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Consoles gone wild: The Real Problem
ussultimatum
Member Posts: 0 Arc User
There are a lot of reasons why we see powers put onto items (itemized), such as profitability & ease of incorporation onto builds (which is part of profitability) - I'm not really interested in that, debating that or debating "pay to win" here. Feel free to create a thread on it.
I'm interested in balance, and usability.
Balance & Usability: rely on a number of factors such as opportunity cost, power output, stack-ability and cool-downs compared to other items in its class.
Some other terms:
Itemized Powers: Powers that are put onto an item, for example a console or a 3 piece set.
Force Multiplier: A force multiplier refers to a factor that dramatically increases (hence "multiplies") the effectiveness of an item or group. (It's often used by militaries, it's applicable to games like this).
Examples of Force Multipliers
Fire on my Mark, Sensor Scan, Subnucleonic Beam, Attack Pattern Beta/Delta, All "Fleet" abilities, Scattering Field, Generally any effective control power (Tractor beam, Eject Warp Plasma, etc).
Things that are not Force Multipliers
Attack Pattern Alpha, Rotate Shield Frequency, Nadion Inversion, Go Down Fighting.
I think itemized powers can add an interesting dimension to PvP, when they are both usable and balanced.
Where this game, very consistently, runs into problematic implementation with regards to balance in PvP is almost always (there are exceptions) when the power in question is a force multiplier as opposed to a passive stat boost or a direct damage power.
Some examples of console based stat boosts that grant an edge but are generally decently balanced and also usable:
Borg Assimilated Module
Nukara Particle Converter
Tachyokinetic Converter
Zero Point Energy Conduit
Some examples of console (or device) powers that are self-only boosts (utility or defense), damage boosts or damaging attacks, that run anywhere from weak, to usable, to occasionally over performing:
Photon Torpedo Point Defense System
Enhanced Plasma Manifold
Ablative Generator
Impulse Capacitance Cell
Subspace Jumper
Point Defense System
Some examples of console powers (or set powers) that are force multipliers are widely regarded as problematic or "cheap" (as in cheap tactics, not cost) and are often banned from tournaments or private pre-made matches due to their ability to be stacked, and dominate tactics at a macro level.
Theta Radiation Vents
Graviton Pulse Generator
Anti-matter Spread
Aceton Assimilators
Subspace Integrated Circuitry (the original version)
Temporal Inversion Field (not a console)
TL;DR:
Cryptic seems to be decent at balancing simple passive stat boost items.
Cryptic seems to be decent at balancing self-focused boosts/damage use powers.
Crytpic sometimes really misses the mark with force multipliers (SEE: Subspace Integrated Circuitry's original implementation), and these are often the most problematic items implemented. This also includes DOFFs and Hangar pets that are force multipliers, which is a different type of itemization.
Lastly, I encourage open debate and I enjoy when people have intelligent arguments that disagree with mine.
I request everyone to try their best to remain civil towards myself, each other and the developers (yes, they are people too).
I'm interested in balance, and usability.
Balance & Usability: rely on a number of factors such as opportunity cost, power output, stack-ability and cool-downs compared to other items in its class.
Some other terms:
Itemized Powers: Powers that are put onto an item, for example a console or a 3 piece set.
Force Multiplier: A force multiplier refers to a factor that dramatically increases (hence "multiplies") the effectiveness of an item or group. (It's often used by militaries, it's applicable to games like this).
Examples of Force Multipliers
Fire on my Mark, Sensor Scan, Subnucleonic Beam, Attack Pattern Beta/Delta, All "Fleet" abilities, Scattering Field, Generally any effective control power (Tractor beam, Eject Warp Plasma, etc).
Things that are not Force Multipliers
Attack Pattern Alpha, Rotate Shield Frequency, Nadion Inversion, Go Down Fighting.
I think itemized powers can add an interesting dimension to PvP, when they are both usable and balanced.
Where this game, very consistently, runs into problematic implementation with regards to balance in PvP is almost always (there are exceptions) when the power in question is a force multiplier as opposed to a passive stat boost or a direct damage power.
Some examples of console based stat boosts that grant an edge but are generally decently balanced and also usable:
Borg Assimilated Module
Nukara Particle Converter
Tachyokinetic Converter
Zero Point Energy Conduit
Some examples of console (or device) powers that are self-only boosts (utility or defense), damage boosts or damaging attacks, that run anywhere from weak, to usable, to occasionally over performing:
Photon Torpedo Point Defense System
Enhanced Plasma Manifold
Ablative Generator
Impulse Capacitance Cell
Subspace Jumper
Point Defense System
Some examples of console powers (or set powers) that are force multipliers are widely regarded as problematic or "cheap" (as in cheap tactics, not cost) and are often banned from tournaments or private pre-made matches due to their ability to be stacked, and dominate tactics at a macro level.
Theta Radiation Vents
Graviton Pulse Generator
Anti-matter Spread
Aceton Assimilators
Subspace Integrated Circuitry (the original version)
Temporal Inversion Field (not a console)
TL;DR:
Cryptic seems to be decent at balancing simple passive stat boost items.
Cryptic seems to be decent at balancing self-focused boosts/damage use powers.
Crytpic sometimes really misses the mark with force multipliers (SEE: Subspace Integrated Circuitry's original implementation), and these are often the most problematic items implemented. This also includes DOFFs and Hangar pets that are force multipliers, which is a different type of itemization.
Lastly, I encourage open debate and I enjoy when people have intelligent arguments that disagree with mine.
I request everyone to try their best to remain civil towards myself, each other and the developers (yes, they are people too).
Post edited by ussultimatum on
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Comments
For the force multipliers, this could be a good step towards maintaining their usability while simultaneously improving their balance (cost opportunity) to an extent.
I think some of them are still a bit too dramatic in effect, but this is definitely a good idea.
I would love to throw out a cute simple to implement fix... but there isn't one.
Frankly Cryptic has already messed this one up beyond a point that can be fixed with traditional means.
The only option for them to fix it in an honest way at this point is to completely overhaul pvp.
PvP needs to be broken off into its own gear setup.
For anyone that has played Guild Wars they know what I mean... Ships need a PvP paper doll... a doll that can only equip PvP gear... set bonuses need to be remoeved in general (or PvP specific ones added to -p gear)... weapons need to loose there purple / Fleet status... and simply be "mk XII - p" Weapons with the same number of modifiers for everyone... and the idea of dual weapons removed from PvP.
Until Cryptic goes down that road this games PvP system will be forever flawed and nothing more then a diversion for true pvpers... while they are away from other more serious games.
That may seem harsh... it is however just the way it is.
If you throw one Sensor Scan onto a target, yay! Throw 3 on, and the poor guy is going to die from a single BO.
3.they dont do pvp updates
Well, I said it was a good idea but I didn't say that it would actually happen. :P
On the other hand things they could do that wouldn't take a ton of work:
1) Take extra precautions when creating itemized force multipliers, especially with regards to the magnitude & duration of debuffs.
2) Make sure item is flagged to be resisted by appropriate skills.
3) Make sure AoE Force Multiplier effects are within reason, as these have the most problematic potential (team buffs are generally a safer bet than AoE debuffs).
Take a look at all of the single target damage clickies they have created, take a look at all of the AoE Effect Debuffs they have created.
They always pour a bit too much into the AoE Force Multipliers, and they often pour too little into the damage effects.
They are cautious of overdoing the damage effects, but they tend to underestimate the AoE Debuffs/Force Multipliers.
I think some of this is a bias due to their history as a company, they have developed primarily PvE games and also because damage is generally a lot easier to balance than a force multiplier.
A force multiplier is hard to quantify in terms of impact.
Subnucleonic beam is arguably the most powerful captain skill in the game in PvP.
In PvE it's borderline irrelevant.
Even in some PvP matches, typically uncoordinated PUG matches, the true power of SNB goes largely unrealized because if your Force/Team does not capitalize on the buff strip, then nothing gets multiplied/magnified.
You're ignoring defense, the role it plays in the game, the implementation of defense in the game, how defense is gained or isn't in the game, and in general 'defense'.
Everything you are discussing is above the level of defense in the game and derives from it. Those things are not relevant to a discussion on balance. Because defense is not balanced.
In short, and I'm wasting my effort here I'm sure, at any time when bonus defense is present, and most certainly when it is present by the new passives (go FIGURE, PASSIVES) none of the things you mentioned are problematic at all. In fact, they are all ineffective.
There really are simple answers.
WUT? console powers don't miss, wtf defense have to do with this.
Vin Naftero@playhard88 - FED Sciencie
K'tan@playhard88 - KDF Tactical
Argento@playhard88 - RRF Tactical (FED)
yeah that's what I was thinking...
maybe I'm missing something, but the only way to evade one of the force multiplier consoles, as defined by ussultimatum is to be fast enough to get out of the way, but that has to do with too much speed rather than defense.
Are you sure you are in the correct thread?
As for defense, take another look at the force multiplier debuffs that are added onto consoles.
Most of them have no interaction with DEF as a score (because they auto-hit), outside the ones that are capable of stripping defense in the case of movement debuffs (GPG, TIF, Theta, etc) - that's part of them being force multipliers.
Its like he forgets how well balanced the game was prior to defense.
The issue isn't defense... its the fact that the combo of active and passive healing along with resistance has people healing 10x there hull and 20x there shield values every min. Sure noobs don't understand how to achieve that so for them PvP is a broken slaughter fest... and of course those people become pretty easy marks for the candy man selling them equalizer consoles.
Defense is just a third defensive aspect of the game that adds dimension. The idea that ACC rules them all is BS... it doesn't rule them all at all.
The game has plenty of issues right now... not sure defense is one of them. Perhaps it could be argued that the ships designed to take advantage of defense where never intended to be running stupid things like on crit placates... on hit heals... along with 2x natural shield regen... 50% shield resists thanks to fleet shields. (which is really eating poor thises BOLS)... and power enough to push that shield regen another 40-50% as well as juicing up any aux heals they bring along.
To much power to much resist to much regen... on top of DEF boosts to go along with.
Its power Creep that messes things up not the actual stat mechanic.
I'll try and split the difference.
I'd include non AoE defesive (and defensive reducing abilities) as force multipliers. A TB reduces a target's defense for all who choose to shoot the target. APO boosts defense against all shooting at the target.
Along these lines a great many things are force multipliers including resists to Sci Boff abilities, resists, SNBs, relative movement advantage (defensively speaking for most builds). It's why I'd count some engineer abilities as force multipliers even though they only buff the engineer's defense.
Imo, it's pushing the extremes which has caused the most issues which includes the ACC vs Defense rating.
Random Quote from Kerrat
"Sumlobus@****: your mums eat Iced Targ Poo"
C&H Fed banter
Hiya,
By the definition that I personally go by, a force multiplier magnifies the capability of the entire team (or at least multiple units).
So for example,
Polarize Hull (self only) is not a force multiplier
vs.
Scattering field (Self +allies) is a force multiplier
APO (self only) is not a force multiplier
vs.
Fleet Maneuver Gamma (JHHEC console) (self+ allies) is a force multiplier
For your other example, Tractor beam, it is absolutely a force multiplier as it strips defense and holds targets, it magnifies the entire teams ability to suppress or kill.
Cannon Rapid Fire on the other hand, only buffs 1 ship's ability. It's not a force multiplier (just as a comparison).
Nearly all control effects, Debuffs, AoE Buffs, AoE Heals, etc., are a type of force multiplier.
One of the best force multipliers available?
Team Speak/Ventrillo. :P (I'm serious, think about what GPS does for the capabilities of a military unit/force)
Force Multipliers in and of themselves are good, they are the bread and butter of support classes and support ships, as well as good teamwork.
Force Multipliers that are Itemized Powers are often where we see problematic implementation and are generally the most heavily criticized.
Why only go one way though? If an ability that allows a target to be hammered by a team be would be a force multiplier (TB), wouldn't an ability that prevents/absorbs that damage and boosts resists of the allied repairs (in terms of HP) be a force multiplier (PH)?
Edit: Granted AoE are in general worse if equal magnitude of Single Target disables.
Random Quote from Kerrat
"Sumlobus@****: your mums eat Iced Targ Poo"
C&H Fed banter
An SNB that strips a canon rapid fire is not really a force multiplier. It was the only thing taking part in the effect (a reduction in the targets damage output).
However an SNB that strips an APO and EPtS is a force multiplier. If one person on your team shoots the victim that SNB would be measurably response able for a set amount of damage dealt because it removed those defensive buffs. If four people on your team fire on the victim that SNB would have indirectly dealt much more damage.
It is the same logic that makes APB so stupid powerful in PvE even if most people fail to realize it.
Or you could just ask yourself if five players all used this ability at the same time on the team would it's effect be significantly stronger than if just one did for each one activated. That sounded simpler in my head.
* > +
For the sake of example, let's switch to sensor scan & APA.
Blue Team Player A gets hit by Sensor Scan
Red Team Players (x5) now do more damage
Blue Team Player A
Red Team Player Z APAs and shoots Blue Team Player A. The damage contribution of the other Red Team players remains unchanged.
In order to be a Force Multiplier, mechanically, the powers effect needs to benefit the rest of the force by amplifying what they all do.
This is also why in Premades Sci is the most important captain, the one that Stacks the best.
Nearly every single captain power they have is some type of Force Multiplier. Even Photonic Fleet, to an extent.
Sci Force Multipliers = Sensor Scan, SNB, Scattering Field, Sci Fleet. And to an extent Photonic Fleet.
Tac Force Multipliers = FOMM, Tac Fleet
Eng Force Multipliers = Eng Fleet
This doesn't mean that individual "self-only" powers aren't useful or powerful, obviously APA is powerful. It's just a statement on the potential for any given power, item, doff, console, etc to augment either SELF or TEAM.
Technically I think this is still a Force Multiplier.
Unlike say, PH, which is completely self only.
Using SNB to strip APA & CRF defends the entire team, as the Escort can target anyone.
So in that usage, it is still a Force Multiplier and arguably the single best control power in the game.
But, PH amplifies the effectiveness of allied hull repairs, much in the same way ES amplifies shield repairs (not withstanding the differing effectiveness do to cap differences and overall differences between shields and hulls). They both only target 1 ally, they boost the effectiveness of team repairs.
I'm not saying I disagree with why you're categorizing what you have as offensive force multipliers, I just think you're leaving out some if the defensive ones is all.
Random Quote from Kerrat
"Sumlobus@****: your mums eat Iced Targ Poo"
C&H Fed banter
Well, honestly this thread is more about consoles as opposed to force multipliers.
I needed to layout the term for those who hadn't heard of it before.
I have an idea for a thread that might go back into that for a bit, and some side conversation here is fine too.
ES Magnifies only one persons resistance, that's the main bit really.
I mean we could lump "heals" into a single category and call them a force multiplier, because they certainly do help the team. But mechanically, individually, most of them are single target and are not really multiplying the force on their own.
Rather its a 1 ship to 1 ship buff, so its good but it doesn't multiply the entire force's capability in a single application.
Unlike say the Vesta's Sympathetic Fermion Tranciever, which is an AoE regen (and PG) buff.
ES can either be a force multiplier or not depending upon situation. If only one person is firing at the target then the damage reduced via increased resistance is minor but if five are firing at the target then yeah, force multiplier. You are simply relying upon the other team to create it.
So yeah, in the proper situation it is but not always, although opinions will vary.
Fair enough, though I'd think of it as a multiple target force multiplier and is semantics at this point. They do need to be handled more carefully then single ship/target force multipliers since the potential is that much greater.
Those type of abilities need to have long cooldowns or readily available options for counters. They should also have a ceiling of impact when combined w/like abilities (instead of log based curves too many hyperbolic stacks). This is Cryptic's main failing when introducing new powers imo, instead of offering different interesting routes to similar effects it's just toss w/e new idea against the wall w/o seeing the forest from the trees (OT, I should see how many cliches and mixed metaphors I can toss into 1 run-on sentence).
Random Quote from Kerrat
"Sumlobus@****: your mums eat Iced Targ Poo"
C&H Fed banter
How many people on your team were saved or protected by that 1 ES?
1.
That's why its a single target power, and not a force multiplier.
A Force Multiplier, needs to multiply the capabilty of the entire force in some way, in a single activation.
Mutiple target is intrinsic to being a force multiplier.
This the meat of the conversation really, either some way to curb stacking limits and create ceiling of impacts or the AoE Control/Debuffs need to be much more limited in their magnitudes of power than they are now.
For example:
Graviton Pulse Generator.
Not only is it a Multi-target AoE with a massive cone...
Not only does it debuff speed...
Not only does it debuff movement...
It can be buffed to have it's duration last well over 50s, at the super extreme end of 60s!
60!!
Could you imagine a 120s EWP?
That's the same duration multiplier that GPG inexplicably has, applied to EWP.
This is the core of problematic implementation, and generally Force Multipliers are at the root, because they are so powerful to begin with by their nature of being Force Multipliers.
Ok I guess for sake of literal interpretation I could agree to label it a force divider. Sound good?
Let's take a quick look at the available pets.
Fed Only
Danubes
Delta Flyers
Peregrine Fighters
Shield Repair Units
Stalker Fighters
KDF Only
B'Rel
Fer'Jai
Marauding Force
Orion Slavers
Orion Interceptors
Power Siphon drones
S'kul
Tachyon Drones
To'Duj
Romulan Only
Romulan Drones
Cross Faction
Jem'Hadar Attack Ships
Jem'Hadar Fighters
Scorpion
Tholian Mesh Weaver
Tholian Widow
Now let's split these up into 2 broad categories: Standard (Damage, or Healing) & Force Multipliers (Debuffs, AoE effects)
Standard
B'Rel
Jem'Hadar Fighters
Jem'Hadar Attack Ships
Peregrine Fighters
Scorpion
Shield Repair Units
S'kul
To'Duj
Tholian Widow
Force Multipliers
Danubes (Yellowstones)
Delta Flyers
Fer'Jai* [They appear as damage pets, but they come with Aceton (debuff), Tricobalts (stun) and Chronitons (movement debuff))
Marauding Force
Orion Interceptors
Orion Slavers* (probably intended as a debuff, as they "steal crew")
Power Shiphon Drones
Romulan Drones
Stalker Fighters (Atrox)
Tachyon Drones
Tholian Meshweaver**
Take a look at the Standard list.
Take a look at the Force Mulitpliers.
I'll give you one guess as to which list contains most (or all) of the commonly complained about, often banned (from tourneys or arranged premade 5v5s) pets.
Sure, there are some duds, like Delta Flyers who by design have a power that is severely underperforming so they in turn are underperforming pets.
Yet, we can clearly see the issue: Danubes/Yellow Stones, Power Siphons, Rom Drones, Orion Interceptors - all of the problematic pets are effective itemized force multipliers.
**Fun note, they made a strong showing in the recent No BS Tourney hosted by lag - just wait til the general PvE playerbase finally wraps their heads around (and acquires) Elite Tholian Meshweavers. I expect a nerf possibly around that point.
Think it's hyperbole? Think sub 3 minute Elite STFs. It's happening now.
Another fun note: Take a look at the force multipliers list. Take a look at the colors by faction. Guess which faction has the most force multipliers? Guess which faction's pets have often received the most complaints?
Glad you are learning from our last conversation i believe this was my argument that the ability isnt op its the stacking. Sounds like 3 sensor scans is an i win button better ban that from the next tourney. Something that only has one clear and that clear puts your tac team on cooldown has such a short cooldown and is aoe with no cost of a boff ability or console and with 1 doff can aoe debuff your damage to ****. nah who am i kidding grav pulse is worse.
if i throw a ball at you and you move and the ball doesn't hit you is that a miss. If you fire off inversion and i move is that a miss. While defense doesn't help movement does.
This post has been edited to remove content which violates the Perfect World Entertainment Community Rules and Policies . ~Bluegeek