So I copied my lv35 Oracle cleric over to test out questing with it. What with the way the divinity system works now... I feel like soloing is actually even harder than before on a leveling DC. o_O
On live, with the old DC system, I didn't have too many problems dealing with mob clusters on my own, honestly. But now with this new setup, everything feels even weaker. Especially considering how much time it takes to build up Empowerment for an encounter. The complexity isn't as much of an issue as is how much harder it is to level now. I actually found it nearly impossible to solo some brute solo mobs, simply because I couldn't kill them fast enough before my Tank companion would simply take too much damage and die. No, don't give me the "youre a cleric, heal it" argument, because the only decent heal you have at that level (read: not sunburst) is Healing Word, and that still wont keep him alive. Anyway, yeah, just my thoughts.
1) Sun Burst knock back is awesome in PvP but kinda counter productive in PvE. - Make it 3 seconds stun/daze.
2) Exaltation needs damage immunity - Make Empowered one immune, 1.5 sec immunity per stack would be awesome.[
-Bring back the blue bubble visual effect
3) Divinity gained by at-will only is annoying, especially the cast time is slow. -Divinity gained from using encounters.
4) Astral shield is bugged now, but if it weren't bugged then it'd still be too weak. -Increase 10% DR per empowered stack
"Danger is RED, Healing is BLUE, YELLOW is Safe and so are YOU!"
That was the Mantra I used to chant in Party chat when I got fed up of people standing like lamp posts in the crossfire of three Illithid and a Thoon Hulk and blaming me when they wound up dead.
Or, standing just outside the edge of a Divine Astral Shield at 30% hp with a DoT ticking on them; or just outside a Moon Touched Hallowed Ground.
So, I'd like to suggest that Empowered Encounters should be a different colour, maybe Green. Normal are Yellow, Divine are Blue, so a new colour for any AoE on the ground would help.
Although, my past experiences suggest that it might not help much - some players just have no idea about DC powers, even at level 60.
Shame to mess up the Mantra, though...
"YELLOW is Fine, BLUE is Divine, RED is Nasty, GREEN is Blasty"
[FEEDBACK]Empowerment:It's really annoying keeping an eye on the stacks of Empowerment below your avatar. It would be nice if there were a floating notifier for when a certain encounter reaches max Empowerment stacks.
Thank you, I had yet to notice that there was even a visual aid as to the number of stacks of empowerment. I cetainly agree that it's not user friendly where it currently is. Personally I'd like something to appear above the encounter power icon on your skill bar to indicate the number of charges of empowerment, kind of like the + symbol that is above them in divine mode.
I think it's finally time to retire the old "Sooth" class feature. Consider the situation: Righteous DCs certainly won't be slotting it, the new meta (good GFs with their mountains of threat, CWs with their control, SWs with their massive burst) makes threat from healing somewhat redundant, and should anything unforeseeable happen you guys have finally given Virtuous and Faithful the tools they need to keep themselves alive or to keep the people around them, who in turn are keeping them safe, alive.
As a replacement, may I suggest something that DCs sorely need: a class feature that grants increased control resistance (or something similar).
Traditionally D&D clerics of all stripes were known for their protective powers, and yet atm we are the class most vulnerable to CCs. Considering that we now have potentially the least amount of dodges out of any class besides the SW/GWF (Healing Step is gone) a feat that increases control resistance would definitely help with cleric survivability in both PvP and PvE (how many DCs out there hate fighting those ToD white dragonknights?).
BTW, once you've played preview for a few hours you'll realize that the old SB simply has no place in the new lineup of DC powers.
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"BTW, once you've played preview for a few hours you'll realize that the old SB simply has no place in the new lineup of DC powers".
And this is one of my issues with the overhaul. Why do they feel it necessary to lower the usefulness of some of the Cleric skills? (not just talking about one skill here). All this results in is a "you out - you in" situation.
Surely the better way forward would have been to give players a wider choice of equally useful abilities. Not a - this one now has no place in the skills list approach.
...............vote for your favourite expansion.......... "Mod 6. Oh my f****** god. It gutted the game pure and simple. And what wasn't gutted was messed up by the poorly thought out new level cap and equip. The game never recovered from that atrocity". ..............not this one then.............
What you guys who are saying "only divine sunburst should knockback" are completely failing to realize right now is that divine encounters are spammable now/no cooldown. So now imagine, if you were trying to spam 3 divine sunbursts in a row. And they had that gigantic knockback. ...yeah, that'd be kind of unmanageable now wouldn't it? >_>
THANK YOU.
I reiterate also: the entire argument against non-divine Sunburst not knocking-back is the *possibility* someone might *accidentally* use it in a party environment. Most people play Party environments what: 25% of the time? (Remember: 95% of everyone playing the game likely aren't participating in the forums).
Those making this argument are spending a LOT of their play time in Party... and that's great. However for any non-party and PvP play the default knock-back of Sunburst is an improvement. If you spend all your time in Party-vs-Environment then perhaps you should consider slotting something else? There already is a massive learning curve involved - adding one extra change to your relearning of the class isn't going to hurt any more than the rest of it already.
Either way - if the Devs revert the Sunburst knock-back then so be it. But every argument for this I've seen has been based on theory. I haven't seen any comments that the "problems" with this mechanic has been an actual, in-practice problem as of yet. I won't make this portion of my comment blue as I've already done that - I cast my one vote already.
However:
Regarding EMPOWERMENT: I concur that having each encounter's Empowerment stacks glued only to that encounter makes it more difficult to play. it's easier to just ignore Divinity and Empowerment as it is if I want to remain 'fluid'. Hence my vote is that Empowerment Stacks are global - like the CW Chill and SW Curse: any encounter power can generate the stacks, which are consumed on any OTHER encounter use, etc.
Party needs a DC using SB in Dungeons crowded with vast ambushes - like CN, SP or Kar - for its AOE damage/healing combination and its relatively short cd. Nobody wants SB for its pushing. HOWEVER, since these changes are taking away the "regain divine" feature from SB (with the new mechanics divinity is regenerated by At Wills only) there had to be some "added value" or else SB would have been a total loss. On paper, adding the push might read like a great idea. In the reality of the actual game, the push effectively renders SB useless. In party everybody using any "push"-spell is instantly flamed out of the door and rightly so! Since there are almost no places left where one can clear mobs by pushing them over the edge pushing is a rather pointless feature anyway.
When using AS you will watch players of all levels, dodge away from buffs and heals. Try rising a downed player inside a divine AS. 99 times out of 100, they will instantly dodge away from the blue circle, regardless of actual threat. The blue circle has in many situations a merely psychological effect. The other party members can see the blue circle pop up "Ah, the DC is doing something good, he is useful!" So nerfing AS might not be as bad in many situations as it reads.
This is a completely different story at chokepoints in dungeons like CN (in example where the Battle Wrights Commanders gather just before you reach the door to the first stairway to Valindra's Pet) and of course in boss fights.The combined regen / def AOE of AS on divine makes the difference between success and failure many times. DG, AS and one of your liking is a good starter now. In the future perhaps Bastion of Health on "Empowered" instead of AS, but it reads as if empowered takes forever and a week to get there. Prophecy of Doom could be sort of a substitute if that spell would get rid of its tremendous drawbacks.
The changes to PoD are looking good on paper. However, PoD suffers from long cast-times: DCs will cast PoD unwillingly on dead and dying mobs and cannot do anything about it. Once this happens, the spell goes on 20 sec CD. The spell is wasted about 50% of the time thus rendering the power on CD forever. Further, PoD is a single target spell, which is the last feature you want to slot in situations where masses and masses of mobs are all the rage (CN, SP, Kar…) PoD is cool in party with sparse heavy mobs like eLOL, for example. PoD is rather pointless when soloing your dailies or when fighting crowds - which can amount to about 90% of what you are doing as a DC.
Chains of Blazing Light used to be my favorite spell while leveling and later on for Sharandar dailies. "Used to" because at one point in the distant past CoB stopped working in many places and situations, enabling mobs (and players, for that matter) to just walk over them without triggering anything. Many bug reports where filed, nothing ever happened. In the end, best choice was to drop CoB alltogether. The power is not worth the hassle.
Daunting Light was so far moderately useful on divine: Instant strike, good damage - but poor aiming and terrybad strikingtime w/o divine. Seeing it getting "reduced damage" on divine and some 10% bonus chance for Crit on empowered makes me wonder why I should be using it at all.
Divine Glow seems to be largely untouched, which I highly welcome because DG is one of the workhorse spells of the DC. Same is true for Forgemaster's Flame. DG and FF are highly useful in many situations when neither you nor the party are swamped by masses of mobs (SP, CN, Kar, etc etc) where you would exchange FF for SB, but now you can't because SB is useless with the coming changes… *sigh*
Only At Wills will generate divine reads like a tiny change but is a serious issue: Many spells take ages to cast and take effect during which the DC cannot use any At Wills. It feels like the overall amount of divine generated with the new mechanic is way lower (on testshard as of today) then it is with the old mechanic in place on Dragon.
Not all feels terrybad and some things might actually get better with the new mechanics. However, the harsh Nerfs to Sunburst and Astral Shield and the new the divine accumulation leave a very mediocre feeling: they feel so far off the game's reality. I doubt that these changes will lead to an overall increased demand for DCs in game since their increase in value to the party is - despite all the gongs bells and whistles - not getting them anywhere near other classes.
Paragon feats missing from both trees.
Looking forward to paragon feats and info update.
A little off-topic, but Kaelac! - I am so glad to see you here! I have followed your guide, and the amount of work and dedication to it has been very evident and made my NW life so much easier. I am hoping that pesky PhD finishing is not going to affect my dependence on your testing and insight.
To keep post on-topic, I CAN say that reading through the notes has me very confused. Definitely need a live testing to give any good constructive feedback, so I shall attempt to do so, but I will not be able to test on preview for a bit. At the moment, all I can say is I'm very confused on this whole "empowered" mechanic. Don't really know if it's good or bad, but as I've seen a few posters mention, it seems counter-intuitive to working with divinity and powers. As stated, not personally tested yet, but have to admit I'm feeling overwhelmed already.
Those making this argument are spending a LOT of their play time in Party... and that's great. However for any non-party and PvP play the default knock-back of Sunburst is an improvement. If you spend all your time in Party-vs-Environment then perhaps you should consider slotting something else? There already is a massive learning curve involved - adding one extra change to your relearning of the class isn't going to hurt any more than the rest of it already.
Either way - if the Devs revert the Sunburst knock-back then so be it. But every argument for this I've seen has been based on theory. I haven't seen any comments that the "problems" with this mechanic has been an actual, in-practice problem as of yet. I won't make this portion of my comment blue as I've already done that - I cast my one vote already.
However:
Regarding EMPOWERMENT: I concur that having each encounter's Empowerment stacks glued only to that encounter makes it more difficult to play. it's easier to just ignore Divinity and Empowerment as it is if I want to remain 'fluid'. Hence my vote is that Empowerment Stacks are global - like the CW Chill and SW Curse: any encounter power can generate the stacks, which are consumed on any OTHER encounter use, etc.
Hm....I rarely run dungeons,I mostly just do my dailies solo and pvp.As I metioned earlier in my feedback post though,I do think that SB knocking back in normal mode is a bad idea and here is why:
Solo PvE: Most of our best damage dealing encounters are aoe: Chains,Daunting light,Divine glow etc.I rarely slot sunburst for my dailies,but I dont see why you want wanna knock the adds all over the place anyway.If anything,gathering them up and bursting them with aoe is the fastest way to kill them.Knocking them away from you means they wont all be affected by your other encounters (unless you wait for them to gather up again,but that's counter-productive).In the end,having continuous knockbacks only stretches out the fight.
Party PvE: As most have mentioned,scattering adds ruins everyone else's combos.You are supposed to be near your allies,so you will keep knocking everything around.That's bad.
PvP: Yeah,cc in pvp is nice,specially now that we lost healing step,which makes kiting tougher.However,an aoe knockback with a 9 sec cooldown is OP,specially against melee. You'd keep knocking all enemies away from you and possibly out of the point,meaning free points for your team.Over and over again.Not to mention,2 opposing clerics on the same node is gonna be annoying for everyone.Your enemies try to focus you,so your allies rush in to peel.They get ready to strike and...boom,enemies are sent flying from your sunburst,your allies cant attack (and possibly wasted encounters hitting air).Your enemies start running back to get you,your allies try to intercept again...boom,enemy cleric knocks you and your team away.You run back on point and this process repeats itself every 9 seconds...You can't actually fight if,the whole time,either you,or your target,is mid-air...Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No,it's just a cleric Sunbursting everyone.If you think about it,no other class has any encounter that can simultaneously knock back,do so in aoe and also with such short cd.Both fighters have aoe cc,but stuns,not knockbacks.Plus it's tougher to actually manage to hit everyone with those abilities.Gfs have a knockback,but it's single target.Trs have aoe cc,but only daze,not knockback,plus on a much longer cd.SWs have no knockbacks and only 1 aoe cc (immobilize).Hrs have no knockbacks either,their only aoe cc being roots.And finally CW have multiple aoe cc,but those are stuns,freezes or aoe Repel (which again,wont affect all your enemies).Im not against normal Sunburst having cc,but as I suggested on my Feedback post,I think it would be better to have normal Sunburst stun for ~1.5 sec and add knockback as an upgrade to the stun, in Empowered sunburst.
As for empowered,I think many people are seeing it wrong...Yes,you can have 3 stacks,but just cause you can,it doesn't mean you always should...If they decided to make it stack to 100,would you stop casting normal versions till you have all 100 stacks? No.So why with 3? The bonus your get doesn't increase exponentially,it's linear,so there's no reason to always save 3 stacks.In fact,many powers discourage spamming the same divine ability 3 times in a row (such as HW or AS).Very few are worth casting more than once in a row in divine mode. This gives you flexibility to use one super empowered encounter (for example,a triple bolstered spirit,if your team needs to kill something fast,or bastion of health,if a teammate is dying) ,or spread out divinity on multiple encounters,to have access to more empowered abilities.I feel that the only reason why they allowed 3 stacks,is because you don't always need the empowered version.There's times when you are fighting a tough battle (both in pve an in pve),so you really NEED the empowerment straight away,to benefit from your powers the most.If,however,you are at an advantageous position and are not struggling with your enemies,the empowered version would be an overkill,specially with heals/defensive buffs etc.You dont need a stronger heal,when your enemy cant kill you anyway,for example.This is why they let you save up to 3 stacks(since we have 3 pips) ,for the moment you can actually make use of them.
As for global stacks,they sound good on paper,since it would simplify things,but there's another way to look at it too.In practice,it would bring many awkward moments,as you would be unable to cast any encounter,in fear of losing the stacks your were planning to use.For example,you start building up stacks,with the intention to heal your half dead ally with bastion of health.But you get stunned mid-cast and your ally dies before you can do anything.You are now alone on point vs 2-3.
-Global empower stacks version: No matter which encounter you use now,it will expend all your stacks,whether you want that or not.You dont need empowered bastion of health anymore,because you are still almost full health.You might want to use Divine glow instead,so that you take less dmg and get a heal as well,to survive against your enemies.But you wont get much from an empowered divine glow either.This means you will waste all the stacks you saved up till then and have to build them up from scratch,which you might not be able to do,with all the enemies trying to kill you.
-Current version: You use your other encounters except bastion, without having to worry much about losing stacks (just keep the timer in mind and refresh as needed) and kite around and heal,while building back some divinity too.Then,when you have actually lost some more Hp,you use all the saved up Bastion stacks,which will now benefit you fully.
There are many other similar scenarios too.You build up stacks and plan to use them for a party dps buff on a boss,yet someone takes a hit.You try to heal them,inevitably wasting all your stacks (since you used an encounter),but they pot as you cast and get back to full hp anyway.You now wasted all stacks for nothing.
This would be mostly a problem with people that prefer to save up three stacks on everything all the time (which as I said,I am against for the most part),but why waste even 1 stack to such a silly reason? The current version ensures that you will cast empowered versions of only the encounter you want,instead of whichever encounter you use next.
FEEDBACK: EMPOWERED I will always be against this new mechanic. DC fixes could have easily have been fixed, without the implementation of Empowered, but what goes on in your heads thinking this method is best is a mystery to me and many others. If devs hated working on DCs before, then they will actually despise DCs now. DCs may never be touched again.
FEEDBACK: DIVINITY GAIN Good to see that this was not mucked up. I have spoken with a few in game in regards to the speed it is gained, and i am given mixed results. some love it others think its too fast and still others prefer the original method of gaining divinity.
I like the speed at which we get divinity, and my vote is don't change the speed. As others have posted, it may very well be the class feat Divine Fortune, that is making gain super fast.
FEEDBACK: HEROIC FEATS Yes this was not on the list but many have wanted some sort of rework with them. I agree there should be some rework but not a complete overhaul. only need a few of the feasts to change.
SUGGESTION: HEROIC FEATS The most used HF are;
T1 - Greater Fortune, Toughness
T2 - Domain Synergy, weapon Mastery
T3 - Repurpose Soul
T4 - Bountiful Fortune,
Please don't touch the above HFs!
Instead rework/create new feats for the others not listed.
SUGGESTION: FORGEMASTERS FLAME Place the healing that is given on Divine FF in the live server, to the Normal FF, seeing as nearly 50% of healing powers were eliminated, from 7 to 4. Leave Divine FF Preview Server version as is.
SUGGESTION: SUNBURST Either place knock back to Divine version (we don't have to spam Divine sunburst for three stack of divinity) or replaced knock back with a stun or daze effect that others have suggested.
SUGGESTION: HALLOWED GROUND The healing that it received from an eliminated feat, makes this only a defensible. Return healing to HG, it's a daily for goodness sake.
SUGGESTION: PROPHECY OF DOOM Shorten casting time for this on normal version. I tried it on PvP, and always got stomped on as i tried to cast it on another. If far away and not seen then it's fine, but 9 times of 10, DCs are targeted before all others and it will be difficult as is, to fire this spell.
BUG: Divine Astral Shield This does not have the blue visual on the ground. Please return it.
BUG: Divine Fortune May be giving more Divinity than listed?
EDIT:
FEEDBACK: Lance of Faith Another DC and myself compared the speed, side by side vs dummies. It looks LoF had its speed increased and is on par with Sacred Flame. Also it looks that LoF gives more divinity than Sacred Flame. Can others test this to see if true?
If so, then a good job devs is in order. Also, I'm replacing Sacred Flame and retuning to my old friend LoF, if it has been improved on.
more testing to be done. be back with more feedback.
I show player support, by only playing Neverwinter as F2P
SUGGESTION: HALLOWED GROUND The healing that it received from an eliminated feat, makes this only a defensible. Return healing to HG, it's a daily for goodness sake.
Or at least give the healing of Guardian of Faith a boost. On Preview, we have exactly 0 good healing dailies. Encounter powers heal more than a Daily. And I don't mean Bastion of Health.
sorry im having a headache atm and can't get the colour thing organized atm
commentary on sunburst.
1) This is a weird, unexpected change.
2) pve players will loathe it.
3) PVP players will like it - IF IT IGNORES TENACITY, otherwise your knockback will do nothing but move them a few pixels.
I really like the daze effect that has been suggested. Perhaps knockback distance based on power level of caster (or weapon damage) then reduce it by tenacity. But there has to be some distance to the push after tenacity is taken into account or what's the point ?
4) divine glory has really become the all purpose everything spell. healing bonus, damage buff to allies, damage debuff to enemies, big damage output, capable of bigger effects in a larger are on empowerment. Daunting light actually looks like the poorer cousin now. The only thing is has going for it is the plus 99% (100%?) damage increase on empowerment. Shouldn't daunting light have at least a a faster casting time than divine glory now to balance these spells against each other ?
5) dc's still need more protection versus cc. In the way past we could regen our way through it, but that was deemed to be too tanky. I can't be certain at this point, not enough testing, but it looks like all our big area regen effects, as well as some of the smaller one, have all been taken away and we have been given temp hit point buffs instead. Technically, its almost the same thing, and potentially better if you gave us enough temp hp that a high enough defence will increase the effect. Is that the way we want to go for dealing with cc resist? Give ourselves enough of a temp hp boost so we can ride the cc chain wave ? I dont think you gave use enough temp hp for that in pve or pvp.
I still want to see the three annointed class features combined into 1 feature. That how much i loathe the individual features. Each seperate annointed feature is too specific. Other classes have features that give them a bonus in two or more things at once
My "feature" votes are these: Normal Sunburst Knock-back as the default: YES (Most useful in leveling/solo/PvP - which is most time played)
Empowerment Stacks are Global: YES (Less mental resource management/coordination)
Notification of Empowerment Status: on Encounter Icons or near Divinity Bar: YES (Easier to see what's what)
My main complaint about Empowerment is only this: Lots of memorization to know what does what, it really slows things down (requires an intermediary step (Divinity) on what is already very slow casting speed). So it should be simplified as much as possible; make Empowerment stacks Global at least.
Bug: Faithful Capstone heals for more than intended?
Feedback: Faithful Note that my cleric is decked out for heals, however, given that some people would _want_ to maximise heals, I believe the Faithful capstone might over do it a tad:http://youtu.be/7Wr8SCPP000
Note in the video (I suggest watching at 2x speed): my DC spends 6 minutes being beat on without ever using an active heal. Only using the Capstone "Gift of Faith" and the T4 "Test of Faith," I am virtually invincible, also I didn't even take the T3 "Chaplain's Strength," which would have increased all the heals by another 10%. I'm not sure my DC would have died at all if I had taken "Chaplain's Strength." The only reason he dies in the end is by getting wedged up against geometry so the knockbacks don't knock him out of aoe.
Suggestion: I believe "Gift of Faith"'s maximum pool needs to be capped at some percentage of the casting DC's max health. I have a screen shot of ticking a 146k _non_-crit "Gift of Faith" on myself. It would be nice, however, if after the target has maxed their "Gift of Faith" pool, that _active_ heals stop dropping 25% of their value and return to full heal strength. Also, consider the synergy of Faithful's T1 "Desperate Restoration" at 5 points with "Gift of Faith." Together they mean that 100% of successfully "procced" "Gift of Faith" heals are straight up increased by 30% in a sort of after-the-fact manner. Was that intended?
Invincible in oudated lvl 60 solo content? Is that really an issue? The healing tree shouldn't be balance according to solo gameplay. There's stuff that hits for 50k+ damage in the newer content.
My "feature" votes are these: Normal Sunburst Knock-back as the default: YES (Most useful in leveling/solo/PvP - which is most time played)
Empowerment Stacks are Global: YES (Less mental resource management/coordination)
Notification of Empowerment Status: on Encounter Icons or near Divinity Bar: YES (Easier to see what's what)
I agree with making Empowerment a global resource.
Also, the heroic feat trees are extremely clunky if you're trying to build a DPS cleric. I think a lot of those feats need to be revised.
Another argument for knockback to return back to divine mode: with normal SB I can run in a group of mobs and cast SB that can will reduce defense with the High Prophet set bonus and not ruining the CC over it and a DG that follows up. Chains doesn't go off reliable enough when I use it in normal or in divine mode.
With the new empowerment changes, HP + SB users will now have to use SB in divine mode, taking away the divine pips away from other encounters. Sure we can spam 3x SB in divine mode for all the HP bonus, but if the empowered SB won't be used, it is a waste.
Bug: Faithful Capstone heals for more than intended?
Feedback: Faithful Note that my cleric is decked out for heals, however, given that some people would _want_ to maximise heals, I believe the Faithful capstone might over do it a tad:http://youtu.be/7Wr8SCPP000
Note in the video (I suggest watching at 2x speed): my DC spends 6 minutes being beat on without ever using an active heal. Only using the Capstone "Gift of Faith" and the T4 "Test of Faith," I am virtually invincible, also I didn't even take the T3 "Chaplain's Strength," which would have increased all the heals by another 10%. I'm not sure my DC would have died at all if I had taken "Chaplain's Strength." The only reason he dies in the end is by getting wedged up against geometry so the knockbacks don't knock him out of aoe.
Suggestion: I believe "Gift of Faith"'s maximum pool needs to be capped at some percentage of the casting DC's max health. I have a screen shot of ticking a 146k _non_-crit "Gift of Faith" on myself. It would be nice, however, if after the target has maxed their "Gift of Faith" pool, that _active_ heals stop dropping 25% of their value and return to full heal strength. Also, consider the synergy of Faithful's T1 "Desperate Restoration" at 5 points with "Gift of Faith." Together they mean that 100% of successfully "procced" "Gift of Faith" heals are straight up increased by 30% in a sort of after-the-fact manner. Was that intended?
With enough HP, DR, deflect and regen, NO ONE would die from those lowbie mobs.
I can tank 10+ unhallowed knights in VT but I still die very quickly from 1 CW in PvP with the same set up.
I like the suggestion of Gift of Faith, it makes no sense to store that much unnecessary amount of heal.
no change to class feature divine fortune? what it do now if encounter dont give you divinity?
with all thos changes, how do you proc linked spirit? does it still exist?
what the divine at will do (punish ans sooting light)? if there is no change it will be unusable consider the options you have for divine encounters
any change to our daily? is HG is still the most used one?
any change for the set bonus, looks like HP still be the most used one, but maybe pvp with all the divinity will be more comon
Bug: Faithful Capstone heals for more than intended?
Feedback: Faithful Note that my cleric is decked out for heals, however, given that some people would _want_ to maximise heals, I believe the Faithful capstone might over do it a tad:http://youtu.be/7Wr8SCPP000
I also did this with my cleric. It was fun to leave the PC, get some coffee, do some other things and return to the game where my cleric was still an immortal punshing ball. But this doesn't work so well when you have an ally around. Soloing with an augment companion makes you kind of invincible but as soon as you summon a combat companion you have to do some active healing (at least I had to ). The reason is Test of Faith. It picks one ally around you. Sometimes it's you, sometimes your companion. So I think in a dungeon with 4 party members and maybe some additional combat companions there is still work to do to fill up the Gift of Faith.
But I agree that it would be a good idea include a cap to Gift of Faith. There is no need to have a 50k heal when there is only 30k HP to fill.
Another argument for knockback to return back to divine mode: with normal SB I can run in a group of mobs and cast SB that can will reduce defense with the High Prophet set bonus and not ruining the CC over it and a DG that follows up.
On Live I'm also using Sunburst to spread buffs and debuffs. But I don't mind the change of the knockback. The argument that you accidently use the knockback when it's the default doesn't count for me. In the heat of the fight this happens to me on Live too when I kind of mess up my fingers. If that happens I type a quick "sorry" and nobody complains about my little accident.
With the new changes you can still use Sunburst to apply the High Prophet debuff when using it in divine mode. Although I will stop using Sunburst in PvE (except for the rare situations where the knockback is needed) because I agree with glowingember:
I respect everyone's views and commentary. But so far everything I have read RE: dropping knock-back on SB is all based on theory and guesswork. And as someone else has said: it's a mediocre Encounter at best - why is everyone so worried about putting it back the way it was (making it worse; status quo)? Just asking.
First of all,I'll be the first to say that everyone is entitled to their own opinion and no one has the right to force them to change it.Everyone's opinions should be equally respected,regardless of whether the rest of the players agree with them or not.That being said,the reason why I disagree with you,is not entirely based on theory.Just like you,I have been playing DC as my main since OB (though I have characters of all classes except warlock) and I have spent quite a few hours testing on Mimic.
I am -NOT- suggesting putting the power back the way it was.I don't see what a knockback offers in solo play,that a stun cannot,though.With my suggestion,you don't lose the knockback,you just have to use the empowered version for it.Otherwise,you just stun the adds,which then allows you to instantly follow up with aoe encounters to finish them off.This means that you still prevent adds from attacking you and,if need be,you knock them away too.In pvp,I already explained how it is op.A 9 second aoe knockback that deals a bit of dmg and heals,is way too much..Now,imagine having -40% cd (from avatar) added to that.For me,the cd drops to under 6.5 seconds.This means that, for 25 seconds,your enemies almost cant even step on the circle.It is OP,no matter how I look at it.An aoe stun serves in protecting you just as well,ithout being so cheesy.And again,you still have the option for knockback!
I might seem to be defending things most people find bad here,but if you look at my feedback post (page 12) you'll see I'm not saying everything is fine as is.I'm also asking for a rework on (most,if not all) heroic feats so that they can be on par with those of other classes,as well as a way for us to defend ourselves from CC.Yes,it is a rock-paper-scissors relationship,with strikers being the counter to controllers (because they can burst them down,while also typically having teleports,stealth,cc breaks etc),controllers being the counter to leaders (because a leader is only as strong as his/her buffs/debuffs and heals,so cc prevent them from casting those),leader being the counter to defender (because they are supposed to outheal any damage the defender can do,plus debuff them so their high resistances mean nothing,making them more vulnerable) and defenders being the counter to strikers (because their high mitigation prevents burst dmg from being effective).Just cause something is a counter though,it should NOT lock out another class from being able to play.
It is not ok that a cw can keep us stunlocked from 100 to 0% hp,just cause we cant break cc.That is not as much of a problem to a tr,since they can stealth (making them a tougher target) and break cc with itc,or to a Gwf,since they can just pop unstoppable.Does that make it ok though? No.Cause you cant play with a good enemy cw around.You need your team to cover you,but even then you are not guaranteed to survive.The cw has more cc than we have dodges,so we will get caught eventually.Even if our allies focus the cw,he still has more dodges than us.If we get hit by even one cc from the cw though,we are pretty much dead.Why? Because then the gwf will stun us with takedown and frontline,then as you think "Ok I can move now",you get a proned by the hr and eat a fox shift to the face,then you try to dodge and the cw uses OF,dazing everyone,simultaneously preventing your allies from peeling for you and you from dodging following cc,which means you'll now get frozen by the cw and so on,till you are dead.And all that,based on a team that has your back.Which,unless you are on a premade,is unlikely to happen.None of this is theory,it's my personal experience.
So what could be done to counter this? Make the dc have OP heals to survive through cc? Even if we had an at will that instantly heals us for 100% of our missing hp,it is of no use if you cant cast at all.Does this mean that said at will is ok though? No,it's OP against any other class.
What else could be done? Nerf the cw? Nerfing their cc would make it balanced for us,since we would have a chance to survive,but would put them at a disadvantage against other classes,since they need their cc to survive.
So,what's the solution? Noone likes getting completely shut down just cause their counter class is in game.It's no fun.Noone enjoys getting permastunned.Noone enjoys getting one shot.In short,noone enjoys not being able to have fun and actually play the game they are playing,just cause their enemy has a class they are supposed to lose to.I dont know about the rest of you,but to me,a fight is only fun when the match is close.Whether it is my team,or the enemy team is is getting stomped,it's not fun.Many suggested adding a feat or a feature (possibly in place of soothe) that adds cc resistance.That's a nice idea.Another thing that I suggested on my original post was implementing an additional divine mode mechanic.In short,you'd hold down Tab (or whatever key you have assigned for divine mode) and break free of existing cc and be immune to dmg and cc for 1 second.For the following 3 seconds,you would be taking 33% less dmg from all sources and cc durations would be halved.The catch is,it would cost 1 pip,as well as disable divinity gains for 5 seconds.What this allows us,is to play a "get out of jail" card,which would however not be spammable; you already wasted 1 pip,meaning you cant heal yourself or allies as effectively.You also cant get more divinity for 5 seconds,which means you cant just spam this to be immune permanently.
Btw,this is the same reason why Im saying current sunburst on test server is OP in pvp.It might not be that much of a problem to a ranged class,but being able to keep every melee away from you,especially if combined with break the spirit for the stuns and righteous path for Avatar,would be Op.
Feedback: The damage of our At-Wills should also be increased to bring them more in line with other classes. Soloing can be a nightmare and take an age to complete. An increase in damage for Sacred Flames, Lance, Blessing of Battle and Brand of the Sun could go along way to close the enormous damage gap that we see party play and make dailies more manageable. While Astral Seal could remain as is with its healing component, all of the other need a big bump in DPS.
+1
We are simply under par with every class in DPS, while we have the ability it can not be utilized. Changes should not go in one direction, each tree should be able to do his or her dailies, like Icewind or Ghost Stories with the same ease as they are with other classes. And please not forget PVP as well i don't see these changes to be sufficient to kill for example a GWF with these, not even the "DPS" tree.
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0
adinosiiMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 4,294Arc User
edited October 2014
I have not been posting my observations until now, for the simple reason that I have been busy testing things - testing various configurations to find something that works well enough.
The DC is my primary class - I have been playing it since day 1 of open beta, and what I really liked about the class is its versatility - strong enough for any solo content and useful in groups - either as a healer or as buffer/debuffer.
Now, I am exclusively a PvE player - probably split my time equally between soloing (dailies and HEs) and group content (dungeons and skirmishes). Sometimes I play with well-geared groups that have no real need for healing - sometimes with undergeared or inexperienced groups where healing is crucial. I don't do PvP - in fact, I couldn't care less about PvP, as long as changes made for the benefit of PvP do not hurt my PvE experience.
So, having said this, what do I think of the changes:
Divinity generation
I like the change to have only at-wills generate divinity - it suits my playstyle pretty well, and the divinity generation is fast enough for me. No issues here.
Empowering:
I simply dislike empowering. For me it is a totally unnecessary complication. Moreover, I dislike that we got something like this (which we neither wanted nor asked for) instead of the changes that the DCs have been hoping to see.
First problem: it is simply too hard to keep track of the empowerment status of each encounter. If we are stuck with empowerment (but as I said, I would rather see it removed altogether), the empowerment status should really show in some obvious way on the encounter power icons - the best suggestion I have seen is to place a border around the icons, which gets brighter as the number of stacks grows.
Second problem: You might not always want to use the empowered power - sometimes it will simply be an overkill, and you would much rather use a non-empowered version, and then the use the empowered one later when it is really needed. We do not have that control.
Third problem: Empowerment works best with powers that are "spammable" but it just does not work that well with powers that you don't spam as fast as you can - Bastion of Health, for example.
I am afraid that the decision to implement empowerment is final, but the current implementation is very inconvenient - it does absolutely not make the class more fun to play, and that is perhaps the biggest problem.
The Sun Burst issue
The change to Sun Burst means that nobody will slot it for group content any more. However, it partly served the purpose of easy divinity generation, and with the changes to that, this is no big loss. The issue for me is the uselessness of Sun Burst when soloing (see below for explanation), but the bottom line for me is that the change to have it always knock enemies back has destroyed its usefulness completely.
Feat Changes
I have been playing around with various feat configurations, and finally settled on a Righteous-based configuration. There are problems with that - and I foresee potential issues in HEs (see below), but for now it works for me. I do, however, have an observation - the new feats allow us to be much better either at healing or DPS, but we lose versatility. It used to be that DCs could be "good enough" at everything - with a single build, you could have enough DPS to handle the solo content (slower than other classes, but still), you could do enough healing to get an undergeared group through any dungeon and you could buff/debuff enough to really make a difference in high-end groups.
To me, it feels we have lost that versatility - we can be much better healers than before, or significantly improve our DPS, but it seems much harder to be "good enough" at everything - at least I have not been able to find the right balance yet.
Playing solo
My selection of encounter powers for solo play was Sun Burst, (divine) Divine Glow and (divine) Daunting Light. The problem here is that the knockback of Sun Burst scatters the enemies, which in turn makes the other two encounter powers harder to use. As I do not need Sun Burst for divinity generation any more, I will probably replace that with the chains.
(divine) Divine Glow and (divine) Daunting Light are still good for soloing.
Regarding soloing in general, with my Righteous-based build, enemies melt much faster than before - soloing is a lot easier than it used to be. In some cases it is actually too easy, but as others have pointed out, some powers just seem a but buggy at the moment.
High-end groups
High-end groups (and by than I mean players who know how to play their class, and have good gear (and GS typically in the 17-19K range) do generally not need much healing, due to how efficient Life Steal is, so I focus on buffing/debuffing. In groups like this, I have tried to keep Hallowed ground up as much as possible and my encounter powers have been Sun Burst (for divinity generation), (divine) Astral Shield and (divine) Divine Glow.
This needs complete rethinking.
Sun Burst is out - not merely inconvenient, but completely useless in groups because of the knockback. The best replacement (in particular when fighting bosses or mini-bosses) seems to be Break the Spirit, due to the really nice debuff it gives.
(divine) Astral Shield - now, that is painful. Losing the HP regeneration in the blue circle (and the healing from Sun burst) significantly cuts down on the limited healing I did - and while it is not necessary, it helps. I will probably have to switch to a "real" AoE healing spell instead - which means (divine) Bastion of Health, I don't like it, but I do not see a good alternative.
(divine) Divine Glow is still as useful as before in groups. Phew!
Heroic Encounters
In HEs, I try to get "Great Success" all the time, and that means playing in an utterly selfish way - avoid buffing other players, and just focus on healing, healing healing. This is not going to be a problem for DCs that focus on healing but I wonder if this might become a real issue for Righteous-based builds. They will never be able to compete with other DCs (or SWs) in the healing category, and although DPS is much improved, it may still not match the DPS of the pure DPS classes.
Now, at the moment my HE encounter power selection is Sun Burst, (divine) Astral Shield and (divine) Forgemaster's Flame. This needs complete rethinking too.
Sun burst may actually work - in this case I don't care about the knockback. Astral Shield is out - probably best replaced with Bastion of Health. and Forgemaster's Flame is out too - probably best replaced with (divine) Divine Glow.
So, what's the bottom line?
Well, many of my favourite PvE powers have been changed to the point where they are useless in certain circumstances - the class is still playable, but I have one major issue (the empowerment implementation) and one concern (performance of non heal-specced DCs in HEs).
I have a number of observations and comments on the various feats and individual powers, but there are simply too many bugs right now for me to be able to properly test everything, so I'll wait until after next patch.
In hindsight I think part of my problem is the frustration when the current Live version of Divinity isn't built-up yet, all out of Stamina for Dodging and the brute standing five feet from me drops a red circle. (Ouch) - in other words my mind is using the entire current scenario and focusing only on the Sunburst, forgetting to take into account all the other changes, like rapid Divinity generation. Now taking ALL the new changes into account I admit that even if they reverted the Sunburst knock back or converted it into a stun - the new Divinity generation is fast enough that the frustrations I've explained wouldn't be an issue - even though I do like and prefer the new default knock-back.
I pretty much concur with most of what you and others are saying about other things, especially about the Empowerment mechanic. My primary complaint about that is how slow it feels (getting to the point of using it: first generate divinity, then use divinity, then get to use Empowerment: too many steps). And DC already feels somewhat lethargic as compared to every other class (even GF).
And for other readers who raise their voice rather than reinforce their arguments: Yes, I do play DC, I've always played DC as my main and they all use Sunburst, Chains, and whatever I dabble with in my third slot.
Comments
So I copied my lv35 Oracle cleric over to test out questing with it. What with the way the divinity system works now... I feel like soloing is actually even harder than before on a leveling DC. o_O
On live, with the old DC system, I didn't have too many problems dealing with mob clusters on my own, honestly. But now with this new setup, everything feels even weaker. Especially considering how much time it takes to build up Empowerment for an encounter. The complexity isn't as much of an issue as is how much harder it is to level now. I actually found it nearly impossible to solo some brute solo mobs, simply because I couldn't kill them fast enough before my Tank companion would simply take too much damage and die. No, don't give me the "youre a cleric, heal it" argument, because the only decent heal you have at that level (read: not sunburst) is Healing Word, and that still wont keep him alive. Anyway, yeah, just my thoughts.
- Make it 3 seconds stun/daze.
2) Exaltation needs damage immunity
- Make Empowered one immune, 1.5 sec immunity per stack would be awesome.[
-Bring back the blue bubble visual effect
3) Divinity gained by at-will only is annoying, especially the cast time is slow.
-Divinity gained from using encounters.
4) Astral shield is bugged now, but if it weren't bugged then it'd still be too weak.
-Increase 10% DR per empowered stack
Mod 12.5 PvP Power/Crit/Arp Optimization
Youtube channel (PvE/PvP)
That was the Mantra I used to chant in Party chat when I got fed up of people standing like lamp posts in the crossfire of three Illithid and a Thoon Hulk and blaming me when they wound up dead.
Or, standing just outside the edge of a Divine Astral Shield at 30% hp with a DoT ticking on them; or just outside a Moon Touched Hallowed Ground.
So, I'd like to suggest that Empowered Encounters should be a different colour, maybe Green. Normal are Yellow, Divine are Blue, so a new colour for any AoE on the ground would help.
Although, my past experiences suggest that it might not help much - some players just have no idea about DC powers, even at level 60.
Shame to mess up the Mantra, though...
"YELLOW is Fine, BLUE is Divine, RED is Nasty, GREEN is Blasty"
Meh... I'll keep working on it...
~
Thank you, I had yet to notice that there was even a visual aid as to the number of stacks of empowerment. I cetainly agree that it's not user friendly where it currently is. Personally I'd like something to appear above the encounter power icon on your skill bar to indicate the number of charges of empowerment, kind of like the + symbol that is above them in divine mode.
I think it's finally time to retire the old "Sooth" class feature. Consider the situation: Righteous DCs certainly won't be slotting it, the new meta (good GFs with their mountains of threat, CWs with their control, SWs with their massive burst) makes threat from healing somewhat redundant, and should anything unforeseeable happen you guys have finally given Virtuous and Faithful the tools they need to keep themselves alive or to keep the people around them, who in turn are keeping them safe, alive.
As a replacement, may I suggest something that DCs sorely need: a class feature that grants increased control resistance (or something similar).
Traditionally D&D clerics of all stripes were known for their protective powers, and yet atm we are the class most vulnerable to CCs. Considering that we now have potentially the least amount of dodges out of any class besides the SW/GWF (Healing Step is gone) a feat that increases control resistance would definitely help with cleric survivability in both PvP and PvE (how many DCs out there hate fighting those ToD white dragonknights?).
BTW, once you've played preview for a few hours you'll realize that the old SB simply has no place in the new lineup of DC powers.
And this is one of my issues with the overhaul. Why do they feel it necessary to lower the usefulness of some of the Cleric skills? (not just talking about one skill here). All this results in is a "you out - you in" situation.
Surely the better way forward would have been to give players a wider choice of equally useful abilities. Not a - this one now has no place in the skills list approach.
"Mod 6. Oh my f****** god. It gutted the game pure and simple. And what wasn't gutted was messed up by the poorly thought out new level cap and equip. The game never recovered from that atrocity".
..............not this one then.............
THANK YOU.
I reiterate also: the entire argument against non-divine Sunburst not knocking-back is the *possibility* someone might *accidentally* use it in a party environment. Most people play Party environments what: 25% of the time? (Remember: 95% of everyone playing the game likely aren't participating in the forums).
Those making this argument are spending a LOT of their play time in Party... and that's great. However for any non-party and PvP play the default knock-back of Sunburst is an improvement. If you spend all your time in Party-vs-Environment then perhaps you should consider slotting something else? There already is a massive learning curve involved - adding one extra change to your relearning of the class isn't going to hurt any more than the rest of it already.
Either way - if the Devs revert the Sunburst knock-back then so be it. But every argument for this I've seen has been based on theory. I haven't seen any comments that the "problems" with this mechanic has been an actual, in-practice problem as of yet. I won't make this portion of my comment blue as I've already done that - I cast my one vote already.
However:
Regarding EMPOWERMENT:
I concur that having each encounter's Empowerment stacks glued only to that encounter makes it more difficult to play. it's easier to just ignore Divinity and Empowerment as it is if I want to remain 'fluid'. Hence my vote is that Empowerment Stacks are global - like the CW Chill and SW Curse: any encounter power can generate the stacks, which are consumed on any OTHER encounter use, etc.
When using AS you will watch players of all levels, dodge away from buffs and heals. Try rising a downed player inside a divine AS. 99 times out of 100, they will instantly dodge away from the blue circle, regardless of actual threat. The blue circle has in many situations a merely psychological effect. The other party members can see the blue circle pop up "Ah, the DC is doing something good, he is useful!" So nerfing AS might not be as bad in many situations as it reads.
This is a completely different story at chokepoints in dungeons like CN (in example where the Battle Wrights Commanders gather just before you reach the door to the first stairway to Valindra's Pet) and of course in boss fights.The combined regen / def AOE of AS on divine makes the difference between success and failure many times. DG, AS and one of your liking is a good starter now. In the future perhaps Bastion of Health on "Empowered" instead of AS, but it reads as if empowered takes forever and a week to get there. Prophecy of Doom could be sort of a substitute if that spell would get rid of its tremendous drawbacks.
The changes to PoD are looking good on paper. However, PoD suffers from long cast-times: DCs will cast PoD unwillingly on dead and dying mobs and cannot do anything about it. Once this happens, the spell goes on 20 sec CD. The spell is wasted about 50% of the time thus rendering the power on CD forever. Further, PoD is a single target spell, which is the last feature you want to slot in situations where masses and masses of mobs are all the rage (CN, SP, Kar…) PoD is cool in party with sparse heavy mobs like eLOL, for example. PoD is rather pointless when soloing your dailies or when fighting crowds - which can amount to about 90% of what you are doing as a DC.
Chains of Blazing Light used to be my favorite spell while leveling and later on for Sharandar dailies. "Used to" because at one point in the distant past CoB stopped working in many places and situations, enabling mobs (and players, for that matter) to just walk over them without triggering anything. Many bug reports where filed, nothing ever happened. In the end, best choice was to drop CoB alltogether. The power is not worth the hassle.
Daunting Light was so far moderately useful on divine: Instant strike, good damage - but poor aiming and terrybad strikingtime w/o divine. Seeing it getting "reduced damage" on divine and some 10% bonus chance for Crit on empowered makes me wonder why I should be using it at all.
Divine Glow seems to be largely untouched, which I highly welcome because DG is one of the workhorse spells of the DC. Same is true for Forgemaster's Flame. DG and FF are highly useful in many situations when neither you nor the party are swamped by masses of mobs (SP, CN, Kar, etc etc) where you would exchange FF for SB, but now you can't because SB is useless with the coming changes… *sigh*
Only At Wills will generate divine reads like a tiny change but is a serious issue: Many spells take ages to cast and take effect during which the DC cannot use any At Wills. It feels like the overall amount of divine generated with the new mechanic is way lower (on testshard as of today) then it is with the old mechanic in place on Dragon.
Not all feels terrybad and some things might actually get better with the new mechanics. However, the harsh Nerfs to Sunburst and Astral Shield and the new the divine accumulation leave a very mediocre feeling: they feel so far off the game's reality. I doubt that these changes will lead to an overall increased demand for DCs in game since their increase in value to the party is - despite all the gongs bells and whistles - not getting them anywhere near other classes.
A little off-topic, but Kaelac! - I am so glad to see you here! I have followed your guide, and the amount of work and dedication to it has been very evident and made my NW life so much easier. I am hoping that pesky PhD finishing is not going to affect my dependence on your testing and insight.
To keep post on-topic, I CAN say that reading through the notes has me very confused. Definitely need a live testing to give any good constructive feedback, so I shall attempt to do so, but I will not be able to test on preview for a bit. At the moment, all I can say is I'm very confused on this whole "empowered" mechanic. Don't really know if it's good or bad, but as I've seen a few posters mention, it seems counter-intuitive to working with divinity and powers. As stated, not personally tested yet, but have to admit I'm feeling overwhelmed already.
It's doing way too much damage. it can continue to tick for 50k and more
Hammer of faith hitted for 80k in pvp
Brand of the sun, same as fire of the gods
Hm....I rarely run dungeons,I mostly just do my dailies solo and pvp.As I metioned earlier in my feedback post though,I do think that SB knocking back in normal mode is a bad idea and here is why:
Solo PvE: Most of our best damage dealing encounters are aoe: Chains,Daunting light,Divine glow etc.I rarely slot sunburst for my dailies,but I dont see why you want wanna knock the adds all over the place anyway.If anything,gathering them up and bursting them with aoe is the fastest way to kill them.Knocking them away from you means they wont all be affected by your other encounters (unless you wait for them to gather up again,but that's counter-productive).In the end,having continuous knockbacks only stretches out the fight.
Party PvE: As most have mentioned,scattering adds ruins everyone else's combos.You are supposed to be near your allies,so you will keep knocking everything around.That's bad.
PvP: Yeah,cc in pvp is nice,specially now that we lost healing step,which makes kiting tougher.However,an aoe knockback with a 9 sec cooldown is OP,specially against melee. You'd keep knocking all enemies away from you and possibly out of the point,meaning free points for your team.Over and over again.Not to mention,2 opposing clerics on the same node is gonna be annoying for everyone.Your enemies try to focus you,so your allies rush in to peel.They get ready to strike and...boom,enemies are sent flying from your sunburst,your allies cant attack (and possibly wasted encounters hitting air).Your enemies start running back to get you,your allies try to intercept again...boom,enemy cleric knocks you and your team away.You run back on point and this process repeats itself every 9 seconds...You can't actually fight if,the whole time,either you,or your target,is mid-air...Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No,it's just a cleric Sunbursting everyone.If you think about it,no other class has any encounter that can simultaneously knock back,do so in aoe and also with such short cd.Both fighters have aoe cc,but stuns,not knockbacks.Plus it's tougher to actually manage to hit everyone with those abilities.Gfs have a knockback,but it's single target.Trs have aoe cc,but only daze,not knockback,plus on a much longer cd.SWs have no knockbacks and only 1 aoe cc (immobilize).Hrs have no knockbacks either,their only aoe cc being roots.And finally CW have multiple aoe cc,but those are stuns,freezes or aoe Repel (which again,wont affect all your enemies).Im not against normal Sunburst having cc,but as I suggested on my Feedback post,I think it would be better to have normal Sunburst stun for ~1.5 sec and add knockback as an upgrade to the stun, in Empowered sunburst.
As for empowered,I think many people are seeing it wrong...Yes,you can have 3 stacks,but just cause you can,it doesn't mean you always should...If they decided to make it stack to 100,would you stop casting normal versions till you have all 100 stacks? No.So why with 3? The bonus your get doesn't increase exponentially,it's linear,so there's no reason to always save 3 stacks.In fact,many powers discourage spamming the same divine ability 3 times in a row (such as HW or AS).Very few are worth casting more than once in a row in divine mode. This gives you flexibility to use one super empowered encounter (for example,a triple bolstered spirit,if your team needs to kill something fast,or bastion of health,if a teammate is dying) ,or spread out divinity on multiple encounters,to have access to more empowered abilities.I feel that the only reason why they allowed 3 stacks,is because you don't always need the empowered version.There's times when you are fighting a tough battle (both in pve an in pve),so you really NEED the empowerment straight away,to benefit from your powers the most.If,however,you are at an advantageous position and are not struggling with your enemies,the empowered version would be an overkill,specially with heals/defensive buffs etc.You dont need a stronger heal,when your enemy cant kill you anyway,for example.This is why they let you save up to 3 stacks(since we have 3 pips) ,for the moment you can actually make use of them.
As for global stacks,they sound good on paper,since it would simplify things,but there's another way to look at it too.In practice,it would bring many awkward moments,as you would be unable to cast any encounter,in fear of losing the stacks your were planning to use.For example,you start building up stacks,with the intention to heal your half dead ally with bastion of health.But you get stunned mid-cast and your ally dies before you can do anything.You are now alone on point vs 2-3.
-Global empower stacks version: No matter which encounter you use now,it will expend all your stacks,whether you want that or not.You dont need empowered bastion of health anymore,because you are still almost full health.You might want to use Divine glow instead,so that you take less dmg and get a heal as well,to survive against your enemies.But you wont get much from an empowered divine glow either.This means you will waste all the stacks you saved up till then and have to build them up from scratch,which you might not be able to do,with all the enemies trying to kill you.
-Current version: You use your other encounters except bastion, without having to worry much about losing stacks (just keep the timer in mind and refresh as needed) and kite around and heal,while building back some divinity too.Then,when you have actually lost some more Hp,you use all the saved up Bastion stacks,which will now benefit you fully.
There are many other similar scenarios too.You build up stacks and plan to use them for a party dps buff on a boss,yet someone takes a hit.You try to heal them,inevitably wasting all your stacks (since you used an encounter),but they pot as you cast and get back to full hp anyway.You now wasted all stacks for nothing.
This would be mostly a problem with people that prefer to save up three stacks on everything all the time (which as I said,I am against for the most part),but why waste even 1 stack to such a silly reason? The current version ensures that you will cast empowered versions of only the encounter you want,instead of whichever encounter you use next.
FEEDBACK: EMPOWERED
I will always be against this new mechanic. DC fixes could have easily have been fixed, without the implementation of Empowered, but what goes on in your heads thinking this method is best is a mystery to me and many others. If devs hated working on DCs before, then they will actually despise DCs now. DCs may never be touched again.
FEEDBACK: DIVINITY GAIN
Good to see that this was not mucked up. I have spoken with a few in game in regards to the speed it is gained, and i am given mixed results. some love it others think its too fast and still others prefer the original method of gaining divinity.
I like the speed at which we get divinity, and my vote is don't change the speed. As others have posted, it may very well be the class feat Divine Fortune, that is making gain super fast.
FEEDBACK: HEROIC FEATS
Yes this was not on the list but many have wanted some sort of rework with them. I agree there should be some rework but not a complete overhaul. only need a few of the feasts to change.
SUGGESTION: HEROIC FEATS
The most used HF are;
T1 - Greater Fortune, Toughness
T2 - Domain Synergy, weapon Mastery
T3 - Repurpose Soul
T4 - Bountiful Fortune,
Please don't touch the above HFs!
Instead rework/create new feats for the others not listed.
SUGGESTION: FORGEMASTERS FLAME
Place the healing that is given on Divine FF in the live server, to the Normal FF, seeing as nearly 50% of healing powers were eliminated, from 7 to 4. Leave Divine FF Preview Server version as is.
SUGGESTION: SUNBURST
Either place knock back to Divine version (we don't have to spam Divine sunburst for three stack of divinity) or replaced knock back with a stun or daze effect that others have suggested.
SUGGESTION: HALLOWED GROUND
The healing that it received from an eliminated feat, makes this only a defensible. Return healing to HG, it's a daily for goodness sake.
SUGGESTION: PROPHECY OF DOOM
Shorten casting time for this on normal version. I tried it on PvP, and always got stomped on as i tried to cast it on another. If far away and not seen then it's fine, but 9 times of 10, DCs are targeted before all others and it will be difficult as is, to fire this spell.
BUG: Divine Astral Shield
This does not have the blue visual on the ground. Please return it.
BUG: Divine Fortune
May be giving more Divinity than listed?
EDIT:
FEEDBACK: Lance of Faith
Another DC and myself compared the speed, side by side vs dummies. It looks LoF had its speed increased and is on par with Sacred Flame. Also it looks that LoF gives more divinity than Sacred Flame. Can others test this to see if true?
If so, then a good job devs is in order. Also, I'm replacing Sacred Flame and retuning to my old friend LoF, if it has been improved on.
more testing to be done. be back with more feedback.
astral shield allows all allies to take 0 damage
Or at least give the healing of Guardian of Faith a boost. On Preview, we have exactly 0 good healing dailies. Encounter powers heal more than a Daily. And I don't mean Bastion of Health.
commentary on sunburst.
1) This is a weird, unexpected change.
2) pve players will loathe it.
3) PVP players will like it - IF IT IGNORES TENACITY, otherwise your knockback will do nothing but move them a few pixels.
I really like the daze effect that has been suggested. Perhaps knockback distance based on power level of caster (or weapon damage) then reduce it by tenacity. But there has to be some distance to the push after tenacity is taken into account or what's the point ?
4) divine glory has really become the all purpose everything spell. healing bonus, damage buff to allies, damage debuff to enemies, big damage output, capable of bigger effects in a larger are on empowerment. Daunting light actually looks like the poorer cousin now. The only thing is has going for it is the plus 99% (100%?) damage increase on empowerment. Shouldn't daunting light have at least a a faster casting time than divine glory now to balance these spells against each other ?
5) dc's still need more protection versus cc. In the way past we could regen our way through it, but that was deemed to be too tanky. I can't be certain at this point, not enough testing, but it looks like all our big area regen effects, as well as some of the smaller one, have all been taken away and we have been given temp hit point buffs instead. Technically, its almost the same thing, and potentially better if you gave us enough temp hp that a high enough defence will increase the effect. Is that the way we want to go for dealing with cc resist? Give ourselves enough of a temp hp boost so we can ride the cc chain wave ? I dont think you gave use enough temp hp for that in pve or pvp.
I still want to see the three annointed class features combined into 1 feature. That how much i loathe the individual features. Each seperate annointed feature is too specific. Other classes have features that give them a bonus in two or more things at once
Thank you for taking the time to improve the dc.
Normal Sunburst Knock-back as the default: YES (Most useful in leveling/solo/PvP - which is most time played)
Empowerment Stacks are Global: YES (Less mental resource management/coordination)
Notification of Empowerment Status: on Encounter Icons or near Divinity Bar: YES (Easier to see what's what)
My main complaint about Empowerment is only this: Lots of memorization to know what does what, it really slows things down (requires an intermediary step (Divinity) on what is already very slow casting speed). So it should be simplified as much as possible; make Empowerment stacks Global at least.
-shrugs-
Capstone heals for more than intended?
Feedback: Faithful
Note that my cleric is decked out for heals, however, given that some people would _want_ to maximise heals, I believe the Faithful capstone might over do it a tad: http://youtu.be/7Wr8SCPP000
Note in the video (I suggest watching at 2x speed): my DC spends 6 minutes being beat on without ever using an active heal. Only using the Capstone "Gift of Faith" and the T4 "Test of Faith," I am virtually invincible, also I didn't even take the T3 "Chaplain's Strength," which would have increased all the heals by another 10%. I'm not sure my DC would have died at all if I had taken "Chaplain's Strength." The only reason he dies in the end is by getting wedged up against geometry so the knockbacks don't knock him out of aoe.
Suggestion:
I believe "Gift of Faith"'s maximum pool needs to be capped at some percentage of the casting DC's max health. I have a screen shot of ticking a 146k _non_-crit "Gift of Faith" on myself. It would be nice, however, if after the target has maxed their "Gift of Faith" pool, that _active_ heals stop dropping 25% of their value and return to full heal strength. Also, consider the synergy of Faithful's T1 "Desperate Restoration" at 5 points with "Gift of Faith." Together they mean that 100% of successfully "procced" "Gift of Faith" heals are straight up increased by 30% in a sort of after-the-fact manner. Was that intended?
I agree with making Empowerment a global resource.
Also, the heroic feat trees are extremely clunky if you're trying to build a DPS cleric. I think a lot of those feats need to be revised.
With the new empowerment changes, HP + SB users will now have to use SB in divine mode, taking away the divine pips away from other encounters. Sure we can spam 3x SB in divine mode for all the HP bonus, but if the empowered SB won't be used, it is a waste.
With enough HP, DR, deflect and regen, NO ONE would die from those lowbie mobs.
I can tank 10+ unhallowed knights in VT but I still die very quickly from 1 CW in PvP with the same set up.
I like the suggestion of Gift of Faith, it makes no sense to store that much unnecessary amount of heal.
Mod 12.5 PvP Power/Crit/Arp Optimization
Youtube channel (PvE/PvP)
no change to class feature divine fortune? what it do now if encounter dont give you divinity?
with all thos changes, how do you proc linked spirit? does it still exist?
what the divine at will do (punish ans sooting light)? if there is no change it will be unusable consider the options you have for divine encounters
any change to our daily? is HG is still the most used one?
any change for the set bonus, looks like HP still be the most used one, but maybe pvp with all the divinity will be more comon
I also did this with my cleric. It was fun to leave the PC, get some coffee, do some other things and return to the game where my cleric was still an immortal punshing ball. But this doesn't work so well when you have an ally around. Soloing with an augment companion makes you kind of invincible but as soon as you summon a combat companion you have to do some active healing (at least I had to
But I agree that it would be a good idea include a cap to Gift of Faith. There is no need to have a 50k heal when there is only 30k HP to fill.
On Live I'm also using Sunburst to spread buffs and debuffs. But I don't mind the change of the knockback. The argument that you accidently use the knockback when it's the default doesn't count for me. In the heat of the fight this happens to me on Live too when I kind of mess up my fingers. If that happens I type a quick "sorry" and nobody complains about my little accident.
With the new changes you can still use Sunburst to apply the High Prophet debuff when using it in divine mode. Although I will stop using Sunburst in PvE (except for the rare situations where the knockback is needed) because I agree with glowingember:
First of all,I'll be the first to say that everyone is entitled to their own opinion and no one has the right to force them to change it.Everyone's opinions should be equally respected,regardless of whether the rest of the players agree with them or not.That being said,the reason why I disagree with you,is not entirely based on theory.Just like you,I have been playing DC as my main since OB (though I have characters of all classes except warlock) and I have spent quite a few hours testing on Mimic.
I am -NOT- suggesting putting the power back the way it was.I don't see what a knockback offers in solo play,that a stun cannot,though.With my suggestion,you don't lose the knockback,you just have to use the empowered version for it.Otherwise,you just stun the adds,which then allows you to instantly follow up with aoe encounters to finish them off.This means that you still prevent adds from attacking you and,if need be,you knock them away too.In pvp,I already explained how it is op.A 9 second aoe knockback that deals a bit of dmg and heals,is way too much..Now,imagine having -40% cd (from avatar) added to that.For me,the cd drops to under 6.5 seconds.This means that, for 25 seconds,your enemies almost cant even step on the circle.It is OP,no matter how I look at it.An aoe stun serves in protecting you just as well,ithout being so cheesy.And again,you still have the option for knockback!
I might seem to be defending things most people find bad here,but if you look at my feedback post (page 12) you'll see I'm not saying everything is fine as is.I'm also asking for a rework on (most,if not all) heroic feats so that they can be on par with those of other classes,as well as a way for us to defend ourselves from CC.Yes,it is a rock-paper-scissors relationship,with strikers being the counter to controllers (because they can burst them down,while also typically having teleports,stealth,cc breaks etc),controllers being the counter to leaders (because a leader is only as strong as his/her buffs/debuffs and heals,so cc prevent them from casting those),leader being the counter to defender (because they are supposed to outheal any damage the defender can do,plus debuff them so their high resistances mean nothing,making them more vulnerable) and defenders being the counter to strikers (because their high mitigation prevents burst dmg from being effective).Just cause something is a counter though,it should NOT lock out another class from being able to play.
It is not ok that a cw can keep us stunlocked from 100 to 0% hp,just cause we cant break cc.That is not as much of a problem to a tr,since they can stealth (making them a tougher target) and break cc with itc,or to a Gwf,since they can just pop unstoppable.Does that make it ok though? No.Cause you cant play with a good enemy cw around.You need your team to cover you,but even then you are not guaranteed to survive.The cw has more cc than we have dodges,so we will get caught eventually.Even if our allies focus the cw,he still has more dodges than us.If we get hit by even one cc from the cw though,we are pretty much dead.Why? Because then the gwf will stun us with takedown and frontline,then as you think "Ok I can move now",you get a proned by the hr and eat a fox shift to the face,then you try to dodge and the cw uses OF,dazing everyone,simultaneously preventing your allies from peeling for you and you from dodging following cc,which means you'll now get frozen by the cw and so on,till you are dead.And all that,based on a team that has your back.Which,unless you are on a premade,is unlikely to happen.None of this is theory,it's my personal experience.
So what could be done to counter this? Make the dc have OP heals to survive through cc? Even if we had an at will that instantly heals us for 100% of our missing hp,it is of no use if you cant cast at all.Does this mean that said at will is ok though? No,it's OP against any other class.
What else could be done? Nerf the cw? Nerfing their cc would make it balanced for us,since we would have a chance to survive,but would put them at a disadvantage against other classes,since they need their cc to survive.
So,what's the solution? Noone likes getting completely shut down just cause their counter class is in game.It's no fun.Noone enjoys getting permastunned.Noone enjoys getting one shot.In short,noone enjoys not being able to have fun and actually play the game they are playing,just cause their enemy has a class they are supposed to lose to.I dont know about the rest of you,but to me,a fight is only fun when the match is close.Whether it is my team,or the enemy team is is getting stomped,it's not fun.Many suggested adding a feat or a feature (possibly in place of soothe) that adds cc resistance.That's a nice idea.Another thing that I suggested on my original post was implementing an additional divine mode mechanic.In short,you'd hold down Tab (or whatever key you have assigned for divine mode) and break free of existing cc and be immune to dmg and cc for 1 second.For the following 3 seconds,you would be taking 33% less dmg from all sources and cc durations would be halved.The catch is,it would cost 1 pip,as well as disable divinity gains for 5 seconds.What this allows us,is to play a "get out of jail" card,which would however not be spammable; you already wasted 1 pip,meaning you cant heal yourself or allies as effectively.You also cant get more divinity for 5 seconds,which means you cant just spam this to be immune permanently.
Btw,this is the same reason why Im saying current sunburst on test server is OP in pvp.It might not be that much of a problem to a ranged class,but being able to keep every melee away from you,especially if combined with break the spirit for the stuns and righteous path for Avatar,would be Op.
+1
We are simply under par with every class in DPS, while we have the ability it can not be utilized. Changes should not go in one direction, each tree should be able to do his or her dailies, like Icewind or Ghost Stories with the same ease as they are with other classes. And please not forget PVP as well i don't see these changes to be sufficient to kill for example a GWF with these, not even the "DPS" tree.
Robert E. Lee
I only believe in statistics that I doctored myself.
Winston Churchill
The human race is a herd. Here we are, unique, eternal aspects of consciousness with an infinity of potential, and we have allowed ourselves to become an unthinking, unquestioning blob of conformity and uniformity. A herd. Once we concede to the herd mentality, we can be controlled and directed by a tiny few. And we are.
David Icke
The DC is my primary class - I have been playing it since day 1 of open beta, and what I really liked about the class is its versatility - strong enough for any solo content and useful in groups - either as a healer or as buffer/debuffer.
Now, I am exclusively a PvE player - probably split my time equally between soloing (dailies and HEs) and group content (dungeons and skirmishes). Sometimes I play with well-geared groups that have no real need for healing - sometimes with undergeared or inexperienced groups where healing is crucial. I don't do PvP - in fact, I couldn't care less about PvP, as long as changes made for the benefit of PvP do not hurt my PvE experience.
So, having said this, what do I think of the changes:
Divinity generation
I like the change to have only at-wills generate divinity - it suits my playstyle pretty well, and the divinity generation is fast enough for me. No issues here.
Empowering:
I simply dislike empowering. For me it is a totally unnecessary complication. Moreover, I dislike that we got something like this (which we neither wanted nor asked for) instead of the changes that the DCs have been hoping to see.
First problem: it is simply too hard to keep track of the empowerment status of each encounter. If we are stuck with empowerment (but as I said, I would rather see it removed altogether), the empowerment status should really show in some obvious way on the encounter power icons - the best suggestion I have seen is to place a border around the icons, which gets brighter as the number of stacks grows.
Second problem: You might not always want to use the empowered power - sometimes it will simply be an overkill, and you would much rather use a non-empowered version, and then the use the empowered one later when it is really needed. We do not have that control.
Third problem: Empowerment works best with powers that are "spammable" but it just does not work that well with powers that you don't spam as fast as you can - Bastion of Health, for example.
I am afraid that the decision to implement empowerment is final, but the current implementation is very inconvenient - it does absolutely not make the class more fun to play, and that is perhaps the biggest problem.
The Sun Burst issue
The change to Sun Burst means that nobody will slot it for group content any more. However, it partly served the purpose of easy divinity generation, and with the changes to that, this is no big loss. The issue for me is the uselessness of Sun Burst when soloing (see below for explanation), but the bottom line for me is that the change to have it always knock enemies back has destroyed its usefulness completely.
Feat Changes
I have been playing around with various feat configurations, and finally settled on a Righteous-based configuration. There are problems with that - and I foresee potential issues in HEs (see below), but for now it works for me. I do, however, have an observation - the new feats allow us to be much better either at healing or DPS, but we lose versatility. It used to be that DCs could be "good enough" at everything - with a single build, you could have enough DPS to handle the solo content (slower than other classes, but still), you could do enough healing to get an undergeared group through any dungeon and you could buff/debuff enough to really make a difference in high-end groups.
To me, it feels we have lost that versatility - we can be much better healers than before, or significantly improve our DPS, but it seems much harder to be "good enough" at everything - at least I have not been able to find the right balance yet.
Playing solo
My selection of encounter powers for solo play was Sun Burst, (divine) Divine Glow and (divine) Daunting Light. The problem here is that the knockback of Sun Burst scatters the enemies, which in turn makes the other two encounter powers harder to use. As I do not need Sun Burst for divinity generation any more, I will probably replace that with the chains.
(divine) Divine Glow and (divine) Daunting Light are still good for soloing.
Regarding soloing in general, with my Righteous-based build, enemies melt much faster than before - soloing is a lot easier than it used to be. In some cases it is actually too easy, but as others have pointed out, some powers just seem a but buggy at the moment.
High-end groups
High-end groups (and by than I mean players who know how to play their class, and have good gear (and GS typically in the 17-19K range) do generally not need much healing, due to how efficient Life Steal is, so I focus on buffing/debuffing. In groups like this, I have tried to keep Hallowed ground up as much as possible and my encounter powers have been Sun Burst (for divinity generation), (divine) Astral Shield and (divine) Divine Glow.
This needs complete rethinking.
Sun Burst is out - not merely inconvenient, but completely useless in groups because of the knockback. The best replacement (in particular when fighting bosses or mini-bosses) seems to be Break the Spirit, due to the really nice debuff it gives.
(divine) Astral Shield - now, that is painful. Losing the HP regeneration in the blue circle (and the healing from Sun burst) significantly cuts down on the limited healing I did - and while it is not necessary, it helps. I will probably have to switch to a "real" AoE healing spell instead - which means (divine) Bastion of Health, I don't like it, but I do not see a good alternative.
(divine) Divine Glow is still as useful as before in groups. Phew!
Heroic Encounters
In HEs, I try to get "Great Success" all the time, and that means playing in an utterly selfish way - avoid buffing other players, and just focus on healing, healing healing. This is not going to be a problem for DCs that focus on healing but I wonder if this might become a real issue for Righteous-based builds. They will never be able to compete with other DCs (or SWs) in the healing category, and although DPS is much improved, it may still not match the DPS of the pure DPS classes.
Now, at the moment my HE encounter power selection is Sun Burst, (divine) Astral Shield and (divine) Forgemaster's Flame. This needs complete rethinking too.
Sun burst may actually work - in this case I don't care about the knockback. Astral Shield is out - probably best replaced with Bastion of Health. and Forgemaster's Flame is out too - probably best replaced with (divine) Divine Glow.
So, what's the bottom line?
Well, many of my favourite PvE powers have been changed to the point where they are useless in certain circumstances - the class is still playable, but I have one major issue (the empowerment implementation) and one concern (performance of non heal-specced DCs in HEs).
I have a number of observations and comments on the various feats and individual powers, but there are simply too many bugs right now for me to be able to properly test everything, so I'll wait until after next patch.
I pretty much concur with most of what you and others are saying about other things, especially about the Empowerment mechanic. My primary complaint about that is how slow it feels (getting to the point of using it: first generate divinity, then use divinity, then get to use Empowerment: too many steps). And DC already feels somewhat lethargic as compared to every other class (even GF).
And for other readers who raise their voice rather than reinforce their arguments: Yes, I do play DC, I've always played DC as my main and they all use Sunburst, Chains, and whatever I dabble with in my third slot.
-sighs-