Top Bug - Fixed Solar Amplifier's Empowered Channeling at 200 is Bugged

Mepps, I'm confused... Batuba said earlier that y'all were able to duplicate the problem.. .why do you need video from us if you've been able to do it yourselves?

After introducing each instance, I show the critical frames as slow as possible. The issues presented here happen frequently.

0:00 - 0:47 Getting hit within a few frames of casting a channeled ability cancels the ability and all associated effects. Fairly common and very annoying

0:48 I get stunned at the exact frame that Heat Vision does its burst. I'm still using a channeling, fully locked in its animation and can take no action without cancelling it so this feels very wrong with Empowered Channeling on.

0:58 Two examples of what Batuba was referring to. You become vulnerable before your abilities' animations end, which shouldn't be happening as we don't have control to prevent it and we've lost our Empowered Channeling defense buff along with our blues.

1:56 Becoming grounded ignores Empowered Channeling immunity and cancels channeling. It's an extremely common, standard cc effect prevalent in many boss fights, so this is kinda a big deal as it translates to lost DPS in a very derpy way. Also, note the bizarre running-in-place-with-feet-moving-crazy-fast thing happening here (I was not attempting to move).

3:01 Another example of becoming vulnerable during the last several frames of our casts before we have control again.

3:21 This isn't actually related to Empowered Channeling I just thought the way this taxi derpglitched was pretty funny.


So it appears there are four key issues (one of which isn't shown here):

1. If struck shorty after casting a channeled ability, the cast is outright canceled;
2. Immunity wears off before the cast is truly complete, leaving us vulnerable during animation lock;
3. Grounding effects ignore Empowered Channeling and cancel the cast altogether; and
4. Physics effects that jostle your character cancel some powers (eg. Heat Vision) which don't allow for any movement during cast.

Additionally, and I don't have a video of it now, some push/pull effects like RD/JQ/Flash's various vortex attacks seemed to be ignoring Empowered Channeling despite being very basic/standard control effects but that could be a result of the factors covered here.

The mod isn't removing the vulnerability to counters at all anymore. It's not always noticeable in pve because the cc immunity portion of the mod still works. If you fight an npc capable of gaining immunity from counters, you can see that the interrupt happens even though you aren't knocked down and the channel continues.



Around the 12 second mark, you can see the npc gain the immunity from countering. Then a second time around the 42 second mark.

You can also have another player lunge you. You are immediately knocked down as if you don't have the mod on at all.

Nice catch

In this video at 11 seconds you'll see the issue about there being a vulnerability moment as the power is closing out.



Around 11 seconds in this video I try to hit Heat Vision but the enemy's previous moved had knocked me out of it right as it started (although I am not stunned until I was knocked down, I think... if I remember correctly I haven't needed to breakout from that interaction unless the enemy's followup move causes me to need to). This may be a different symptom of the same timing issue though.

@Mepps/Batuba: Additional info - In BB today, Arc and Sinestro's normal combos were able to cc me through immunity in the middle of Heat Vision cast. This is in addition to the obvious fact that in alert/raid situations where you have a lot more mobs hitting you,the issue with the cast being cancelled at the beginning and you being countered/cc'd at the end before you can do anything happens constantly.
This is in line with my experience with bosses ignoring immunity and highlights another reason the problems we're looking at here are a big deal: they make using Empowered Channeling almost exactly like not having it at all, which I can't imagine is the intent.

Because we were somewhat interrupted by "Electronic Arts" and his idiocy.... The threat is showing that info is needed.

Are y'all still waiting on info from us? I just wanted to see where we were in the fix process.

Thank you very much.

Is getting grounded still cancelling? While I see the logic with it cancelling Heat Vision if someone is flying in place while casting and they fell due to being grounded, it's odd that it cancels If standing on the ground. Also, Absorb Heat isn't canceled by character movement and being grounded still turned it off as well, so it doesn't make sense even if flying while casting there.

Thanks. I'll double check in a few hours to save you time and also see if it's happening regardless of whether or not we have movement mode activated when it procs. I vaguely remember I sometimes used to toggle movement mode off in combat to circumvent something like this.

You're still vulnerable during the channel. Even though you don't get knocked down and the channel continues, enemies still gain counter immunity. Player interrupts in the open world still bypass it completely. Are either of these behaviors intended?

Maybe make Grounding applicable only when a movement mode is active?

I've confirmed the grounding this is a separate but tangentially related issue. I can make a new thread for it if you'd like but it seems close enough to the matters investigated in here that I'll just post my findings and let you decide. Ironically, I knew this stuff way back then just forgot it somehow.

- If movement mode is turned on, regardless of movement type, becoming grounded will immediately interrupt any channeled or charging power even if there is no physics or movement component associated with the grounding;
- If movement mode is turned off, becoming grounded has no effect on channeling/charging powers and they will continue as per normal; and
- Empowered Channeling does not prevent grounding.

Whether this is to be considered a bug is hard to say but it does seem like an unintended behaviour insomuch that it's very awkward for it to cancel powers even if we're on the ground and it makes play a bit clunky. The obvious workaround is just for us to turn movement mode off when we don't need it in combat, which is annoying but tenable. I also can't say whether or not it's intended for grounding to ignore Empowered Channeling; it's a common control effect but I can see even temporary immunity to it breaking some bossfight mechanics, so I can understand either way there.

Overall, this isn't as big a deal as the previously resolved issues with Empowered Channeling so this probably isn't as much of a priority, though changing it so being grounded while already on the ground but in movement mode doesn't turn powers off would be a nice QoL fix.

So this "fix" doesn't seem to have effected being knocked down at all.. which didn't happen until the Metal update. Went from zero knockdowns to almost constant knockdowns...