from rank on ALL BLADES, and allow tailor access with FULL GLOW on ALL pieces (using both SB and DB)
Make Ego Form affect ALL PARANORMAL dmg (like Shadow and Seraphim)
Give us access to that nifty TK Armor power/graphic that Psimon has
Oh, and stuff Ego Leech in an incinerator somewhere so it dies by fire ok? (Maybe you'll get lucky, and it will get reborn like the phoenix into something useful )
It ain't a "TK pass" until TK the POWER (not the framework) get's an overhaul.
So, thanks for the delay Akinos :cool:
My $.02G on TK changes:
Fix the steaming pile that is TK (the power) using the current "pick up and throw" tech (how hard could THAT be?)
Make Ego Lunge a "reverse" lunge (using Force Snap's tech or something), bringing your target to you.
Disconnect "Id Blades" from Ego Form, and use Agressor as a template for an Id Blade toggle
Remove the graphical changes from rank on ALL BLADES, and allow tailor access with FULL GLOW on ALL pieces (using both SB and DB)
Make Ego Form affect ALL PARANORMAL dmg (like Shadow and Seraphim)
Give us access to that nifty TK Armor power/graphic that Psimon has
Oh, and stuff Ego Leech in an incinerator somewhere so it dies by fire ok?
Having and Aggressor style toggle will only lower TK's damage compared to every other melee set who gets an Aggressor style toggle, as they get 8 stacks of enrage also. It's better for it to have a toggle like Form of the Tempest.
Not sure about making Ego Form all paranormal damage, as it has the power cost discount attached to it, possibly increases darkness in an unintended fashion.
Everything else I agree with, especially PSI armor. The graphic would need an overhaul though, as it's so dull.
I like my TK blades character BUT need a lot out of framework powers to make it viable:
Energy shield with laser knight
Martial arts form (the dual blades one)
Protection field
Bionic shielding
This would be a good start.
EDIT:
Changing the frame work down the line will probably mean that the AT will have to be re looked at too. This means that you will be just making more work for your selves in the long run. There is already a healthy enough stream of new content coming to the c-store without the disciple. Heavy Weapons is still fresh on peoples minds and resistance will be plenty of hype. You don't need Resistance AND a new AT. Please just release quality ATs as time permits instead of trying to sell (what even you admit to be a rush job) to you customers. People will be way more likely to buy an AT the next time if you take your time with this one. Or you can just flush all the good pr you had with heavy weapons down the drain.
From what I am seeing, the feedback is leaning towards the Disciple being squishy. Does this mean it is not viable? This may seem like a simplification of the feedback but I am looking for more info.
Squishy is viable on non-boss content, as long as you have the offensive power to survive being squishy. The Disciple doesn't. In addition, since it's in brawler role, ego choke, TK eruption, and TK maelstrom will underperform (Ego Choke and TK Maelstrom are as much CC powers as damage, so they won't be as bad, but still, ugh). I'd almost suggest a defensive passive, but the most appropriate defensive passives for the build (PFF and LR) are iffy -- PFF is just a bad defensive passive, LR needs a bunch of support powers this AT doesn't have. Then I'd give it a martial arts form at level 17 (ego annihilation can be moved to a choice level, or just dropped).
Xavori's kind of hitting the nail on the head. Unfortunately the Disciple's level of squish is not currently made up for by its offensive power. It's too energy hungry and lacks sufficient damage for how quickly it gets shredded. Sheeple get skittish of picking something up even if it's been dramatically improved afterward. It's the only one first impression thing.
I'll probably get cooked over the firepit for this, but I think Ego Leech would be fine if the Energy On Kill component were axed entirely (it was disliked on Spirit Reverb too before the Void pass) and that portion of energy shifted onto the Energy Over Time portion. This would effectively bake the "Rush" effect into TK powers.
Ego Form provides subpar offense compared to other offensive passives; look to WotW for proper scaling. Its defense is also subpar for a melee Offensive Passive. As resistances are a little bland, perhaps a miniature Personal Force Field effect as its defense method. A small HP buffer that recharges quickly (possibly faster than PFF does). Enough to wipe out a typical hench-villain group, or take out a master villain. Decoupling Id Blades from it as well (which had already been mentioned), and possibly making it a shared Mentalist power. The recent Mentalist cost reduction is nice, though.
Ego Blade needs a chance to apply a relevant debuff on its first swing and an advantage to give it a chance on every swing. Standard energy builder utility. On the topic of debuffs, perhaps adding a sprinkling of Disorient and/or Fear to the abilities would help promote cross-framework synergy while also giving TK itself a little buff?
Pantagruel, as always, hit the mark on EBB. :]
The new lunge is nice to have in the set, but the animation is the MIghty Leap one. Can Decimate from Heavy Weapons be used as the animation, allowing for use of the actual Ego Blade during the lunge? Right now, you leap at the enemy and then punch them while holding your blade. Minor, but something to consider for polish if it's possible.
Supplemental to the lunge, a powerful 1.5s maintained Reverse Repel on a cooldown would be very "telekinetic" friendly. As it is, TK doesn't really feel very...telekinetic. Shoving things around is key to the core of the word.
Oh, and the toggle situation. That's been brought up a lot already, though. >_>
Just curious,
What are the specific issues or bugs with the Disciple?
Do you guys have any feedback from playtesting with the Disciple?
From what I am seeing, the feedback is leaning towards the Disciple being squishy. Does this mean it is not viable? This may seem like a simplification of the feedback but I am looking for more info.
The feedback so far has been great. I'm just prodding for more
Primarily, its passive has no defense, so add a passive confuse aura as a unique way of survivable melee.
Honestly, fixing the TK framework goes hand in hand with fixing the AT currently. You could kill two birds with one stone.
What about adding a new Ego Blade Leech attack. This attack could consume any stacks of Ego Leech and get healed based on how many stacks were consumed. Could be either a large or HoT type heal.
This would add in the combo-style attacks and give the AT/Framework a self-heal that is also melee, based off Ego Leech mechanic.
As resistances are a little bland, perhaps a miniature Personal Force Field effect as its defense method. A small HP buffer that recharges quickly (possibly faster than PFF does). Enough to wipe out a typical hench-villain group, or take out a master villain. Decoupling Id Blades from it as well (which had already been mentioned), and possibly making it a shared Mentalist power. The recent Mentalist cost reduction is nice, though.
I really like this idea. I'm thinking something along the lines of Energy Refraction from the force bolts advantage would be nice, especially if it scaled with ego.
The new lunge is nice to have in the set, but the animation is the Mighty Leap one. Can Decimate from Heavy Weapons be used as the animation, allowing for use of the actual Ego Blade during the lunge? Right now, you leap at the enemy and then punch them while holding your blade. Minor, but something to consider for polish if it's possible.
I hate to quote spam but this is important too. The TK lunge looks like a place holder. you guys just made not one but TWO new weapon lunge animations and your not going to use them???
So, EBB (tapped, assuming an average of 2 stacks debuff being applied) is about 10% worse than DC (tapped), with very marginally lower energy cost, and is two hits rather than one. Charge attacks are not as directly comparable due to different speeds, but overall have similarly poor reduced performance. Note that DC is something of an overperformer, so arguably EBB is competitive with a number of other top tier attacks. However, even if we accept that, we're missing the second part of the equation: Way of the Warrior is dramatically superior to Ego Form. It has a substantially higher damage bonus, and it grants a significant quantity of dodge and avoidance; WotW tanks with 50% dodge/avoidance aren't that rare. Ego Form, by comparison, just gives physical damage resistance, and not terribly much of it.
They might have fixed it on Test server, but it shows the same numbers for me for damage on Ego form and WoTW.
What do you mean by doing substantially higher damage?
Edit: It appears to have less damage than WoTW on live, but on test they're the same. :eek:
Just curious,
What are the specific issues or bugs with the Disciple?
Do you guys have any feedback from playtesting with the Disciple?
From what I am seeing, the feedback is leaning towards the Disciple being squishy. Does this mean it is not viable? This may seem like a simplification of the feedback but I am looking for more info.
The feedback so far has been great. I'm just prodding for more
We don't mind the AT being squishy as long as the damage factor is high enough to compensate. Think of a balance scale: On one arm of the scale is survivability with a dedicated tank with multiple active defenses and heals at the top and the current disciple build at the bottom. On the other arm of the scale is the damage factor with the high end PVP damage builds at the top and the Glacier at the bottom. As one arm goes up the other arm can go down and still remain viable. As I said, the Disciple is currently at the bottom of the survivability side so, to balance the equation, it needs to be nearer the top of the damage scale, rather than below the middle line where it is now.
IMHO, every melee set that involves weapons should have a Block that involves brandishing those weapons; I'm hoping that Single Weapon, Dual Weapon, and Fighting Claws will get armed parries when the Martial Arts pass comes by (even if they're merely armed clones of Parry), just as I'm hoping that TK gets something for the Ego/Id Blades. Admittedly, no power set has more than one Blocking Power as things stand; but I don't see why this can't change beyond "we've never done it before". (I'd also like to see armed lunges for the armed martial arts sets; but that's a topic for later.)
Setting up an Ego Blade Parry to counterstrike against ranged attackers (with kinetic darts) would draw upon the "Jedi Knight mythos" from which so much of the TK power set seems to draw inspiration, without being too derivative; and it would be much easier to implement than trying to actually reflect single-target ranged attacks back at the attacker. It would also echo the way that Parry, Retaliation, and Guard all include a counterstrike component while putting a slightly different spin on it.
Simply put, you all are 100% correct: TK needs more work. I feel the changes so far are in the right direction
You know those two statements are entirely contradictory, right? We're not just saying it needs work, but that the steps taken thus far are all in the wrong direction - people are advocating leaving it alone rather than messing it up worse as an interim step to some sort of 'fix'. Right now this embarassing little branch of code is just here where the test-mind folks are poking it. If you want to trot it out to the wide world that's your privilege, but its a mistake.
...and we're releasing the changes thus far as well as The Disciple along with Resistance, but we are not considering this to be the TK review.
So you (collectively) are knowingly going to sell an archetype in a form totally unrelated to how its going to function only months later? You thought Cryptic got 'bait-and-switch' complaints before :mad:?
I'm actually morbidly fascinated to see what a "pass" is going to look like for a framwork tied to a Archetype - creating new powers that would fix problems but can no longer be sloted into the associated archetype without causing wholesale (and retail) chaos. Heck, I may retract my objections so long as you give us enough warning to go make some popcorn before watching the show.
There is no amount of money you can gain in the short term releasing this thing half-baked that you won't lose 3 times over in irritated customers. Don't do it. Don't go there. It a fiasco in the making.
Just curious,
What are the specific issues or bugs with the Disciple?
Do you guys have any feedback from playtesting with the Disciple?
From what I am seeing, the feedback is leaning towards the Disciple being squishy. Does this mean it is not viable? This may seem like a simplification of the feedback but I am looking for more info.
The feedback so far has been great. I'm just prodding for more
My concern would be releasing an archetype you intend to change in the near future. It's false advertising, even if it's for the better.
Release it when you have the TK frameworks where you want them to be.
Give Telekineses the same treatment Supernatural received a while back, split it up into two frameworks, Telekineses (ranged) and TK Blades (melee) and add more powers for both
For the ranged set have a focus on throwing stuff (and enemies) around, even if it has to come out of thin air.
I like the idea a previous poster came up with for a "reverse lunge" for TK blades, pulling the enemy to you, although I'm not sure if that could be as effective as a normal lunge given the way the game works, it'd look cool though.
Another good idea floating around here is a toggle similar to Form of the Tempest that enables Id Blades and perhaps offers an energy discount for TK and TK Blade powers with each stack unless you decide to lower the energy costs as part of the review.
Originally Posted by RoBoBo
Just curious,
What are the specific issues or bugs with the Disciple?
Do you guys have any feedback from playtesting with the Disciple?
From what I am seeing, the feedback is leaning towards the Disciple being squishy. Does this mean it is not viable? This may seem like a simplification of the feedback but I am looking for more info.
The feedback so far has been great. I'm just prodding for more
I dunno about you Robobo, but what I'm seeing in response to this post is that something is either horribly broken with melee powers or forms are massively overpowered....
Just curious,
What are the specific issues or bugs with the Disciple?
Do you guys have any feedback from playtesting with the Disciple?
From what I am seeing, the feedback is leaning towards the Disciple being squishy. Does this mean it is not viable? This may seem like a simplification of the feedback but I am looking for more info.
The feedback so far has been great. I'm just prodding for more
Yes it is squishy. I'd recommend doing something more with tk shield adv, like making it continue resisting dmg besides just physical dmg.
Ego blade also needs to do something more. It needs an adv. Can it provide the "enhanced form" that tk eruption provides? Make it be a chance to proc rather than guarantee to proc like tk eruption. Those two things stacking together will certainly help the AT be a bit more survivable.
we're releasing the changes thus far as well as The Disciple along with Resistance
I don't think this is a good idea for something that is being charged for as a separate item. The precedent has been set with past AT's using sets/power combinations that were generally considered fully functional and/or had recently received a detailed, thorough, quality pass. Also each premium AT has been generally as good as or better than the ones that preceded it in one or more areas. The Disciple isn't better in any area and arguably isn't "as good as" in any area either.
Breaking the quality precedent you've set to sell something that's a little undercooked is not a good move IMO. Hopefully this decision, if it stands, doesn't become yet another thing that burns some goodwill towards this game.
Let me also point out that TK eruption, along with every other non-melee attack suffers in damage due to the fact that the AT is in Brawler mode and most use Brawler on free form to enhance the blade damage.
Going back to TK eruption. I absolutely love the TK Eruption form FX, but I hate the energy cost of the power, the lack of damage and the marginal damage/survivability it gives. If we do get a form like Form of the Tempest, could we have a 0 point advantage that adds this FX to the form?
Above all else, I prefer the FX of Shadow Form+TK eruption. I think it's the best looking FX on a character in the entire game. It looks like you literally transform into a living entity of Ego energy. Whoever designed that FX needs to be in charge of designing a new look to Ego Form imo.
Also, what about letting Ego Blade Annihilation consume stacks of Ego Leech to fit in with it's "Finisher" style of attack. Currently, there really is no reason to ever use this power.
I dunno about you Robobo, but what I'm seeing in response to this post is that something is either horribly broken with melee powers or forms are massively overpowered....
The bar for melee is already set.
With that being said, you could either nerf Forms/Aspects/Enrage to be on par with TK blades damage(Bad Idea if you know your history) Or......
You can finally give TK(the only melee set without a secondary damage booster) a Form to be on par with everyone else. Since TK is built in the same fashion as MA toons (Dex/Ego) then giving them a Form with focus buffs would be the best option.
Comments
Not because TK is a powerset I'm hoping becomes awesomesauce or that Cryptic will buy me a pony or anything.
But finally we have found something that has brought both the PvP and PvE communities together. Both groups of players are in full agreement that telekinesis needs a lot more work before it's ready for prime time. More than that, I suspect that they're even really close in agreement that maybe the dev team should finish up Resistance (which is starting to shape up into a pretty cool pack) and then focus all their attention on TK.
Next time I pass a carebear in the Caprice VIP lounge, I might even buy him or her a drink...
Hold off on finishing it. Pull it from the Resistance patch, give it another month - right now you're at what I'd consider the early-mid point of a good pass; ie: there is simply no feasible way for this to go live as-is and be well done. It just isn't possible.
All that's happened is the addition of a lunge, and some twiddling with energy costs (mostly nerfs) and fiddling with ego leech. That... doesn't really solve anything. At all. It ignores a lot of the important issues people have brought up again and again and again - including new powers the set really could use that other sets during reviews have gotten.
So yes, that's my feedback on the pass so far: Hold off, give it another month. Better to do it right than to do it to keep a schedule.
i've started my suggestions/ideas thread here: http://forums.champions-online.com/showthread.php?t=129419 and i'm open to feedback if anyone has a specific idea
But, it's basically a consensus - TK Needs some serious, SERIOUS help
A character built around a set designed for a very squishy, "get them before they get you," play style needs truly overwhelming damage to succeed. This means attacks that destroy targets (plural, all at once) almost instantly and tougher single targets very quickly. This requires decent energy efficiency so that you do not allow foes free attack time while you use your EB.
The current trend in the Ego Blades pass actually moves away from those needs. Currently, using in set tools, an Ego Blader doesnt really do any more damage than other melee sets do using their own in set synergies. At the same time Ego Blades is significantly weaker defensively and isnt as energy efficient. So currently we have a glass cannon whose gun isnt really significantly bigger than those carried by tanks.
Some suggestions:
Rebuild Ego Leach so that it counts as a buff on the Ego Blader for energy gain (so that the effort of building stacks isnt lost when one defeats a foe) and as a debuff on the target to increase the Ego Blader's damage. Perhaps this could be additional ego damage resistance reduction, or perhaps a rupture effect (as others have suggested).
Make the ID blades Ego based damage boost inherent to the EGO stat (and not tied to the double blade animation).
Add a toggle that increases Ego damage and, to a lesser extent, ranged physical damage. (Honestly I would prefer that other offensive passives worked like quarry by providing a two tiered damage buff for core and secondary damage types so as to reduce the gradual evolution toward class-like building)
- EBB (tap): 0.67s, 35 energy (52 eps), 158x2 (316) damage, 5% debuff stacks 3x. Adds Ego Leech.
- DC (tap): 0.67s, 36 energy (54 eps), 343 damage, +0.5 crit severity
- EBB (charge): 2.00s, 71 energy (36 eps), 449x2(898) damage, 5% debuff stacks 3x. Adds Ego Leech.
- DC (charge): 1.50s, 61 energy (41 eps), 731 damage, +0.5 crit severity, grants rush.
So, EBB (tapped, assuming an average of 2 stacks debuff being applied) is about 10% worse than DC (tapped), with very marginally lower energy cost, and is two hits rather than one. Charge attacks are not as directly comparable due to different speeds, but overall have similarly poor reduced performance. Note that DC is something of an overperformer, so arguably EBB is competitive with a number of other top tier attacks. However, even if we accept that, we're missing the second part of the equation: Way of the Warrior is dramatically superior to Ego Form. It has a substantially higher damage bonus, and it grants a significant quantity of dodge and avoidance; WotW tanks with 50% dodge/avoidance aren't that rare. Ego Form, by comparison, just gives physical damage resistance, and not terribly much of it.With 35% crit chance and 100% severity, initial hit dps is 668, 3rd hit dps is 731 (counts debuffs).
With 35% crit chance and 100% (base) severity, dps is 780.
With 35% crit chance and 100% severity, initial hit dps is 636, 3rd hit dps is 697.
With 35% crit chance and 100% (base) severity, dps is 743.
Exactly my point. Thank you for providing the numbers to back it up.
I dont mind the idea of Ego Blades being a glass cannon set. It provides variety if this set plays dramatically differently than other melee sets. But if glass part is in place then the cannon part is needed as well.
I feel gratitude on some level, but really this broken gear situation has gone on too long, with too little comment by Cryptic, and these latest changes to scaling on elite just make me say "bleh."
I mean I understand that it's in the nature of MMOs to invalidate a lot of our past effort by "raising the bar", i.e. level cap raises or new more powerful gear replaces the previously best gear we might have spent a lot of time collecting. I'm not complaining about this basic process. On the other hand Cryptic seems to lack appropriate care and concern when they make those types of changes.
The most recent live example is the complete and sudden devaluing of VB costume unlocks. "Hey guys, we suddenly decided VB unlocks would go from some of the most valuable items in our economy to being dirt common, enjoy!" The immediate gratification crowd did enjoy it for a few days, but of course now they are bored again (I literally watched people go from "I've been farming for two hours and NOTHING, this SUCKS" to "OMG I got a waist cape!" to "sigh, nothing left to do in this game anymore").
This latest change to elite scaling is "Hey guys, we've heard your feedback from 8 months ago that elite gear should be better gear than Very Hard, and the way we've decided to handle it is by introducing better gear that's enough of an improvement over all the gear you've collected so far to devalue it all, but isn't better enough to really excite you into wanting to repeat all the farming you've done this whole past year, enjoy." "Oh, and we still haven't fixed that fact that purple gear has lagged behind adventure pack blues for over a year, but don't worry soon we'll have an unexciting fix for that, or not, we're still deciding how best to waste your time with these new elite blues."
I'm pretty disappointed that this is how Cryptic values the CO end-game.
Currently, all melee sets get their 20% from str without having to invest any powers in it. So basically, it looks like this:
TK blades Form:
Gets up to 20% increase in damage from ID blades(Ego scale), 8 stacks of a damage buff, likely building stacks off crit since most build dex/ego. Could possibly grant stacks everytime you infect a target with Ego Leech, can only happen every 2 seconds?
Get rid of ID blades off the offensive passive and give it damage boost based on super stats and a better defensive boost based off super stats.
This would put it on par with Martial arts, who gets the exact samething. Might and Heavy weapons also get their 20% from str, a toggle, and 8 stacks of enrage. I believe they get this because nobody builds them for crits, so it helps them stay on par.
Whatever you do, please don't remove a mechanical purpose for ID blades. It's what keeps me to this set. Just let us change the appearances.
Also, change the ugly look of Ego Form, lol.
Delay the TK pass until you have time to do it right. I may change my mind on this if your next iteration includes some serious revamping; but as things stand, the proposed changes aren't even close to being worthy of going live.
Id Blades as a Toggle. I can't tell you how happy I'll be to be able to wield Id Blades without having my character shrouded in the Ego Form sfx, and vice versa.
Buff Ego Form. This is needed even if Id Blades remain tied to it; if they're pulled out as a separate Toggle, it becomes even more important. Set up Ego Form so that your survivability scales with Ego; this boost in survivability can and should be biased toward Paranormal damage; but it should apply across the board.
Decouple the various TK Blade appearances from Rank, either by adding an Ego Blade option to the Costume Editor or by allowing power customization such as is done for Controllable Pets. The former is preferred, because multiple powers use the blades.
Find some way to let me use the TK power in a fight without having to shift my targeting focus away from the bad guys.
More abstractly, find a way to make this set work as a melee/ranged hybrid: we already have plenty of solid pure-melee and pure-ranged sets; but we have a shortage of sets that can do both (Might being one such example).
Simply put, you all are 100% correct: TK needs more work. I feel the changes so far are in the right direction, and we're releasing the changes thus far as well as The Disciple along with Resistance, but we are not considering this to be the TK review.
I am going to head up a more comprehensive TK review myself once Resistance is out the door. We've definitely seen your top concerns and have talked about what we can do. Hopefully I'll be able to say more soon.
Thanks again for your feedback so far. I'll be looking for more soon. I'll likely start an in-game chat channel like we did with the melee review, for those of you that remember that. Looking forward to working through these issues with you guys again.
Might it be a mistake to release The Disciple before the TK pass is complete?
Poor poor squishie Disciple....
There is definitely the worry of buyer backlash on The Disciple though. Right now it seems to be shaping up to be by far the worst of the ATs, and I can't imagine people will be too happy if they find that out after actually putting down money for it.
I worry that you're trying too hard in the wrong directions with Ego Leech. As a baked-in component of most of the powers, it ought to be either more broadly useful, like Enrage has become, or minor enough that it doesn't cause so much cost-inflation that the powers are unattractive when it can't be fully exploited. Clinging Flames, Fear, and Disorient, are all good examples of how such "rider effects" manage both. Right now, Ego Leech is shaping up to be neither.
I wonder if it couldn't be moved off of the powers themselves and onto something more global, like a Toggle or Passive. Pestilence seems to work in this kind of fashion, as a kind of semi-permanent version of an "on-next-hit" power. Maybe you could shift Ego Leech to Ego Form or something similar? That, coupled with a Form-Toggle that activates dual-blades (and provides a Focus-like stacking damage buff + energy return) might solve the problems of poor energy management, cost-inflated powers, and visual choices being chained to the passive choice.
No company ever did well by selling a substandard product with the promise that it would be improved after the customer bought it, yet that is precisely what you would be doing.
Nor would most players hear or believe any comments that more changes were coming (many don't even read patch notes). The pattern of Archetypes being released simultaneously with a review of that framework is now firmly established. If you release an Archetype first, the vast majority of players will assume that the TK review is done, and will see any post-AT changes as attempts to compensate for incompetance. You simply cannot win this PR fight. Your only recourse is to delay the Disciple until it has the TK review to back it up.
I need to echo the sentiment that pushing out a half-baked Disciple is really a poor decision, and there will definitely be backlash over silvers purchasing an incomplete AT -- especially considering it's possible that changes to TK could serious impact how the Disciple plays. Unless, of course, you're completely rooted in how Ego Leech is currently functioning, in which case I will be extremely disappointed.
Indeed, there was a thread on the Suggestions forum some time back that proposed setting up three Mentalist power sets: a melee-oriented "psi blades" set, a range-oriented telekinesis set that conforms more closely to what most people think of when they hear "TK", and the existing support-oriented Telepathy set, with enough overlap in their powers that hybrids of the three are easier to manage than, say, a hybrid of Munitions and Dual Blade. I think that such a move should be given serious consideration.
What are the specific issues or bugs with the Disciple?
Do you guys have any feedback from playtesting with the Disciple?
From what I am seeing, the feedback is leaning towards the Disciple being squishy. Does this mean it is not viable? This may seem like a simplification of the feedback but I am looking for more info.
The feedback so far has been great. I'm just prodding for more
I've got 9 level 40 freeform characters:
-Electricity
-Force
-Might
-Arcane sorcery
-Fire
-Single blade
-Archery
-Power armor
-TK blades
I've also got a level 33 dual blades character.
I like my TK blades character BUT need a lot out of framework powers to make it viable:
While I have fun playing the character, it is my only character that ever dies on a Unity mission on normal difficulty. NemCon is almost funny. Even with the form character doesn't compare to the others. When the debuff on EBB occurred the character just got even weaker. I think others have done a good job already of describing the issues with some of the powers (e.g., dividing the hit from EBB into 2 his so flat mitigation applies twice).
I really can't imagine the masochism required to play this archetype without a form or any kind of defens. It's especially disappointing after the (wonderful) changes to archery, electricity, etc.
Mind Knight is a lot of fun for me, but when I think about it the only TK powers he has are the energy builder, ego form ego blade breach and ego blade frenzy. Others have already detailed problems with the ranged abilities.
Look at the other Dex/Ego superstatted AT, the Soldier. It does less damage, but it doesn't have to close to melee range to do damage, it gets a few control tools, and Munitions' powers are a great deal cheaper than the Disciple's.
Even if Disciple gets into melee range, it doesn't have high enough damage to end fights before it runs out of energy. And if it can't end a fight before it runs out of energy, it's stuck in melee range using an end builder with no defense to speak of.
The control powers it has (mainly TK Eruption) are too expensive for it to use, or too limited in use (Ego Choke).
And I can't believe I'm making a case for The Soldier being a better AT than...well. Anything but Marksman.
Do you know how nearly impossible it is to break a bad reputation on something you are trying to sell?
You're going to release a product (the Disciple AT) that virtually every single person who has tested it says is incredibly weak. The few players who buy it without asking are going to be underwhelmed versus the other toons they have. Both these groups will be actively warning off other players from making the purchase.
More than that, it's unlikely you'll get all of them to try it again later which means even after you fix it, you'll still have a significant number of players telling other potential purchasers to avoid buying. Heck, I have friends who still warn people off CO as a whole because of the dramatic nerf-everything that happened at release which was almost two years ago even though the game bears little resemblance to that travesty.
Contrast this to the Tempest which when released was a "WoW! This is fun!" because while squishy, could put out very respectable DPS. I'm not sure how many Tempest AT's the store sold, or how that AT compared with others released after F2P, but I do know that zone chat was overwhelmingly positive about it, and I suspect anyone on the fence about making the purchase went ahead and did so based on the near universal recommendation.
Moving from a sales to PR standpoints...
You'll generate more good will by stepping up and saying "We care about not selling sub-par products to our customers more than we care about making a few extra dollars by shoveling half-baked new shinies into the store" than you'd ever lose by disappointing people who want stuff now.
I mean, look at the response to the delaying of Mass Effect 3...overwhelming positive by the gaming community (side note: ya, I'm gonna be missing from CO for a couple months when that game comes out). That doesn't mean you should go all Duke Nukem Forever on the Disciple, but a couple extra weeks isn't going to bankrupt Cryptic or Atari, and it will help Cryptic begin to build a reputation as a developer who puts quality first.
The Disciple has horrible energy problems, lacks damage other melee ATs have(Forms,Toggles,Enrage), is a horribly squishy melee character, has the worst advantages in the game, Ego Blade Annihilation is a horrible finisher move, and the set gets access to it's only debuff and ok damage at level 40, weakening it's ability to deal decent vs bosses for such low survivability. Until level 40, it can only rely on Ego Weaponry and Ego Annihilation as single target attacks, lol.
This AT is far from viable, and will almost 100% cause an up rise in paying customers expecting more. Please please please take into account your customers.
The same thing can be said about freeform version, except it can get Internal Dampening field/Bionic shielding/Clickable defense power/Form of the Tempest to make up for those disadvantages to an extent, and even free form TK users have major problems. This should say something about how bad the AT is.
Here is a starter list of things that will help both the AT and framework:
1. Lower energy costs, especially on TK eruption. It already does low damage for the amount of endurance it cost, and the damage boost gives like 100 extra damage at rank 2.
2. Give Ego Form an all damage resistant buff. Nothing too insanely OP, but enough to address how squishy the Framework/AT is.
3. Give it a TK specific toggle like Form of the Tempest and move ID blades to the toggle.
4. Since the 20% ego melee damage boost is likely going into the powers themselves, allow ID blades to attack quicker than the single blades to provide a reason to want ID blades. This would help both the AT and framework in terms of DPS while not being too overpowered.
Here's one big issue; building a melee toon without Enrage or a Focus Form is pure foolishness. How can you say no to +150% dmg (pretty much double an offensive passive)? Please give the Discple form of the tempest or a new TK toggle.
So, thanks for the delay Akinos :cool:
My $.02G on TK changes:
- Fix the steaming pile that is TK (the power) using the current "pick up and throw" tech (how hard could THAT be?)
- Make Ego Lunge a "reverse" lunge (using Force Snap's tech or something), bringing your target to you.
- Disconnect "Id Blades" from Ego Form, and use Agressor as a template for an Id Blade toggle
- Remove the graphical changes from rank on ALL BLADES, and allow tailor access with FULL GLOW on ALL pieces (using both SB and DB)
- Make Ego Form affect ALL PARANORMAL dmg (like Shadow and Seraphim)
- Give us access to that nifty TK Armor power/graphic that Psimon has
Oh, and stuff Ego Leech in an incinerator somewhere so it dies by fire ok?(Maybe you'll get lucky, and it will get reborn like the phoenix into something useful
Having and Aggressor style toggle will only lower TK's damage compared to every other melee set who gets an Aggressor style toggle, as they get 8 stacks of enrage also. It's better for it to have a toggle like Form of the Tempest.
Not sure about making Ego Form all paranormal damage, as it has the power cost discount attached to it, possibly increases darkness in an unintended fashion.
Everything else I agree with, especially PSI armor. The graphic would need an overhaul though, as it's so dull.
If your going to fix the AT without fixing the framework then you are going to have to give it powers from out side the framework.
This would be a good start.
EDIT:
Changing the frame work down the line will probably mean that the AT will have to be re looked at too. This means that you will be just making more work for your selves in the long run. There is already a healthy enough stream of new content coming to the c-store without the disciple. Heavy Weapons is still fresh on peoples minds and resistance will be plenty of hype. You don't need Resistance AND a new AT. Please just release quality ATs as time permits instead of trying to sell (what even you admit to be a rush job) to you customers. People will be way more likely to buy an AT the next time if you take your time with this one. Or you can just flush all the good pr you had with heavy weapons down the drain.
I'll probably get cooked over the firepit for this, but I think Ego Leech would be fine if the Energy On Kill component were axed entirely (it was disliked on Spirit Reverb too before the Void pass) and that portion of energy shifted onto the Energy Over Time portion. This would effectively bake the "Rush" effect into TK powers.
Ego Form provides subpar offense compared to other offensive passives; look to WotW for proper scaling. Its defense is also subpar for a melee Offensive Passive. As resistances are a little bland, perhaps a miniature Personal Force Field effect as its defense method. A small HP buffer that recharges quickly (possibly faster than PFF does). Enough to wipe out a typical hench-villain group, or take out a master villain. Decoupling Id Blades from it as well (which had already been mentioned), and possibly making it a shared Mentalist power. The recent Mentalist cost reduction is nice, though.
Ego Blade needs a chance to apply a relevant debuff on its first swing and an advantage to give it a chance on every swing. Standard energy builder utility. On the topic of debuffs, perhaps adding a sprinkling of Disorient and/or Fear to the abilities would help promote cross-framework synergy while also giving TK itself a little buff?
Pantagruel, as always, hit the mark on EBB. :]
The new lunge is nice to have in the set, but the animation is the MIghty Leap one. Can Decimate from Heavy Weapons be used as the animation, allowing for use of the actual Ego Blade during the lunge? Right now, you leap at the enemy and then punch them while holding your blade. Minor, but something to consider for polish if it's possible.
Supplemental to the lunge, a powerful 1.5s maintained Reverse Repel on a cooldown would be very "telekinetic" friendly. As it is, TK doesn't really feel very...telekinetic. Shoving things around is key to the core of the word.
Oh, and the toggle situation. That's been brought up a lot already, though. >_>
Primarily, its passive has no defense, so add a passive confuse aura as a unique way of survivable melee.
What about adding a new Ego Blade Leech attack. This attack could consume any stacks of Ego Leech and get healed based on how many stacks were consumed. Could be either a large or HoT type heal.
This would add in the combo-style attacks and give the AT/Framework a self-heal that is also melee, based off Ego Leech mechanic.
Thoughts or opinions?
I hate to quote spam but this is important too. The TK lunge looks like a place holder. you guys just made not one but TWO new weapon lunge animations and your not going to use them???
They might have fixed it on Test server, but it shows the same numbers for me for damage on Ego form and WoTW.
What do you mean by doing substantially higher damage?
Edit: It appears to have less damage than WoTW on live, but on test they're the same. :eek:
We don't mind the AT being squishy as long as the damage factor is high enough to compensate. Think of a balance scale: On one arm of the scale is survivability with a dedicated tank with multiple active defenses and heals at the top and the current disciple build at the bottom. On the other arm of the scale is the damage factor with the high end PVP damage builds at the top and the Glacier at the bottom. As one arm goes up the other arm can go down and still remain viable. As I said, the Disciple is currently at the bottom of the survivability side so, to balance the equation, it needs to be nearer the top of the damage scale, rather than below the middle line where it is now.
Setting up an Ego Blade Parry to counterstrike against ranged attackers (with kinetic darts) would draw upon the "Jedi Knight mythos" from which so much of the TK power set seems to draw inspiration, without being too derivative; and it would be much easier to implement than trying to actually reflect single-target ranged attacks back at the attacker. It would also echo the way that Parry, Retaliation, and Guard all include a counterstrike component while putting a slightly different spin on it.
You know those two statements are entirely contradictory, right? We're not just saying it needs work, but that the steps taken thus far are all in the wrong direction - people are advocating leaving it alone rather than messing it up worse as an interim step to some sort of 'fix'. Right now this embarassing little branch of code is just here where the test-mind folks are poking it. If you want to trot it out to the wide world that's your privilege, but its a mistake.
So you (collectively) are knowingly going to sell an archetype in a form totally unrelated to how its going to function only months later? You thought Cryptic got 'bait-and-switch' complaints before :mad:?
I'm actually morbidly fascinated to see what a "pass" is going to look like for a framwork tied to a Archetype - creating new powers that would fix problems but can no longer be sloted into the associated archetype without causing wholesale (and retail) chaos. Heck, I may retract my objections so long as you give us enough warning to go make some popcorn before watching the show.
There is no amount of money you can gain in the short term releasing this thing half-baked that you won't lose 3 times over in irritated customers. Don't do it. Don't go there. It a fiasco in the making.
My concern would be releasing an archetype you intend to change in the near future. It's false advertising, even if it's for the better.
Release it when you have the TK frameworks where you want them to be.
Give Telekineses the same treatment Supernatural received a while back, split it up into two frameworks, Telekineses (ranged) and TK Blades (melee) and add more powers for both
For the ranged set have a focus on throwing stuff (and enemies) around, even if it has to come out of thin air.
I like the idea a previous poster came up with for a "reverse lunge" for TK blades, pulling the enemy to you, although I'm not sure if that could be as effective as a normal lunge given the way the game works, it'd look cool though.
Another good idea floating around here is a toggle similar to Form of the Tempest that enables Id Blades and perhaps offers an energy discount for TK and TK Blade powers with each stack unless you decide to lower the energy costs as part of the review.
I dunno about you Robobo, but what I'm seeing in response to this post is that something is either horribly broken with melee powers or forms are massively overpowered....
Since you have two energy returns, perhaps one could be changed to a health return.
Perhaps an ego version of Vicious Cyclone could be added. Make the knocks scaled by EGO instead of STR. That would be an Ego Blades compliment.
A toon with the TK Eruption FX and Laser Knight probably looks really cool. It would be neat to see an EGO variant of that.
Yes it is squishy. I'd recommend doing something more with tk shield adv, like making it continue resisting dmg besides just physical dmg.
Ego blade also needs to do something more. It needs an adv. Can it provide the "enhanced form" that tk eruption provides? Make it be a chance to proc rather than guarantee to proc like tk eruption. Those two things stacking together will certainly help the AT be a bit more survivable.
I don't think this is a good idea for something that is being charged for as a separate item. The precedent has been set with past AT's using sets/power combinations that were generally considered fully functional and/or had recently received a detailed, thorough, quality pass. Also each premium AT has been generally as good as or better than the ones that preceded it in one or more areas. The Disciple isn't better in any area and arguably isn't "as good as" in any area either.
Breaking the quality precedent you've set to sell something that's a little undercooked is not a good move IMO. Hopefully this decision, if it stands, doesn't become yet another thing that burns some goodwill towards this game.
Going back to TK eruption. I absolutely love the TK Eruption form FX, but I hate the energy cost of the power, the lack of damage and the marginal damage/survivability it gives. If we do get a form like Form of the Tempest, could we have a 0 point advantage that adds this FX to the form?
Above all else, I prefer the FX of Shadow Form+TK eruption. I think it's the best looking FX on a character in the entire game. It looks like you literally transform into a living entity of Ego energy. Whoever designed that FX needs to be in charge of designing a new look to Ego Form imo.
Also, what about letting Ego Blade Annihilation consume stacks of Ego Leech to fit in with it's "Finisher" style of attack. Currently, there really is no reason to ever use this power.
The bar for melee is already set.
With that being said, you could either nerf Forms/Aspects/Enrage to be on par with TK blades damage(Bad Idea if you know your history) Or......
You can finally give TK(the only melee set without a secondary damage booster) a Form to be on par with everyone else. Since TK is built in the same fashion as MA toons (Dex/Ego) then giving them a Form with focus buffs would be the best option.