Work towards a resolution continues, but there will not be one available in tomorrow's patch. As many of you know, there is an interesting history with FaW in STO, and we plan on continuing to investigate the reason why bugs with it occur. We are not currently planning to push a resolution for any issues related to FaW until we're confident that we've tracked down the underlying issue and have a permanent solution in place. I don't have a current ETA for this. We will continue to keep you in the loop as we have more information related to FaW to share, but know it's not forgotten.
Thanks for your patience, and we apologize for the inconvenience experienced by our players who use this power.
Cheers,
Brandon =/\=
Thanks for keeping us informed.
Unlike a lot of others, I still use fire-at-will on several characters. It's part of my builds for them and I don't like substituting something I really don't want to use. At least for the time being I can still use FAW, so it's not completely broken and unusable.
(Just the occasional mishap )
Captain: "Lieutenant Dorf, why did you shoot my first officer?"
Lt. Dorf: "You told me to fire at Will, sir."
Captain: "You know damn well his name is Jack. You're confined to quarters until further notice."
The only hard part about coding FAW was the energy drain. Mainly because you're shooting more times per second. Especially with multiple targets. And the selection of multiple targets would be a bit difficult as well.
The possibility of hitting a target is basic math and it uses a 0-99 roll system. It gets your to hit %. This starts with a base hit % which we're lead to believe is 95% as shown under ship/attack/accuracy. You then add up all your accuracy from shipattack/accuracy+weapons+consoles+etc. You then get the targets defense. Then you get the difference of acc/def. Then do if diff<0, 1/(1-Diff), if diff>0, 2-(1/(1+Diff)). This is then added and or subtracted to the 95% chance to hit. If you have an 80% chance to hit you need to roll 20-99 to hit. If you roll below 20 you miss. Now this is a 2 roll system in that the 2nd roll would determine if you crit or not. However a 1 roll system is close to the same except if you had a 20% chance to crit it would be 80-99=crit, 20-79=hit, 0-19=miss.
For figuring out crit hit % you add up ship/attack/chance to crit/energy weapon spec/weapons/etc. You then get the difference of accuracy/defense. Then do if diff>0, diff*.125. Same applies to Crit severity except it uses if diff>0, diff*.5
There really isn't to much difference between how to code to determine a hit, crit, crit severity, etc etc between abilities. It's all just basic math and extremely basic programming. Except for the drain and faw's multiple targeting which can and will complicate it a bit. But the basics should still be in place.
So i'm just a bit stumped as to why this appears to be so difficult. Yes there's more to it then I described. Your power level, Targets range, Targets resistance, etc, etc. But the basics ie chance to crit aren't even working. If it needs to be recoded that's fine. It still shouldn't take much time or effort. Some people seem to think this is overly complicated. I tend to strongly disagree. Nothing is hard if you put your mind to it.
And this is not a complaint as I applaud the honesty of Branflakes post letting us know what's going on. And I agree 100% with fixing it for real this time. But like others I use FAW. I been using an aux2bat build for about a year now. I don't enjoy playing science and I don't like the limited arc of a DHC build. Beam Arrays are the only thing I enjoy. Love that broadsiding like a ship at sea. I don't need to do 20k+ dps. I just need FAW to work correctly so I can enjoy the game. So of course I want it fixed asap. But I can be a little patient. Especially if it's fixed correctly this time. But being patient to me doesn't mean waiting a month. So get her done, please.
So i'm just a bit stumped as to why this appears to be so difficult. Yes there's more to it then I described. But the basics ie chance to crit aren't even working. If it needs to be recoded that's fine. It still shouldn't take much time or effort. Some people seem to think this is overly complicated. I tend to strongly disagree. Nothing is hard if you put your mind to it.
The thing about FAW is that it's multi-targeting works on the basis of sending messages out to potential targets and waiting for a "Shoot me" response, then it locks targets and fires, rinse and repeat, This to the proc system was counting as two attacks, hence double proc-ing, if they were to consolidate these processes into one process that would likely fix the issue but that involves new suedo-code and ultimately new code, which takes a while to build and test
The thing about FAW is that it's multi-targeting works on the basis of sending messages out to potential targets and waiting for a "Shoot me" response, then it locks targets and fires, rinse and repeat, This to the proc system was counting as two attacks, hence double proc-ing, if they were to consolidate these processes into one process that would likely fix the issue but that involves new suedo-code and ultimately new code, which takes a while to build and test
I don't believe for a second that it sends out a message to potential targets and waits for a "shoot me now" response. No game that I know of programs anything like this and therefore this game wouldn't either. That makes absolutely no sense at all.
FAW if I was programming it would first find potential targets that were in range and within it's arc. Then I would have it do it's thing, ie fire at the target. And i'd be using "While" and not "GoTo" statements. The only complication would be which targets FAW selects. If you had 8 targets within the arc of your front beams and 3 targets within range of the rear beams. For the rear ones if like me you only have 3 in the rear then you know which targets get hit. For the front 7 targets is just picks them at random with a random number generator. Or perhaps it picks near to far. It could be done either way. Well except for the target you actually have selected that is as that will always get hit. It then fires at those targets until the cycle is complete. After cycle completion it repeats. Now it is possible that after it selects the targets that it then gets your accuracy/targets def/range/weapon power, targets resistance, etc etc. And as depending on which FAW you use ie 1, 2, or 3 it would increase it's damage. But this code would be the same as autofiring for determining hit, crit H, Crit D damage except for the added damage and cycle times.
I still don't know if there was ever a double proc problem either. Although there could have been. I did see double procs but not the way you think. It merely looked like a double proc. ie combat logged looked like this.
plasma beam fire at will II crits for xxxx
DEM hits for TRIBBLE
DEM hits for TRIBBLE
This was a combat log issue and or it takes time to register a hit based on distance. During the time of the so called double procs my combat log looked like this.
DEM III hits for xxxx
plasma beam fire at will II crits for xxxx
plasma beam fire at will II hits for xxxx
Cutting beam hits for TRIBBLE
plasma beam fire at will II crits for xxxx
plasma beam fire at will II hits for xxxx
plasma beam fire at will II hits for xxxx
plasma beam fire at will II crits for xxxx
DEM III hits for TRIBBLE
DEM III hits for TRIBBLE
plasma beam fire at will II hits for xxxx
DEM III crits for xxxx
DEM III hits for xxxx
Notice there were 7 fire at will hits without DEM between them. You then see a double proc to make up for it. Then a FAW hit then another double proc, etc, etc. However in the end it worked out to the correct amount of actual procs. At least for me when I tested this with rom plasma weapons using FAW II and DEM III. And again maybe there was a real double proc problem. I'm just saying that in my tests they were all as shown above.
Oh heck, wasting to much time on this. Sherlock Holmes (Brit version) on in a bit and I still have a BBQ to do. Broken FAW just can't compete with that. ~
FaW adds absolutely no value to this game what so ever. Keep it in its current state, non critting. Without Crits its still more powerful then Cannon Scatter Volley.
FaW adds absolutely no value to this game what so ever. Keep it in its current state, non critting. Without Crits its still more powerful then Cannon Scatter Volley.
lol.
Cannon rapid fire and beam overload adds nothing to the game, atleast for me, please break it so it doesn't crit.
I don't believe for a second that it sends out a message to potential targets and waits for a "shoot me now" response. No game that I know of programs anything like this and therefore this game wouldn't either. That makes absolutely no sense at all.
"I will find up to 2 targets within my firing arc, and send them a message. They will send back a message telling me to shoot them."
It's built in this manner in order for us to be able to do point-to-point beam FX to multiple targets with a single power activation pulse. We've toyed with rebuilding it, but it never feels as responsive and intuitive as the current structure.
You may not believe it but it doesn't make it wrong :P
The difference here is that FAW involves coding, the UI just involved swapping out one set of assets for another.
Er... no. The UI is completely different from the old one. It might look like an asset swap, but it's pretty obvious from the enhancements that it's a complete re-implementation (and if it wasn't LoR dev blog #8 specifically says they reimplemented the UI).
Any progress on this? The thread has been quiet for almost a week. There is a patch tonight but the patch release notes still only list the FAW crit issue as a "known" issue.
Update! We're testing a resolution internally and will also roll it out to Tribble for player testing as soon as possible. Hopefully in the next Tribble update, or the one after.
Update! We're testing a resolution internally and will also roll it out to Tribble for player testing as soon as possible. Hopefully in the next Tribble update, or the one after.
Cheers,
Brandon =/\=
resolution is to veigh a word! details man, details! was it rebuilt or a truly fixed original?
Update! We're testing a resolution internally and will also roll it out to Tribble for player testing as soon as possible. Hopefully in the next Tribble update, or the one after.
Cheers,
Brandon =/\=
Thanks for that update. I'll head over to Tribble and do some testing as it looks like it's already on Tribble.
Can we get a dev blog on what you did during this latest iteration to fix it?
I can only assume that some serious considerations and tinkering occurred because it has been so long.
Hey Brandon this would actually be pretty cool as a "behind the scenes" post. It could include some whiteboard scribbled notes showing a logic flow, quick interview notes from the programmer who fixed it, etc. Historically FAW has unfortunately had more than its fair share of bugs so a rewrite of the function is noteworthy.
Nitpicking is a time-honored tradition of science fiction. Asking your readers not to worry about the "little things" is like asking a dog not to sniff at people's crotches. If there's something that appears to violate natural laws, then you can expect someone's going to point it out. That's just the way things are.
My fleet is reporting that while BFAW is indeed Critting, [Acc] modifiers are NOT overflowing correctly.
I just spent a little time on tribble testing with a fleet Chimera, with the Dynamic Tactical Console enabled, accurate traits etc for a base accuracy overflow of 29,5%. Then I slapped on three Nanite Disruptor [acc]x3 Beam arrays, and three common phaser beam arrays. Added to that where 1 romulan male tactical officer and 1 borg console for a base crit chance of 5,4% when viewed in space.
To get as much hits as possible I went with minimum weapons power and spent 11:01 minutes shooting stuff in SB24.
Results: hits criticals swings
Disruptor Beam Array: Fire at Will III; 4790 205 4916
Phaser Beam Array: Fire at Will III; 4853 217 4853
Update! We're testing a resolution internally and will also roll it out to Tribble for player testing as soon as possible. Hopefully in the next Tribble update, or the one after.
Cheers,
Brandon =/\=
2 months and Bridge Officers in away team are still getting ruined by the melee bug/glitch.
I'm not playing this game again untl that is fixed and reported in release notes.
Any BO equipped with melee weapon will stop using primary and secondary attacks. Even when re-equipped with energy weapons of any kind, primary attack is gone, permanently.
The only solution is to dismiss the BO and get a new one from exchange.
This is a horrid example of gameplay bug and should have been fixed long time ago.
Resolution is just fine, it works, stuff that is broken should be of highest priority.
I just spent a little time on tribble testing with a fleet Chimera, with the Dynamic Tactical Console enabled, accurate traits etc for a base accuracy overflow of 29,5%. Then I slapped on three Nanite Disruptor [acc]x3 Beam arrays, and three common phaser beam arrays. Added to that where 1 romulan male tactical officer and 1 borg console for a base crit chance of 5,4% when viewed in space.
Disruptor Beam Array: Fire at Will III; hitrate 97,4% ; crit chance 4,28%
Phaser Beam Array: Fire at Will III; hitrate 95,81%; crit chance 4,47%
Now, I know this is a pretty small sample size but it appears to me something isn't right there, Cryptic please fix:)
(PS. Tried to align numbers with spaces, but its not working very well, a table function wouldn't be so bad either:rolleyes:)
Not sure how helpful that test would be. Did you remove all hits to shields? Shields hit will never indicate a crit. Yet you do get the added damage. Did you account for moving targets? This will effect acc overflow. Please test vs stationary targets as i did in my tribble bug report post. http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?p=14624961#post14624961
My testing so far shows that Energy Weapon Specialization still does not work for FAW. ACC via ship attack: accuracy and nukara particle converter seem to be working fine for acc overflow. I did not test the acc modifiers on weapons. But i don't believe that works during normal firing so i wouldn't expect it to work for FAW either. But i could be wrong on the last.
Not sure how helpful that test would be. Did you remove all hits to shields? Shields hit will never indicate a crit. Yet you do get the added damage. Did you account for moving targets? This will effect acc overflow. Please test vs stationary targets as i did in my tribble bug report post. http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?p=14624961#post14624961
My testing so far shows that Energy Weapon Specialization still does not work for FAW. ACC via ship attack: accuracy and nukara particle converter seem to be working fine for acc overflow. I did not test the acc modifiers on weapons. But i don't believe that works during normal firing so i wouldn't expect it to work for FAW either. But i could be wrong on the last.
Actually what bothers me the most about the numbers is the increased miss-rate when using FAW. That acc overflow is variable and therefore can't be relied upon to give a consistent bonus to crth/d I won't dispute, but that activating FAW would cause an increased miss-rate even using [acc]x3 weapons on top of 29,5% base overflow I find rather peculiar. Especially since movement during FAW and non-FAW fire doesn't seem likely to vary in such a large amount as to drop accuracy below 100%.
Further testing is in progress however,
Lost and Delirious... and Disenchanted too Apparently some forum posters have diplomatic immunity nowadays, where can I get mine?
Maybe I missed something, but why are people conducting test now on Tribble?
Didn't Branflakes say they will roll it out to Tribble ASAP (i.e., it hasn't been rolled out yet); so whatever you're currently testing is not the corrected FAW?
Edit: from Tribble Notes: "Systems:
Powers: Beam Fire at Will:
Resolved an issue where this ability was unable to critically hit."
Actually what bothers me the most about the numbers is the increased miss-rate when using FAW. That acc overflow is variable and therefore can't be relied upon to give a consistent bonus to crth/d I won't dispute, but that activating FAW would cause an increased miss-rate even using [acc]x3 weapons on top of 29,5% base overflow I find rather peculiar. Especially since movement during FAW and non-FAW fire doesn't seem likely to vary in such a large amount as to drop accuracy below 100%.
Further testing is in progress however,
I agree with you in that acc in regards to missing has always bothered me. However if the target ship is moving it gains def and this would decrease your chance to hit. Example follows.
Targets def value from speed and assuming 100% hit chance at 0 defense (which ignores the tooltip that says 95%)
+0% acc
+25% defense
hit chance=80%
+0% acc
+50% defense
hit chance=66.67%
+0% acc
+75 defense
hit chance=57.14%
+25% acc
+25% defense
hit chance=100%
+25% acc
+50% defense
hit chance=80%
+25% acc
+75% defense
hit chance=66.67%
+45% acc
+25% defense
hit chance=100%
+45% acc
+50% defense
hit chance=95.24%
+45% acc
+75% defense
hit chance=76.92%
When you use FAW hit chance will decrease as it shoots at torpedos, pets, etc. All of which have a higher def mainly due to speed. However i still feel that boff abilities still miss at a higher rate then normal autofiring. I miss Dreadnoughts etc that aren't even moving or are moving very slowly when using FAW. And this makes no sense to me why i miss them unless they used an ability which increased their def beyond my +35% acc. Or did someone using Repusler cause their speed and therefor their def to exceed my 100% chance to hit. Another reason for me to hate when people use that ability if this is true.
Sadly this is a very difficult one to test as you'd need a target that has a consistent def and preferably a high one like 75% or so. So the only way i know to get consistent results would be to challenge a friend. He'd need to be at max impulse speed to achieve a high enough def value to conduct a real test. And as the hit chance will still be determined by a die roll of 0-99 with having to roll a 19-99 for an 80% chance to hit as an example it means sample size would have to be quite large. I'd say at least a 60k sample size.
This is why we use stationary targets for testing acc overflow for crt hit and crit severity. But as they have we assume -15% def we'll never miss. So we can't test hit chance that way.
I already posted these results on the Trible Bug Thread, but since I am unsure off where the Devs will be reading, I will post them here as well.
I performed testing on Tribble on the new FAW-fix, in a PvP environment, using 3 [dmg] beam arrays, 3 [acc] beam arrays, and depending on the tests, between 9 and 0 points in Energy Weapon Specialisation (EWS) and Starship Targetting Systems (STS). The targets where unshielded, and had known defense ratings. Base critical chance was 5,4% for all three tests.
Test 1, Base acc overflow 25, 9 points in EWS, targets defense rating 10, unshielded target, 9 points in STS
Hits
Crits-Actual Crt%-Base Crt%-Acc. Overflow Crt%-EWS Crt%-Expected Crt%
BA [acc]
8891
881
9,91
5,4
2,5
2
9,9
BA [dmg]
8774
812
9,25
5,4
1,63
2
9,03
BA FAW [acc]--10079----775
7,69
5,4
2,5
2
9,9
BA FAW [dmg]-10084----754
7,48
5,4
1,63
2
9,03
Test 2, Base acc overflow 25, 0 points in EWS, targets defense rating 7.7, unshielded target, 9 points in STS
Hits
Crits-Actual Crt%-Base Crt%-Acc. Overflow Crt%-EWS Crt%-Expected Crt%
BA [acc]
9680
765
7,90
5,4
2,68
0
8,08
BA [dmg]
9712
769
7,92
5,4
1,84
0
7,24
BA FAW [acc]--9240
469
5,08
5,4
2,68
0
8,08
BA FAW [dmg]-9245
516
5,58
5,4
1,84
0
7,24
Test 3, Base acc overflow 10, 9 points in EWS, targets defense rating 10, unshielded target, 0 points in STS
Hits
Crits-Actual Crt%-Base Crt%-Acc. Overflow Crt%-EWS Crt%-Expected Crt%
BA [acc]
9876
916
9,27
5,4
1,14
2
8,54
BA [dmg]
9796
752
7,67
5,4
0
2
7,4
BA FAW [acc]--9225
695
7,53
5,4
1,14
2
8,54
BA FAW [dmg]-9200
707
7,68
5,4
0
2
7,4
Test 1,difference between expected crt% and actual crt%
Actual Crt%-Base Crt%-Acc. Overflow Crt%-EWS Crt%-Expected Crt%-difference Crt%
BA [acc]
9,91
5,4
1,84
2
9,9
0,01
BA [dmg]
9,25
5,4
1,63
2
9,03
0,22
BA FAW [acc]
7,69
5,4
1,84
2
9,9
-2,21
BA FAW [dmg]
7,48
5,4
1,63
2
9,03
-1,55
Test 2,difference between expected crt% and actual crt%
Actual Crt%-Base Crt%-Acc. Overflow Crt%-EWS Crt%-Expected Crt%-difference Crt%
BA [acc]
7.90
5,4
2,68
0
8,08
-0,18
BA [dmg]
7,92
5,4
1,84
0
7,24
0,68
BA FAW [acc]
5,08
5,4
2,68
0
8,08
-3,00
BA FAW [dmg]
5,58
5,4
1,84
0
7,24
-1,66
Test 3,difference between expected crt% and actual crt%
Actual Crt%-Base Crt%-Acc. Overflow Crt%-EWS Crt%-Expected Crt%-difference Crt%
BA [acc]
9,27
5,4
1,14
2
8,54
0,73
BA [dmg]
7,67
5,4
0
2
7,4
0,28
BA FAW [acc]
7,53
5,4
1,14
2
8,54
-1,00
BA FAW [dmg]
7,68
5,4
0
2
7,4
0,28
Difference in Crt% between FAW and non-FAW fire:
Test 1, FAW [acc] weapons, 2,2% lower Crt% then regular fire
Test 1, FAW [dmg] weapons, 1,8% lower Crt% then regular fire
Test 2, FAW [acc] weapons, 2,83% lower Crt% then regular fire
Test 2, FAW [dmg] weapons, 2,3% lower Crt% then regular fire
Test 3, FAW [acc] weapons, 1,74% lower Crt% then regular fire
Test 3, FAW [dmg] weapons, 0,00818% higher Crt% then regular fire
Average difference in Crt% between FAW and non-FAW fire on tests 1 and 2:
FAW on average 2,3% lower Crt% compared to non-FAW fire
Average difference in Crt% between FAW and non-FAW fire on test 3:
Interestingly enough, there is no significant difference when we look at the [dmg] FAW vs. normal firing. Note that the [acc] weapons do show a difference of 1,74%
Total sample size test 1; 37828 hits, test 2; 37877 hits, test 3; 38097 hits, total amount of hits; 113802 hits. This is not an extremely large sample size, but, I wouldn't consider it to be too low to be significant either.
With regards to critical chance, EWS seems to do pretty much what it is supposed to do. The observed Crt% is rather close to the expected Crt%, during normal firing. There is some variance between expected and observed Crt%, but that is most likely due to sample size. The moment FAW becomes activated, this changes completely. With or without 99 points into EWS, I observed an average lower Crt% of 2,3%. This appears completely unrelated to EWS. Having tested the use of FAW using 3 weapons where total acc overflow equals defense, and using 3 weapons where total acc overflow exceeds defence, the results regarding Crt% seem clear. There is no significant reduction in Crt% for the [dmg] mod where acc equals defense, whereas there is a significantly lower critical chance of 1,74% between normal firing and FAW firing for the [acc] weapons. Albeit this number is slightly higher then expected, looking at the results I can only conclude that accuracy overflow does not get converted into Crt% when using FAW.
On a perhaps interesting side-note, during FAW firing using the [dmg] mod weapons whereby defence equalled total accuracy, there where 0 misses recorded.
I know there is some speculation regarding critical severity and EWS not doing what it is supposed to there, but that fell outside of the scope of my tests. I have the data, and when I find a convenient way of extracting it I might update with results regarding severity.
PS. Any feedback would be welcome:).
PPS. A way too import tables from Excel would have made this post look a lot less messy;).
Lost and Delirious... and Disenchanted too Apparently some forum posters have diplomatic immunity nowadays, where can I get mine?
OK more testing but with the Daeinos "Console-Universal-Dynamic Tactical System". Also weapons were changed out to Plasma Beams [Acc]x3. But still using the Kinetic Cutting beam.
Sample size=60k iterations
Ship stats
acc 29.5% (this increased by 4.5% from Daeinos's Console-Universal-Dynamic Tactical System)
Crit Hit 15.9% (not testing crit hit as the test target has shields)
Crit Sev 82.9%
Additional items and skills that don't show under ship attack
99 into Energy Weapons Specialization for 2% crit hit% and 25% crit sev
Nukara Particle Converter for 10% Accuracy to beams
Weapons are
Plasmas beams [Acc]x3 or +30% acc (Expected crit Sev before factoring in acc or def=107.9%)
Kinetic Cutting Beam=(Expected crit Sev before factoring in acc or def=107.9%)
Acc 29.5%
Acc 10% (Nukara Particle Converter)
Acc 30% Plasma Beams [Acc]x3=30%
Total Acc=69.5%
Assuming -15 defense for the Starbase 234
Diff= +84.5
Chance to hit=145.8%
Acc Overflow for Crit Sev=45.8*.5=22.9%
Plasma Beams [Acc]x3 or 30%=107.9%+22.9%=130.8%
Plasma Beams [Acc]x3 normal firing
expected crit severity=130.80%
Actual result=130.78%
difference= -0.02%
Plasma beams [Acc]x3 Fire at Will III
expected crit severity=130.8%
Actual result=108.01%
difference= -22.79% (Note: This one is way off what it should be.)
Acc 29.5%
Assuming -15 defense for the Starbase 234
Diff= +44.5
Chance to hit=130.8%
Acc Overflow for Crit Sev=30.8*.5=15.4%
Kinetic Cutting Beam=107.9%+15.4%=123.3%
If we first look at the Plasma beams [Acc]x3 during normal firing it tracks within 0.02%. However when using Fire at Will it's -22.79%. Note that if Acc Overflow does not work the expected Crit Sev% is 107.9%. Which would then track at +0.11%. Coincidence? I don't think so.
-Conclusion of Tribble testing-
I'm fairly convinced, especially after respeccing and testing the high acc build for crit severity this time around that Accuracy Overflow is NOT working for Fire at Will. Especially combined with gr4v1t4r's Crit Hit % testing which also had the same behavior.
Comments
Thanks for keeping us informed.
Unlike a lot of others, I still use fire-at-will on several characters. It's part of my builds for them and I don't like substituting something I really don't want to use. At least for the time being I can still use FAW, so it's not completely broken and unusable.
(Just the occasional mishap
Captain: "Lieutenant Dorf, why did you shoot my first officer?"
Lt. Dorf: "You told me to fire at Will, sir."
Captain: "You know damn well his name is Jack. You're confined to quarters until further notice."
Lt. Dorf: "Aye sir."
The possibility of hitting a target is basic math and it uses a 0-99 roll system. It gets your to hit %. This starts with a base hit % which we're lead to believe is 95% as shown under ship/attack/accuracy. You then add up all your accuracy from shipattack/accuracy+weapons+consoles+etc. You then get the targets defense. Then you get the difference of acc/def. Then do if diff<0, 1/(1-Diff), if diff>0, 2-(1/(1+Diff)). This is then added and or subtracted to the 95% chance to hit. If you have an 80% chance to hit you need to roll 20-99 to hit. If you roll below 20 you miss. Now this is a 2 roll system in that the 2nd roll would determine if you crit or not. However a 1 roll system is close to the same except if you had a 20% chance to crit it would be 80-99=crit, 20-79=hit, 0-19=miss.
For figuring out crit hit % you add up ship/attack/chance to crit/energy weapon spec/weapons/etc. You then get the difference of accuracy/defense. Then do if diff>0, diff*.125. Same applies to Crit severity except it uses if diff>0, diff*.5
There really isn't to much difference between how to code to determine a hit, crit, crit severity, etc etc between abilities. It's all just basic math and extremely basic programming. Except for the drain and faw's multiple targeting which can and will complicate it a bit. But the basics should still be in place.
So i'm just a bit stumped as to why this appears to be so difficult. Yes there's more to it then I described. Your power level, Targets range, Targets resistance, etc, etc. But the basics ie chance to crit aren't even working. If it needs to be recoded that's fine. It still shouldn't take much time or effort. Some people seem to think this is overly complicated. I tend to strongly disagree. Nothing is hard if you put your mind to it.
And this is not a complaint as I applaud the honesty of Branflakes post letting us know what's going on. And I agree 100% with fixing it for real this time. But like others I use FAW. I been using an aux2bat build for about a year now. I don't enjoy playing science and I don't like the limited arc of a DHC build. Beam Arrays are the only thing I enjoy. Love that broadsiding like a ship at sea. I don't need to do 20k+ dps. I just need FAW to work correctly so I can enjoy the game. So of course I want it fixed asap. But I can be a little patient. Especially if it's fixed correctly this time. But being patient to me doesn't mean waiting a month. So get her done, please.
The thing about FAW is that it's multi-targeting works on the basis of sending messages out to potential targets and waiting for a "Shoot me" response, then it locks targets and fires, rinse and repeat, This to the proc system was counting as two attacks, hence double proc-ing, if they were to consolidate these processes into one process that would likely fix the issue but that involves new suedo-code and ultimately new code, which takes a while to build and test
I don't believe for a second that it sends out a message to potential targets and waits for a "shoot me now" response. No game that I know of programs anything like this and therefore this game wouldn't either. That makes absolutely no sense at all.
FAW if I was programming it would first find potential targets that were in range and within it's arc. Then I would have it do it's thing, ie fire at the target. And i'd be using "While" and not "GoTo" statements. The only complication would be which targets FAW selects. If you had 8 targets within the arc of your front beams and 3 targets within range of the rear beams. For the rear ones if like me you only have 3 in the rear then you know which targets get hit. For the front 7 targets is just picks them at random with a random number generator. Or perhaps it picks near to far. It could be done either way. Well except for the target you actually have selected that is as that will always get hit. It then fires at those targets until the cycle is complete. After cycle completion it repeats. Now it is possible that after it selects the targets that it then gets your accuracy/targets def/range/weapon power, targets resistance, etc etc. And as depending on which FAW you use ie 1, 2, or 3 it would increase it's damage. But this code would be the same as autofiring for determining hit, crit H, Crit D damage except for the added damage and cycle times.
I still don't know if there was ever a double proc problem either. Although there could have been. I did see double procs but not the way you think. It merely looked like a double proc. ie combat logged looked like this.
plasma beam fire at will II crits for xxxx
DEM hits for TRIBBLE
DEM hits for TRIBBLE
This was a combat log issue and or it takes time to register a hit based on distance. During the time of the so called double procs my combat log looked like this.
DEM III hits for xxxx
plasma beam fire at will II crits for xxxx
plasma beam fire at will II hits for xxxx
Cutting beam hits for TRIBBLE
plasma beam fire at will II crits for xxxx
plasma beam fire at will II hits for xxxx
plasma beam fire at will II hits for xxxx
plasma beam fire at will II crits for xxxx
DEM III hits for TRIBBLE
DEM III hits for TRIBBLE
plasma beam fire at will II hits for xxxx
DEM III crits for xxxx
DEM III hits for xxxx
Notice there were 7 fire at will hits without DEM between them. You then see a double proc to make up for it. Then a FAW hit then another double proc, etc, etc. However in the end it worked out to the correct amount of actual procs. At least for me when I tested this with rom plasma weapons using FAW II and DEM III. And again maybe there was a real double proc problem. I'm just saying that in my tests they were all as shown above.
Oh heck, wasting to much time on this. Sherlock Holmes (Brit version) on in a bit and I still have a BBQ to do. Broken FAW just can't compete with that.
lol.
Cannon rapid fire and beam overload adds nothing to the game, atleast for me, please break it so it doesn't crit.
I have a quote for you...
You may not believe it but it doesn't make it wrong :P
Er... no. The UI is completely different from the old one. It might look like an asset swap, but it's pretty obvious from the enhancements that it's a complete re-implementation (and if it wasn't LoR dev blog #8 specifically says they reimplemented the UI).
Cheers,
Brandon =/\=
I can only assume that some serious considerations and tinkering occurred because it has been so long.
resolution is to veigh a word! details man, details! was it rebuilt or a truly fixed original?
Thanks for that update. I'll head over to Tribble and do some testing as it looks like it's already on Tribble.
Hey Brandon this would actually be pretty cool as a "behind the scenes" post. It could include some whiteboard scribbled notes showing a logic flow, quick interview notes from the programmer who fixed it, etc. Historically FAW has unfortunately had more than its fair share of bugs so a rewrite of the function is noteworthy.
Joined January 2009
I just spent a little time on tribble testing with a fleet Chimera, with the Dynamic Tactical Console enabled, accurate traits etc for a base accuracy overflow of 29,5%. Then I slapped on three Nanite Disruptor [acc]x3 Beam arrays, and three common phaser beam arrays. Added to that where 1 romulan male tactical officer and 1 borg console for a base crit chance of 5,4% when viewed in space.
To get as much hits as possible I went with minimum weapons power and spent 11:01 minutes shooting stuff in SB24.
Results: hits criticals swings
Disruptor Beam Array: Fire at Will III; 4790 205 4916
Phaser Beam Array: Fire at Will III; 4853 217 4853
Disruptor Beam Array; 1590 104 1590
Phaser Beam Array; 1586 91 1592
Disruptor Beam Array: Fire at Will III; hitrate 97,4% ; crit chance 4,28%
Phaser Beam Array: Fire at Will III; hitrate 95,81%; crit chance 4,47%
Disruptor Beam Array: normal firing; hitrate 100% ; crit chance 6,54%
Phaser Beam Array: normal firing; hitrate 99,62%; crit chance 5,74%
Now, I know this is a pretty small sample size but it appears to me something isn't right there, Cryptic please fix:)
(PS. Tried to align numbers with spaces, but its not working very well, a table function wouldn't be so bad either:rolleyes:)
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2 months and Bridge Officers in away team are still getting ruined by the melee bug/glitch.
I'm not playing this game again untl that is fixed and reported in release notes.
Any BO equipped with melee weapon will stop using primary and secondary attacks. Even when re-equipped with energy weapons of any kind, primary attack is gone, permanently.
The only solution is to dismiss the BO and get a new one from exchange.
This is a horrid example of gameplay bug and should have been fixed long time ago.
Resolution is just fine, it works, stuff that is broken should be of highest priority.
Not sure how helpful that test would be. Did you remove all hits to shields? Shields hit will never indicate a crit. Yet you do get the added damage. Did you account for moving targets? This will effect acc overflow. Please test vs stationary targets as i did in my tribble bug report post. http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?p=14624961#post14624961
My testing so far shows that Energy Weapon Specialization still does not work for FAW. ACC via ship attack: accuracy and nukara particle converter seem to be working fine for acc overflow. I did not test the acc modifiers on weapons. But i don't believe that works during normal firing so i wouldn't expect it to work for FAW either. But i could be wrong on the last.
Actually what bothers me the most about the numbers is the increased miss-rate when using FAW. That acc overflow is variable and therefore can't be relied upon to give a consistent bonus to crth/d I won't dispute, but that activating FAW would cause an increased miss-rate even using [acc]x3 weapons on top of 29,5% base overflow I find rather peculiar. Especially since movement during FAW and non-FAW fire doesn't seem likely to vary in such a large amount as to drop accuracy below 100%.
Further testing is in progress however,
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Didn't Branflakes say they will roll it out to Tribble ASAP (i.e., it hasn't been rolled out yet); so whatever you're currently testing is not the corrected FAW?
Edit: from Tribble Notes: "Systems:
Powers: Beam Fire at Will:
Resolved an issue where this ability was unable to critically hit."
OK I'm sorry my mistake. Test away and thanks!
I agree with you in that acc in regards to missing has always bothered me. However if the target ship is moving it gains def and this would decrease your chance to hit. Example follows.
Targets def value from speed and assuming 100% hit chance at 0 defense (which ignores the tooltip that says 95%)
+0% acc
+25% defense
hit chance=80%
+0% acc
+50% defense
hit chance=66.67%
+0% acc
+75 defense
hit chance=57.14%
+25% acc
+25% defense
hit chance=100%
+25% acc
+50% defense
hit chance=80%
+25% acc
+75% defense
hit chance=66.67%
+45% acc
+25% defense
hit chance=100%
+45% acc
+50% defense
hit chance=95.24%
+45% acc
+75% defense
hit chance=76.92%
When you use FAW hit chance will decrease as it shoots at torpedos, pets, etc. All of which have a higher def mainly due to speed. However i still feel that boff abilities still miss at a higher rate then normal autofiring. I miss Dreadnoughts etc that aren't even moving or are moving very slowly when using FAW. And this makes no sense to me why i miss them unless they used an ability which increased their def beyond my +35% acc. Or did someone using Repusler cause their speed and therefor their def to exceed my 100% chance to hit. Another reason for me to hate when people use that ability if this is true.
Sadly this is a very difficult one to test as you'd need a target that has a consistent def and preferably a high one like 75% or so. So the only way i know to get consistent results would be to challenge a friend. He'd need to be at max impulse speed to achieve a high enough def value to conduct a real test. And as the hit chance will still be determined by a die roll of 0-99 with having to roll a 19-99 for an 80% chance to hit as an example it means sample size would have to be quite large. I'd say at least a 60k sample size.
This is why we use stationary targets for testing acc overflow for crt hit and crit severity. But as they have we assume -15% def we'll never miss. So we can't test hit chance that way.
Don't expect anything this time just because they pinky-swear its finally fixed, after promising the exact same thing for literally years of patches.
I performed testing on Tribble on the new FAW-fix, in a PvP environment, using 3 [dmg] beam arrays, 3 [acc] beam arrays, and depending on the tests, between 9 and 0 points in Energy Weapon Specialisation (EWS) and Starship Targetting Systems (STS). The targets where unshielded, and had known defense ratings. Base critical chance was 5,4% for all three tests.
Test 1, Base acc overflow 25, 9 points in EWS, targets defense rating 10, unshielded target, 9 points in STS
Hits
Crits-Actual Crt%-Base Crt%-Acc. Overflow Crt%-EWS Crt%-Expected Crt%
BA [acc]
8891
881
9,91
5,4
2,5
2
9,9
BA [dmg]
8774
812
9,25
5,4
1,63
2
9,03
BA FAW [acc]--10079----775
7,69
5,4
2,5
2
9,9
BA FAW [dmg]-10084----754
7,48
5,4
1,63
2
9,03
Test 2, Base acc overflow 25, 0 points in EWS, targets defense rating 7.7, unshielded target, 9 points in STS
Hits
Crits-Actual Crt%-Base Crt%-Acc. Overflow Crt%-EWS Crt%-Expected Crt%
BA [acc]
9680
765
7,90
5,4
2,68
0
8,08
BA [dmg]
9712
769
7,92
5,4
1,84
0
7,24
BA FAW [acc]--9240
469
5,08
5,4
2,68
0
8,08
BA FAW [dmg]-9245
516
5,58
5,4
1,84
0
7,24
Test 3, Base acc overflow 10, 9 points in EWS, targets defense rating 10, unshielded target, 0 points in STS
Hits
Crits-Actual Crt%-Base Crt%-Acc. Overflow Crt%-EWS Crt%-Expected Crt%
BA [acc]
9876
916
9,27
5,4
1,14
2
8,54
BA [dmg]
9796
752
7,67
5,4
0
2
7,4
BA FAW [acc]--9225
695
7,53
5,4
1,14
2
8,54
BA FAW [dmg]-9200
707
7,68
5,4
0
2
7,4
Test 1,difference between expected crt% and actual crt%
Actual Crt%-Base Crt%-Acc. Overflow Crt%-EWS Crt%-Expected Crt%-difference Crt%
BA [acc]
9,91
5,4
1,84
2
9,9
0,01
BA [dmg]
9,25
5,4
1,63
2
9,03
0,22
BA FAW [acc]
7,69
5,4
1,84
2
9,9
-2,21
BA FAW [dmg]
7,48
5,4
1,63
2
9,03
-1,55
Test 2,difference between expected crt% and actual crt%
Actual Crt%-Base Crt%-Acc. Overflow Crt%-EWS Crt%-Expected Crt%-difference Crt%
BA [acc]
7.90
5,4
2,68
0
8,08
-0,18
BA [dmg]
7,92
5,4
1,84
0
7,24
0,68
BA FAW [acc]
5,08
5,4
2,68
0
8,08
-3,00
BA FAW [dmg]
5,58
5,4
1,84
0
7,24
-1,66
Test 3,difference between expected crt% and actual crt%
Actual Crt%-Base Crt%-Acc. Overflow Crt%-EWS Crt%-Expected Crt%-difference Crt%
BA [acc]
9,27
5,4
1,14
2
8,54
0,73
BA [dmg]
7,67
5,4
0
2
7,4
0,28
BA FAW [acc]
7,53
5,4
1,14
2
8,54
-1,00
BA FAW [dmg]
7,68
5,4
0
2
7,4
0,28
Difference in Crt% between FAW and non-FAW fire:
Test 1, FAW [acc] weapons, 2,2% lower Crt% then regular fire
Test 1, FAW [dmg] weapons, 1,8% lower Crt% then regular fire
Test 2, FAW [acc] weapons, 2,83% lower Crt% then regular fire
Test 2, FAW [dmg] weapons, 2,3% lower Crt% then regular fire
Test 3, FAW [acc] weapons, 1,74% lower Crt% then regular fire
Test 3, FAW [dmg] weapons, 0,00818% higher Crt% then regular fire
Average difference in Crt% between FAW and non-FAW fire on tests 1 and 2:
FAW on average 2,3% lower Crt% compared to non-FAW fire
Average difference in Crt% between FAW and non-FAW fire on test 3:
Interestingly enough, there is no significant difference when we look at the [dmg] FAW vs. normal firing. Note that the [acc] weapons do show a difference of 1,74%
Total sample size test 1; 37828 hits, test 2; 37877 hits, test 3; 38097 hits, total amount of hits; 113802 hits. This is not an extremely large sample size, but, I wouldn't consider it to be too low to be significant either.
With regards to critical chance, EWS seems to do pretty much what it is supposed to do. The observed Crt% is rather close to the expected Crt%, during normal firing. There is some variance between expected and observed Crt%, but that is most likely due to sample size. The moment FAW becomes activated, this changes completely. With or without 99 points into EWS, I observed an average lower Crt% of 2,3%. This appears completely unrelated to EWS. Having tested the use of FAW using 3 weapons where total acc overflow equals defense, and using 3 weapons where total acc overflow exceeds defence, the results regarding Crt% seem clear. There is no significant reduction in Crt% for the [dmg] mod where acc equals defense, whereas there is a significantly lower critical chance of 1,74% between normal firing and FAW firing for the [acc] weapons. Albeit this number is slightly higher then expected, looking at the results I can only conclude that accuracy overflow does not get converted into Crt% when using FAW.
On a perhaps interesting side-note, during FAW firing using the [dmg] mod weapons whereby defence equalled total accuracy, there where 0 misses recorded.
I know there is some speculation regarding critical severity and EWS not doing what it is supposed to there, but that fell outside of the scope of my tests. I have the data, and when I find a convenient way of extracting it I might update with results regarding severity.
PS. Any feedback would be welcome:).
PPS. A way too import tables from Excel would have made this post look a lot less messy;).
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Sample size=60k iterations
Ship stats
acc 29.5% (this increased by 4.5% from Daeinos's Console-Universal-Dynamic Tactical System)
Crit Hit 15.9% (not testing crit hit as the test target has shields)
Crit Sev 82.9%
Additional items and skills that don't show under ship attack
99 into Energy Weapons Specialization for 2% crit hit% and 25% crit sev
Nukara Particle Converter for 10% Accuracy to beams
Weapons are
Plasmas beams [Acc]x3 or +30% acc (Expected crit Sev before factoring in acc or def=107.9%)
Kinetic Cutting Beam=(Expected crit Sev before factoring in acc or def=107.9%)
Acc 29.5%
Acc 10% (Nukara Particle Converter)
Acc 30% Plasma Beams [Acc]x3=30%
Total Acc=69.5%
Assuming -15 defense for the Starbase 234
Diff= +84.5
Chance to hit=145.8%
Acc Overflow for Crit Sev=45.8*.5=22.9%
Plasma Beams [Acc]x3 or 30%=107.9%+22.9%=130.8%
Plasma Beams [Acc]x3 normal firing
expected crit severity=130.80%
Actual result=130.78%
difference= -0.02%
Plasma beams [Acc]x3 Fire at Will III
expected crit severity=130.8%
Actual result=108.01%
difference= -22.79% (Note: This one is way off what it should be.)
Acc 29.5%
Assuming -15 defense for the Starbase 234
Diff= +44.5
Chance to hit=130.8%
Acc Overflow for Crit Sev=30.8*.5=15.4%
Kinetic Cutting Beam=107.9%+15.4%=123.3%
Kinetic Cutting Beam [Dmg]x3
expected crit severity=123.3%
Actual result=122.85%
difference= -0.45%
If Nukara Particle Converter does work for the KCB
Acc=29.5%
Acc 10% (Nukara Particle Converter)
Total Acc=39.5%
Assuming -15 defense for the Starbase 234
Diff= +54.5
Chance to hit=135.28%
Acc Overflow for Crit Sev=35.28*.5=17.64%
Kinetic Cutting Beam=107.9%+17.64%=125.54%
Kinetic Cutting Beam [Dmg]x3
expected crit severity=125.54%
Actual result=122.85%
difference= -2.69%
If we first look at the Plasma beams [Acc]x3 during normal firing it tracks within 0.02%. However when using Fire at Will it's -22.79%. Note that if Acc Overflow does not work the expected Crit Sev% is 107.9%. Which would then track at +0.11%. Coincidence? I don't think so.
-Conclusion of Tribble testing-
I'm fairly convinced, especially after respeccing and testing the high acc build for crit severity this time around that Accuracy Overflow is NOT working for Fire at Will. Especially combined with gr4v1t4r's Crit Hit % testing which also had the same behavior.