Test Discussion Water Powers

Hello Developers,

First I just want to say that I am enjoying water so far. Its animation and play style is different and works really well.

Now to what I have noticed so far. As a healer the "High Tide" effect works well on most of the abilities and I enjoy it. There is only one power it doesn't seem to completely work on. Now this could just be a description error or an actual bug. The power "Blessing of the Depths" high tide effect only seems to work on the caster and not any group member(the animation for it also only appears on the caster and no one else at the moment). There is no indication in the description that stats it only a self ability so it is presumed that it should also work on others. I hope this is a bug that can be fixed as I like the idea of using high tide to activate a semi hot right after a nice burst heal. It works well with a high tide load/rotation and I really enjoy that.

Thank you developers for your hard work on the game and our new water power. I can't wait to see what's next. Great Job.

Sincerely: Brav

I had a few practice today and gotten a little better. I'm just not used to the loadouts yet.

One thing I found/noticed is the fact that Ebb will flow down the stairs in the animation, But it doesn't flow up the stairs. It goes through the stairs as it goes upwards.

I do feel the damage is not in line with other power sets. Maybe buff Shark and increase the Dots of the Lance move (forgot the name). Water has no dots hardly. It'll be a power good for adds (it's like 90% burst) but terrible at single target. On a boss fight, Water will fall behind I feel.

Tsunami Strikes seems like a stable. I feel people will use this move twice in a row because using it twice causes other powers to cooldown in time. Plus it does make the High Tide cooldown even lower assuming you successfully hit enemies.


The other power PI, forgot it's name as I'm not logged in. I feel like it needs an additional effect. For example, using it while in High Tide will give you Bubble? Just a thought, I mean, you're taking the risk to get in melee range just to apply your PI? Doesn't seem worth it unless you know you have a benefit to doing it. A free Bubble with increase damage for taking that risk would be worth wild to use that PI. If not, I see others only using Drown. Drown is the stable PI to use. The other is only good for maybe PVP.

Speaking of PVP, Water is going to be one of the best PVP healer powers out there. I can see it now, healers using the sword melee combo.

Crashing wave? The dash thing? I think a bubble added to it with hightide would be sweet.

Since Bubble already has a boost to damage role to it, I see no reason to do the High Tide PI to Crushing Wave. Plus, the way I see it Crushing Wave's risk/reward is it does more damage than drown does.

From how I feel about the damage side of things, only improvements I can think of are increase Aqualance's High Tide DOT duration to 12 secs and have the DOT damage equivalent to electrocute and Circle of Destruction or increase the damage of Shark Frenzy. As it stands it is pretty much a one or the other for loadouts and seems a waste since there is only 2 High Tide DPS abilities and 5 for Healing.

Yes, Shark Frenzy needs a buff. I have 16,000 might can can hit for like 5000-8800. The crits are like 6000-8000 on averaged from testing. Kind of low if you ask me. It should be able to easily hit 10,000+ (in terms of crits). On live Voltaic Blast and Tesla Blast can crit for 11-13 k with 16000 might. For this reason, I don't think Shark Frenzy is strong enough in damage so it needs a slight buff.

I agree with the Lance DoTs damage. Make it 12 seconds because it's a good ability for single target and Boss fights. Also, I feel like the DoTs need to have a 10% increase in damage to account for the adds being killed to fast and to make up for the lack of single target damage in Boss fights. This would make it like the Water version of EG only the lance has an initial Burst hit followed by a 12 second DoT duration.

As for two abilities. People won't use both of them in the same loadout. Like others said, you need to chose one or the other. One is good for burst damage and other is good for slight burst and DoTs. I see Shark being good for Adds while Lance being used more for Single Target. Some people will want to have a DoT for Adds though since we have no Dots. The only fix for this is to make the Jelly finish heal move usable in Damage Role. Then we would have a choice with Sharks + Jellyfish or you can chose to have 2 DoTs in your loadout with Lance + Jellyfish.

And I still think Call of the Deep is too strong. On three adds it did like 155,000 damage. Two adds got hit for like 49,000 and one add got crit for like 55,000. Is it splitting right?

^ and yes, that was a trinket + Supply drop.

Remember there is a trade off system now. Asking for a buff for abilities will also mean an increase in the power cost to use those abilities

True but the power is already 300 power cost and doesn't hit the hard as it should. Not many are using the shark from what I seen so far.

I can see lance with a slight decrease to the initial burst and an increase to Dots by 10% and 12 second duration. Seems fair.

If its already 300 then yea i agree. I wasnt aware it was, or should say couldnt remember as i havent been on test in a few days. My bad.

Shark Frenzy is a 200 power cost, Voltaic Blast is a 300 power cost, so ofc Voltaic Blast will hit harder. And Shark Frenzy gets a buff when using High Tide, did you get your numbers when in High Tide?

I tested CotD on test, and used it multiple times. Its avg hit is 50-55ish (League hall buff only). Damage starts splitting at 3 targets, meaning all the potential damage is shared, but it still totals up to about the same number. Also you said that this was with supply drop/trinket, so yeah...its gonna hit harder. Also its a 100% SC so those will usually hit harder than 50%. Also how many times did you used it? Because using it once or twice isn't getting a accurate average, try using it 10 times then getting the average of the 10 hits.

I use Shark Frenzy and Aqualance in my loadout and they work pretty well together, just need to polish out the order I used the powers and I'll be golden.

I thought it was 300.

I'll check again later. That is why I was comparing it to Voltaic Blast

i'm trying right now, Drown, High Tides, Riptide, Aqualance, High Tides, Shark Frenzy, Tsunami strikes + Shark Frenzy (back to rotation) Can you try it and tell me what you think.

Thats my rotation/loadout to a T, but trying to get a better flow (no pun intended).

Damn you xD you got me doubting myself now lol. I just double checked it is a 200.

Yea so if it gets buffed it will most likely end up a 300. Thanks for looking btw. I dont have time these days to get on test.

Also it was stated during the stream that much work was put into making sure the shark always hits the target and doesnt fall short or long and miss. Can this please be applied to other abilities in the game? For example gravity bomb/singularity and the projectile abilities sorcery has (forget the names atm)?

anyways, i find myself blinded when using shark frenzy twice: once when activating, once after target is hitten...
tranquille of the seas also still covers a lot of sight when used after a jump for example... i guess tanks will love it.
sorry to compair again: shark frenzy is worse than distortion wave and TOTS is just like gravity well in my oppinion.
of course i can turn down the effects, but then i turn down all effects and i don't see other powers aswell... hmmm...

All the stuff that happens in the test server, like characters, cr level and such. will all that transfer to the normal server along with the water powers. or are they just going to be deleted. i hope we can keep them and their stats.

If they did that, DCUO would shut down. How does giving everything for free pay for the development, salaries, and servers up keep?

No, only water and the mechanic/UI changes that were announced would go live. Also...

What he said.

What about specific power mods, like energized ones from head, anyone has any info of what´s going to happen?

My guess would be they're coming with the next TC. But thats only a guess.