Originally, I wasn't going to make this thread, because the little things I did notice didn't mean much and were something good, but recently I've found a lot of things that are just straight infuriating and wish to out some of these changes as to educate and spark discussion in the community as some of these changes have significant impact in PvP. Vague Note #1 - Implementing Region Clamped Values System in and of itself For those that have never spec'd their skill points in arenas, this what I'm referring to: A new set of values were placed on each stat to have effect in pvp. This system was put on test server early on with no update notes to explain its purpose relative to pre-revamp. Originally, this sytem was escalating decreasing for stat increases as a reversal of how pve worked. Example being: At the time of this screenshot- 1: 1003 precision 2-5: 20/21 per sp 6-15: 5/6 per sp 16-30: 3/4 per sp 31-50: 2/3 per sp 50-130ish: 1/2 per sp 130-140ish: 1 per sp This system was in place since January on test server but was only mentioned indirectly on May 12 in the test server notes as "PvP Clamps: Most normal stat vectors (such as skill points, mods, etc.) will now work in PvP, but will be scaled to PvP item levels. Note that this is different from the hard-clamping on Live." I do not know how 'scaled to pvp item levels' means to reverse how the sp stat progression works in pve so the portion of concern was still unaddressed and the only thread concerning this topic was closed. Left Out Note #1 - Reversing the Region Clamped Values & Bug During the entire stats revamp testing and the inital release on live server, skill points under the region clamped values were escalatingly decreasing. At some point in time, this was changed to escalatingly increasing.While I don't have a problem with this directly and is what I originally wanted, I have a problem with there being no notes on this change as people like me would've set up armories to maximize our stats in pvp arenas according to the old system and would unknowingly be weak after this change. I, along with several other people from the pvp community, keep up with live server update notes regularly and I just double check'd from Stats Release to June this year and saw nothing concerning this change. When I did testing with leaguemates, I also seem to have found a bug that might've been related to when this change was created. The stats you get from your skill points inside of arenas varies depending on character. With 205sp put in precision, region clamped values inside of arenas shows the following: Water toon, villain, 311sp, 97 pvp cr - 642 Weaponization, 401 Precision Water toon, hero, 329sp, 10 pvp cr - 657 Weaponization, 410 Precision Water toon, hero, 334sp, 92 pvp cr - 616 Weaponization, 385 Precision Fire toon, villain, 311sp, 86 pvp cr - 642 Weaponization, 401 Precision Atomic toon, hero, 334sp, 100 pvp cr - 645 Weaponization, 403 Precision ^ Why is it showing that my Water toon with the lowest pvp cr is getting basically a precision mod's worth of stats extra from the same sp spec in arenas? I had leaguemates that actually showed over a mod's worth of difference between them and that was spec'ing only 100sp in prec so I'm assuming with 205 it might reach 2 mods' worth (they all had 100/101 pvp gear for anyone that might attempt to try to find a pattern). I'm somewhat curious as to how far this gap can go considering we only had ~10 character pool, but this inconsistency shouldn't be here and I don't remember this existing under the escalatingly decreasing system when I showed it to other people on live when teaching how to do specs. Vague Note #2 - Mod Clamping & Buffing Pre-revamp had pve mods giving full strength to pvp characters inside of arenas (we had hard caps but still). During early revamp on test server, pve mods were clamped down to be slightly weaker than prefab mods, and later this was changed to be exactly the same as prefab vi expert mods, which is the same as how it is on live currently. While this prevents pve mods from getting out of hand, the reverse of this has me heated rn. Alpha mods, aka 1 Byte & 1 Equipment Alpha are boosted instead of arenas to produce the same stats as prefab vi expert mods. My Power Alpha which normally gives 54 Power was boosted to showing 180 Power inside of Arenas. THIS COMPLETELY DESTROYS THE POINT OF PREFAB MODS AS A WHOLE. If I'm in arenas, why would I spend 20K to 50K Marks of Valor on Mods when I can get 10 Bytes for 100k in the broker and add 2000 cash and have 10 alpha mods buffed to the same stats. If I'm in open world, why would I spend time getting 20K to 50K Marks of Valor for Mods when I can make T7/T8 or higher mods a lot faster that'll give me more stats as well. Giving benefit of the doubt, this is the mistake of what would happen if someone set the code to auto change ANYTHING pve related to pvp prefab vi expert level instead of just reducing the stats of higher tier mods in the process of "will be scaled to PvP item levels". Left Out Note #2 - Excessive Arena Buffs & Toughness Scaling Removed First, there is no toughness difference between 96 PvP and 101 PvP gear. Second, while buffing in arenas isn't a new concept, it is when it's blown completely out of proportion and becomes unreachable for most of the community. Current Restoration Buff for Healer Role - 3204 Restoration Current Dominance Buff for Tank Role -1914 Dominance Current Dominance Buff for Troll Role - 1648 Dominance Current Vitalization Buff for Troll Role - 1974 Vitalization Full 101 Restoration Base Stat - 1719 Restoration Full 101 Dominance Base Stat - 119 Dominance Full 101 Vitalization Base Stat - 1074 Vitalization Prefab Dom VI Expert - 24 Dominance Prefab Restoration VI Expert - 24 Restoration Prefab Vitalization VI Expert - 15 Vitalization *Hybrid Mastery - 5% bonus* values tested for a toon on live but subject to bug I found earlier 205SP in Dominance - ~322 Dominance + 10% 205SP in Restoration - ~322 Restoration + 10% 205SP in Vitalization - ~201 Vitalization + 10% Healer Role - +35% Restoration Controller Role - +35% Vitailzation 1719 Resto(base) + 240 Resto(full mods) + 322(full sp) = 2281*1.5 = ~3356-3421 depending on % increase order. Conclusion: Healers can barely crack over the restoration buff. 119 Dom(base) + 240 Dom(full mods) + 322(full sp) = 681 Dom *1.15 = ~783-786 Conclusion: Tanks and Controllers have over double pushing triple the dominance they can possibly have for free. 1074 Vit(base) + 150 Vit(full mods) + 201 Vit(full sp) = 1425 *1.5 = ~2137-2221 Conclusion: Controllers barely crack over the vitalization buff. Questions to ask: - Why should a healer put sp and mods into restoration to have 150-200 extra restoration that adds 30% of it to their healing formula (52.5) when they can go full dom instead and add 700+ Dom at 25% (175+)? - Why are we nerfing shields and atomic healing when both of those scale from dom which seems to be a blatantly obvious problem? -Why even give trolls and doms free dominance to that degree just to nerf the powers to where that huge boost means nothing when you can just lower the dominance boost significantly and make people actually spec into that stat to have strong shields and heals at the cost of significantly less damage, power management, etc.? What happened to trade offs? - Why should a controller/healer spec for 200 vit/resto as opposed to 3500+ power? - Where did barely buffing someone to 96 pvp cr with alpha mods (non-buffed) and like 70sp worth of stats go? xD When I sit down and think about how PvP is dead based off of mistakes from rushing conceptually, and not even rushing the actual balance process, I can't help but get a vibe of This is America from Childish Gambino. Riots and burning vehicles and symbolisms of death in the background. Killings left and right. Just utter nonsensical chaos playing out while the main people in the camera just dance and try to act like nothing is happening, at least until the main one sits back and takes a smoke, to later be running for his life when reality sets in.
