Nerfing avoidance makes more sense, considering they're buffing defense. Dodge should be left alone. There's nothing wrong with hitting 100% dodge. What makes dodging overpowered is the avoidance % being stacked with other defenses. Dodge is nothing but a random number generator which procs avoidance. By nerfing avoidance alone, players could choose between keeping a high dodge % with mediocre mitigation or sacrificing some dodge % for more avoidance or defense, whichever they fancy.
Edit: Misread OP. No defense buff.
So...take LR, dodge everything, but...still get hit for lots of damage?
Maybe what needs to be done, is make it so LR itself is the Dodge/Avoid Passive and can avoid a lot of the changes they want to do with Dodge/Avoid.
I admit to wanting some sort of change. I found the +DMG of Quarry to be worth switching to over LR (original passive) as I really didn't see that big of a difference play wise in the defense aspects (but noticed the damage difference).
I am not in favor of this change because Dodging attacks is a:
simple staple of heroic comic book characters!
When I first started playing CO I thought it was a great idea that you separated out dodge and avoidance mechanics just like having block mechanics.
This change basically destroys the concept of a hard to hit hero and huge swaths of themed characters.
You want to decrease the effect of dodge? I am all for it but do some real home work and make changes like this:
Holds make Dodge Chance go to zero.
Roots reduce Dodge Chance
AoE attacks reduce Avoidance values
Have a maximum Dodge chance of 95% that can only be exceeded by Masterful Dodge.
Or simply make the bulk of the nerf fall on avoidance and not dodge, that accomplishes the nerf better IMHO
There are so many better ways to fix dodge AND preserve the heroic concept better. This change you propose isn't about mechanics, its about heroic themes and concepts.
I like these suggestions for a way to reign in Dodge, especially if it applies to enemies too. That would play into some strategic gameplay by opening up new options for debuffing foes. Perhaps we could also have debuffs for Critical Chance / Severity as well? IMO, that would be a lot more satisfying than just redoing the Diminishing Returns curves.
The current PTS build ( FC.31.20130824.10 ) has the following preview changes.
The diminishing returns curves on Avoid, Dodge, Critical Chance, Severity, and Offense have all been adjusted. Additionally Offense now scales in a separate layer of damage bonus to make it more straight forward to understand. Avoid, Dodge, Critical Chance, and Severity will now rise significantly more slowly while at level cap. Offense will now scale with an entirely new curve, and should be much more valuable to players overall. This is an experimental potential future change that will not be part of the bug fix release. We are interested in how these adjustments feel at at all levels of gameplay.
The Debugger has an upcoming set of gear (Justice Gear) for your testing and feedback.
Please discuss them in this thread!
Lordgar, you seem like a nice person, so I'm just going to say this person to person and not as a customer.
Who asked for this? Any of this? I see a blurb in Gamasutra about Jack Emmert's upcoming speech on how to handle "pay to win" situations and frankly I don't think it's a coincidence. Push this through, and I will be speaking to my bank and getting a rather large chunk of the sizeable amount of money I've spent on this game back. I know this means I will no longer be able to play any of PWE's games ever again, but frankly, despite the wonderful friends I have made here, that in and of itself is simply not enough to make me turn a blind eye to what's happening here, and I'll pull the trigger and walk away.
Lordgar, you seem like a nice person, so I'm just going to say this person to person and not as a customer.
.... Push this through, and I will be speaking to my bank and getting a rather large chunk of the sizeable amount of money I've spent on this game back. ...
I thought you weren't speaking as a customer? Seriously. :rolleyes:
Apparently Lightning Reflexes and Way of the Warrior provide dodge RATING (which is what is now steeply diminished) while Quarry provides dodge CHANCE (which is not). Pretty sure Lightning Reflexes and Way of the Warrior (possibly other powers) will need to be exempted from this diminishing change, or modified to provide dodge chance instead of their current approach. Quarry remains quite robust.
I can't help but think this change completely misses its intended target. They're intending to make it so you can't get huge amounts of dodge while still running an offensive passive. But people don't do that by stacking lots of dodge rating, so changing dodge rating is ultimately pointless and only serves to irritate people at the lower end.
The ones who have the huge dodge plus offensive roles are doing it with powers that provide flat bonuses to dodge. Quarry, Evasive Maneuvers, Lead Tempest with advantage, etc. None of those are affected by diminishing returns at all.
So what needs to be done is not any change to dodge rating, but rather changing those flat bonuses to be properly affected by diminishing returns. The simplest way, as I see it, to do that would be to change them to grant dodge rating equivalent to their old flat bonus. So Quarry for example, instead of giving a flat 18% dodge chance bonus, would give however much dodge rating is equivalent to 18%. Which is to say, the amount that would take a character with no other source of dodge rating from the base of 10% to 28%.
That way, they can prevent the ridiculous dodge + offensive passive combo without making dodge rating itself effectively useless and also without making Lightning Reflexes useless, as in keeping with the intention of it being the dodge passive it would be the only power to keep its current flat bonus. This would in turn cement LR's place as the best passive for dodging stuff.
so is this why the rewards for
Help a bigfoot in trouble, have changed from
dodge core or an avoid core and an armoring core,
to 2 rank 3 stats and 1 rank 4. (and thats on LIVE)
they are being removed so people can't get them.
are they doing this to the FEW missions which have dodge/acoid cores as rewards, replacing them with low rank rubbish mods.
so is this why the rewards for
Help a bigfoot in trouble, have changed from
dodge core or an avoid core and an armoring core,
to 2 rank 3 stats and 1 rank 4. (and thats on LIVE)
they are being removed so people can't get them.
are they doing this to the FEW missions which have dodge/acoid cores as rewards, replacing them with low rank rubbish mods.
Well they are leftovers from a mod system that isn't quite finished.
so is this why the rewards for
Help a bigfoot in trouble, have changed from
dodge core or an avoid core and an armoring core,
to 2 rank 3 stats and 1 rank 4. (and thats on LIVE)
they are being removed so people can't get them.
are they doing this to the FEW missions which have dodge/acoid cores as rewards, replacing them with low rank rubbish mods.
When people log in to find that legion gear has been nerfed, that a greater divide between heroic and legion gear will exist under the guise of "sweeping changes" to core mechanics, and that instead of tailoring changes to a few powers they will overhaul the system apparently on a whim and prepare us for new gear to buy so that we may adjust accordingly, the mods themselves will be the least of Cryptic's worries.
I see a lot of people talking before testing.
This is a massive change, there will be some errors and tweaks.
The idea looks to be a shift from "Dodge and crit all the time always" to having offense and defense gear choices actually look appealing.
Are we there yet? Well no, the few tests I did have my build a lot crazier in damage outputs and survivability than it is on live with a heavy offense/defense spec. Won't be done testing for a while for a writeup, there's a lot to go through.
How about some datamining, like real datamining. Not just looking at numbers with what you already want to say in mind.
I see a lot of people talking before testing.
This is a massive change, there will be some errors and tweaks.
The idea looks to be a shift from "Dodge and crit all the time always" to having offense and defense gear choices actually look appealing.
Are we there yet? Well no, the few tests I did have my build a lot crazier in damage outputs and survivability than it is on live with a heavy offense/defense spec. Won't be done testing for a while for a writeup, there's a lot to go through.
How about some datamining, like real datamining. Not just looking at numbers with what you already want to say in mind.
Sorry for the double post, hit wrong button.
But this.
Testing is important. PTS to LIVE should be allottted longer time schedules for testing. Give silvers a means of joining and helping. If we get enough people, we could do what K proposes.
I'm also hearing that Lightning Reflexes, R3, at level 40, is only providing 10% Dodge Chance. So it's utterly worthless IMHO as a Passive.
^this
Cryptic, are you willing, if this LR nerf will go life, return Zen to every player who ever bought the Specialist or the Master AT, just like you did with Hawkwing prototype jets?
And grant them retrain token, so they can use Zen for purchasing other AT and retrain to it?
Because you will have to. You will be selling non-functional, broken product to people. Archetypes with no working passive.
Maybe what needs to be done, is make it so LR itself is the Dodge/Avoid Passive and can avoid a lot of the changes they want to do with Dodge/Avoid.
I admit to wanting some sort of change. I found the +DMG of Quarry to be worth switching to over LR (original passive) as I really didn't see that big of a difference play wise in the defense aspects (but noticed the damage difference).
But killing LR is a terrible idea.
It's my personal opinion that, if anything, Lightning Reflexes should be the most important way for obtaining high dodge and avoidance. While everything else can be safely nerfed. It's a dodge dedicated passive which is, since On Alert, overshadowed by everything else, from gear to offensive passives. Players wanting extreme dodge and survivability should be looking at LR first, not for Quarry or WoTW. As it is now, dodge system makes little sense and I do agree that some changes must be done to dodge stacking.
It's just that killing LR will be counter-productive, while Quarry will remain largely unaffected.
I would think that the history of a previous MMO would be a lesson to any future MMOs as to what happens when drastically changing its combat sytem.
To summarize, a company well-known for its MMO background managed to alienate the majority of its customer base by drastically changing its combat system. Now mind you, this was a STARWARS license, with a major fanbase that went well beyond your typical MMO playerbase, but even said license wasn't enough to prevent a mass exodus.
Don't get me wrong, I can accept that dodge/avoid has been a problem since I've started, and I'm referring to pre-alert. However, pre-alert, the biggest "issue" was Bountiful Chi Resurgence not having an internal cooldown, which was fixed ages ago.
Post alert, it's become standard across the board regardless of setup. However, it's mostly been out of necessity. Alerts are typically five random players thrown together to defeat a group of enemies. However, there is absolutely no guarantee of a well balanced team short of forming one beforehand.
As someone who's lost count of the alerts I've completed, I can tell you to this day I'm more likely than not going to pull more than my own weight, whether it be to carry lower level players or more casual ones. While that's all fine and dandy when I'm running my tank, I prefer offensively focused roles. To this day my most played character is my very first, an AT. Post-alert gear has allowed that character to remain playable in a less than ideal environment, which would be effectively the entire alert system.
By drastically reducing dodge/avoid, you would not only destroy a core mechanic, but also alienate a significant (if not large/majority) of your playerbase, myself included. While my departure from this game would be just shy of meaningless, I can guarantee you I would not be the only one. Players of all skill levels invest a combination of time, effort and money in order to enjoy their playing experience. Even this Destroid Invasion weekend, I'm still seeing folks taken aback by the recent changes to legacy devices, something that had significant advanced warning.
Don't get me wrong, a lot of us vets have learned to push the current combat system to the limit. But these changes would affect everyone, even the most casual of players. It should be no surprise that some of the playerbase can vastly outperform the majority, we've put in the time and effort to learn the system and adapted accordingly. But what about that brand new 40 that leveled strictly through smash alerts?
Also, as I'm sure has been mentioned, this change would single-handedly destroy any specialist AT, master AT, or any character built around lightning reflexes. While freeforms have the option of changing passives, those do not.
Ultimately I feel this is a poorly thought out solution from someone with little actual gameplay experience. I know from personal experience I've spent countless hours seeing the impact dodge has had on the gameplay experience across a number of characters both Archetype and Freeform. If there's an issue with damage mitigation, dodge/avoid may be a factor but its hardly the culprit.
The current PTS build ( FC.31.20130824.10 ) has the following preview changes.
The diminishing returns curves on Avoid, Dodge, Critical Chance, Severity, and Offense have all been adjusted. Additionally Offense now scales in a separate layer of damage bonus to make it more straight forward to understand. Avoid, Dodge, Critical Chance, and Severity will now rise significantly more slowly while at level cap. Offense will now scale with an entirely new curve, and should be much more valuable to players overall. This is an experimental potential future change that will not be part of the bug fix release. We are interested in how these adjustments feel at at all levels of gameplay.
The Debugger has an upcoming set of gear (Justice Gear) for your testing and feedback.
I've seen a few (very few) of my fellow players express what can be done with dodge when we min/max. That's a valid point, but in my opinion a marginally valid one and here's my opinion why. Note: This is my opinion.
The only people who are in support of this that I see are people who I know from years of playing with them, against them, and talking to them to be power gamers in this game. They (we) are the minority. Yes we can do some amazingly powerful stuff in the game but let's be honest most people who freeform aren't doing that kind of stuff and the ATs definitely are doing much of it either.
This is a delicate issue and I'm being nice by calling it an issue because I don't think dodge, avoid, crit etc. are the issue. I can count on one hand how many people I personally know who quit because the game is "too easy" and I'd need a few pages to write the names/handles of the ones I've said goodbye to over the last 4 years because they ran out of things to do...
I'll probably catch some flak for this but hopefully my friends respect me enough to respect me disagreeing with them on this one. Those of us on a certain channel who are pushing for this? Stop listening to them on this topic, seriously. They (we) have historically always found ways to break this game since launch that the vast majority of the playerbase either never know about or simply do not do. It's the game within the game. These dodge changes won't kill the game for me (or them). It'll kill some concepts but I'll build around them as I usually do or retire them like I did my main Sho Nuff about two years ago when a major change gutted his concept beyond repair at the time (although that change made me leave the game for months). However, when people like my casual friends, my wife, my cousin's wife, my frat brothers, or my 13 year old son play the game they already find it difficult and some of their characters are using dodge as it is now. I repeat they are using the current dodge and think the game is moderately hard. And let's not forget all the dodge characters I see falling in defeat in the PUG alerts.
In a nutshell, this looks like an attempt to make existing content "harder" but to be frank it won't make much of anything harder for the people pushing for this change and they (we) know it because we already know several other ways to get around this. It'll make a few isolated pieces of content slightly more challenging but the big effect is that it's going to make the game more difficult for the type of players that don't seem to need/want it to be more difficult. Don't do this, give the power gamers something new to do that will faceplant them until they figure it out.
To those speaking of LR: I've a sneaking suspicion it's bugged atm and is being looked at.
As to the changes:
I'm with Bob and Hinkypink. These were needed a very long time ago. Stacking dodge/avoid made making never-dying tanks too easy and trivialized content (my quarry single-blade guy could solo Cybermind. Yeah). Perhaps this way it won't be as easy to stack defense and healers will end up being a little more desired in Alert/team settings.
And before you people jump on me and say this is too much: player power is out of control and has been since On Alert hit. I suspect many of those complaining have gotten used to being this powerful or joined after On Alert hit. If it's this easy to create a free-form that can solo just about everything, there's something very wrong with the systems available and a good, hard look is needed.
There's also the fact that the devs may be seeing that players are stacking crit/dodge/avoid at the expense of all else. Having something be that desirable means its overpowered and requires adjusting.
This is only the initial adjustment. Some fine-tuning is expected, but I think this is the right direction. Hopefully, reigning in player power will allow the developers to create meaningfully challenging content.
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[thread=139701]My old, old guide for Ego Blades. Updated for On: Alert.[/thread]
[thread=154211]The Costume Contest Schedule. Stay up-to-date without having to log in![/thread]
They're just testing this change guys. This isn't going live tomorrow or anything. It makes sense to start the testing with more extreme values and then dial it in, rather than the other way around.
Funny part is, the mass outrage people are expressing at the fact that they might actually have to do something other than just slap on the exact same heroic primary with the exact same defense mod (and in a lot of cases the exact same passive) for every single character... just shows how badly this change is needed.
Remember when we used to complain that there were too many "obviously better" choices that restricted our ability to be creative? Good times.
Remember when we used to complain that the game was too easy? Now we're terrified that if our dodge gets lower we're all gonna get slaughtered.
I really don't care what the min max OP players do. I care that most of the players will LEAVE THIS GAME because they will DIE to easy mobs. repeatedly. superhero games are supposed to make you feel super. listen to kenpojitsu he knows what he's talking about.
Try actually playing a character without dodge primary and dodge mod installed, and a non-dodge passive. I've done it. You might be surprised. Did you know that there are things in this game to keep you from dying other than RNG?
They're just testing this change guys. This isn't going live tomorrow or anything. It makes sense to start the testing with more extreme values and then dial it in, rather than the other way around.
Funny part is, the mass outrage people are expressing at the fact that they might actually have to do something other than just slap on the exact same heroic primary with the exact same defense mod (and in a lot of cases the exact same passive) for every single character... just shows how badly this change is needed.
Remember when we used to complain that there were too many "obviously better" choices that restricted our ability to be creative? Good times.
Remember when we used to complain that the game was too easy? Now we're terrified that if our dodge gets lower we're all gonna get slaughtered.
I agree with that. Would be nice to see the other Heroic Primary with different defense mods used.
But killing the dodge build concepts isn't the way to do it. They need to figure out a way for the passives that are dodge/avoid themed to stay good at that and beable to build on it.
I really don't care what the min max OP players do. I care that most of the players will LEAVE THIS GAME because they will DIE to easy mobs. repeatedly. superhero games are supposed to make you feel super. listen to kenpojitsu he knows what he's talking about.
You should. They're often the ones who test this stuff.
It's currently possible to use an offensive passive and gain enough dodge to cover an off. passive's weakness: low defense. This removes the incentive to "kill before you are killed' and allows players to create offensive toons that can shrug off nasty hits. How do you construct content around a playerbase that creates toons that can solo just about everything? Or, for the matter, players using a defensive passive and stacking massive dodge on top of that? Invuln+dodge was a pretty popular combo and it's still potent nowadays, and don't get me started on Defiance+dodge.
I imagine this is intended to put dodge and crit back into their niche and make defense/offense stacking more attractive. Once LR gets looked at, I don't think this adjustment will look as bad as players are currently making it out to be. Until then, I'm reserving final judgment until LR's scaling is looked at.
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[thread=139701]My old, old guide for Ego Blades. Updated for On: Alert.[/thread]
[thread=154211]The Costume Contest Schedule. Stay up-to-date without having to log in![/thread]
I agree with that. Would be nice to see the other Heroic Primary with different defense mods used.
But killing the dodge build concepts isn't the way to do it. They need to figure out a way for the passives that are dodge/avoid themed to stay good at that and beable to build on it.
I have. problem is some people like having dodge be a viable alternative. this will kill it. there needs to be a dodge offensive passive that's viable. I tested quarry with full Justice gear on pts. it flat out was horrible. I died instantly to everything with over 200 defense stacked.
not to mention is makes BCR nearly useless for most builds.
I agree, those passives that have dodge as a core concept should still give useful amounts of dodge and avoidance; they were balanced like that at some point in the past after all, though just how much of it they should be able to keep will need to be seen.
Making BCR useless for most builds? Shouldn't that be the case? Should a power that essentially relies on a specific mechanic to make the best use of it be useful for every single build out there, or maybe just those builds that specifically focus on that mechanic?
See that's the problem here. This isn't killing dodge builds... this is actually creating dodge builds. Currently on live, every build is a dodge build... so effectively, that's just a default attribute of all builds. If this goes through in some form, the effect would be that making a dodge build actually means something.
And like I said... they're just testing these numbers. Developers will often start with extreme values and then dial them in, so what you're seeing now is unlikely to creep into live. Hell, people are reacting like this is going live next week... for all we know, this is just the start of a process that might take months.
Also Gradii... remember, there is more to this game than just face tanking everything. This might actually make people use some of those other gameplay mechanics this game has... you know, the ones other than "jump around spamming attacks while RNG keeps you safe" :P
no, because BCR fills the "not enough thematic self heals" void. its a neutral looking power that can be made to fit any theme. kill the dodge and now no one can effectively self heal without specific builds.
DON'T do this. players will LEAVE.
Yeah, cause threatening them with caps is the best thing to do to show that you haven't been emotionally compromised by self-interest.
even so, the stuff is better than legion gear AND even using a full set, dodge sucks. do they really want to kill off dodge themed toons that badly?
I tested the set by testing dodge. how's that.
I'm not getting suckered again. This is a classic Chinese business tactic to sucker you in with fake sht. They will end up nerfing whatever this new gear buffs in a few months and make us pay for it, like they do with everything else, I'm done supporting the Asian gang bang on my wallet.
Damn, I am wrong. That's horrible, that gear shouldn't even be considered for pass. It's just another way to make Heroic and Legion gear redundant, most likely shoved into a lockbox I bet.
Try actually playing a character without dodge primary and dodge mod installed, and a non-dodge passive. I've done it. You might be surprised. Did you know that there are things in this game to keep you from dying other than RNG?
Not the point. Anyone who has altitis, a lifetime sub, a gold sub, lots of freeform slots, etc knows this.
I'm not sure why people are defending this nonsense, and at this point I frankly don't care to speculate why a tiny minority of players are the only ones supporting this.
Bottom line, nerfing gear and existing mechanics instead of choosing to bring a few powers in line is beyond stupid and will not end well.
Want to raise the level cap and introduce new content so that I need to buy new gear? SOLD.
Can't sell keys anymore and think that changing old gear and introducing new gear sans incentive to actually use it (the fact the old stuff is changed because Emmert is speaking on a panel regarding a tricky mmo topic is not a reason)? No deal.
Again the gear is for testing this not sure it will be added with this..and its not even ready yet..So people are asumeing to quickly that this is going to be bad..Give them time to work it through give them constructive help insted of complaining. There is no need for complaining
PS: If this new gear is real.....NOT IN LOCK BOXES!!! Make it so we get it from mobs bosses quest or unity dallies...
Haven't tested yet, but just from looking at the feedback/numbers in the thread so far, here's my suggestions:
1. Convert everything that currently adds flat dodge chance to dodge rating (Evasive Maneuvers, Thundering Kick with advantage, etc). This lets you scale everything on the same scale, with one exception (which I'll mention below)
2. Change LR to add flat dodge chance and avoidance, scaling with superstats and rank.
3. Hard cap Avoidance and Dodge Chance at 95%. I'd suggest that level 40 LR hit this at about 1000 combined superstats and rank 3. It should be at about 80% Dodge/75% Avoidance at "expected" level 40 superstat levels (whatever's necessary to get 60% total damage boost from superstats) and scale from there with Dodge Chance rising faster than Avoidance. You should be able to hit the hard cap on Dodge Chance far sooner than you hit it on Avoidance.
Reasoning:
If you invest in LR as your passive, you should be guaranteed to get roughly equivalent performance to the other defensive passives. Preferably, the good ones (Defiance, Invuln, sometimes Regen).
With this setup, LR users (and Archetypes stuck with LR) won't have to take other dodge-granting powers, but also won't get much benefit from them unless they do something other than just add dodge/avoidance. I think this is an acceptable tradeoff as long as LR is truly capable of standing on its own (which, at present, it's not consistently able to without backup, and with the proposed PTS changes, it definitely won't be).
Yes, this kills some build synergies, but it also means you don't need to know the ins and outs of the synergies to make a good dodge build. Which is as it should be. You don't need to stack a bunch of stuff to make Invuln perform well, and you shouldn't with LR either.
This nerfs the defensive components of Quarry, WotW, and the Avoid/Dodge primary defenses that everyone seems to be running around with. I think this is advisable, as in the current metagame, at even moderately high levels of optimization, you can get Quarry up to levels where it meets LR-levels of performance for most content.
I'd also suggest, when nerfing all the non-LR dodge rating stuff, that you put more emphasis on lowering Avoidance over Dodge Chance. High Avoid/low Dodge is far more frustrating than high Dodge/low Avoid, as it leads to spikier gameplay and less reliable defenses.
Alternatively, keep the hard cap and just make everything add flat dodge chance, with LR getting very close to the hard cap on its own.
Oh, and regardless. Buff the base defense on gear a bit.
Dodge/Avoid gear should hit its soft cap around the Heroic Gear mark. (40-50%)
Over-investing with Legion Gear should provide far less returns at that stage, encouraging Legion Gear havers to invest in something else (IE an avoidance core, + HP, defense, etc. etc.)
Dodge-built-in passives should have their soft cap raised to account for the built-in Dodge bonus... or said bonus should become a flat addition that doesn't trigger diminishing returns.
Lightning Reflexes, Quarry, Way of the Warrior and Night Warrior are saved. Adding Dodge/Avoid to a Defensive or Support passive build is still possible, but using Legion Gear to push Dodge/Avoid to absurd levels becomes impossible. BCR + RR is still viable.
With Unbreakable's fix, Masterful Dodge may very well have some competition in the Active Defense field, thus making both options attractive. Bring more powers in line and don't go overboard with the soft caps and we'll be fine.
Really, though... only being able to 'dodge' 15% of all attacks coming your way is harsh.
Again the gear is for testing this not sure it will be added with this..and its not even ready yet..So people are asumeing to quickly that this is going to be bad..Give them time to work it through give them constructive help insted of complaining. There is no need for complaining
PS: If this new gear is real.....NOT IN LOCK BOXES!!! Make it so we get it from mobs bosses quest or unity dallies...
This. Seriously, just look at some of the numbers that are coming out of the curve changes. Quarry has more dodge-chance than LR. The people who will be hit hardest are the people who actually use dodge-based passives. You can still get ridiculously high dodge chances by cheesing Evasive Maneuvers and Thundering Kicks. This is so obviously beta that there is no doubt that this will get changed substantially in the future, or at worst, not be released at all.
Though, as a bit of a potential rebuttal, you might consider the Telepathy moves to be a horrible failure that was rushed out the door. However, consider that there are plenty of people that have made excellent use of them for controller/debuff characters, and also that there had been something of like upwards of a year spent developing this stuff, and it was all brand new moves. Contrast this to the dodge curve adjustment, which is just a tweak and not in fact new stuff. If it's broken and can't be fixed, it won't get released.
And finally, here's a bit of a comparison between current iterations of dodge and other damage mitigation tactics:
Damage Mitigation:
Reduces all incoming damage.
If you're lucky/combine defense with a defensive passive, you can cut all incoming damage into half.
Defense on its own, if specialized to buff it (say around 350 defense) can almost sort of kind of halve damage on its own.
Difficult to stack, and has no special mechanics or extra defensive perks tied to it.
Dodge:
Redcues incoming damage sometimes - in some cases, upwards of 70% of the time.
Said damage gets cut down by an exact percentage of avoidance. If you have 70% avoidance, you only take 30% of the damage. Period.
Dodge can heal. BCR + RR. This right here is probably the biggest disparity between dodge and the rest of the defenses.
And finally, it's ridiculously easy to stack.
And hey, I got upwards of 15 characters geared to dodge and basically be tankmages. But on the other hand, holy sht you are reacting to this like babbies. It was only a matter of time before this would happen.
Lazy dum description for people who cant read: Dodge most likely will get nerfed. But definitely not to the extent it's been done here right now.
I'm not a buildmeister, and I normally don't comment on powers stuff where it doesn't relate to genre emulation, but...
I'm not against a modest nerf to Dodge to make other build styles more attractive. I don't think "more challenging content" that only caters to the top 5% of the player base is the answer, though we do need more good, repeatable content for those players. (A new Lair where the Difficulty slider really matters and where people receive decent incentives to run it would be nice).
I'm willing to wait to see if the initial numbers are just flat broke before I start screaming, and I'd encourage at least a little restraint from the rest of the player base. However, please take your time and be *very* certain before you implement this one, Cryptic. Anything that makes an AT unplayable should not hit Live.
This. Seriously, just look at some of the numbers that are coming out of the curve changes. Quarry has more dodge-chance than LR. The people who will be hit hardest are the people who actually use dodge-based passives. You can still get ridiculously high dodge chances by cheesing Evasive Maneuvers and Thundering Kicks. This is so obviously beta that there is no doubt that this will get changed substantially in the future, or at worst, not be released at all.
Though, as a bit of a potential rebuttal, you might consider the Telepathy moves to be a horrible failure that was rushed out the door. However, consider that there are plenty of people that have made excellent use of them for controller/debuff characters, and also that there had been something of like upwards of a year spent developing this stuff, and it was all brand new moves. Contrast this to the dodge curve adjustment, which is just a tweak and not in fact new stuff. If it's broken and can't be fixed, it won't get released.
And finally, here's a bit of a comparison between current iterations of dodge and other damage mitigation tactics:
Damage Mitigation:
Reduces all incoming damage.
If you're lucky/combine defense with a defensive passive, you can cut all incoming damage into half.
Defense on its own, if specialized to buff it (say around 350 defense) can almost sort of kind of halve damage on its own.
Difficult to stack, and has no special mechanics or extra defensive perks tied to it.
Dodge:
Redcues incoming damage sometimes - in some cases, upwards of 70% of the time.
Said damage gets cut down by an exact percentage of avoidance. If you have 70% avoidance, you only take 30% of the damage. Period.
Dodge can heal. BCR + RR. This right here is probably the biggest disparity between dodge and the rest of the defenses.
And finally, it's ridiculously easy to stack.
And hey, I got upwards of 15 characters geared to dodge and basically be tankmages. But on the other hand, holy sht you are reacting to this like babbies. It was only a matter of time before this would happen.
Lazy dum description for people who cant read: Dodge most likely will get nerfed. But definitely not to the extent it's been done here right now.
"And hey, I got upwards of 15 characters geared to dodge and basically be tankmages. But on the other hand, holy sht you are reacting to this like babbies. It was only a matter of time before this would happen."
No, I am reacting to this like a paying customer who sees absolutely no need for a nerf to gear I have paid for. Furthermore, when you call customers "babbies" and say things like "f night warrior passive" frankly sir you have no business being a community moderator. It was not a "matter of time", unless you just got your crystal ball out of hock and it's just now powering up.
edit: reread your entire post is an example of why you should not be a community moderator.
Wait, Bluhman's a community moderator? Since when? I thought he was just some weirdo who makes costumes with an LTS.
?_?
... also, those hold/root = dodge debuff suggestions from earlier sound great too, do those.
I would also like to note that, if you're primarily ranged, stacking EM and Thundering Kicks is a pain in the butt. Not so much if you're melee though.
Bluh a community moderator!! hahahahahahaahahahahhah that was a good one =p.
Though in all honesty I agree 100% with his opinion. Dodge needs to be nerfed, though definitely not as massive as it is right now, but lowering its effectiveness by... lets say... 20% would be a good start. Or leave dodge as it is but remove the advantage of BCR.
And also... plz buff Offense moar, kk, thx, bye =p.
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OK, I've been running numbers and I propose a simpler, easier solution to dodge and critical chance. IMHO, the biggest change to Dodge and Crit was the gear post On Alert -- it made anyone just slap on some Heroic with the right mods gain a minimum 30% crit and 40% dodge with 60% avoidance (more of course with Legion).
So I propose:
All Gear AND Gambler's Luck cores have HALF VALUE for critical chance, dodge rating and avoidance rating.
Do not make any new curves, do not change any powers or specs. Gear is the problem. This change will still preserve the heroic concept for those players who want a dodge/crit toon. Now players might actually want to use Lightning Reflexes and Parry in their builds again (just like before On Alert).
Before and After Numbers:
Quarry/Legion Agility 72%/62% before, 59%/52% after
Heroic Agility 40%/58% before, 29%/45% after
As for halving the critical rating on Gambler's and Gear at least now people who want critical chance will need DEX or actually use the spec trees in Strength and Ego.
I don't know why you would change the Severity DR curve, it was bad before anyways and rarely did players use Piercing mods.
I have tested not your Offense changes, I suspect it was a reaction to the critical chance nerf. I would simply get rid of DR with it completely and just make it a flat bonus like Defense does. Additive damage already has a DR curve so why have the existing double DR for Offense?
Players, I would love to see support for this change vs. others.
and canadascott, we dont need lairs and new content to cater ONLY to top tiers, we need new mechanics that challenge ALL players by how its designed.
Hence the "where the difficulty slider really matters" part of my comment. That's the mechanic that was intended to make content accessible for a wide range of build styles, though even when it did matter (pre-On Alert), it always left something to be desired. Do that effectively, and players can work their way up to higher challenge levels on their own speed.
The current PTS build ( FC.31.20130824.10 ) has the following preview changes.
The diminishing returns curves on Avoid, Dodge, Critical Chance, Severity, and Offense have all been adjusted. Additionally Offense now scales in a separate layer of damage bonus to make it more straight forward to understand. Avoid, Dodge, Critical Chance, and Severity will now rise significantly more slowly while at level cap. Offense will now scale with an entirely new curve, and should be much more valuable to players overall. This is an experimental potential future change that will not be part of the bug fix release. We are interested in how these adjustments feel at at all levels of gameplay.
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I've seen some of you telling people that the variety of playstyles aswell as stat combinations were to be reviewed before PvP.
I'd like to say that for a start, completing your objective on this very subject will also result in a positive impact in PvP anyways. Do not crash on this one though, flat bonuses will be a problem with the nerfs, such as with Quarry.
Hmm while i dont post very often i have this to say, while i can expect these numbers to be toned down before going live i feel the dodge/avoidance changes should only start affecting the higher end builds, the ones that have near and above 80-100ish% dodge and avoidance mostly from stacking flat dodge buffs, anyone below i feel should be unnaffected imho.
Perhaps they could change the flat dodge/avoidance boosts into dodge/avoidance rating which is affected by diminishing returns, say having the rating equal to the amout they would have from the flat bonus until they start stacking it at which point dimishing returns would kick in and prevent them form having silly amounts of dodge/avoaidance, that way thouse with moderate amounts of dodge/avoidance (say about 55-65ish% dodge and 60ish% avoidance) would remain unnaffected.
nerfing gear isn't the answer either. monsterdaddy's previous suggestions made more sense.
I still like my previous suggestions but they are just hard to implement. Gear really is the major change due to On Alert. My proposed nerf to gear brings it closer to pre On Alert levels (but still better than before) and is very easy to implement.
We could also stop pretending this has anything to do with balance. This is an attempt to get us to purchase a new set of gear.
If people feel like they are trivializing the content, self limitation is a fix that could be applied by the players themselves.
Dodge too high? Don't rank up passives that use it. Is the content still super easy? Ok, strip out your secondary gear and run content. Is your damage output ruining your fun? Easy, take different powers or don't rank the powers you think are overpowered. Still not enough? Leave an active offense out of your build. We could go on all day with this.
All Gear AND Gambler's Luck cores have HALF VALUE for critical chance, dodge rating and avoidance rating.
I think that's an excellent idea. Balance-wise, I don't think the curves (aside from Offense) are the problem. The problem is that a single piece of gear can push far enough into those curves that the gear becomes an acceptable surrogate for certain superstats or powers.
Then Repurpose should be removed from Prescence's stat tree, or severly nerfed, to prevent people from using the new Offensive scaling to abuse healing more than it already is now. As it stands Repurpose+Offense is grossly op, and if you eliminate the dr's on Offense without nerfing Pre's spec tree, people will transition from dodge to healing.
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So...take LR, dodge everything, but...still get hit for lots of damage?
Maybe what needs to be done, is make it so LR itself is the Dodge/Avoid Passive and can avoid a lot of the changes they want to do with Dodge/Avoid.
I admit to wanting some sort of change. I found the +DMG of Quarry to be worth switching to over LR (original passive) as I really didn't see that big of a difference play wise in the defense aspects (but noticed the damage difference).
But killing LR is a terrible idea.
I like these suggestions for a way to reign in Dodge, especially if it applies to enemies too. That would play into some strategic gameplay by opening up new options for debuffing foes. Perhaps we could also have debuffs for Critical Chance / Severity as well? IMO, that would be a lot more satisfying than just redoing the Diminishing Returns curves.
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Lordgar, you seem like a nice person, so I'm just going to say this person to person and not as a customer.
Who asked for this? Any of this? I see a blurb in Gamasutra about Jack Emmert's upcoming speech on how to handle "pay to win" situations and frankly I don't think it's a coincidence. Push this through, and I will be speaking to my bank and getting a rather large chunk of the sizeable amount of money I've spent on this game back. I know this means I will no longer be able to play any of PWE's games ever again, but frankly, despite the wonderful friends I have made here, that in and of itself is simply not enough to make me turn a blind eye to what's happening here, and I'll pull the trigger and walk away.
Simple as that.
I thought you weren't speaking as a customer? Seriously. :rolleyes:
The ones who have the huge dodge plus offensive roles are doing it with powers that provide flat bonuses to dodge. Quarry, Evasive Maneuvers, Lead Tempest with advantage, etc. None of those are affected by diminishing returns at all.
So what needs to be done is not any change to dodge rating, but rather changing those flat bonuses to be properly affected by diminishing returns. The simplest way, as I see it, to do that would be to change them to grant dodge rating equivalent to their old flat bonus. So Quarry for example, instead of giving a flat 18% dodge chance bonus, would give however much dodge rating is equivalent to 18%. Which is to say, the amount that would take a character with no other source of dodge rating from the base of 10% to 28%.
That way, they can prevent the ridiculous dodge + offensive passive combo without making dodge rating itself effectively useless and also without making Lightning Reflexes useless, as in keeping with the intention of it being the dodge passive it would be the only power to keep its current flat bonus. This would in turn cement LR's place as the best passive for dodging stuff.
Help a bigfoot in trouble, have changed from
dodge core or an avoid core and an armoring core,
to 2 rank 3 stats and 1 rank 4. (and thats on LIVE)
they are being removed so people can't get them.
are they doing this to the FEW missions which have dodge/acoid cores as rewards, replacing them with low rank rubbish mods.
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Well they are leftovers from a mod system that isn't quite finished.
Deliciously nutritious!
When people log in to find that legion gear has been nerfed, that a greater divide between heroic and legion gear will exist under the guise of "sweeping changes" to core mechanics, and that instead of tailoring changes to a few powers they will overhaul the system apparently on a whim and prepare us for new gear to buy so that we may adjust accordingly, the mods themselves will be the least of Cryptic's worries.
This is a massive change, there will be some errors and tweaks.
The idea looks to be a shift from "Dodge and crit all the time always" to having offense and defense gear choices actually look appealing.
Are we there yet? Well no, the few tests I did have my build a lot crazier in damage outputs and survivability than it is on live with a heavy offense/defense spec. Won't be done testing for a while for a writeup, there's a lot to go through.
How about some datamining, like real datamining. Not just looking at numbers with what you already want to say in mind.
The PTS server does not have enough players participating at the moment.
Don't.
Touch.
My.
Gear.
Unless we agree that inborn tenacity items are causing imbalance, and should be removed.
Sorry for the double post, hit wrong button.
But this.
Testing is important. PTS to LIVE should be allottted longer time schedules for testing. Give silvers a means of joining and helping. If we get enough people, we could do what K proposes.
Cryptic, are you willing, if this LR nerf will go life, return Zen to every player who ever bought the Specialist or the Master AT, just like you did with Hawkwing prototype jets?
And grant them retrain token, so they can use Zen for purchasing other AT and retrain to it?
Because you will have to. You will be selling non-functional, broken product to people. Archetypes with no working passive.
It's my personal opinion that, if anything, Lightning Reflexes should be the most important way for obtaining high dodge and avoidance. While everything else can be safely nerfed. It's a dodge dedicated passive which is, since On Alert, overshadowed by everything else, from gear to offensive passives. Players wanting extreme dodge and survivability should be looking at LR first, not for Quarry or WoTW. As it is now, dodge system makes little sense and I do agree that some changes must be done to dodge stacking.
It's just that killing LR will be counter-productive, while Quarry will remain largely unaffected.
I would think that the history of a previous MMO would be a lesson to any future MMOs as to what happens when drastically changing its combat sytem.
To summarize, a company well-known for its MMO background managed to alienate the majority of its customer base by drastically changing its combat system. Now mind you, this was a STARWARS license, with a major fanbase that went well beyond your typical MMO playerbase, but even said license wasn't enough to prevent a mass exodus.
Don't get me wrong, I can accept that dodge/avoid has been a problem since I've started, and I'm referring to pre-alert. However, pre-alert, the biggest "issue" was Bountiful Chi Resurgence not having an internal cooldown, which was fixed ages ago.
Post alert, it's become standard across the board regardless of setup. However, it's mostly been out of necessity. Alerts are typically five random players thrown together to defeat a group of enemies. However, there is absolutely no guarantee of a well balanced team short of forming one beforehand.
As someone who's lost count of the alerts I've completed, I can tell you to this day I'm more likely than not going to pull more than my own weight, whether it be to carry lower level players or more casual ones. While that's all fine and dandy when I'm running my tank, I prefer offensively focused roles. To this day my most played character is my very first, an AT. Post-alert gear has allowed that character to remain playable in a less than ideal environment, which would be effectively the entire alert system.
By drastically reducing dodge/avoid, you would not only destroy a core mechanic, but also alienate a significant (if not large/majority) of your playerbase, myself included. While my departure from this game would be just shy of meaningless, I can guarantee you I would not be the only one. Players of all skill levels invest a combination of time, effort and money in order to enjoy their playing experience. Even this Destroid Invasion weekend, I'm still seeing folks taken aback by the recent changes to legacy devices, something that had significant advanced warning.
Don't get me wrong, a lot of us vets have learned to push the current combat system to the limit. But these changes would affect everyone, even the most casual of players. It should be no surprise that some of the playerbase can vastly outperform the majority, we've put in the time and effort to learn the system and adapted accordingly. But what about that brand new 40 that leveled strictly through smash alerts?
Also, as I'm sure has been mentioned, this change would single-handedly destroy any specialist AT, master AT, or any character built around lightning reflexes. While freeforms have the option of changing passives, those do not.
Ultimately I feel this is a poorly thought out solution from someone with little actual gameplay experience. I know from personal experience I've spent countless hours seeing the impact dodge has had on the gameplay experience across a number of characters both Archetype and Freeform. If there's an issue with damage mitigation, dodge/avoid may be a factor but its hardly the culprit.
Pretty much this. ^
I've seen a few (very few) of my fellow players express what can be done with dodge when we min/max. That's a valid point, but in my opinion a marginally valid one and here's my opinion why. Note: This is my opinion.
The only people who are in support of this that I see are people who I know from years of playing with them, against them, and talking to them to be power gamers in this game. They (we) are the minority. Yes we can do some amazingly powerful stuff in the game but let's be honest most people who freeform aren't doing that kind of stuff and the ATs definitely are doing much of it either.
This is a delicate issue and I'm being nice by calling it an issue because I don't think dodge, avoid, crit etc. are the issue. I can count on one hand how many people I personally know who quit because the game is "too easy" and I'd need a few pages to write the names/handles of the ones I've said goodbye to over the last 4 years because they ran out of things to do...
I'll probably catch some flak for this but hopefully my friends respect me enough to respect me disagreeing with them on this one. Those of us on a certain channel who are pushing for this? Stop listening to them on this topic, seriously. They (we) have historically always found ways to break this game since launch that the vast majority of the playerbase either never know about or simply do not do. It's the game within the game. These dodge changes won't kill the game for me (or them). It'll kill some concepts but I'll build around them as I usually do or retire them like I did my main Sho Nuff about two years ago when a major change gutted his concept beyond repair at the time (although that change made me leave the game for months). However, when people like my casual friends, my wife, my cousin's wife, my frat brothers, or my 13 year old son play the game they already find it difficult and some of their characters are using dodge as it is now. I repeat they are using the current dodge and think the game is moderately hard. And let's not forget all the dodge characters I see falling in defeat in the PUG alerts.
In a nutshell, this looks like an attempt to make existing content "harder" but to be frank it won't make much of anything harder for the people pushing for this change and they (we) know it because we already know several other ways to get around this. It'll make a few isolated pieces of content slightly more challenging but the big effect is that it's going to make the game more difficult for the type of players that don't seem to need/want it to be more difficult. Don't do this, give the power gamers something new to do that will faceplant them until they figure it out.
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As to the changes:
I'm with Bob and Hinkypink. These were needed a very long time ago. Stacking dodge/avoid made making never-dying tanks too easy and trivialized content (my quarry single-blade guy could solo Cybermind. Yeah). Perhaps this way it won't be as easy to stack defense and healers will end up being a little more desired in Alert/team settings.
And before you people jump on me and say this is too much: player power is out of control and has been since On Alert hit. I suspect many of those complaining have gotten used to being this powerful or joined after On Alert hit. If it's this easy to create a free-form that can solo just about everything, there's something very wrong with the systems available and a good, hard look is needed.
There's also the fact that the devs may be seeing that players are stacking crit/dodge/avoid at the expense of all else. Having something be that desirable means its overpowered and requires adjusting.
This is only the initial adjustment. Some fine-tuning is expected, but I think this is the right direction. Hopefully, reigning in player power will allow the developers to create meaningfully challenging content.
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Funny part is, the mass outrage people are expressing at the fact that they might actually have to do something other than just slap on the exact same heroic primary with the exact same defense mod (and in a lot of cases the exact same passive) for every single character... just shows how badly this change is needed.
Remember when we used to complain that there were too many "obviously better" choices that restricted our ability to be creative? Good times.
Remember when we used to complain that the game was too easy? Now we're terrified that if our dodge gets lower we're all gonna get slaughtered.
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If it turns out to be a scam to sell more lockboxes I will be very unhappy with this game.
A few pages back someone mentioned that that new gear is just for testing, and will not go live.
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Try actually playing a character without dodge primary and dodge mod installed, and a non-dodge passive. I've done it. You might be surprised. Did you know that there are things in this game to keep you from dying other than RNG?
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I agree with that. Would be nice to see the other Heroic Primary with different defense mods used.
But killing the dodge build concepts isn't the way to do it. They need to figure out a way for the passives that are dodge/avoid themed to stay good at that and beable to build on it.
You should. They're often the ones who test this stuff.
It's currently possible to use an offensive passive and gain enough dodge to cover an off. passive's weakness: low defense. This removes the incentive to "kill before you are killed' and allows players to create offensive toons that can shrug off nasty hits. How do you construct content around a playerbase that creates toons that can solo just about everything? Or, for the matter, players using a defensive passive and stacking massive dodge on top of that? Invuln+dodge was a pretty popular combo and it's still potent nowadays, and don't get me started on Defiance+dodge.
I imagine this is intended to put dodge and crit back into their niche and make defense/offense stacking more attractive. Once LR gets looked at, I don't think this adjustment will look as bad as players are currently making it out to be. Until then, I'm reserving final judgment until LR's scaling is looked at.
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I agree, those passives that have dodge as a core concept should still give useful amounts of dodge and avoidance; they were balanced like that at some point in the past after all, though just how much of it they should be able to keep will need to be seen.
Making BCR useless for most builds? Shouldn't that be the case? Should a power that essentially relies on a specific mechanic to make the best use of it be useful for every single build out there, or maybe just those builds that specifically focus on that mechanic?
See that's the problem here. This isn't killing dodge builds... this is actually creating dodge builds. Currently on live, every build is a dodge build... so effectively, that's just a default attribute of all builds. If this goes through in some form, the effect would be that making a dodge build actually means something.
And like I said... they're just testing these numbers. Developers will often start with extreme values and then dial them in, so what you're seeing now is unlikely to creep into live. Hell, people are reacting like this is going live next week... for all we know, this is just the start of a process that might take months.
Also Gradii... remember, there is more to this game than just face tanking everything. This might actually make people use some of those other gameplay mechanics this game has... you know, the ones other than "jump around spamming attacks while RNG keeps you safe" :P
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Yeah, cause threatening them with caps is the best thing to do to show that you haven't been emotionally compromised by self-interest.
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I think I'm done....
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Upcoming set. The set is there to be tested, not to useto test other things. Unless anyone can provide a dev quote that says otherwise?
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I'm not getting suckered again. This is a classic Chinese business tactic to sucker you in with fake sht. They will end up nerfing whatever this new gear buffs in a few months and make us pay for it, like they do with everything else, I'm done supporting the Asian gang bang on my wallet.
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Thankfully the gear is just for testing, as far as I am aware.
Read up two posts please.
Deliciously nutritious!
Damn, I am wrong. That's horrible, that gear shouldn't even be considered for pass. It's just another way to make Heroic and Legion gear redundant, most likely shoved into a lockbox I bet.
Not the point. Anyone who has altitis, a lifetime sub, a gold sub, lots of freeform slots, etc knows this.
I'm not sure why people are defending this nonsense, and at this point I frankly don't care to speculate why a tiny minority of players are the only ones supporting this.
Bottom line, nerfing gear and existing mechanics instead of choosing to bring a few powers in line is beyond stupid and will not end well.
Want to raise the level cap and introduce new content so that I need to buy new gear? SOLD.
Can't sell keys anymore and think that changing old gear and introducing new gear sans incentive to actually use it (the fact the old stuff is changed because Emmert is speaking on a panel regarding a tricky mmo topic is not a reason)? No deal.
NO. DEAL.
PS: If this new gear is real.....NOT IN LOCK BOXES!!! Make it so we get it from mobs bosses quest or unity dallies...
1. Convert everything that currently adds flat dodge chance to dodge rating (Evasive Maneuvers, Thundering Kick with advantage, etc). This lets you scale everything on the same scale, with one exception (which I'll mention below)
2. Change LR to add flat dodge chance and avoidance, scaling with superstats and rank.
3. Hard cap Avoidance and Dodge Chance at 95%. I'd suggest that level 40 LR hit this at about 1000 combined superstats and rank 3. It should be at about 80% Dodge/75% Avoidance at "expected" level 40 superstat levels (whatever's necessary to get 60% total damage boost from superstats) and scale from there with Dodge Chance rising faster than Avoidance. You should be able to hit the hard cap on Dodge Chance far sooner than you hit it on Avoidance.
Reasoning:
If you invest in LR as your passive, you should be guaranteed to get roughly equivalent performance to the other defensive passives. Preferably, the good ones (Defiance, Invuln, sometimes Regen).
With this setup, LR users (and Archetypes stuck with LR) won't have to take other dodge-granting powers, but also won't get much benefit from them unless they do something other than just add dodge/avoidance. I think this is an acceptable tradeoff as long as LR is truly capable of standing on its own (which, at present, it's not consistently able to without backup, and with the proposed PTS changes, it definitely won't be).
Yes, this kills some build synergies, but it also means you don't need to know the ins and outs of the synergies to make a good dodge build. Which is as it should be. You don't need to stack a bunch of stuff to make Invuln perform well, and you shouldn't with LR either.
This nerfs the defensive components of Quarry, WotW, and the Avoid/Dodge primary defenses that everyone seems to be running around with. I think this is advisable, as in the current metagame, at even moderately high levels of optimization, you can get Quarry up to levels where it meets LR-levels of performance for most content.
I'd also suggest, when nerfing all the non-LR dodge rating stuff, that you put more emphasis on lowering Avoidance over Dodge Chance. High Avoid/low Dodge is far more frustrating than high Dodge/low Avoid, as it leads to spikier gameplay and less reliable defenses.
Alternatively, keep the hard cap and just make everything add flat dodge chance, with LR getting very close to the hard cap on its own.
Oh, and regardless. Buff the base defense on gear a bit.
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Dodge/Avoid gear should hit its soft cap around the Heroic Gear mark. (40-50%)
Over-investing with Legion Gear should provide far less returns at that stage, encouraging Legion Gear havers to invest in something else (IE an avoidance core, + HP, defense, etc. etc.)
Dodge-built-in passives should have their soft cap raised to account for the built-in Dodge bonus... or said bonus should become a flat addition that doesn't trigger diminishing returns.
Lightning Reflexes, Quarry, Way of the Warrior and Night Warrior are saved. Adding Dodge/Avoid to a Defensive or Support passive build is still possible, but using Legion Gear to push Dodge/Avoid to absurd levels becomes impossible. BCR + RR is still viable.
With Unbreakable's fix, Masterful Dodge may very well have some competition in the Active Defense field, thus making both options attractive. Bring more powers in line and don't go overboard with the soft caps and we'll be fine.
Really, though... only being able to 'dodge' 15% of all attacks coming your way is harsh.
Also, this new gear looks redonkulous.
This. Seriously, just look at some of the numbers that are coming out of the curve changes. Quarry has more dodge-chance than LR. The people who will be hit hardest are the people who actually use dodge-based passives. You can still get ridiculously high dodge chances by cheesing Evasive Maneuvers and Thundering Kicks. This is so obviously beta that there is no doubt that this will get changed substantially in the future, or at worst, not be released at all.
Though, as a bit of a potential rebuttal, you might consider the Telepathy moves to be a horrible failure that was rushed out the door. However, consider that there are plenty of people that have made excellent use of them for controller/debuff characters, and also that there had been something of like upwards of a year spent developing this stuff, and it was all brand new moves. Contrast this to the dodge curve adjustment, which is just a tweak and not in fact new stuff. If it's broken and can't be fixed, it won't get released.
And finally, here's a bit of a comparison between current iterations of dodge and other damage mitigation tactics:
Damage Mitigation:
Dodge:
And hey, I got upwards of 15 characters geared to dodge and basically be tankmages. But on the other hand, holy sht you are reacting to this like babbies. It was only a matter of time before this would happen.
Lazy dum description for people who cant read: Dodge most likely will get nerfed. But definitely not to the extent it's been done here right now.
Also, devs, don't forget, try considering lowering dodge effectiveness from equipmeeeent~~!
I'm not against a modest nerf to Dodge to make other build styles more attractive. I don't think "more challenging content" that only caters to the top 5% of the player base is the answer, though we do need more good, repeatable content for those players. (A new Lair where the Difficulty slider really matters and where people receive decent incentives to run it would be nice).
I'm willing to wait to see if the initial numbers are just flat broke before I start screaming, and I'd encourage at least a little restraint from the rest of the player base. However, please take your time and be *very* certain before you implement this one, Cryptic. Anything that makes an AT unplayable should not hit Live.
It's made of bodyparts of Deadpool, what else can it be.....
And playing by myself since Aug 2009
Godtier: Lifetime Subscriber
"And hey, I got upwards of 15 characters geared to dodge and basically be tankmages. But on the other hand, holy sht you are reacting to this like babbies. It was only a matter of time before this would happen."
No, I am reacting to this like a paying customer who sees absolutely no need for a nerf to gear I have paid for. Furthermore, when you call customers "babbies" and say things like "f night warrior passive" frankly sir you have no business being a community moderator. It was not a "matter of time", unless you just got your crystal ball out of hock and it's just now powering up.
edit: reread your entire post is an example of why you should not be a community moderator.
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... also, those hold/root = dodge debuff suggestions from earlier sound great too, do those.
I would also like to note that, if you're primarily ranged, stacking EM and Thundering Kicks is a pain in the butt. Not so much if you're melee though.
Though in all honesty I agree 100% with his opinion. Dodge needs to be nerfed, though definitely not as massive as it is right now, but lowering its effectiveness by... lets say... 20% would be a good start. Or leave dodge as it is but remove the advantage of BCR.
And also... plz buff Offense moar, kk, thx, bye =p.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
Click up there if you want to find more about the costumes behind my heroines.
So I propose:
All Gear AND Gambler's Luck cores have HALF VALUE for critical chance, dodge rating and avoidance rating.
Do not make any new curves, do not change any powers or specs. Gear is the problem. This change will still preserve the heroic concept for those players who want a dodge/crit toon. Now players might actually want to use Lightning Reflexes and Parry in their builds again (just like before On Alert).
Before and After Numbers:
Quarry/Legion Agility 72%/62% before, 59%/52% after
Heroic Agility 40%/58% before, 29%/45% after
As for halving the critical rating on Gambler's and Gear at least now people who want critical chance will need DEX or actually use the spec trees in Strength and Ego.
I don't know why you would change the Severity DR curve, it was bad before anyways and rarely did players use Piercing mods.
I have tested not your Offense changes, I suspect it was a reaction to the critical chance nerf. I would simply get rid of DR with it completely and just make it a flat bonus like Defense does. Additive damage already has a DR curve so why have the existing double DR for Offense?
Players, I would love to see support for this change vs. others.
Hence the "where the difficulty slider really matters" part of my comment. That's the mechanic that was intended to make content accessible for a wide range of build styles, though even when it did matter (pre-On Alert), it always left something to be desired. Do that effectively, and players can work their way up to higher challenge levels on their own speed.
I've seen some of you telling people that the variety of playstyles aswell as stat combinations were to be reviewed before PvP.
I'd like to say that for a start, completing your objective on this very subject will also result in a positive impact in PvP anyways. Do not crash on this one though, flat bonuses will be a problem with the nerfs, such as with Quarry.
Don't ruin powers - lower the additional benefits from gear.
But maybe not quite so much.
4% dodge for a R4 or R5 lucky gem? Seems kinda low. Personally.
Perhaps they could change the flat dodge/avoidance boosts into dodge/avoidance rating which is affected by diminishing returns, say having the rating equal to the amout they would have from the flat bonus until they start stacking it at which point dimishing returns would kick in and prevent them form having silly amounts of dodge/avoaidance, that way thouse with moderate amounts of dodge/avoidance (say about 55-65ish% dodge and 60ish% avoidance) would remain unnaffected.
I still like my previous suggestions but they are just hard to implement. Gear really is the major change due to On Alert. My proposed nerf to gear brings it closer to pre On Alert levels (but still better than before) and is very easy to implement.
If people feel like they are trivializing the content, self limitation is a fix that could be applied by the players themselves.
Dodge too high? Don't rank up passives that use it. Is the content still super easy? Ok, strip out your secondary gear and run content. Is your damage output ruining your fun? Easy, take different powers or don't rank the powers you think are overpowered. Still not enough? Leave an active offense out of your build. We could go on all day with this.
I think that's an excellent idea. Balance-wise, I don't think the curves (aside from Offense) are the problem. The problem is that a single piece of gear can push far enough into those curves that the gear becomes an acceptable surrogate for certain superstats or powers.
Changing gear is not the answer.