20 réponses à ce sujet

[Pacifien]

Yes, it's this discussion again. Blame my horrid memory, but I'm looking for some clarification here.

Barrier is a Biotic Power.
Geth Shield Boost is a Tech Power.
Fortification is a Combat Power.

Now, there are no upgrades that affect combat powers, but there are upgrades that affect biotic and tech powers. Specifically, upgrades for cooldowns, damage, and duration.

So Barrier and Geth Shield Boost should both benefit from the 20% cooldown reduction and the 20% power duration upgrades, yeah? As well as the power recharge and power duration benefits when you evolve your biotic/tech class passives?

I don't see why all of those factors wouldn't affect Barrier and Geth Shield Boost, but I have this vague memory that maybe one of the factors didn't, and I don't know why I have that memory, and I need someone else's memory to set me straight here.

[PsyrenY]

Yes, Barrier benefits from biotic cooldown/duration and GSB benefits from tech. Fortification benefits from no upgrades.

This is the reason Fortification is considered one of the weakest bonus powers (second only to shredder ammo, I believe) - the others do what it does, only better.

Modifié par Optimystic_X, 07 septembre 2010 - 06:19 .

[numotsbane]

I haven't noticed any duration effects, but to be honest they rarely never last for the duration anyway. I'm confident that the tech/biotic cooldowns apply to the respective bonuses.

From What Sinosleep and Christina Norman said, Fortification doesn't get any upgrades to balance Grunt, which is why it's worse than the others. which is sort of irrelevent, really.

sorry to not have a more specific answer, I'm not one for precise testing.

[PsyrenY]

My fix to fortification: Make one of the evolutions buff melee damage a very high amount. It would distinguish it from the others without losing the "combat power" feel, give people a reason to pick it (especially Vanguards) and even fit the existing flavor of flooding your suit with a fluid that hardens on impact.

[numotsbane]

But if they fix fortification then I wont be able to say decisively which bonus power is the absolute worst...

[khevan]

IIRC, one of the devs mentioned that Fortification was balanced with Grunt in mind. If it benefitted from cooldown reductions, it'd make Grunt ultra over-powered.



I get the feeling that the bonus powers were balanced with that respective squadmate in mind, such as Reave for Samara, and Energy Drain for Tali. Both are amazing powers in Shepard's hands. Both are incredibly useful (but not OP) when used by a squadmate. This leads me to think that bonus powers are "balanced" towards the squadmates, not Shepard.



Thus, Fortification being extremely weak for Shepard, in comparison to GSB or Barrier.

[sinosleep]

khevan wrote...

IIRC, one of the devs mentioned that Fortification was balanced with Grunt in mind. If it benefitted from cooldown reductions, it'd make Grunt ultra over-powered.

I get the feeling that the bonus powers were balanced with that respective squadmate in mind, such as Reave for Samara, and Energy Drain for Tali. Both are amazing powers in Shepard's hands. Both are incredibly useful (but not OP) when used by a squadmate. This leads me to think that bonus powers are "balanced" towards the squadmates, not Shepard.

Thus, Fortification being extremely weak for Shepard, in comparison to GSB or Barrier.

Yup, that's what I took out of it when Christina replied to my original thread. While standard powers are balanced around the PC bonus powers are balanced around the squadmates who originally use them. I don't want to get into a which power is OP discussion (I'll ignore it) but that would lead me to believe that if any power has the potential to be, it'd be a bonus power.

As to the OP from whaat I remember everything about GSB and Barrier were identical when I made my vid, unfortunately I wasn't testing for total duration so that may be something that differentiates them but I doubt it. I could do some testing.

Modifié par sinosleep, 07 septembre 2010 - 12:37 .

[Pacifien]

See, numotsbane's bonus powers thread showed that Fortification was still, for some reason, a popular choice. I've read a couple times that people pick it simply because it looks cooler than Barrier or Geth Shield Boost. Okay, I can run with that.

Yesterday, someone playing an Engineer told me he picked Fortification over the other two because 1) Barrier would be a biotic power on a nonbiotic class and Improved Fortification could last for 3 minutes whereas Geth Shield Boost doesn't have that option. But he wasn't aware of the tech upgrade benefits to GSB. Makes me think a lot of people do choose Fortification over GSB because they aren't aware of the same thing.

Modifié par Pacifien, 07 septembre 2010 - 01:13 .

[sinosleep]

Definitely possible. The number of things that a player that doesn't frequent these forums wouldn't know about is starting to stack up. The fortification thing, I'm sure some people don't realize AR doesn't benefit from any CD reduction, charge not benefiting fully from biotic CD reduction research (you only get 5% instead of 20%) the claymore reload trick, etc, etc, etc.

[PsyrenY]

sinosleep wrote...

Yup, that's what I took out of it when Christina replied to my original thread. While standard powers are balanced around the PC bonus powers are balanced around the squadmates who originally use them. I don't want to get into a which power is OP discussion (I'll ignore it) but that would lead me to believe that if any power has the potential to be, it'd be a bonus power.

I find that to be an oversight, imo. They had no problem tweaking powers to be different on squadmates than on Shepard in other instances (e.g. Combat Drone) so I don't see a reason they couldn't adjust Grunt's Fort to be weaker than Shepard's, have a longer cooldown or some other balancing factor that wouldn't affect Shepard. I don't mind Fort bringing up the rear in most cases, but I do mind it being so completely eclipsed by the other choices to the point that taking it at all is meaningless.

sinosleep wrote...

As to the OP from whaat I remember everything about GSB and Barrier were identical when I made my vid, unfortunately I wasn't testing for total duration so that may be something that differentiates them but I doubt it. I could do some testing.

Duration/Cooldown wise they are indeed identical. There are other differences between them though, e.g. Barrier's lack of an animation and GSB's damage boost option, that can be used when making a decision.

[Tony Gunslinger]

This is sort of on my mind, but if Charge’s CD isn’t affected by biotic upgrades, but is affected by the Vanguard’s passives, does that mean a) Charge is a combat skill? And could Vanguard’s passive CD bonus affect tech and/or combat skills’ CD? I find it very odd that Charge is the only biotic skill that behaves this way.

[Kronner]

It is simply a balancing decision. If it worked on Charge, you could Charge every 3.9 seconds if you are a Champion. That would be gamebreaking.

[sinosleep]

Tony Gunslinger wrote...

This is sort of on my mind, but if Charge’s CD isn’t affected by biotic upgrades, but is affected by the Vanguard’s passives, does that mean a) Charge is a combat skill? And could Vanguard’s passive CD bonus affect tech and/or combat skills’ CD? I find it very odd that Charge is the only biotic skill that behaves this way.

I think it's still a biotic skill cause it is affected, just not the full amount. And while we still haven't gotten word back on what the issue is several of us believe it's simply a balancing issue. As is you can charge every 4.9, with full benefit of research CD reduction it would be every 3.9 seconds. Getting a full shield refresh every 3.9 seconds while being put in perfect shotgunning range seems pretty wild. I mean vanguards (with some luck) can already solo a colossus on 4.9, I don't even want to think about what they could do getting charge a full second faster.

[Tony Gunslinger]

I totally agree, Charge is already fine as it is and would be overpowered if it was affect by upgrades. But just looking at the system from the big picture point of view, Charge can be classified as a combat skill.

Well, actually, if I get a chance I'll test out my Vanguard with something like Flashbang Grenade and see if his passive CD affects it. I really, really doubt it, but:  A) if Vanguard's passive doesn't affect combat skills' CD, then Charge is a biotic skill that just doesn't get affected by upgrades like everyone already agrees with, or Vanguard's passive CD applies to biotics and combat skills in the same way the Sentinel's CD affects both biotics and tech. It's a wild guess, but hey why not, I'll try it out.

Edit: Oh, Kasumi's Shadow Strike is a combination of combat and tech, so that's an example of a power where not all bonuses are applied. Charge could be the same thing.

Modifié par Tony Gunslinger, 07 septembre 2010 - 02:29 .

[Simbacca]

I love seeing current discussions about how if Vanguards could Charge a second faster they'd become overpowered juxtaposed with all the Vanguard's suck discussions back right after game's release.

Actually, this could easily be apart of sinosleep's early list of "the number of things that a player that doesn't frequent these forums wouldn't know about is starting to stack up". Players that don't frequent ME2 forums still believe that Vanguards and Adepts are ineffective on insanity, despite how long that has been known to be otherwise here.


{EDIT} Though now I realize this is OT, as has been the disuccsion in the thread.  As to Pacifien's original questions:

Pacifien wrote...

...So Barrier and Geth Shield Boost should both benefit from the 20% cooldown reduction and the 20% power duration upgrades, yeah? As well as the power recharge and power duration benefits when you evolve your biotic/tech class passives?

I don't see why all of those factors wouldn't affect Barrier and Geth Shield Boost, but I have this vague memory that maybe one of the factors didn't, and I don't know why I have that memory, and I need someone else's memory to set me straight here.

I can not confirm or deny either way unfortunately, and I am curious to the answer as well. 

Another question I'd like clarification on is also related to class passive abilities:  Has it been confirmed that the class passives only affect one of the three branches of powers and I've just missed it or something?  People here always act like the class passives only affect one branch, implying that an Engineer's Reave wouldn't gain duration from Mechanic and that a Soldier's Energy Drain wouldn't game damage from Commando.  However when I read those passive's descriptions, I don't see specific reference to one or the other; Mechanic has "+15% Power Duration" not '+15% Tech Power Duration', Commando has "+15% Power Damage" not '+15% Combat Power Damage'.

Modifié par Simbacca, 07 septembre 2010 - 03:53 .

[Athenau]

+% power damage and % faster recharge affect everything. They aren't tech or biotic specific.

[sinosleep]

Athenau wrote...

+% power damage and % faster recharge affect everything. They aren't tech or biotic specific.

I just tested it, this is correct. My adept and engineer both had 7 second recharge times on their GSB.

[JaegerBane]

Athenau wrote...

+% power damage and % faster recharge affect everything. They aren't tech or biotic specific.

Do you mean just gear and passives that offer this? It'd be a bit weird if research affected it too...

[Tony Gunslinger]

Just tested this as well with an Infiltrator and a Vanguard using Barrier, GSB, Fortification, Flashbang. Both classes' passives reduced cooldown on all 4 powers. So tech, bio, and combat powers are affected by class passives.

For my sake, I can't think of any evidence to refute the sentence "Charge can be a combat power", but that's getting off-topic. I do think it's interesting that the Soldier is the only class without passive CDs.

[Athenau]

I do think it's interesting that the Soldier is the only class without passive CDs.

Adrenaline rush would be even more ridiculous with a 15% recharge bonus. Also, the soldier gets more health and the whopping 40-50% storm speed bonus which is pretty amazing, IMO.

[Tony Gunslinger]

Ah yes, I forgot about ARush, and makes sense that a soldier can't be an expert in powers.