Ice's DPS side got no consideration...

This new hand mod coming out soon called Max Damage is going to ruin the one cool thing about ice's DPS side, Ice Armor. If you don't know what Ice Armor does for the DPS side its pretty simple. Once it gets activated after 5 consecutive chill effects are on you, it locks you at a 50% damage modifier. The Powers that give chill effects are: Cold Snap, Ice Bash, and Reflection. This is one of the coolest mechanics in the game and now its going to be somewhat pointless.

Now Max Damage is going to be a new hand mod that locks you at a 60% damage modifier. Oh guess what, the ONLY power in ice that grants a 60% damage modifier Frost Blast. Yes this will open up new loadouts for ice, but it also makes ice armor worthless.

Atleast I know someone agrees with me that this hand mod is gonna screw over Ice:

Now... the "GOOD" part. THe so called AWESOME Mechanic. Mobile Focused Attacks. Don't know what it does? This is what it does:
Mobile Focused Attack: This mechanic is based around setting up and attempting to launch powerful sustained but interruptible attacks. Mobility allows for dynamic positioning so you can properly line up attacks, move away from danger or attempt to "kite" foes.

The only interruptible attacks (not including the finisher, its not that good anyway) are: Arctic Gust, Glacier Flash, Frost Blast, and Avalanche.
My Stats are: 5076 Might and 2477 Precision.
I'm using the 2 Iconic DPS.
I will be using Frost Blast for the 60% Modifier to maximize the damage of the powers.

Avalanche: Hits 3 Targets, does not crit with Weapon Mastery, Poor Damage: 200 range first hit if crit quickly drops off to 50-70 range for about 6 ticks. Cannot Move. Jump Cancel-able but not for full damage.

Arctic Gust: Hits 4 Targets, does not crit with Weapon Mastery, Poor Damage: 200 range first hit if crit quickly drops off to 70- 100 range for 6 ticks. Cannot Move. Jump Cancel-able but not for full damage.

Glacier Flash: Single Target, does not crit with Weapon Mastery, Mediocre Damage, 200 range first hit drops down to 175-225 range. Channeled Power: 6 Ticks. Cannot Move. Jump Cancel-able but not for full damage.

Frost Blast: Hits 8 Targets,Splits after 2, LONG cast time so no weapon mastery, Single Target Damage: Average 2500 total damage. 8 Target Damage: Hits each target in 100 range for 6 hits.

These moves are more than likely going to be in the "Awesome/Advanced Mechanic," but from my testing the damage is very poor on all of them and none of them even get the crit from weapon mastery on the initial hit.

Also Snow Devil. Probably one of the most derpiest pets in the game.
- Around 60 Second Cooldown.
- Disappears around 30 Second Mark.
- Frostbites Enemies.
- Damage is best compared to Robot Sidekick: Low Damage With Few Heavy Hits. 70s and the Heavy Hits of 200-300 range.

There really isn't a way to fix the Powers, because the Advanced Mechanic will exclude the Weapon Mastery bonus (even though the don't crit from it anyway). Frost Blast would need to hit for at least 25k base if you were to use it instead of weapon mastery. The other moves should be sped up or at least on of them should be changed to a 40-45% burst move, so there would be another 45% burst to compete with ice boulder.

Now for Snow Devil (IMO a good fix would be)
- Make Permanent Pet and leave damage as is (does robot sidekick type of damage)
- Or Shorten cooldown and increase damage (exclude weapon mastery)
- Increase Damage, but remove PI Applying ability.
- Make Permanent Pet, remove PI Applying abiliy.

*I say make it a permanent pet much like gadgets Suppressor Turret.

TL;DR: New Hand Mod Max Damage could screw over Ice's Ice Armor Ability. Awesome Mechanic will not benefit as of right now since we don't know exactly what may be included into the mechanic. Snow Devil needs fix compared to other pets.

Feel free to post what you think could help out ice in the future.

That new mod is definitely over the top. Considering what they did to Fire with the AM I'm thinking Frost Blast is going to get a serious buff so it's capable off doing damage similar to mass Det. I hope that Ice does get a sort of revamp with new powers but I imagine it's probably not like Fire didn't since they got updated at the same time.

I just had to point out something that you made as a big part, if not the essential, of your post.

If Ice Armor actually acts like an armor, then Ice Armor is not necessarily useless, is it?

The ice armor ARMOR effect is only for tank. The 50% modifier is for DPS

The AM will definitely be taking a hit, at least fires, the one thing that helps fires AM which is already lacking, is the60% from mass det. The wm rotation will get a buff now because of this mod yet the AM was already running at 60, so it will remain unchanged which is short of like a nerf since all other rotations will be buffed

Agreed basically with this mod everyone is going to get a better form of ice armor.

Has someone checked it out on test if the new mod is really overwriting the ice armor buff? Atm. noone gave any confirmation on this as both are locking in a modifier.

However it turns out it seems devs totally forgot that they had a powerset called Ice. =/

i cant see how ice would suffer , i mean ice is atm already top dps power with icebash , benefiting most from other role buffs while ice not buffing anything for the grp.

I meant, as in, if the Ice Armor grants a shield or a shield-like effect, regardless of its strength, then it's not totally useless. Much like Rage's shield in DPS role is not as effective as it would be in Tank role. Otherwise, yeah, you're probably right then. That is what I meant with my comment.

If it didn't overwrite ice armor that would be bad that would be basically NERFING ice people from using their own powers. Even if you only used the ice weapon buff you can still activate ice armor. So if u just used the weapon buff you would be getting nerfed.

The mod is good and bad at the same time, give every power a 60% could means more variation in loadouts, but also increase drastically damage output in players which may lead to even more health pools in future dlcs (something i don't really want), also ice powerset may be affected since ice armor lock on 50% in dps role.

Add 10% seems the best solution, without have to revamp some powersets to not be affected in the process.

Gotta roll with the punches I guess. Fires AM now becomes even more pointless for damage.

Yes the OP reflects what I have been trying to say for the past few days.
Devs: If you are going to do this then why not just take Ice Armor out of the game? Honestly? If every other powerset is going to get Ice's only unique mechanic AND a boost along with it.
edit: Look at this topic-https://forums.station.sony.com/dcuo/index.php?threads/give-ice-variety.215980/#post-2735298
...

Agreed. They need to buff mass det now. In think about 15%. Since I'm gonna round off the average multiplier to 45 (being generous) that's where I'm getting the15%

Even if it does turn out that Max dmg mod overwrites, then why have Ice armor mechanic in the first place if every other power gets a better version of it?

I think a good solution would be to make ice armor an increase of 5-10% to the current modifier so that ice armor will still be able to increase damage and won't be overpowering at the same time.

I'm new on this debate. Explain why fire AM becomes pointless? Serious question.

I guess it's because Mass Detonation is a 60% modifier, but considering that Fire's AM basically revolves around that one power as a damage dealer I don't see why this would make much of a difference to the AM itself. Other powers will do a lot more damage now though.

I would agree but my guess is that you guys and IA specifically are going to be crippled at your revamp anyway.

I'm also okay with max being 50% to keep the cast timers and the fire and Ice awesome usable.

But I'm thinking the OP has a point. It's gonna make an entire rotation that many have used useless. I don't know. I don't know enough about ice to fully understand. But if what the OP says is true then, yeah......someone dropped the ball dev-wise.