Starting to get Protection right!
May 5, 2016 2:18AM
edited May 2016
I have, on these forums, said a couple different times that the devs SAY that protection is different from health, but they don't program the game that way.
2 cases in point:
First: Talia has an ability to sacrifice Health to heal the rest of her team. But as programmed, she sacrificed Protection, as if Protection was interchangeable with Health (which, obviously, it is not supposed to be if we are to believe the Devs).
Second: Certain effects, such as Healing Immunity, are only supposed to take effect (or be resisted) upon a successful hit. In the olden-golden days, the only way to avoid taking Health damage from a blow was to Dodge/Deflect using Evasion. Now there's Protection. An ablative armor, if you will. You can't heal it, so it's not part of you. But ever since Protection was implemented if you take damage to your Protection, you can still receive a Stun from Ventress or Daka, or Healing Immunity from Sidius & IG-88, etc.
As of 6:00pm Pacific time today, for the first time I saw Talia sacrifice Health to heal others even though she had a full Protection bar. It was in GW, and I'd added her to my squad, but with some remaining toons still injured from the previous battle.
First action by Talia I used Waters of Life to take the Heal and the Turn Meter bonus. Her health bar went down & her Protection Bar was untouched.
THIS IS EXCELLENT, DEVS! THANK YOU.
It's important to me that the game is honest: if Protection isn't Health, then a character who sacrifices Health shouldn't sacrifice Protection. This is clearly a good change - not least because Protection nerfs all healers (since there is now a good bit of damage that every Purple-gear toon takes that cannot be healed by any healer). When Talia can't heal the Health that she sacrifices to heal her squad (using her auto-heal on her basic attack) it actually strikes at the fundamental balancing choices of the character. Allowing her to heal this Health back while the opposing squad is hammering at her protection is a good choice.
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As for scenario 2: I've still been seeing toons inflict status effects when doing Protection-bar-Only damage.
I don't think this is quite as clear-cut as Talia's situation, since it clearly said she sacrifices "Health," but if Sidius can't inflict Healing Immunity on a dodged attack, this is obviously not some Force-effect that merely takes place at the same time as the light-saber attack. When you look at the wording for IG-88 ("mortal wound") it's also clear that this is intended to be an injury you cannot (easily) heal.
But damage to the protection bar is not injury!
I recognize the difficulty in getting things right when adding a feature to the game that wasn't part of the original design and balancing decisions. This post is mostly praise for taking a serious look at the Protection/Health distinction and, as a result, adjusting Talia's healing power.
But I do encourage the Devs to continue thinking about what status effects can be inflicted when the damage of an attack is dodged, and whether any of those status effects should be inflicted when the damage of the attack is completely avoided through Protection instead of Dodge. Perhaps some status effects can be inflicted through Protection-bar-Only damage. (Stun, maybe? The shock of the attack might still daze an opponent even if the injury was avoided?) However, I think that the default assumption should be that a status effect cannot be inflicted when damage is entirely avoided through protection IF that status effect cannot be inflicted when damage is entirely avoided through Evasion. In particular, Healing Immunity, of all the status effects, is the one that most strains credulity when it's inflicted without causing any Health damage.
So...
...good first step, Devs. Obviously you're looking at this issue and obviously you saw at least one part of this issue in the way that I think is correct. Thank you for doing the looking.
While it's your game, and you can certainly decide to allow status to be inflicted through protection, I encourage you to re-word ability descriptions if you determine that should be the case for a certain character/status effect.
One final time: thank you for your work on this issue.
2 cases in point:
First: Talia has an ability to sacrifice Health to heal the rest of her team. But as programmed, she sacrificed Protection, as if Protection was interchangeable with Health (which, obviously, it is not supposed to be if we are to believe the Devs).
Second: Certain effects, such as Healing Immunity, are only supposed to take effect (or be resisted) upon a successful hit. In the olden-golden days, the only way to avoid taking Health damage from a blow was to Dodge/Deflect using Evasion. Now there's Protection. An ablative armor, if you will. You can't heal it, so it's not part of you. But ever since Protection was implemented if you take damage to your Protection, you can still receive a Stun from Ventress or Daka, or Healing Immunity from Sidius & IG-88, etc.
As of 6:00pm Pacific time today, for the first time I saw Talia sacrifice Health to heal others even though she had a full Protection bar. It was in GW, and I'd added her to my squad, but with some remaining toons still injured from the previous battle.
First action by Talia I used Waters of Life to take the Heal and the Turn Meter bonus. Her health bar went down & her Protection Bar was untouched.
THIS IS EXCELLENT, DEVS! THANK YOU.
It's important to me that the game is honest: if Protection isn't Health, then a character who sacrifices Health shouldn't sacrifice Protection. This is clearly a good change - not least because Protection nerfs all healers (since there is now a good bit of damage that every Purple-gear toon takes that cannot be healed by any healer). When Talia can't heal the Health that she sacrifices to heal her squad (using her auto-heal on her basic attack) it actually strikes at the fundamental balancing choices of the character. Allowing her to heal this Health back while the opposing squad is hammering at her protection is a good choice.
===========
As for scenario 2: I've still been seeing toons inflict status effects when doing Protection-bar-Only damage.
I don't think this is quite as clear-cut as Talia's situation, since it clearly said she sacrifices "Health," but if Sidius can't inflict Healing Immunity on a dodged attack, this is obviously not some Force-effect that merely takes place at the same time as the light-saber attack. When you look at the wording for IG-88 ("mortal wound") it's also clear that this is intended to be an injury you cannot (easily) heal.
But damage to the protection bar is not injury!
I recognize the difficulty in getting things right when adding a feature to the game that wasn't part of the original design and balancing decisions. This post is mostly praise for taking a serious look at the Protection/Health distinction and, as a result, adjusting Talia's healing power.
But I do encourage the Devs to continue thinking about what status effects can be inflicted when the damage of an attack is dodged, and whether any of those status effects should be inflicted when the damage of the attack is completely avoided through Protection instead of Dodge. Perhaps some status effects can be inflicted through Protection-bar-Only damage. (Stun, maybe? The shock of the attack might still daze an opponent even if the injury was avoided?) However, I think that the default assumption should be that a status effect cannot be inflicted when damage is entirely avoided through protection IF that status effect cannot be inflicted when damage is entirely avoided through Evasion. In particular, Healing Immunity, of all the status effects, is the one that most strains credulity when it's inflicted without causing any Health damage.
So...
...good first step, Devs. Obviously you're looking at this issue and obviously you saw at least one part of this issue in the way that I think is correct. Thank you for doing the looking.
While it's your game, and you can certainly decide to allow status to be inflicted through protection, I encourage you to re-word ability descriptions if you determine that should be the case for a certain character/status effect.
One final time: thank you for your work on this issue.
Post edited by BentWookiee on
0
Replies
WOOT!
Also, Protection should probably not act like Tenacity Up.
I don't see any issue with protection in GW. I don't think I have failed to finish a GW since we'll before the update. I usually don't need more than my initial five toons either.
+1 for using the term "ablative" in your well thought out post.
Yes. This is what I think as well. However, if the status effect can't be inflicted when a target dodges, I think the starting assumption must be that the status effect can't be inflicted when a target avoids damage through Protection. Obviously, that implies that if a status effect can be inflicted when a target dodges, then the starting assumption must be that the status effect CAN be inflicted when a target avoids damage through Protection. I don't know of any cases like that off the top of my head, but that's where I'd start my analysis if that were true.
And, truly, the one that bugs me most is Healing Immunity. The "Protection" is something that cannot be healed...and so when IG-88 or Kylo Ren hits it and not only does damage, but so thoroughly mangles the protection that it cannot be healed...
...what's changed, since it couldn't be healed anyway? I don't get it.
This actually wouldn't affect Sid too much, since Sid tends to AoE on the first turn anyway. This would **absolutely** be the correct tactic if Sid couldn't inflict Healing Immunity without inflicting actual injury (damage to Health). The AoE would eat away at the Health bars so that his first basic attack would have a chance to get though the Protection & do Health damage & Healing Immunity.
BTW: Damage over Time is one effect that I think could be inflicted without doing health damage. If you get sprayed with acid, it will eat away at your protection (if you have any left) but after the protection, the acid would damage your skin/body/Health. Obviously "the Force" is not acid, but the comparison helps show one case where inflicting the status without doing Health damage makes a ton of sense.