[2019] A letter to the developers

Originally posted by AcidicSwords

As a discord we have agreed upon many of the issues and devised multiple solutions for each of the said issues.

Our issue has been relaying this information as many of the solutions require input from the devs, the limitations they have etc.

Feedback and solutions on mechanics cannot just be read and implemented. Things like this need to be discussed.

Asking for more loot can be taken at face value, but talking about core mechanics require a two way street

Originally posted by ExoRonin

..... he literally made a bullet point list of the talking points....

Originally posted by PG-13_Woodhouse

Mods unlocked the thread so I'll put this here now.

In regards to the damage formula, the primary concern is that too many things stack additively as opposed to multiplicatively. Currently, damage is calculated as follows:

DAMAGE = (Base * (1+A)*B*(1+C)*D*E)+1

where

• A is sum of all damage bonuses on gear.
• B is the base crit multiplier of your weapon/ability.
• C is the sum of all critical damage modifiers
• D is the damage type modifier (things like Lightning doing more damage to shields)
• E is the sum of all debuff modifiers. Currently just Target Beacon/Taunt (33% each and they don't stack with each other) and Acid (25%) for a Max of +58% damage.

source

The issue here is that almost all bonuses we can get from inscriptions, MW bonuses, and components fall into category A. Meaning that all of the cool stats we can control stack additively and can't have synergy with each other the way they do in most other games. The one other multiplicative scale we can get is things like speed on gear and reload time/clip size on weapons. /u/AcidicSwords explains this issue in a bit more detail here

but essentially there are 3 main problems with additive scaling:

1) It means you need increasingly more bonuses to get the same % difference in power level. (i.e., if you roll +200% damage on your weapon, then in order to double your damage, you need to collect another 300% damage from all sources). So the value of farming for additional gear goes down in terms on noticeable difference in power. For the most part, it takes a %difference for players to feel more powerful, which is ultimately the reason we want to chase loot.

2) It means stacking lots of damage bonuses doesn't really matter, all that matters is the sum of everything. there's no synergy between gear.

3) It doesn't work well with the exponential scaling between difficulty levels. /u/acidicswords explains this in more detail here

Obviously, not everything needs to be multiplicative, but breaking out a few more of the things in category A would go a long way.

Originally posted by reptoo

Your responses kinda read condescendingly with a tone of "oh none of this seems to be on our radar of worries, what's your problem?"

Originally posted by Bacon-muffin

https://www.reddit.com/r/AnthemTheGame/comments/b03gkr/imo_the_current_overall_quantity_of_loot_is_not/

Here's an opinion thread I made about loot, got a bit buried with all the drop rate talk going on.

Just wanted to say, your guys continued engagement with the community is what ultimately caused me to buy the game after my premier sub ran out. Not shying away from the tough questions even in a virulent sea of posts is so refreshing and makes me optimistic for the future.

Originally posted by Biggy_DX

Hey Brenon. I wanted to pass a quality of life suggestion to you guys to help players avoid downtime from walking in Fort Tarsis. With the recent addition of the "Hold to Start Expedition" button on the HUD (added in Patch 1.03), I think this sets you guys up to expand the functionality of that button option to other activities as well. My suggestion is this:

- Using the "Hold to Start Expedition" button brings up a list of options the players can choose from with the Arrow Keys/D-Pad; since they're not used in Fort Tarsis.

- Among these options are the following: Expedition, Forge, Vault, Launch Bay

- The player chooses which option they want, and the game sends them to that respective area.

- This would be a good stop-gap measure to removing as much downtime between missions as possible

Take it easy, and I hope you guys succeed in bringing the game closer to greener pastures.

Originally posted by EvolutionDemon

How about being able to launch the expedition map right at the end of an expedition after receiving loot? That way we can skip loading Fort Tarsis just to turn around and bring the map up to launch another expedition.

Originally posted by PG-13_Woodhouse

Mods unlocked the thread so I'll put this here now.

In regards to the damage formula, the primary concern is that too many things stack additively as opposed to multiplicatively. Currently, damage is calculated as follows:

DAMAGE = (Base * (1+A)*B*(1+C)*D*E)+1

where

• A is sum of all damage bonuses on gear.
• B is the base crit multiplier of your weapon/ability.
• C is the sum of all critical damage modifiers
• D is the damage type modifier (things like Lightning doing more damage to shields)
• E is the sum of all debuff modifiers. Currently just Target Beacon/Taunt (33% each and they don't stack with each other) and Acid (25%) for a Max of +58% damage.

source

The issue here is that almost all bonuses we can get from inscriptions, MW bonuses, and components fall into category A. Meaning that all of the cool stats we can control stack additively and can't have synergy with each other the way they do in most other games. The one other multiplicative scale we can get is things like speed on gear and reload time/clip size on weapons. /u/AcidicSwords explains this issue in a bit more detail here

but essentially there are 3 main problems with additive scaling:

1) It means you need increasingly more bonuses to get the same % difference in power level. (i.e., if you roll +200% damage on your weapon, then in order to double your damage, you need to collect another 300% damage from all sources). So the value of farming for additional gear goes down in terms on noticeable difference in power. For the most part, it takes a %difference for players to feel more powerful, which is ultimately the reason we want to chase loot.

2) It means stacking lots of damage bonuses doesn't really matter, all that matters is the sum of everything. there's no synergy between gear.

3) It doesn't work well with the exponential scaling between difficulty levels. /u/acidicswords explains this in more detail here

Obviously, not everything needs to be multiplicative, but breaking out a few more of the things in category A would go a long way.