FHR Changes: A Good Intention, Bad implementation

PTR Feedback
1

There have been many topics discussing FHR and I have to acknowledge and thank Blizzard for at least trying to fix how FHR currently works on live D2R.

If people don’t already know, on live D2R, there is no weapon-swap-glitch (WSG), like on LoD that allowed you to escape hit recovery animation. This lack of WSG allows classes that cause hit recovery frequently (especially assassins), to be extremely dominant in PvP. Many of the top winners in community tournaments have been assassins in D2R. It feels extremely un-fun to be mindblasted and stacked with wake of fire traps and not being able to move or do anything. Obviously this is not ideal so in PTR 2.4, Blizzard/VV has tried to address this by implementing what they call diminishing returns on faster hit recovery.

The problem is, this isn’t diminshing returns, or at least what I would understand diminishing returns to be. In the current 2.4 PTR iteration of faster hit recovery, when an enemy is first put in to hit recovery, there is a fixed duration of time where the character is basically immune to any hit recovery. This does not diminish, it is fixed.

Rather than complain about it in text, I did the testing to show how it looks. Judge for yourself.

2.4 FHR Testing Assassin v Necro

Now this could arguably be an improvement to the current hit recovery mechanics of live, since you will no longer be bogged down by infinite mindblast spam (especially in team duels), but there is a more insidious side effect. It promotes defensive gameplay and no longer rewards aggressive gameplay. If a character does not get put in to hit recovery as often, characters that play aggressively, like teleporting barbarians, smiters, hammerdins, are much weaker since they can’t lock down their opponent as often. Ultimately this will create a meta in pvp that favors more defensive play and may lead to excessively long duels (especially at high level). In my opinion, it’s just not fun.

A good example of how the fun is removed is the nerf of the foh/smite combo.
Good paladins all know this trick: You smite your opponent to put swirls on them. Once they have swirls you cast fist of heavens to put them in to a guaranteed hit recovery animation, and then immediately teleport stomp on them, then cast hammers or smite again. It’s an exciting and mechanically difficult combo to pull off in the heat of a duel. But pulling it off feels so satisfying. In the PTR, this combo is extremely weak, since after the first hammer after the foh-tele, the enemy is put in to ‘unstunnable’ frames. It’s sad to see that it won’t be as rewarding:

PTR 2.4 Foh Smite Combo

In summary, this is a video game, and in my opinion, fun should be maximized. The intention of the FHR changes to reduce the amount of overbearing stuns is good, but these changes went too far.

My recommendation is actually make FHR diminishing, or better yet (fingers crossed), add back in the weapon swap glitch.

9 Likes
2

Very good post. I also want true diminush return. Make people wins FHR frame when they are repetitively stun, until they escape said stun. Either that, or make so the stun immunity proc later and less often (lets say for example, after 5 consecutive hit recovery anime)

2 Likes
3

Can absolutely confirm the poster is right!

1 Like
4

people can still kill within the first fhr stun

5

i think it would be good if the pro pvpers were as precise as possible with their ideas here. what would you suggest? something like

  1. if hit within a 2 second timewindow consecutively, your next fhr animation will be 20% shorter?

2)if hit within a 2 second timewindow consecutively, your next fhr animation will be a 2 frames shorter?

please adjust the numbers for better ones (im not a pro pvper, all i do is lvl 9-18 lld, and not on a professional level) or if you have better ideas post them, but with precise numbers and reasoning. i think that would help the devs alot.

6

One example I was thinking of is something like this:

Upon the beginning of the first hit recovery animation, start a 1 second (24 frame) timer. During this timer, remove 1 frame of recovery animation duration (0.041s) for every consecutive hit. Each consecutive hit will lower your stunned duration by 1 frame (0.041s). When that total 1s is over, the cycle repeats. This should give enough time for a properly Fhr geared person to teleport or run away.

Exact timings (1-1.5s?) and frames (1-2 frames?) may be adjusted.

Let’s say you have 0 FHR on a paladin, hit recovery frames are 9 (so a 9/24 s recovery = 0.375s stun). If you get stunned again, make that recovery frame lowered by 1 frame so your next stun is only 8 frames (0.333s). If you are stunned again the recovery is 7 frames (0.292s), by then the timer has elapsed over 1s and the paladin is back to a 9 frame recovery.

Now let’s say you had 86 Fhr on a paladin.
Hit recovery frames is 4 frames (0.167s). Then second hit is only 3 frames, 3rd hit is 2 frame etc. Once you get to 0 frames you are stun immune until that 1s timer refreshes. Some numbers on the very high Fhr may need to be adjusted so it’s not abusable, e.g. make the timer only 0.5s if your hit recovery frames are very low already like in this case.

Alternatively, instead of a timer, make it based on consecutive hits, let’s say, 5 like Harg mentioned above.

So for the 0 FHR paladin example: 9,8,7,6,5 then back to 9 frame recovery.

86 FHR paladin: 4,3,2,1,0, then back to 4.

I think there would still need to be some sort of timer so someone couldn’t ‘save’ their fast frames for a next duel.

This is truly diminishing in my opinion. I’m open to suggestions.

2 Likes
7

I had the exact same idea as Instigmata actually, as he explained (winning one fhr frame every time you get it, and its reset after a short period if you arent hit)

My other idea would be to keep the immunity proc (its not “real diminush return” then but w/e) and to make proc later or less often. For example, you need to be put 5 time in hit recovery consecutively (if its only 3 for example, it will reset fast) before its activated and you get your immunity. Once its over, you are to needing 5 hit recovery anime.

Are those ideas balanced with the number we are giving ? No idea, it would actually need to be tested. Are they better than the current monstruosity blizzard created ? Yes 1000%.

1 Like
8

Very well stated, agree with this

1 Like
9

well its a good start. the more we discuss possible pit falls, the more likely the devs will avoid them. i think for instance flat 1-2 frames less is better than %of frames removed, because %frames might encourage having less fhr on your build, since they benefit more from it. i dont really know the exact numbers for each class, so i dont know if 1 or 2 frames removed might be better. maybe some of you guys can reason there.

My other idea would be to keep the immunity proc (its not “real diminush return” then but w/e) and to make proc later or less often

ok

For example, you need to be put 5 time in hit recovery consecutively (if its only 3 for example, it will reset fast) before its activated and you get your immunity. Once its over, you are to needing 5 hit recovery anime.

dont really get that part. what do you mean with “if only hit 3, it will reset fast”.
you mean you need to get hit 5 times consecutively for the immunity to trigger? what is the timewindow in which that has to happen? something around 1-2 sec? if immunity is triggered, how long should it be active? and what do you mean with “needing 5 hit recovery anime”

1 Like
10

I mean if you arent put in hit recovery more than 3 time, your “timmer” before immunity reset.
And i forgot a word (or rather a part of the sentence LOL), the sentence was suposed to be “Once its over, you are back to the point where you need 5 hit recovery anime to trigger stun immunity again.”

Sorry, when i do too many thing at the same time i tend to do these kind of fails in english

1 Like
11

no problem, im not a native english speaker too. just needed clarification. its hard enough to get through all of this if you are not deep into pvp.

1 Like
12

Bumping this. Good discussion in this thread. I’m hopeful that blizz keeps trying to work on this and make diminishing returns actually diminish

1 Like
13

honestly i hope they just revert the change and take more time to fine tunes that mechanic in future patch. PvP isnt a priority right now with ladder coming, so there is no reason to hurry, especially when the current fhr change could very make half the current pvp community run away on another game.

1 Like
14

Spam meta incoming! Combos are FINISHED.

15

Yup it’s real sad if they keep things this way, that’s likely what will happen, zons, necs, and es sorcs will dominate

16

I think new auradin foh smiter hybrid will be nasty. Charge with aura and spam foh to chip at range, if you ever get close they smite you to death. There’s no range that it’s not good at. Without some sort of stun to deal with FoH, you can’t really counter the build with a close range character anyways. All you can do is try to stay off the screen and hit them with something long ranged.

17

ive been thinking about your suggestion. do you think that it could have consequences for pvm? like wave 5 baal getting too easy or so since it could trigger there? should the timer somehow be tied to the enemy/player attacking you? like in a team vs team fight, people ganging up on someone, etc?

18

these fhr changes are for player vs player interactions, not monsters… which is also why its sad when the pvm focused people flame us for giving feedback on a pvp mechanic

edit to quote the post they made:
Developer Comments: We want to fix some of the awkward lockouts that reject player input from casting skills. For PVP, we added a way to reduce hit recovery spam to prevent edge cases of characters being locked out for too long.

1 Like
19

Like Stadium mentioned, the current FHR changes are only applicable to players, so yeah it shouldn’t have any effect on monsters anyways

1 Like