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FC.31.20130612.28 PTS Update
lordgar
Posts: 267 Arc User
This build is scheduled to hit PTS at 2:15 pm, 8/8/13
Greetings!
We're updating PTS with this build to test stability, as well as the changes listed below:
Release Notes:
Laser Sword:
Other:
Please format any bugs you find in the following format:
Bug
Where it happens
What happens
ere it happens
What happens
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Greetings!
We're updating PTS with this build to test stability, as well as the changes listed below:
Release Notes:
Laser Sword:
- Particle Smash - This power now has a flat base damage and a 30 second cooldown. This power now additionally strikes in a 15 foot AoE around its target. 5 target Cap.
- Particle Smash - This power will apply Plasma Burn to all targets in the AoE based on the number of Unified Theory Stacks.
- Particle Smash - This power will refresh the duration of any Plasma Burn on affected targets.
- Particle Smash - This power no longer consumes Accelerate.
- Accelerate - This buff now only has one stack and makes your next Unified Theory cast instant.
- Particle Accelerator - This power now has a 5 target cap, up from 3.
- Particle Accelerator - This power now has a 30% chance per target hit to grant Accelerate.
- Particle Accelerator - This power now has a 5% chance per target hit to reset the cooldown on Particle Smash.
- Unified Theory - This power now only stacks 3 times.
- Unified Theory - This power now grants Perfect understanding at 3 stacks.
Other:
- We have made a change to the way level scaling (sidekicking) works. See this thread for more information.
Please format any bugs you find in the following format:
Bug
Where it happens
What happens
ere it happens
What happens
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Post edited by lordgar on
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Comments
:redface:
We will be releasing a new PTS build within the next couple of hours with the powers switched on!
Any way we can get the Cyber Ninja's powers in the PA set?
I'll give you bacon jerky and let you make out with my sister.
The Whiteout version don't seem to count
Here we are now going to the West Side
Weapons in hand as we go for a ride
Some may come and some may stay
Watching out for a sunny day
Where there's love and darkness and my sidearm
In game as @forgemccain
Oh thank you. I appreciate that you listened to my suggestions.
Looks over the changes... -_-
The community tried to tell me I was asking to much out of you guys, didn't want to believe them. Well, I shall try to make the best out of this.
I went ahead and tested a all the laser sword set powers with a level 40 build(using green debugger gear.) Stats were Dex/Int/Str. I chose Form of the Tempest since apparently we still have to go out of set for a Form. Also took Intensity. Had roughly 40% Crit/ 115% Severity
After toying with the build for quite awhile to find a good rotation of powers. I discovered a few things...
1) Laser Sword(The attack) is now completely useless with these new powers and will only hinder your performance if used. It's also not stacking Plasma Burn like it should, there's no refreshing going on here. But it's ok because this power can now be avoided completely!
2) Lightwave Slash is STILL USELESS! Also ok because it can be avoided completely!
3) The Rotation that I came across that works best is actually pretty damn simple...
Against 3 targets in the powerhouse...
*Click Accelerator one or twice at most to gain stack.
*Near Click lengths charge of UT for stack
*Repeat step 1
*Repeat step 2
*Repeat step 1
*Repeat step 2
*Pop Intensity
*Click Particle Smash for around 20-25k damage
*Anything that survives can be followed up with a Plasma Cutter for around 10-12k almost immediatly.
As you can see, the numbers are a bit to high still for a sub par build with sub par gear.
4) I also noticed that the Accelerator and UT stacking is WAY TO FAST vs a Mob and WAY TO SLOW vs a Single Target.
Here are my NEW SUGGESTIONS!!!
How about we try to SAVE Laser Sword(the attack) from these new powers by combining it with Particle Accelerator. This is what I'm aiming for guys...
*This combined power becomes a 3 hit COMBO ATTACK! The first 2 hits of the combo have a 15% chance to apply Plasma Burn(Plasma Burn should REFRESH when applied.) The third hit in the combo automatically applies your stack of Accelerator!
Laser Sword also has an Advantage(called Particle Accelerator.) I would like to see the power keep this advantage as it obviously would still make sense.
This power may need to become a Single Target attack though because of these changes. Maybe something can be done with Lightwave Slash to make it more useful if that is indeed the case.
With these changes, stacking time remains the same vs either a mob or single target! You don't have to keep your eyes glued to your portrait to see when Accelerator is getting added to you because you'll already KNOW when it will be added, allowing you to focus on the action! And it condenses the amount of attacks the set is using, as currently it just FEELS like to many for me to handle. Even with this change I can't see how anyone would be able to make a hybrid build using Laser Sword and Power Armored attacks. Shame, cause you could have done that with my other suggestions.:rolleyes:
Other then combining Laser Sword and Particle Accelerator into one Combo Attack, my only other major gripe would be the Quantum Stability.
Quantum Stability SHOULD BE A MELEE PASSIVE! With a small RESIST ALL DAMAGE BUFF! And the SUMMON is absolutely ridiculous! PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE change this into a PBAoE buff that allows for movement! This is the ONLY one of my previous suggestions that I feel like I MUST continue to push at you guys.
QUANTUM STABILITY(I would like to see a name change to support the plasma theme more, so throwing in PLASMA DRIVE as a possible name change):
PASSIVE
*Increases Melee Particle Damage and Ranged Particle Damage to a lesser degree. Scales with Superstats.
*Increases ALL Damage Resistance by a small amount(Equal to other Off Passives.) Scales with Superstats. Damage Absorbtion would also be acceptable.
*Grants stacks of INSTABILITY for every tick of Particle Damage you deal(with the exception of Plasma Burn.) When you reach 30 stacks you create a PLASMA DISCHARGE(which replaces the current AoE Summon.)
*Plasma Discharge is a Player Based AoE that engulfs the user within a massive Plasma Ball. Plasma Discharge reaches 15-20ft and increasing Particle Damage by 30% for the duration. You can not build stacks of Instability in the duration of Plasma Discharge has ended.
FX
*I like the Low Visual Electrical FX on the power currently.
*The Plasma Discharge should respect color changes and look something like so...
A REALLY cool effect if the game is capable of doing would be to make your plasma discharge fx latch onto enemies within it's AoE range. If you've ever touched a Plasma Globe then you know the effect in which I speak of. Granted this may be a bit to much to ask for.
Other than those 2 things, I think it's ok. Not as great as it COULD have been, but ok. Might want to work on getting those numbers down a bit though.
I'll sign on to the passive needing a bit of survivability, especially since its damage effects are once again narrower than existing passives. Doesn't need to be a "melee" passive though, Kinetic Manip and esp. Quarry are ranged passives with good defense, and there has not been and should not be a passive locked into just Melee or Ranged DPS. Offensive is fine.
Oh, and this would be a GREAT time to fix Plasma Burn so it properly refreshes when new stacks are applied. Since, y'know, that's been bugged SINCE IT WAS INTRODUCED.
EDIT: Also, whoever's writing the tooltips now is using a different style than the old ones and it's going to cause confusion. Specifically the "what kind of power is this" bit on the new powers. Particle Accelerator and Unified Theory are labeled as "Melee Strike", while Particle Smash is a "Short Range Strike". This really should be fixed once these are finalized.
Massive -res coupled with solid damage/plasma burn is bad? Do you guys actually test the powers out? It's your main source of DPS in the rotation.
Particle Smash has greater use now, however I would keep it out of your single target rotation as it takes away from dps. Great for mobs though.
Dex/Con/Int generic dps build.
Numbers could be slightly higher if I had better energy management.
Rotation: Laser Sword, using Accelerator when my energy got low or to keep up the Unified buff. Particle Smash is not used in this setup.
Similar rotation, but more focus on using Particle Smash.
Edit: A lot more fluid and enjoyable. My only nitpick is lack of an energy return power. I've been using MSA/Conviction, but it would be nice if there was an option a bit more specific to the set.
What I meant by my statement, is that Laser Sword becomes useless when paired with the new powers. If your using a Laser Edge(Plus PB Adv) + Laser Sword(Plus Particle Acc Adv) + Plasma Cutter attack chain then it's great. Would be nice if the Plasma Burns refreshed though.
The Problem with Laser Sword is that it doesn't FIT into the rotation with these new powers.
A few suggestions to help the current implementation out would be to...
Combine Laser Sword and Particle Accelerator as I mention before.
*Make it a 3 hit combo. First to hits have a 15% chance to apply PB, third hit applies your Accelerator stack.
*The attack still hits up to 3-5 targets, but it does greater damage to your selected target.
*Use the current Laser Sword swing Animations, because spamming the side swipe animation on Particle Accelerator is BORING as can be.
*Keep the Particle Accelerator ADVANTAGE that ramps up damage and end cost per swing.
*Remove the Particle Resistance Debuff!
Why remove the Particle Resistance Debuff? So you can move it over to UT!
*UT can grant 7-10% Particle Damage Res Debuff per stack of UT
This makes UT a more interesting power.
These suggestions are to help clean up the current implementation. It's still feels messy, having to manage to much.
And PLEASE Change the Animations on UT and PS! They just feel awful with a laser sword.
The only other thing I want to see changed is the Passive, as I mentioned in the above post.
These are some pretty valid points you make, and enough to sway me. As long as the passive gets either an All Damage Resistance buff OR a Damage Absorption buff I'll be fine with it buffing All Particle Damage(Both Melee and Ranged equal.)
The Summon is the worse thing going with this passive though, I can't friggin' stand it! It just an eye soar. Sure it's a great buff and AoE(IF EVERYTHING IS STANDING STILL), but in combat things tend to move around. Sure you could turn this black hole looking Darkness Entity into a reverse repel like Implosion Engine to help bring enemies to you and MAKE THEM stand still but it still wouldn't FIT the powerset.
I seriously hope you guys consider my PBAoE suggestion which fits more in line with a Plasma/Particle theme and still falls in line with what your looking for out of it.
Same build, without laser sword.
Loss of roughly 600dps.
Except that none of this makes any sense in a real situation.
Ok, so we have LS-PA-UT-LB-PS
So, you're not bursting PBs with Cutter?
PS doesn't come back quick enough to keep PBs up...
But anyway, that's 5 attack powers, that you have to manage...
How are you really going to do that in a real situation, unless you have a ubar build that doesn't have to worry about dying?
While I didn't post it I tried using the rupture and it wound up hurting my dps. I don't have that log saved anymore, perhaps later I'll test it again.
Take a look at my target in the logs. I've been using Teleiosaurus as my test dummy to illustrate a more realistic scenario on how powers will perform. Perhaps I could go run Andriths, as the new passive has a slight edge against the dino with particle breath.
Outside of my laser sword powers I had Ego Surge, ice Sheathe, Conviction, Force Shield, Form of the Tempest, MSA and Masterful Dodge. I used an Elixir while fighting Teleiosaurus.
1. I partially agree with this suggestion.
2. What I disagree with is removing the -Resistance portion of the advantage (its the reason to take the advantage over R3 or Crippling Challenge). That minus to resistance is what's boosting the damage of the attack, not the advantage itself.
3. What I do agree with is taking Particle Accelerator and baking it (including the AoE portion) into the original Laser Sword. Change the Particle Burn application on the Laser Sword Combo to have its application rate made identical to Bleeds from Reaper's Caress in single blade. i.e. 25% chance on the first two strikes and 100% chance on the third strike. Also on the Third Strike it also applies a stack of the Accelerator Buff.
After my trial runs with it against Mega D, the new method of applying the Accelerator Buff takes way too long and cut into the over all DPS. And the timer on the stacks of Unified Theory should be extended to compensate for the now longer to stack Accelerator. Since it only provides One Stack now, but at a much lower chance to apply rather than a guaranteed chance from the previous incarnation with the multiple stacks.
On a positive note it looks like the Electric Form aura has been completely removed from the new passive...can't wait to see what the new aura looks like...
And what about the tailoring issue for the Laser Swords and the Power Armor Slots. There's already a tab set up in the tailor for the Power Armor pieces that you can currently only change the color of the pop ups. That tailor spot makes me think that we can only change the color because there aren't any other models available to players for their use. But there are other models in the game that can be used to fill in for those slots if they were only made available and the tailor were to allow the changes.
1. Wrist Bolter - That Hand Blaster that Cyber Soldier was asking for. The Dual Launchers from the Become Cyber Ninja devices. The wrist mounted chain guns from the destroid annihilators
2. Tactical Missile - The single wrist launcher from the Become Cyber Ninja Device.
3. Mini-Gun - The Enlarged version from Fire All Weapons. The Rune Covered version from the Become Lemurian Power Armor Device.
4. Shoulder Launcher - The Enlarged Version from Fire All Weapons. The Big Shoulder Cannon from the Become Lemurian Power Armor.
And I've already made my suggestions for the Laser Swords if they can finally get their own tailoring option.
Hmm... I also want to keep LaserSword/Particle Accelerator's ramp up damage effect, but didn't realize it was caused by placing a debuff on the target. How does placing a debuff on the target ALSO make the attack cost more and more energy too? *shrugs*
Anyway, I'm fine with the power keeping that setup as it WORKS and makes sense for the power.
I just want to make Unified Theory seem more MEANINGFUL. Right now it's just there to stack your way to Particle Smash. I want to see those stacks DO SOMETHING! ANYTHING!
So here's a few suggestions to add onto the stacks for Unified Theory...
-Particle Damage Buff
-Particle Damage Debuff
-Overall Cost Reduction Buff
-Buff to Plasma Burn Damage(I would only except this if Laser Sword and Particle Accelerator get mashed together and are more capable of applying and refreshing Plasma Burns)
-Heal/Regen Buff
-Damage Res Buff
Actually I like some of those ideas to bake some extra utility in to the unified theory stacks...well here's my idea...
1. In addition to normal buffs the Unified Theory stacks also provide an Overall Cost Discount to other Laser Sword powers.
2. In addition to that Cost Discount, when striking a target affected by Plasma Burn and you are under the effects of at least one stack of the Unified Theory Buff, striking a target with Particle Damage will provide a small energy return (like gain stacks of a Form). This effect can only happen 3 times every 3 seconds.
Mechanically it puts a -res debuff on the enemy and also a +energy debuff on you, which can end up being kind of a pain if you're changing targets (like, in the 80-90% of the fights in the game that are versus a pile of mooks) because the energy cost stays high but you don't get any -res.
Maybe it's just me, but I end up caring about performance against hordes as much or more as performance against Cosmics/Alert bosses, and in those fights Laser Sword is probably just going to exist to apply a stack of -res now.
well if they could fuse the Particle Accelerator power and the Laser Sword combo power together keeping the AoE and applying the stack of Accelerator on the last strike and move the Plasma Burn applications to a percent chance on the first and second strikes and guaranteed on the third it would work better. Because with that Advantage it applies the -Resistance debuff on each target it hits...well it actually applies three stacks to each target it hits so if the Laser Sword combo power were to have the AoE feature of Particle Accelerator it would be so much the awesome. Just my opinion, but if they were able to do that I think it would greatly benefit the Laser Sword suite of powers.
Where it happens: At power selection.
What happens: Concentration is a Tier 1 power common to the Technology framework (it is available under each of the Archery, Gadgeteering, Munitions, Power Armor tabs). The requirements part is fine in that taking an Technology energy builder will allow access to it. However, the power itself does not count as a Technology power for the purposes of tier requirements. It is only counted as a generic power.
In other words, the following:
Wrist Bolter -> Concentration -> (Particle Beam Rifle is not selectable)
Gunslinger -> Assault Rifle -> Concentration -> (Gatling Gun is not selectable, but all Tier 1 powers are unlocked)
I am posting this here since I am a recently returning player who still can't create new threads yet.