Official Feedback Thread: Great Weapon Fighter changes

amenar

While we worked on the class review for Guardian Fighters, several Great Weapon Fighter powers were affected, due to the Fighter classes sharing Paragon Paths.

Feedback Desired
We’d like you all to focus on playing the class in various content and giving us feedback. There are many changes that are meant to work together as a whole, so we'd appreciate feedback after playing with the changes, more than just reactions to the patch notes themselves.
If you find a bug or have feedback, please follow the guidelines below when posting:
• Respond to this forum post.
• Type: Bug/Feedback (Please only choose one)
• Format: Please use “Bold” face text for the Type & Spec then type your feedback in the body of your post. If you are listing a bug please have this text in RED, if you are posting an opinion or feedback please use BLUE.
• (Bonus: Concise Feedback & Screen Shots are much appreciated)

Examples:
Bug: Power: Avalanche of Steel
Doesn't seem to prone the targets, though it still says it should

Here is the list of changes:

• Avalanche of Steel: Rank 4 of this power will now properly increase the prone time by 0.25s, as stated in the Rank Up description.
  
• Enduring Warrior: In addition to its existing effects, now also increases the amount of healing you receive.
  
• Feat: Staying Power: This debuff should now last the same length as the base debuff provided by Weapon Master's Strike.
  
• Ferocious Reaction: Base cooldown reduced to 3 minutes, and rank ups now only reduce the cooldown by 30s. This means the cooldown at rank 4 has been decreased to 90s, down from 120s.
  
• Ferocious Reaction: Updated the tooltip to clarify that the damage resistance buff lasts 10s, not 5s as previously stated.
  
• Frontline Surge: Increased the delay between when you activate the power and when you can swing again by 0.2s. The amount of time between when you activate the power and when you can move is unchanged, and now matches the swing delay.
  
• Frontline Surge: Is now properly considered AoE damage.
  
• Frontline Surge: Recharge time reduced to 14s, down from 19s.
  
• Indomitable Strength: Increased the base damage of this power by ~20%. This means players with low-quality gear will see as much as a 4% damage increase, while players with high-quality gear will see a much smaller increase.
  
• Indomitable Strength: Increased the damage debuff to 20%, up from 10%.
  
• Indomitable Strength: Range increased to 15', up from 11'.
  
• Steel Blitz: No longer secretly gets an increased chance to proc based on the number of targets hit. Now has a base chance of 25% to proc. FX reworked slightly to account for these changes.
  
• Steel Blitz: Now deals 60% of weapon damage, instead of the "at least 50%" formula it was using before, and gains +5% Weapon Damage with every rank, instead of increasing the overall damage by 12%. Net result is slightly more damage unless you have a weapon that is lower level than you are.
  
• Steel Defense: Reduced immunity duration to 2s +0.5s per rank up (3.5s max), down from 3s +1s per rank up (6s max).
  
• Steel Grace: No longer shared with the Guardian Fighter. Renamed to Steel Resolve. Several bugs with this power have been fixed, which should make it work much more reliably.
  

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joannabraccini

Hi! I don't play much with gwf, but a friend told me that there are a few bugs:
-Slam does not crit damage;
-Battle Awareness does not give 25% power;
-Might Blade does not increase wms damage.

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scathias

Echoing the issue with the Mighty Blade Feat here. Mighty Leap says AoE damage is increased but currently it only increases the AoE damage of abilities that are classified as "burst" damage, like avalanche, not so fast, Mighty Leap and now possibly Front line surge. AoE is aoe and thus should effect weapon master strike, wicked strike slam, hidden daggers etc. Stuff that can hit more than 1 target is an AoE i would say.

rinat114

Quoting myself from the bug post I made nobody looks at because it's in the bug section (lawd.)

rinat114 said:

This screenshot is taken from the Elemental Evil module patch notes:



But then recently (I'd say a few weeks now), if you check the at-will on the live server it says -



Same goes for Wicked Strike (in the same patch notes) and I vageuly remember something about Sure Strike never having the target penalty, but now it does have one.

If you could please address this, my assumption is that it's only a tooltip error and it somehow reverted back to the old one, but it's important.

As for feedback:

Not sure why Steel Defense had to be on the list of nerfs for the GWF. It's not like GWF's tank these days, even the rare ones who go SM for pvp don't use it, so why make it even more unattractive? Not a big deal, but the nerf is unnecessary (unless you ever make Senti GWF's a thing again, even then it'd be a doubtful justification).

+1 for the Staying Power change, should make it easier for a lot of people who are sturggling with the short window of self-buffs.

joannabraccini said:

-Battle Awareness does not give 25% power;

Battle Awareness is fine and is working correctly.

scathias

defiantone99 said:

What about tooltips for our major at-wills saying they have damage penalties after the first target?

It would be incredibly helpful if there was a response about this issue. These damage penalties for hitting multiple targets were removed in mod 6, why are they being brought back again, and why are these changes not in the patch notes?

scathias

rinat114 said:

Not sure why Steel Defense had to be on the list of nerfs for the GWF. It's not like GWF's tank these days, even the rare ones who go SM for pvp don't use it, so why make it even more unattractive? Not a big deal, but the nerf is unnecessary (unless you ever make Senti GWF's a thing again, even then it'd be a doubtful justification).

Steel defense with GWF is fine as it is on live. One change that does need to happen with steel defense though is to make it so that its effect is canceled if the daily does not use 100% of the AP bar. Right now on live a GWF can start Spinning Strike, get Steel Defense, then sprint cancel out of Spinning, keeping 80-90% of their AP and still have the full Steel Defense buff.
Sprint canceling Spinning Strike needs to stay possible because otherwise Spinning can be suicide to use, but this cheesy method of using Spinning and Steel Defense is just plain wrong.

With my proposed change Steel defense can easily go back to 6 seconds of uptime with not ill effects in pve (since gwf have no effective way to tank anyways) and steel defense stops being a cheese problem in pvp with gwfs using it to stay immune a lot of the time

scathias

There are a number of Swordmaster/Iron Vanguard skills in the Guardian Fighter patch notes that have been changed with no mention if those changes are specific to GF or apply to to GWF as well since those changes do not appear in the GWF patch notes.

• Crescendo: Increased the damage of the first for hits by 25%. This has increased the overall damage of this power by ~10%.
  

• Numerous changes to Flourish
  

• Threatening Rush changes
  

• Weapon Master Strike on GF got a bunch of changes that I know for sure did not make it to GWF. Are these changes coming to GWF at all?
  

amenar

Hey guys -

Thanks for all the feedback. I can't address each individual issue, but we are looking into them.

Regarding GWF At-Wills: No intentional changes were made to any of them this module. I'll look into it.

Regarding questions about "GF equivalent power X got changes and GWF didn't" - this was most likely intentional. The Great Weapon Fighter and Guardian Fighter are two very different classes, and trying to balance them separately while leaving large chunks of powers that are identical between them has proven to not work out well for us. Powers that are very desirable by the GF are worthless to the GWF, and vice versa. As such, you'll see more and more changes where the GF and GWF versions of powers grow further apart. Internally, we broke all of the links that tied them together, and are now treating them as completely separate powers - albeit with the same names and very similar effects.

beckylunatic

People have been urging separation of the fighter paragons for a long time. It's a mental adjustment that you're actually doing it.

As you continue making these adjustments, I think you should look at more name changes, to emphasize that they are not the same and not being treated the same.

scathias

beckylunatic said:

People have been urging separation of the fighter paragons for a long time. It's a mental adjustment that you're actually doing it.

As you continue making these adjustments, I think you should look at more name changes, to emphasize that they are not the same and not being treated the same.

Very much what Becky said here. Thank you for separating the classes. More name changes like was done with Steel Grace would be excellent, though I guess a name change is probably saved for total reworks like steel grace and not for 50% rework like WMS.

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theguiido

defiantone99 said:

Well, GFs are starting to look at the class as a GWF but without the drawback of having to take damage. The fact that GFs can be immortal GWFs is confusing to all the GWFs that have suffered nerf after nerf to our survivability. I hope GWF can get some love survivability wise to balance things out now that tanks can be DPS.

GWF's with unstoppable are great what are you even talking about. Some love to Sentinal as much as some love to Protector is the same thing.

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vteasy

amenar said:

Hey guys -

Thanks for all the feedback. I can't address each individual issue, but we are looking into them.

Regarding GWF At-Wills: No intentional changes were made to any of them this module. I'll look into it.

Regarding questions about "GF equivalent power X got changes and GWF didn't" - this was most likely intentional. The Great Weapon Fighter and Guardian Fighter are two very different classes, and trying to balance them separately while leaving large chunks of powers that are identical between them has proven to not work out well for us. Powers that are very desirable by the GF are worthless to the GWF, and vice versa. As such, you'll see more and more changes where the GF and GWF versions of powers grow further apart. Internally, we broke all of the links that tied them together, and are now treating them as completely separate powers - albeit with the same names and very similar effects.

this is a great idea. the sharing has been a big complaint forever. Except when it broke one of the classes for the better of course

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cellablock

metalldjt said:

@macjae
> Destroyer remains *by far* the paragon path which is preferable to use, both in PvE and PvP. There is really no contest. Right now, it's a problem that Destroyers can build determination more effectively than the other paragon paths;.

Sure PvE determination is built really fast with the damage that the GWF outputs (GWF damage is also based on the outside buffs that are provided from other classes) , while in PvP the Determination is slowly gained , ex takes like 30s-60s to get half bar of determination while attacking a Devoted Cleric in PvP , but you are right, the other 2 paragons should have the same ability as the Destroyer capstone to gain gain determination faster.

> sentinels are tankier with unstoppable on, but having it on less frequently essentially nullifies that benefit, and leaves them simply being able to deal a lot less damage for no appreciable real benefit.

- by reading the sentinel paragon feats you can assume that it's tankier, but in PvE DR doesn't make any difference, there is a reason why Guardian Fighters (block 80% incoming damage with shift) and Paladins (binding oath + daily heroism or bubble) are taken as main TANKS, because Damage Resistance and the mechanics of the GWF cannot make GWFs a proper tank in PvE like those 2 classes that are designed so, even if they have a total of 200% DR, mobs and Orcus can still whitter GWFs down in 1 hit. In PvP having high DR does make a difference, it's not the only class that can stack DR, even a GF has over 70% DR (+self buffs) , a high end GWF Destroyer usually has it's base of 20% DR(Armor class + Defense) + 15% DR countless scar = 35% DR total , while if he is sprinting he has 30% more, and when he goes in unstoppable for 4s - 8s he gains between 15%-30%. The other DR that the GWF obtains comes from T.Negation which is external buff and not related to the class directly reason why you consider them performing in "tankiness" is that 3 strikers classes cannot deal enough burst damage and at the same time being balanced for PvE, because DoT damage should be decreased, and their burst damage alongisde some of their base damage should be increased, this goes for SW and HR, while for a CW its a bit better for them because they can burst with disintegrate in a fight few times, but it's not consistent and it's not followed by another good hit. If a BiS GWF is focused by a CW+ HR he will mostly be cleared in 10-15 seconds, but 1v1 the GWF has the potential burst to beat them, but the control that these 2 classes posses CW( repel + freeze) and HR( perma daze-root-disable) , will make the GWF loose his damage stacks most of the times, but if he has the chance the GWF can surerly win against them with a good combo with the damage stacks up, but for this to happen takes a 5-15 minute fight.

- while destroyer does have damage, the other 2 paragons are lacking in that factor, thats why i asked for the damage stacks to be changed, and have the GWF base damage increased by 50% either from every base encounter or weapon damage, and have the Destroyer paragon : Destroyer purpose & Focused Destroyer+destroyer class feature being REDUCED to compensate the increasement of base damage.

> GWF performance remains overall among the highest in both PvP and PvE (in the case of Destroyer GWFs being outperformed in damage terms, it's because of other classes abusing things that are broken, not because their intended class mechanics are remotely competitive).

- i dont deny that the performance of the GWF is indeed higher than the other 3 strikers (SW , HR and CW), but its exactly as it should be for the other striker classes thats why i advocate for those 3 classes to get their damage increased in PvP and at the same time NOT ruining the balance that in PvE for others. Other reason why they have to get their damage increased is because the only 2 classes that can oppose any sort of threat towards a DC is the Trickster Rogue and Guardian Fighter, so it would be better to have 3 other classes there.

- GWF resides into 2 roles and thats of a Striker + Defender , and i assume that the Damage resistance is part of that Defender Role, which if you remove their Damage resistance it will disable their 2nd role, while i do wish for Damage Resistance to be changed with something else to improve the GWF as TANKS in PvE and fulfill their roles as Defenders, the DR needs to be changed to someth else, but completly removing it without adding something else to make them Defenders it's absurd, maybe if you wish for the removal of the 2nd role we can get our prones back : takedown, punishin charge, grand fissure, and fulfil a Controller role, but be far more squishier than you see GWF the class now.


> So, have the Destroyer capstone feat reduce the amount of determination gained for *taking* damage. Reduce the amount of stacks the Countless Scars feat can achieve to one per rank, and give the Sentinel capstone +10% DR and double the hit point bonus from Constitution instead. This would accentuate the differences between the paragon paths. Even with those changes, Destroyers would still be more desirable than the other paths, but it would be a good start.

These are like the worst suggestions ever, it's like you thrown there few ideas that you came out AND said thats it, while reducing countless scar to 5% is indeed a good idea, but givin more DR to a capstone, the GWF cannot even tank in PvE with DR. I made a thread awhile back , advert your eyes.

(FEEDBACK : http://www.arcgames.com/en/forums/neverwinter#/discussion/1214519/feedback-great-weapon-fighter/p1 )


CONCLUSION: The GWF DAMAGE output damage is right where it should be in accordance with the PvP we have nowadays, same goes for his "tankiness" and same goes for Insignias for every class, these should not be changed, what needs to be IMPROVED is the damage of Scource Warlocks, Hunter Rangers and Control Wizards .

the idea is not necesarly to have a 1v1 where a class wins right away, i find it more balanced having 2 classes ex : GWF and TR fighting eachother and have the TR bringin the GWF down to 20% HP, the GWf heals back, and then have the TR being brought down to 20% and have him healing back, but not having a fight between a GWF and a HR, and the HR cannot take even 15% out of the GWF Hitpoints because the HR doesn't have the required burst damage.

I. Reworking the Damage Bonus Stacks & Number of stacks.

As we all seen so far the difference in DPS between Instigator <-> Destroyer and Sentinel <-> Destroyer , Destroyer is outperforming the other 2 paragons in DPS with the huge amount of damage bonus, the idea of the thread is BOT to nerf the destroyer, but rather to take some amount of damage bonus from destroyer paragon and share it with the other 2 paragons, and by doing that you will have to increase the weapon damage by 50% or increase the base damage of every encounter/atwill by 50% , and take away 50% damage bonus from the paragon Destroyer. It is needed for the other 2 paragons Instigator and Sentinel, for instigator to have a higher DPS and Sentinel to be able to keep the Threat as a TANK. So what does this mean if the weapon damage or base damage of every encounter/atwill is increased by 50%, i've taken some screen shots to be as explicit as possible.

NOTE*: my GWF has 30.000 power

In the image we can observe the difference in the tooltips by using Nightmare Greatsword and a Legendary Weapon damage, and we can also estimate the amount of the tooltip damage that would be if the weapon damage is increased by 50% or the suggestion of increasing the base damage of encounters/atwill . How it will look if we increase 1860-2273 weapon damage from the legendary weapon by 50% it will be 2790-3409

*NOTE: 3 stacks of Destroyer that gives us 46% damage bonus to show how it will look if the weapon damage is increased by 50% , ofc this is an estimation.

With this DONE, takin' away damage bonus and stacks from Destroyer is absolutely needed, let's take a look on the image bellow to show exactly where the rework is needed.

As you can see in the picture, there are 2 feats that needs to be reworked and 1 class feature.
36% damage bonus(Destroyer class feature) + 10.5% damage bonus(Focused destroyer) = 46.5% damage bonus. Destroyer class feature needs a change instead of 4% damage bonus per rank, it should give only 1% per rank, at rank 4 it should be 4% Damage Bonus , 4%x3 stacks = 12% damage bonus. As for Focused Destroyer instead of 3.5% at 5/5 feat points spent , it should be 2.5% damage bonus at 5/5 feat points spent , 2.5% x 3 = 7,5% So this is how it will look like 12% + 7.5% = 19.5%
For Destroyer purpose i would say that lowering the stacks to 5 stacks with 5% damage bonus per stack = 25% , while in unstoppable your encounters will hit by 10% more, down from 20%.
so the weapon damage got increased by 50% and we took 50% damage bonus from the Paragon Destroyer, it's a trade off, and we decreased the huge difference between Destroyer - Instigator and Destroyer - Sentinel with this change.

why do i sense these changes has to do with pvp > correct me if i am wrong

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commanderdata002

defiantone99 said:

GWF needs a huge increase in base damage. That way we will not need Hidden Daggers and WMS just to compete with other classes.

On the contrary!
GWF needs a huge nerf in base damage and a caps for various feats in power and gear scaling !
Scaling too good for power/gear and making too much dmg in dungeons compared to other dps classes!

rinat114 said:

Quoting myself from the bug post I made nobody looks at because it's in the bug section (lawd.)
...
If you could please address this, my assumption is that it's only a tooltip error and it somehow reverted back to the old one, but it's important.

Maybe next time turn on Stronghold boons before you go to forums and make your conslusions...!

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scathias

metalldjt said:

commanderdata002 said:

defiantone99 said:

GWF needs a huge increase in base damage. That way we will not need Hidden Daggers and WMS just to compete with other classes.

On the contrary!
GWF needs a huge nerf in base damage! Making too muach dmg in dungeons

thats why he mentioned hidden dagger, since hidden dagger is another 40% melee damage on top of the base damage.
also the reason why GWF deals alot of damage is WMS which he also mentioned it, that Atwill is better than Wicked Strike for some reason, and it should be close to threatin rush in terms of damage.

There is nothing wrong with having the 2 paths do different things, nerfing down WMS strike so that it deals similar damage to a single target, charge based at will like TR is sort of stupid. You could buff TR to work like the OP at will that hits multiple targets, but then it is still charge based and that is what screws it over as a DPS at will. WMS has no team utility (TR has mark), no personal utility (like the dash from TR). boosting wicked strike to be similar to WMS is the correct way to do this, because that helps instigators as well as giving IV a good AoE at will.

scathias

So, after some testing (watching tooltip damage values) on preview I can confirm that Frontline Surge is now benefiting from the feat Mighty Blade. This is a good step, but doesn't really make FLS a good encounter for pve gwfs. perhaps if sentinal gets reworked to be a better tank then FLS would become a possible way of controlling and dealing damage/managing threat.

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