Stats Revamp 1.5: Iconic Abilities

As long as battle drone doesn't interfere with tank aggro or kill adds, that's great. But for an example, we were going for the "don't KO juvenile Starros on final boss" feat last night. Someone popped a pet; it killed a juvenile by itself; feat over.

I understand how things are on test and the direction they're taking it; but with gadgets players in particular, the devs don't seem to be considering how the play requirements are going to interact with existing content mechanics. I can see a gadgets power becoming a pariah and excluded from content by groups because gadgets needs battle drone to supply the group but battle drone also causes the boss fight to go south. It will be a poisoned power set.

That's just wrong. Again, they are just going in a direction that iconic powers will be ignored. It really should be just as good and viable as a regular power set's one. In this regard, if the power return was the same, it would be weaker because it doesn't have a shield attached. UGH.

Sonic Cry is very nice PI setup. Gag Glove's cone is too narrow. Batarang is just meh. I am kind of sad that Word of Power is useless now.

Is this where we can talk about movement ones too? Throwing Knives needs a shorter cooldown. Maybe to 1 second, and I'd be okay with an increase in cost to compensate. That or set it to 2 second with the 200 and have it leverage a PI.

Can Zip Tie Attack be either a multitarget pull or be a single target taunt? The only time I've ever opted to use the power was when I needed to pull and not overwrite the lead troll.

Can backflip be restored to a non SC power?

Can you guys restore Dash attack and etc etc to regular superpowers.
Give them fair cooldowns, I really don't think any of them being bumped from 25% to 50% is fair.

At the rate you generate SC on test, 50% feels like 25

Neo Venom boosts buff is the same as the regular weapon buff and it's a SC ( SAY WHAAAA??)
The SC lasts about 15 seconds for weapons. The cool down is 45 seconds

This buff ( SC ???) will not get used if left as is. The cool down is waaaayy too long.

All I can say is WOW and ask.

What is the deal with the cool downs?

But the fact it adds a bonus 40% damage to ALL abilities AND WEAPON attack ON TOP OF the 10% bonus to WEAPONS with an 80% defense buff makes it a great Damage Booster. It's also a 1,000 SC cost if you wanted to know since it only says it on the loadout page. You'd also be surprised what you can do in those 15-20 seconds.

P.S. The areas in caps was not me getting upset, it was just me emphasizing my point.

Sometimes I hit caps and miss it. Some people use caps because they need glasses. Depending on the color of chat I might have to use caps so that I can read what is there. LOL

I don't take anything by seeing caps.


Also I need to keep testing it with weapons. I thought I had a couple runs with the buff only working about 5 seconds.

I know what can be done in that amount of time but my main concern is with the cool down and its lackluster animation for a Super Charge.

They should look into making the player morph into bane or something like the ice SC does. That would give Neo Venom boost an extra wow factor and also would give the players a time frame on when the buff runs out.

True, but I really don't want to become Bane XD. They actually have something in there to help but it's not as easily seen when using powers; everytime you hit a target, whether it be an ability or a weapon attack, green venom glowing spots appear where you character attacks. But you're right, maybe something like a green explosion of light occurring when the effects wear off.

NVB actually enables the best Dps Parsing for Hybrid with almost every powerset I've tested.

I was running NVB in this run aswell (Testing Soul):


If anything..I think it might need a nerf, right now if you're running Prec and Might Hybrid.. NVB is just too solid to skip - I'm not certain the Devs want an Iconic Power on every single hybrid loadout when this hits live.

I figured as much but I was trying to think of some animations already within the game that the devs could use.
Something not as subtle as what Neo venom boost has now. I was thinking of something more grandiose

That there I think you are wrong. If an iconic power is thought of every time someone builds a character then the DCUO DEVS did the right thing with iconic powers. Any one of the iconic powers should be able to stand with any other power within the game. The very definition of iconic indicates awesomeness.

My thoughts on supercharges are that they should be super and long cool downs keep them from being super like many other powers. A supercharge being used should be based on how fast that you can build that SC not on the cool down. Look at other SC's that are comparable to Neo Venom Boost. Look at Ice SC specifically. That SC is 0.5 seconds.

Why is the iconic SC that is comparable 45 seconds when you are striving for balance?

Major Feedback

Character Name (on test): Witch Hunter

CR: Varies from time to time so I can accurately give feedback on all levels of the game. Will be giving out numbers as if I was CR 189 though.

Role: Varies from time to time, at the current moment I'm an Earth DPS/Tank although mainly testing the DPS side of things before I move on to Tanking.

Movement: Acrobatics

SP: Varies from time to time to set up different experiences based on how much SP someone might have; max SP is 205.

Time on Test today: About a total of 4 hours.

What were you testing: Mainly Iconics and how they compare to other powers and powersets, both at end game and on lower Teir stuff such as T4 and T5.

Iconics Compared to Powerset (Earth DPS)

As you know, Earth tends to revolve around Dazing and Crushing PI's with Dazing being the better of the two; the same can be applied to Iconics, it revolves around several PI applications but mainly focuses on Dazing PI applicators. Down below is how these Dazed PI applicators and Dazed PI benefactor performed on one target.

1. Multi-Batarang

• • Sets up Dazed PI to multiple enemies.
  • Does two ticks of damage, one on the initial hit of the target and one about a second later. Both ticks hit for about 4.8k no critical and about 7.5k-8.4k for critical.
  • Overall, this is a very poor Dazed PI applicator due to how low it hits compared to the other Dazed PI applicators; the problem to this is probably because of the two ticks of damage it gives off instead of the one, initial big hit that the others do.

2. Gag Glove

• • Cone width for setting up a Dazed PI is way too small.
  • Does one tick of damage hitting for about 8.4k-9.3k no critical and about 17.4k-18.6k for critical.
  • Overall, this is an O.K. Dazed PI applicator, but not great due to the very narrow cone of width it hits for.

3. Sonic Cry

• • Sets up a Dazed PI to multiple enemies.
  • Does one tick of damage that hits for about 9.6k-10.6k damage no critical and about 20.4k-21.7k for critical.
  • Overall, a great Dazed PI applicator that has a decent AoE and amazing damage compared to all the other Dazed PI applicators. (Recommended as your Dazed PI applicator when Earth DPS'ing)

4. Sonic Shout

• • Benefits from Dazed PI on enemies and deals damage to multiple enemies.
  • Does four ticks of damage each one being about 6.4k-7.6k damage per tick no critical and ranges from 10.6k-14.3k damage per tick for critical.
  • Overall, a great Dazed PI benefactor that currently hits harder than any other Earth Dazed PI benefactor except for upheaval, the only concern about using this is your stuck in the animation with no ability to move and the anamation itself is rather long with each tick spaced out to about one second per tick.

5. Stone

• • Sets up a Dazed PI to multiple enemies.
  • Deals one tick of damage for about 8.4k-9.6k damage no critical and about 19.4k-20.3k damage for critical.
  • Overall, a very good Dazed PI applicator with a slightly better range than Sonic Cry but with lower damage and a nice AoE.

6. Unstoppable

• • Sets up a Dazed PI to multiple enemies
  • Deals one tick of damage for about 4.8k-5k damage no critical and about 8k damage for critical
  • Overall, it has a very poor range but a great AoE and generates supercharge plus knocks enemies down and is clippable with any power in Earth's powerset.. This makes up for the very low damage it deals but still Sonic Cry is recommended.

7. Tectonic Break

• • Benefits from Dazed PI and deals damage to multiple enemies.
  • Deals one tick of damage for about 15.3k damage no critical and 27.6k-29.8k damage for critical.
  • Overall, it has a very poor range and a decent AoE and deals a nice burst of damage, but is also rather costly. Depending on the situation, this or Sonic Shout is fine to use.

8. Neo-Venom Boost

• • Gives a 10% damage bonus to all weapon attacks and a 40% damage bonus to all weapon attack and ability attacks. On top of this, it gives an 80% defense buff. These effects last for about 15-20 seconds
  • This is a very good power and a staple in any loadout.

9. Robot Sidekick

• • Way too low damage to be useful and does not stack with Crystal.

10. Clown Box

• • Requires too much supercharge to be very useful in combat.

11. Word of Power

• • Does not return power to pets and the damage or power given back to the player is not even worth it to begin with, especially for the cost of the supercharge.

Robot Sidekick doesn't require an additional spot on your loadout to use. He is also pretty self sufficient. If maybe you are looking at a different method of play than pet feeding, it's not a bad fire and forget it power pet.

I agree with your assessment of Clown Box and WoP. Neither are a power that is worth it anymore for anything other than maybe finding an exploit for Clown Box yet again. lol

I remember the clown box exploits. I missed those days and the days before those .