During the past few days, I ran loads of Omnibus content randomly. Analyzing the performance of my teammates, showed some tremendous problems many seem to encounter which leads to big performance gaps between new and endgame players. #1 Augments (Not adaptive Augments!) Augments were a system that streamlined the old gear-mod system, making it easier to obtain and keep track of these stat bumps. While this is a good system in general, it seems to be a great source of imbalance if done wrong. No playstyle requires different augments. Four of the same kind are always the best way to go. There may be some edge cases when a Controller wants to have stronger shields and doesn't need all four Vit augments to keep the group powered. This won't move the needle when it comes to how much damage a controller shield can take, so this is also negligible. Turning these augments into sets of four would help players a lot in choosing what they may need most for their playstyle. Meaning, that if you equip a might augment, you equip all four. #2 Tactical mods Tactical mods were introduced to add more depth into builds, but ultimately lack any choice ever since their introduction. There is one particular mod for each playstyle and adding all stat bumps or buffs we end up with roughly 6% more damage if done correctly. Most new players are not aware these mods exist, don't want to invest the initial amount of Source marks, or are simply too lazy to update their gear since every piece has to be modded individually. So, what if we simply get all stat-related mods as base buffs? The system would persist with the optional ones such as feet mods or back mods but mods like Max damage will be granted through our powerset, just like penetrating strikes and the Prec/Might buffs from the neck. (The same applies to support roles too of course). #3 Artifacts Asking for anything progression-related regarding artifacts is pretty much impossible to justify getting implemented - I know. However, what I'm asking for is a change of order when it comes to progression without changing the cost/price of Artifacts. Moving the Rank 80 initial effect to Rank 0 will boost new players immediately and also make them understand faster what an artifact will do. I've seen way too many players using artifacts for roles that they can't even use if ranked up or that do nothing for their playstyle. Their artifacts are usually equally ranked between 40 and 60, giving them no artifact effect at all and the minor stat bumps at those levels do not make any noticeable difference. If a new player doesn't use the right augments, no tactical mods, and no artifact beyond Rank 80 (even if they're the right ones)and then compare their damage to someone with the same base setup but the correct choice of Augmets, the correct choice of adaptive augments and just one artifact focused to get to R80 (current system), their damage will be roughly 25% higher. With 3 artifacts this will increase further, granted the player chose the right ones for their playstyle, but given the fact that new players do not necessarily have the oversight of all possible artifacts, one is most likely to be the correct one for their role while two will remain non-optimal or incorrect. An experienced player will always outperform those that have no experience or idea about the optimal playstyles, so all this would do is reduce initial confusion, prevent some expensive mistakes (mostly ingame currency), and give all players an overall better experience when getting randomly grouped up with new players.
Decent suggestions. I will say that if one didn't know any better, they might inspect some my farming toons and think "clueless new player". While they don't have the rainbow augs, they do have some odd artifact combinations, none of which are over 60, and they're not ever going to be....because they're just farming toons.
TBH some Battle Role builds benefit from a mix of Origin Augments (and Adaptive Augments). I've seen people mix Origin Augments for Battle Tanking and Battle Healing, for instance. Others use their Adaptives for the second Stat, and others do the balancing in their SP trees. There seem to be a lot of different approaches to getting Stats in the sweet spot, and forcing 4 x Origins only would remove the option to do the fine tuning there. Wouldn't it be easier to Role-lock Origin Augments? If, for instance, you tried to fortify a Vit Origin Augment whilst in DPS Role, it simply wouldn't allow it (with a suitably informative error response - "You must be in Controller Role to fortify Vitalization Augments")? If you switch to Troll, then you can fortify Dom and Vit Augs. It would at least give the hint that those are only useful when in Troll stance?
