Fixing the Aura Stacking + Pumping Single Skill Problem

What exactly is broken about auras?
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CycloneJack a écrit :
There needs to be a skill investment to running 5+ auras on a single character.

You mean like investing points into mana to support those 5+ auras and have enough regen to sustain casting of your main skill with only 2-3 uses worth of mana left unreserved? Because that looks like a skill investment to me. If there is a problem with that, might it be because mana doesn't really work as a resource at the moment?
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I like the idea of them adding something to the skill tree for specific auras. I'm not entirely sure how they would do it, but perhaps they could make around 4 or so keystone nodes that have lets say two auras assigned to each; and those keystones would buff the hell out of, or in some way make more meaningful and unique, those auras, with the catch being that you cannot use any other auras but the ones in the keystone. This way, aura choices could be more meaningful and unique, while also in some regard limiting them, so that not everyone and their mothers third cousin from Borneo feels it necessary to have their character look like a disco ball at a rave.
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Dernière édition par Obsidus#7533, le 29 mars 2013 à 15:29:04
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CanHasPants a écrit :
What exactly is broken about auras?
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CycloneJack a écrit :
There needs to be a skill investment to running 5+ auras on a single character.

You mean like investing points into mana to support those 5+ auras and have enough regen to sustain casting of your main skill with only 2-3 uses worth of mana left unreserved? Because that looks like a skill investment to me. If there is a problem with that, might it be because mana doesn't really work as a resource at the moment?


'Tis possible. Perhaps if mana regen worked off of usable mana instead of total mana, then that aspect would be OK. And if Blood Magic increased the reservation of auras by the same percentage that it increases the cost of skills, then that side could be balanced up a bit as well.

Still, if one has to get +1 minion nodes, +1 curse nodes, +1 trap nodes and +1 totem nodes, then why not +1 aura nodes? Maybe limit the base to 2 or 3 auras max, and then allow players to build for more if they want them.

As is, aura stacking is over powered and is being used as a crutch, imo. How many builds in merciless or in maps would still be viable if they could only use 1 or 2 auras? Is that the fault of the build, or is it the fault of how poorly the game is balanced? Don't get me wrong, the game is fun, but I think the game's faults, in both offense and defense, could be better seen if auras were limited.
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deteego a écrit :
Lets not beat around the bush here, PoE does have some very fundamental flaws, especially late game.

One of these flaws is the basic mandatory stacking of auars (if you are a non BM user) combined with just souping a single ability (often FP/EK/LA/PS) when you hit late game. Even though auras and related abilities/support gems have gotten nerfed, its still happening, and its a problem, lets have a look at why

Although people can argue that having cooldowns on skills can break pacing, with PoE its basically taken to the other extreme, having skills with no cooldown means you just soup a single skill thats broken and continuously spam it. Also games like D3 have shown that putting moderate/sane cooldowns on skills actually improves gameplay combat, not make it worse (we don't want the situation that we have on TQ though where abilities have cooldowns of greater than 8 seconds, because that really does break gameplay pacing)

1. Auras are being treated as passives, not auras. Typically in these RPG style of games, Auras imply some supportive ability that you give to yourself as well as allies. They usually also imply that the aura version of a passive is weaker than the passive itself, mainly because you are spreading it in an AoE. The problem in PoE? Auras are stronger than passives (either through the passive tree or item mods) and they are being used as passives, instead of auras.

2. Mana regen is still based off max mana, not the usable mana you have. The biggest limiting factor, in terms of resource managed for skill usage in PoE, is regeneration, not mana pool. Its generally considered quite difficult to get a skill using 250+ mana (and when it gets to that stage, most people use a reduced mana/mana leech/health leech for BM gem). The thing is, its not uncommon at all to have 1k+ mana, and because skills have no cooldown (and hence one PoE encourages spamming a single skill), whats more important than anything else is regeneration of mana, not how big your pool. Aura stacking is attractive because when you are sitting at 1k+ mana, you literally have a massive section of mana that would never get used, and so its always filled with auras, and doing so doesn't effect mana regeneration

3. A lot of the broken abilities are broken because they have no CD. One of the biggest issues in game design (in general) is not putting restrictions on things that should have restrictions. If a skill is generally very good and reliable (i.e. applicable in all situations), which is what FP/LA/EK/PS are, than such skills should either have a cooldown or have very low damage. Thats not the case with PoE (and PoE is breaking the formula in this regard). I mean its really gotten so bad that watching a stream of something like Kripp playing is painful. Its literally him, just perma casting FP (inbetween moving) for a period of 12 hours, its just sad

Possible solutions

1. It would actually be better off, in terms of gameplay, if such abilities had a smallish cooldown (lets say ~3 seconds). The abilities can get a slight buff to compensate for cooldown, but what it would mean is it would encourage using a group of skills, instead of just pooling everything into a single offensive skill. Its in PoE's interest to make sure that one dimensional charcters are not the most effective ones, they in fact should be the least effective ones

2. Mana regeneration is based off not your max mana (which includes max mana), but the mana that is available to use. To offset this, base mana regeneration can be buffed

3. Abilities like EK/FP/LA would get a buff in raw numbers, but they would also get a cooldown (of something like ~2 seconds would be good). Generally speaking, if you can constantly spam an ability, it should either be weak (in terms of what it does) or be plain utility. Thats not the case for these spells. GGG can also introduce a reduced CD support gem which would allow people to decrease the CD of the abilities if they want a similar playstyle to what is currently available

4. Auras give less stats to the user compared to allies. To prevent aura stacking, one method is to make sure auras are auras in the general definition of what they are RPG type games, that is, an AoE ability that benefits your allies. There is nothing wrong with a summoner/totem stacking auras, in fact they really should be the only class that should be stacking auras. One way to encourage this is to make it, simply put, that auras do not give full benefits for you. So if you want to be selfish, and you are getting purity because you need MR (and not because you are a summoner whos minions need MR), then you would get a passive which grants you MR instead of the aura

General consensus is though, you aren't going to fix this problem with just number tweaking, thats already been done and it hasn't solved anything

What are your guys thoughts?


Well put I agree on all the problems.
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deteego a écrit :
Lets not beat around the bush here, PoE does have some very fundamental flaws, especially late game.

1. Auras are being treated as passives, not auras. Typically in these RPG style of games, Auras imply some supportive ability that you give to yourself as well as allies. They usually also imply that the aura version of a passive is weaker than the passive itself, mainly because you are spreading it in an AoE. The problem in PoE? Auras are stronger than passives (either through the passive tree or item mods) and they are being used as passives, instead of auras.

Possible solutions

1. It would actually be better off, in terms of gameplay, if such abilities had a smallish cooldown (lets say ~3 seconds).


Don't agree. I hate cooldowns. They are one of the most annoying things from diablo 2/wow imo and I would hate to see them creep into this game anymore than they already are... Auras in this game are less gamebreaking than they were in Diablo 2.

Managing CDs in a rotation is one of the most enjoyable things IMO. Even in PoE, I still throw some curses and try to use at least 2 other skills, instead of just spam-spam-spam my FP, which I find mind-numbing (tried it...).

You really like having to use one single skill? Improve it to hell and back, and that's it? Even ther RPGs such as TL have some CDs, maybe annoyingly long and not really what I'd call balances, but they're used. I remember using at least 4-5 main abilities on my Embermage or whatever is the name of the class. Way better than keeping my finger on the mouse button to pew-pew my FP.

BTW, the main nuke skills should have very low CDs, but there should be incentive for other skills to be used in rotation. I'll give an example with what I'd like for a cold witch, since it's what I play:

- pew-pew filler Freeze Pulse/Ice Spear, short CD, obviously affected by cast speed, good but not great DPS is used alone
- a debuff ability, such as Cold Snap, should be with a 4-8 secs or so CD, and slow/freeze mobs on crit, but also apply a "frozen" debuff
- Ice Spear or a new "bomb" frost spell should "shatter" the debuffed mobs. The CD should be a little longer than Cold Snap's
- when used with Frostbite, these spells should be more powerful; also, frostbite should not be possible to be specced for no expiring, so the player should need to refresh it periodically.

This would be but a simple application. It would make your gameplay more involved. Just imagine the possibilities with the many support gems.
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@Undon: Sounds too much like GW, which successfully turned the MMO combat scheme into an engaging test of efficient resource (mana and build up of other class-unique resources) and time (CDs) management. Indeed, it was fun, but it was not aRPG. Yes, I do want to spam the same damn (2-3) skills over and over again, like I did growing up on Gauntlet at the arcades as a kid (heh, arcades... remember those?). The main appeal here is watching shit asplode all over the screen and running around with a god-complex.
Devolving Wilds
Land
“T, Sacrifice Devolving Wilds: Search your library for a basic land card and reveal it. Then shuffle your library.”
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deteego a écrit :
Lets not beat around the bush here, PoE does have some very fundamental flaws, especially late game.

One of these flaws is the basic mandatory stacking of auars (if you are a non BM user)


Stopped reading here.

If auras aren't mandatory while your BM, then by definition they aren't mandatory at all. Pretty much all there is to it.

If you're upset about people min/maxing. No matter what is done there will be another trend where it's "mandatory" to achieve max efficiency. Any game with numbers involved will end up like that. There's not a single suggestion that would ever change that. EVER. Well there is one, don't make a game with depth and choice.

As for "pumping" a single skill. That's done more because it's mindless, it's not always the most effective or best idea. But it's easier. It just fits this genre's theme "mindless killing with an emphasis on loot and not so much on immersive combat"
Dernière édition par riptid3#6233, le 30 mars 2013 à 16:05:22
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CanHasPants a écrit :
@Undon: Sounds too much like GW, which successfully turned the MMO combat scheme into an engaging test of efficient resource (mana and build up of other class-unique resources) and time (CDs) management. Indeed, it was fun, but it was not aRPG. Yes, I do want to spam the same damn (2-3) skills over and over again, like I did growing up on Gauntlet at the arcades as a kid (heh, arcades... remember those?). The main appeal here is watching shit asplode all over the screen and running around with a god-complex.

I remember wanting to play the arcades sometimes, I was crazy about some space-ship thing that became a classic, forgot the name :) Always ran out of money, damn :(

Anyway, I always wanted to try GW2, didn't play any of the games.

What I did write, about the combos and CDs, it's actually a pretty common RPG mechanic, yes it appears on (some) MMOs too, but lots of other RPGs have CDs, including some ARPGs, but that's hardly the point.

The point is to find a middle-ground solution that would not feel MMO-like, yet would accomplish the goal of keeping the player a little more alert and focused. I think 2-3 (needed) offensive skills would be OK, especially is supplemented with some necessary defensive skills, if they will ever introduce any :)
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I'd rather see more supports added specifically for curses, auras, and totems so there are more appealing options to stacking auras and pumping a single skill. Additionally more buff skills with longer durations; the charge system is boring to me as it simply improves stats already on the character sheet. Not a problem necessarily but they're obnoxiously annoying to maintain for such a dull effect.

Regardless I like the fact that my summoner can run seven auras with three curses and two totems, but at the same time my duelist just running three auras with a bunch of buffs on the other slots still has an appeal as well.
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