Dev Discussion: GU103 Pet Changes and Tank Changes

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Batuba has dropped changes coming to DCUO with Game Update 103. Pets and Tanks are getting the balance pass love.

Pet Changes

Sorcery and Earth have always been the Pet Powers but they haven’t been up to par ever since the Revamp happened some years ago. These changes also bring some updates to Robot Sidekick and Gadget’s Suppressor Turret.

 

Hello everyone!

With GU 103, we are looking at shifting the power of permanent pets so each have a niche to where they are best in specific circumstances. We will be keeping close tabs to make sure pets do not over perform with these new changes, yet remain a viable play option for players.

TL;DR

  • Damage buffs to Robot Sidekick
  • Damage buffs to Fury/Crystal
  • Damage buffs to Suppressor Turret
  • Buffs to Offering / Fortify Golem
  • Damage nerfs to Guardian
  • Threat generation buffs to Guardian
  • No changes to Brick

Goals

Our goal is to have all pets to be viable for all powersets and each pet be "best" at something unique to them. To reach for this goal, we've changed pets to meet the following criteria:

If you don’t actively try to apply PI’s or Buff pet with tray abilities, the best pets (#1 being strongest) in order will be:

  1. Robot Sidekick
  2. Suppressor Turret
  3. Sorcery/Earth DPS pets (Fury, Crystal)
  4. Sorcery/Earth Tank pets (Guardian, Brick)

If you apply just PI’s:

  1. Suppressor Turret (when applying both PIs it benefits from)
  2. Robot Sidekick
  3. Sorcery/Earth DPS pets (Fury, Crystal) – Closely behind Robot sidekick
  4. Sorcery/Earth Tank pets (Guardian, Brick)

If you use Tray Abilities

  1. Sorcery/Earth DPS pets (Fury, Crystal)
  2. Robot Sidekick
  3. Suppressor Turret
  4. Sorcery/Earth Tank pets (Guardian, Brick)

If you use Tray Abilities and PI’s

  1. Sorcery/Earth DPS pets (Fury, Crystal)
  2. Suppressor Turret
  3. Robot Sidekick
  4. Sorcery/Earth Tank pets (Guardian, Brick)

Changes
The list of changes are as follows:


Robot Sidekick (RSK)

  • Rockets now deal damage in AoE
  • Increased Ranged damage by approx. 50%

Developer Notes: RSK has very strong melee single target, however it's ranged component is fairly weak. We bridged the gap between the two to where melee should be at approximately 10% damage increase over ranged. We've also added a small AoE component behind RSK's rocket attack which should now make this pet comparable to other pets available to specific powersets.


Suppressor Turret (ST)

  • Increased base damage by 30%.
  • Greatly increased damage on targets suffering from PIs (approximately 40% total damage increase)
  • No longer self-destructs out side of combat.

Developer Note: Suppressor Turret was very much behind other powerset pets. With these changes, Gadgets players will see a significant damage difference, especially in AoE situations while PI's are applied.


Crystal

  • Reduced base damage by 8%.
  • Increased overall damage increase when buffed.
  • Fortify Golem now buffs Crystal's damage by 15% for 6 seconds.
  • Cleaned up AI for less variance on types of auto attacks.

Developer Notes: Crystal should be behind other powerset pets damage wise when you do nothing to buff it. However, should you apply "Crushed" power interaction and use Fortify Golem, this should be the best DPS pet (along with Fury) available.


Fury

  • Increased base damage to more or less match Crystal's base damage.
  • Offering now buffs Fury's damage by 15% for 6 seconds.

Developer Notes: Fury should be behind other powerset pets damage wise when you do nothing to buff it. However, should you apply "Bad Karma" power interaction and use Offering, this should be the best DPS pet (along with Crystal) available.


Guardian

  • Reduced damage by 25%
  • Increased threat generation on attacks by 200%

Developer Notes: Guardian was over-performing in AoE situations to where its base damage was greater than other pets by a significant margin. With our changes, we've shifted the focus of Guardian to be more of a pet tank for Sorcery by generating more agro and having an easier time of holding enemies off the player. For a damage focus, Sorcery players will want to use Fury.

We look forward to players testing these changes in a few weeks (details and dates soon) and will continue to adjust numbers as needed. Your feedback is extremely valuable to us and we hope together we can make a more enjoyable tank experience for everyone.

Thanks!
Batuba

 

Tank Changes

Some Tank Powers are getting changes to bring them closer together on how they function in the Tank Role. The biggest change and probably the most welcome are the changes to Fire.

 

Hello everyone!

With Game Update 103, we plan to do a general balance pass on Tank powersets. Today, we would like to get your feedback on the changes as they stand now, before we move them to the public test server.

We intend these changes to be as non-invasive as possible. That means we want to adjust a few critical pieces in some of the powersets, but not rebuild anything fundamentally.

TL;DR

  • Ice and Earth are generally where we want them. Minor to no changes planned.
    • Suggestions welcome.
  • Rage is slightly too good. Minor changes.
  • Atomic is slightly struggling. Minor changes.
  • Fire lags behind noticeably. Moderate changes.


Ice

  • No major changes planned, but suggestions welcome.

Developer Notes: Ice has strong advantages and some disadvantages that put them in line with where we want all tanks to be. That said, we are open to (smaller) suggestions for these powersets.


Earth

  • No major changes planned, but suggestions welcome.
  • Fortify Golem now provides a heal over time for Brick.
  • Increased healing from Totem.

Developer Notes: Earth is scaling very well, however maintaining Brick becomes very difficult in higher content. As part of maintaining Brick is one of the "risks vs rewards" of this tank specialty, we want to maintain the threat to Brick being destroyed. That being said, we also want to increase the player's ability to keep Brick alive if they actively try to do so, so we've increased the players healing potential towards brick to help him last as long as possible.


Rage

  • Fervor grants 45% defense bonus (down from 50%).
  • Scar Tissue grants max 50% of dominance as health at 15 hit counter (down from 100% at 30 hit counter).

Developer Notes: Rage tanks benefit from being the best of all worlds when it comes to health vs mitigation, being able to increase both their defense and health significantly, which puts them ahead of other tanks. These changes will mainly affect players at high end content and it should place them in line with other tanks.


Atomic

  • Quark-Gluon Aura now lasts 14 seconds (up from 12 seconds).
  • Quark-Gluon Aura now 35% control resistance (up from 15%)

Developer Notes: Atomic is in a strong spot defensively. However, due to the amount of crowd control in the game, it is very difficult to properly finish Atomic combos in order to maintain their aura and realize that strong defense. These changes will help Atomic tanks maintain their aura a little easier.


Fire

  • Fire Soul Base Defense increased to 35% (up from 30%).
  • Fire Soul stack counts have been reduced to requiring 5 (down from 20) to get max defense bonus.
    • (Stack count increases each time you hit a burning target.)
  • Fire Soul max stack defense bonus increased to 25% (up from 20%).
  • Fire Soul buff reduces power costs of abilities by 30%.

Developer Notes: Fire is the health and healing tank, but even in that niche it has lagged behind the other tanks in effectiveness. Fire Soul's stacks take too long to build and fall off too fast (before they could ever reach max...), meaning Fire tanks run with less than optimal defense most of the time.

Also, because Fire tanks require the constant casting of abilities to survive, and their main healing abilities are so high in power cost, they would find themselves out of power too quickly and at the mercy of their healers and their enemies. These changes will help create smoother and stronger gameplay for Fire tanks.

  • Immolation shield in Tank role now grants nearly double shield value, however only absorbs 35% of damage taken (down from 100%). Tank Role only, DPS role remains unchanged.

Developer Notes: Immolation shield was also changed to reflect that Fire healing niche more. This will shift Immolation from being an up-front, weakish shield to a damage mitigation over time ability more in line with Fire.

Immolation as a shield that negates all damage also negates Fire's main strength, healing. Immolation as a shield that reduces damage for a longer period of time allows and invites Fire tanks to take more advantage of their strong self heals and better control their situation.


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On a larger design note, it is important that we don't always only buff classes. It is sometimes more important for the overall health of the game to bring certain powers down to be in line with everyone else. Should we always only look to buff, we will only create a larger gap between how difficult content is vs how difficult it really should be.

We look forward to players testing these changes in a few weeks (details and dates soon) and will continue to adjust numbers as needed. Your feedback is extremely valuable to us and we hope together we can make a more enjoyable tank experience for everyone.

Thanks!
Batuba

 

There has been no date for when GU103 will be coming to the PC Test Server but it is expected that this game update will be tied to Episode 37: Birds of Pray launch.