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to those who said oppressor sucks
johnygwapo
Member Posts: 442 Arc User
Im not trying to bash other builds here, but pls stop giving false information regarding oppressor let others have the opportunity to explore.
oppressor may not be the best it has other potentials which other builds dont have, BUT i hope devs would change or improve the feats on oppressor, because as of this moment the some of its feats is not really related to its name and description.
Update july 14 (effective only on PVP 1 vs 1):
as demanded they want me to prove and provide numbers to what i said that Oppressor can freeze faster than Renegade/Thau. They said that CoI + Ice rays + Icy terrain + chill strike is enough to freeze the opponent, yes it is enough but then it would take you time to freeze them (talking about efficiency; time consumption).
CoI 1 stack per second, Icy terrain 1 stack per second, Ice rays 3 stacks (must be on tab to have 3), chill strike gives 1..
the usual power setup of renegade and thau is CoI + Ice rays + chill strike. Icerays will give you 3 (in 1 sec) + 1 (in 1 sec) from chill strike, +2 stacks more (for 2 seconds) from CoI, to sum it all up it would take you 3 seconds and 3 powers to freeze the enemy BUT 3 seconds doesnt include animations of the powers AND each power would take you .5-1 seconds to cast them.
before CoI start ticking it would take you .5 seconds, so 2 seconds + .5 seconds = 2.5 seconds
before Ice rays will have 3 stacks youll need to cast it twice and it would take you .5 for each strike, so 2.5 seconds + 1 second (2 strikes, 0.5 * 2 = 1 second) = 3.5 seconds
before casting chill strike it would take you 1 second, so 3.5 seconds + 1 = 4.5 seconds.
how freezing is efficiently done in Oppresor?
what you need:
chill strike (3 stacks already)
ray of frost 1 stack/sec (25% additional stack)
Chill strike in 1 second youll have 3 stacks and + 3 stacks for 3 seconds from RoF, in a total of 4 seconds only AND if you get the 25% additional stack (which really happens most of the time) 1+1 stack/sec, so chill strike (3 stacks for 1 second) + RoF (2 stack/sec) will cost you for 3 seconds only. How much more if i tabbed CoI and Ice rays?
CoI tabbed + chill strike + RoF would take me 2.5 seconds OR Icerays tabbed + chill strike would take me 2 seconds only
Q: What if ice rays and chill strike is on CD can you still maintain that oppressive strategy?
A: why not, if those 2 powers are on CD i can cast entangle force and RoF doesnt have CD. by the time the EF is over the opponent is frozen already then cast RoE or whatever and after that i can cast chill strike + ice rays again.
in addtion: Yes i sacrificed 10-15% of my damage, but i dont care as long as i can freeze my opponent to death
this saves my life too, check it out.
http://nw-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?347522-review-regarding-severe-reaction
oppressor may not be the best it has other potentials which other builds dont have, BUT i hope devs would change or improve the feats on oppressor, because as of this moment the some of its feats is not really related to its name and description.
Update july 14 (effective only on PVP 1 vs 1):
as demanded they want me to prove and provide numbers to what i said that Oppressor can freeze faster than Renegade/Thau. They said that CoI + Ice rays + Icy terrain + chill strike is enough to freeze the opponent, yes it is enough but then it would take you time to freeze them (talking about efficiency; time consumption).
CoI 1 stack per second, Icy terrain 1 stack per second, Ice rays 3 stacks (must be on tab to have 3), chill strike gives 1..
the usual power setup of renegade and thau is CoI + Ice rays + chill strike. Icerays will give you 3 (in 1 sec) + 1 (in 1 sec) from chill strike, +2 stacks more (for 2 seconds) from CoI, to sum it all up it would take you 3 seconds and 3 powers to freeze the enemy BUT 3 seconds doesnt include animations of the powers AND each power would take you .5-1 seconds to cast them.
before CoI start ticking it would take you .5 seconds, so 2 seconds + .5 seconds = 2.5 seconds
before Ice rays will have 3 stacks youll need to cast it twice and it would take you .5 for each strike, so 2.5 seconds + 1 second (2 strikes, 0.5 * 2 = 1 second) = 3.5 seconds
before casting chill strike it would take you 1 second, so 3.5 seconds + 1 = 4.5 seconds.
how freezing is efficiently done in Oppresor?
what you need:
chill strike (3 stacks already)
ray of frost 1 stack/sec (25% additional stack)
Chill strike in 1 second youll have 3 stacks and + 3 stacks for 3 seconds from RoF, in a total of 4 seconds only AND if you get the 25% additional stack (which really happens most of the time) 1+1 stack/sec, so chill strike (3 stacks for 1 second) + RoF (2 stack/sec) will cost you for 3 seconds only. How much more if i tabbed CoI and Ice rays?
CoI tabbed + chill strike + RoF would take me 2.5 seconds OR Icerays tabbed + chill strike would take me 2 seconds only
Q: What if ice rays and chill strike is on CD can you still maintain that oppressive strategy?
A: why not, if those 2 powers are on CD i can cast entangle force and RoF doesnt have CD. by the time the EF is over the opponent is frozen already then cast RoE or whatever and after that i can cast chill strike + ice rays again.
in addtion: Yes i sacrificed 10-15% of my damage, but i dont care as long as i can freeze my opponent to death
this saves my life too, check it out.
http://nw-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?347522-review-regarding-severe-reaction
Post edited by johnygwapo on
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Comments
So I personally will take the challenge based on damage, with a wager of 500k AD, and I am willing to take a 10% handicap as well. Meaning if you manage to get within 10% of my total damage with an Oppressor build, you still win. I am on Dragon with @copticone. And if the idea of a wager doesn't appeal to you, no problem. I am up for a friendly T2 run anytime.
alright i will pm you later in game, but i wont bet my AD because im broke at the moment i used all my AD on transmute haha.
i think we have the same rotation on powers, but maby mine is better because im INT/WIS faster cooldown on powers and longer CC effects
because of
Tempest Magic - affects only when the opponent's is below 30% hp
Malevolent Surge - happens only when you get to last hit the opponent
Frozen Power Transfer - affects chilling cloud only
the only thing which makes your path good is Elemental Empowerment
compared to mine
Reaper's Touch adds 15% and Controlled Momentum adds 10% to at wills, in a total of 25%
and also im using Arcane Presence (class feature) so if i have stacks of arcane mastery it adds up 34% to my cold spells
what im trying to stay is that my build has a consistent DPS, which means that im not relying on chances because my feats affects at all times.
I assure you, I am not trolling, or being condescending, but can you please provide me with a break down of how your freeze/chill effects are "better"? With my setup, I currently have CoI on TAB, so it is constantly adding chills for seven ticks. My Icy Terrain is on a 10sec cooldown, meaning the effect is lasting the entire time until Icy Terrain is up again. So I personally would not benefit from a shorter cooldown on it from Alacrity. My main At-Will is Chilling Cloud, applying a chill every 3rd hit, and maintaining ALL current chills with every hit. So that's 3 Powers constantly applying Chills on top of each other, ALL of which are AoE chill distributors, not single target like Ray of Frost or Chill Strike. So the only Powers Oppressor has that applies Chill AoE is Icy Terrain and Ice Storm. Are you constantly using Ice Storm in dungeons to apply Chills? I am very curious how does an oppressor like you apply his chills. Like what are you rotations and strategies, etc..
With regards to INT/WIS. Can you again please provide me with how much longer your CCs are prolonged with what I would assume 4-5 WIS more than your typical INT/CHA CW? Do you have these numbers in seconds? I mean that's 4-5% right? and on what exactly? Frozen mobs break freeze when they take damage. So with all the AoEs happening from CWs, GWFs, GFs, even some TRs, I am not sure how effective is 5% longer duration. So that leaves, Steal Time and Entangling Force. I would genuinely like to know how much in fractions of a second do 5 extra WIS prolong them.
No problem on the wager, I totally understand because I've been there. Just hit me up any time if you're on Dragon as well and we will run together.
For Tempest Magic, it actually is perfect that way since it helps me finish off mobs more than anyone else in the party, which help Malevolent Surge. I've never been in a run where a GWF/GF had more kills than a CW. Malevolent Surge is constantly up for me. There is also no other better option to take than Tempest Magic. I cant take Snap Freeze because my targets are always chilled. Storm Pillar is beyond pathetic, so there goes Destructive Wizardry.
You are also not right about Frozen Power Transfer, it adds damage buff to ANYTHING else I do. Why do you think I stuck with this build after running Renegade builds forever? And I started pumping more damage with this build over any of my previous Renegade builds even before the nerf.
But lets not derail this thread into how my build works. This is your thread about your build. Can you walk us through with every feat you took into Oppressor and how each one synergizes with each other or your Powers slotted and such. I want to get a picture of how it is playing out, mainly in PvE.
pls read
Frozen Power Transfer - Chilling Cloud now grants 1/2/3/4/5% bonus damage for every target you strike with its third strike. (This bonus lasts for 8 seconds and is reset if you cast the third strike of chilling Cloud again)
only chilling cloud is mentioned. tried that too.
i dont constantly use ice storm, depends on the scenario. CoI on tab and icy terrain is enough to stack chills and freeze since im a INT/WIS my powers have shorter cooldown i can use them right away after breaking the freeze on the enemy.My at will is MM to keep my arcane mastery up.
i need to keep my arcane mastery up, because of my Arcane Presence which burst the damage of my cold spells that includes CoI and icy terrain.
imagine the bursted damage of my CoI and icy terrain, compared to your chilling cloud that you'll still have to wait on its bursted third strike.
dont forget the shorter cooldown on powers that INT/WIS can give
If you think I would create a build, put myself out there for all to criticize without making sure I test and retest things, then you have a very low opinion of me. And that's cool. You dont know me from the next person here. But I assure you, based on actual tests and practice that it does affect everything else. Maybe you created your build by just reading descriptions, but I didn't. Regardless, I still don't see anything in the description that is misleading. The third hit of chilling cloud applies a BUFF per each target hit. You can use other encounters and benefit from the buff, then do a full chilling cloud rotation to maintain it within 8seconds.
So again whenever you get the chance, we would like to see the math behind all this.
i see. thank for you for that idea though
I have to second all this. I switched from Renegade to Thaumaturge for my main CW, and Frozen Power Transfer is actually quite nasty, especially since Dungeon play tends to involve clustering targets as closely together as possible, allowing for maximum benefit from that feat. For what it's worth, my CW is usually top DPS in dungeons I run with players of comparable GS unless I'm needed to focus exclusively on flinging trash over a cliff. With my power setup I'm focusing more on control than anything. The DPS is just a byproduct!
I tend to run with Chilling Cloud and Magic Missile as my At-Wills, though I would swap MM for RoF if the additional CC were desperately needed. Generally mobs spend a ridiculous amount of time frozen or stunned between CoI (on Tab for me as well), Icy Terrain, and Steal Time. I swapped out Eye of the Storm for Chilling Presence as well.
Since I've given up tabbed Chill Strike for CoI, I've been playing with Shard of the Endless Avalanche to fill the AoE damage gap, and its large explosion radius +knockdown is actually a useful substitute. The damage isn't as craptastic as I had feared, either. If they get around to fixing its bugs along with the rest of the CW powers and feats and maybe decrease its cooldown to compensate for the lengthy start-up, I'll be even happier about it.
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well its good that Frozen Power Transfer is clarified. so its Frozen Power Transfer and Elemental Empowerment which i find useful in thau.
but like what i said im not trying to say that oppressor is the best i just want to share my knowledge regarding oppressor that it is competitive to other builds too
Sadly, its pretty much useless in pve, compared to conventional builds. The point is (and not all CWs actually realize it, from what i've seen in forums), every CW can CC effectively in pve. U can run without feats and ability scores whatsover and still do your job effectively. Even more, every CW can do damage, surprised? And with correct encounters/passives and good gear every CW can do good damage.
But what we can see - thaumaturge/renegade path can buff entire party with those Assailing Force/Chaos Magic feats (and few others, like Elemental Empowerment). Opressor can not. Thus it sucks. Not like its comlete useless s**t, but still, conventional builds better. But, again, in pvp opressor is unmatched.
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Chill doesn't add anything in therms of damage that other feat can't surpass, which is why you can't surely claim oppressor does more damage than other specs.
You get 5% damage for 6s from just casting a chill spell (tier 1 so every spec can take it), you get a 9% boost only on cold spells (coi, it and cs), 10% damage on at wills, and using chilling cloud you get an 8s buff of 5% dmg per target for using a lower damage at-will (compared to MM) which takes 2s to build up and you need to be sure to get multiple targets clumped together (on sigle target is nothing great) nor to mention it's a tier3 in thaumaturge and has nothing to do with oppressor itself.
On the other side you have to give up all of renegade and thaumaturge damage that THE ENTIRE PARTY would benefit of, like nightmare wizardry or assailing force or chaos magic.
You also forget to include this in your calculation: if I do 1M damage and contribute to another 1M from the additional damage my party does, it's much better than doing 1.5M by myself, and I'm pretty sure you simply can't do 50% more damage than other spec as oppressor in any case.
There's nothing magic, it's simple math. By going oppressor you have to give up much more important feats than you gain, and atm there isn't a single gimmick fight that would favor oppressor over other fights in any dungeon.
Prove me wrong with numbers, not fake challenges.
as it is now though, if i switch to cold spells to get the freeze effects it is just not the same level of control as the arcane powers. you stack up to freeze, they are stunned for like ~2 seconds and then you have to stack it all up all over again before they get frozen again.
with the arcane spells it is more direct control, you stun them, you knock them, you make them go prone, etc... so you can keep a small group of enemies in a near continual state of control. i just feel safer that way.
Going with freeze powers does not sacrifice the use of Steal Time, Shield Pulse and Singularity. Regardless of the build, all CWs have access to the same CCs, whether freeze or arcane.
wouldnt post such thing which i havent tried. dont have much time documenting everything thats why i want it in game, is there any problem with that? dont get me wrong
after all it really depends on how the player will "play"
im just saying that oppressor is not that bad after all
You can play whatever you want, but the definition of "bad" is really subjective. Personally I find unintresting every feat after tier 2 in oppressor and I don't really see anything that boosts your damage (which you claim is higher than other specs from personal experience). Don't get me wrong either, but claims like what you did are impossible to compare, since you are basically saying that you outplayed most if not all the rene/thaum cw you played with.
I'm just pointing out that mechanics works with rather simple math, on top of that you can only spend a limited amount of points and once you spend them in a certain tree you will have to give up from other trees. From t3 till the last point in oppressor you get 10% damage on at-wills (which is at best 30% of total dps vs a single target, much less in multi target fights and has nearly no scaling on recovery) and a reduced cd on 2 spells that don't do most of your damage, so the point of outdamaging is moot. Also your spell choices will tend to be for a coi or cs on tab for best chill stacking on multiple targets, while you get a great boost on EF from feats, which is the best AP generating ability once tabbed and untabbed CS is basically useless in most situations.
You also have to give up either RoF or shield or steal time OR a primary spell for your tree (prolly cs).
So you end up doing exactly what other specs do in therms of rotation, but you will have less dps bonus and better freezing uptime, but that won't be a big deal since your cc is still AS->shield/ef/st->rinse and repeat. Freeze would be superior only with mobs like the drow spiders that can be stunned/freezed but can't be knocked or moved.
You can play the same way with every spec, you just tend to change the rotation for efficiency. And I don't see what changes can be driven by choices in the oppressor tree by itself apart casting a cold spell every 6s to keep up the buff (and you don't need more than 5pts in t1 so every spec can get it). Since in any case your best passive powers seems to be storm spell and eye of storm in all cases and chilling presence is basically worse than arcane presence (the latter can have a single ramp up and is on you, the former works on mobs debuffs and must be rebuilt).
So apart from the nice name "Oppressor" if you aren't choosing the spec for solo/pvp, you are basically gimping your potential by at least a 15% dps just for yourself, and much more if you consider group damage and utility.
Maybe in a future tier there will be small packs of hard hitting adds and single target bosses, but actually is a zerg fest so I don't see where this spec is going to win.
And just to be clear, I'm all for making the tree better, either in therms of utility or damage, hoping that any tree can be good for solo, pvp and dungeons and the difference is in the playstyle. But as it is now you will spec out of oppressor asap once you get 60 if you plan to be a pve-oriented player, and compared to other tree it definitely "suck", but I don't like to say it this way, I prefer to say "other specs are clearly superior" in the content we are playing now.
Sorry for the long reply, I have no tldr since I'm just expanding the concepts I said earlier.
Edit: grammar and such
Check out my CW Oppressor Tank Guide Here
technically this is true, but you have used up half of your power slots now on non-cold based attacks which just makes it that much more difficult to stack chill effects up to the freeze stun.
each to their own, but if i was going to go with a chill based build i would want to use the powers that applied chill effects. that does seem to to be the point of the build and the feats that focus on chill. i would be more looking at conduit of ice, icy terrain, chill strike, and icy rays with ice storm. that way im building chill stacks and taking full advantage of my feat selection.
as far as that goes, who thought taking a CW with all attacks and feats based on arcane or chill and giving them a paragon path based on lightning with nearly zero synergy was a good idea?
i somehow agree that some feats in oppressor is useless same as thau and renegade too, but you can actually skip tier 2 if you dont like em.
+1 to you ....
i totally agree on you on this.
I've been using oppressor since the balance patch, used my free respec to try it out. Thought the tree looked kinda weak, but interesting none the less.
I won't even consider the other trees now, I can do everything I need to do in pve the same as the other trees (AS, punt, etc.) and often I"m pulling threat over other CWs in the group on single target damage (which is the only damage that really matters in pve atm), I say this not to say oppressor does more dps than the other trees, but to show that it is at least competitive in single target damage output. There are other factors that could contribute to me pulling and holding threat on a single target.
In pvp not only is the build really good, imo it's alot more fun than renegade or thauma, icy rays also hits pretty hard with chill stacks as well as chilling presence. Oppressor was alot better than I thought it was prior to actually trying it.
There's nothing wrong with experimenting with crazy builds, unless you lack any shred of empiricism, and can't tell when something you're testing gives a bit of a blatantly negative result. The Dunning-Kruger effect is a harsh mistress.
There are nice specs for PvP using Oppressor, there are useful specs prioritising PvE using Thaum (and to an extent, some in Renegade, though it seems a little.. emasculated now). The OP, however, seems to have managed something which is optimal for neither. As cheery and friendly as he is, his claims are wooly and unsubstantiated, and he seems to have a tenuous grasp of class mechanics. I suspect that were this WoW, he'd be the arms/prot warrior with green +spirit gear.
Still, don't let the facists oppress you with their maths and fixation on doin' stuff, maaaaan XD
I play a cold based Thauma. The problem with freeze is people's expectations of it. Once you start looking at freeze as simply an interrupt, one that you can chain on 5+ mobs constantly every 2-3seconds, you will see how a huge damage mitigation it is for the entire party. Being able to freeze Cleaving/range/AoE mobs, especially post-update with the limited Astral Shield, is very useful.