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Lunge + Power Creep = +5K damage (Suggestions to Fix)
tk79
Member Posts: 1,020 Arc User
A follow-up to a similar topic I posted on Tribble back when S9 was under testing.
Motivation
Lunge is now the most powerful skill in ground combat given the amount of melee damage bonuses the latest additions to the game are providing.
It has the ability to hit for +5K shield-penetrating physical damage in one hit, which is extremely hard to counter.
Power Creep factors that led to this scenario:
In addition to the former existing mechanics:
Captain/Kit Powers:
The issue is greatly aggravated by CRITICAL CHANCE and SEVERITY bonuses:
And other debuffs:
Everything listed above can be used AT ONCE for a single hit kill.
Most skills have a reasonable, not so long cooldown time that allow them to be used often in a match, not considering Tactical Initiative.
The optimal kit setup for OneHitLunge is:
[Lunge] + [Ambush] + [Motion Accelerator] + [Stealth Module] + [Rally Cry]
Suggestions
This is a direct request to change/nerf several abilities. Bear with me (or not):
LUNGE:
MOTION ACCELERATOR:
OMEGA WEAPON PROFICIENCY:
RALLY CRY:
MELEE DOFFs:
HONOR GUARD 2-PIECE SKILL:
CROUCH PENALTY:
MENTAL ACUITY TRAIT:
FIRE ON MY MARK:
CONCLUSION
My goal with these suggestions is to make Lunge competitive, not a I-Win skill. It should still be possible to get proper one-hit kills with it under the right circumstances:
With all above conditions true, a OneHitLunge would be deserved.
That, of course, depends on how devs really see Lunge capable as one-hit-killing player targets.
If there is anything wrong in the information above please post a reply and I will fix it.
If you have anything else to add in this matter please let me know as well.
Feedback and constructive criticism always welcome.
Disclaimer:
Motivation
Lunge is now the most powerful skill in ground combat given the amount of melee damage bonuses the latest additions to the game are providing.
It has the ability to hit for +5K shield-penetrating physical damage in one hit, which is extremely hard to counter.
Power Creep factors that led to this scenario:
- Old Season Feature: All Melee attacks bypasses shields by 80%
- Passive Reputation Traits that increase Shield Bleedthrough
- Season 9: Omega Weapon Proficiency (+10% melee damage)
- Season 9: Undine Lockbox Trait: Adrenal Booster (+50% all damage, -100 resistance)
- Season 9: Undine Reputation Armor (+30% melee damage)
- Season 9: Undine Reputation Trait: Mental Acuity (+10% all damage while Aiming, affects all skills)
- Season 9: Fleet Kits with Skill bonuses to Tactical skills that increase melee damage
In addition to the former existing mechanics:
- Personal Trait: Aggressive (+All Damage)
- Personal Trait: Physical Strength (+Melee Damage)
- -100 melee damage resistance to crouched enemies
- Honor Guard Armor 2-piece bonus power: +40% melee damage
- Stealth Module: Decloak +Damage
- Large damage variance, allowing for high damage spikes
- Event Food buffs (+Damage, +Crit Chance/Severity)
Captain/Kit Powers:
- Ambush: 100~150% all damage
- Motion Accelerator: ~37% melee damage
- Target Optics: 25~50% all damage (from wiki)
- Strike Team: 22~% all damage (from wiki)
The issue is greatly aggravated by CRITICAL CHANCE and SEVERITY bonuses:
- Season 9: Ambush and Rally Cry (+Crit Chance) can be used at the same time
- Melee DOFFs: 8% CritH 25% CritD each, up to 24% crit chance, 75% crit severity when stacked
- Gambling Device: 10% crit chance and severity
And other debuffs:
- Fire On My Mark: damage resistance debuff
Everything listed above can be used AT ONCE for a single hit kill.
Most skills have a reasonable, not so long cooldown time that allow them to be used often in a match, not considering Tactical Initiative.
The optimal kit setup for OneHitLunge is:
[Lunge] + [Ambush] + [Motion Accelerator] + [Stealth Module] + [Rally Cry]
Suggestions
This is a direct request to change/nerf several abilities. Bear with me (or not):
LUNGE:
- (maybe) Decrease shield penetration to 50%
- Narrow the damage variance, making the damage numbers more predictable.
MOTION ACCELERATOR:
- Remove the melee damage bonus altogether. The skill already does many good things: speed bonus and immunity to mobility debuffs.
OMEGA WEAPON PROFICIENCY:
- Change the melee bonus to weapons only, as the name implies.
RALLY CRY:
- Add a 15s shared cooldown with Ambush (suggestion by majortiraomega)
- Cut the Critical Chance and Critical Severity bonus in half (down to +4 chance/40% severity) while doubling the heal bonus (suggestion by majortiraomega)
MELEE DOFFs:
- 8% crit chance per DOFF is extremely high. Consider lowering it.
HONOR GUARD 2-PIECE SKILL:
- Decrease the melee damage bonus but increase the healing DoT to compensate.
CROUCH PENALTY:
- (maybe) Rethink this mechanic. Crouched enemies are harder to hit with melee, not easier. At least with horizontal attacks, if you want to get a little technical.
MENTAL ACUITY TRAIT:
- Change it to ranged weapons only. Reason: Aim only benefits ranged weapons.
FIRE ON MY MARK:
- Add ways to clear the debuff with Science skills that can be casted on self and teammates. (Engineers can do it with Quick Fix in Season 9.)
CONCLUSION
My goal with these suggestions is to make Lunge competitive, not a I-Win skill. It should still be possible to get proper one-hit kills with it under the right circumstances:
- A critical hit
- Non-dodge
- Flanking
- Crouching
With all above conditions true, a OneHitLunge would be deserved.
That, of course, depends on how devs really see Lunge capable as one-hit-killing player targets.
If there is anything wrong in the information above please post a reply and I will fix it.
If you have anything else to add in this matter please let me know as well.
Feedback and constructive criticism always welcome.
Disclaimer:
- Those are just suggestions.
- Anyone is welcome to disagree.
- No, I haven't really tested *everything*. Some numbers I got from reports from other players, a few from the wiki, and some from the game.
- I do have a melee-centric PvP tac character, a Fed Klingon with the Melee DOFFs. I don't personally like how powerful he is.
Post edited by Unknown User on
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Comments
R.I.P
Resist to melee, not 100% more damage there is a BIG difference.
Isn't Motion Accelerator bonus increased by skills?
I'll fix the Crouch debuff info after I confirm where I got the % info from. It was not the wiki, but I just saw the wiki says % as well.
STO Screenshot Archive
I think the flaw in this is what happens to that tac officer afterwards? sure he can assassinate one person who's standing there like an idiot, but shouldn't the other team(PVP is supposed to be a team isn't it) brutally murder him afterwards since he's gone full on into offense and nothing else?
The problem with the "assassination" thinking is that it's capable of taking down mostly anyone, not just the ones standing around, because of the absurd damage numbers it yields.
I'd rather focus on those numbers alone because when teamplay is involved things can get really complex. And duels in PvP are quite common.
I am of the opinion that at least tanky Science captains should be able to resist those assassination strikes.
Disclaimer:
STO Screenshot Archive
Science could probably counter it with Nanite Health Monitor but the charges all used up when Fire On My Mark is used on the Science captain. It's very likely a bug.
STO Screenshot Archive
Certain players have become fond of stacking various food buffs for extra Critical chance/severity and raw damage. A fully buffed non-critical non-expose lunge hit isn't overpowered. It hurts, but it usually won't one hit kill. Now, a fully buffed Critical hit lunge, with the right gear/traits/items, will one hit kill about 70% of the time.* A fully buffed Critical hit lunge that also hits an expose will one hit kill 99% of the time.
*Important note: The 70% of the time is excluding Science officers with Medical Vangaurd, as Medical Vangaurd makes them immune to shield bypassing damage.
Overwatch is a defensive buff and Battle Strategies provides about the same amount of damage buff as Stealth Module.
Honestly, I'd just remove the shield penetration altogether. While we are at it, pull the shield bypass from Exothermic Induction Field. That ability deals about the same amount of damage as lunge, but in the form of fire (no passive fire resists) and from 30 meters.
In theory that wouldn't be so bad, but you'd need to lower the cooldown (currently 3 minutes) if you remove a core part of an ability.
Or just make it +5% All Damage and call it a day.
I think you mean a 15 second shared cooldown between Rally Cry and Ambush, right? That is what I suggested yesterday. My other suggestion would be to cut the Critical Chance and Critical Severity bonus on Rally Cry in half (down to +4 chance/40% severity) while doubling the heal bonus.
Yeah...that is pretty insane. Honestly it should be cut in half.
They could just remove the melee bonus, add a +20% runspeed bonus, and moderately increase the healing bonus.
This penalty don't work at the moment and should honestly have a penalty. A toggle that grants +50% Dodge should have a penalty attached.
You'd need to significantly improve the trait if it just provided +10% ranged damage.
They did with Season 9 actually, Quick Fix now clears Fire on My Mark. Science officers are still lacking a cleanse, but all in good time.
Well, I offered a bit of feedback above, hopefully it is helpful to you.
I have, it is an extremely easy method for killing targets.
It is exceptionally easy to one hit kill players with lunge at the moment. Also, Motion Accelerator now scales with level. My Motion Accelerator Mk XI (very rare), which I got today, provides +37% Physical damage.
The only class capable of reliably surviving one hit kill lunge strikes is a Science officer using all heals. It is possible to temporarily reach 1,060 hit points with a medic. Additionally their class trait, Medical Vanguard, makes them 100% immune to shield bleedthrough damage and adds +50% shield damage resistance for 4 seconds after using a science buff. They can still be oneshotted if they are exposed, but a Science officer using all heals will have 4-5 methods of removing exposes.
It is a bug that has existed since Season 7. Nanite Health Monitor classifies Fire on My Mark as a debuff that it is capable of cleansing. However, the debuff is tactical and cannot be cleared by health monitor. As a result, the ability burns up all of its charges.
--->Ground Combat General Bugs Directory
Real join date: March 2012 / PvP Veteran since May 2012 (Ground and Space)
About the crouch penalty:
I agree it's a hefty buff to dodge. What if the dodge bonus only applied to ranged attacks and not to melee? (I realize I am getting rid of a debuff to place another nerf in place.) It makes sense in my head. Crouching targets are harder to hit with ranged attacks, as the dodge bonus implies. I think it's a bit convoluted to consider that crouching targets can also dodge melee attacks, but take more damage to them.
Also, are you sure it doesn't work? I don't have any logs right now but in my perception I take a lot more damage from Lunge while crouching.
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