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M18 Class Balance Adjustments

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  • theraxin#5169 theraxin Member Posts: 370 Arc User
    edited December 2019

    Thaumaturge:

    There has been decent talk in this thread of fixing several of the issues with Thaumaturge around smolder such as:

    Critical Conflagration will only apply smolder to one target even when an AoE crits
    Directed Flames does only 50% of the smolder damage instead of 75% like it should (and like it does with Rimefire)
    When using AoE powers to cause Rimefire, it only applies to one target

    The good news is that I'm actively looking into these to get fixes in place.

    The bad news is, it will also be time to fix Directed Flames. Directed Flames is intended to do 75% of the damage smolder would have done over time when it first lands, and then not be able to be reapplied to the target until the normal smolder time has passed (can apply once every 12 seconds). This has obviously not been the case as it can just keep reapplying over and over making it much more powerful than Smolder itself.

    The original intent was to have a feat that made smolder more useful for quicker fights where the critters die faster than 12 seconds.

    There wasn't a rush to fix this as Thaumaturge wasn't crushing the DPS charts (and contrary to some beliefs, we don't prioritize all player benefiting bugs to the top of the list), but some of these other fixes will actually necessitate fixing that now.

    As an additional change to go along with that, I was considering changing Rimefire Weaving to be "A stack of chill or smolder on a target will decrease its damage resistance to your attacks by 5%, having Rimefire on the target will decrease it by 10%." I would be interested to hear from Wizards how they feel about that change to Rimefire Weaving.

    In general, as wizard I fear bugfixes as for this class, notoriously, it's a big thing and affects the whole class balance. Arcanist only became the best paragon after a bugfix happened to Thaumaturge, so I think the importance is really underplayed. But, back to the actual feat.

    I think there's a huge misunderstanding. Rimefire weaving was specifically and only used to make smolder a quickly proccable effect, not a DoT. Most players just won't be interested in a frontloaded DoT Rimefire and they definitely feel it as a nerf, as the whole DPS paragon was built around that effect. This is a major paragon-rebalance.

    However, I personally just don't like this feat at all, even in bugged form. At the moment it's just a Storm spell with rimefire, so if you want the exact same playstyle and experience, just go Arcanist and do it better. I'm relieved that it was a mistake, because a copycat paragon is less than nothing, because we lost our support tree, which was the unchallenged king of trial content. I miss the Master of Flames and a support paragon is more reasonable than to try and make an other DPS paragon, which already locked in to play almost the same.

    My suggestion is: A stack of Smolder on a target will decrease its damage resistance by 3%, having Rimefire on the target will decrease it by 5%.

    And as said before, please prioritize things based on the player's need, because this just feels very unimportant.
  • rafamarques#5700 rafamarques Member Posts: 155 Arc User
    edited December 2019
    well... as a "non cw player", Iam feel a little "persona non grata" in this forum now. again, take away that -10% penalty in tank damage; doing that and you will have 3 happy groups of players.
  • rikitakirikitaki Member Posts: 926 Arc User


    Smolder has always been a 12 second DoT and still is. The cooldown is on Directed Flames and is per target, you can still use smolder/Directed Flames on as many different targets as you want in that 12 seconds.

    I still think there is already a penalty for Dir Flam in form of having to be reapplied (versus refreshing.) That already takes off some of the damage as it would take a really great skill in having accurately on mind its 12 second time frame.

    If you take the boss case, that reapply delay would justify even retaining 100% damage. But everyone would use it then though - as having such little loss and technically no benefit from having enemies on slow fire would be easy choice.
    I guess I would make it 6 seconds and 50% of the damage. That way it retains the mob boost it exactly has at the moment - and still would be inferior to rimefire on bosses because of the need of being set on fire in regular intervals.

  • sobi#1980 sobi Member Posts: 401 Arc User
    edited December 2019
    hrakh said:



    @noworries#8859
    It might be a thought to spend a little more effort on considering the environment you are firing your statements into...

    I for one am not convinced that a statement that essentially translates to "So yeah, I said we do not have time to address major issues with Arbiter, Hellbringer, Barbarian, etc., but here is some relatively in depth work we are willing to do on Wizards..." is a great call, but YMMV...

    From my perspective it only reinforces the already quite prevalent opinion among players that the Wizard class is where your attention lies , at the detriment of all other classes. As your communication people should be able to tell you, the optics matter. Especially when dealing with a group of people that has been feeling ignored for >6 months..

    Just something to consider..

    Thaumaturge:
    Bug fixes are not the same as major power redesigns. Everything called out in my post is a bug fix with the exception of a change to Rimefire weaving to make it so those bug fixes don't actually bring the paragon path down in damage when it is an already under-performing paragon path. Wizard's other paragon path also got intentionally adjusted down, while other classes/paths received buffs.


    Bravo! That should mean that at least you will be fixing bugs for all other classes, right? I shall look forward to it.

    I am still curious about how arbiter, warlock and etc actually need a class overhaul or major power redesigns? It's just a matter of buffing their already existing powers. For that matter actually, isn't that what you have already done, just buffed the magnitudes?

    SMH...........


    Post edited by sobi#1980 on
  • gabrieldourdengabrieldourden Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 1,212 Arc User
    sobi#1980 said:

    hrakh said:

    Thaumaturge:

    There has been decent talk in this thread of fixing several of the issues with Thaumaturge around smolder such as:

    Critical Conflagration will only apply smolder to one target even when an AoE crits
    Directed Flames does only 50% of the smolder damage instead of 75% like it should (and like it does with Rimefire)
    When using AoE powers to cause Rimefire, it only applies to one target

    The good news is that I'm actively looking into these to get fixes in place.

    The bad news is, it will also be time to fix Directed Flames. Directed Flames is intended to do 75% of the damage smolder would have done over time when it first lands, and then not be able to be reapplied to the target until the normal smolder time has passed (can apply once every 12 seconds). This has obviously not been the case as it can just keep reapplying over and over making it much more powerful than Smolder itself.

    The original intent was to have a feat that made smolder more useful for quicker fights where the critters die faster than 12 seconds.

    There wasn't a rush to fix this as Thaumaturge wasn't crushing the DPS charts (and contrary to some beliefs, we don't prioritize all player benefiting bugs to the top of the list), but some of these other fixes will actually necessitate fixing that now.

    As an additional change to go along with that, I was considering changing Rimefire Weaving to be "A stack of chill or smolder on a target will decrease its damage resistance to your attacks by 5%, having Rimefire on the target will decrease it by 10%." I would be interested to hear from Wizards how they feel about that change to Rimefire Weaving.

    @noworries#8859
    It might be a thought to spend a little more effort on considering the environment you are firing your statements into...

    I for one am not convinced that a statement that essentially translates to "So yeah, I said we do not have time to address major issues with Arbiter, Hellbringer, Barbarian, etc., but here is some relatively in depth work we are willing to do on Wizards..." is a great call, but YMMV...

    From my perspective it only reinforces the already quite prevalent opinion among players that the Wizard class is where your attention lies , at the detriment of all other classes. As your communication people should be able to tell you, the optics matter. Especially when dealing with a group of people that has been feeling ignored for >6 months..

    Just something to consider..
    Bug fixes are not the same as major power redesigns. Everything called out in my post is a bug fix with the exception of a change to Rimefire weaving to make it so those bug fixes don't actually bring the paragon path down in damage when it is an already under-performing paragon path. Wizard's other paragon path also got intentionally adjusted down, while other classes/paths received buffs.
    tenetomb said:

    @noworries#8859

    And it does make it not useful on bosses, hence the proposed adjustment to Rimefire Weaving to give a better boss option.

    Bravo! That should mean that at least you will be fixing bugs for all other classes, right? I shall look forward to it.

    I am still curious about how arbiter, warlock and etc actually need a class overhaul or major power redesigns? It's just a matter of buffing their already existing powers. For that matter actually, isn't that what you have already done, just buffed the magnitudes?

    SMH...........

    Talking about bugs, Hindering Strike still misses all targets quite often. Sometimes when this happens I get the message that a certain monster is °out of range". On an area power...
    Le-Shan: HR level 80 (main)
    Born of Black Wind: SW Level 80
  • gabrieldourdengabrieldourden Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 1,212 Arc User

    Warden:
    Focused - now increases 2% per second to a maximum of 20%
    To The Wind - now grants a 5% boost to Throw Caution
    Skirmisher's Gambit - now reduces Critical Strike by 10,000 and increaes crit severity by 25%


    I have only 1 question: Why? That is one gigantic boost, they are top dps already they do not need more inc. I need to delete this peace of s**t game

    https://imgur.com/6n2zxIp

    These are all nerfs actually...

    Focused is 25% on live, now 20% on preview.
    To the Wind is 10% on live, 5% on preview.
    Skirmishers Gambit is 30% more crit severity and 3000 Critical strike reduction on live, now 25% more crit severity and 10000 critical strike reduction.
    Le-Shan: HR level 80 (main)
    Born of Black Wind: SW Level 80
  • quickfoot#7851 quickfoot Member Posts: 488 Arc User

    Thaumaturge:

    There has been decent talk in this thread of fixing several of the issues with Thaumaturge around smolder such as:

    Critical Conflagration will only apply smolder to one target even when an AoE crits
    Directed Flames does only 50% of the smolder damage instead of 75% like it should (and like it does with Rimefire)
    When using AoE powers to cause Rimefire, it only applies to one target

    The good news is that I'm actively looking into these to get fixes in place.

    The bad news is, it will also be time to fix Directed Flames. Directed Flames is intended to do 75% of the damage smolder would have done over time when it first lands, and then not be able to be reapplied to the target until the normal smolder time has passed (can apply once every 12 seconds). This has obviously not been the case as it can just keep reapplying over and over making it much more powerful than Smolder itself.

    The original intent was to have a feat that made smolder more useful for quicker fights where the critters die faster than 12 seconds.

    There wasn't a rush to fix this as Thaumaturge wasn't crushing the DPS charts (and contrary to some beliefs, we don't prioritize all player benefiting bugs to the top of the list), but some of these other fixes will actually necessitate fixing that now.

    As an additional change to go along with that, I was considering changing Rimefire Weaving to be "A stack of chill or smolder on a target will decrease its damage resistance to your attacks by 5%, having Rimefire on the target will decrease it by 10%." I would be interested to hear from Wizards how they feel about that change to Rimefire Weaving.

    Thanks for the explanation.

    What if you change directed flames to a lower value, lets say 25%, and remove the 12 sec CD? Otherwise that capstone will be very bad for bosses. Or maybe your intention is to have a capstone for bosses and other for AoE? That could work but it limits our options, and 12 sec CD is too long, you usually take less time between mob groups.

    Either way, our class features are horrible in both paragons, and one of them we were using is going to be nerfed by half (Chilling presence).

    Now that you are working at bugs, take a look into some powers not giving Action Points or giving a micro value. Thank you.
    The intent of Directed Flames is never to have smolder/rimefire do more damage than it would have as a DoT, but instead to allow it to be unfront damage for shorter fights. Smolder/Rimefire lasts for 12 seconds which is why that is the cooldown length. So while it could be something like 25% with a 4 second cooldown, that would make it less useful on quick to kill targets than 75% with a 12 second cooldown. The cooldown is per target. And it does make it not useful on bosses, hence the proposed adjustment to Rimefire Weaving to give a better boss option.
    My only concern is how will this affect critters being attacked by 2x Wizard/Thaums? Will the first wizard to apply smolder get their dps in and the 2nd wont?

    If it's really only intended for quick fights, have you considered allowing for 100% of smolder's dot instantly, and increasing the timer?

    The way it worked in m16 seemed pretty cool, even if unintended behavior. It had a nice flow to it. Though, it does make sense to fix it considering that if you wanted a dot, then just use a dot. On the other hand, it was kind of like Thaum's Storm Spell, but easier to proc. Perhaps change crit conflag to be have a chance to apply smolder on crit's like Storm Spell has and adjust the damage modifier on directed flames accordingly to tune the dps. Just an idea.

    As for the debuff idea for Rhimefire weaving, I like it. It sounds like it would be easier to use than as it is now and more useful in general, an overall improvement, I would even consider ditching directed flames for it altogether and not look back.

  • bifflincultebifflinculte Member Posts: 210 Arc User

    My only concern is how will this affect critters being attacked by 2x Wizard/Thaums? Will the first wizard to apply smolder get their dps in and the 2nd wont?

    There's another issue occuring when a thauma and an arcanist are in the same party. Thauma adds smolder with any spell on a target: he will proc 3s-dot smolder or 75%-with-12s-cd smolder. The arcanist casts a cold spell: he will refresh rimefire and also deals 3s-dot smolder. It has always been the case. So, Thauma is the only paragon granting extra damage to another paragon, as paladin's aura of courage used to do for all classes.

    Suppose arcanist and thauma are very balanced paragons. A party for tomm has 4 wizards: 3 will go arcanist and the 4th thauma, to grant smolder damage to the 3 arcanists, and becomes a specific buffer for arcanist paragon.

    My point is that smolder or rimefire should be a personal feat, as arcanist's storm spell, warden's Enhanced Conductivity... Now it's a status on a target and every player adding chill on it, triggers personal additional damage. I think smolder philophy should evolve, pre mod 16 it had mostly party dr debuff aim and very low dps, mod 16 gave us a very good feat, not only in term of dps.

    Maybe the way to go is making thauma more tactical by removing the automatic addition of smolder thanks to critical conflagration. Good smolder dps would require smart managment of it with fire spells (and chilling spells for rimefire). You manually add smolder on a target, it gets hit by smolder damage. No 3 or 12s cooldown (why not 2h), no complication.
  • aerhythia#3255 aerhythia Member Posts: 173 Arc User

    Come on guys. The devs give us an inch and we want to take a mile.



    Noworries said that these are just small changes and won't fix all balancing problems. They just will bring a little more balance and equity. Thanks for your work @noworries#8859.

    It doesn't really do much for Arcanist AoE and Arbiter single target (which devs have identified as a problem) so far.
  • aerhythia#3255 aerhythia Member Posts: 173 Arc User

    It doesn't really do much for Arcanist AoE and Arbiter single target (which devs have identified as a problem) so far.

    I don't agree at all. Arcanist aoe is awesome ! It's even more powerful than thauma. Just cast repel (tab), terrain, lightning, stealtime and Storm Pillar, storm spell will do the rest automatically. And with Nightmare wizardry, arcanist also hasaccess to passive combat advantage on all targets !

    And with right build and rotation, Arbiter has high dps vs single targets too.
    Well, that's what devs said, or at least their data. 4 of 5 of the Cleric changes won't increase single target damage by a measurable amount... so this doesn't seem to add up from my point of view.


    The toolkit of Arcanist AoE is definitely great (that's the advantage of having 2 DPS paragons) but I doubt it would be overperforming with a few tweaks here and there.

  • legend#9825 legend Member Posts: 31 Arc User
    edited December 2019
    #nowoories

    Warlocks - Is there any way, that the soul investure power isn't dependant on having a soul puppet? If we have 5x AND the soul puppet dies, which is often the case in ToMM, we lose the hard work of a full minute building up the additional encounter damage.

    Also, please make this soul investure damage bonus available to all powers not just encounter.

    The ability for us warlocks to build soul investure should be faster.... Why not use the "soul spark" resource as meter for soul investure and just give us a Curse Mastery (RB) to place a power there.
  • legend#9825 legend Member Posts: 31 Arc User
    Decent increase to some of our damage encounters and at-wills. However, our problems is not only encounter damage output, but also the mechanics of our powers. I posted above the issue with our soul investure, which is a huge problem (unless soul puppet was indestructible). In long battles we only have 1 control power that calls forth a puppet and builds soul investure, and that's Hardars Grasp (for PVP this is another big problem we need to talk about this) which also is on long timer (15.9sec).

    Here are some other issues to consider:
    Whatever powers we have that consumes a curse, make it call forth a soul puppet.

    Hellish Rebuke: Increase magnitude from 40/10 DoT and 20 on counter to 45/10 DoT and 25 on counter

    Hand of Blight: Increase magnitude from 35 melee/45 ranged to 40 melee/50 ranged

    Arms of Hadar: Increase magnitude from 55 to 65
    Give us another control power that's usable, instant and direct (Arms of Hadar is stupid) change this encounter please do it can be usable, specially in pvp... Turn it into like a ground of skeletons or ghost rooting the target and stunning them for 1.5 to 2 sec.

    Vampiric Embrace: Increase magnitude from 250 to 275 - Allow this temp shield to work better in groups, thus far, it replaces Healadin shield and the temp shield it provides is extremely weak (like 3-5% of hp)

    Blades of Vanquished Armies: Increase magnitude from 20 to 25
    Hadar's Grasp: Increase magnitude from 200 to 230 - Lower it's timer to around 11sec ....
    Fiery Bolt: Increase magnitude from 175 to 200 - Please increase this to 300 magnitude
    Dreadtheft: Increase magnitude from 340 to 395 - Make this power instant as oppose to it's channel form.. just wider or cone 130% degree in front of caster attack.. Makes the whole cool down phase unbearable to use in real fights. Again, despite high magnitude UNUSABLE in fights.
    Hellfire Ring: Increase magnitude from 120/200 DoT to 135/220 DoT
    DoTs of ring ARE NOT doing their stated magnitude, it's bugged or not working as intended... Many of us top locks stopped using Ring altogether, also allow to refresh lesser curse on every tick.
    Curse: Increase magnitude from 10 to 12
    Parting Blasphemy: Increase magnitude from 75 to 85 - Should work with reapplying curse
    Propose: Increase Deadly Curse from 25 to 50 magnitude
  • maruda#1373 maruda Member Posts: 168 Arc User
    Fail...
  • rikitakirikitaki Member Posts: 926 Arc User
    sobi#1980 said:

    They are trying to bug fix the fiesta known as Thaum,...

    ...and the fun fact is that by the various "fixes" (including Directed Flames) to "intended" behaviour the thauma gets a massive boost to trash disposal while loosing a significant part of his potential in the single target engagement. (and atm single target situation is already not the place to shine for thauma)

    noworries, I realize we reversed your intention and actually used the feat in a wrong (=useful) way. But if the fix means to render thauma even less competitive choice - well, whatever, just do it...
  • bigdragon#4214 bigdragon Member Posts: 33 Arc User
    I think with mod 16 you've doed the game... You have created a class that does twice the damage of the other classes. Forced one of the best classes for damage to tank... The new mod was made to balance the damage but because of your ignorance and your unwillingness to do things was quite the opposite. And to this day after months and after several nerfs the wizard class continues to do more damage than all... Do you know how to work the you know only postpone the problem??.. You're ruining a beautiful game because of your incompetence
  • sobi#1980 sobi Member Posts: 401 Arc User
    rikitaki said:

    sobi#1980 said:

    They are trying to bug fix the fiesta known as Thaum,...

    ...and the fun fact is that by the various "fixes" (including Directed Flames) to "intended" behaviour the thauma gets a massive boost to trash disposal while loosing a significant part of his potential in the single target engagement. (and atm single target situation is already not the place to shine for thauma)

    noworries, I realize we reversed your intention and actually used the feat in a wrong (=useful) way. But if the fix means to render thauma even less competitive choice - well, whatever, just do it...
    I don't care if they buff thaum nor do all those locks, barbs and fighters. All they had to do was to give arcanist AOE and buff all other classes but lets assume nerfing was the right decision. Instead of nerfing arcanist ST and buffing its AOE, instead they nerf the AOE across the board. So now they are taking extra time to fix thaum, that they further messed up by their own lack of knowledge and understanding the class and all these non-meta classes have to wait for mod 19 for their fixes. You don't see an uproar because no one cares anymore, they just burned out from screaming. As a arbiter main, i am in a really good position but my mistakes are still very unforgiving, but i do feel for those other non-meta classes. This game is just sad.
  • bigdragon#4214 bigdragon Member Posts: 33 Arc User
    The cryptic can do nothing but weaken the classes.... Instead of thinking about the nerf delago they should think about how to balance the other classes on the same level... Too hard to do for their genial mebti
  • tenetombtenetomb Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 113 Arc User

    12 seconds?...

    Smolder ticks 4 times, once every second. The normal time would be 4 seconds, not 12. This change is just making smolder worse, not better.

    Problem is : it doesn't tick every second anymore. And dot lasts well 12 seconds.
    I don't know when it was changed. Maybe mod 16...
  • thefabricantthefabricant Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 5,248 Arc User
    tenetomb said:

    12 seconds?...

    Smolder ticks 4 times, once every second. The normal time would be 4 seconds, not 12. This change is just making smolder worse, not better.

    Problem is : it doesn't tick every second anymore. And dot lasts well 12 seconds.
    I don't know when it was changed. Maybe mod 16...
    It was definitely still 4 seconds in m16, since I checked it then. Likely when the directed flames rework occurred it was changed. Whatever, the defining class feature of thaum is completely useless then.
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