What if support roles did more damage?

I'm interested to see what the community thinks about support role damage. Could it be higher? Should it be higher? Why & why not?

Should the support role damage penalty by reduced, or eliminated?

What about an artifact that would incrementally reduced the support role nerf? (Since the game likes artifacts...)

Would it be so bad? Would it negate armories? Would battle-support become the "meta"? Would everybody lose their minds?!?

IDK

You thought of a case for why such changes would be good or bad for the game LOL or is your question part of a stimulating dorm room after refreshments-styled discussion? (Respectfully.)

Support roles do extreme dmg output with art swaping there is no need for them to do more dmg. Art swaping can crush the enemies like one shots if the whole group is in on it not just one person

One of the key reasons that they're kept separate is to offer a challenge to the player. If there's no challenge, players tend to become bored and bored players tend to look elsewhere for their gaming entertainment. I'm sure that Daybreak doesn't want that.

So what would be the point having a damage role when you have support roles that does everything with no hindrance?

Thinking of it in reverse, it's not support roles that would go away. It's the sole DPS role.

#imahealer

Well I've seen multiple threads on bettle-whatever loadouts. Then there's the players I've seen in support roles running through content like a dps (tanks that don't use powers or pulls, healers doing weapon attacks while the rest of the party is at 1/2 health, & trolls that never/rarely apply debuffs)

So yeah, I've often wondered what others thought about reducing the nerf placed on support roles.

With the exception of raids (a fraction of the games available content), prioritizing a support can feel... frustrating. For those players who don't dual-role, and focus on support role gear/arts/etc., dailies could take a while.

So why the giant difference in damage between DPS & Support?

Should it be less, yes. But only because when doing support role stuff (heals, agro, debuffs), they're not damaging targets. Not because there's a significant nerf applied.

So support roles are supposed to spend time, bouncing in & out of menus, during combat, to get close to the damage they would have just naturally gotten were it not for the support role damage reduction?

Additionally, they are supposed to invest the time & resources into the extra arts needed for the swap? Which is a method that the devs stated as unintended, and likely be removed (eventually).

I think this is the reason we have the ability to switch role in menu. I cleared almost all of my early level 10-30 content as a DPS due to the low damage output as a healer, even though all I wanted to do was heal.

Unfortunately running into players that don't play the role they chose will never go away, but at least we have the option to change role and counter it a bit. But I hear you, I do.

Could you please elaborate on this?

How would narrowing the gap between DPS and support role damage remove the challenge? Who's challenge?

Do you think tanks, trolls, and healers would suddenly leave the game bc they could get through open-world & solos faster? Or are you saying that all content would be easier? (Like the devs wouldn't just increase enemy heath to accommodate, and keep average completion times within expectations)

Look how long it took them to nerf eog swap eventually sounds like a very long way off. I have run with a few support roles that swap and they can keep up with the dps burn not off by much. Arts are not clamped like ur stats are in this revamp. So swap away while u still can and break the content and then call the game out on being way too easy to beat content

Well, damage rolls would still do more damage than a support role.

Currently there is a massive difference between support & DPS. So a player would still have a choice: superior damage, or modest damage + support.

Where's the harm in closing the gap a bit? DPS would still top the scorecard.

. . . would it?

If DPS still did more damage (bc or course they would), wouldn't there still be DPS only players? Just like there are still support only characters (despite the games focus on DPS)

Ahh I see. Hm, seem to be some good responses here... I get where you're coming from now. Only speaking for myself, the enjoyment of using any build I make is crafting it to a use case and tweaking it to specification for content. Aside from broader gameplay/business consequences, I can't imagine battle-roling would be fun anymore if it was a granted feature of the game.

On the flip side, what would it even mean to be a non-support damage dealing at that point? idk how you see it, but I've heard it from plenty of out fellow players that what makes this game special is a fairly extreme ability to customize, and I tend to agree.
But yeah, some people like to be fed from a bowl, others like to hunt. I'm fully satisfied with needing to put in a little extra effort to crank out significant damage from a traditional support stance, and in general I lean towards not changing anything just for the sake of it; The more lethal tanks, healers and controllers I know are okay with things overall. I've talked to a few who'd like a 4th artifact permanent artifact slot, but that's not really related to changing the framework of what roles mean in content as a rule.

Also, personally I feel saying there's a damage nerf on support roles sounds a little deficient. Being in one stance instead of another just emphasizes your stats differently for specialization, right? Yeah, my preferences aside, this sort of change would be the most unfriendly thing that could possibly be done to newer players and those with lower artifacts, artifacts, experience, etc, and new players are too important to treat that way. I'd still gladly read a reasoned pitch for it, though. Sorry for rambling... lunch.

Edit: What I mean by specialization over nerf... What mechanism other than role is there to determine a tank/dps' intention when using a hard taunt/single target attack? Would it make sense to have a dps/tank competing for aggro while using the same ability? We just mean weapons maybe?

Well, I'm not making a pitch for it. Just interested in the feedback.

I can argue for, or against it. Each having pretty compelling points.

Since I've returned, I've noticed the difference in damage between players when looking at scorecards.

1) DPS variance: is often easy to understand when comparing CR (420 beats 412, that tracks)

2) DPS outliers: very high/low is usually due to the players skill or lack there of (not SP, actual skill)

3) Support difference: in many (not all) it's very obvious to identify the support players by damage out. We don't even need to look at the other columns to chech the dam-in/heal-out/power-out

Switching stance has a bigger impact then some ppl realize. For fun, take a dps through a combat pass. Then, have them toggle to support. Use the same gear, and dps loadout/powers/rotation. The stats didn't change, but the damage difference will likely be greater than one would have expected.

I ramble too

Look, maybe it's just damage creep.

Maybe a 40+mil difference today, is the same as a 5+mil difference was in the past (% wise) ps: these are off-the-cuff numbers, so don't read too much into them

This example may be making the case for non-"sparring" targets; the targets we have very specifically show the results of fighting. This is what I meant when I tried to describe how I see "nerfed" differently than "role-specialized.' So yeah, that's accurate as things stand today, but it's not a very well-rounded look at the overall changes based on that toggle. Does that make sense?

Not really, but that could be just me.

I see sparing targets like a benchmark. It a way to measure maximum damage output under ideal circumstances. With the understanding that practical application will be less (due to multiple factors)

As such they can be used to demonstrate the difference in damage potential between stances. Just keep all other factors the same (gear, loadout, rotation). We can even consider the "buff" that a DPS stance gains from the stance (its like 10%, or something).

From my perspective, if the support stance is less than the DPS by more then 10% (or whatever the dps stance buff is) then the support stance is being "nerfed". That's the game design intentionally reduceing support role damage BELOW baseline. To me, that's a nerf.

My personal stance:
Not only should they have damage reduced, conversely they shouldn't be able to do their role so well without speccing into it (ie: gear/sp)
Content shouldn't be able to be completed without all roles until people are fully geared for it.
Damagers should be more glass cannons.
But then again, I think controllers should still be power healers, too.

However, following my stance would be bad for the game. People have made it clear they want roles to be fairly epicene. They don't want it to be a wipe if they lose a key player and no one has a swap, because any failure will mean fingerpointing and a disband of he entire instance.

In any case, there should be no need for battle roles if damagers are even halfway decent players.
Part of that isn't their fault ... the damage numbers you see are inconsistent with actual damage due to stat adjustment.

And I'd never argue with whatever definition you choose to use, bud. I'll try again. The targets absolutely DO show you damage out. We're caught up there. What our targets are NOT set up to show us are traditional support-related contributions. If they were, I think you'd see what I'm saying a little easier about my preferred wording being specialized instead of nerfed. LOL support targets, as funny as it sounds, would potentially have you asking What if damage role did more support?... as the toggle would emphasize support ability output with all the same setup. Interesting thought, though, who knows how things will shake out in the future, you know. Catch up with you later!