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Debuffs and Cleanses - a new mechanical approach?
mustrumridcully0
Member Posts: 12,963 Arc User
Okay, I have probably been out for too long to really start theorycrafting again, but I had this idea on my way home and need to write it down, anyway.
With the upcoming change to the system cooldown for team abilities, a few are worried that cleansing of abilities might become too strong (among other things).
ONe issue the game has always had was that cleanses are pretty binary, and there is little need for a cleanse to be high level. Coupled witht he prevalence of TT since the addition of the shield distribution ability, that made some powers rather weak - for example, Attack Pattern Beta and Delta and FIre on my Mark. This problem might also happen elsewhere.
So here is my idea:
Debuffs generate multiple, tiered stacks of debuffs, depending on their rank.
Cleanses can clear only stacks with a rank equal or lower to their own rank
(Variation: They can also clear one of higher rank, but only if at the time of casting, the lower rank versions are already removed.)
For example:
Attack Pattern Beta II generates an APB I and APB II stack. The total damage resistance reduction and stealth reduction would be exactly the same as for APB II now, but it's now split up in two stacks.
If you now use a rank I cleanse (Tactical Team 1), you would remove the Tier I APB stack, but not the APB II stack.
Subnucleonic Beam III (the version cast by Science VAs) would create 3 cooldown-increasing debuff stacks, and Science Team I would clear the lowest rank, ST II the 2nd lowest and so on.
One could apply this even to buffs, so EPtS III might create 3 stacks of EPtS, and while SNB (III) might still get rid of all 3, there could be new (and revamped old) abilities that target different levels. (Imagine Beam Target Engines having a proc to clear a EptE, Evasive or APO stack and stuff like that)
In addition, the cleanse abilities could also provide an immunity window to stacks that are below their level.
Admittedly, I suspect that implementing this would be non-trivial and thus is unlikely to happen.
But wat do you think? Would that be a viable approach?
With the upcoming change to the system cooldown for team abilities, a few are worried that cleansing of abilities might become too strong (among other things).
ONe issue the game has always had was that cleanses are pretty binary, and there is little need for a cleanse to be high level. Coupled witht he prevalence of TT since the addition of the shield distribution ability, that made some powers rather weak - for example, Attack Pattern Beta and Delta and FIre on my Mark. This problem might also happen elsewhere.
So here is my idea:
Debuffs generate multiple, tiered stacks of debuffs, depending on their rank.
Cleanses can clear only stacks with a rank equal or lower to their own rank
(Variation: They can also clear one of higher rank, but only if at the time of casting, the lower rank versions are already removed.)
For example:
Attack Pattern Beta II generates an APB I and APB II stack. The total damage resistance reduction and stealth reduction would be exactly the same as for APB II now, but it's now split up in two stacks.
If you now use a rank I cleanse (Tactical Team 1), you would remove the Tier I APB stack, but not the APB II stack.
Subnucleonic Beam III (the version cast by Science VAs) would create 3 cooldown-increasing debuff stacks, and Science Team I would clear the lowest rank, ST II the 2nd lowest and so on.
One could apply this even to buffs, so EPtS III might create 3 stacks of EPtS, and while SNB (III) might still get rid of all 3, there could be new (and revamped old) abilities that target different levels. (Imagine Beam Target Engines having a proc to clear a EptE, Evasive or APO stack and stuff like that)
In addition, the cleanse abilities could also provide an immunity window to stacks that are below their level.
Admittedly, I suspect that implementing this would be non-trivial and thus is unlikely to happen.
But wat do you think? Would that be a viable approach?
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Comments
I proposed something very similar once upon a time. That rage that ensued was incredible. Nobody, and I mean nobody wanted to give up the ability to cleanse everything with ensign abilities, no matter how powerful the debuff. However, given the upcoming changes, I feel it's a good time to try again. I like your idea.
It seems a bit complicated, perhaps a percentage based system could do the same without needing to re-work how all of these other buffs/debuffs function?
Example, (really just shooting from the hip here):
Team Ability 1 = +60% resistance or cleanse vs. effects
Team Ability 2 = +80% resistance or cleanse vs. effects
Team Ability 3 = +100% resistance or cleanse vs. effects
Or something like that, the numbers need to be tweaked - it's just an example.
Of course you'd also have to go and nerf all of the powers so that they don't just stack endlessly on top of one another.
Now TT 1 is still useful vs. APB 3, but it's not as useful as TT 3.
ST 1 is still a decent pickup vs. SNB but it won't remove the entire CD reduction.
Honestly though we still have an environment that has:
> Eroded the place of standard escorts.
> Favors massive spike
> Still allows for full FAW teams
It's going to take at least a month for the dust to settle on the team CD changes to see what actually does or does not make sense.
Keep in mind that the idea of these stacks is that you still get a "partial" result.
So your Escort can only afford a Science Team I. Evil Science Captain subnukes you. You get 3 stacks of SNB, each increasing your cooldowns by 33 %. Now you cast ST I, and you get rid of one of these 33 %. That's not nothing, and will lower the window of opportunity to kill you.
I am not sure if I formulated it well above - multiple castings would also remove higher rank stacks (though that's not really relevant for your single ST, it can be important in team play.)
And on the plus side - guess who can clear those FOMMs and APBs from you or your allies, or more importantly perhaps, from your enemies?
One thing I also considered is that the temporary immunity granted could be stack-agnostic, and simply stop the accumulation of any stack, so for the next 5-15 seconds (whatever length we deem fair) you could resist further attempts against you.
And of course, a science vessel with ST III might be the only one to clear everything, but that's also a Lt.Cmdr slot that it cannot use to debuff you.
How would you cleanse 5x A2B FAW boats with perma APB 2 or 3?
Do you force your damage dealers to sacrifice their actual functionality (dealing damage) to stuff TT 2 & 3 onto their builds?
Can you even realistically bring enough TT 2 & 3 to do that?
It is certainly true that you will have to change some assumptions - for example, that you will be able to fight "debuff-free" for extended periods of time. But particular for FOMM, APB, APBD and SS, these debuffs are not annoying like being perma-scrambled* or stunlocked. They will hurt you, but they are manageable - and you will have to learn to live with them. But if people do indeed stack APBs on you -that will mean that they can't stack APO on themselves, which can buff some of the movement debuffs, and also means that another source of damage you would take was taken away from them. (Unless you tell me there is a way to stack APB and APO consistently, with the right DOFFs, then I'd be wrong, but not as wrong as the designer that made that possible.
Of course, if things aren't balanced well overall, it might mean no change (because APO is still absolutely necessary) or merely a change to one different ability. Ideally we'd create a metagame where people have meaningful choices and the trade-offs have to be carefully considered and don't lead to an automatic selection of particular abilities.
*) Now placate, scrambles and stuns are another matter - how could one implement those with a stack system? I don't know yet. Though I was always the opinion that confuses and placates should, on players, only act as damage debuffs, perhaps also perception debuffs, instead of really control-altering abiltiies. But that won't happen, will it?
Usually the irony comes in the suggestion being made and then Cryptic doing something like they are with the teams. There were the discussions taking place and then they dropped out the WCE(Cleanse) DOFF...sort of thing.
But yeah, I didn't play after reading about the team changes. I don't see the point in playing with those changes...meh.
Attacker casts EWP1, defender casts HE1, both are tier-1 spells. EWP1 sticks to the target and periodically does a tier-1 damage pulse. HE1 also sticks, and periodically downgrades any sticky attacks by one tier level. When HE1 reduces the EWP1 to teir-0 it is removed. If the defender is still in the warp cloud, it can be reapplied on the next damage pulse.
Attacker casts EWP3, defender casts HE1. This next pulse from HE1 reduces EWP3 to EWP2, and the next pulse reduces it to EWP1, then the next one clears it. If the target is still in the cloud during any of this the EWP3 is reapplied.
Attacker casts EWP3, defender casts HE3. Same as if they were both using tier-1, in that HE3 takes it to zero in one pulse.
This preserves value for investment on both sides. HE1 is useful but not an instant cure. Investment in higher-level attacks and cures yields more rewards.
This doesn't work. Why? The power insulators skill already cuts drains to about 40% for most builds and I usually find that healers have 60% resistance. The extra cleanse versus effect, even at the team ability 1 you're proposing, cuts drains down to 30-40% of stated value. Even escorts might as well ignore any sci abilities like this.
I think you need to re-evaluate what you've just said, because to be perfectly honest that is not the reality of the current game. I'm not trying to be rude, I know you've come back to the game after a bit of a hiatus.
"Perma" APB 3 multi-stacked from 3+ ships is not "annoying", due to the amount of bleedthrough effects we have right now.
How does watching 5% to 10% of your hull disappearing every second while you have RSP and full shields sound?
This is possible right now, no you will unlikely see this in a PUG match.
Just take a moment and calculate what 5x APB 3 looks like on a single target, and then extrapolate that to encompass an entire team since this can be FAW-spammed onto every target permanently.
If FAW gets changed at some point, and debuffs no longer stack, usually, without diminishing returns then you would be onto something.
Effectively we are at a point in the game where proposals like yours while good intentioned and even interestingly conceived are not realistic without sweeping changes to many other aspects of the system.
It's like a jenga tower the size of a skyscraper.
Ok a few things:
1) ST doesn't cleanse drains, HE cleanses Tykens and ES. Although I'd say HE should work like this as well.
2) My proposed system:
Team Ability 1 = +60% resistance or cleanse vs. effects
Team Ability 2 = +80% resistance or cleanse vs. effects
Team Ability 3 = +100% resistance or cleanse vs. effects
what we have now
Team Ability 1 = +100% cleanse vs. effects
Team Ability 2 = +100% cleanse vs. effects
Team Ability 3 = +100% cleanse vs. effects
That's what we have right now where TT 1 cleanses/resists all Tac debuffs of every level at 100% efficacy.
ST 1 cleanses SNB at 100% efficacy.
Some of those 100% cleanses function as "resistance" (TT vs. APB) some of them do not (ST vs. SNB).
Maybe that's not enough of a difference. Maybe the cleanse should be, as some previous poster suggested, actually come in multiple pulses - after, say, 4 or 8 seconds, even an APB3 would be cleared entirely with a TT1?
Or are you saying that even without APB3 (didn't hear that most people use APOs on their escorts? Or is that just PUG advice?), the bleed through is ridicilous and we cannot under any circumstance allow APB or SS to actually stick?
Let me put it another way.
Stacked APB 1 alone is enough to melt hulls right now.
So if in your system, you had ships running AB3 / 2 and that simply got downgraded to 1, it would still be exceptionally powerful to never be able to reliably clear this without gimping yourself for TT 3.
Most people use APO, it's not specifically a PUG thing.
You can however make team comps that heavily use APB. You could also make them where they rotate during APOs downtime.
You can coordinate that APB, but you can also make team comps that focus specifically on perma APB saturation.
It's actually possible now to saturate another team with so much APB that even with the current TT cleanse they can't realistically keep their entire team free of it (although the TT CD change might alleviate this to an extent, it still comes with cost).
Bleedthrough in and of itself isn't the issue, BFAW hitting every target without even needing a target is part of the issue.
Full weapons power DEM 3 is part of the issue.
Having AoE Debuffs but no AoE cleanses is part of the issue.
2.5% bleed through rep passive is part of the issue.
This is what I meant by that jenga tower, there are so many overlapping and problematic mechanics at this point that a change on the scale you're proposing needs to take them into account.
It's not that its a bad idea, its that there are so many other bad things in the game that it shouldn't be implemented without dealing with them.
That's always been one of the curious things about TT...that it's a pulse rather than an immunity. Spam enough APB while spamming enough damage...the TT won't matter, because of those miniscule gaps will add up from the sheer about...the saturation.
What if it were along the lines of a comparison...?
Cleanse = Debuff, then it's a 100% pulse cleanse.
Cleanse > Debuff, then it's a 100% cleanse plus immunity.
Cleanse < Debuff, then it's not a 100% pulse cleanse.
Cleanse << Debuff, then it's not only not a 100% pulse cleanse - but the pulse is slower too.
But much like there are skills that increase the debuffs, should there not also be skills that increase the cleanses...perhaps boosting that less than 100% or speeding pulses, etc, etc, etc?
Of course, all of this points to a more complex system where Cryptic appears hellbent on putting everything on the spacebar...or letting us hook up an old Atari 2600 joystick to play.
Maybe a fix to BFAW is to make DEM a tac skill. It would be more balanced in tac tree as LT/LTC/CMDR level skill. An escort or tac oriented ship would have to choose between DEM3/APO3/CRF3/APB3/CSV3. But I guess that is for the other thread.
I'd go for that. Then you could get by with ET1, TT1, and ST1 still being useful, but the higher versions would clearly be better.