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robiwan
Moderator
1035 Posts |
 Posted - 05/05/2008 : 08:58:48
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Game Update 4: Officer Q&A
I have about an hour that I can kill right now. I am going to spend this hour in this forum answering what questions I can. I will not even read any posts I consider hostile, so keep that in mind when you post. If this thread gets overly hostile, then I will stop responding, so for the sake of all your Officer brethren, keep it constructive.
Right now you all know almost everything that is going into the update. I know there is some confusion over what may or may not go in. So I will attempt to clear those up. Also keep in mind you guys are one of the more balanced professions in the game, you have a ton of DPS and really fantastic group buffs. You guys didnt need a full overhaul like some of the other professions.
Sysgroup: This is a system message to all members of the group
RallyPoint: This is an ability that allows the officer to place a location nearby for your group to "Rally" around. There are two versions of it. One is offensive one defensive. I am at home, so I dont have the exact numbers, not that it matters cause they will change. I do know that current RallyPoint(offensive) gives your group mates a red partice to gather around. If you are within 10m of this particle you will get the offensive buff. This buff *Currently* decreases your action costs, increases your strikethru value and Strikethru chance. The RallyPoint(defensive) will give your groupmates a blue particel to rally around. If you are within 10m of this particle you will recieve a Defensive buff. This buff *Currently* increases your armor by a percentage, and increases your dodge.
Advanced Paint Target: Since Blix said I couldnt have the armor break stack, I removed this effect. All that has changed on this ability thus far is I fixed the bug with the particle not lasting the length of the debuff. I may not do any more to it, as it seems fine to me, and other devs I have talked to.
Base Supply Drop:The fruits and vegetables that are in this crate will now scale a little better with your level. At 45 (I think) is when you get the next upgraded fruit, and then again at 75.
New Weapon: This was not approved.
Core Bomb and Grenade Attack (plus Dots): The core bomb now can stack up to 5 fire dots on your target. This stack can be shared with other officers. I changed WP Grenade to have a poison Dot. This poison Dot can stack up to 10. The reason for the 10 is because you can actually get a stack of 2 on one attack. I also changed the name to reflect its poisonous nature. It is now called Dioxis Grenade.
Channel Hate: This is a new ability that allows you to channel the hate you gain from a mob to a member of your group. It is a linked buff, meaning that both you and your target have this buff on you. If either of you cancels, both should lose it. Right now it is 3 expertise boxes in your squad command tab. First box gives you the command and a base 10%. Next box gives you 5% more. and the final box gives you 10% more. This totals to 25%. Again this may change, but right now this feels about right.
Pistol Line Changes: You now get up to 8 more meters range on your pistol, this was added to an existing expertise.
Drill Master: This buff will also now give an additional 5% damage increase to those who are using pistols.
New Pistol Special: I cannot remember what I called it off the top of my head. But it is a relatively fast and cheap ability that does about 50% more damage than your normal white damage (base attack)
Melee Bleeds: Your two melee attacks already had bleeds on them, I hooked them into the new system. The only real difference you should see is a new icon. They dont stack.
Group Buffs Toggle: At the level tactics is granted (cant remember what level that is now) you get a modifier that allows you to toggle a group buff. Reduced leadership take two points. Added a modifier to leadership that allows you toggle up to two more group buffs. Right now the only three buffs that can be toggled are Tactics, Focus Fire, and Drill Master. I wanted to add more group buffs, but lets face it, Focus Fire and Tactics are fantastic. They have about 3 effects each.
This is all I can think of off the top of my head. Remember keep the thread non-hostile and constructive.
Edit: Added Group buffs toggle.
Jesse "Loche" Benjamin
Game Designer
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I have waited and planned and built my strength for fifteen thousand years. I have evolved. It is time.
(Omnius Evermind)
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Feyd'Rautha Saresh (Medic, Rebel Alliance, Europe-Chimaera), Robe Saresh (Force Sensitive, Rebel Alliance, Europe-Chimaera)
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robiwan
Moderator
1035 Posts |
Posted - 05/05/2008 : 08:59:18
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Otazky a odpovede:
Q: Excellent, thank you Loche!
I think most of my curiosity is about the Rally point stuff. At 10m, anyone at the spot is going to be fodder for an enemy Officer's attack. We may need to have that increased. Also, will Leadership effect the duration of the buff? Will the General set effect the cooldown? Does it also provide a group WP so those not in visible range know it's down?
Also, can we get a run down on all the aspects of how our expertise is changing? I also assume that we'll get a reset.
A: Great Questions, and thanks for pointing out the 10m flaw. I will see about extending it. Right now leadership and General set does not, but before I left yesterday I was toying with that idea. I am hoping to get with Blix some time next week and have him help me balance it.
it doesn't currently apply a group waypoint, it is currently designed to be an ability used within visible range. I think it is capped at 64m. This is because it is using the ground targeting system to help you place it.
As for expertise rundowns, lets see...
We added the pistol ability as an off-shoot from the box just above drill master (cant remember the name).
We added 3 new boxes in the squad command tab, these are the the channel hate expertise mods/command
Changed Leadership to only take up to 2 points, these two points also allow you to increase your toggled group commands( which I apparently forgot to mention in my previous post).
Also, advanced paint target expertise has been linked to require the previous expertise boxs. I know this may not be popular, but that is actually how it was supposed to be, Blix and I were looking at it, and it wasnt hooked up correctly.
I think those are all the expertise changes I made. I am also going to flag you guys for a free respec when you log in, like we did with the other professions that had expertise changed dramatically.
Q: I'm fine with it being within the Officer's visible range, but I was thinking more for any other group members that might be out of range, so that they now where to rally too without having to look for a particle.
Also, adding in a pre-req for Adv PT is going to make it very expensive. In light of this change, I would really like you to reevaluate the debuff again. It might be good enough now, but if it costs more after the update the debuff should be more potent.
A: It will be a little harder to add the waypoint to everyone, cause at that point I will need to know the Ids of each waypoint and be able to clean them up when the buff goes away. I will see what I can do, but hopefully the particle will be clear enough. right now I am using a similiar particle to that used on Tansarrii, the blue light at the end of the wisp trail. I can try to make it larger if it seems to hard to see.
As for the PT, I can re-evaluate it, but I cannot make any promises.
Q: First, thank you for taking the time to visit.
Now, As I have a commando and an officer, I have a request for this offensive buff. Strikethrough has no effect on heavy weapons. So, this buff would have no benefit for heavy weapon wielding commandos. Might it be possible to add a devastation bonus to the buff? Seeing as the HW are the only weapon strikethrough doesn't work for and devastations only work on heavy weapons it would be a good balance for the buff to be able to help everyone.
A: Sure I will look into that possibility. Remember the current buff effects may change dramatically. The hard part was getting this ground targeted aura buff to work. this is slightly different than anything we have done before. The second hardest part is balancing it. Plugging in the numbers and choosing effects may take several iterations, I wouldnt be surprised if this changed several times while on TC (which is where we get our best feedback).
Q: What is the mechanic for Channel Hate being canceled? Is there a duration on it?
A: There is not duration, and you just right click the buff to cancel it.
Q: Since a new weapon was not approved any chance we can get the melee bonuses and specials applied to all melee weapons? I understand the argument for not changing the pistol bonuses to all ranged, however all melee weapons are essentially the same weapon with different skins. There is no performance difference between them. This point was also brought up in the stratics interview.
If you are linking all the previous boxes to advanced PT, I think it would have to either have the base special damaged increased or the debuff strength increased, as Fuelsean pointed out that is a significant investments of points.
A: I can re-evaluate it, but I cannot make any promises.
Q: So, we've freed up 2 points from Leadership, and added 4 new boxes, plus tighened up Adv PT. This is going to make for some tough choices now in expertise. Can't wait to see how that plays out. I just hope that we don't end up with any new boxes that nobody ever takes.
A: I know for PvP spec, You actually may have saved 2 boxes. As you wont be buying into the channel hate. Yep, we are real big on making people make choices now on what expertise they want/need depending on thier play style.
Q: Oh... I also meant to ask if the Rally Point and /sysGroup abilities will be tied to our profession wheel or added through expertise?
A: Both are part of your profession wheel. I cant remember where /sysgroup is granted, but I know Rally is for level 90 officers.
Q: Hmm... is there any possibility of tapping the old Rally Point code? If the waypoint doesn't get clean up, I'm sure that you wouldn't have much objection. Perhaps you could do the cleanup in future. As for the blue light, you mean that every group member would get a trail leading them to the spot - just like /find used to work?
Also, I know you said that the buff lasts 15 sec, but how long does the point stay up?
A: I would tap into the old code, I cant remember if it cleaned itself up or not though. The blue light is the one at the end of the wisp trail, the one that is at your target location. There is no trail, this requires art path nodes and such.
The point will only last as long as the buff, as the effect is gone, you dont need to be there anymore. I think of it as a way to tell your group mates to stand in a certain place during a battle, and the added benefit is they get a buff for listening. You can use for tactics in Heroics and pvp.
Q: For the Rally Point Light Beams - do they change color depending on the version?
Once again the melee question, can we get the bonuses/specials to all melee weapons since there is no variance in performance for melee weapons well at least that the players can see. This would give us a bit more variation in weapons - as basically for PvP officers you have 3 melee weapons - Gaffi, Stun baton, Nova Edge.
A: yes it is a blue light for Defense and a red for offense.
I will discuss the melee changes with blix and others and see if this is something we want to do.
Q: frist thanks thanks thanks for posting...
2nd? anyword on that solider upgrade??? its really useless :/
3rd, Is there a way to maybe up the armor for more points for those of us that dont want to die in 5 secs :/
A: No soldier upgrade at this point, I am fast running out of time.
I have talked about the armor issue with others, and it was felt that this was a trade off for the high dps. Right now most of your high damage comes from AOEs and those are incredible hard to mitigate, as they require evade skills, which are low. So the only way in PvP to really survive you is to take take you out quick.
This is a standard MMO practice, mages in EQ and EQ2 have low armor but deal tons of damage. I am not calling you a mage, because those dont exist in Star Wars, I am just saying the same concept fits. SMILEY
Q: Awesome.
Oh this isn't so much a real request but could the level 75 base supply drop fruit be a maroj melon SMILEY<img src=" />
A: Now thats funny. I will try to remember to change the art and name.
Q: Ok how about anything done to that buff "last words" it adds health and action when we die??? anything new on that?
A: Not sure what you mean. I haven't touched that buff.
Q: BTW hows that dot system going..i know its not just an officer thing but it really effects our damage output on what you call our mage prof SMILEY<img src=" />
A: If you get full stacks up, you will definitely get more damage output. The easiest and fastest way to do this is to work with another officer. Most likely you will see the difference in heroics and on other players, if they survive your sick alpha strike.
I had shadowbrak show me how he specs his officer when we have him play an officer in our heroics, and I was amazed at the sheer power you guys can sustain, not to mention the alpha strike. So combine that with the dots stacking, and you are doing great.
Also remember on live right now your Core Bomb and WP dont stack thier dot. With GU4 you can have at least 1 of each up. Most times I get a stack of 2 on my first grenade attack. This should be more damage then you are putting out now. Most likely when you guys get this update on TC, we may tweak the damage of the dots. It is harder to theorycraft the data then it is to just play it with a large base and tabulate the results.
Q: i just personally find it silly to be useful when im dead...maybe its a me thing. Im not sure if its been fixed but it use to remove its buff when u died sf and went back on leave...i think it had an action or damage reduction in it 2...never used it since i try not to die to much :/
A: I actually like this buff. When Shadowbrak plays his officer, we all get some great boosts, and our heroics are a little easier. I like the fact that if the guy who is obviously helping us dies, we don't just all the sudden suck, we get a little boost to keep going. I actually wish we had more abilities like this. Kinda like when the tank wipes, half the time the group I am in starts running around like chickens with thier heads cut off, and die one by one. His death really effected us negatively. Where in death, and officer is still valuable. its a win win to me.
Q: One last thought....
Since we three of our buffs are being made toggles could you add a group buff range increase to the General Set? As the action cost reduction mainly helped for Tactics and Focus Fire ( which are action hogs ). Or possibly increase the chance for inspired action by 5% that would offset it SMILEY<img src=" />
Of course please leave everything else of the set as it is, as I love it.
A: Ya I noticed that having the toggled buffs kinda gimps the jewelry a little. You dont think 100m is a wide enough range? I was going to address this with blix this week. I am thinking we might have it hook into rallypoint. But again, I cannot promise anything.
Q: I don't suppose we could get an idea of about when to expect GU4 on TC? SMILEY
A: soontm?
Q: Last comment before i have to run..the dead eye set is far the weakest of the 3 officer ones. With paint target not getting much of a boost any way to up the jewlery sets some?
A: Unfortunately I am sounding like a broken record. I can look, but time is short and I cant promise anything. Wish I could say more.
Q: Wait will the wp stay up until the person gets too it just incase they are a bit busy with a mob or person until they finish them off to make it to the wp?
A: Current implementation is to have the particle show only while the buff is available. I did it this way to alleviate confusion. Whats happening behind the scenes is I am placing an invisible object on the ground, then placing a trigger volume around it. When a member of the group breaches the volume, they get the buff. I thought it would be confusing to the player if they ran to the particle and nothing happened.
That being said, I can see if I can spend a little time on tweaking it to give a waypoint as well.
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I have waited and planned and built my strength for fifteen thousand years. I have evolved. It is time.
(Omnius Evermind)
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Feyd'Rautha Saresh (Medic, Rebel Alliance, Europe-Chimaera), Robe Saresh (Force Sensitive, Rebel Alliance, Europe-Chimaera)
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Edited by - robiwan on 05/05/2008 08:59:33 |
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