Root mechanic discussion - not about Zemo
Drago_von_Drago
Member Posts: 934 ★★★★
I didn’t want to clutter the Zemo thread with this but I want to have a discussion about the root mechanic in general and the way the dev response says the design team thought it was working. They said:
“Back in January as Zemo was heading out the door, someone made an offhand comment about how the defender’s heavy bias while rooted seemed really reliable in keeping the opponent from throwing specials, to the point where they couldn’t remember it ever not working. No AI bias should ever be 100%, and that was not the intent with which we had been building characters. Our engineers informed us that root fully special locked the defender, preventing all three special attacks, and always had.
This was a problem because there is a big difference between designing a character that reduces specials and grants openings, and designing a character that prevents them. “
I’m assuming that means they thought the heavy bias was working like taunt/infuriate or the SP1/2 bias nodes. Some of those descriptions just say “more likely” and some give a percentage for how much more likely the behavior shift is.
The message implies the design team thought this was the same for rooted defenders throwing heavies but they didn’t know what that percentage the bias was. That seems like a problem in itself but that’s not the discussion I’m looking for here.
They say the design team assumed this bias was somewhere less than 100%. They didn’t know it was resulting in a full special lock.
My question is how would root even be useful if it matched their understanding? If the rooted defender could throw a special at any time, even if it’s a 99% bias not to, who would risk attacking when they have 1+ bar of power and maybe catching a special to the face?
The old root with the 100% special lock was already a worse version of stun. The defender was only halfway incapacitated and if you time things wrong you could still get clipped by a heavy or blocked.
With the way the design team thought it was built, you’d also be gambling every time you attacked a rooted defender over 1 bar of power. With the shift in BG scoring placing a higher focus on health remaining, who would use a mechanic that risks getting hit even if you execute everything else perfectly?
The only way root makes sense is if it also special locks. I’m guessing that’s why the engineers built it that way. I’m also guessing that’s why they landed on the solution they did. I don’t even mind the change to only being an Sp1/2 lock aside from the ramifications laid out in the other thread about how it was done.
Am I missing something here? Who would want to use root if it wasn’t a 100% special lock? We have plenty of situations where RNG impacts damage dealt or damage received when you mess up. Who would want a mechanic with RNG dictating whether you can even attack safely with no big upside?
“Back in January as Zemo was heading out the door, someone made an offhand comment about how the defender’s heavy bias while rooted seemed really reliable in keeping the opponent from throwing specials, to the point where they couldn’t remember it ever not working. No AI bias should ever be 100%, and that was not the intent with which we had been building characters. Our engineers informed us that root fully special locked the defender, preventing all three special attacks, and always had.
This was a problem because there is a big difference between designing a character that reduces specials and grants openings, and designing a character that prevents them. “
I’m assuming that means they thought the heavy bias was working like taunt/infuriate or the SP1/2 bias nodes. Some of those descriptions just say “more likely” and some give a percentage for how much more likely the behavior shift is.
The message implies the design team thought this was the same for rooted defenders throwing heavies but they didn’t know what that percentage the bias was. That seems like a problem in itself but that’s not the discussion I’m looking for here.
They say the design team assumed this bias was somewhere less than 100%. They didn’t know it was resulting in a full special lock.
My question is how would root even be useful if it matched their understanding? If the rooted defender could throw a special at any time, even if it’s a 99% bias not to, who would risk attacking when they have 1+ bar of power and maybe catching a special to the face?
The old root with the 100% special lock was already a worse version of stun. The defender was only halfway incapacitated and if you time things wrong you could still get clipped by a heavy or blocked.
With the way the design team thought it was built, you’d also be gambling every time you attacked a rooted defender over 1 bar of power. With the shift in BG scoring placing a higher focus on health remaining, who would use a mechanic that risks getting hit even if you execute everything else perfectly?
The only way root makes sense is if it also special locks. I’m guessing that’s why the engineers built it that way. I’m also guessing that’s why they landed on the solution they did. I don’t even mind the change to only being an Sp1/2 lock aside from the ramifications laid out in the other thread about how it was done.
Am I missing something here? Who would want to use root if it wasn’t a 100% special lock? We have plenty of situations where RNG impacts damage dealt or damage received when you mess up. Who would want a mechanic with RNG dictating whether you can even attack safely with no big upside?
3
Comments
The issue is the assumptions that players had to make. If this was described early on, this bug could have been prevented. I also think it’s fair to not completely prevent opponent specials or special 3 at least via root, adds more cautious and less safety net. Some people will bring up iDoom’s ability to special lock and that is different than root.
I never used root this way and like I said, assumed it was a built in agro that caused the heavies. My main issue with this all is the lack of clarity until now on how root is supposed to work and the need for player assumption towards that mechanic. It’s things like that which allow players to assume this is part of the functions mechanic and therefore part of a champions kit.
My concern is more that the team that is designing champs assumed root worked in a much less player friendly way than it did and in a way that doesn’t seem practical or useful. It makes me wonder what else they are working on.