Reconstruct stealth nerfed?

[knockcocker]

I've done some investigation into this issue.

Several experimental spell power coefficient changes ended up in the Update 16 Lamannia build - these are not intended to go live. I've reverted them all.

Thanks for speaking up. Much appreciated.

[Eladrin]

Thank you, Eladrin.

Is it safe to assume Reconstruct will not be getting hit with the same ruling as Heal spell was? Or is the long term decision still being decided?

At this time I see no need to modify Reconstruct. If repair amplification effects become commonplace, this may be revisited, but currently it's different enough from Heal (lacking the condition cures, for instance) that right now there's no need to change it.

Glad to hear it. Since there apparently is a perceived need to keep refining it though, mind letting us know what you find problematic and why when you've a chance? No promises to agree, but if we know where you're coming from, at least future feedback would be relevant.

Heal and Reconstruct are on the "watch list" of sorts because in general, huge efficient heals can be a problem when the content team is trying to challenge a party. Often monster damage increases to compensate so they can remain a threat, but this tends to lead to an undesirable power spiral where as monster damage increases, healing characters eventually become unable to do anything but chain those huge efficient heals together.

[Scraap]

Heal and Reconstruct are on the "watch list" of sorts because in general, huge efficient heals can be a problem when the content team is trying to challenge a party. Often monster damage increases to compensate so they can remain a threat, but this tends to lead to an undesirable power spiral where as monster damage increases, healing characters eventually become unable to do anything but chain those huge efficient heals together.

I can see that, and I'm glad you folks are cognizant of the fact that most players really aren't content to healbot outside of emergencies. Guessing that would have been one of the reasons for fortification bypassing/debuffing: infrequent spike damage?

[Postumus]

This is stupid. It's so stupid, my head hurts thinking about how stupid it is. So the DEV's were smoking weed, and now they're mainlining crack. What's next?

So now that Eladrin explained this was a coding error and that it will not go live, you want to back down off that ledge?

[Tid12]

Finally, all this doom, threats and crying here and in general discussion can end.

Thanks for the answer Eladrin.

[Xezrak]

At this time I see no need to modify Reconstruct. If repair amplification effects become commonplace, this may be revisited, but currently it's different enough from Heal (lacking the condition cures, for instance) that right now there's no need to change it.


Heal and Reconstruct are on the "watch list" of sorts because in general, huge efficient heals can be a problem when the content team is trying to challenge a party. Often monster damage increases to compensate so they can remain a threat, but this tends to lead to an undesirable power spiral where as monster damage increases, healing characters eventually become unable to do anything but chain those huge efficient heals together.

Thanks Eladrin,

However might I suggest that challenge doesn't always have to mean higher damage from monsters and higher hp to wack down, the latter which is almost just boring (keep hitting keys for a bit longer).

Instead for challenge may I suggest increase the number and verity of spells being cast by monsters and the various disables they have. One of the most tough encounters at level is the end fight in 'In the flesh' on Elite, one of the reasons for this is beholders disabling casting ability, plenty of stuns etc. Also increase the amount of co-ordination needed by the team, eg tiles/roids in Abbot, inferno in Abbot, The arrow rain thing in Lord of Blades etc.

[scoobmx]

Thanks Eladrin,

However might I suggest that challenge doesn't always have to mean higher damage from monsters and higher hp to wack down, the latter which is almost just boring (keep hitting keys for a bit longer).

Instead for challenge may I suggest increase the number and verity of spells being cast by monsters and the various disables they have. One of the most tough encounters at level is the end fight in 'In the flesh' on Elite, one of the reasons for this is beholders disabling casting ability, plenty of stuns etc. Also increase the amount of co-ordination needed by the team, eg tiles/roids in Abbot, inferno in Abbot, The arrow rain thing in Lord of Blades etc.

i think abbot is an excellent raid. can we please have more raids that have puzzles that cannot be 1) brute forced or 2) solved using solver scripts
to this day it's still a very interesting and challenging raid, because the answer to it is not just 'm0ar dps and m0ar hjeals'

[Ovrad]

i think abbot is an excellent raid. can we please have more raids that have puzzles that cannot be 1) brute forced or 2) solved using solver scripts
to this day it's still a very interesting and challenging raid, because the answer to it is not just 'm0ar dps and m0ar hjeals'

Nothing wrong with puzzles, but there's something wrong with puzzles that make you fail the whole raid because you had a split second of lag. Also, if you're gonna force the party to split, make it so the 3 parts take the same time to complete. Having to wait 10 mins for tiles to finish (or quite likely fail) isn't fun at all.

[Scraap]

Instead for challenge may I suggest increase the number and verity of spells being cast by monsters and the various disables they have. One of the most tough encounters at level is the end fight in 'In the flesh' on Elite, one of the reasons for this is beholders disabling casting ability, plenty of stuns etc. Also increase the amount of co-ordination needed by the team, eg tiles/roids in Abbot, inferno in Abbot, The arrow rain thing in Lord of Blades etc.

Along those lines, I'm going to go ahead and suggest something likely incredibly unpopular. No fail on a 1 was a mistake, since that pretty much kills spike damage if you can build to fall off the dice.

Perhaps if they shifted that aspect to "and saves rolled above 10 automatically succeed", that'd parallel to some degree Improved Evasion's half-reflex-based-damage, while giving disintegrate and the like back it's teeth without requiring that mobs end up overinflated in order to bypass that restriction.

[taurean430]

At this time I see no need to modify Reconstruct. If repair amplification effects become commonplace, this may be revisited, but currently it's different enough from Heal (lacking the condition cures, for instance) that right now there's no need to change it.


Heal and Reconstruct are on the "watch list" of sorts because in general, huge efficient heals can be a problem when the content team is trying to challenge a party. Often monster damage increases to compensate so they can remain a threat, but this tends to lead to an undesirable power spiral where as monster damage increases, healing characters eventually become unable to do anything but chain those huge efficient heals together.

Good to see you make an appearance in the thread

It's pretty clear what you guys are trying to do from what I've seen and experimented with insofar. Being stuck chain casting excepting any other actions is a concern of mine as well as I love playing divine classes.

I'm not sure what can be done beyond what has so far, as it appears player choice in building and playstyle affect these issues moreso than any other factor. Is it possible to take another look at PRR to see if that can be tweaked a bit? I only ask because it's been my experience that some players will make investments in gear if they see a noticeable difference when running harder content.

[MeliCat]

Oh what a relief. I thought you were trying to wipe robots from the game or something there for a moment. Lub ma little robots.

[Faent]

So now that Eladrin explained this was a coding error and that it will not go live, you want to back down off that ledge?

My fury has subsided. But it was perfectly reasonable to think this was intended. A DEV (MadFloyd) already stated that Reconstruct *was* going to go the way of Heal. It's good to see this decision has been revisited.

I've done some investigation into this issue.

Several experimental spell power coefficient changes ended up in the Update 16 Lamannia build - these are not intended to go live. I've reverted them all.

Thank you!

At this time I see no need to modify Reconstruct. If repair amplification effects become commonplace, this may be revisited, but currently it's different enough from Heal (lacking the condition cures, for instance) that right now there's no need to change it.

And thank you again. For the record, it is currently not trivial to Reconstruct in Epic Elite content. To be effective, you need both Reconstruct and a Repair loaded, and you need to be slotting a Reconstruction item. This is *in addition* to Reconstruct scrolls. Arcanes are already fairly low on the HP totem pole these days. Epic Hard challenges nobody. And a Reconstruct nerf would seriously gimp WF arcanes in Epic Elite content. It is not even close to overpowered in the current endgame.

[tasebro]

At this time I see no need to modify Reconstruct. If repair amplification effects become commonplace, this may be revisited, but currently it's different enough from Heal (lacking the condition cures, for instance) that right now there's no need to change it.


Heal and Reconstruct are on the "watch list" of sorts because in general, huge efficient heals can be a problem when the content team is trying to challenge a party. Often monster damage increases to compensate so they can remain a threat, but this tends to lead to an undesirable power spiral where as monster damage increases, healing characters eventually become unable to do anything but chain those huge efficient heals together.

Props for at least admitting *what* you guys did, and *why* you made your choice; but there are no "healing characters": simply Do Not Exist....that comment is a revelation of a default mindset that is *part* of the problem that resulted in divine caster output arbitrarily getting nerfed 50% in MOTU.

The fact remains that you devs made the short-sighted decision to *break* existing, workable (Heroic) content in order to accommodate your otherwise broken (Epic) MOTU content, and default to prop up the lowest common denominator; that was a *bad* design decision, based on *bad* initial assumptions, supported with *bad* non-justifications, resulting in *bad* (not unforseeable) consequences.

Drop the institutional "healing characters" mindset;
Recognize the detrimental results of that myopic mindset;
Reverse the MOTU 50% nerf of divine caster output.
Restore full divine caster ability;
Cease attempts at denial of *full* player contribution for players who play divine casters---at *all* levels of play, INCLUDING heroic level play;

[Credinus]

Thanks for the clarification Eladrin, it's great to hear that this isn't something intended to go into live for now. Echoing Faent's post, the primary reason we all reacted so quickly on this is because there was indeed a post from another dev during the U15 preview stating that Reconstruct was going to be changed in this manner, which spawned huge mega-threads decrying it; seeing it get in place had us all assuming that the change was entirely intentional based on that. Personally, I've resubscribed after hearing this since the only character I enjoy playing anymore is a WF Evocation AM and this change would've ruined me. On a related note, seriously, where did the feedback/survey form go for subscription cancellation?



As far as improving difficulty, I agree with everyone saying that upping monster damage isn't always the best bet, and generally isn't a good one at all. Things like healing curses, the reduced healing effects in the Demonweb, anti-magic zones, etc. are a great way to counter uber heals without making monsters so absurdly powerful that they'll 1-2 shot everyone in the party. I'd love to see more of these approaches, rather than simple mob power ramping.

[Postumus]

My fury has subsided. But it was perfectly reasonable to think this was intended. A DEV (MadFloyd) already stated that Reconstruct *was* going to go the way of Heal.

Yeah, I saw his quoted post in another thread... Maybe the wiki... So I still have some lingering doubts whether this was intended all along or really an error. :-P

[azrael4h]

Nothing wrong with puzzles, but there's something wrong with puzzles that make you fail the whole raid because you had a split second of lag. Also, if you're gonna force the party to split, make it so the 3 parts take the same time to complete. Having to wait 10 mins for tiles to finish (or quite likely fail) isn't fun at all.

Yeah, I don't mind puzzles of any kind, and do quite well with them. However, make sure the entire party has something to do. No matter what, it's boring to have one person do a puzzle, and everyone else stand around twiddling their thumbs.

Take an approach where one person needs to work out a puzzle, and another group infiltrate a base. If they go too fast, then they get a different fight than if the puzzle gets done. Sorta Magic Candle-ish I guess. If I wasn't exhausted I could articulate it better.

[Entelech]

Heal and Reconstruct are on the "watch list" of sorts because in general, huge efficient heals can be a problem when the content team is trying to challenge a party. Often monster damage increases to compensate so they can remain a threat, but this tends to lead to an undesirable power spiral where as monster damage increases, healing characters eventually become unable to do anything but chain those huge efficient heals together.

Bah. Just add another few zeroes to the critter's hitpoint total and call it good, just like you've always done before. We'd hate to ask the content team to be clever.

There's a fundamental flaw in the thought process you outlined above:

PC Clerics are already an endangered species in DDO. If they're unable to do anything but chain those "huge efficient heals" together, then you nerf those "huge efficient heals", they can do NOTHING.

[Entelech]

Oh...and I do have an example of a quest that I feel is well-designed to challenge a party:

The Lost Thread.

The Drow are not stupidly overpowered in that quest, but they position archers defensively and place magical traps along the approaches to said archers.

Hmm, FINALLY a fantasy race with a bonus to Intelligence that actually uses rudimentary REAL WORLD DEFENSIVE TACTICS. Thumbs up.

[Lord_Darquain]

So if recon is nerfed like Heal, does Healing Amp apply to repair spells now?

[sephiroth1084]

Heal and Reconstruct are on the "watch list" of sorts because in general, huge efficient heals can be a problem when the content team is trying to challenge a party. Often monster damage increases to compensate so they can remain a threat, but this tends to lead to an undesirable power spiral where as monster damage increases, healing characters eventually become unable to do anything but chain those huge efficient heals together.

I'll also add that this "power spiral" is also part of the reason that there is such a gulf between characters with good self-healing (casters) and those without--the game gets balanced to assume you have someone that can throw out 300, 400, 500 hundred point Heals, so when you don't have someone doing that, you can't compensate with potions.

Not a dig against the devs here, but against all the people that complain about seeing Heal nerfed.