Test Discussion Episode 41: Allies Balance Feedback

On the bright side, self-duplication seems to be very much a part of the speedster bag of tricks, in DCUO anyway. So at least it ended up being someone it’s relatively in character for.

It’s just 1 zoom. He just got time variants of himself to join him

Passive from Aquaman now reduces CD from 90 to 78 seconds, so now it is not possible to summon several allies in a row (and yes, at the moment, Zoom AoE damage is 4 times stronger than any other ally (damage is not split) ...

Oh that’s a good thing. Does the passive have an internal cooldown? IE can someone use back to back SCs to bring down the cooldown faster?

I just used 3 SC in a row but cd decreased only to 78-80 seconds ...

I really hope that zoom's damage get adjusted properly before it hits live. I don't want to see another artifact situation where people spend money to level up a can't miss item and then it gets fixed later on.

Does it?? When I tried Aquaman yesterday it did not reduce CD.... at all.

Will have to try it again today.

yes, it reduces cd by about 10%, so from 90 to about 80 ... I'm an old person so I could be wrong for a second or two

I was inaccurate in my previous testing:
Aquaman's Passive cooldown reduction is dependant on how much SC you use
15,000 SC = 1:08 (68 seconds)
10,000 SC = 1:15 (75 seconds)
5,000 SC = 1:23 (83 seconds)
2,500 SC = 1:25 (85 seconds)
0 SC = 1:30 (90 seconds)

10%????

Wow... that is almost.... useful??

Why go from 100% to 10%??

Any reason they could not set it at 50%???

They pretty much made the 1 usefull passive ability useless.

So...... we will need to spend a LOT of resources to upgrade the Allies... only to get some useless support abilities??

Not sure who thought this was a good idea?

and I thought that this was my senile inattention and it just seemed to me that the CD changed depending on the SC ...

thank you for checking and clarifying specific numbers ... maybe you will be interested in information on pets, if you use trinkets pets (t3 regular and t3 turrets (I did not check on t1-t2), then the damage of any 2 other pets during this time will increase by 10% (it can be Furry or a Crystal or a robot, or pets from artifacts, or even sidekick (but only 2 if there are more pets, then only 2 will receive a boost))

Test server has been saying that it’s down when I try to log in. I’ll try again later. Has anyone tested how much regen cyborg gives after the update? When I last tested it was still giving no additional power. Same with aquamans pet buff. Does it increase robots damage? And what percentage buff does it give them and for how long? If anyone knows. I know someone said Batman’s Prec healing was a bit much. Was it patched? And if so what are the mew numbers? Same with Diana’s might buff.

I haven’t been able to get onto test for a few days so can’t test myself

Oh interesting. Thanks for the update

I did a couple of additional tests ... it turned out that t1 pets do not give any bust, t2 give 5% bust, t3 give 10% bust ... but I'm tired and want to sleep so I could be wrong somewhere ...

100% was never inteded, it was bugged and could be exploited to have up to 24 allies at once for less than 1 normal supercharge pool. 50% is way too much as well, if everyone has full supercharge before a boss fight that is 16 allies at once without any setup, which would probably limit them from creating better single target allies in the future or increasing the level cap.

But 22% for 15,000 SC is in fact way too little, that's 60k SC for like 400k damage. It looks like they don't want allies to be mandatory, but right now every support ally is pretty much useless.

I get that 100% was not intended.

So obviously they were going to nerf it.
Pretty sure I even mentioned as much once or twice before.

But I was hoping against hope that they would not nerf it into oblivion.

As it stands right now......
none of the Allies' Support abilities are even worth all the resources needed to upgrade them Allies.

And even worse....
some you will have to purchase with real $$$ in the Marketplace.....
for support abilities that are pretty much useless in the end.

Other then the Cool factor to have Zoom or Flashpoint Batman at your side for 3 seconds.....
not really worth it.

I made that comparison before....
but this reminds me of the Gotham Signal trinket that allows you to summon Batman for a few seconds.

Cool idea.... for about 5 minutes.....
but not very useful in the end.
Actually you said it.... right now every support ally is pretty much useless

If they hope to make $$$ by monetizing the Allies system.....
I don't think they will make much $$$ seeing this first batch of Allies.

Things that I feel should be addressed, or at the very least should have the dev intent clarified before allies are released.

Are AoE allies meant to never exceed their single target output? Should a 250k single target output really split 3-8 ways when in an AoE situation? Or is Zoom one of the only allies working correctly? If Zoom is working correctly, that's fine. Nobody will take issue with an ally they invest in getting buffed. But if Zoom is not working correctly, it is wrong to take an ally that has been invested in and nerf him when the issue has been known and reported for quite some time.

Is Batman's heal really meant to be that strong? As it stands now, people will invest in him for the heal. Nerfing after it goes live and people invest is wrong when it's a known issue.

I'm sure there are other issues as well. Some minor ones that will not effect how a player chooses to invest and maybe some not so minor ones that will. But the above are clear standout issues in my mind.

As I've said previously, this is a system that people will be spending time (and money) on. Releasing things in a broken and unclear state when there has been repeated calls for fixes and clarity is a huge mistake. It is unethical to release something that is knowingly broken when that broken state will cause players to spend their time and money chasing that broken state. Youtube videos will show "Ally is OP" and players will jump on it. Without any dev input to the contrary, why should anyone believe an ally isn't working as intended?

We aren't talking unknown issues here that get discovered after months and months on live that occur under special circumstances. There are foundational issues that have been known and reported. And by all accounts ignored. Please, I beg of you, do not stay silent and do not release allies. Not without serious fixes or at the very least, a clear statement that lays out the true intended state of allies, their abilities and their maximum potential.

Sorry to come off as overly critical. But I'm seriously concerned at how poorly the ally launch could go if things are not addressed. It's now less than a day away from launch and we're not that much better off (in ally polish or dev clarification) than when allies were first introduced on test nearly three weeks ago.

I understand.

Zoom is doing 5x the damage of most primary ally abilities, is that intended? Seems destined for a nerf and complaints of wasted money down the road... I understand Zoom cost more XP than epic or rare allies but... this will be a serious issue down the road if it goes live that unbalanced.

Was finally able to get on for a bit. Cyborgs power regen is still not working. With weapon focused (did superpowered focused last time and cyborg didn’t work) I my power bar went from empty to full I’m 33 seconds. While using cyborg my power regened from empty to full in… 33 seconds. So that ability is still not working.

And with zoom not splitting zoom is the default combat pet since on aoe they all do around the same anyways (cyborgs randomness can go higher). So if they all do similar I’m ST than you just pick the one that’s best for aoe.

The hall of legends robot is returning about 15%-20% of our max power but it works every few seconds. About 3-5? Before it would restore full power but cooldown was longer. The reduced cooldown between power means that even thou you store less power you can pretty stay in a safe power zone without a troll as long as you can CC. Dom healers are back I guess lol. Gadgets and mental can sleep in stealth to regen power too. Sooooo…

I’m guessing allies are being released in this state? Can a dev confirm whether these are intended or not? Doesn’t seem intended but I also don’t want another solar nerf issue where solar wasn’t splitting at 200 which was discussed openly on the forums for a long time before it was patched.