The hidden message in the dev posts

[TACeMossie]

I see a lot of hate going out to the devs since they posted their reasonings behind the 3.2.1 changes. Most of it stems from this line:

 

Players will need to rethink how the rotation plays and respond carefully to each situation to get the most out of the new Annihilation/Watchman Discipline.

 

However, i'm here to point out that they, in fact were making a point.

 

The first evidence is in their 2 points they emphasized:

 

1. You should be prioritizing Force Melt on cooldown

2. You should not be using Twin Saber Throw unless a spot is open for you to use it.

 

They also mentioned the possibility of adding Twin Saber Throw to the set bonus.

 

Now it is true that the post I highlighted is a bit of an L2P Message, but there is a second point I can show for it:

 

MOST OF THE COMPLAINTS ON THE PTS WERE FROM DELAYING FORCE MELT, AND PRIORITIZING 18 SECOND TST USAGE.

 

Here's where the rotation El'ethon put out is found

Summarised as follows:

 

Merciless / Annihilate + Overload Saber / Deadly Saber

Cauterize / Rupture

Master Strike / Ravage

 

Merciless / Annihilate

Cauterize / Rupture

Zealous Strike / Battering Assault

Force Melt / Force Rend

 

Merciless / Annihilate + Overload Saber / Deadly Saber

Cauterize / Rupture

Force Leap / Force Charge

Filler (Saber Throw > Dispatch > Slash > Strike)

 

Now there wasn't enough focus for this, as Oofalong proceeded to model and come to the conclusion of 9% less DPS Here

 

BUT

 

Taking into mind what the devs said, I looked at the rotation again. They were emphasizing the 15 second cooldown abilities. Not the 6 second CD abilities, not the 18 second CD abilities, but the 15 second ones.

 

From that, I made the following rotation / Priority System / Whatever

 

 

Merciless -> Force Melt -> Cauterize -> Zealous Strike ->

Merciless -> Force Leap -> Cauterize -> Master Strike ->

Merciless -> Twin Saber Throw -> Cauterize -> Force Melt ->

Merciless -> Zealous Strike -> Cauterize -> Force Leap ->

Merciless -> Filler -> Cauterize -> Master Strike ->

 

Merciless -> Force Melt -> Cauterize -> Zealous Strike ->

Merciless -> Force Leap -> Cauterize -> Twin Saber Throw ->

Merciless -> Filler -> Cauterize -> Force Melt ->

Merciless -> Zealous Strike -> Cauterize -> Force Leap ->

Merciless -> Master Strike -> Cauterize -> Twin Saber Throw ->

 

Merciless -> Force Melt -> Cauterize -> Zealous Strike ->

Merciless -> Force Leap -> Cauterize -> Filler ->

Merciless -> Master Strike -> Cauterize -> Force Melt ->

Merciless -> Zealous Strike -> Cauterize -> Force Leap ->

Merciless -> Twin Saber Throw -> Cauterize -> Filler ->

 

Use Overload Saber on cooldown, and Filler will either be strike, slash or dispatch depending on how nice RNG is to ya

 

 

Now, Something important to note is every Master Strike should be clipped for this.

 

"But Kwerty, that's ridiculous, there's no way that's better than El'ethon's rotation!"

 

Really?

 

Because When El'ethon's rotation was modelled here (Oofalong again) and all resource problems were ignored, the rotation was 2.5% behind live.

 

Similarly, Oofalong later went on to model my rotation which was created because the devs said "L2P stop prioritizing TST and Prioritize Force Melt!", and you can find it here

 

The important thing to note is Both rotations are 2.5% behind live in DPS. However, because we were looking at prioritizing Twin Saber Throw/Dual Saber Throw and getting full channels of Master Strike/Ravage out, we were missing a whopping 7.14% of our potential DPS. Thats almost as bad as forgoing accuracy.

 

Now, is the rotation an abomination? YES. Could it use work? DEFINATELY

But the dev post of "L2P you're doing it wrong" was accurate. We were looking at it wrong, and as such weren't pulling the numbers that the spec was capable of.

 

JOHN WAS NOT BEING A DICK ABOUT THIS. HE WAS TRYING TO HELP.

 

And he did. And for that, I thank him, because without that dev insight post, we may have never stumbled across this alternative rotation that actually works with the current changes.

 

Its still an abomination though. I mean seriously, clipping Master Strike?

[Trogusaurus]

A nice attempt at silver lining, but the fact remains this is a change we as a community very much didn't want nor ask for. We don't want to think harder about the crappiest new move in our arsenal. If anything, we want it either gone or mindlessly applied/reapplied so we don't have to think more about such a boring move.

 

Edit: Not to mention this is still very much a nerf, even with your modeled rotation.

Edited May 8, 2015 by Trogusaurus

[FerkWork]

I don't get the clipping Master Strike/Ravage fascination Devs have. Why not reduce the channel time for Ravage/Master Strike if we aren't suppose to use the full duration?

 

 

Pardon my language but Force Rend is like a bag of poop. Just because you put a bow on it and say it's valuable and nothing else is doesn't change the fact that it is poop.

Edited May 8, 2015 by FerkWork

[TACeMossie]

Pardon my language but Force Rend is like a bag of poop. Just because you put a bow on it and say it's valuable and nothing else is doesn't change the fact that it is poop.

 

I dunno, it hits harder over its duration than a full channel of master strike and needs half the GCDs, not to mention the shorter effective cooldown as well

[FerkWork]

I dunno, it hits harder over its duration than a full channel of master strike and needs half the GCDs, not to mention the shorter effective cooldown as well

 

I was speaking more to the playstyle rather than the numbers. To me balancing 3 DoTs in a Energy starved Spec with a push towards DoT spread is not going to appeal to many New players and will make it an underplayed class. If Force Rend is to stay then it should just replace Rupture.

 

On a different note, what if MS/Ravage built Rage over the channel? How would that effect the playstyle?

[TACeMossie]

I was speaking more to the playstyle rather than the numbers. To me balancing 3 DoTs in a Energy starved Spec with a push towards DoT spread is not going to appeal to many New players and will make it an underplayed class. If Force Rend is to stay then it should just replace Rupture.

 

On a different note, what if MS/Ravage built Rage over the channel? How would that effect the playstyle?

 

Oh that would definately be an improvement, only there's the slight issue of you'd still have to either clip it, delay cauterize, or delay Force Melt.

 

Honestly, the only thing that 3.2.1 is starting to get right is the 15 second rotation (a 6/12 second cycle doesn't have enough room for everything they want to have). It needs a little work, but with a couple of changes the spec would be amazing.

 

As for this:

A nice attempt at silver lining, but the fact remains this is a change we as a community very much didn't want nor ask for. We don't want to think harder about the crappiest new move in our arsenal. If anything, we want it either gone or mindlessly applied/reapplied so we don't have to think more about such a boring move.

 

Edit: Not to mention this is still very much a nerf, even with your modeled rotation.

 

I wasn't looking for a silver lining. I was trying to prove to the community that the L2P from the devs was actually warranted, and that John was trying to damage control the situation. Just the way he said it came across to the community wrong, and the backlash was ridiculous all because people refused to admit the devs were right about something.

Edited May 8, 2015 by TACeMossie

[WheresMyWhisky]

Tace I am pretty sure I tried this on PTS and yeah it didn't seem like a 350 dps loss but it didn't seem so much better that it was only a 2.5% loss but I was pretty crap at clipping ravage so I put it down to getting a bit lucky that it was a slight improvement maybe I was too quick to dismiss it as your modelling isn't usually that far off.

 

I just want RnG back in the spec to make it reactive as in my opinion that is the only way to create reactive and rewarding spec, then they could make carnage without RnG as it currently is but it needs something to use apart from massacre as quite frankly the amount you use it is mind boggling.

 

This just reminds me of balance shadows when they made the changes to them 2.0 that no one wanted and no matter how much the community told them it sucked they just didn't listen. The silver lining there is its actually not that bad to play now, but it did take a whole content cycle to sort .

 

To sum up when the whole community pretty much tells you that you got it wrong you should listen, which to a point they did in that they made changes however actually listening to the changes the community wants or at least opening an actual discussion around them and engaging them tends to get people onside. Anyways I think the ship has sailed and we stuck with this turd til 4.0

Edited May 8, 2015 by WheresMyWhisky

[TACeMossie]

Tace I am pretty sure I tried this on PTS and yeah it didn't seem like a 350 dps loss but it didn't seem so much better that it was only a 2.5% loss but I was pretty crap at clipping ravage so I put it down to getting a bit lucky that it was a slight improvement maybe I was too quick to dismiss it as your modelling isn't usually that far off.

 

I just want RnG back in the spec to make it reactive as in my opinion that is the only way to create reactive and rewarding spec, then they could make carnage without RnG as it currently is but it needs something to use apart from massacre as quite frankly the amount you use it is mind boggling.

 

This just reminds me of balance shadows when they made the changes to them 2.0 that no one wanted and no matter how much the community told them it sucked they just didn't listen. The silver lining there is its actually not that bad to play now, but it did take a whole content cycle to sort .

 

To sum up when the whole community pretty much tells you that you got it wrong you should listen, which to a point they did in that they made changes however actually listening to the changes the community wants or at least opening an actual discussion around them and engaging them tends to get people onside. Anyways I think the ship has sailed and we stuck with this turd til 4.0

 

Oh where I say clip ravage, I mean don't even bother with the third hit. It needs to hit (on average) ~7.5k damage for it to be worth it unless you're really good at the clip, in which case it would need ~6.5k damage on that last hit

Edited May 8, 2015 by TACeMossie

[DuckimusPrime]

Except for the whole having to clip channeled attacks is just bad development. And all the other 3.0 changes they made to remove this.

[WheresMyWhisky]

Oh where I say clip ravage, I mean don't even bother with the third hit. It needs to hit (on average) ~7.5k damage for it to be worth it unless you're really good at the clip, in which case it would need ~6.5k damage on that last hit

 

I know what you meant I was just crap at it kept clipping at 2 secs as I kept forgetting I wasn't clipping around 2.7 as normal

 

Just one of those muscle memory things since we have been clipping at 2.7 for ever

Edited May 8, 2015 by WheresMyWhisky

[cmorea]

No qwerty he was exactly being a dick.

 

In the post they say they got rid of the boring rotation and "designed" a new priority system. Then your post were you guys supposedly figured out how to maximise DPS, looks a lot like a.... rotation. What about that is the dynamic rotation they claimed we were getting? Wow so exite one of my dots switches spots in my otherwise set boring rotation! YIPIE!!!!!

 

Also don't pat yourself on the back to hard for stumbling upon this rotation, people (mace, el eth, or somebody) already talked about how silly it is for us to have to clip master strike.

Edited May 8, 2015 by cmorea

[DynamiCtagez]

Except they still nerfed our utilities, our self-heal and pretend we have a viable DoT-spread--a mechanic nobody wanted in the first place. They homogenized the class by giving it the sage self-heal just with a 10times worse spread, so it's a straight up nerf. Not only is this not what the community wanted (we want to stay a single target spec with a unique concept like it used to be), it's also a straight up nerf. Edited May 8, 2015 by DynamiCtagez

[Arkhonos]

I was under the impression that the developers did not intend to have any sort of rotation anymore. Furthermore, given the likelihood that clipping abilities is an undesired outcome for the developers, don't you think it is probable that this is an accident?

[TACeMossie]

I was under the impression that the developers did not intend to have any sort of rotation anymore. Furthermore, given the likelihood that clipping abilities is an undesired outcome for the developers, don't you think it is probable that this is an accident?

 

Honestly, since the devs are trying to add Twin Saber Throw/Dual Saber Throw to the 6-piece, I believe they don't intend Watchman/Annihilation to use Master Strike at all.

 

The issue is though that the first 2 hits still make up enough damage for it to be worth it, and if we were to move damage into the third hit then the 3rd hit would get a little ridiculous in damage for the first 2 to no longer be worth it.

 

e.g. if Master Strike was doing 10k damage after armor and crits total, currently the first 2 hits would be 2.5k and the third hit would be 5k. We would have to drop the first 2 hits to 1.25k each and up the third hit to 7.5k in order to prevent silly things like clipping it.

 

Actually looking at that example, the moving damage to the back half isn't so bad.

 

Except PvP

If all the damage is on the third hit, then the ability is easy to shut down. Which sucks. Similarly if you have to move, you miss out on a lot of damage.

[cs_zoltan]

That's just too funny. The community gets pissed about the L2P comment, and it was actually true. This is too good to be true

[PallyHk]

Except for the whole having to clip channeled attacks is just bad development. And all the other 3.0 changes they made to remove this.

 

Yeah, They should just reduce Ravage's channel time to the actual attack time and be done with it. Learn to dev.

[oofalong]

Kwerty et al,

 

First off, I wish you hadn't share my latest model more publicly; I do not feel it is ready for prime time. However, since you let the cat out of the bag, I will look to refine it further. At this point, the only thing I feel comfortable stating about the DPS capability of what appears to be destined to go live is that it is not as bad as I first projected. Soon, I hope to be more specific than this.

 

As for the hidden message, I actually recognized the hidden message although I suppose I was so irate that I chose to ignore it. (Incidentally, ignoring customer feedback rarely results in positive relationships, but that is a separate rant.)

 

I still challenge that there is a clear vision of how this Discipline should play. We have a number of talents along the discipline path that seem irrelevant. Examples include Close Quarters, the shorter CD is not beneficial, and Pulverize | Mind Sear, which buffs a skill we are not supposed to use rotationally. On top of this, our Set Bonus is tied to Ravage | Master Strike and incorporating this into our play is challenging. Plus, if we do manage to fit the ability in it appears our best option is to clip it. The Devs followed up their playstyle rationale with a post suggesting DST/TST may similarly be a trigger for the 6-piece. This is confusing based on the previous posts assertion that is is a situational ability. Finally, according to a previous Dev post, Annihilation | Watchman is supposed to be the:

 

Annihilation/Watchman: High Rotation Difficulty, High Sustained and Low Burst Damage

 

The shortening of Force Rend | Melt to 15s supposedly increases our burst damage. I estimate this to be a 5% increase in DPS due to the bigger ticks as well as the shorter duration. However, in true burst/burn phases I worry we will be too resource starved to use our execute as well as potentially DST/TST with a net effect of lower our DPS. More testing and analysis is required here.

 

So while the hidden message, which was delivered in a demeaning manner, was rethink how you play the spec, I suggest that at best the Combat team has developed a half-baked version of whatever their vision is. I believe their vision is to a constant juxtaposition of melee attacks mixed with a somewhat frequent hard hitting force attack. As an early defender of the 3.0 playstyle, I watched as the overwhelming majority of players came to dislike this playstyle. I won't be a defender of the 3.2.1 planned playstyle, and I suspect the overwhelming majority of players will dislike it from its onset.

 

Cheers,

oofalong

Edited May 8, 2015 by oofalong

[oofalong]

In the post they say they got rid of the boring rotation and "designed" a new priority system. Then your post were you guys supposedly figured out how to maximise DPS, looks a lot like a.... rotation.

 

This too, I find it really odd for the Devs to proclaim no rotation and to then be able to model a rotation so easily. Also, I don't fully understand the dislike of a rotation. Innovative Ordnance | Assault Specialist is often cited as the hardest spec to play in the game, yet a rotation that almost maximizes its DPS is scriptable. I think people want an engaging and rewarding playstyle. What makes the Annihilation | Watchman debacle so confounding is that the Devs ostensibly want this too, and while we had this pre-3.0 they have offered no explanation about why embracing those ideas is not a better option than the 3.2.1 version.

[znihilist]

Kwerty, that was fairly understood from his post IMO, however, it is not really engaging and hard when you just need a week to figure out the new rotation. It is not really engaging and hard when they switch the focus of the spec from one ability to another. So it took us for example 2 weeks to come up with what is optimal, then what ? Were those 2 weeks supposed to be the time where we encounter a hard and engaging rotation ?

 

Matter of fact is this: They have a very different vision of what the spec should be. I am not going to assign malice to the written post, but I do assign to it lack of insight on how to write it.

 

Their new vision of sustained dps is neither flawed or flawless, the problem is in this: Three dots on a melee class with a tight rotation that needs to generate the resource before consuming it doesn't work in this way, the class feels way too much like a ranged class but with the restrains of resources and range. The only working version right now is in the way it was implemented with Vengeance.

 

There are going to be hard choices for us to make if we insist on a 2.10-like rotation and they insist on a third dot. Because the few solutions that exist will trivialize a good part of the DPS, and that is either by another off-GCD dot (which they won't do), or an auto-refreshed one either passively* or actively** (the likely option), or finally to copy Vengeance which also won't happen (EDIT: Or maybe tie to Berserk ?).

 

 

* : By making rend a normal discipline buff that triggers a dot on a long CD ability (Ravage, Battering Assault, DST, etc).

**: By making Rend used in the opener and then refreshed whenever another ability is used (Annihilate, Ravage, Battering Assault, DST, etc).

Edited May 8, 2015 by znihilist

[TACeMossie]

Kwerty et al,

 

First off, I wish you hadn't share my latest model more publicly; I do not feel it is ready for prime time. However, since you let the cat out of the bag, I will look to refine it further. At this point, the only thing I feel comfortable stating about the DPS capability of what appears to be destined to go live is that it is not as bad as I first projected. Soon, I hope to be more specific than this.

 

As for the hidden message, I actually recognized the hidden message although I suppose I was so irate that I chose to ignore it. (Incidentally, ignoring customer feedback rarely results in positive relationships, but that is a separate rant.)

 

I still challenge that there is a clear vision of how this Discipline should play. We have a number of talents along the discipline path that seem irrelevant. Examples include Close Quarters, the shorter CD is not beneficial, and Pulverize | Mind Sear, which buffs a skill we are not supposed to use rotationally. On top of this, our Set Bonus is tied to Ravage | Master Strike and incorporating this into our play is challenging. Plus, if we do manage to fit the ability in it appears our best option is to clip it. The Devs followed up their playstyle rationale with a post suggesting DST/TST may similarly be a trigger for the 6-piece. This is confusing based on the previous posts assertion that is is a situational ability. Finally, according to a previous Dev post, Annihilation | Watchman is supposed to be the:

 

Annihilation/Watchman: High Rotation Difficulty, High Sustained and Low Burst Damage

 

The shortening of Force Rend | Melt to 15s supposedly increases our burst damage. I estimate this to be a 5% increase in DPS due to the bigger ticks as well as the shorter duration. However, in true burst/burn phases I worry we will be too resource starved to use our execute as well as potentially DST/TST, which would actually lower our DPS. More testing and analysis is required here.

 

So while the hidden message, which was delivered in a demeaning manner, was rethink how you play the spec, I suggest that at best the Combat team has developed a half-baked version of whatever their vision is. I believe their vision is to a constant juxtaposition of melee attacks mixed with a somewhat frequent hard hitting force attack. As an early defender of the 3.0 playstyle, I watched as the overwhelming majority of players came to dislike this playstyle. I won't be a defender of the 3.2.1 planned playstyle, and I suspect the overwhelming majority of players will dislike it form its onset.

 

Cheers,

oofalong

 

Yeah I probably should have checked with ya first about the model.

/walks away in shame

 

Regardless, there are a couple of other situations where utilities have useless benefits to the skill tree. Assault Specialist, for example, has a 3 second CD reduction on Full Auto. Considering it is only used every 15 seconds, that section of the talent seems rather pointless. Until you consider the secondary effect:

 

For the mando, if you have to move, the reduced CD on full auto lets you use an ability on the move slightly earlier than it would be without the talent, making the utility a nice buff to mobility.

 

Similarly, on the Sentinel, if you are knocked back from the target (and as such are >4m away), the extra 3 seconds CD reduction on force leap means you'll be able to leap back slightly earlier if necessary. That specific skill goes from being a focus generation buff to a mobility buff.

 

Still, I'd prefer a rotation that isn't stuck with:

• A 45 second cycle for half the GCDs with the other half being on a 12 second cycle, resulting in a 180 second long rotation
  
• The only way to use Master Strike is to clip the damn thing
  
• The rotation falling apart if you miss even the smallest of RNG rolls in your favour.
  

As I've said multiple times, my personal preference is the 15 second rotation (with Merciless + Cauterize being on a 7.5 second cooldown), where the RNG is if Mind Sear procs in time for TST, and if you have enough focus generated from passive effects for Force Leap to be replaced with Slash/Dispatch/Force Sweep. The devs kind of merged this with the 12-second cycles though, which is why we have an abomination.

Edited May 8, 2015 by TACeMossie

[cmorea]

I think the 7.5 second merciless with 7.5 and 15 sec dots is fine as long as Merciless damage is slightly increased. This could help with resources since we'd use merciless less. I think the better thing to do, if we're sticking with this play style, would be to shorten melt to 12 seconds and make merciless cost 3 focus.

 

Also what about a proc that makes the next slash or dispatch free? They my toon could shout HEY!!! again.