The changes to archery and combat look underwhelming at first glance, though maybe something will make them seem better with some experimentation with different configurations.
The problem with trying to buff underused and underpowered options is to get them to a point where they achieve parity with existing viable options, not to supersede them or to be insufficiently buffed. Hopefully the developers will listen to feedback to get things to that point.
...
I do appreciate the fact that some of the changes mean that trapper HRs in PvP can no longer permadaze. While this probably isn't the primary goal of balancing here, the permadaze rotation has never been anything but toxic, and removing it provides room to generate additional data for more PvP-specific future balancing. Retaining it would likely mean that HRs in PvP will never go for anything but that specific build.
I would have thought that the permadaze problem was caused by Crushing Roots. They should have implemented an ICD from the start to lock down permadaze. Now they go and mess with one of the key encounters to the Trapper mechanic.
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Commanding Shot: Reworked the debuff this power applies, and reduced its duration. Reduced the damage debuff component to 10%, down from 15%. Changed the defense component from lowering their defenses by 15% to increasing the damage they take by 10%. This changes where in the formula the damage increase takes place, and this power can cause the target to take increased damage even if you have enough Armor Penetration to completely ignore their Damage Resistance.
Currently on live the DR debuff of Commanding works just like the DR debuff from plague fire (i just had this tested). This means that when a player has enough arp to ignore the DR of the target Commanding works as a 15% damage boost anyways. So based on this understanding of Commanding, what you implemented was an overall nerf to the damage boost by 5%. Now, for very low geared people who do not have enough armor pen to ignore all the DR a target has the change you made is better, but as soon as a toon has 60% RI (max needed for pve content at this time) your change to commanding shot is worse overall. HR s also get a lot of arp on their gear so they are the mostly likely to be hurt by this change in the low ilv range. In addition you reduced the duration.
So was your intention to nerf Commanding Shot? because that is what has happened here
I'm glad someone else caught this. Now, to be fair, not a lot of us used Commanding Shot but in very specific situations, but I agree with Scathias' comment that it's worrying to see you apparently misunderstood how this skill worked in the first place.
I'll be having a bit of fun on the Preview server to see how the other changes work out. I've heard Binding Arrow no longer applies roots, which is worrying, as it's a key encounter to a rotation people use when the going gets a bit tougher. For now, I'm just going to assume it's a bug.
Having Steel Breeze be charge-based kind of annoys me, though, as it makes more skills operate outside of the Trapper feats. Guess all that Recovery placed on every other piece of HR gear had to be good for something, aye?
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i saw the Marauder's Escape encounter and though what i great idea one thing though as to something to add for it since its mainly helping in getting away while in range stance why not make it root or slow the target. that will make it more viable in combat for range and melee builds and since the hybrid build wont really be using it it should matter. as to what kind of root or slow effect i don't know strong or weak grasping roots or how long should it slow or should it make the target(s) immobile i don't know but though i give my thoughts on that one encounter cant wait to see how the hr is changed since its the only class i play... if anyone else has a response as to what they think of this just tell me or something i don't know but i enjoy this game and have had fun ever since beta. so cant wait to see what happens.
This will be very interesting to try out. I've stubbornly kept my main as an archer build ever since I created her during mod 2. My bread-and butter powers today are Cordon of Arrows, Thorn Ward, and Rain of Arrows, and I typically slot Aspect of the Falcon and Aspect of the Pack. Needless to say, her dps is mediocre at best, even with an iLvl of 4.2k.
One of my biggest gripes is how non-trappers had their survivability eviscerated with mod 6: we lost our regen during combat, and with no (repeat: NO) crowd control it was something we absolutely relied upon.
How did I deal with this? By ramping Defense all the way up to Ludicrous Speed(tm). Thirty-thousand defense, courtesy of a chicken with R12 bondings (indeed, R12' everywhere) and Loyal Defender gear. Having my augment (out of necessity) slanted so heavily toward defense also, I would note, causes a huge loss to dps (economists might term it an "opportunity cost").
Today nearly all of my toons have the Drowned weapon set, and unless something similar comes along, they are weapons that I will never, ever, EVER give up. They're too important.
Insane levels of defense like this shouldn't be necessary, but they are in T2 dungeons. Trust me on this -- I've taken Thia to plenty where there was another (normally-specced) HR there, and the difference in survivability was like night and day. Unfortunately for me, the difference in dps is also like night and day, and not in a good way.
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My Foundry playthrough channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/Ruskaga/featured
- Btw, don't misunderstand me. I love HR class and all it contains, yet I can't bear to see that in order to compete with other players in dungeons, HR needs to be much more agile with buttons and general control over the gameplay screen while a stupid GWF with some stupid power boon from the Stronghold boons only needs to press at-will button.
You're already making yourself misunderstood by telling GWFs are stupid that only needs to press at-will button to be top DPS. Oh right, it's in your username. Wow. Why do I take your comment seriously?
I don't know if Amenar is going to read this but it's worth a shot...
After reading his dev blog about the incoming changes for the Hunter Ranger, it's pretty clear that the team is looking for a wider class diversity. Unfortunately, there aren't too many options due to the limited number of feats/paragons, so instead of adding new mechanics/classes, your goal is to bring back to life the less played "builds" (e.g archery and melee HR or in a future Sentinel and Instigator GWF). This is actually a good idea since it is faster because the content is already in the game and it only requires some adjusments, also improves the quality of the game considering that you could theoretically play every build according to your playstile and exactly what you want, not just the less underperforming class. This means a new process of rebuilding a character, testing, theorycrafting which is always fun.
One of the main problems in this game is that once a build is solid and is clearly perfoming better than others, it's way too easy to replicate it mostly with a simple inspect to the character. Diversity is fun and it is very necessary in Neverwinter because less people playing in the same way will bring a better view to the class balance since there will be less people/classes overperforming. Instead of every player excelling, there would be a wide array of players between those squeezing the potential of the character and the most casual kind of gamers.
Would consider viable to add an option that blocks the character's sheet while being inspected? Blocking every slot except, maybe, item level. This is not about elitism, it is mostly about trying to change the mindset of the players where everyone is trying to simply imitate the gear and encourage them to test and understand the mechanics of the game which would improve a lot our community.
Everyone following the same meta is boring and unhealthy.
i do agree with you but doing this would not do anything since the builds most people use for trapper is online and everyone can see all different kinds of builds online at mmominds and just copy those builds as they have already done
This will be very interesting to try out. I've stubbornly kept my main as an archer build ever since I created her during mod 2. My bread-and butter powers today are Cordon of Arrows, Thorn Ward, and Rain of Arrows, and I typically slot Aspect of the Falcon and Aspect of the Pack. Needless to say, her dps is mediocre at best, even with an iLvl of 4.2k.
One of my biggest gripes is how non-trappers had their survivability eviscerated with mod 6: we lost our regen during combat, and with no (repeat: NO) crowd control it was something we absolutely relied upon.
How did I deal with this? By ramping Defense all the way up to Ludicrous Speed(tm). Thirty-thousand defense, courtesy of a chicken with R12 bondings (indeed, R12' everywhere) and Loyal Defender gear. Having my augment (out of necessity) slanted so heavily toward defense also, I would note, causes a huge loss to dps (economists might term it an "opportunity cost").
Today nearly all of my toons have the Drowned weapon set, and unless something similar comes along, they are weapons that I will never, ever, EVER give up. They're too important.
Insane levels of defense like this shouldn't be necessary, but they are in T2 dungeons. Trust me on this -- I've taken Thia to plenty where there was another (normally-specced) HR there, and the difference in survivability was like night and day. Unfortunately for me, the difference in dps is also like night and day, and not in a good way.
i just dont agree with you, i am a solo build hr trapper and i dont worry about defense. i solo dungeons quests epic dungeons instances and many more stuff... i dont do pvp not my type of gameplay. ugess ill post my build here alter =D.
In this blog, we’ll go over the changes we made to the Hunter Ranger in the upcoming expansion.
Needless to say, please keep all discussion respectful rather than throwing around any insults. Class balance is a touchy topic, which is highly subjective, but with the data we have we try and make changes that may not be obvious, but work for the game as a whole; not just the class itself. Most players have their own thoughts on how to balance out a class among a sea of possible changes. It's also a two-sided coin in the end.
Feedback preface: 1) This feedback is for PvE Hunter Archery (tree) build. 2) Please don't conflate the needs of an Archer (tree) to that of a Trapper or Combat. Please don't just use data from ALL hunters, but also from players that are only using the Archery tree. 3) The essential requirements for an Archers: a) Distance - Maximize damage and keep away from mobs b) Mobility - Maintain distance, positioning and also setting up mobs. c) Fast Cast Skills - To keep our distance and mobility and due to how NW structure mobs. Mobs are grouped in 3-5 clumps. Some in twos but stronger (eg. Giants, Yeti). Archers can't afford to cast slowly especially on a single target while being overwhelmed by multiple assailants. Hence, I'm skeptical at how Aimed-shot can be the "go to" at-will instead of what conventional experience tells me, which is Rapid Shot.
On the other hand, the interrupt precludes Aim Shot from being tested for viability in the first place. Thus, it's not entirely out of the question. On Boss mobs though, Aim Shot is indispensable. But just not tested enough to be salable/suitable for regular gameplay situations.
Feedback: Marauder's Escape - Instead of AOE damage, I would suggest an AOE slow at the origin of the dash. This would buy Archers time (depending on the situation) for ME cooldown, extra charge on Cordon, Self heal cooldown, Stamina regen, or an extra pop of Split Shot. I'd suggest 0.5s slow per tier.
Hawk Shot - This encounter is weaker than the current Aim Shot (at-will). It has a cast time and a long cool down. Now with the buffed Aimed Shot, Hawk Shot would be excessively redundant for that purpose. The only use for this was to prime a target for Prey. There's a much superior multi-purpose alternative for that: Rain of Arrows. Even Cordon can be used for that, although i'd prefer to save the charge.
To earn a spot on a rotation, this skill has to be stronger than Aimed Shot and instant cast. Last I remember, it has a 12 second cooldown. Aimed shot has no cooldown, and has higher damage and soon with lowered cast time and uninterruptible. Why use this inferior skill and waste an encounter slot?
Rain of Arrows - This is best used for single-target, fire-and-forget, focus fire dps to supplement Rapid Shot. It also doubles as 3-mob clump AOE finisher/primer for Cordon. What I'm worried is that the increase in radius will dilute the single target focus fire. Archers are already deficient on single target dps and hopefully this doesn't become just another AOE dps.
Dodge - The +30% dodge is close to what I was hoping for: a balanced increase of 30-40%.
Suggestions: Rapid Shot - This is currently the go to At-will for an Archer. It's fast cast and can be used in between dodges and easily cancelled. But the base damage should be increased by at least 20-30%. Archers lack a single target DPS skill that is in conjunction with these necessities: distancing, mobility and fast cast.
Hasty Retreat Feat - I never ever put a point in this ever. Why would an Archer allow itself to be hit by a mob in a first place? A mob dogging an Archer would continually dog a Archer until it is dead. Just go to the WOD. The demons hitting you will keep following you and having an extra speed would be moot and futile. Instead, I use Marauder's Escape and Dodge. Instead of having 25% extra speed after being hit, it should be a permanent 10% speed buff while in combat. Mobs quickly close the gap on Archer even after a Marauder's Escape, hence a 25% extra speed after being hit is pointless.
Hindering Shot - This is only slotted for Archers up until Thorn Ward opens up. As i've mentioned before, NW mobs are structured in clumps of 3-5. From my memory of this, it has a slow component but single target. What Archers lack is an AOE slow, so either give this an AOE slow or another skill much like the Electric-Shot effect that will slow mobs around the target.
What's the difference between AOE Slow and rooting? Slow makes the mob converge on your point making it easier to herd them or set them up for Split Shot, Cordon or Rain of Arrows, maximizing rate of attack before firing off Marauder's Escape.
This are some suggestions to improve the Archer Tree. I really don't see an average player (much less a newbie) being attracted to being an Archer without improvements to the 3 core areas I renumerated: Distancing, Mobility and Fast Cast.
Thx for reading. And thx for trying to improve Archery tree.
this build is mainly for soloing but is also used for dungeons/groups (note it doesn't completely focus on dps about 60%-75% of the build is dps and remainder is used for helping the character stay alive)
my class build is close to one of the mmominds trapper builds but its a spin off of it and made my own build after testing it over and over i don't know what these updates will do to my build but hopefully it wont change to much for me as i am happy where i am at. to put it into words my build is the HR Trapper Stormwarden control/deflect build... i use cc as a way to tank and stay alive with the crushing roots daze and i use deflect to help support survivability, though i never really used deflect before so getting my deflect higher was fairly easy. i use my dps to both deal and do small heals i use combat medic to stay alive in my fights most of the time since i don't focus on life steal now that regen is not that helpful.
the stats i focus mainly on are the normal stats power/armor pen/crit strike/crit severity... but i also focus on some secondary stats like deflect/control bonus/incoming healing bonus/life steal/life steal severity... which are all used for my tanking ability. now i do have no threat generation and i took off all my reducing threat generation affects as well and in the dungeon runs i have done i have no pulled any mobs so far as long as the tank help agro like a tank is suppose to do and the build does work well in soloing dungeons and anything i try to solo; even though my stats are only gonna get better since my item lvl is below 3k since i keep decreasing my item lvl to improve either damage or survivability.
if anyone has a comment on my build or a question i would love to here any and all of your opinions as we all think and do stuff differently and we all enjoy a good game every now and again. its nice to hear other peoples opinions and see what they thinks.
this may have been the wrong place to put this but i thought since this thread is talking about HR's i would like any opinions as to what may happen to my hr in the future with these updates.
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brockweaver1Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 18Arc User
edited July 2016
As an HR player since Mod 4, these anticipated changes are encouraging. The situation appears well understood as I too started an HR anticipating to play a ranged pew pew class. I, like many others, tried everything and soon realized that to play this style I was not able to fill a solid dps role in the manner that I wanted. So I switched to trapper (mod6ish) which I initially did not take to. So I switched to a whole different class completely, while merely keeping my HR current with the campaign boons. The introduction of a few things over the last couple of mods made me try out my HR once again and is back to my main class choice... as a trapper.
As many have stated, I too have some concerns with what was shared, however with 100 or more "tweaks" ahead, I am reserving judgement.
I would hope that to make the archery tree viable, the following would be addressed:
1) base dmg (yes this was mentioned) 2) rate of fire (this too was mentioned, hopefully other skills are included) 3) aggro gain
# 3 was my greatest concern with playing an archery HR. Solo, I would grab aggro from even my geared out defensive pet when it was equipped with defender gear, owl, aggro dog, feat selection, etc. In groups, I would pull aggro from GF marked targets, other defensive pets, etc. In dungeons the mobs would make a beeline right for me. This led me to spend more time dodging around in melle range for my life rather than picking off mobs from afar, focusing on dps rotations and range buffs. If this is no longer a concern due to current stat distributions and builds, then great. With the other changes I'll probably give the other trees another look.
Best wishes to all the HRs and happy testing.
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ghoulz66Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 3,748Arc User
edited July 2016
Seriously what is the obsession to continually ignore clear the ground/electric arrow? Buffing clear the ground is a step in the right direction for making combat actually decent again. And electric arrow is currently useless for both combat and archery.
Even with a P vorpal and the un-nerfed lostmauth set along with longshot electric arrow crits still did just about diddly squat.
One of my biggest gripes is how non-trappers had their survivability eviscerated with mod 6: we lost our regen during combat, and with no (repeat: NO) crowd control it was something we absolutely relied upon.
I'm just looking back in at Neverwinter after dipping in and falling out way back during beta and this point was one of the things i noticed when i started my hunter ranger. The Archer build when soloing is made of glass but has no real means to stop an enemy dealing damage and dosen;t burn targets down anywhere near fast enough to avoid damage. And it's mainly because the base root duration of the weak/strong grasping roots class feature is so utterly terrible that your early option for applying it (hindering shot) actually takes longer for the animation to finish than the root lasts. It's still worth using the skill for the DPS boost but as a means to help avoid damage it's less than worthless.
As much as i'm hoping this talk of improved damage numbers and the marauder's escape skill damage effect will solve it i really hope they give some thought to this stuff. Really given they can have seperate root durations for PVE and PVP i have no idea why the roots are so short, their existence and use is a basic necessity the way the ranger is currently setup for effective solo archery play.
Paingiver is not an acurratte or Useful measure of your actual sustained damage output, (i.e DPS), in various ways it lies. For a true idea use ACT. Link below:
In this blog, we’ll go over the changes we made to the Hunter Ranger in the upcoming expansion.
Needless to say, please keep all discussion respectful rather than throwing around any insults. Class balance is a touchy topic, which is highly subjective, but with the data we have we try and make changes that may not be obvious, but work for the game as a whole; not just the class itself. Most players have their own thoughts on how to balance out a class among a sea of possible changes. It's also a two-sided coin in the end.
Feedback preface: 1) This feedback is for PvE Hunter Archery (tree) build. 2) Please don't conflate the needs of an Archer (tree) to that of a Trapper or Combat. Please don't just use data from ALL hunters, but also from players that are only using the Archery tree. 3) The essential requirements for an Archers: a) Distance - Maximize damage and keep away from mobs b) Mobility - Maintain distance, positioning and also setting up mobs. c) Fast Cast Skills - To keep our distance and mobility and due to how NW structure mobs. Mobs are grouped in 3-5 clumps. Some in twos but stronger (eg. Giants, Yeti). Archers can't afford to cast slowly especially on a single target while being overwhelmed by multiple assailants. Hence, I'm skeptical at how Aimed-shot can be the "go to" at-will instead of what conventional experience tells me, which is Rapid Shot.
On the other hand, the interrupt precludes Aim Shot from being tested for viability in the first place. Thus, it's not entirely out of the question. On Boss mobs though, Aim Shot is indispensable. But just not tested enough to be salable/suitable for regular gameplay situations.
Feedback: Marauder's Escape - Instead of AOE damage, I would suggest an AOE slow at the origin of the dash. This would buy Archers time (depending on the situation) for ME cooldown, extra charge on Cordon, Self heal cooldown, Stamina regen, or an extra pop of Split Shot. I'd suggest 0.5s slow per tier.
Hawk Shot - This encounter is weaker than the current Aim Shot (at-will). It has a cast time and a long cool down. Now with the buffed Aimed Shot, Hawk Shot would be excessively redundant for that purpose. The only use for this was to prime a target for Prey. There's a much superior multi-purpose alternative for that: Rain of Arrows. Even Cordon can be used for that, although i'd prefer to save the charge.
To earn a spot on a rotation, this skill has to be stronger than Aimed Shot and instant cast. Last I remember, it has a 12 second cooldown. Aimed shot has no cooldown, and has higher damage and soon with lowered cast time and uninterruptible. Why use this inferior skill and waste an encounter slot?
Rain of Arrows - This is best used for single-target, fire-and-forget, focus fire dps to supplement Rapid Shot. It also doubles as 3-mob clump AOE finisher/primer for Cordon. What I'm worried is that the increase in radius will dilute the single target focus fire. Archers are already deficient on single target dps and hopefully this doesn't become just another AOE dps.
Dodge - The +30% dodge is close to what I was hoping for: a balanced increase of 30-40%.
Suggestions: Rapid Shot - This is currently the go to At-will for an Archer. It's fast cast and can be used in between dodges and easily cancelled. But the base damage should be increased by at least 20-30%. Archers lack a single target DPS skill that is in conjunction with these necessities: distancing, mobility and fast cast.
Hasty Retreat Feat - I never ever put a point in this ever. Why would an Archer allow itself to be hit by a mob in a first place? A mob dogging an Archer would continually dog a Archer until it is dead. Just go to the WOD. The demons hitting you will keep following you and having an extra speed would be moot and futile. Instead, I use Marauder's Escape and Dodge. Instead of having 25% extra speed after being hit, it should be a permanent 10% speed buff while in combat. Mobs quickly close the gap on Archer even after a Marauder's Escape, hence a 25% extra speed after being hit is pointless.
Hindering Shot - This is only slotted for Archers up until Thorn Ward opens up. As i've mentioned before, NW mobs are structured in clumps of 3-5. From my memory of this, it has a slow component but single target. What Archers lack is an AOE slow, so either give this an AOE slow or another skill much like the Electric-Shot effect that will slow mobs around the target.
What's the difference between AOE Slow and rooting? Slow makes the mob converge on your point making it easier to herd them or set them up for Split Shot, Cordon or Rain of Arrows, maximizing rate of attack before firing off Marauder's Escape.
This are some suggestions to improve the Archer Tree. I really don't see an average player (much less a newbie) being attracted to being an Archer without improvements to the 3 core areas I renumerated: Distancing, Mobility and Fast Cast.
Thx for reading. And thx for trying to improve Archery tree.
I agree on Hawk shot..they are abit under-powered..compare to aimed shot, they got cooldown and less dmg which render them useless as an encounter..the dmg should probably doubled of aimshot dmg to proof its worth..
although i have disagree that only rapid shot at-will base dmg is increase..if to increase, they should increase all at-will as a whole. Rapid shot already got the agility advantage over at-will like aimshot. Aimshot should be rewarded with a higher dps than rapid for its penalized movement. Its like if u want extra dmg, u need to sacrifice with ur mobility and agility.. else it will make aimshot useless like the hawkshot scenario.
I play hunter/archer style and not a single skill I use was mentioned. I guess that's good, because hopefully it means they didn't screw it up.
The fact according to their analysis only one build was viable proves what I've been saying for ages. The class should just be split into two classes, a hunter class and a ranger class. But no, they will continue to cripple it and try to patch the gimp.
As other people have said, the improvement to HR dodge will be useful, so long as it doesn't affect the immunity period at the end of the action. If that is reduced or removed, the new situation may actually be worse than what we have now; a dodge which is still quite short without the ability to time it so we can survive being caught in large red zones.
It would be very useful to have an official summary of the damage nerfs in this thread ASAP. The blog was very upbeat, and it specifically mentions that there's a belief that HRs are behind other DPS classes; optimised trappers by a little, other trappers as well as combat and archery builds even more so. But other information on the forums suggests that some key powers will have their damage reduced, and it would be good to have a detailed discussion of why that is before this goes live.
That statement about the class being generally behind sits very oddly with making nerfs. If the only issue was balancing within the class, then it might make sense to boost some powers used mainly by combat and archery builds and nerf some of the core trapper powers, assuming you don't want to start changing feats.
But if the class as a whole is behind other classes (which is what the blog stated) then wouldn't it make more sense to boost some powers and leave the rest alone? There seems to be a disconnect between the stated premise and the remedial actions.
The changes we're seeing now also seem to put the stormwarden even further in front of pathfinder. The main advantage pathfinder had was additional single target damage from CA, the use of which is heavily discouraged by the community due to the widespread belief that it causes lag if used in larger groups.
But the damage from CA is being reduced, which seems odd, when nothing else is being done to improve that path. You would be doing pathfinders a considerable service if you did not erode its main advantage by reducing CA damage. Please also investigate the lag issue so every time lag occurs in large groups the pathfinders present don't get hostile tells accusing them of causing it and can play at full effectiveness by using all their powers.
This would be also be a very good time to fix buggy powers like Aspect of the Pack rank 4 and the others mentioned in this thread, as well as revisit useless class features like Battlehoned. A quick read of the HR forums will show you what is buggy and/or useless, and some of it has been like that for quite a long time.
Anyway, I hope we can have more information about the changes and time for a proper discussion before these changes are pushed to the live servers. As things are, I think a lot more could be done to achieve your stated goals.
Very thoughtful post from strumslinger on Class Balance: Hunter Ranger. It made me hate you less. I have an archer build as my alt (which is unplayable the way I want to play him) and you nailed the problem. The fix is complicated and will likely not be right the first time, but at least you get the problem. Kudos.
Commanding Shot: Reworked the debuff this power applies, and reduced its duration. Reduced the damage debuff component to 10%, down from 15%. Changed the defense component from lowering their defenses by 15% to increasing the damage they take by 10%. This changes where in the formula the damage increase takes place, and this power can cause the target to take increased damage even if you have enough Armor Penetration to completely ignore their Damage Resistance.
Currently on live the DR debuff of Commanding works just like the DR debuff from plague fire (i just had this tested). This means that when a player has enough arp to ignore the DR of the target Commanding works as a 15% damage boost anyways. So based on this understanding of Commanding, what you implemented was an overall nerf to the damage boost by 5%. Now, for very low geared people who do not have enough armor pen to ignore all the DR a target has the change you made is better, but as soon as a toon has 60% RI (max needed for pve content at this time) your change to commanding shot is worse overall. HR s also get a lot of arp on their gear so they are the mostly likely to be hurt by this change in the low ilv range. In addition you reduced the duration.
So was your intention to nerf Commanding Shot? because that is what has happened here
I'm glad someone else caught this. Now, to be fair, not a lot of us used Commanding Shot but in very specific situations, but I agree with Scathias' comment that it's worrying to see you apparently misunderstood how this skill worked in the first place.
I use commanding shot on runs that only need a large debuff for a short time on live, chose this over thorn ward for fast burns, but with these rework yeah, im gonna have to say bye bye to it. i dont need a faster cooldown from it, can do normal rotation even with its long cooldown in live.
I don't know if Amenar is going to read this but it's worth a shot...
After reading his dev blog about the incoming changes for the Hunter Ranger, it's pretty clear that the team is looking for a wider class diversity. Unfortunately, there aren't too many options due to the limited number of feats/paragons, so instead of adding new mechanics/classes, your goal is to bring back to life the less played "builds" (e.g archery and melee HR or in a future Sentinel and Instigator GWF). This is actually a good idea since it is faster because the content is already in the game and it only requires some adjusments, also improves the quality of the game considering that you could theoretically play every build according to your playstile and exactly what you want, not just the less underperforming class. This means a new process of rebuilding a character, testing, theorycrafting which is always fun.
One of the main problems in this game is that once a build is solid and is clearly perfoming better than others, it's way too easy to replicate it mostly with a simple inspect to the character. Diversity is fun and it is very necessary in Neverwinter because less people playing in the same way will bring a better view to the class balance since there will be less people/classes overperforming. Instead of every player excelling, there would be a wide array of players between those squeezing the potential of the character and the most casual kind of gamers.
Would consider viable to add an option that blocks the character's sheet while being inspected? Blocking every slot except, maybe, item level. This is not about elitism, it is mostly about trying to change the mindset of the players where everyone is trying to simply imitate the gear and encourage them to test and understand the mechanics of the game which would improve a lot our community.
Everyone following the same meta is boring and unhealthy.
@lazaroth666 whilst I understand what you are trying to do and agree with the sentiment, it wouldn't work. Most of the time, if someone has done testing and has developed a build that performs better than others in PVE, they are willing to share it. Why? Because there is not really any reason to compete with each other in PVE. So they run a dungeon with other people, then those people ask them what they doing, then they tell that person, then that person can copy their build regardless. The only way to prevent meta builds from becoming meta as quickly using your method, is to introduce a competitive element to the pve in the game, some sort of pve ladder. At that point, pve players would be incentivized to withhold information that potentially gives them a competitive edge. At the moment, as it currently stands, even if they hid everything from everyone else, I would still test stuff and I would still publish my results for everyone else to look at. Then all they would have to do is ask me in game and I could link it, or do a bit of research on the forums. The same is true for you, I have a feeling, if someone asked you for help or an opinion, you would provide it. Hiding a character sheet alone is never going to fix this, there would have to be multiple things done, to actually incentivize players to not share information.
The meta problem exists in a lot of games. It's the culture. I don't think creating a PvE leaderboard would solve anything but it would definitely cause a lot of epeen behavior. Leave that to PvP please.
Looks like Amentar is getting his hands wet on the black arts of "How to class balance a fantasy MMO after some years of power creep". You ARE a brave one!
I love the hunter ranger class of NWO. My main character is a HR stormwarden trapper. I don't do any number punching on the classes, so I can't say anything about the adjustments in detail, but I am pretty sure that improvements on the dodge will be appreciated by everybody.
On the other hand I think, one important property of any given class is, it has to have a weakness, and quite some fun comes from learning how to handle this weakness.
As for the statistic on prefered HR encounter powers. Beware, besides damage and survivabilty, a very important property of choosing those 3+2 powers and 2 buffs is: it feels right for the class. It gives a good flow. Unfortunately, statistics can't reveal this.
Well I kinda like playing underpowered classes in general..they make u play better
So i play HR i have two of them lol both paragon paths SW and PF i never went on Trapper build and never had any points spent in that skill tree. HR as a class is all about stance dance ..range to weaken opponents and melee to finish em up, and that works fine on during questing. Major HR issue is bad skill pairing. Some good range encounters have bad melee counterparts and vice versa. No amount of balancing will change that. What HR as a class really needs is total rework/redone/redesign of at will/encounter skill trees and their respectiv progression on level up.
For example Rapid Shot have no higher tier upgrade.. Here would be nice to add electricity lol..Electric Arrow shoulda be Rapid Shot upgrade for SW build like adding 25% Electric damage initially and +5% on each skill level. and a bit of knockback effect added to boot, that would be very nice
Arrows are very devastating projetiles in real life and modern bows..have more kinetic energy that many powerful hunting rifles and their calibers of ammo. They have high initial mass and thus have strong knockback effect on targets and there is actual archery crowd control lie and NOT in ridicilous Grasping Roots mechanics that mostly DONT work in game.
I would also like to see useful skill pairings instead of having 4 or 5 encounters at best to actually have 3 range/3 melee skills slotted that are actually useful
Also melee ranger weapons are ridicilously underpowered. Dual Wield Scimitars in this game have similar or lower base damage od a SINGLE Trickster dagger. Nonsensical in any meaning of the word.
and to conclude. my expirience with Cryptic is mostly from years playing STO. and my expirience tells me that whenever they do some rebalancing we end up worse than we been before their "enchancments" and it will be the same here.
p.s. HR PvP issues are completly diffrent manner of horrible again because of bad conceptualisation of bot PvP and HR as a class..but its different issue only partially relatetd to here
As for the statistic on prefered HR encounter powers. Beware, besides damage and survivabilty, a very important property of choosing those 3+2 powers and 2 buffs is: it feels right for the class. It gives a good flow. Unfortunately, statistics can't reveal this.
I kept saying this lol ..numbers doesnt really matter if u have fun playing..that whats important. and numbers and stats and parsings have absolutly no incling on do people enjony playing their chars or do not right?
Arrows are very devastating projetiles in real life and modern bows..have more kinetic energy that many powerful hunting rifles and their calibers of ammo.
Kinetic Energy of a modern 540 grains Hunting arrow at 220 fps: ~79J Kinetic Energy of a .30-06 Springfield: ~4KJ
Now granted, you might have thought of carried momentum, but even there you're off:
And even IF the arrow had a higher momentum, it still has a vastly higher sectional density:
Hunting Arrow: ~.653 psi .30-06: ~.285 psi
So, the arrow is vastly better at penetrating the soft tissue, which means it retains a higher amout of its kinetic energy and momentum, transfers less to the target and as such has less stopping power.
So, you are wrong on all possible accounts.
Edit: Typos corrected
Post edited by jaysun1977 on
0
feanor70118Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,170Arc User
i'm fine if you want to give "HR more DPS" but remove some of the Roots, That Perma-Root build are just annoying"
It's really incredible to me that 3 mods after Crushing Roots was introduced, some people are still complianing about permadaze. You're obviously pvping without pvp gear, so you should expect to be crushed by anyone and everyone. People wearing the burning or lionsmane sets and no other special pvp gear or exceptional control resist just hop around as if they aren't being hit with roots at all. There is no permadaze problem. There hasn't been for a very long time. Get yourself some gear, please, before repeating this tired nerf request.
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The most important thing in life is to be yourself. Unless you can be Batman. Always be Batman.
I'll be having a bit of fun on the Preview server to see how the other changes work out. I've heard Binding Arrow no longer applies roots, which is worrying, as it's a key encounter to a rotation people use when the going gets a bit tougher. For now, I'm just going to assume it's a bug.
Having Steel Breeze be charge-based kind of annoys me, though, as it makes more skills operate outside of the Trapper feats. Guess all that Recovery placed on every other piece of HR gear had to be good for something, aye?
One of my biggest gripes is how non-trappers had their survivability eviscerated with mod 6: we lost our regen during combat, and with no (repeat: NO) crowd control it was something we absolutely relied upon.
How did I deal with this? By ramping Defense all the way up to Ludicrous Speed(tm). Thirty-thousand defense, courtesy of a chicken with R12 bondings (indeed, R12' everywhere) and Loyal Defender gear. Having my augment (out of necessity) slanted so heavily toward defense also, I would note, causes a huge loss to dps (economists might term it an "opportunity cost").
Today nearly all of my toons have the Drowned weapon set, and unless something similar comes along, they are weapons that I will never, ever, EVER give up. They're too important.
Insane levels of defense like this shouldn't be necessary, but they are in T2 dungeons. Trust me on this -- I've taken Thia to plenty where there was another (normally-specced) HR there, and the difference in survivability was like night and day. Unfortunately for me, the difference in dps is also like night and day, and not in a good way.
Blood Magic (RELEASED) - NW-DUU2P7HCO
Children of the Fey (RELEASED) - NW-DKSSAPFPF
Buried Under Blacklake (WIP) - NW-DEDV2PAEP
The Redcap Rebels (WIP) - NW-DO23AFHFH
My Foundry playthrough channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/Ruskaga/featured
1) This feedback is for PvE Hunter Archery (tree) build.
2) Please don't conflate the needs of an Archer (tree) to that of a Trapper or Combat. Please don't just use data from ALL hunters, but also from players that are only using the Archery tree.
3) The essential requirements for an Archers:
a) Distance - Maximize damage and keep away from mobs
b) Mobility - Maintain distance, positioning and also setting up mobs.
c) Fast Cast Skills - To keep our distance and mobility and due to how NW structure mobs. Mobs are grouped in 3-5 clumps. Some in twos but stronger (eg. Giants, Yeti). Archers can't afford to cast slowly especially on a single target while being overwhelmed by multiple assailants. Hence, I'm skeptical at how Aimed-shot can be the "go to" at-will instead of what conventional experience tells me, which is Rapid Shot.
On the other hand, the interrupt precludes Aim Shot from being tested for viability in the first place. Thus, it's not entirely out of the question. On Boss mobs though, Aim Shot is indispensable. But just not tested enough to be salable/suitable for regular gameplay situations.
Feedback:
Marauder's Escape - Instead of AOE damage, I would suggest an AOE slow at the origin of the dash. This would buy Archers time (depending on the situation) for ME cooldown, extra charge on Cordon, Self heal cooldown, Stamina regen, or an extra pop of Split Shot. I'd suggest 0.5s slow per tier.
Hawk Shot - This encounter is weaker than the current Aim Shot (at-will). It has a cast time and a long cool down. Now with the buffed Aimed Shot, Hawk Shot would be excessively redundant for that purpose. The only use for this was to prime a target for Prey. There's a much superior multi-purpose alternative for that: Rain of Arrows. Even Cordon can be used for that, although i'd prefer to save the charge.
To earn a spot on a rotation, this skill has to be stronger than Aimed Shot and instant cast. Last I remember, it has a 12 second cooldown. Aimed shot has no cooldown, and has higher damage and soon with lowered cast time and uninterruptible. Why use this inferior skill and waste an encounter slot?
Rain of Arrows - This is best used for single-target, fire-and-forget, focus fire dps to supplement Rapid Shot. It also doubles as 3-mob clump AOE finisher/primer for Cordon. What I'm worried is that the increase in radius will dilute the single target focus fire. Archers are already deficient on single target dps and hopefully this doesn't become just another AOE dps.
Dodge - The +30% dodge is close to what I was hoping for: a balanced increase of 30-40%.
Suggestions:
Rapid Shot - This is currently the go to At-will for an Archer. It's fast cast and can be used in between dodges and easily cancelled. But the base damage should be increased by at least 20-30%. Archers lack a single target DPS skill that is in conjunction with these necessities: distancing, mobility and fast cast.
Hasty Retreat Feat - I never ever put a point in this ever. Why would an Archer allow itself to be hit by a mob in a first place? A mob dogging an Archer would continually dog a Archer until it is dead. Just go to the WOD. The demons hitting you will keep following you and having an extra speed would be moot and futile. Instead, I use Marauder's Escape and Dodge. Instead of having 25% extra speed after being hit, it should be a permanent 10% speed buff while in combat. Mobs quickly close the gap on Archer even after a Marauder's Escape, hence a 25% extra speed after being hit is pointless.
Hindering Shot - This is only slotted for Archers up until Thorn Ward opens up. As i've mentioned before, NW mobs are structured in clumps of 3-5. From my memory of this, it has a slow component but single target. What Archers lack is an AOE slow, so either give this an AOE slow or another skill much like the Electric-Shot effect that will slow mobs around the target.
What's the difference between AOE Slow and rooting? Slow makes the mob converge on your point making it easier to herd them or set them up for Split Shot, Cordon or Rain of Arrows, maximizing rate of attack before firing off Marauder's Escape.
This are some suggestions to improve the Archer Tree. I really don't see an average player (much less a newbie) being attracted to being an Archer without improvements to the 3 core areas I renumerated: Distancing, Mobility and Fast Cast.
Thx for reading. And thx for trying to improve Archery tree.
my class build is close to one of the mmominds trapper builds but its a spin off of it and made my own build after testing it over and over i don't know what these updates will do to my build but hopefully it wont change to much for me as i am happy where i am at. to put it into words my build is the HR Trapper Stormwarden control/deflect build... i use cc as a way to tank and stay alive with the crushing roots daze and i use deflect to help support survivability, though i never really used deflect before so getting my deflect higher was fairly easy. i use my dps to both deal and do small heals i use combat medic to stay alive in my fights most of the time since i don't focus on life steal now that regen is not that helpful.
the stats i focus mainly on are the normal stats power/armor pen/crit strike/crit severity... but i also focus on some secondary stats like deflect/control bonus/incoming healing bonus/life steal/life steal severity... which are all used for my tanking ability. now i do have no threat generation and i took off all my reducing threat generation affects as well and in the dungeon runs i have done i have no pulled any mobs so far as long as the tank help agro like a tank is suppose to do and the build does work well in soloing dungeons and anything i try to solo; even though my stats are only gonna get better since my item lvl is below 3k since i keep decreasing my item lvl to improve either damage or survivability.
if anyone has a comment on my build or a question i would love to here any and all of your opinions as we all think and do stuff differently and we all enjoy a good game every now and again. its nice to hear other peoples opinions and see what they thinks.
this may have been the wrong place to put this but i thought since this thread is talking about HR's i would like any opinions as to what may happen to my hr in the future with these updates.
As many have stated, I too have some concerns with what was shared, however with 100 or more "tweaks" ahead, I am reserving judgement.
I would hope that to make the archery tree viable, the following would be addressed:
1) base dmg (yes this was mentioned)
2) rate of fire (this too was mentioned, hopefully other skills are included)
3) aggro gain
# 3 was my greatest concern with playing an archery HR. Solo, I would grab aggro from even my geared out defensive pet when it was equipped with defender gear, owl, aggro dog, feat selection, etc. In groups, I would pull aggro from GF marked targets, other defensive pets, etc. In dungeons the mobs would make a beeline right for me. This led me to spend more time dodging around in melle range for my life rather than picking off mobs from afar, focusing on dps rotations and range buffs. If this is no longer a concern due to current stat distributions and builds, then great. With the other changes I'll probably give the other trees another look.
Best wishes to all the HRs and happy testing.
Even with a P vorpal and the un-nerfed lostmauth set along with longshot electric arrow crits still did just about diddly squat.
As much as i'm hoping this talk of improved damage numbers and the marauder's escape skill damage effect will solve it i really hope they give some thought to this stuff. Really given they can have seperate root durations for PVE and PVP i have no idea why the roots are so short, their existence and use is a basic necessity the way the ranger is currently setup for effective solo archery play.
https://github.com/nilsbrummond/Neverwinter-ACT-Plugin
although i have disagree that only rapid shot at-will base dmg is increase..if to increase, they should increase all at-will as a whole. Rapid shot already got the agility advantage over at-will like aimshot. Aimshot should be rewarded with a higher dps than rapid for its penalized movement. Its like if u want extra dmg, u need to sacrifice with ur mobility and agility.. else it will make aimshot useless like the hawkshot scenario.
The fact according to their analysis only one build was viable proves what I've been saying for ages. The class should just be split into two classes, a hunter class and a ranger class. But no, they will continue to cripple it and try to patch the gimp.
It would be very useful to have an official summary of the damage nerfs in this thread ASAP. The blog was very upbeat, and it specifically mentions that there's a belief that HRs are behind other DPS classes; optimised trappers by a little, other trappers as well as combat and archery builds even more so. But other information on the forums suggests that some key powers will have their damage reduced, and it would be good to have a detailed discussion of why that is before this goes live.
That statement about the class being generally behind sits very oddly with making nerfs. If the only issue was balancing within the class, then it might make sense to boost some powers used mainly by combat and archery builds and nerf some of the core trapper powers, assuming you don't want to start changing feats.
But if the class as a whole is behind other classes (which is what the blog stated) then wouldn't it make more sense to boost some powers and leave the rest alone? There seems to be a disconnect between the stated premise and the remedial actions.
The changes we're seeing now also seem to put the stormwarden even further in front of pathfinder. The main advantage pathfinder had was additional single target damage from CA, the use of which is heavily discouraged by the community due to the widespread belief that it causes lag if used in larger groups.
But the damage from CA is being reduced, which seems odd, when nothing else is being done to improve that path. You would be doing pathfinders a considerable service if you did not erode its main advantage by reducing CA damage. Please also investigate the lag issue so every time lag occurs in large groups the pathfinders present don't get hostile tells accusing them of causing it and can play at full effectiveness by using all their powers.
This would be also be a very good time to fix buggy powers like Aspect of the Pack rank 4 and the others mentioned in this thread, as well as revisit useless class features like Battlehoned. A quick read of the HR forums will show you what is buggy and/or useless, and some of it has been like that for quite a long time.
Anyway, I hope we can have more information about the changes and time for a proper discussion before these changes are pushed to the live servers. As things are, I think a lot more could be done to achieve your stated goals.
Thanks.
The is no "right" way of balancing. You can't make everyone happy.
That Perma-Root build are just annoying"
You ARE a brave one!
I love the hunter ranger class of NWO. My main character is a HR stormwarden trapper. I don't do any number punching on the classes, so I can't say anything about the adjustments in detail, but I am pretty sure that improvements on the dodge will be appreciated by everybody.
On the other hand I think, one important property of any given class is, it has to have a weakness, and quite some fun comes from learning how to handle this weakness.
As for the statistic on prefered HR encounter powers. Beware, besides damage and survivabilty, a very important property of choosing those 3+2 powers and 2 buffs is: it feels right for the class. It gives a good flow.
Unfortunately, statistics can't reveal this.
So i play HR i have two of them lol both paragon paths SW and PF i never went on Trapper build and never had any points spent in that skill tree. HR as a class is all about stance dance ..range to weaken opponents and melee to finish em up, and that works fine on during questing. Major HR issue is bad skill pairing. Some good range encounters have bad melee counterparts and vice versa. No amount of balancing will change that. What HR as a class really needs is total rework/redone/redesign of at will/encounter skill trees and their respectiv progression on level up.
For example Rapid Shot have no higher tier upgrade.. Here would be nice to add electricity lol..Electric Arrow shoulda be Rapid Shot upgrade for SW build like adding 25% Electric damage initially and +5% on each skill level. and a bit of knockback effect added to boot, that would be very nice
Arrows are very devastating projetiles in real life and modern bows..have more kinetic energy that many powerful hunting rifles and their calibers of ammo. They have high initial mass and thus have strong knockback effect on targets and there is actual archery crowd control lie and NOT in ridicilous Grasping Roots mechanics that mostly DONT work in game.
I would also like to see useful skill pairings instead of having 4 or 5 encounters at best to actually have 3 range/3 melee skills slotted that are actually useful
Also melee ranger weapons are ridicilously underpowered. Dual Wield Scimitars in this game have similar or lower base damage od a SINGLE Trickster dagger. Nonsensical in any meaning of the word.
and to conclude. my expirience with Cryptic is mostly from years playing STO. and my expirience tells me that whenever they do some rebalancing we end up worse than we been before their "enchancments" and it will be the same here.
p.s.
HR PvP issues are completly diffrent manner of horrible again because of bad conceptualisation of bot PvP and HR as a class..but its different issue only partially relatetd to here
Kinetic Energy of a .30-06 Springfield: ~4KJ
Now granted, you might have thought of carried momentum, but even there you're off:
Hunting Arrow: ~.52 slg-ft/s
.30-06: ~2.08 slg-ft/s
And even IF the arrow had a higher momentum, it still has a vastly higher sectional density:
Hunting Arrow: ~.653 psi
.30-06: ~.285 psi
So, the arrow is vastly better at penetrating the soft tissue, which means it retains a higher amout of its kinetic energy and momentum, transfers less to the target and as such has less stopping power.
So, you are wrong on all possible accounts.
Edit: Typos corrected