New NT defence nanos explained.

[Seventh]

WTB instacast nuke line doing 1200-3K damage with a 3s recharge time, without level locks.

Cotp does even better dmg is instacast and llvl locked to only 185 btw.

[Keldros]

we never get anything that isn't nerfed---that's it!

So reduce the recharge time to 1s.

[flguru]

Either we are the masters of technology and get the capacity to assign every different line of nanos to an independant CPU in our imaginary cyberdeck/belt o' wonders.. (so you can cast 2 or 3 things at once while other lines are recharging)

-OR-

NanoCinit scales Casting as well as recharge time!

If you're going to limit us to playing in this orchestra a single note at a time.. at least let us do it quicker.

And if you need someone ELSE on test.. to look at these new NT nanos.. you see the name, I'm sure you've seen me on test.. if not, ask around.

[Devilry]

Well, I've pretty much finalized the form of the nano. Now that we've tested out the shielding part, I can add the rest. I didn't want to add any more so we could focus on the defensive portion, as that is new code. Basically, the nano should now give a substantial bonus to nano initiative, nano damage multiplier, and guarantee the lowest nano cost possible. I threw in 75 point damage buffs just in case as well. It now gives 2500 nano over the course of the shielding portion, then has 1 minute and 35 seconds of mana drain.
I'm aware that many people will not ever be happy, but understand this, the nano represents a 20-60% boost in survivability in potentially lethal situations. This nano is a tool for use at the end of fights. You can either use this to finish off an opponent or flee. The nano drain ensures that you have to end the fight and that is going to have to stay in place.
Oh yeah, forgot to add, you'll only be able to use this once every 30 mins now, to prevent people from abusing it for the buffs.

I've been wondering, with what environment in mind did you mainly design the nanoline? If I understood your post(s) correctly, then this is some kind of "just let me get one more hit in" tool, with a concept similiar to what the soldiers OMHH used to offer at its specific level range back in the days.

While I do see the logic behind such a concept - and personally think that it's a refreshing approach - I have my doubts that today's Anarchy Online environment is a suitable place for it, let me try to explain why:

From a PvM perspective
Your average mobs hp bar is rather large, which means a NT's survivability somehow has to be ensured until that final stage of the fight is going to happen where you describe this nano to be effective. I don't see it happen. In a solo environment, if you don't have the means to bring down a mob to the last blob, you can't actually benefit from this nanoline as you're never gonna be able to use it. On the contrary, if you can bring the mob in question down to one blob, you won't be needing this nanoline either since you have already managed with your tools for this long. Having played solo encounters with both a TL7 NT, keeper and doctor, I found this above concept to be always true regardless of profession.

If you're strictly thinking of a team environment, I see no reason why the NT should all of a sudden get massive aggro in the final stage of a battle. If he didn't get it till now, what would suddenly change? If anything, tanking classes can keep aggro better the longer a fight will last. You always have the Nullity Sphere option available as the panic button, good enough for me. On the contrary, if the NT (for some reason) has been tanking from the start, the team ensured his survival for so long ... why fail on the last blob? It's just not logical.

From a PvP perspective
Personally, I think the "one last hit" concept of AO can be considered completely dead in PvP. Today's game is mostly about alpha power to be used during "cooldown" of your opponents toolset, it's about delivering a combination of attacks quickly enough to prevent your opponent from restoring himself through his toolset.

Based on my experience, surviving for a little bit longer to get that one or two more nukes in won't alter a battle very much at all. For that to happen, the NT profession would actually be required to come close to killing his opponent, which in most cases isn't gonna happen because you just don't have the offensive options available over a short period of time to really hurt your opponent. Surely that nuke every 3 seconds (in the best possible scenario) does hurt a large majority of professions, but who in their right mind would just stand there taking it? With the loss of range advantage due to guns outranging nukes and melee professions not being affected by roots much at all, the slow artillery concept of NT nukes feels completely out of place ... and giving them the option to get a few more nukes off won't change the failure of the initial concept. It's all about timing perks and specials ... and doing it fast.


A couple of ideas/suggestions
Now with that said, I think this new nanoline is following the tradition of NT range debuffs and AI DoTs, namely being limited to shine in 1% of all game encounters, where it actually runs in danger to be completely forgotten about. With all the limitations to the nanoline, I think you have created an extreme.

I'd like to use the opportunity to talk about the other extreme though, the same nanoline but without any disadvantage whatsoever at all:

Personally, I think the nanoline shouldn't come with a nanodrain at all, but using the 1 min 35 sec as the lockdown, very similiar to how Nullity Negative Feedback works today. Yes that's right, two minutes lockdown, not 30 minutes. I have been completely baffled over your concern that NT's might "abuse" the offensive version to increase their damage, because honestly, I personally think that such a damage increase is very much needed and I guess the officiall NT wishlist does support me in that case.

Now, with those changes, you could basically offer three improvements at the same time, namely:

• Higher damage output. Completely ignoring the defensive part, a NT could now use the newly added offensive boost to create a 25 seconds window every 2 minutes to increase his damage output.
  
• Improved defense. Finally, the defensive aspect of the nano. Even without an added nanodrain, the harsh damage > nano transformation will ensure that your pool will heavily suffer the moment you start taking repeated hits over a short period of time. I think Masta has tested this in detail - if you're playing tank mage, your pool will be gone pretty fast. Basically, you have some lesser form of a bio cocoon.
  
• Putting all the nano mods and boosts into use. Let's face it, a large majority of all NT equipment and perks has its focus on nano adding and regeneration equipment, which is mostly been left untouched because such a high boost is not required. Hell, my 220 NT on testlive has not a single point in nanopool at all, nor would you ever have to touch any + nano gear or perks the moment you have accomplished self sufficient nano regeneration, an ability no longer limited to the NT profession, but available to all caster classes. To cut it short, there are two threads I've written in A51 a few months ago covering this topic in detail, I'm sure Masta can hook you up with the links if you'd like to (re-)read it. But basically, a NT focusing on max nano and regeneration would finally be rewarded through the option to make use of the nano defense for an extended amount of time.

Like I initially said, this is the other extreme, I guess a reasonable level of balance could be found somewhere in between these two extremes. Maybe a nano drain as such should remain, giving a NT focused on nano and regeneration the option to deal higher damage (by using the offensive part) and to take more damage (by using the defensive part) of said nanoline.

When it comes to the offensive part, think of it as a player equiping his toon with every + damage + AR + weaponskill item available and then be rewarded for it through better damage. Such an option is currently close to unavailable to the NT profession, simply because of the limited + nano damage gear and perks and nuke damage not scaling with anything whatsoever.

This nanoline has a lot of potential to be good, but to me it just seems like another far to careful approach on a boost is being done in order to not disturb the current "balance" to much.

[Nanotehnpoir]

Wow... now I know Seventshadow saw this.... but not sure if you others people noticed this...

For the first time ever .. I saw with my own eyes... that this dev (fc_karma) ACTUALLY took our feedback on the new nano she showed.. and changed it to something we'd like more...

I have to give you credit.. this is simply amazing, I never thought it would come to be.... You gave us your idea - we didn't like it.. gave suggestions to change it to make it useful.. and you did it... simply amazing

Fc_Karma.. I don't know how long you've been dev - but where you have you been hiding?

Keep up the work in listening to your customers! You earn my respect now - and for taking it out of the reflect line.. even more!

Keep up on the improvements!

One suggestion though: I think Traders aren't really the profession to be the "nullity" type users.. it's a start in the defensive direction, but I think traders ability lies with more being able to "evade" mainly.. - this is good for surviving alpha, step in the right direction, but we need higher drains now so that we can further survive beyond this nano.. and more stuff that you probably know is already in the wishlist...

[Steveo]

Thanks for the quick response Karma, I think its through these discussions that we can further the profession, even though I'm not a fan of the dramatics and flaming I'm glad that you took the time to actually look at the nano and give us some options.

Positive points from my perspective:

• Doesn't overwrite RRFE (Great addition)
• New piece of defense for us (This is something we've been asking for, for a very long time)
• Utilizes our nanopool (also something we've been after for a long time)

Negative points from my perspective:

• Recharge on the offensive nano is way too high - the only mediator to this is that I haven't seen the exact numbers as far as how empowering this will be to us. It may be that once we have a chance to check out the nano the recharge might make a little more sense but I would still question why it is that it needs to be every 30 mins not to be overpowered. What mob do we fight every thirty minutes? If its a new addition to our toolset it would seem like we should have access to it slightly more often than every thirty minutes, but as I said once we get our hands on it on testlive it may make more sense.
• It feels like this nano is way too punishment oriented. I understand that with all good things come bad things but really how many do we need to get? 30 min cooldown and we get our nanopool zapped and there is a long recharge on casting? I dunno, I understand there is balance to think about but don't you think we may have gone a little far here?

I will report more when I can actually test these buggers out. Unfortunately for me, getting set up on testlive is taking a little longer than expected cause a couple peeps are on vacation. Hopefully I can get some more info soon.

All that being said, THANKS AGAIN Karma, for listening to us and giving us some new stuff based on feedback. That is an amazing thing, lets not stop talking

[Gothique]

[*]Utilizes our nanopool (also something we've been after for a long time)

lol.

I for one was not asking for a huge nano drain to be added on top of something to to utilize my nanopool.

[Steveo]

lol.

I for one was not asking for a huge nano drain to be added on top of something to to utilize my nanopool.

I don't think anyone was, but our nano pools have sat basically untouched for a long time. This can be looked at as a good or a bad thing. I was also not in favor of all the complaining about the nano pool situation (if its not broke don't fix it) because its only too easy (case in point here) to create something that will definately utilize that thing we aren't using.

[Nanotehnpoir]

True, the Nano pool was quite untouched for sometime, Not many people have actually tried the nano, so it's hard to make a true judgement on how it will do on Live.. if you can get your nano back decently though, it could be good...

But I do think the negatives of the nano need to be put low enough where an NT doesn't actually have to start training in some of the not so useful nano regain perks.. as many other perklines are quite wanted for Nt to be "good".. and giving those perks up to make this nano better would be too harsh of a downside..

But time will tell!

[Abalz]

Maybe instead of draining our nano to 0 after.. this nano should run a hostile add%nano cost for 2 minutes like 50% or something crazzy... to just make nano more costly after the shield goes off.. and a slightly less nano drain after like 2k instead of 3k.

[Keldros]

But I do think the negatives of the nano need to be put low enough where an NT doesn't actually have to start training in some of the not so useful nano regain perks..

You're basically saying you want those perks to remain useless because you don't have them trained yourself.

Those perks are only useless as long as you don't have to deal with anything draining your nano.

The problem is, the perks aren't an advantage if the nanodrains are all targetted specifically at the profession with those perks. It's like giving bioshield professions unlimited nanopool for a few seconds in exchange for a 3K self-DoT--why would they use it?

If the devs want to make our huge nanopools useful by adding massive nanodrains that's fine, but those nanodrains should be AoE traps and boss specials that can target all players.

[Nanotehnpoir]

You're basically saying you want those perks to remain useless because you don't have them trained yourself.

Those perks are only useless as long as you don't have to deal with anything draining your nano.

In my opinion, it'll depend how useful the defensive nano is in-game overall, and whether if perking the nano regaining perklines is really worth it (if needed).. in my mind as of now, I don't feel it's totally worth it.. but seeing it in-game and getting opinions from nt's I know/seeing it used will help me finalize my thoughts on it..

[knitewulfe]

1st I also have to give major appreciation to karma for finally listening to us

. I threw in 75 point damage buffs just in case as well.

You do realize that dmg buffs dont affect nukes right? Or is this for the 2 weapon wielding NTs I've seen.

Oh yeah, forgot to add, you'll only be able to use this once every 30 mins now, to prevent people from abusing it for the buffs.

Everyone seems to realize NTs need more dmg, so putting say a 2-5 minute restriction on this seems more fair even if the bonus is as high as +50% nanodmg (heck I'd be pretty happy if it was a 5-10 minute resriction). The nanoinitiative bonuses wont really help since most of us already cap the SL nukes. The problem is the 2/1 second cap. Sure it would be nice to be able to cast more towards full def, but then we have to adjust the agg/def bar everry time we cast this. With the already harsh nanopool side effects I dont really see how the 30 minute restriction makes sense. We do need more damage and this would actually serve that purpose then. I hope you realize that you are actually right on target to fixing the NT profession IMO if the 30 minute restriction is reduced to around 2 minutes. With the 30 minute restriction we will not see a real increase in our damage and it wont really help with soloing as was stated before. In pvp we are still so slow with our 2/1 second caps and lack of alpha this will just give us a slightly better chance and will not overpower us in any way.

I hope you take our lack of damage into consideration karma. This is exactly what we need but still has too harsh of restrictions. Anyway great work on this so far, and I'm happy to see progress into fixing the NT.

[lunette]

30 minutes is harsh for an MMO?

Yes, 30 minutes is harsh for an MMO. Heck, 5 minutes is harsh.
What could a skill that you can use once per mission possibly do to fix a profession? You may fix it for 1 in 50 encounters. Then you still need something for the other 49.

[Actium1]

the dmg boost is a nice try but it wont help. In PvM we would still not be able to deal the dmg fast enough. Same in PvP. Actually i think lunette summed it up nicely: If i can only use it once every 30 mins ... what i do in the times when i cant use it ? So this helps again only in a very few situations and so it wont help to fix this profession.

[Morkhai]

It will "help" but certainly won't be enough.

[sobeguy]

I hope you take our lack of damage into consideration karma. This is exactly what we need but still has too harsh of restrictions. Anyway great work on this so far, and I'm happy to see progress into fixing the NT.

It might help to remember that the devs know whats coming down the pike in LE. I'm assuming that at least explains a bit the utility of the Trader version of this.

Say they use this nano to fix all NT problems, by making it available across levels to increase damage by 300%, and give you some survibility. Now, in LE you get new nukes that increase your base damage by 200%, with research lines that reduce recharge and cast time beyond what init can do - if that happened, today's fix would make tomorrow's fix too much.

[Vlain]

I know I said I left this thread, but I hadn't heard anyone comment on my idea. What would you guys think if the 30min recharge scaled down with a particular nanoskill the same way the recharge on dimach scales with dimach skill?

[Morkhai]

I was just thinking about the same

Like more MC = less recharge

[Actium1]

the idea is nice vlain