MP Wishlist: New init/dmg debuffs

[Veshel]

So

*Bump*

[Wizz]

Had the idea a few days ago but work around Christmas is eating up my brains and energy.

Anyway...

The damage reduction doesn't have to be proposed as just one number. It could be a range of damage reduction averaging around the numbers that were proposed.
If game mechanics allow it could even be percentage of reduction, in which case it doesn't matter if it's base damage that is affected or not.

[Bionitrous]

We need to seriously work the Dev's to focus on the MP's core abilities as masters of emotion and the innate flow of Notum and how it is linked to the 'magical' feats that can be performed through its manipulation.

If we could somehow get the playerbase to understand us as being tuned into the metaphysical, more than simply as nanoskill buffing whores, we could explore the MP more fully. Those damn nanoskilll buffs are the albatross around our necks that prevent us from ever getting any more interesting.

I am the master of my emotions. Or more succinctly, the metaphysical after-effects of my rage or compassion tied in with my uncanny link to the flow of notum on this planet cause messed up things to happen. I may not completely understand it, but stuff happens. In pop culture lore, who would be the ultimate Metaphysicist? I would respond: 'Bruce Banner'. Bombarded by Gamma Rays, when his rage reaches a critical mass, his body is transformed inasmuch of a defense mechanism as anything into The Incredible Hulk. This state lasts until his wrath is abated and the situation is safe. Let me propose that defense mechanism nano for the MP elsewhere.

However, the flip side of that coin was to be our Wrath Abatement line. We come across an Enforcer who's pulled a picture of his ex-girlfriend giving a lap dance to his best friend out of his pocket and is looking for some heads to crack. He's going offensive. Our tools are supposed to ease that anger. Lessen his impulses to draw blood and harm others. Turn IKillzJoo into a pussycat. Does slowing down his attack fit in with this? Yes. Does lowering his damage fit in with this? Yes, he ought to be hitting with a little less gusto behind his swings.

I agree that decreasing damage of the affected toon is in order in terms of game mechanics. I've never been too much of a fan of game mechanics holding too much of a higher priority over character development. Ideally, I think we could explore an additional component to the Abatement line that might make things more interesting. If we could stop attacks and force a retarget in PvP, it would be representative of the attacker putting his pistol in his pocket and his thumb in his mouth before realizing that he was angry only a second ago and getting back to business. Essentially, basically we'd be hitting the 'Q' button for them.

I'd never want to see us being able to 'turn' the enemy on his own unless that was tied into Balbuto somehow (% chance to totally bewilder and target a friendly). Leave that to the charmers and mind swappers. Still, I'd like to see some more emphasis put on our ability to both dampen and amplify the metaphysical effects of human emotion.

Imagine making an enemy Doc so enamored of you that he decides to be benevolent enough to offer you a Complete Heal in the midst of battle. Imagine enraging an already pist off Enforcer to the point where he starts attacking whatever is closest to him just to be able to draw blood or hear the crack of bones that much quicker. Imagine a Soldier going FullAuto while spinning in circles simply spraying bullets in all directions as he laughs maniacally. NT's who sit down to read an article in Nanoprograms Monthly that they've been putting off for a nice set in the john.

If we could get some identity in the game world, I'd be happy. One of the biggest complaints from most MP's is that we're considered as nothing more than buff whores. WE know the backstory behind our profession. Others see us as tools. Agents can roleplay. Doctors can roleplay. Enforcers can roleplay. Bureaucrats can roleplay. We are buff whores who add points to skills.

I'd love to be able to say 'Settle down or I'll have to do it for you' at a rambunctious guild meeting and have people lol and understand what I meant. 'Don't piss me off. You know I have trouble checking my emotions lately' should envoke images of something good/bad happening to the MP that one may or may not want to happen in their vicinity.

Point being, I'm tired. So very tired of being a buff whore. Let's focus a bit on the Abatement line. Let's push for the Mezz pet to do something in line with our backstory. Let's get a nano that makes us green and ugly when we're down to 10% hitpoints. Let's try to get the word out that we aren't scientists like the NT's but rather gifted children who play with Notum-Doh when they are kids and make fantastic stuff without knowing why. We're the freaks the NT's study and envy owing to our ability to catch Nano-Fireflies in a jar. I'm sure more than one MP-destined child has been locked up in a Sentinel or Omni-Tek padded cell and poked and prodded as they tried to figure out what made him or her tick. Too much prodding and a ball of hate shoots out of his butt. Work with that. Do other players in this game even realize that our 'pets' are physical manifestations of the MP's pure hatred and rage. Do they think of us as being able to even get so angry? Could they even accept us as being Shao Lin whose anger never presents itself on the face of the MP but instead balls up until such time as he releases it calmly to maim and kill?

Bah! Does any of this have to do with the thread I posted in? Talk about a tangent.

[Xtremtech]

Very good thoughts Bio and passionately said as always.

I've often thought that there should be some way of defocussing the target of somebody in PvP. How would this work with auto-attacking do you think?

X

[Bionitrous]

With auto-targetting, a 'de-focus' would simply initiate a response attack as usual. If I am fighting you currently and sate your bloodlust, then you detarget me and leave combat mode. Easy enough. If you have auto-attack on, the next time I hit you, you respond in kind. It's a small thing, perhaps. But, potentially strategic. Imagine, defocusing an enemy who is attacking you and is foolish enough to have auto-attack on (perhaps not so foolish in Lag-Wars aka Notum Wars). Sure would be nice for yer Cacodemon to land the next hit instead of you.

Confusing? I hope so. Isn't that the idea?

[Xtremtech]

Yes indeed. It would be a useful effect if only as a way of redirecting to the 'tank'-demon.

How do you feel about the wishlist entry for the dmg/init debuff?

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[Bionitrous]

OK, read the proposal. I'm afraid yer asking for so much that we'll get nothing. I honestly can't see them making the MezzPet truly 'Mezz'. As much as we'd love to see this, I'm 99% sure that won't happen.

What I would like to see is 'PacifyTarget' get fixed. That being, when you are 'Pacified' you can't perform any aggressive actions. Not necessarily a Stun (I would expect the victim to be able to move and perform beneficial actions on himself and others) but a general decrease in damage output of the target. Basically no hostile actions while pacified.

This probably won't be touched either for the simple fact that PacifyTarget is a component of the 'real' Mezzes. Mess with our MezzPets and they could potentially break three other professions.

Which leaves us with the final component of the wishlist: the init debuff. I'd rework it to be more like the insta-break line of Doc init-debuffs. You've been 'pacified' to the point you can barely raise your arms an point yer gun at me. However, if I or something else hits you, you regain your composure.

This has a benefit. Something actually happens. And, if we dump the PacifyTarget component of Captivated Gaze we can be bug-free again. Never to complain again. I guarantee you I would pull out the Mezz pet if it dropped a massive (yet insta-break) init debuff on its target of short duration. No matter what anyone said at least it would be doing something. Something you could see. Even if one attack every 12 seconds had to go off at a -1000 init penalty, we'd be appreciated for cooling down the enemy. And never would it be hated as much as that unbreakable Uncontrollable Body Tremors that lasts forever. Hell, I would even bring back my old suggestion of 'groovy colors' (invert the playerview color palette) for the duration of the effect.

One thing we need to realize is that our attack pet, heal pet, and psychosis pet, require no nano to execute any of their damage, healing, or other effects. I think the effectiveness of Belamorte (for example prompting them to put in the Land Control buffing limits) has them scared. A no-nano Mezz-over-time, has to be frightening to them. Something that ticks every 12 seconds and maybe causes whatever you may be doing at that time to kinda take a while seems to be workable.

If we get a 'real' Mezz I'll be both ecstatic and shocked. If we get a noticeable init debuff off the Psychosis pet, I will be 100% satisfied.

[Xtremtech]

Bio:

So you're proposing giving the Mez pet a plain high level breakable init debuff... which is reasonable in and of itself I guess... though I'm not sure that we won't get a proper mez for the pet... it's only 12 second duration after all.

What do you want to do with the dmg/init debuff line then? As in wrath abatement etc... (the original topic of this thread... )

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[Xtremtech]

Not just bumping this one but getting it back on track a little:

There was an interesting suggestion before the topic strayed a little about the possibility of making the damage portion of the debuff a precentage reduction in the damage hit - rather than a fixed amount.

This seems to me to be a great idea in that the damage reduction would be more accurately balanced between low level mobs and high level mobs and between PvM and PvP (which is always going to be difficult with this kind of debuff because damage levels vary quite widely between PvM and PvP at similar levels).

The thing I'm not sure about is how such a debuff would scale.

Seems to me there are a few options:

1) Damage and Init debuff are expressed as a fixed percentage through the line - but the line includes a level check with the level of Mob or Player affected rising qith the QL of the nano

2) Dmg/Init debuff is expressed as a variable percentage with the percentage rising with the higher QL of the nano (this seems to leave the lower level MPs at a disadvantage...)

3) Dmg debuff could be expressed as a percentage of the total hit or as a percentage of the base hit.

I'm sure there are other possibilities too.

X

[Sallust]

or leave the lower level ones alone as straight damage reducers and make the top end versions reduce the % damage.

The line really does work great in PvP and only starts losing its effectiveness after level 100. Its the high end ones which need the adjustment, so just adjust them.

[Xtremtech]

Yup Sallust,

I'd agree. Only thing is I'm not sure how easy it will be to get FC to have the same line work differently at each end. Perhaps a suggestion like:

1) Shed Anger:

• Damage reduction 3 + 0%
  Init reduction 19

2) Wrath abatement:

• Damage reduction 37 + 15%
  Init reduction 261

would be easier...

What do you think? What sorts of percentages might make sense?

X

[Sallust]

Well for coding purposes I'd leave it to just doing straight damage removal or a percentage. Not adding the two together.

Percentages are better anyways because it means that even at worst they'll still be hitting for something.

I don't know what a good percentage is, but I would think it should be in the 10-30% range. I think aiming on the lower end of that spectrum is better. I don't know, others would probably be a better judge.

We are a "squishy" profession in PvP, but then again this effects the target. Not us.

[Xtremtech]

We are a "squishy" profession in PvP,

Lol! What does that mean?

X

[Sallust]

"Squishy" means that we have dark blue HP, and many of us are nanomage to boot. Many weapon based professions can get 2-3 alphas off on me and then I'm dead without a chance at a fight. Happens the exact same to engineers, NTs, and agents if you can find them.

Given the chance to survive the first 6 seconds of combat though I can usually pound people pretty good.

So because of our weakness in HP this % reduction of damage would be a very good and valuable line for us. But we have to remember this minimizes the target's ability to do damage against anyone (like enforcers) not just us.

Sorry, I was trying to be a bit to brief earlier.

[Alpherah]

Dont remind me how squishy we are please..

Manex burst caps my hp..

Normal QB hit caps my hp..

Flashpoint alpha leaves me with the 600-800 hp bela heals me for at the end if im lucky...

Total Concentration HAS killed me before (dude got off 3 norm hits and a aimshot somehow)

At least sneak attack doesnt seem to cap my hp *goes to find some gimpy advs w/ byom blades...*

Bleh.. if they gonna introduce weapons like that, EVERYONE needs double hp to survive the opening seconds alone =/

[Xtremtech]

I've been trying to do some calculations on a percentage based damage reduction by looking at the average hits for mobs at the level of Shed Anger and Wrath Abatement are used and comparing that to the damage reduction built in to the debuff.

I think something like 20% at the Shed Anger end of the range should be about right to emulate the present debuff... while we'd be looking at more like 8% at the Wrath Abatement end. It's hard to calculate it without taking into account armour etc... but these figures 'feel' about right for the line as it now stands.

Given that we need to improve the top end while leaving the bottom end pretty much as is... maybe we should go for a flat 20% damage on all the different QLs in the line and let the Init debuff rise with the line's QL (leaving it at what it is now).

How does that sound?

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[Wizz]

It's Xmas aftermath and everything is a bit fuzzy but I don't get what's wrong with it.

Anyone you'd land an init/dmg debuff on is an enemy (at least potentially) and if aforementionned enemy can't hit things for anything worth it's just as good. Or am I wrong?

[______________Hayake]

Though I sympathize with the uselessness of your wrath line, I'd just like to point something out: pvp in ao is already a lot like 'being debuffed online'.

At least 50% of the time I'm either blinded, rooted, snared, init debuffed, plundered or dominated or a combination of the above. This isn't fun. Especially the blinds suck real bad.

I'm pretty sure that you guys and girls know as well how much fun being debuffed all the time is, I'd rather have FC give you something positive than ANOTHER debuff. Pvp is too much of a debuff/root game already imo.

This isn't the mp's fault but with nw and all the area debuffs/roots, debuffing has gone waaay too far already.

[Xtremtech]

Hmmm Hayake, although I do appreciate your point.... let's take a look at the MP defences in PvM:

1) Mez pet doesn't mez
2) Unmakes have no effect
3) Dominates have no effect
4) Nano Shutdown has no effect
5) Curse of Chronos stun (5 sec effect 10 second recharge and 5600 taunt.... and only high level)

we have the heal pet to heal us but in terms of defence against a foe in PvM we have only CoC really which shuts off nukes and pet buffs pretty much too.... At higher levels, the pets cannot do enough damage or taunt enough to keep aggro unless the MP is at full def and the pet is fully anima'd/evo'd and if the MP ever uses his stun - the pet isn't going to outdo the 5600 taunt....

MP defences in PvP:

1) Mez pet isn't supposed to do anything
2) Unmakes/Dominates are useful (at varying levels)
3) Nano Shutdown is extremely difficult to land (and only high level)
4) our piddling dmg/init does as good as nothing really
5) Attack pet can't tank anyway and is largely ignored
6) Curse of Chronos stun (high level only)

We're supposed to be nanomages and have absolutely no real defences against weapons damage. Every PvP player is also a weapons user - so being able to defend against nano stuff is only part of the puzzle.

Our pals the NTs have nullity, layers, AC buffs with HP buff, roots, calms with big init debuffs, blinds, stuns with dmg and shorter recharge, better evades buff etc. Crats have roots, mezzes with big init debuffs, demotivational speeches, stuns. Docs have massive init/dmg debuffs. Traders have AC increasers, AR reducers, drains etc. Engis have AC buffs, Specials shields etc. And let's not forget that the init debuffs that most other weak professions have include nanocasting too so they're getting excellent weapons and nano defences.

MPs have.... ummm.... a damage init debuff that removes 37 dmg plus a bit off weapons inits and a short duration stun that kills our ability to nuke/debuff because of its massive recharge. We can just about keep an evo running on the attack pet and stun for 5 seconds out of 20. That's it - maybe squeeze one nuke into the gap between the recharges.

If you'd like to remove some of the debuffs in the PvP game I'd not argue with you - but the MP really does need to have some kind of defence against weapons users in PvP and right now - particularly at higher levels - we have very little defence at all. Our 'soul-mates' the NTs, also nanomage oriented and also useless with weapons get nullity, layers, AC buffs with HP buff, roots, calms with big init debuffs, blinds, stuns with dmg and shorter recharge, better evades buff after all... and they complain no end about being too vulnerable a lot of the time....

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[Xtremtech]

Oops sorry I forgot... the MPs have the creation shields of course... which have some AC and other benefits.... as long as we don't carry a weapon of course... which isn't really an option in PvP anyway.

X