(sorry about the multi post, but I have PTSD over editing posts) Suggestion
Feral Rage
Have the power give you a bonus to charge speed on Bestial powers (to compensate slightly reduce the bonus damage on Bestial Powers).
The darkness EU is barely giving back any juice to attack with, trying INT, EGO, and END, nothing seems to work out. The only way that I could even keep attacking was to stand on a circle. I wasn't able to parse because of this. So, I don't know how the #s look.
Suggestion
Feral Rage
In a tank's perspective, I'd say lower the CD on ADs/AOs for like 30secs(or lower). A 1min cd for BOTH is a bit too much, especially if you're NOT running Protector Mastery as a tank. Not to mention you also loose your stacks in the process.
Bug
Feral Rage
Doesn't consume all Enrage stacks as the tooltip says. It only consumes 3 stacks. (Personally think it's fine that way. Stacking Enrage isn't as fast as stacking Focus w/ Form of the Tiger.)
__________________________________________________________________
Alts:
Lord Sans (Full Healer FF)/Axel Leonard (Crowd Controller/Off-Tank)
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Feel free to visit my websites!^^: DeviantART|FurAffinity| Twitter
Bug
Shadow Manifestation displays as a Melee-centric form, rather than Ranged.
Advantaged Dimensional Collapse doe not flow well with a DPS rotation. Because Devoid and Fear only last 12 seconds, most builds in typical combat scenarios will see a gap between Fears, and Devoid will fall off before being refreshed.
Suggestion
Increase Devoid (and possibly Fear) duration to 16 seconds; reduce Dimensional Collapse's cooldown to 10 seconds and cut a few damage ticks to compensate.
Is that me or nothing applies Devoid inherently anymore ?
On a side not, I notice that Munition, Sorcery and Poison all have inherent debuff applier which are also their own refresher. Are they going to be locked behind very obnoxious rotation/locked behind adv to get their debuff, or is this on purpose everything else is a hassle to set up ?
Post edited by leuchadegoutiere on
@Leucha - Cascade, Praise, Gluh, Sanglots, Chernozem, Saadhaka, Ralsershei, La Lice, Cardinale and so on
Make devoid from shadow blast apply on tap as before or reduce it's charge time, many other ranged debuffs for other sets and even melee apply on tap, this power's damage is very low and it has a very long charge time so it is pretty annoying to have to full charge it.
Is that me or nothing applies Devoid inherently anymore ?
Madness Aura does, but that PRE led build style might not be to everyone's taste. Otherwise it's freely available as an Advantage, like most other Debuffs, and with the set having lots of DOT powers, it's worth taking. Shadow Blast does good damage
Some feedback for Kaizerin, then:
New Spirit Reverberation works fine on a traditional Blast/DOT Darkness Ranged build with REC SSS. Much better energy management than the previous EU.
Dimensional Blast - Hmm. I would rather this was a quick Tap/Charge power like TK Burst, with reasonable alpha damage, the knock down and utility functions, rather than another DoT. The set already has Soul Vortex and Ebon Rift to do that. I would also take the Back to the Darkness advantage away from Shadow Blast and add it to this power. I don't really want my basic blast attack removing my Shadow Pets, that's not a handy function - I would rather have it on an occasional utility power like this one.
Ebon Rift - damage on the R3 PTS version of this is 20% down on Live, when comparing a level 30 character with the same stats, gear and everything else. Is this intentional?
Also BUG - Shadow Manifestation is showing as a Melee toggle.
Madness Aura - needs a lot of Energy for a toggle power which - presumably - you're supposed to be running at the same time as other things. It consumes energy much faster than the EU builds it and the damage output appears to be extremely unpredictable. It's potentially good but I've found these "throw object" powers extremely unreliable as you tend to run out of objects quickly or to be reliant on luck to have a decent object to throw. I would prefer this to be more of a Sparkstorm style toggle, to be honest - reasonable energy costs, moderate reliable damage and tying in with useful debuffs. The sound effects are fun, though!
Madness Aura's Energy cost is different on the Midnight AT than it is on my Freeform character. It's lower on the AT (and much more useable as a result).
Overall it's a good DPS, does excellent damage: but lacks a little survivability even with all those incremental heals and ways to boost them. Circle of Ebon Wrath feels a bit unnecessary when you can hit for 8K crits from Ebon Ruin at the same time as having Ebon Void and Madness Aura going! Perhaps a stronger heal of some kind instead? Something which consumes Fear and heals for a set amount on each affected enemy might be good.
Form of the tiger is broken, it's ICD isn't working.
That is a big issue with this new ultimate. It's a very OP ultimate (30% base damage bonus is insane), that is sort of balanced by removing all form stacks and setting AD/AO on full cooldowns. But if you can then get those all back up in 10 seconds that half of that disadvantage is hardly doing anything.
I'd prefer is the base damage scaled on enrage stacks too, the game could do with pushing people away from melee dex stacking builds a bit.
Suggestion:
I think lowering the cooldown on Feral Rage by half and lower the base damage to 5/10/15% would make the power far more useful, at the moment it looks like a solid Damage check power but with such a long cooldown it'll be off cooldown on most actual checks. With such changes I think it might also be a good idea to lower the stack lost afterward to only 5, Otherwise You'd be loosing all stacks a lot more often.
Bug
Shadow Manifestation scale on Constitution instead of Presence
It actually seems to be scaling w/ Recovery atm, as far as I can tell.
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First, a suggestion related to Mental States: I think that we should add Regret (from Shadow of Doubt) to the list of Mental States. Seems a bit weird that the other TP debuffs and Fear are included, but Regret isn't (it can't proc the forms that use Mental States atm).
Psychotic Break now applies Bleed? I'm unsure if this is intended (not a listed change), but if it is.. Bug: Shadow Shroud's Terrifying Visage adv still states that the Psychotic Break deals Dimensional dmg over time, instead of the new Bleed effect.
(the bleed does proc stuff like FotS and AotB, for what its worth)
(and Detect, from the new adv, does seem to count as an Enchantment as listed, since it can proc Spellcaster)
Ebon Ruin's Darkness Feast adv could probably clarify that it only doubles the Shadowfeast heal if it is the attack that procs it (tooltip is a bit vague here imo).
(also kinda wished Defile's energy cost got reduced instead of ERuin's energy scaling up to match Defile's, but I guess they're pretty comparable nukes for each powerset now)
Speaking of energy costs, I think that Shadow Eruption's energy costs should be lowered a bit. Even if it does do decent burst dmg, its cost is higher than some Ults atm. Bug?: Shadow Eruption's Consume Fear adv doesn't seem to 'consume' Fear on any target (ie. end the debuff early, one would assume), though the Rupture dmg still registers on each.
Bug: Shadow Embrace's Draining Shadows heal adv doesn't seem to take the number of targets hit into account. (seems only able to proc once every dmg tick, regardless of target number)
(on the flip side, SBlast's Back to the Darkness adv does seem to scale w/ the number of shadows consumed)
Also, is it intended that Shadow Embrace has an NttG adv? Just curious; I know its had it in the past, but it seems like an odd adv for an attack like that to have.
As mentioned before, it looks like Shadow Manifestation's descriptions are saying its a melee toggle, though this appears to just be a tooltip error as it does seem to grant a higher bonus dmg to ranged than to melee atm.
Aqia just touched on this, but- Bug: Spirit Reverberation seems to only be giving its base 15 energy per tick, regardless of the tooltip value or its scaling.
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That's all from me for now. Will try to check on some of the other powers & changes later.
Also, just realized that Shadow Eruption can't proc Shadow Manifestation, regardless of advs taken (since Devoid is a Curse). With its current high cost, it would be nice if there was a way it could proc the new form for the set.
re: TELEKINESIS
Hm, don’t get me wrong, this power’s been a staple for my main since like 2009/10 when I first started playing (and everyone’s like: but… WHY??? lol) so, I’m thankful it’s getting a review, it could definitely use some love! However:
- This actually feels/ plays a lot… clunkier, I guess (maybe it’s the CD?), and not nearly as fun or dynamic as its former version (even with all its flaws). Not feeling the visuals, either.
A telekinetic makes use of their environment to fling stuff at enemies, that’s roughly the idea, yes? Now: ideally, a player with this power should be able to lift every object in every map, but when that’s not feasible (and instead of spawning objects out of thin air) – why not use THEM (your foes) as objects, throw them around like ragdolls. Up, down, at one another... go crazy!
SUGGESTION:
- If no objects are thrown, Knocks Up primary target (something like Force Snap’s effect would actually look pretty cool, IMO. Stun, Disorient… everything else, as applicable. Higher-ranking enemies receive base/direct damage instead (telekinetic “blast/grip/whatever”).
(Bonus:“Poltergeist” (2 pt Adv): Lifts/throws up to 5 enemies (X radius); or throws up to 5 objects.)
Alternatively: Taking objects out of the equation entirely; instead TK-rip chunks of rock from the ground to hurl at enemies – bonus points if using TK Maelstrom’s (R.I.P) old FX – y’know, if it’s something that must be done and it's done nicely, I’d prefer this over what’s currently on PTS.
Suggestion:
Add a 2 point advantage to "Feral Rage" that removes all other effects but keeps the damage boost, and (maybe) the small heal while it's active, then this advantage either shortens or removes cooldowns that it puts on Active Defenses and/or Active offenses, and shortens the cooldown on the ultimate to 1 min and so instead of 2.
and if possible this advantge would give the same boost to the damage as rank 3 does. if ranking it affects it.
But I would still settle for rank 2 tbh, just would be very nice, this power looks amazing.
Suggestion:
Add a 2 point advantage to "Feral Rage" that removes all other effects but keeps the damage boost, and (maybe) the small heal while it's active, then this advantage either shortens or removes cooldowns that it puts on Active Defenses and/or Active offenses, and shortens the cooldown on the ultimate to 1 min and so instead of 2.
and if possible this advantge would give the same boost to the damage as rank 3 does. if ranking it affects it.
But I would still settle for rank 2 tbh, just would be very nice, this power looks amazing.
Wat :v
In what way do you consider this balanced at all?
Bug
Character select
On the outfit for The Midnight AT, the male is using an Anubis jackal head while the female is not. Do not know if this is due to the defaults/unlocks or that head was simply not given to the female outfit.
"Interesting builds are born from limitations not by letting players put everything into one build."
Removed Dragon Rush from these powers and moved them to an advantage.
While it was stated in the past that we would only adjust these powers once their framework review had come around, due to the Dragon Rush effect causing balance issues we are choosing to move the effect to an advantage now.
Given most of the people (outside of PvP) who are doing silly things with them are simply going to move to COAP and lose 200 dps by dropping nanites or such, whatever. It's your game.
However, since you're doing this without framework adjustment the ATs affected by this should be given complimentary respecs. Night Avenger in particular gets around some of the worst energy management in the game via Dragon's Rush, and it seems a bit unfair that they get to take it on the chin here when they're neither the problem nor do most of the people playing ATs tend to have a bunch of respecs and/or Gs lying around.
Dark Transfusion
New Advantage (2): Increases base healing for your next direct heal, but makes you immune to heals briefly.
This is both pointless on a now-useless skill (I've seen DT used a grand total of once via parsing in the last six months, and I'd take a wager that what was always a rare power is now one of the least chosen skills in the game) and implies a surprising lack of understanding.
Properly built healers almost never face energy issues both because of the role bonus and the true spammers don't because they're forced to either take REC or END and/or get around it by taking AOPM. DT's main advantage - that of suddenly having the equivalent of 500 or so REC - is essentially worthless to them, and losing self healing and 2500 hps over the 15 seconds means it rules out almost any use to begin with for that class.
But when you look at the advantage proper, its even stupider. A whopping 20% increase for a single heal. Yippee! Even if you're going to run this on a non-healer build that might theoretically benefit, you're better off just buying a cheap set of gloves, spending 1g on a rank III Sent Brooch, putting them on a heal gear tab, and when it's required that you drop a heal you can pop over to the tab and get better than that 20% all the time.
Where this would get far more interesting is if it (and blood sacrifice) were reverted back to the intent of the power to begin with - a crazy way to max out the stack with significant risk if you do. The original application of the advantage (200% damage) is both worth restoring and a better place to start. Instead of 20% for a single heal, let's say 200% healing of others, or essentially a full 8 stack of compassion with a good PRE healer during the entire duration of the power makes a lot more sense. Then you'd get into a bunch of fun risk/reward arguments, including literally pouring your lifebar out in inquity spam to keep someone alive at the very end of a fight while selfless doesn't keep up since it's down 90%, or if a crit heal build could do some amazing things with 10k+ spike click heals, or if this could be used by non-healing builds to spend 15 seconds acting as a healer while putting themselves at significant risk in the process.
Doubt anything that fun will come to pass, of course.
Ebon Rift with Vengeful Shadows should pull enemies into reach of Vengeful Shadows, instead of stopping the pull at the edge of the rift area.
Ebon Rift is in general a problematic power in the game as it's currently played, because it's a non-tracking slow maintain so it has inadequate damage output vs bosses and is too slow to be practical to use on chaff. Consider changing it to a fire and forget power similar to Shattering Rain (Oubliette uses what appears to be ebon rift graphics, and there it's clearly a fire and forget power).
New Ebon Ruin is 'generic blast power #xxxxx'. I understand that all of the special mechanics it's had before haven't worked very well, but it seems a shame to make it a pure damage effect.
Dark Transfusion needs a rethink. Most builds don't need occasional bursts of energy, they need continual energy, and dark transfusion isn't actually that much energy on most builds. Consider changing what it does from providing energy to a more direct benefit.
Loving the new SFX for Dimensional Collapse.
Also really like the heartbeat SFX on Feral Rage, though I wish you could hear it from a greater distance.
BUG?
Feral Rage
Is using Athletic/Acrobatics animation while on the Beast stance. This results in you doing a backflip while jumping backwards which looks a bit out of place
BUG
Energy Step
TP unlock is called Energy Explosion in the Power selection menu
The VFX only shows on your side. Other people see you as if using Arcane Flight
It has a great animation but it is an utterly terrible power. Every time the dark set gets a review my expectation of a fix is met with nothing, or apparently, a nerf this cycle.
Unfortunately Soul Vortex, which was essentially what Rift needed, was created as a new power. Soul Vortex outperforms it for utility and virtually everything else outperforms it offensively. It is bad for both.
There are numerous good assets currently locked in bad powers - perhaps, if Cryptic's calculations value these abilities so differently than the playerbase, an efficient solution would be reused animations with slight differences in alternative powers.
I just want a black hole or void power that is not terrible.
That might cause people to use it, which would be bad because it's hideous and blinding (other powers are ugly but don't block your vision. Related to this, make mega-destroid stomp invisible).
That might cause people to use it, which would be bad because it's hideous and blinding (other powers are ugly but don't block your vision. Related to this, make mega-destroid stomp invisible).
Dimensional collapse is still way to stingy at 11 seconds cd considering ebon ruins inbuilt delay after casting, not to mention that it becomes completely unviable on encounters like dino where AOE's can come in at any second.
Minor typo: there's an extra period after 'bleeding' on Shadow Shroud's Terrifying Vision description. Another typo in Shadow Blast's Devoid adv where a comma is missing after 'Ebon Rift' in the yellow text.
Bug: The AoE Devoid application doesn't seem to work w/ Ebon Rift when fully charging Shadow Blast w/ the Devoid adv. (Dimensional Collapse's interaction seems to work fine)
Bug?: The healing rune created by Soul Vortex says that it counts as an Enchantment, but it doesn't seem to be able to proc Spellcaster. (some other healing runes have this issue too, like Condemn's Dark Rune and Expulse not procing either Spellcaster or Conjuring, though Pillar of Poz and Pyre's Burning Sun do; I don't have it on the PTS yet, but Bestial's Moonstruck could also be checked here)
Bug: Madness Aura doesn't seem to apply Devoid to affected targets when objects explode. (also may want to make it more clear in the tooltip on what condition the Devoid applies, since the power also has the passive Fear aura)
Bug: Bite's heal (despite now scaling w/ Bleed stacks) does not seem to be counted properly as a life-drain effect atm, since Dark Transfusion's heal penalty still applies to it while its up.
Suggestion: If its allowed for balance, it may be nice to allow Dimensional Collapse's DoT to stack from the same source, since the cd can be quite shorter than the DoT's full duration.
Suggestion: assuming it doesn't get a boost w/ ranks now, a 10% chance to apply Fear is imo a bit low for Soul Vortex's 2-pt Fear Machine adv, since the old Soul Vortex started at 15%, and you could boost the chance by 10% per normal rank, and cause the power only ticks every 1 sec.
Minor suggestion: could be worth clarifying that the extra dmg Ebon Rift's Vengeful Shadows does to knock-immune targets is per dmg tick.
Minor suggestion: could also be nice to mention Bane as the debuff that applies random effects in their adv's basic descriptions (since their adv names are different- Chaos Magic, Event Horizon, Chaos! Chaos!, etc).
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It seems like the scaling on Shadow Manifest and SReverb were fixed too, so cool stuff. Darkness has always had some interesting 2ndary effects and options w/ its powers, and it seems the revamp is expanding that (kinda makes things a PITA to test though, rofl). Also find it kinda funny that you can get the added threat adv and the threat wipe adv on Feral Rage at the same time :x
Bug: Madness Aura doesn't seem to apply Devoid to affected targets when objects explode. (also may want to make it more clear in the tooltip on what condition the Devoid applies, since the power also has the passive Fear aura)
Can't repro this one. This only has a 15% chance of occurring per tick of the power, not if a object happens to explode due to another object being thrown. It's a light purple cloud fx.
Bug: Madness Aura doesn't seem to apply Devoid to affected targets when objects explode. (also may want to make it more clear in the tooltip on what condition the Devoid applies, since the power also has the passive Fear aura)
Can't repro this one. This only has a 15% chance of occurring per tick of the power, not if a object happens to explode due to another object being thrown. It's a light purple cloud fx.
Hm, I guess I was just having a run of bad luck before w/ the tests, but I did just see Devoid proc on a Regen dummy when nearby objects exploded on two diff activations. So it does seem to be working after all; thanks for the clarification and follow-up.
Give Ebon Ruin it's DoT effect back.
Considering this is the only real good charge spike in the set, I think the dot would help it keep up with it's rivals, like force's force cascade which is aoe even. defile. chi fist which does considerable damage and places it's own dot, etc.
It would also make the power feel more unique and less like a bleh, generic blast thing.
Bug
Ebon Rift - everywhere
Damage lowered by 20% on PTS compared to live
Bug
Madness Aura - Energy Display incorrect
Level 40 AT shows 63/21 , level 30 Freeform shows 72/24
Suggestion
Dimensional Collapse
Increase Alpha damage and reduce DOT - this set already has several powerful DOT attacks in Ebon Rift and Soul Vortex, a more bomb blast effect with quick charge and deployment would be a nice addition
Fixes on Shadow Manifestation and Shadow Reverberation look fine
Dark Transfusion needs a rethink. Most builds don't need occasional bursts of energy, they need continual energy, and dark transfusion isn't actually that much energy on most builds. Consider changing what it does from providing energy to a more direct benefit.
Actually, I do use this on my Darkness character. Some of the Darkness powers have quite a high initial energy or maintain cost which makes them quite difficult to charge or maintain at lower tiers. This power fills the Energy bar and means I can charge things like Grasping Shadows without an issue. It may not be so necessary with the new EU in which case...
Dark Transfusion
Add advantage to boost critical rate for a few seconds (rather like a scaled down Imbue). The bonus would have a cost (health lost) but it would make a useful "last stand" power.
I also I agree with the others, Endbringer Graps NEEDS to be updated, especially now that the corrupted gimmick is worthless for endgame
also PLEASE do something more with Ebon Rift, I also want this power to be good for a Dark Hole on command
New Power: Feral Rage
Bestial Supernatural Ultimate
Can be obtained in the Punk lockbox.
Active Ultimate.
Shame it's another Passive Ultimate, For Bestial I was expecting a crazy frienzy ultimate with dynamic animation like Devastating Strike
Soul Vortex
This power now leaves behind a healing rune once the Vortex expires.
EXCELLENT, Healing runes are always welcomed
Spirit Reverberation
This energy unlock now scales off of Recovery primarily.
Changed to apply energy over time to bring it in line with other recent energy unlocks.
We were all expecting the Constitution scale to be removed, I don't think it was a surprise
Endurance would be better since Darkness has so high energy cost
Post edited by avianos on
POWERFRAME REVAMPS, NEW POWERS and BUG FIXES > Recycled Content and Events and even costumes at this point Introvert guy who use CO to make his characters playable and get experimental with Viable FF Theme builds! Running out of Unique FF builds due to the lack of updates and synergies! Playing since 1 February 2011 128 + Characters (21 ATs, 107 FFs) ALTitis for Life!
ONGOING BUG: Ebon Rift Maintaining this power STILL doesn't trigger neither Concentration nor Chill Form
POWERFRAME REVAMPS, NEW POWERS and BUG FIXES > Recycled Content and Events and even costumes at this point Introvert guy who use CO to make his characters playable and get experimental with Viable FF Theme builds! Running out of Unique FF builds due to the lack of updates and synergies! Playing since 1 February 2011 128 + Characters (21 ATs, 107 FFs) ALTitis for Life!
Ebon Ruin
Increased base damage of power.
Cost has been recalculated for new damage.
Removed Despair from this power.
Removed Return to the Darkness advantage. This advantage has been moved to Shadow Blast. Increased Nyctophobia advantage to 2 points, increased damage value.
New Advantage (1): Using this power doubles the effectiveness of the Shadow Feast heal on Shadow Form.
Ok, I was REALLY cautius and upset about this change for Visual Aesthetics reasons alone,
in general, Im not a fan of sacrificing power visuals for the sake of ADV points (example: HW Annihilate-Scorching Blade, RANK2 having no ground damage visuals)
Keep in mind that the power's size change with the height of the character.
The scale of the Dark Ball visuals will be different on a smaller and bigger character
Extra, rank 1
Suggestion: Since the power change is forcing you to take 2 points adv for better offensive results. Readjust the visuals for rank2 and 3 Ebon Ruin to be more similar, especially the Dark Ball
A lot of people enjoy the visuals of R3 Ebon Ruin
POWERFRAME REVAMPS, NEW POWERS and BUG FIXES > Recycled Content and Events and even costumes at this point Introvert guy who use CO to make his characters playable and get experimental with Viable FF Theme builds! Running out of Unique FF builds due to the lack of updates and synergies! Playing since 1 February 2011 128 + Characters (21 ATs, 107 FFs) ALTitis for Life!
Ebon Rift
The pull will now only target entities outside of its damage radius.
The pull now scales with rank.
Updated tooltips.
New Advantage (2): Chance to apply Bane to targets.
New Advantage (2): Applies Flashfire when partially maintained.
Please, please, please oh so much please Suggestion: Change Ebon Rift-Vengeful Shadows ADV from knock back into knock down or just Reduce it knock back the mobs 4-8 feet away from the center
The Knock Back power of the power with EGO primary is RIDICULOUS, scatters the whole group of mobs, makes the power annoying in team alerts and its anti-productive in general
People want to use the power as AOE Dark Hole
POWERFRAME REVAMPS, NEW POWERS and BUG FIXES > Recycled Content and Events and even costumes at this point Introvert guy who use CO to make his characters playable and get experimental with Viable FF Theme builds! Running out of Unique FF builds due to the lack of updates and synergies! Playing since 1 February 2011 128 + Characters (21 ATs, 107 FFs) ALTitis for Life!
The dps on new darkness is very very nice.
It's nicely balanced compared to other ranged sets, as long as you ignore existence of NW and other charge speed buffs.
But since we do have lots of AoAC on organized cosmic fights it will outperform any maintain based ranged sets quite a bit (PA is technically not maintains).
Using NW:
Using Shadow Form:
Just to compare, my lightning dps:
2 issues I ran into
- Ebon Ruin does not proc Concentration form on taps
- the Devoid refresh from Dimensional Collapse is a bit to tightly timed. With a bit of server lag it dropped of a few times even when I was only 1 second late with DC (meaning, using it 1 second after cooldown). A 16 seconds duration for Devoid, slightly lower cooldown on DC, or a double refresh on DC would make the set a lot more fun to play.
ps.
Please add a darkness damage mod to the debugger. Making a r9 was a big hassle.
I see that the Auras Visuals for the activation of Shadow Shroud and Immolation AOs got updated with discreet aura visuals, this makes me really happy because I was avoiding those AOs for the obnoxious visuals takeover alone
Unfortunately Electric Sheath was not touched yet at least
Suggestion: Update Electric Sheath's visuals. This AO has been using obnoxious overwelming outdated visuals a long time now in the same manners like the old Shadow Shroud and old Immolation
Dark Tranfusion got updated too, no more negative colours
POWERFRAME REVAMPS, NEW POWERS and BUG FIXES > Recycled Content and Events and even costumes at this point Introvert guy who use CO to make his characters playable and get experimental with Viable FF Theme builds! Running out of Unique FF builds due to the lack of updates and synergies! Playing since 1 February 2011 128 + Characters (21 ATs, 107 FFs) ALTitis for Life!
Comments
Suggestion
Feral Rage
Have the power give you a bonus to charge speed on Bestial powers (to compensate slightly reduce the bonus damage on Bestial Powers).
Feral Rage
In a tank's perspective, I'd say lower the CD on ADs/AOs for like 30secs(or lower). A 1min cd for BOTH is a bit too much, especially if you're NOT running Protector Mastery as a tank. Not to mention you also loose your stacks in the process.
Bug
Feral Rage
Doesn't consume all Enrage stacks as the tooltip says. It only consumes 3 stacks. (Personally think it's fine that way. Stacking Enrage isn't as fast as stacking Focus w/ Form of the Tiger.)
__________________________________________________________________
Alts:
Lord Sans (Full Healer FF)/Axel Leonard (Crowd Controller/Off-Tank)
- - - - - -
Feel free to visit my websites!^^:
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Shadow Manifestation displays as a Melee-centric form, rather than Ranged.
Advantaged Dimensional Collapse doe not flow well with a DPS rotation. Because Devoid and Fear only last 12 seconds, most builds in typical combat scenarios will see a gap between Fears, and Devoid will fall off before being refreshed.
Suggestion
Increase Devoid (and possibly Fear) duration to 16 seconds; reduce Dimensional Collapse's cooldown to 10 seconds and cut a few damage ticks to compensate.
On a side not, I notice that Munition, Sorcery and Poison all have inherent debuff applier which are also their own refresher. Are they going to be locked behind very obnoxious rotation/locked behind adv to get their debuff, or is this on purpose everything else is a hassle to set up ?
Make devoid from shadow blast apply on tap as before or reduce it's charge time, many other ranged debuffs for other sets and even melee apply on tap, this power's damage is very low and it has a very long charge time so it is pretty annoying to have to full charge it.
Madness Aura does, but that PRE led build style might not be to everyone's taste. Otherwise it's freely available as an Advantage, like most other Debuffs, and with the set having lots of DOT powers, it's worth taking. Shadow Blast does good damage
Some feedback for Kaizerin, then:
New Spirit Reverberation works fine on a traditional Blast/DOT Darkness Ranged build with REC SSS. Much better energy management than the previous EU.
Dimensional Blast - Hmm. I would rather this was a quick Tap/Charge power like TK Burst, with reasonable alpha damage, the knock down and utility functions, rather than another DoT. The set already has Soul Vortex and Ebon Rift to do that. I would also take the Back to the Darkness advantage away from Shadow Blast and add it to this power. I don't really want my basic blast attack removing my Shadow Pets, that's not a handy function - I would rather have it on an occasional utility power like this one.
Ebon Rift - damage on the R3 PTS version of this is 20% down on Live, when comparing a level 30 character with the same stats, gear and everything else. Is this intentional?
Also BUG - Shadow Manifestation is showing as a Melee toggle.
Madness Aura - needs a lot of Energy for a toggle power which - presumably - you're supposed to be running at the same time as other things. It consumes energy much faster than the EU builds it and the damage output appears to be extremely unpredictable. It's potentially good but I've found these "throw object" powers extremely unreliable as you tend to run out of objects quickly or to be reliant on luck to have a decent object to throw. I would prefer this to be more of a Sparkstorm style toggle, to be honest - reasonable energy costs, moderate reliable damage and tying in with useful debuffs. The sound effects are fun, though!
Ebon Rift damage is lower on PTS, no statement on darkness post saying it's damage was lowered.
Madness Aura's Energy cost is different on the Midnight AT than it is on my Freeform character. It's lower on the AT (and much more useable as a result).
Overall it's a good DPS, does excellent damage: but lacks a little survivability even with all those incremental heals and ways to boost them. Circle of Ebon Wrath feels a bit unnecessary when you can hit for 8K crits from Ebon Ruin at the same time as having Ebon Void and Madness Aura going! Perhaps a stronger heal of some kind instead? Something which consumes Fear and heals for a set amount on each affected enemy might be good.
That is a big issue with this new ultimate. It's a very OP ultimate (30% base damage bonus is insane), that is sort of balanced by removing all form stacks and setting AD/AO on full cooldowns. But if you can then get those all back up in 10 seconds that half of that disadvantage is hardly doing anything.
I'd prefer is the base damage scaled on enrage stacks too, the game could do with pushing people away from melee dex stacking builds a bit.
Shadow Manifestation scale on Constitution instead of Presence
"there nothing more fun then Punching faces LIKE NO BUSINESS!!!"
Spirit Reverb says it gives 31 energy in my tooltip, but I am seeing 15 energy ticks.
I think lowering the cooldown on Feral Rage by half and lower the base damage to 5/10/15% would make the power far more useful, at the moment it looks like a solid Damage check power but with such a long cooldown it'll be off cooldown on most actual checks. With such changes I think it might also be a good idea to lower the stack lost afterward to only 5, Otherwise You'd be loosing all stacks a lot more often.
Alexandra
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First, a suggestion related to Mental States: I think that we should add Regret (from Shadow of Doubt) to the list of Mental States. Seems a bit weird that the other TP debuffs and Fear are included, but Regret isn't (it can't proc the forms that use Mental States atm).
Psychotic Break now applies Bleed? I'm unsure if this is intended (not a listed change), but if it is..
Bug: Shadow Shroud's Terrifying Visage adv still states that the Psychotic Break deals Dimensional dmg over time, instead of the new Bleed effect.
(the bleed does proc stuff like FotS and AotB, for what its worth)
(and Detect, from the new adv, does seem to count as an Enchantment as listed, since it can proc Spellcaster)
Ebon Ruin's Darkness Feast adv could probably clarify that it only doubles the Shadowfeast heal if it is the attack that procs it (tooltip is a bit vague here imo).
(also kinda wished Defile's energy cost got reduced instead of ERuin's energy scaling up to match Defile's, but I guess they're pretty comparable nukes for each powerset now)
Speaking of energy costs, I think that Shadow Eruption's energy costs should be lowered a bit. Even if it does do decent burst dmg, its cost is higher than some Ults atm.
Bug?: Shadow Eruption's Consume Fear adv doesn't seem to 'consume' Fear on any target (ie. end the debuff early, one would assume), though the Rupture dmg still registers on each.
Bug: Shadow Embrace's Draining Shadows heal adv doesn't seem to take the number of targets hit into account. (seems only able to proc once every dmg tick, regardless of target number)
(on the flip side, SBlast's Back to the Darkness adv does seem to scale w/ the number of shadows consumed)
Also, is it intended that Shadow Embrace has an NttG adv? Just curious; I know its had it in the past, but it seems like an odd adv for an attack like that to have.
As mentioned before, it looks like Shadow Manifestation's descriptions are saying its a melee toggle, though this appears to just be a tooltip error as it does seem to grant a higher bonus dmg to ranged than to melee atm.
Aqia just touched on this, but- Bug: Spirit Reverberation seems to only be giving its base 15 energy per tick, regardless of the tooltip value or its scaling.
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That's all from me for now. Will try to check on some of the other powers & changes later.
- Be safe and have fun, champs - for science!
- Be safe and have fun, champs - for science!
Hm, don’t get me wrong, this power’s been a staple for my main since like 2009/10 when I first started playing (and everyone’s like: but… WHY??? lol) so, I’m thankful it’s getting a review, it could definitely use some love! However:
- This actually feels/ plays a lot… clunkier, I guess (maybe it’s the CD?), and not nearly as fun or dynamic as its former version (even with all its flaws). Not feeling the visuals, either.
A telekinetic makes use of their environment to fling stuff at enemies, that’s roughly the idea, yes? Now: ideally, a player with this power should be able to lift every object in every map, but when that’s not feasible (and instead of spawning objects out of thin air) – why not use THEM (your foes) as objects, throw them around like ragdolls. Up, down, at one another... go crazy!
SUGGESTION:
- If no objects are thrown, Knocks Up primary target (something like Force Snap’s effect would actually look pretty cool, IMO. Stun, Disorient… everything else, as applicable. Higher-ranking enemies receive base/direct damage instead (telekinetic “blast/grip/whatever”).
(Bonus:“Poltergeist” (2 pt Adv): Lifts/throws up to 5 enemies (X radius); or throws up to 5 objects.)
Alternatively: Taking objects out of the equation entirely; instead TK-rip chunks of rock from the ground to hurl at enemies – bonus points if using TK Maelstrom’s (R.I.P) old FX – y’know, if it’s something that must be done and it's done nicely, I’d prefer this over what’s currently on PTS.
Add a 2 point advantage to "Feral Rage" that removes all other effects but keeps the damage boost, and (maybe) the small heal while it's active, then this advantage either shortens or removes cooldowns that it puts on Active Defenses and/or Active offenses, and shortens the cooldown on the ultimate to 1 min and so instead of 2.
and if possible this advantge would give the same boost to the damage as rank 3 does. if ranking it affects it.
But I would still settle for rank 2 tbh, just would be very nice, this power looks amazing.
Wat :v
In what way do you consider this balanced at all?
Character select
On the outfit for The Midnight AT, the male is using an Anubis jackal head while the female is not. Do not know if this is due to the defaults/unlocks or that head was simply not given to the female outfit.
-Sterga
Seconding this. Such a cool looking power that it deserves commensurately satisfying functionality.
Also, thank you for adding another damage aura power. I've loved those in other games and I'm excited to see what people do with more options.
Given most of the people (outside of PvP) who are doing silly things with them are simply going to move to COAP and lose 200 dps by dropping nanites or such, whatever. It's your game.
However, since you're doing this without framework adjustment the ATs affected by this should be given complimentary respecs. Night Avenger in particular gets around some of the worst energy management in the game via Dragon's Rush, and it seems a bit unfair that they get to take it on the chin here when they're neither the problem nor do most of the people playing ATs tend to have a bunch of respecs and/or Gs lying around.
This is both pointless on a now-useless skill (I've seen DT used a grand total of once via parsing in the last six months, and I'd take a wager that what was always a rare power is now one of the least chosen skills in the game) and implies a surprising lack of understanding.
Properly built healers almost never face energy issues both because of the role bonus and the true spammers don't because they're forced to either take REC or END and/or get around it by taking AOPM. DT's main advantage - that of suddenly having the equivalent of 500 or so REC - is essentially worthless to them, and losing self healing and 2500 hps over the 15 seconds means it rules out almost any use to begin with for that class.
But when you look at the advantage proper, its even stupider. A whopping 20% increase for a single heal. Yippee! Even if you're going to run this on a non-healer build that might theoretically benefit, you're better off just buying a cheap set of gloves, spending 1g on a rank III Sent Brooch, putting them on a heal gear tab, and when it's required that you drop a heal you can pop over to the tab and get better than that 20% all the time.
Where this would get far more interesting is if it (and blood sacrifice) were reverted back to the intent of the power to begin with - a crazy way to max out the stack with significant risk if you do. The original application of the advantage (200% damage) is both worth restoring and a better place to start. Instead of 20% for a single heal, let's say 200% healing of others, or essentially a full 8 stack of compassion with a good PRE healer during the entire duration of the power makes a lot more sense. Then you'd get into a bunch of fun risk/reward arguments, including literally pouring your lifebar out in inquity spam to keep someone alive at the very end of a fight while selfless doesn't keep up since it's down 90%, or if a crit heal build could do some amazing things with 10k+ spike click heals, or if this could be used by non-healing builds to spend 15 seconds acting as a healer while putting themselves at significant risk in the process.
Doubt anything that fun will come to pass, of course.
Ebon Rift is in general a problematic power in the game as it's currently played, because it's a non-tracking slow maintain so it has inadequate damage output vs bosses and is too slow to be practical to use on chaff. Consider changing it to a fire and forget power similar to Shattering Rain (Oubliette uses what appears to be ebon rift graphics, and there it's clearly a fire and forget power).
New Ebon Ruin is 'generic blast power #xxxxx'. I understand that all of the special mechanics it's had before haven't worked very well, but it seems a shame to make it a pure damage effect.
Dark Transfusion needs a rethink. Most builds don't need occasional bursts of energy, they need continual energy, and dark transfusion isn't actually that much energy on most builds. Consider changing what it does from providing energy to a more direct benefit.
Epic Stronghold
Block timing explained
FC.31.20190108.21
Also really like the heartbeat SFX on Feral Rage, though I wish you could hear it from a greater distance.
BUG?
Feral Rage
Is using Athletic/Acrobatics animation while on the Beast stance. This results in you doing a backflip while jumping backwards which looks a bit out of place
BUG
Energy Step
TP unlock is called Energy Explosion in the Power selection menu
The VFX only shows on your side. Other people see you as if using Arcane Flight
It has a great animation but it is an utterly terrible power. Every time the dark set gets a review my expectation of a fix is met with nothing, or apparently, a nerf this cycle.
Unfortunately Soul Vortex, which was essentially what Rift needed, was created as a new power. Soul Vortex outperforms it for utility and virtually everything else outperforms it offensively. It is bad for both.
There are numerous good assets currently locked in bad powers - perhaps, if Cryptic's calculations value these abilities so differently than the playerbase, an efficient solution would be reused animations with slight differences in alternative powers.
I just want a black hole or void power that is not terrible.
Endbringer's Grasp needs better stats too.
Epic Stronghold
Block timing explained
Yeah and just in case nerf growth again o3o
Epic Stronghold
Block timing explained
Bug: The AoE Devoid application doesn't seem to work w/ Ebon Rift when fully charging Shadow Blast w/ the Devoid adv. (Dimensional Collapse's interaction seems to work fine)
Bug?: The healing rune created by Soul Vortex says that it counts as an Enchantment, but it doesn't seem to be able to proc Spellcaster. (some other healing runes have this issue too, like Condemn's Dark Rune and Expulse not procing either Spellcaster or Conjuring, though Pillar of Poz and Pyre's Burning Sun do; I don't have it on the PTS yet, but Bestial's Moonstruck could also be checked here)
Bug: Madness Aura doesn't seem to apply Devoid to affected targets when objects explode. (also may want to make it more clear in the tooltip on what condition the Devoid applies, since the power also has the passive Fear aura)
Bug: Bite's heal (despite now scaling w/ Bleed stacks) does not seem to be counted properly as a life-drain effect atm, since Dark Transfusion's heal penalty still applies to it while its up.
Suggestion: If its allowed for balance, it may be nice to allow Dimensional Collapse's DoT to stack from the same source, since the cd can be quite shorter than the DoT's full duration.
Suggestion: assuming it doesn't get a boost w/ ranks now, a 10% chance to apply Fear is imo a bit low for Soul Vortex's 2-pt Fear Machine adv, since the old Soul Vortex started at 15%, and you could boost the chance by 10% per normal rank, and cause the power only ticks every 1 sec.
Minor suggestion: could be worth clarifying that the extra dmg Ebon Rift's Vengeful Shadows does to knock-immune targets is per dmg tick.
Minor suggestion: could also be nice to mention Bane as the debuff that applies random effects in their adv's basic descriptions (since their adv names are different- Chaos Magic, Event Horizon, Chaos! Chaos!, etc).
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It seems like the scaling on Shadow Manifest and SReverb were fixed too, so cool stuff. Darkness has always had some interesting 2ndary effects and options w/ its powers, and it seems the revamp is expanding that (kinda makes things a PITA to test though, rofl). Also find it kinda funny that you can get the added threat adv and the threat wipe adv on Feral Rage at the same time :x
- Be safe and have fun, champs - for science!
Can't repro this one. This only has a 15% chance of occurring per tick of the power, not if a object happens to explode due to another object being thrown. It's a light purple cloud fx.
- Be safe and have fun, champs - for science!
Give Ebon Ruin it's DoT effect back.
Considering this is the only real good charge spike in the set, I think the dot would help it keep up with it's rivals, like force's force cascade which is aoe even. defile. chi fist which does considerable damage and places it's own dot, etc.
It would also make the power feel more unique and less like a bleh, generic blast thing.
Ebon Rift - everywhere
Damage lowered by 20% on PTS compared to live
Bug
Madness Aura - Energy Display incorrect
Level 40 AT shows 63/21 , level 30 Freeform shows 72/24
Suggestion
Dimensional Collapse
Increase Alpha damage and reduce DOT - this set already has several powerful DOT attacks in Ebon Rift and Soul Vortex, a more bomb blast effect with quick charge and deployment would be a nice addition
Fixes on Shadow Manifestation and Shadow Reverberation look fine
Actually, I do use this on my Darkness character. Some of the Darkness powers have quite a high initial energy or maintain cost which makes them quite difficult to charge or maintain at lower tiers. This power fills the Energy bar and means I can charge things like Grasping Shadows without an issue. It may not be so necessary with the new EU in which case...
Dark Transfusion
Add advantage to boost critical rate for a few seconds (rather like a scaled down Imbue). The bonus would have a cost (health lost) but it would make a useful "last stand" power.
also PLEASE do something more with Ebon Rift, I also want this power to be good for a Dark Hole on command
Shame it's another Passive Ultimate, For Bestial I was expecting a crazy frienzy ultimate with dynamic animation like Devastating Strike
EXCELLENT, Healing runes are always welcomed
We were all expecting the Constitution scale to be removed, I don't think it was a surprise
Endurance would be better since Darkness has so high energy cost
Makes sense.
in general, Im not a fan of sacrificing power visuals for the sake of ADV points (example: HW Annihilate-Scorching Blade, RANK2 having no ground damage visuals)
Keep in mind that the power's size change with the height of the character.
The scale of the Dark Ball visuals will be different on a smaller and bigger character
Extra, rank 1
Suggestion: Since the power change is forcing you to take 2 points adv for better offensive results. Readjust the visuals for rank2 and 3 Ebon Ruin to be more similar, especially the Dark Ball
A lot of people enjoy the visuals of R3 Ebon Ruin
Suggestion: Change Ebon Rift-Vengeful Shadows ADV from knock back into knock down or just Reduce it knock back the mobs 4-8 feet away from the center
The Knock Back power of the power with EGO primary is RIDICULOUS, scatters the whole group of mobs, makes the power annoying in team alerts and its anti-productive in general
People want to use the power as AOE Dark Hole
It's nicely balanced compared to other ranged sets, as long as you ignore existence of NW and other charge speed buffs.
But since we do have lots of AoAC on organized cosmic fights it will outperform any maintain based ranged sets quite a bit (PA is technically not maintains).
Using NW:
Using Shadow Form:
Just to compare, my lightning dps:
2 issues I ran into
- Ebon Ruin does not proc Concentration form on taps
- the Devoid refresh from Dimensional Collapse is a bit to tightly timed. With a bit of server lag it dropped of a few times even when I was only 1 second late with DC (meaning, using it 1 second after cooldown). A 16 seconds duration for Devoid, slightly lower cooldown on DC, or a double refresh on DC would make the set a lot more fun to play.
ps.
Please add a darkness damage mod to the debugger. Making a r9 was a big hassle.
lmao
My super cool CC build and how to use it.
- Be safe and have fun, champs - for science!
Unfortunately Electric Sheath was not touched yet at least
Suggestion: Update Electric Sheath's visuals. This AO has been using obnoxious overwelming outdated visuals a long time now in the same manners like the old Shadow Shroud and old Immolation
Dark Tranfusion got updated too, no more negative colours