Make VG/PT specs better with only a couple changes.

[JMagee]

You must be a special kind of new to this game or something.

 

Can "something" be someone who is familiar with the terms used in this game, can partake in an intelligent discussion and provide factual information?

 

Because once again, chaff flare/diversion was never a cleanse.

[Nezyrworks]

I wouldn't say old AP...

 

I'd argue its a mechanically direct descendant to the old AP/Pyro hybrid. With the second rail shot being replaced with fire pulse, of course.

 

Actualy that spec was called Run'A'Gun or Maveric and consisted stamples from both AP and Pyro (gut to improve railshot, railshot reset, but also railshot autocrit and stockstrike reset). Later during the 2.0 (after pre release nerf and stance binding of railshot autocrit) it was no longer viable. This spec was initially designed by Oozo (check his oozostrikesback.blogspot for details).

[Nezyrworks]

Can "something" be someone who is familiar with the terms used in this game, can partake in an intelligent discussion and provide factual information?

 

Because once again, chaff flare/diversion was never a cleanse.

 

Degauss at 2.0 (old Pyro)

Degauss: Chaff flare removes movement impaling effects

 

Degauss at 2.4 (old Pyro)

Degauss has been redesigned: Activating Chaff Flare increases your defense chance by 12.5/25% for 6 seconds.

 

It never cleansed for PT/VG.

 

At the Highest peak of defensive skills for PT (Post Patch 2.4)

 

OLD Pyrotech (now AP in terms of railshot reset) - unique only

Automated Defenses: Reducing cooldown of Kolto Overload every hit taken, and increasing damage reduction by 15%/30% during Kolto Overload regen process.

Degauss: defence chance 12.5/25% for 6 seconds.

Infrated sensors: 1/2% ranged defense (passive)

Integrated Cardio Package: 1/2/3% bonus Endurance

Flame Suit: Reduces periodical damage taken by all periodic effects by 7.5%/15%

 

Old AP (Now Pyrotech in terms of flame engine)

Stabilized Armor: 15/30% less damage from AOE and 15%/30% less damage while stunned (those bonuses stacked in stunned + targeted by AOE against that AOE).

Energy Rebounder: 50%100% to produce a rebound effect reducing Energy Shield cooldown by 1.5%/3%. Can work only once every 1.5 sec and have a 10%/20% chance to produce small rebounder absorb effect absorbing some damage during next 6 sec

 

Both Specs

Power Armor: Reduces damage taken by 1/2% (because it was bottom tier for old AP, both specs had it often)

 

Offensive Changes

AP

Lost unique mechanic called Prototype Flamethrower

Lost Immoliate

Lost Flame Barrage free Rocket Puch mechanic

Lost: Railshot Autocrit

Gained: Railshot Reset

Gained: Termodetonator

Gained: railshot no longer requires dot to reset

(im not counting small stuff, or utilities)

 

Pyrotech

Lost: unique Railshot Reset

Lost: Termodetonator

Lost: Railshot reset

Gained Immoliate

Gained Flame Barrage free Rocket Puch mechanic

 

Pyrotech

The problem is, that Pyro its a dot+melee spec focused on channeling their biggest hitter. It is not burst, it requires long setup time and is easly interrupted. It kept old pyro burst spec defenses which were sufficient for a 10/30m shooter, but are very weak for >10m melee doter with long setup time.

 

Advanced Prototype Now

Due to the swap it gained universal defensive tools which work better than they used to (to a point). I would only argue about the overload regen immortality old pyro had, because a smart played had a way around it anyway.

Now it gained alot of new toys and a proper execute skill (which CAN be used above 30% making it borderline OP).

Due to loaders it can burst longer, and more reliably, and to a point he can heal up by 5% total health each missile (7 missiles) which makes him even better.

 

Conclusion:

There should be a dractic change done to Pyrotech making his setup time shorter, and dots more deadly. They should also do something with Flamethrower because unless you were a skank AP in season 1, it was unreliable tool, Now even more without proper melee fighter defenses.

 

For me there should be at least one playable PVP discipline. Powertech have 2 out of 3. I would say im very happy with AP, but i would not want Jet Charge/Storm as a baseline, as most of our skills are 30m anyway, and it's a dps loss. Now the longer cooldown on Hydraulics - it hurts...., so i would just tweak Hydraulics and call it a day.

 

Old AP, new Pyro was always borderline bad for PVP with only some glory moments when skans were working in season 1 and season 2, just before they introduced new pyro defenses and kolto immortality (>.< almost). It will be bad because of the flamethrower itself. It's just bad for anything that moves and will be even worse post 4.0 when everyone will just walk around it lol. My point: remove flamethrower mechanic as it is, or give it a go while moving. If removing flamethrower, give better dots and a new mechanic with simplier and shorter setup time, making it more similar to Madness.

 

Sorry for a wall of text, but i hope i had explained changes done to a class in terms of defense quite clear.

Edited October 2, 2015 by Nezyrworks

[Bonzenaattori]

Can "something" be someone who is familiar with the terms used in this game, can partake in an intelligent discussion and provide factual information?

 

Because once again, chaff flare/diversion was never a cleanse.

 

Chaff flare used to remove movement effects... I call that a cleanse, I don't give specific names for movement effects only... What do you call it? "de-cripple"?

 

Sry the concept of cleanse is too broad for you to understand that.

I probably should've specified instead of guessed the implication wasn't enough for you to know what i was talking about. My mistake, I'm not trying to insult you

[Nezyrworks]

Chaff flare used to remove movement effects... I call that a cleanse, I don't give specific names for movement effects only... What do you call it? "de-cripple"?

 

Sry the concept of cleanse is too broad for you to understand that.

I probably should've specified instead of guessed the implication wasn't enough for you to know what i was talking about. My mistake, I'm not trying to insult you

 

Movement impaling effect is called "Root". So the skill is a Root breaker.

 

"cleanse" specificaly implies a removal of ill effect appied on friendly target. Root is not considered ill effect by any means. It was always root. Dot, debuff is an ill effect.

 

And noone remembers now the time when Chaff Flare was removing movement impaling effect, because it was changed to defense buff in 2.4 which was a huge PT revamp.

Edited October 1, 2015 by Nezyrworks

[JMagee]

Movement impaling effect is called "Root". So the skill is a Root breaker.

 

"cleanse" specificaly implies a removal of ill effect appied on friendly target. Root is not considered ill effect by any means. It was always root. Dot, debuff is an ill effect.

 

And noone remembers now the time when Chaff Flare was removing movement impaling effect, because it was changed to defense buff in 2.4 which was a huge PT revamp.

 

Exactly, it was basically a root breaker that was tied to Electro-shield pre-2.0. (I think it also may have removed slows, so maybe "movement impairing effect remover" is "more right")

 

When VGs finally got a threat drop in 2.0 (Diversion) they switched it to work off of Diversion instead. Which from 2.0-2.4 was a "root-breaker". It then became the defense chance buff instead, as you summed up nicely above.

 

Sry the concept of cleanse is too broad for you to understand that.

 

And "cleanse" isn't too difficult of a term to understand in general, but when an ability in this game that has a functionally different outcome is called a "cleanse", calling the removal of movement impairing effects a "cleanse" is wrong. If I used Diversion with 2 DoTs on my VG during 2.0-2.4, it would not remove them. Hence, not a cleanse.

Edited October 1, 2015 by JMagee

[Zoom_VI]

Chaff flare used to remove movement effects... I call that a cleanse, I don't give specific names for movement effects only... What do you call it? "de-cripple"?

 

Sry the concept of cleanse is too broad for you to understand that.

I probably should've specified instead of guessed the implication wasn't enough for you to know what i was talking about. My mistake, I'm not trying to insult you

 

New Game Terminology

•Cleanse - Removes a limited number of a certain type (or types) of negative effects, usually Force or tech, from the target.

•Purge - Removes all negative dispellable effects from the target, usually yourself.

•The Sith Sorcerer's Purge ability has been renamed Expunge.

•NOTE: Many ability tooltips have been changed to clarify whether an ability cleanses or purges negative effects from a target.

Source

This game's community refers to abilities that remove movement impairing effects as "root breakers" since they are primarily used to break out of roots.

Edited October 1, 2015 by Zoom_VI

[realleaftea]

Every class can lower threat, not every class can taunt that's why we have dps/heal dps/tank and 2 pure dps that used to have exclusive access to trauma. I'm not getting your point at all.

You can easily design a ranged class without any heals at all. They are purely optional! Yet, noone complained that non-healer subtypes got them as well. On contrast, adding a single DoT to a subtypes not centered around them seems to be an absolute 'no-go' and worth complaining. How so?

 

So that's essentially my point. And in that regard, I don't care if you compare it with heals, taunts or other similar aspects. I just mentioned heals, because I've used it in the other part of my reply.

 

Course I also don't understand why in 4.0 they are giving tactics a DoT when plasma is the DoT tree but oh well.

So yeah, one DoT not added to the DoT subclass. What a shame!

___________________________________

 

Adrenaline rush is extremely situational at best. I don't see anything about it being proactive. It only works when you take damage and reach a certain hp% threshold, which makes it by definition, reactive. It only heals you once you take further damage, which again is reactive.

 

It heals for a set amount per second independent of how much damage you take. It can easily be overwhelmed by 1.5 people's damage(1 direct, 1 person's DoTs) in PvP and does not provide any sort of anti-focus utility. The absolute best case scenario if you manage to stay alive through AR is that you are at 40% life and dead within 3more GCDs.

Well.... my point was that you can't exclude Adrenaline Rush from the list of defensive skills (DCDs), simply because you don't like it, think that it's too limited or not proactive. I could say the same about Reactive Shield and most other defensive skills. Even the highest shield absorb is useless, if it doesn't trigger.

 

And although originally meant as a side note, once again about the reactive part:

I tried to highlight the fact that reactive effects aren't bad per se. Let's say, a fight breaks out while you're still injured (f.e. at 80% max. HP). If you now use a heal skill it to patch yourself up right before the attack, do you still consider it reactive or is it now proactive? And more importantly, would the result be different or outright worse than a damage-absorbing Force Armor or some percentual damage reduction? - I don't think so!

 

And that's the reason, why I said that any reactive effect can be seen as proactive, especially on the 'per-strike' scale. Because as soon as you take the damage and are healed, that distinction in which order that happened simply doesn't matter anymore. And although Adrenaline Rush is capped at 40%, it has proven more valueable than Reactive Shield... at least in my cases.

 

So let's look at the whole part again:

If you take Sonic Defense out of Tactics, I really think you need to put some sort of defensive back in. Not from a Tactics vs. Plasmatech survivability standpoint, but from an overall # of DCDs on Tactics stand point.

 

You get rid of Sonic Defense, Tactics has 2 DCDs (not including the passive traits). That's not enough. Adrenaline Rush barely counts because it doesn't proactively mitigate damage. Leaving Tactics with only reactive shield and its intermediate length cooldown (if you're avoiding damage elsewhere) is going to make a pretty glass-cannon spec even more glass cannon in PvE in PvP.

Well, then we better exchange Adrenaline Rush with Enure (and call it 'Hold the Line'). That latter is at least undoubtedly 'proactive'!

[JMagee]

 

And although originally meant as a side note, once again about the reactive part:

I tried to highlight the fact that reactive effects aren't bad per se. Let's say, a fight breaks out while you're still injured (f.e. at 80% max. HP). If you now use a heal skill it to patch yourself up right before the attack, do you still consider it reactive or is it now proactive? And more importantly, would the result be different or outright worse than a damage-absorbing Force Armor or some percentual damage reduction? - I don't think so!

'!

 

I don't think we're going to see eye-to-eye on this discussion. For me, a heal, by function, is always reactionary. If you are at full health, and you heal yourself, it does no good. It doesn't give you 115% health. If you're at 80%HP and you heal, you're reacting to the loss of HP, not preparing for more damage.

 

It depends what the result is. If the heal = FA = flat DR than the result wouldn't be different. The point I'm trying to make regarding Adrenaline Rush is somewhat different.

 

If I only had time to either cast a heal, force armor, or Reactive Shield, my choice is going to depend on what I think the next X seconds of "my life" is going to be. If I expect to taking a lot of damage, Reactive Shield is going to be the choice because it has the highest potential to lessen damage. Heal (if not 100%) and Force Armor are known quantities of HP/Absorb shield.

 

The issue I have with AR is with it's current functionality there isn't really a situation where you think "This is the job for AR". It doesn't provide any DR, so in order for it to be most effective, it needs to be used in conjunction with Reactive Shield, and at best it delays the inevitable. If you use it under focus fire, it may not keep you alive. In my game experiences, the only "efficient" (and really impossible) way to use Adrenaline Rush is to somehow run away from all damage and use it as a ~30% heal.

 

There are just too many situations where you activate the ability at >40% HP. And then you take damage that brings you <15% HP. And if you continue taking damage, AR doesn't heal you quickly enough to offset the incoming damage. So yes, it is a DCD, but it's incredibly situational and, like Sonic Defense, not always effective at keeping you alive.

Edited October 2, 2015 by JMagee

[KainrycKarr]

No it wasn't

think you might wana recheck your stuff before that BS comes pilling up to an absurd level...

 

Pyro had Kolto cooldown reduction when on cd, Chaff flare cleanse and dot dr

AP had stun dr, aoe dr and rebounder.

 

chaff got changed to defense chance on pyro spec, with aoe taunt change

and kolto got changed to damage miti. again on pyro spec

Both from Pyro spec, kkthx

 

Wut are you on about m8

 

 

kay.

 

I think you may want to read your disciplines lol.

[realleaftea]

I don't think we're going to see eye-to-eye on this discussion. For me, a heal, by function, is always reactionary. If you are at full health, and you heal yourself, it does no good. It doesn't give you 115% health. If you're at 80%HP and you heal, you're reacting to the loss of HP, not preparing for more damage.

Let's compare two effects then:

 

Heal over Time (Trauma Probe // Slow-release Medpac) => ongoing heal effect over 18sec

Damage bubble (Force Armor) => can't be casted on the same target for 15~20sec

 

Because heals are - quote "by function always reactionary", only the bubble is proactive. From my point of view however, they are conceptually identical. Does the bubble do any good if you're at full health? - No, it just triggers as soon as you take damage. Doesn't the HoT (Heal over Time) do exactly the same thing? - Yes, but there might be a short delay.

 

So at the point, we could discuss whether the delay matters or not. In my opinion, not that much - which is the reason why I called the reactive heal "proactive in regard of the next strike". Because unless it's a killing blow, the HoT will trigger and you'll have more HPs, potentially creating the same result. The HoT could even do more than the proactive version (restoring you to full health) if you don't take any further damage. But sure, both variants have their ups and downs.

 

The same way, Reactive Shield doesn't do anything if you don't take any damage while it's active and has a well-known maximum effect. So that's not an argument against heals.

If I only had time to either cast a heal, force armor, or Reactive Shield, my choice is going to depend on what I think the next X seconds of "my life" is going to be. If I expect to taking a lot of damage, Reactive Shield is going to be the choice because it has the highest potential to lessen damage. Heal (if not 100%) and Force Armor are known quantities of HP/Absorb shield.

Just to make it clear. Even if the damage reduction from Reactive Shield would be permanent, the total benefit would never be more than 100 / (100 - Dam.Red). That means, a permanent 20% damage reduction is equivalent to 25% more HP.

 

In other words, if you take damage equal to 125% of your max. HP, the 20% damage reduction won't safe you (lowers the damage taken to 100% of your max. HP again). And iit doesn't matter if the damage is dealt within a single strike or splitted over the whole duration of the skill.

 

I can't check these values right now, but let's assume that Reactive Shield reduces all damage taken by 20% for 15sec (= 10 GCDs). Let's further assume that a character loses 10% of his maximum HPs every GCD.

 

In this scenario, it takes 10 strikes to get that character to 0% HP if he doesn't activate the Shield, whereas he would be at 20% HP if he does. The total benefit of Reactive Shield therefore is that it takes 2 additional strikes to bring that character down (the skill expired). In order for Adrenaline Rush to generate the same result => surviving +2 more hits, the regeneration once below the percentual HP mark, must be high enough that the character restores 20% of his max. HP within 4 GCDs (the time needed to bring him from 40% to 0%).

 

And the lower the damage per GCD, the less effective the Reactive Shield and the more effective the Adrenaline Rush would be.

 

And that's the point. Adrenaline Rush isn't there to survive any amount of damage, it's there to give you a few extra seconds. And in that way, it's not different compared to a Reactive Shield. If you're ganked, neither version will keep you alive.

 

To sum it up, depending on the effect, a heal ability, damage bubble or potion could be more efficient than a Reactive Shield, even if you're under heavy fire and could choose only one effect.

 

And to come to an end:

I haven't planned to argue about these details. As I've said, it was just a careless comment or side note and it doesn't matter if it's called reactive or not. I was just a bit perplex that it wasn't added in your list. So I hope everything is fine.

[starsorter]

The only thing I can think is make the Power Tech - AP use the main hand more often just for animation purposes. For example change the way Rail Shot is used by making the character execute it via the pistol rather than his left hand. Switching from one hand to another can look quiet cool and gives the feeling of correct synchronization with the other offensive skills.