FC.31.20151015.22 - Fractal Aegis, Frozen Auras, Onlaught Fixes

ladygadfly · November 2015

Release Notes for FC.31.20151015.22
This build is available on PTS as of 11/13/2015

PTS Store
- Added new Aurora, Starlight & Ice Storm auras to the PTS Store.
- Added the power unlock for new Ice Ultimate "Fractal Aegis" to the PTS store.
- Added new icons to new auras and sidekicks.

Onslaught Fixes
- Fixed issue with Onslaught reward token packs going into overflow. Now requires you to have an inventory slot available in order to accept reward.
- Nailed to the Ground: Now correctly affects Vehicles.
- Gravitar's Inversion Bolt now applies Nailed to the Ground to the primary target.
- Onslaught Supervillains gain a new debuff upon activating their device, Genetic Exhaustion. This debuff prevents the activation of further Villain devices, but it is removed if the player completes their time as a villain (either by dying or timing out).
- Onslaught Supervillains can now see through stealth and perception debuffs.
- Onslaught Supervillains will no longer benefit from the heal from Sentinel Mastery.
- Onslaught Supervillains will now apply Vile Challenge to players who block their basic attacks. This effect functions identically to Crippling Challenge.
- Devices should no longer incorrectly have their effects persist when becoming an Onslaught Villain.

Additional Bug Fixes
- Vehicles: Incendiary Rounds Mark 1: This power no longer erroneously performs as a Mark 3 weapon.
- Powers: Darkness: Endbringer's Grasp: This power no longer incorrectly ticks for much more damage than expected. It will now deal an appropriate amount of damage for its intended effect.
- Fixed Medusa hair from not coloring properly.
- Fixed Hipan Belt's texture.
- Updated NPC costumes using the hipan belt to use their correct texture.
- Fixed Dragon Armor Belt so it glows properly. Made it so its detail texture isn't required.
- Ravenswood Helmet beak can now be colored.
- Added cloth and leather materials to Gravitar Legs. Fixed metal material from displaying as leather.
- Fixed a problem with the Avian set not unlocking the armored boots and winged gloves for females.

Please format any bugs you find in the following format:
Bug
Where it happens
What happens

Please stay on topic in this PTS thread. We use bug reports from this thread to decide whether a PTS build is ready to go live, and so we need to make sure we're seeing everything in it. Please do discuss the changes, but if you find yourself writing about something that isn't specific to what's on PTS, then that should probably go here: http://forum.arcgames.com/championsonline/categories/gameplay-bugs1.

These player & moderator maintained threads are checked weekly by the development team. The costume one probably needs to be updated.
- http://www.arcgames.com/en/forums/championsonline/#/discussion/1203148/onslaught-bugs-and-balance-qol-concerns
- http://forum.arcgames.com/championsonline/discussion/1198089/known-power-bugs
- http://forum.arcgames.com/championsonline/discussion/1194284/champions-online-alerts-issues
- http://forum.arcgames.com/championsonline/discussion/1199083/costume-bug-list
- http://forum.arcgames.com/championsonline/discussion/1198119/compiled-list-of-bugs-issues-and-qol-concerns-version-2-0

ealford1985 · November 2015

I is gonna have too learns to reads goods with all theses fixes!

numaman1990 · November 2015

These fixes are delicious!
Keep up the good work!

pantagruel01 · November 2015

ladygadfly said:
- Nailed to the Ground: Now correctly affects Vehicles.

Make sure this can't apply to Stone's ship in the Nighthawk event, or it will glitch the event. Also, what does "correctly affect" mean? Vehicle travel powers can't actually be toggled off, does it mean "cause them to fall to the ground"?

ladygadfly said:
- Onslaught Supervillains will now apply Vile Challenge to players who block their basic attacks. This effect functions identically to Crippling Challenge.

That... may prove problematic for Medusa. Currently, the only means of dealing with Medusa's holds are running away before being held, blocking through the hold, or just being tough enough to survive her attacks while held. In addition, she can apply a hold with her basic attack. I would suggest something like:

Her basic attack is capped at 9 stacks of mind spikes (and thus cannot stun).
Any attack on a blocking target is capped at 9 stacks (and thus cannot stun).

roughbearmattach · November 2015

Bug:
Aurora Aura turns off after being recolored in either combat or always-on slot. When re-equipped, it activates again.

Bug: Aurora Aura tint is off. It is a lovely, multi-hued aura, but the base tint causes many colors not to match what was chosen. Examples: a green tint gives a green aura, but so does yellow. Orange tint choice is a blend of yellows and greens, but blues seem to work as intended.

roughbearmattach · November 2015

Bug:
Starlight Aura has a tinting button, but I don't think any tint was intended. Changing tints does nothing, anyway.
This is also a really lovely effect.

roughbearmattach · November 2015

Suggestion:

Fractal Aegis is a good start, but against a boss, the player is likely to only ever get 1 stack of the defense buff, and the damage is quite low, considering the recharge time of the power. When the player is surrounded by mobs, they can get up to 8 stacks, but mobs aren't usually enough of a threat to matter.

I would significantly increase the damage, maybe 200% more, or perhaps increase the knock up height, or apply Chill.

Another thought--maybe don't connect the defense buff to the number of enemies hit. Just give a 30% damage resistance no matter what, or something like that. Again, it only last 10 seconds anyway.

Final thought: ranking up this power changes raises its tiny amount of damage to slightly less tiny. There defense buff and knock up remain the same . . . so there is no reason to rank it up.

themightyzenith · November 2015

ladygadfly said:
Release Notes for FC.31.20151015.22
This build is available on PTS as of 11/13/2015

PTS Store
- Added new Aurora, Starlight & Ice Storm auras to the PTS Store.
- Added the power unlock for new Ice Ultimate "Fractal Aegis" to the PTS store.

Does this mean that they will be in the Z-Store when moved to live?

roughbearmattach · November 2015

ladygadfly said:

Onslaught Fixes

- Onslaught Supervillains gain a new debuff upon activating their device, Genetic Exhaustion. This debuff prevents the activation of further Villain devices, but it is removed if the player completes their time as a villain (either by dying or timing out).

BUG:
Activating Gravitar's flight travel power canceled the Onslaught Device. I held down the travel power keybind, as if to charge up flight, and the flight power animation began, and then the Onslaught Device cut out as if the timer elapsed (which it hadn't).

roughbearmattach · November 2015

ladygadfly said:

Onslaught Fixes

- Onslaught Supervillains will now apply Vile Challenge to players who block their basic attacks. This effect functions identically to Crippling Challenge.

SUGGESTION:
Oh, my, this works way, way too good. Pretty much, heroes cannot block. This will make it nearly impossible for them to defeat against villains. Gravitar, with her low-damage attacks, even, can apply Vile Challenge alternating with Inversion Bolt, and really defeat level 40 heroes quite easily. We don't want unkillable tanks wasting OV's time, but this is too far in the other direction.

Maybe Vile Challenge should not be applied on the basic attacks, but one of the higher ones with a cooldown.

thelastsonofzod · November 2015

I really like the concept of Fractal Aegis, but it doesn't really seem like a fitting Ultimate attack. Its more a really shiny tanking ability.

Now, I'm not saying that Ultimates can't do tanking, but most up until now have been raw DPS. Thats why they get such long recharge time. Applying that same recharge time to an ability whose function only lasts 10 seconds, and does not significant damage is slightly ridiculous. I think you should reduce the cooldown timer, and make it more useful for tanking (Perhaps upping its DPS mildly, and giving it a flat damage resistance that scales with level, and lasts a useful amount of time.

roughbearmattach · November 2015

ladygadfly said:

Additional Bug Fixes

- Powers: Darkness: Endbringer's Grasp: This power no longer incorrectly ticks for much more damage than expected. It will now deal an appropriate amount of damage for its intended effect.

SUGGESTION:
This power does so much less damage that it will likely be dropped by most toons that have it. The main idea is for the power to temporarily control mobs, but considering that it is an Ultimate power, largely used by level 40 toons, mobs just don't matter enough to bother being controlled. Many fights that high-level characters engage in don't involve any mobs at all, just bosses.

Reducing the damage isn't a bad idea, but you went too far.

nbkxs · November 2015

BUG: I wasn't able to get the aurora aura to work again after I changed the color; it would briefly show up, then vanish again.
Suggestion: The cripple challenge effect on the OVs is a bit much; it pretty much keeps the block permanently disabled on any one they hit, it makes them pretty much effortless to kill, maybe put a timer, so that it can only knock it off every 10 seconds? Or some such?

pantagruel01 · November 2015

I think the cripple is only on basic attacks *when the target is blocking*, but I think it may still be too much. Maybe a deferred effect -- e.g. a hit on a blocking target applies a debuff for 2s. At the end of that period, if the target is still blocking, block is disabled.

circleofpsi · November 2015

Super cool stuff!.

Edit: Alright so, " Added new icons to new auras and sidekicks.", yeah there is only "One" sidekick.

Also, there seems to be a Hoverboard of some-kind in the PTS

avianos · November 2015

ladygadfly wrote: »

- Added the power unlock for new Ice Ultimate "Fractal Aegis" to the PTS store.

So... people said its a Defensive Ultimate? with a really Low DPS? and bound Treat? ... WHY?

When will ICE POWERFRAME get a legit Theme Energy Builder anyway?

ladygadfly wrote: »

Onslaught Fixes
- Fixed issue with Onslaught reward token packs going into overflow. Now requires you to have an inventory slot available in order to accept reward.
- Nailed to the Ground: Now correctly affects Vehicles.
- Gravitar's Inversion Bolt now applies Nailed to the Ground to the primary target.
- Onslaught Supervillains gain a new debuff upon activating their device, Genetic Exhaustion. This debuff prevents the activation of further Villain devices, but it is removed if the player completes their time as a villain (either by dying or timing out).
- Onslaught Supervillains can now see through stealth and perception debuffs.
- Onslaught Supervillains will no longer benefit from the heal from Sentinel Mastery.
- Onslaught Supervillains will now apply Vile Challenge to players who block their basic attacks. This effect functions identically to Crippling Challenge.
- Devices should no longer incorrectly have their effects persist when becoming an Onslaught Villain.

Pretty Stellar Onslaught changes! I'm happy that the Genetic Exhaustion finally works, this means less Exploits
and finally no Dinos/Sidekicks/Back Ups

Nice little BUFF for OSV Gravitar

ladygadfly wrote: »

- Powers: Darkness: Endbringer's Grasp: This power no longer incorrectly ticks for much more damage than expected. It will

I don't agree with this, I prefer the Damage over an useless Mind Control effect which may or may not BUG the game play and missions (and alerts like Forum Malvanum where there is a TIMER) the Damage output should not have been downgraded

But again, I use Endbringer's Grasp just for theme and visuals and nothing more

circleofpsi · November 2015

themightyzenith said:

ladygadfly said:
Release Notes for FC.31.20151015.22
This build is available on PTS as of 11/13/2015

PTS Store
- Added new Aurora, Starlight & Ice Storm auras to the PTS Store.
- Added the power unlock for new Ice Ultimate "Fractal Aegis" to the PTS store.

Does this mean that they will be in the Z-Store when moved to live?

Moreless, No, a new power like this, and with auras at the same time, smells like a new lockbox!.

pantagruel01 · November 2015

ladygadfly said:

- Nailed to the Ground: Now correctly affects Vehicles.

This apparently means 'vehicles fall to the ground'. They seem to continue moving at normal speed.

ladygadfly said:
- Onslaught Supervillains gain a new debuff upon activating their device, Genetic Exhaustion. This debuff prevents the activation of further Villain devices, but it is removed if the player completes their time as a villain (either by dying or timing out).

Debuff is not removed in my experience (died to a turret, timed out; neither removed it).

ladygadfly said:
- Onslaught Supervillains can now see through stealth and perception debuffs.
- Onslaught Supervillains will no longer benefit from the heal from Sentinel Mastery.

- Seems to work.

ladygadfly said:

- Onslaught Supervillains will now apply Vile Challenge to players who block their basic attacks. This effect functions identically to Crippling Challenge.

Does not seem to work for Grond.

ladygadfly said:
- Devices should no longer incorrectly have their effects persist when becoming an Onslaught Villain.

Still had pheremones active after going villain.

kamokami · November 2015

ladygadfly said:

- Onslaught Supervillains gain a new debuff upon activating their device, Genetic Exhaustion. This debuff prevents the activation of further Villain devices, but it is removed if the player completes their time as a villain (either by dying or timing out).

Bug: This debuff persists even if you die as a villain or if you time out.

ladygadfly said:

- Devices should no longer incorrectly have their effects persist when becoming an Onslaught Villain.

Bug: They still do.

ladygadfly said:

- Onslaught Supervillains will now apply Vile Challenge to players who block their basic attacks. This effect functions identically to Crippling Challenge.

Bug: Doesn't work for Grond.

You may consider reducing the duration of Vile Challenge down to something like 2 seconds.

chaosdrgnz43 · November 2015

Good stuff. Seems like Onslaught would prove to be more challenging. Still hoping for troll healers getting the "Fighting SV" buff when healing UNTIL Defenders.

aiqa · November 2015

While I understand why some changes to onslaught are needed, I think the block and stealth changes remove any feel of having a fighting chance against OV's for players. This effectively means if Medusa is targeting on you, you're dead (nttg>lunge>build mindspike>spikeattacks>win). While this might be lots of fun for the people using Medusa it's going to feel very cheap for anyone fighting her. The other OV's are going to be a little less impossible to fight, but not by much.

I don't think this will renew interest in onslaught (I know I'm going to completely ignore any OV's after these changes), and in my opinion it would be better to just move on to the next idea.

About Incendiary Rounds, I am assuming the purple version from the bloodmoon store is meant to be mk1? If so then the only change so far is that the damage is lowered, it still has unlimited targets and a 120 feet range. I am unsure about the threat bonus, I haven't been able to test that on PTS.

aiqa · November 2015

Suggestion:
Performance of Frarctal Aegis is a little underwhelming, suggestions to improve it:
- let the buff duration scale with rank
- add a scaling threat bonus, and maybe a AoE crippling challenge (forced agro not the block break) effect

sanguineviper · November 2015

Why put the block cancel on the basic attacks? Should definitely be on one of the starting CD powers.

Also, seriously try to get it using the legit "While Blocking" condition that the Shoulder Launcher and Ego Blade Breach advantages use. This way you can't just spam it on a target repeatedly to prevent blocking preemptively, but instead have to actually expend it on them while they're blocking to cancel their block for a few seconds.

roughbearmattach · November 2015

The new NttG effect on vehicles DOES work with OV attacks--at least on Gravitar, whom I tested.
The vehicle plunges all the way to the ground, and can't gain altitude for a few seconds.

dakrushmor · November 2015

So, but how about combine these onslaught fixes with onslaught GEAR fixes? l just wonder, why it even went Live with all those bugs? They were discovered when it was on Test, but instead of getting fixed, they migrated to Live then. Rushing up raw content, it's kinda moveton, but just for me... Anyway, this game already contained decent # of bugs at that moment & instead of fix, their numbers were multiplied & it's sad ((((
At least devs could deal with surface bug, like inproper power flagging. A plasma beam for instance? Isn't interesting for devs themselves how exactly it (unusual power with 0.1 ticking) will behave with Onslaught Burst Enhancement?

aiqa · November 2015

dakrushmor said:
So, but how about combine these onslaught fixes with onslaught GEAR fixes? l just wonder, why it even went Live with all those bugs? They were discovered when it was on Test, but instead of getting fixed, they migrated to Live then. Rushing up raw content, it's kinda moveton, but just for me... Anyway, this game already contained decent # of bugs at that moment & instead of fix, their numbers were multiplied & it's sad ((((
At least devs could deal with surface bug, like inproper power flagging. A plasma beam for instance? Isn't interesting for devs themselves how exactly it (unusual power with 0.1 ticking) will behave with Onslaught Burst Enhancement?

The issues of onslaught sniper gear both under and overperforming due to adding a fixed number damage (scaling only with certain damage bonuses) to any damage tick was reported well before it went live. But while PA (both normal and exploit) gain much more out of it than other sets, Plasma Beam doesn't seem to proc Onslaught Burst at all.

theravenforce · November 2015

Onslaught Adjustment thoughts

Overall, these changes are looking very promising, with a few exceptions:

*Medusa's TK Spear has a very inconsistent NTTG application effect. It also needs to apply Freedom! Buff to affected enemies once NTTG effect wears off.

*Put Gravitar's NTTG effect on Crushing Field instead of Inversion Bolt. OSV Grav users will be able to get more targets that way.

Now...adding a block breaker to OSV's is iffy territory...so please consider and implement the following suggestion:

Regarding "Vile Challenge". There are two options to make this viable and not overbearing:

1 - Burn this effect in a fire and never ever bring it back

2 - Create a counter mechanic to not only Vile Challenge but also to Crippling Challenge like so:

- Crippling Challenge: This mechanic now has a counter mechanic which is innate to all players called [Challenge Accepted] buff. Challenge Accepted buff prevents Crippling / Vile Challenge from removing block for 15 seconds once the effect wears off. Challenge Accepted buff will proc immediately if a player is affected by Crippling Challenge WITHOUT actively blocking.

This would address Vile Challenge being too powerful as well as making PvP more bearable.

PLEASE CONSIDER & DO THIS.

Without such an implementation of a counter mechanic, this will drive people further away from Onslaught game play.

There IS a way to do this so that it only affects targets who are blocking.

Have a look at Telekinesis Tree's Ego Blade Breach, Domineering Will advantage, applies a stun on full charge but only if said target is blocking the effect.

theravenforce · November 2015

Thoughts on ICE ULTIMATE - Fractal Aegis:

Visuals

To me, and no doubt other players, visuals are incredibly important when deciding if we're going to use something.

Fractal Aegis based on appearance ALONE needs a complete make over. It doesn't look nice at all, it should create something like an Ice Burst Construct which spears through enemies and then coalesces around your character in fragments of ICE ARMOR. (Think an ice version of Stone Shroud Rank 3)

Not explode outwards with Gravitic Ripple effect and then spawn little diamond like ice crystals spinning around you....

Functionality / Mechanics

I can achieve much better damage resistance values from another Ice Power (Ice Barrier Rank 3) than I can with Fractal Aegis.

It needs to deal MUCH more damage in it's current form OR provide 10/20/30% resistance (rank 1/2/3 respectively) and last a little longer to even be worth unlocking.

Overall: It's mechanics sound great but visuals are lacking, please please please bring it back to the VFX board and make it look pretty and work in a way which is more desirable.

You realistically cannot go from two very pretty looking ultimate abilities:

Gravity Driver

Endbringer's Grasp

to this...

The only remotely redeeming animation here is the post charge up release animation:

PLEASE MAKE THIS PRETTY AND COOL (pun shamelessly intended)

draogn · November 2015

The OV turrets are still fairly useless. Most can easily be los'd in Westside just by standing next to Kodiaks truck and in Ren Center by by putting the until station that defender is standing at between them and the turret. Even then many of them won't fire until they have taken some damage.

championshewolf · November 2015

If you are going to give the OVs block break then their damage has to be lowered significantly. Considering the only reason they were given high damage was because of the blocking, removing this element is just going to infuriate players because it's just going to be strings of unfair one shots. Plain and simple. And outside of Defiance/Invuln builds few of them can survive those type of hits. So you just screwed over the non-tanks big time with block breaker, and really only the dodge builds will be at peak performance.

I will put it this way; there is a supreme difference between challenging and unfair and giving OVs block breakers with their ridiculous damage now falls into the category of unfair. You can kill blockers now. They either block break or have high damage that one shots even high health tanks. They shouldn't have both.

xrazamax · November 2015

I don't think the vile challenge is a good addition - it makes fighting Medusa way too hard. The only way to prevent being stunned by Medusa is to block and even then you are going to die eventually.

And while I can see that being spammed with smoke grenade or other stealth causing effects may be annoying to OVs, I think OVs should only have their perception increased and not be able to simply see through ALL stealth and perception debuffs. That takes away from the abilities and strengths of anyone who took those powers - why even have different gameplay mechanics like stealth and debuffs if you can't use them when they would help the most?

An increase to OVs perception would allow them to see someone who just tacked on smoke grenade to their build, while ATs like the soldier or others who have high a Dexterity stat will be able to effectively use stealth powers to stay alive.

aiqa · November 2015

Suggestion:
Remove the ice covering the body from Icestorm Aura. For people that want to use that effect they can just get Legacy Aura: Ice Form, and some people might like the storm effect without being covered in ice permanently.

xrazamax · November 2015

aiqa said:
Suggestion:
Remove the ice covering the body from Icestorm Aura. For people that want to use that effect they can just get Legacy Aura: Ice Form, and some people might like the storm effect without being covered in ice permanently.

Agreed, although if someone did want both effects they would now need to use two aura slots. But between the choices, I would take off that ice sheet.

Side question: How will these auras be made available? Which ones will be lockboxes or z-store or even Drifter Store?

riverocean · November 2015

xrazamax wrote: »

Suggestion:
Remove the ice covering the body from Icestorm Aura. For people that want to use that effect they can just get Legacy Aura: Ice Form, and some people might like the storm effect without being covered in ice permanently.

Agreed, although if someone did want both effects they would now need to use two aura slots. But between the choices, I would take off that ice sheet.

Side question: How will these auras be made available? Which ones will be lockboxes or z-store or even Drifter Store?

I'm betting all the iced themed stuff (including the Windchill Sidekick) is going into some kind of Winter Themed lockbox. No confirmation of that, but it seems like a good assumption. We'll see if I'm right.

sterga · November 2015

So, forum people wanted villains to have block breakers and now they're getting that. Now there are complaints that the block breaking is a bad idea...

There wasn't much reason to play the hero side before and now it's going to be significantly less appealing. Because the lack of heroes participating isn't bad enough, I guess. Players are using "unkillable" tanks and vehicles because other builds get roflstomped. If people even bother playing a hero at all, which most have already opted out of doing. When you prioritized monitization at the expense of a fun event that both sides could get cool stuff from, you screwed the event over. None of these fixes are addressing that issue and will likely not help.

Fight are a lot more fun when you have a bunch of both sides. Kinda like what happened in the first few days before people figured out that you only get the cool stuff from playing a villain and the hero team gets the shaft. Like that many people would pick costume bits over lolop gear and fancy new powers.

championshewolf · November 2015

sterga wrote: »

So, forum people wanted villains to have block breakers and now they're getting that. Now there are complaints that the block breaking is a bad idea...

I certainly didn't. Because I've always said with the current damage that block breaking would be bad.

xrazamax · November 2015

The more I consider it, the more I realize that most of these problems are specific to medusa. I don't think it is a huge deal that Gravitar would be able to disable your block with her basic attack. I think Grond's powers can be avoided by literally running out of the way. It is Medusa who is the most broken, and is becoming even more broken due to these changes.

pantagruel01 · November 2015

The problem is that you want to allow occasional blocking without allowing pure turtling. Crippling challenge was never a very good solution in PvP, and thus it's not very good in Onslaught either.

riverocean · November 2015

sterga wrote: »

So, forum people wanted villains to have block breakers and now they're getting that. Now there are complaints that the block breaking is a bad idea...

You can't lump everyone into one big group. Getting everyone on the forums agree unanimously on anything would be a small miracle.

sterga wrote: »

There wasn't much reason to play the hero side before and now it's going to be significantly less appealing. Because the lack of heroes participating isn't bad enough, I guess. Players are using "unkillable" tanks and vehicles because other builds get roflstomped.

The only advantage to vehicles are extra hit points and the ability to get out of range quickly. NTTG will fix that. However, I do agree. I figured out pretty quickly that being a silver player put me at a distinct disadvantage. Silvers are pretty much stuck playing hero and have to amass a huge amount of tokens to unlock a villain. Of course when people figured out you can just buy a Villain from the AH - and skip the hero token grind. Well things dropped off.

Even then, I don't entirely blame Onslaught. Onslaught is pointing out a lot of things that are basically wrong in CO. Including broken powers and imbalances. At it's core Onslaught is actually a lot fun. But the rewards issues, build issues, and vehicle issues are what's impeding it. I pretty much fear until those things are addressed, putting anything new into CO is going to be problematic.

. But many players don't want those issues addressed at all - so again nobody can agree on anything. The dev team is going to need pick a direction in regards to balance, and just go for it. It's going to piss people off but there's no way to avoid it. New stuff can't be introduced into a broken environment.

pantagruel01 · November 2015

sterga said:
Players are using "unkillable" tanks and vehicles because other builds get roflstomped.

It's also because the content is not designed to reward anything but surviving. If there were actual rewards for attacking, people would block less.

xrazamax · November 2015

pantagruel01 said:

sterga said:
Players are using "unkillable" tanks and vehicles because other builds get roflstomped.
It's also because the content is not designed to reward anything but surviving. If there were actual rewards for attacking, people would block less.

But the ONLY way to get tokens is to attack the villains.

sterga · November 2015

There was no quantifier in my statement nor specific people mentioned. Too many people have terrible mind reading skills and aren't getting better with practice.

One Grond is easy to deal with, but 3+ at a time? Not being able to block is going to suck so bad for anyone dumb enough to play a hero. Lance Rains + Nuclear Ground Slams + Several, Overlapping AoEs all while being stunned.

You don't have to survive as a hero, your corpse can earn tokens too. But getting killed so much your character feels useless kinda sucks. "I got an energy builder hit off! Woo! But now I'm dead... I have 5 minutes to afk for soda."

championshewolf · November 2015

sterga wrote: »

There was no quantifier in my statement nor specific people mentioned. Too many people have terrible mind reading skills and aren't getting better with practice.

Well that was your mistake because your statement above is pretty much all encompassing, not singular.

zamuelpwe · November 2015

theravenforce said:
2 - Create a counter mechanic to not only Vile Challenge but also to Crippling Challenge like so:

- Crippling Challenge: This mechanic now has a counter mechanic which is innate to all players called [Challenge Accepted] buff. Challenge Accepted buff prevents Crippling / Vile Challenge from removing block for 15 seconds once the effect wears off. Challenge Accepted buff will proc immediately if a player is affected by Crippling Challenge WITHOUT actively blocking.

This would address Vile Challenge being too powerful as well as making PvP more bearable.

PLEASE CONSIDER & DO THIS.

Without such an implementation of a counter mechanic, this will drive people further away from Onslaught game play.

There IS a way to do this so that it only affects targets who are blocking.

Have a look at Telekinesis Tree's Ego Blade Breach, Domineering Will advantage, applies a stun on full charge but only if said target is blocking the effect.

This really feels like the best decision, both for Vile Challenge and for adjusting Crippling Challenge itself. Well, I also agree that Vile Challenge should be on something with recovery and not the basic attacks. Plus, Vile/Crippling Challenge should probably scale up/down how long the block breaker lasts off of animation and charge time of the attack but that may be outside the scope of things.

riverocean probably said it best that fixing a lot of the problems with OVs is gonna require some rebalancing of the players themselves. There's just too big of a gulf between the effectiveness of player builds. Granted, one OV specific adjustment that would make things more bearable would be to make OVs take more damage from each other's attacks. This would have the dual usage of forcing them to split up (instead of clustering in a group to squash heroes) while also making OV vs OV brawls viable.

sterga · November 2015

Saying "people" could mean many people or few people. Not having a quantifier makes what I say pretty vague on that. All you can really figure is that I mean "more than one". Two people is more than one. So is 50. But you don't know which one because I didn't tell you and you can't read my mind.

Edit: "Granted, one OV specific adjustment that would make things more bearable would be to make OVs take more damage from each other's attacks. This would have the dual usage of forcing them to split up (instead of clustering in a group to squash heroes) while also making OV vs OV brawls viable."

Yes! That would be dreamy. Villain VS Villain brawls is on my wishlist for Onslaught. But not with the pitiful damage they do to each other.

dakrushmor · November 2015

aiqa said:

dakrushmor said:
So, but how about combine these onslaught fixes with onslaught GEAR fixes? l just wonder, why it even went Live with all those bugs? They were discovered when it was on Test, but instead of getting fixed, they migrated to Live then. Rushing up raw content, it's kinda moveton, but just for me... Anyway, this game already contained decent # of bugs at that moment & instead of fix, their numbers were multiplied & it's sad ((((
At least devs could deal with surface bug, like inproper power flagging. A plasma beam for instance? Isn't interesting for devs themselves how exactly it (unusual power with 0.1 ticking) will behave with Onslaught Burst Enhancement?
The issues of onslaught sniper gear both under and overperforming due to adding a fixed number damage (scaling only with certain damage bonuses) to any damage tick was reported well before it went live. But while PA (both normal and exploit) gain much more out of it than other sets, Plasma Beam doesn't seem to proc Onslaught Burst at all.

Not only Plasma Beam, but Conflagration and Venomous Breath don't want to work with Onslaught Burst too. Most likely that's just because these powers weren't included in maintain category of that gear descriptor table (they appear under "charge" category), or whatever. Some powers, like Conflagration, Sparkstorm, Ego Storm & Celestial Conduit don't work with both Onslaught Burst & Overdrive.

chaelk · November 2015

BUG:and here we have one for Nighthawk-fighting Stone, some people have worked ut how to get vehicles inside the building.
vehicels%20inside_zps6p7tvary.png

dakrushmor · November 2015

chaelk said:
BUG:and here we have one for Nighthawk-fighting Stone, some people have worked ut how to get vehicles inside the building.

If you don't leave instance immediately after finishing, but descend down to broken glass level, you can take a fighter & become fighterized for 15 mins (or until first defeat). You can be even fighter indoors. Leaving instance when fighter form is active leads to fighterization as well.

It's curious effect, since you can pick healing fighter.

raighn · November 2015

pantagruel01 said:

sterga said:
Players are using "unkillable" tanks and vehicles because other builds get roflstomped.
It's also because the content is not designed to reward anything but surviving. If there were actual rewards for attacking, people would block less.

Um... check again... Onslaught is not designed to reward surviving.. it's designed to reward killing... you get nothing from survival... as a hero you get the same amount of tokens from killing an OV no matter how long it takes you and how many times you die in the process... as an OV you get nothing from surviving for long periods and only get rewarded for killing heroes... this is why those Unkillable tanks and vehicles are a problem... Because people don't like dying, designing a system with the intent of having players die numerous times to benefit one player and ending with that one player dying once to benefit them was a bad choice... Onslaught needss to have a multi-facited reward system...

My suggested reward parameters:
OV:
Time Survived = X tokens per minute... No tokens for time spent not engaging players or OV targets. For every minute spent engaged in combat with other heroes or OV targets gain 1 stack of Fighting Heroes.
Hero Kill = X tokens per hero kill (Static, guaranteed value)
SuperHero Kill = X tokens per stack of Fighting Supervillians on hero

Heroes:
Time Survived = X tokens per minute... No tokens for time spent not engaging OVs. For every minute spent engaged in combat with an OV gain a stack of Fighting Supervillians. Stacks are lost on death or after 3 minutes out OV combat.
Villian kill = X tokens per hero kill (Static, guaranteed value)
SuperVillian Kill = X tokens per stack of Fighting Heroes on villian

This way even if you cant get a kill in you'll still get rewarded... if you spend an excess amount of time trying to kill that one unkillable super tank you'll get rewarded extra for your efforts.

Alternate option: insteadd of making Fighting Heroes/Fighting VIllians stack, new stacking buffs would be applied called Nemesis & Tough It Out.

Nemesis would be applied to any hero that an OV targets heavily with attacks, gaining 1 stack for every X damage dealt to the target (before resistance) the buff expires upon death or after 3 minutes of not being damaged by an OV.

Tough It Out would be applied to any Hero or OV for every 1 minute engaged in Onslaught combat. This debuff expires under any of the following conditions: 1) Expiration of Fighting Supervillains, 2) Death, 3) Expiration of OV device. Upon expiration you are rewarded a number of tokens of the appropriate type.

jaazaniah1 · November 2015

Personally, I don't care if I lose to an OV. They are supposed to be terribly powerful and need a team of heroes going after them. A hero gets knocked out of the fight for a few seconds; big deal. That's actually what happens in comic books. As long as everyone gets tokens its fine. I've been playing games of all sorts for a long time (miniatures, board, RPG, now MMO) and I've developed a thick skin about losing. If Superman gets beaten on occasion, why shouldn't I?

draogn · November 2015

jaazaniah1 said:
Personally, I don't care if I lose to an OV. They are supposed to be terribly powerful and need a team of heroes going after them. A hero gets knocked out of the fight for a few seconds; big deal. That's actually what happens in comic books. As long as everyone gets tokens its fine. I've been playing games of all sorts for a long time (miniatures, board, RPG, now MMO) and I've developed a thick skin about losing. If Superman gets beaten on occasion, why shouldn't I?

If fighting OVs was fun you would have something, but fighting an OV is nothing but a mindless button mashing grind. If you don't have a build that can survive you'll spend a lot of time being one shot either as you run back to fight to try to get a few more tokens or while recovering at the spawn point. Being one shot isn't fun imo.

FC.31.20151015.22 - Fractal Aegis, Frozen Auras, Onlaught Fixes

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