Changes to Perk targeting and effect on Agents

[Jonalethian]

-Perks will now always land on the target selected when firing the Perk, regardless of whether you switch targets before it completes.

Did agent pvm damage really deserve a nerf? i'm talking about the 2 large agent damage perks Assassinate (requires target below 15% health) and Death Strike ( 15% health + stunned)

Both have 5 second execution time, deathstrike kinda has 6, since its usually used with concussive shot to get the stunned requirement filled. Any mob in normal teaming conditions is dead before they get to land!!
Skilled agents were able to start executing them on almost dead mob and transfer the effect to next one - no more it seems.
Doing a fast calculation I get roughly 12k/minute damage reduction to agents pvm damage if they cant use the damage from these perks due to target mob dying before the perk has chance to land.

Agents do not deserve a nerf in their already low pvm damage.

Edit: Maybe this mechanic change was done to fix some larger issue, if so a simple reduction to Assassinate/DeathStrike execution time is in order.

[hsemage]

bump

[Autofil]

I love this change... Now ppl cant que up all their perks, then attack me in BS anymore...

[Hacre]

Edit: Maybe this mechanic change was done to fix some larger issue, if so a simple reduction to Assassinate/DeathStrike execution time is in order.

It prevents people queuing up perks on a pet/easy to perk profession then swapping attack mode to a fixer/MA and obliterating them. Also prevents melee from perking someone who's 40m away.

[hsemage]

I think a good solution to this would be to decrease the execution time as the OP suggested. These "finishing" perks are kind of silly if you never really have a chance to use them in this gameplay that is becoming more and more fast paced.

[kiggity]

It prevents people queuing up perks on a pet/easy to perk profession then swapping attack mode to a fixer/MA and obliterating them. Also prevents melee from perking someone who's 40m away.

you say that like we can perk people that are 3m away. <3

[Hacre]

you say that like we can perk people that are 3m away. <3

LMFAO too true, too true.

[Bolen]

I think decreasing cast time dramatically for finishing perks would be fine. I think being able to transfer a perk that requires < 15% health to another target does not sound like intended behavior.

[Hacre]

The perks should either:

Have fast/instant execution with a pre execution HP check (can't execute if HP is higher than the req)

OR

Have the slower execution, but do the HP check (like sepukku slash did/does?) when it lands.

Slow execution with the check happening pre execution is moronic.

[kiggity]

i know the advy shadowstalker perks check if you are behind your target both when you execute and when they go off (much to my frustration if the bastard moves)

[Arlanon]

Or just up the HP requirement to like <35% HP pr so. 15% is kinda stupid.

[derishen]

Or just up the HP requirement to like <35% HP pr so. 15% is kinda stupid.

bump for this. MAs have the same problem with Obliterate, which I doubt I'll be landing anytime soon with this "fix"

[TheVainglorious]

You guys thought switching coup de grace perks to mobs that weren't actually low on health was reasonable to begin with?

I can agree that such perks should perhaps be fixed so that they don't suck, but IMO, switching targets real quick to deathblow a different mob with all its health is an exploit.

[Tradersoft]

They weren't too useful before, but now... they're completely useless and looks like The Shot is heading towards that direction as well.

[kuznechik]

I can't QQ more for agents' cause... I was QQ-ing all the night... I was crying "Leave Britney, ehm.. agents alone!", honestly.

Exploit is exploit. Doesn't matter how you spell it. Starting 5 seconds perk on some pet, then queueing all fast perks you have to switch it all on some evader was really good tactic. I guess Showoff will miss it. Tough luck, I wanna times when engies were able to perkheal self back too. But alas - it was exploit too.

Regarding loss of pvm damage - freaking ask for pvm damage. Get your profs to bug devs/Sil to check what kind of increase of pvm damage is "good for an agent". Tho - keep in mind that NTs and traders suck even more than you pvm dd wise.
I also feel that I need to mention one more thing - you have these +damage procs almost noone is using cause "omagawd, I need to swap arith on to cast it and also unperk even NR1". You'll get my support when I will be able to cast my top nanos w/o arith swapping. And it ain't gonna happen anytime soon.

P.S.: Regarding useless perks... Don't get me started, k? Every profession have some. For some professions it's to the point when half of perks they use in general (accessible for all) tab.

[Vaalena]

Regarding loss of pvm damage - freaking ask for pvm damage.

/me waves as mad in direction to the Agent's forum

But for the most of the rest I agree. It is wrong to rely on "odd-working mechanics" to do DD. Plus, this change is in favour of agents now. As we have NO other way to do DD now, but to get a rifle with stats at least 425-700 (750) and 1.5/1.5.

[thesun1]

after giving agents first bit of pvp love in years by making theshot executable from sneak, they take it away right next patch. Right as i was starting to warmup to you funcom. TSK TSK.

[Ragetra]

Have the slower execution, but do the HP check (like sepukku slash did/does?) when it lands.

fix those perks like suggested here

[Silirrion]

Sorry folks, this was an obvious bug / exploit and should have been fixed some time ago (it wasn't due to technical difficulty in doing so, but once we found a solution it was always going to be resolved). Using a secondary target to avoid resist or other skill checks on a target was always very clearly not an intended game mechanic.

Likewise I don't think we have any specific concerns regarding agent damage (either in PVM or PVP) at the current time.

[Tradersoft]

I also feel that I need to mention one more thing - you have these +damage procs almost noone is using

Get your facts straight, we are using the procs but we're not using the highest ones because they're basicaly a waste of IP's considering the low difference of dmg and a lot higher requirements.

Sorry folks, this was an obvious bug / exploit and should have been fixed some time ago (it wasn't due to technical difficulty in doing so, but once we found a solution it was always going to be resolved). Using a secondary target to avoid resist or other skill checks on a target was always very clearly not an intended game mechanic.

Likewise I don't think we have any specific concerns regarding agent damage (either in PVM or PVP) at the current time.

There's 2 professions with a better AS weapon than us, there's many professions with a better perk alpha than us, there's a lot of professions with much more dmg than us in PvM. In PvP we're almost forced to go NR1-2 if you dont like to have your toolset rendered useless everytime you meet someone with debuffs (which happens a lot)

We're the most vulnerable profession to debuffs, and compared to other professions that use artillery symbs we're basically forced to go NR if we want to PvP.

Seeing as we got up to 3 perk changes, 2 of them rendered useless and 1 a lot less useful in PvP, which means a nerf for us in both PvP and PvM. (as always) 1 of these perks are The Shot that you couldn't perk swap in the first place.

Assassinate and Death strike are pretty tricky to perk swap in PvP anyways, as you have to have your target down to 15% and/or stunned, but its pretty much useless in PvP if you don't swap it as if you got your oponnent down to 15% hp and/or stunned he's pretty much dead. Why didn't they do something about the attack time instead of nerfing it? The long attack time is why the only use of this perk is to swap it onto someone else, which most of the time isn't even worth the effort.