Development Cycle Archive
Thread: IT 7-2 Preliminary Combat Balance Changes
SWG-Runesabre wrote:
We are still evaluating our position with Panic Shot. The changes to Panic Shot will probably stand with Publish 7 until we see how everything balances out with the upcoming Combat Balance changes when we have most everything adjusted we need to adjust. I am still discussing the changes with my combat balance designer and will be able to give you a final answer in the upcoming week.
Is this the ability I saw some sort of TKA/Commando/Marksman elite Solo a krayt with today?
Something odd was going on- this TKA stood there, must have warcried the krayt, flamed it, then spammed some move that caused the krayt to run away, then it came back again. Over and over and over. 15 mins later, the krayt died of flame wounds (he continued to flame, then make the krayt run back and forth). Thefellawas buffed, wearing good suit of composite mind you. But still...
Not sure what was going on. I'm sure it was 'ingenious', but I really hate to see one single player EASILY solo a 'legendary canyon krayt' 
Warcry nerf is a good start to get rid of cheap kills, but I never saw a yell move that looked like a warcry with this fella. Was he using Panic Shot, or something else?
This change to panic shot is bad. Panic shot does not imbalance combat. Yes it is a strong skill, but it definitely is not game breaking. There is no need to change this. 10 seconds is a bit to wait, but the 30 second delaytotally prevents you from spamming it. This is integral to combat for a smuggler. If the delay is any shorter than 10 seconds, it really isn't worthwhile. You can get about 2 shots off during the delay because of the delay mod on panic shot. Then you can miss on those 2 shots too.
I personally don't like that the Devs seem to have made up their minds even though they have plenty of negative feedback on the issue. It's going to be changed no matter what we say now and then maybe in 4 or 5 patches (about 6-8 months) they might put it back to 10 seconds because they made a mistake. Listen to us Devs. Sure, we don't know all of the combat plan, but I don't think you all can tell us that Panic Shot is unfair for Smugglers to have as it currently is in live play.
I might be wrong, but it seems you guys just have too much work to change it back even though you didn't mean to change it in the first place. That is weak. SOE gets a ton of cash every month from this game and there should be plenty of developer time to go around.
Well, I digress here, but this skill should not be changed, especially if it is out of programming convenience. The Devs really agree that we need love and the minor love that we got with contraband honestly did nothing for the profession. We are getting nerfed now even though we need more. I've loved being a smuggler and have never envisioned dropping it. Now I am because smuggler has become pretty much useless. Feign and Low Blow are nice. Last Ditch is cool, but I can definitely live without it in combat. Panic Shot becomes very ineffective except in a group where everyone is hitting the target I just delayed. That isn't worth the skill points. Spices are not a smart investment anymore. Food kills them. Slicing can be done by a guildmate. And underworld is not something that helps me out unless I'm buying faction perks (which is rare) and I'm a high enough level in the imp army and have enough cash that the contraband bonus does not help me. Master Smuggler gives two perks. One means nothing if you don't purchase faction perks. The other doesn't matter if you are high enough in the imp army or have cash. I've continously been a supporter of the Smuggler profession and have recommended it to players a ton of times, but I can't justify it anymore.
I don't complain about the Devs often at all and generally support and stick up for them, but I am very disappointed by this decision and had to voice my opinion. Thanks for reading.
I seriously think moving open weapons to professional class certifications is a very bad idea. The weapons being moved aren't that great for non-compattants, but it at least gives them the small chance of fending off some nasty creatures that are trying to eat them. I mean come on. I've never held a gun in my life, but I know which end the pain comes out of, and if I point it at something and pull the trigger, I may miss but I at least have a chance of hitting. Making it impossible to shoot a weapon for a non-combatant is unrealistic. I'm a duel-class, doc/architect. I have absolutely no points for even novice marksman, and am glad to have at least a couple basic ranged weapons I can use. You're going to be condemning many artisans to hiding in cities where it's safe.
Also, let's assume you move these to professional classes. Who would use a republic blaster over even a FWG5 or DX2? And a Nym slugthrower.... I mean come on. How petty can you get? You can't get much simpler than these two weapons, and yet you're making them professional class weapons?
Renairdor wrote:
SWG-Runesabre wrote:We are still evaluating our position with Panic Shot. The changes to Panic Shot will probably stand with Publish 7 until we see how everything balances out with the upcoming Combat Balance changes when we have most everything adjusted we need to adjust. I am still discussing the changes with my combat balance designer and will be able to give you a final answer in the upcoming week.Is this the ability I saw some sort of TKA/Commando/Marksman elite Solo a krayt with today?
Something odd was going on- this TKA stood there, must have warcried the krayt, flamed it, then spammed some move that caused the krayt to run away, then it came back again. Over and over and over. 15 mins later, the krayt died of flame wounds (he continued to flame, then make the krayt run back and forth). Thefellawas buffed, wearing good suit of composite mind you. But still...
Not sure what was going on. I'm sure it was 'ingenious', but I really hate to see one single player EASILY solo a 'legendary canyon krayt'
Nope that wasn't Panic Shot. Panic Shot is a Smuggler skill. It is shot that hits anything within a cone area and causes a 10 second delay. During this delay the creature affected don't run away... they still continue to rush you but can't do any attacks. There is also a delay which prevents you from spamming this shot over and over.
From what you said about the guy making the Krayts run away and then come back, it sounded very much like Warning Shot which is a Marksman skill. I used to use it when I was levelling my character early on. It used to work on red-con mobs like Bolle-bols on Naboo but i've never tried them on Krayts.
Daker-Naritus wrote:
Your post will be deleted. The devs are deleting any and all commando posts in this thread (including at least 3 of my own, DESPITE the fact that this is theGENERAL preliminary combat balance thread), and haven't provided any alternative testing forum to discuss the commando changes.
SWG-Runesabre wrote:
We are still evaluating our position with Panic Shot. The changes to Panic Shot will probably stand with Publish 7 until we see how everything balances out with the upcoming Combat Balance changes when we have most everything adjusted we need to adjust. I am still discussing the changes with my combat balance designer and will be able to give you a final answer in the upcoming week.
It's just impossible for me to swallow the concept that "balnce" means that a 2nd-tier Hybrid profession's ability should be fundamentally identical to anabilityobtained in the Novice box of a starting profession - and a Novice box that's a prerequisite for the Hybrid profession!
That's not balance at all, unless the lowest level of a newbie starting profession is meant to haveabilities as potent as a Hybrid profession that's invested considerable time, xp, and skillpoints. And if that's the case, we may as well rename this game The Sims.
Demane wrote:
I will add my request as well to the:
Does the defense cap apply to defense vs. abilities and/or dodge/counter/block and/or melee and ranged d???
My character outcome is hinged upon knowing this. I cannot complete the fencer skills I want until then. It is going 4040 or 0440 but I currently sit not knowing what to do. I know it is testing but wow is this annoying.
...purdy colours.
wow shocking accidently nerfed an inocent class
Main difference between warcry and panic shot:
Panic shot doesn't have triple range, melee range is seven warcry range is 21
Ranged profesions don't kill you in three hits unless your buffed armored etc
ohh and what was that... oh ya you don't get panic shot at novice brawler DUH, not all KD's DElays bleeds etc should be considered equal you packs of one size fits all monkeys (devs)
Defensive Modifiers will have a hard cap with profession template stacking. Defense stacking will no longer stack beyond the intended combat calculation limits causing the defender to be nigh invulnerable.
Thunderheart said the cap was going to be 125:
There should be a hard cap of 125 of defense mods, although I think Im the last one here atm and I'll have to confirm with someone over the weekend...
I don't understand the furor. Why are people trying to overcomplicate this? The worst case seems to be 'every defensive skill will be hardcapped at 125', which means a max of 125 ranged defense, 125 melee defense, 125 stun resist, 125 dodge, 125 counterattack, etc.
Hardcapping the skillmods means that you can't get more in that skillmod from any source (second profession, skill tapes, BE clothing, chef food, whatever) than 125.
There's no reason to try to complicate the language with a lot of whatifs. There's no plausible reason to assume center of being will be broken (unless you've got defense acuity/effectiveness above 125, then you might have something to worry about), it's a SECOND skillmod, not just glommed onto dodge/counter/block... and if it IS clipped by the cap, it's likely unintentional and the exact thing they need to know from TESTING, not semi-hysterical hypothetical questions from people who aren't trying the publish changes.
There's no reason to suppose if there's a HARDCAP that skillmod adjusters will be able to take you past the cap. Though we've already got proof that the ctrl-s skillmod display won't accurately display capped skills (We're explicitly told you can gain no more than +25 to any single skillmod from BE stuff/skilltapes/whatever, but it's trivial to see much more than +25 on the skillmod display interface), so there's no good reason to assume the display will show it right... but if in testing you can come to the conclusion that if you have these professions which add this much to the skill, which should hit (or exceed) the presumed 125 cap, and you eat food X and drink Y, which should take you measurably over the cap... and you measurably perform better than you did without the cap, it's been tested as 'not a working hardcap'. Yes? But you've got to go TEST it. See how it actually works, not continually thrash looking for different wording, confirmation or denial that your worst fears are true, or whatever.
Testing is the key. The point to the In Testing threads are to see how it's working (or not working) and suggest ways it needs to change before it goes live. In Concept is the place to whine and moan about how theoretically everyone could be doomed by a change, and you should do This (or That) instead.
If you take the 'read it as plain english' tack, you will probably be less stressed and more accurate than if you're looking for evidence of things never said. They mentioned template stacking (which can stack melee defense, ranged defense, dodge, counterattack, block, condition defenses, etc), then mentioned later that defensive mods shouldn't be able to exceed 125. They never said 'defensive mods other than these', or 'triggered defenses only' (like CoB), or 'passive defenses only' (like dodge/block/counter), or 'accuracy mods only' (like ranged defense/melee defense). You've already got the answer in plain, if not exhaustively explicit and detailed wording.
On Panic Shot, I think it's really wrong to say it's exactly the same as Warcry1, so why should you have to spend all these extra points for the same ability then have it nerfed by accident. It does damage, it has range, neither of which are true of warcry1, so there's the reason for the extra skillpoints and a weaponspeed delay modifier. That said, I think it's exceedingly wrong for devs to more or less admit that it was an unplanned for nerf (they obviously didn't think 'gee, if we change the system on delays, we'll hit this skill too because the skill was built around the delay system' just like they never noticed that when they changed knockdown in general they also got all of the other specials that induced a knockdown effect), then go on to say 'We're going to let it ride until the full set of changes are done'. Deliberately inflicting a break for a period of a month or two is never right. It's bad enough when something slips live, and they say we'll have to wait for the next publish for a fix. When they know it's going to cause grief before hand, have a chance to prevent it, then go 'oh well, it'll be broken in a week and stay that way until we're done' it feels a LOT worse. I can only assume that there's zero way to unlink the delay component from the general warcry (maybe the changes to warcry were made to the shared delay component, and there ISN'T any way to do it just to warcry/warcry2 without clipping panicshot or rewriting the entire skill). And there's no way they're going to try to tear down and rebuild the panicshot (or smuggler tree) in the in-testing phase for a change, so their choice is 'back out the change entirely' or 'put it through and deal with the side effects'. If they decided the change had to happen badly enough (and apparently they have), they roll with it.
It does mean panicshot's doomed, since the delay-breaks-when-damage-is-done means a damaging delay attack will always break itself. Maybe if they changed the execution order of panic shot (apply damage, apply delay, end delay when damage is done) so the shot's own damage doesn't end the delay, but... that's going back to the rewrite panicshot which takes In Development time first, then In Testing time second.
Overall, I think we're screwed because of how delay is currently being used (or abused in Dev eyes) to make many many things simple. I know that as a TK, just using the warcry1 I can take zero damage (aside from self-inflicted from specials) on things singly or in groups, just by applying it after a knockdown to get the damage multiplier and keep it on the ground longer (since animals utterly ignore the dizzy state). Just like I know friends who'd use warcry2 to close on a krayt, apply flame and status, then run the hell away and never get touched because it was ondelay for the approach and retreat.
With the new system, they'll still get the approach, but as soon as they light it up it'll bite back.