Agent Issues

[Vipr]

Now as Mattie's list is over 6 months old i think its time a new 1 was made.
What id like to do is to make a new one from the ground up, so if everyone could post what they think are the biggest issues we have in this thread, i shall give it a week or so and then redo the list.

Thanks

Link to previous list


Scaling of Nano Skills for SL Damage Buffs
The top nanos need too much skills to cast for much to little gain. Very few agents bother to cast much above the Unsettling line as we need to use a pensive, get a CM and drain a mob, unless willing to wait until mimic is about to expire and then draining. This is much too long downtime before we can do anything and thus many will never bother to cast these nanos.

Extension of RK Nanos
Most if not all of our RK nanos are useless in SL, the roots break almost as soon as they land IF they land at all, snares barely affect the mobs runspeed. All thats needed here is just a couple of additions to our already existing lines to allow them to be able to work with some sort of consistency in SL

Symbiants
Artillery Symbiants are lacking in several areas if compared to others, no add all def in left arm for example.. right arm is missing burst. There are also several gaps in qls.

Extension to Agility and Sense Lines
This is self explantory, we are stuck with a 25 and a 15 buff from our RK toolset whereas Shades a new proffesion in game gets a self only +70 to agility, we would like ours brought into line with that, to at least make it easier for some of the non opifex agents to be able to get into our Armours

[Karuga]

My biggest issues with my agent:

1) The scaling for nano skills on the proc nano lines seems way off to me. From Sickening Shock to Unsettling Shock is a jump in 500 points in nano skills. Even at 216 I'm looking at mochams + umbral/drains to cast. That's a lot of twinking for minimal damage gain in my eyes.

2) The graphics on the alien rifle are just too big. I prefer the slick clean look of the Joy of the Race. The alien rifle just looks too bulky and obnoxious. Minor issue I know, but agents are about style afterall

3) Would love to see a minor extension of our existing nano lines, particularly the root and rifle/as line of nanos.

That's about it for me.

[cellestron]

1. the SL damage nanos have become bugged. Upon zoning the proc effect stops working or the proc effect "shifts" (i.e. if you buff DD than DoT and zone you get the DD effect).

[Militaryman666]

1) Fix... Concealment, please get to it eventually.

There are alot of nice posts to fix concealment, many of which take Aimed Shot out of the equation and use Aimed Shot as it's own skill similar to full auto, with a simple execution timer similar to perks.

2) Aimed Shot... Read above, i'd love to see Aimed Shot be allowed to be shot in an NPC combat, right now in pvp it's not all that critical that we get an increase in damage, however we are hurting a bit in damage agains't NPCs without charms or outside of raid type battles where we can already fire off so many Aimed Shots.

3) Rework of a few perks, some of the perks simply execute too slow for their effect and requirements, either change the execution or the requirements/effect.

4) I would love an expansion to the Ruse of Taran line, so it was in the GSF line of nanos (dosen't stack with run buffs), That way you could stack it with the team concealment line of buffs as well.

Add Run speed and a slight bit of defense to the nanos, nothing too flashy, just enough to get around faster (similar to GSF ratings). Defense as high as 500, but please, nothing higher that would unbalance it a bit too much.

Extend the range to Phase 4 and 5 at levels 208 and 219 requirements.

5) Alot of other stuff on the forums posted under my name, read them for some insight.

[Onlymeh]

My list-according to me- in no defined order. Very brief.

1. Our SL Damage Nanos:
- These nanos aren't stacking correctly; the proc effect isn't stacking with the DoT effect- only the last casted nano has its effect running. Also, sometimes when zoning is involved, such effects are completely canceled and/or changed into other effects. ie, If you casted the Proc as your last nano in order to utilize it, after a zoning, the DoT is the one used and the Proc is completely ignored.

2. Damage...(cough)
- It seems that the agent prof is solely dependant on AimedShot in order to race the ranks for high damage; that or Mimic Crat. We need to pull up our regular damage in order to compensate for the "1 AimedShot." This can be so by doing one of the following:1. Give us new rifles with higher level-locks that have considerable Mins and Maxes. 2. Add more damage based armor/perks that are locked to the Agent prof only. 3. This, being the last resort would be defined as, AllOff AllOff AllOff.

3. Glory on the QL300 Silenced:
- Would love to see a fix for this and I think the Silcener is bugged too- but have't really tested it yet.

4. Aimed Shot:
- I'm not sure if anyone faced this bug, but I've did- many times. Sometimes when you fire AimedShot, you'll get a feedback from the Client that says you're Attacking the mob, however no AimedShot fired. Its usually 2 Messeges that come back at you- and no AS- a loss of potential damage.

5. Perks:
- I believe only two phrases sum this "perk" matter up; Less time, More damage . Thats for the DirectDamage perks, however, why not get some new creative perks. Creative in a sense of debuffing the opponent with different aspects and so. Also, why not recieve perk that add up to our evades and/or AllDef/Off.

6. Nanocost:
- I can't see why Nanocost was only introduced in the last 2 perks on The Made AI line. We need more of this to compensate for the Mimic costs, either by Agent-only items, and/or perks.

7. Toolset:
- We need a shift in our prehistoric nanoset. This can be achieved in either extending our current Mimic nanos with alternative settings/debuffs or introducing new SL buffs or new buffs (completely new) to the agent profession. Oh and, be creative about it;ie, wouldn't mind a new root in this little mixture or augment earlier nanos, such as the Ruse line- as said by Militaryman.

8. Symbiants:
- This is every artillery-symb-user's call, and I'm pretty sure everyone is "annoyed" by this. We need some twinkage to the Artillery Symbiants I believe, especially the Left-Arm.

Needs some elaboration, yep, and probably will see some edits here and there and maybe even more additions, good luck Vip and you know where am I if you ever need help, mate.

[Carla02]

I would like to see a extension to our Roots. What with the NR people can get now not to mention HHaB rings, they are pretty obsolete in PvP and inconsistent in PvM.

New Roots Plz

[Militaryman666]

Roots would be welcomed, however I would also love to see an NPC based only root that was much stronger then normal ones, that would allow us to solo outside of mimic to at least some degree. (And when I say stronger, I mean more difficult to break from a physical attack)

They would be short term and have a nano-cost reflecting their usefulness of course..

I was thinking somewhere around 2-4% Chance to break for the highest root on a physical attack, duration of 90 seconds, and a nanocost of 1500..

Of course I would also love to see our normal line of roots made easier to land on higher nano resist players.

[Bullsaye]

Id love to see an exstention to this line, either a longer duration on mimic itself, recasting every 20 min is abit annoying when u have recast mimic doc in mid fight during raids and such. Or just remove the hostile nano so we can recast if we must during fight when we really need it at most.


/bulls

[bootcher]

Concealment is an ancient bug, it would be nice if they could fix it someday/somehow.

I guess now higher lvl agents don really have a clear purpose. Our mimic is no longer continued, our SL nanos are bugged, and if they were working as intended they are in no way comparable to the boost given by SL nano's of most other proffesions. We didnt get much extra damage at SL launch in comparison to other proffs, we didnt get much defenses in comparison to other proffs. I dont think mimic crat should be 'the' nano to use when one wants to do some good damage (and this is only for inferno).

I liked some of the ideas posted above, some extension to our old nano's would very welcome indeed. The SL escape nano's could use some work imho, as with the dot/dd ones. The latter have crazy reqs, agents dont really have one nano to look forward to when they hit 220.
A new root would be nice, indeed. I guess new nano's would be nice, but a new ruse wouldn't help us much, i dont think the higher level agents need more concealment. It would have to add some other bonus or something.
Extension or some rework on mimic would be nice, but i dont think this is an option as far as Funcom is concerned.
Shorter cast time of some of the perks would make them a bit more usefull, assasinate and death strike mostly .

PS. grats and GL to our new proff!

[Tenkx]

I agree with pretty much everything written so far. These are the things that bother me the most...

I'd like to see a little more focus on useful armor, as a 206 agent (and with my previous 208 rimor agent) armor choices are difficult to make.. I can say good and bad things about various armors. However the fact that at 206 I'm in a combination of armor that was nearly all pre-SL says something. At level 220 I would have some more good choices but there are still problems with most combos.

I need to be able to solo to function (after all I live on test now but even on live I soloed a lot). Lukily we do solo pretty well, however lack of any kind of refresh on mimic is totally annoying, I don't like that I can't start a fight because I know mimic will run out during the fight (and the mob is hard enough that refreshing it will likely be fatal). I can live with no refresh during a fight but I'd like to be able to refresh before a fight. This upsets my game and causes me to drink too much coffee which is unhealthy..

My perk chain is very annoying, I usually chain with Soften->APC->Pinpoint->Find the Flaw->Concussive->Fuzz. The recharge times being all different is just a pain.

(not just agents) double the number of hotbars please and make 2 visible on the screen (and keyboard usable) at all times.

Are we supposed to be ppl who crit a lot or not, I know that FC felt they had to give agents crit buffs in 14.2 when they took away UVC etc. when agents used X-3 rifles and stuff critting a lot made sense. If we are supposed to crit a lot give us better scope choices, extend the Gnat's line and put decent crit modifiers on rifles. If we aren't supposed to crit a lot then boost MBS on rifles and increase the min damage some.. (I really wasn't going to moan at all about damage but in the end it slipped out).

[Militaryman666]

Sure, at level 220 Agent's dont have too much of a problem with concealment when they are required to sneak past certain mobs, or hide from them while in a group. However lower level agent's would very much welcome a boost to their concealment to be able to do that a little sooner.


If it were possible to spend alot of detail into the matter, which I doubt it is at this point. (It would most likely need to be worked on in the next major expansion..)

Concealment should get a complete overhaul from the skill it once was. Perception holds nothing to do with combat other then detecting concealment at this point. I think those two skills should be taken completely out of combat purposes and put them in as utility skills. It can be done easily by improving the run speed you get while concealing and improving the effectiveness of perception for select professions.. (Martial Artists should have an average perception, while Fixers have a much higher rating, and adventurers will be the only ones capable of detecting the smallest details and revealing hidden objects.)

Put some chests into the game, as well as higher level explosives in missions that do more then simply deal damage. A small hit of damage right now is no real harm to a person when it comes to traps and mines. Allow an active detection skill that constantly runs a search on the area but slows the run speed down to the point where it is comparable to concealment speed, although constantly searches for hidden objects, NPCs, and Players.

I've made a post about this in the past, and I still think that it would be the best solution as things are right now, however it will have many pre-requisites that can't go un-touched if this change is made. Such as Aimed Shot being based off of something else, most preferrably.. itself.

If they make it so that it's possible to be able to run at a run speed that is half of your concealment while you're sneaking, provided you have that run speed.. It would considerably improve the way concealment is right now and finally allow it to be used for recon and exploration. Same could be said about perception.

To deal with this change however, there will have to be a new type of mob added to the game, similar to the Security Camera's, but on a more scout based concept. These new mobs would have high perception and constantly be on the lookout for a hidden charactor. Warnings of being detected when within range of that NPC will allow the person to be a bit more cautious then normal and avoid it.

That's simply my point of view on concealment and perception, Sneak Attack of course will be based upon being stealthed to execute it, and the new concealment change would allow them to reach their target quicker to unleash a Stealth Attack. The change that would have to be added however, is that in PVP a person must be stealthed first to execute it, that would add a little balance to the current melee alpha's that alot of people have been using when it comes to mid level pvp.

Shades should get at the very least, a small to moderate concealment boost on their evasion nanos. That's just something that I think would help them out when it comes to it, because they are a stealthy charactor profession. They are called Shade's afterall.

Anyways, i'm simply using this post as a way to relieve some of the pressure i'm feeling from this headache other people call work, so if you don't like the idea, feel free to comment, but please. No flames.

[Zoolander]

Except for aliens I must say that I'm fine with concealment and I love having it for pvp purposes too.

We have a lot of crit chacne in our perks, we have a 2% helmet and a 4% nano..I crit a lot when I'm PvMing and I think our gun (kyr'ozch rifle...maybe only on the silenced..i dont care) should have, if nothing else is changed, a higher crit value.

[Frigidflames]

Crit on the Kyr'ozch should be doubled from (250) to (500).

[Twistshot]

A lot of the agent items should be heavily reworked to take into consideration that playing an agent is VERY IP hungery.

Range Meters, Movement Predictors and so forth should not use TS skills to use them, they should use something like perception or sense.

When using Trap disarm, we should get a message that tells us if a trap is on/in an item, I often disarm chests and such half a dozen times then cringe as I open or unlock them.

Our Nano's need to be looked at very, very closely. While i have no evidence to support this it seems like our root nanos fail more often than they work. We should also have some nanos that would let us break LOS so we can resneak. Smoke screans, blinding flashes something like that. After all agents are sapose to sneak in and sneak out, like some kind of high tech demented ninja on crack.

Armor, oh yeah. We need a greater selection of Sense/Agaility armor. Every where i look i see plenty of armor for other attribute combos but other than the rare bit of steel ribbed, of which i have 3 peices at nearly level 30, i have seen squat that i can really use.

I dont know how this would work but I for one would like to be able to set traps and not just take them apart. A little tool that can set traps based on its QL level and type would be fun for an agent, and a real life saver when soloing. Set a few traps up on your back trail and at the very least you get some warning when a wondering mob decides to come over and slap you in the back of the head.

Rifle, our range should be atleast 10 meters longer than it is. yes this would not be fair to those who have systems that cant prossess graphics out that far but it would make us better suited to long range combat by making us choice pullers, maybe then we can start finding better groups. Reduce the skill requirements for repressors or increase their effect and we can even survive being a puller.

Concealment needs to be reworked completly, ground up. And what is the deal with crawl?

AS, some one needs to take a good hard look at this as well. if it is kept the same something needs to be developed that will let us agents compete in combat with the other classes that get specials (or two or three) that can be used several times in a combat.

[Strolling]

Looking at the wider picture.

As we all know at higher lvls our ability to work whilst in mimic is seriously hampered by our inability to use other proffs SL nano's. Whereas at lower levels having 2 mimicked agents in a team is pretty much comparable to having a doc, certainly by the time we get to 200-210 it is not. ( I use the doc simply as an example).
I'm not suggesting that we should be able to compete with a doctor as a healer, but the example is useful in illustrating what seems to be a fundamental flaw in the agent proffesion. ie. as all other professions reach higher levels they become better in what they do. Now, for an agent to improve in what he/she does means one of two things. Either they become better in their various mimicked roles ( something that at the moment is not the case ) , or the agent "comes into his own" as it were; the agent reveals his true nature = that of a baddass DD. ( something that at the moment is not the case.)
IMO the agent role at higher levels is an illdefined one. Further, I can only assume that this is deliberate. ie. that funcom do not want the agent to be wholly a Badass DD nor a Jack of all trades that can fulfill any role fully within a team. It does seem to me though that Funcom is leaning more towards the DD side of an agents nature than his utilitarianism. The evidence for this being simply that whereas the nanos we can use in mimic cease to improve after a while. our damage does keep ( slowly ) improving. However, if this is indeed the case then not only do we need to have the problems that effect our current damage output sorted, but we also need, quite simply, to be able to Deal more Damage.
The specific things that I feel need sorting out have by enlarge been said before:
1.Better weapon.
2.Sort out our SL damage line so it stacks/ doesnt change when zoning.
3.Give us a root that works in SL.
4.Get rid of Death Strike and give us a serious DD perk that we can use mid fight rather than 2 perks that are only good for the last 15%.
5.Consider letting us use AS mid fight for monsters.
Really, some or all of the above are what I see most agents asking for and I couldn't agree more!
And please!
Fix the sneak bug where we can be seen in some areas- shops etc.
Stop aliens from being aware of us despite our concealment far out weighing their perception!
P.S. Good work, overall I love my agent.

[newarival]

the ruse idea is nice .. wouldnt mind an extention to that line at all
wouldnt mind an extension to gnats//ac either


I think the problem with mimmic could be helped if they were made "refreshable"

While in mimmic doc you could cast mimmic doc
While in mimmic soldier you could cast mimmic soldier etc
This would take allot of downtime out of buffing or waiting to buff

I would rather we concentrate on nano's and maaaaybe perks rather than items but arti symbs are hurting bad

[Carla02]

Ive been keeping up with this thread...1 thing i dont think we should waste space on our issue list is bug fixes.

"Whats he saying??? omg newb"

Lemme explain......many bugs affect agents. Say for example less bugs affect another class..if FC says ok we'll give each proff 5 things from thier list, the other prof will get new cool things and we will get old stuff fixed and be even more behind other classes. Make sense?

IMO thats wrong. As paying customers we are ENTILTLED to things that work. Our issues list should be about improvments and/or new ideas. Bug fixes should be a ongoing thing FC are doing. And yeah the proffesionals should make FC aware, but i hope our issues list wont just be "plz fix conceal when zoning into a mission...hitting H a few times is soooo gamebreaking" (No sarcasm intended)

This wasnt a flame to anyone that asked for bug fixes, im just trying to get the most for the agent proffesion.

[jutlin]

Would like to see an extension of our Feline Grace/Enhanced Senses line.

as others have pointed out, the way it's set up now is if you picked a breed other than opi -- like nanomage, which was uba pre-SL (pvh/shades equalled CH at much lower level) -- you now have no chance of getting on 300 armor, can never take off your chosen armor if you did decide to upgrade it at all, and have to waste months resetting perks to get them up to, i believe a nanomage can get about 280ish and maybe a little higher using all the best goodies possible. it just stinks, have to do 100 beast raids to get the agi/sense belt and get the highest level rings. etc. etc.

why can't they make a self only extension of the line like shades have? they get 70 frickin agility iirc.

[Frigidflames]

I think the problem with mimmic could be helped if they were made "refreshable"

While in mimmic doc you could cast mimmic doc
While in mimmic soldier you could cast mimmic soldier etc
This would take allot of downtime out of buffing or waiting to buff

This is actually one of the best ideas I have seen in a while. It would not be hard for FC to implement or be overpowering in any way. Just pure agent love. All they would have to do is add a tag to each nano (not the crystal) for Self VisualProfession == _______ for each nano. This would not take alot of time either.

For example:

(Mimic Profession: Doctor)
Self PsychologicalModification >= 754
Self SensoryImprovement >= 754
Self BiologicalMetamorphosis >= 754
Self VisualProfession == Agent

would be

(Mimic Profession: Doctor)
Self PsychologicalModification >= 754
Self SensoryImprovement >= 754
Self BiologicalMetamorphosis >= 754
Self VisualProfession == Agent
Or (Self VisualProfession == Doctor)

Done. Come on FC make this happen, waiting to refresh mimic at the right time is a drag on everyone. At least give us the option to do so at our convenience.

[Militaryman666]

The mimic refresh, would only work if visual profession wouldn't let a doctor (or whatever it required) upload it and cast it as well, not that there would be any benefit to that, just saying.

As for now, I believe that False Profession programs are Visual Profession: Agent, in this case, they should simply change it to Visual Profession: Agent or Visual Profession: Doctor, or whaever nano line they want to use.

I also wouldn't mind a much higher level mimic, somewhere for agent's in their 210-220 range that allowed them to use them with Profession: Agent requirements (can switch mimic's on the fly..) And were able to cancel it on demand, or a simple nano (that could take a long casting time like composites) to cancel any mimic running on yourself. Would allow them to buff up a bit easier and offer a little more variety while still limiting them on what exactly they can do all at once.

Suggestion such as..

Mimic Refresh
Requirements..
1300 SI 1300 PM 1600 MM
Level 208

Cost of 1200 Nano
30 second cast time, 0 second refresh..

Cancel's current mimic nano on self.

Some would claim it to be overpowered, but right now I wouldn't think so. One would be able to switch buffs on the fly with their nano-delta pretty high up without feeling much pressure in it, but then again they can only use pre-SL nanos as it is, and most professions hardly use them anymore considering they aren't that great compared to the new ones.

If that wasn't done, then they should put in a new line of mimics with higher penalties and requirements that allowed them to switch mimic whenever they want through a Profession: Agent requirement tag, that would allow the Agent to buff up, then simply use their last mimic nano they will fight with (most likely doctor)

And finally, if that wasn't done then they should either unlock some SL nanos for us, or simply give us the damage we should have by letting us use Aimed Shot in mid fight.