be angry is a consequence about dont see practical and honest responses..
*if gc say "ok, i find some general problems now, I cant talk about them, so it will be difficult to TEST and deal with gwf until at least May,
* make a list of problems that you guys are lying ahead, and i will do the necessary to try fix", really, everbody i will understand, i will curse some times? maybe.
the problem is this Olympic arrogance of repeating "I'm happy to x". even to use the gateway I lost interest, imagine share the happiness of the devs.
Hey all, wanted to drop in and let you all know we are monitoring the PVP performance.
To clarify some things, we are generally fairly happy with where GWFs are in PVE. They are competitive, and do very solid damage for the risks they take being in melee range (where there are more consistent threats to worry about).
However in PVP we want to make a few targeted buffs that should not strongly impact PVE performance. These buffs will not make it for launch, but should go live roughly 2 weeks after launch.
Determination: Determination gain now scales with damage before damage resistance (instead of damage after damage resistance).
Unstoppable: Now increases movement speed by 20% while active.
Takedown: Base stun duration now increased to 4 seconds (up from 3 seconds). This stun can no longer be improperly deflected.
Front Line Surge: Base stun duration now increased to 4 seconds (up from 3 seconds). This stun can no longer be improperly deflected.
We believe these buffs should help improve PVP performance significantly without upsetting the PVE balance greatly.
Thank you all for your continued feedback.
Chris "Gentleman Crush" Meyer
Great buffs, especially with the stuns. There are 3 small things I would buff.
1. Flourish and IBS should have a lower cast time - melee spells with low range and low cast time feel a bit boring.
2. Destroyer class feature should be easier to stack.
3. Unstoppable HP over time shouldn't be effected by power or dmg bonuses it should be a flat amount of HP.
dont forget tenacity and CC resist will lower this quite a bit.
With 26% tenacity plus 10% CC resist from wis, GWF's stuns last forever on live. CC sucks, there should be no CC in PvP that lasts more then 2 seconds ideally. However, we'll see how GWFs are gonna be at m6 launch since these buffs are delayed. May be there won't be a need for them.
M6 almost drains your soul given how boring it is. (c) joocycuzzzzzz
With 26% tenacity plus 10% CC resist from wis, GWF's stuns last forever on live. CC sucks, there should be no CC in PvP that lasts more then 2 seconds ideally. However, we'll see how GWFs are gonna be at m6 launch since these buffs are delayed. May be there won't be a need for them.
While I agree its not the IDEAL change, nevertheless he doesnt seem to be listening to our feedback about what we DO need changed to be viable.
Personally I dont think we need these two encounters stunning longer, what we need is a better "stacking" system for damage boosts, we need temp HP NOT reliant on damage bonuses - Real quick just think about that. You can only gain damage bonuses by constantly attacking your target, you can only gain determination to pop Unstoppable when BEING attacked. Basically it seems to me we cant BOTH BE attacking and GET attacked thus the fact that our damage bonuses are based on attacking means they are OPPOSED to eachother.
Either you will BE attacking, but not gain determination (or very much of it anyways) OR you will be getting attacked, probably CCd or Kited, and THEN youl will need temp HP. Its all backwards LOL.
Honestly what the increased stun time REALLY does for the class is gives us a BETTER chance of getting damage stacks up. Id be fine with a better stack system and less CC as long as we have the tools - like run speed - to KEEP UP with targets instead of getting perma kited and never have any bonuses.
4 seconds too much? What this probably means is really more like ~2.67 seconds in PVP with tenacity and maybe less with CC resist. But yes, Id rather have:
1) Better stacking system
2) Temp HP NOT reliant on Damage bonuses but just a boost
3) Unstoppable DR at a FLAT 30% and given its own layer of DR
4) Intimidation buffed to work like Fire of the Gods - 100% weapon damage every second 15 sconds.
5) remove Hidden Daggers and create "Inexorable Shift" - a Savage Advance encounter, high damage (maybe 75% of IBS), higher CD (maybe 12-14 seconds ISH), Gap closer (just like Savage Advance) that potentially stuns for 2+ seconds (instead of Prones)
6) Roar given a 2 second DAZE
I think these changes ONTOP of the PRE-DR determination gain, and 20% movement IN unstoppable would bring the class inline WITHOUT making stun last 4 seconds (3 is fine without deflect IF we get the proper tools) however WITHOUT better stacking, better DR, better gap closers, better temp HP etc, we will NEED better CC.
"5) remove Hidden Daggers and create "Inexorable Shift" - a Savage Advance encounter, high damage (maybe 75% of IBS), higher CD (maybe 12-14 seconds ISH), Gap closer (just like Savage Advance) that potentially stuns for 2+ seconds (instead of Prones)"
remove the SINGLE good encounter/atwill/daily of this class? why not the over nerfed grand fissure, the ex second better encounter/atwill/daily?
to negotiating powers, the class has lost intimidation... stop the bargains, ok?
what you guys need is "savage advanced now comsuming only half of daily bar" or 75% at least; steel defense will be useful (that is, now i can SURVIVE against the new damages) and the battle awareness will have a reason to exist.
And yet you make Swordmasters not viable for pvp even further. Why not buff Flourish stun as well? Frontline gets a buff and Flourish gets nothing?
Personally I feel the changes won't solve the main problems in PVP. We still can't dodge TR's SE, we still die (and will die) too fast. The determination change won't help because you only get to spam unstopabble like twice (if you're lucky) before a TR smacks you to death. Most I can do is run like a headless chicken and hide behind pillars with unmanageable damage next mod. As if I'll be able to land any of those stuns.
Suggestion -
Flourish stun duration should be longer (buffed like takedown and frotnline) and should MARK. It will be a fair exchange for the additional mark method IV's get.
D&D PnP skills post via the View post link above in quote.
SM needs a mark ability other than IBS , and Grand fissure needs damage increased to be a viable slot over IBS (maybe like 70-80% of ibs dmg) to give us other options for wider AOE in PvP and PvE. At the current damage level its useless for anything other than looking tough
Here's a skill from the fighter class on PnP, that would fit well. medium damage single target encounter with a knockback that marks enemies in aoe.
Warrior’s Challenge Fighter Attack 17
You land a mighty blow that causes your foe to stagger backward.
With a wicked grin, you hoist your weapon and flash it menacingly
at other enemies nearby.
Encounter ✦ Martial, Weapon
Standard Action Melee weapon
Target: One creature
Attack: Strength vs. AC
Hit: 3[W] + Strength modifier damage, and you push the
target 2 squares.
Special: All of your enemies within 2 squares of the target are
marked until the end of your next turn.
The studio loses manpower, the game is in hiatus, the future aint looking all too bright and the forum mods still got nothing better to do than censor posts. Wake up people, we are only still posting here cause we still care. Good luck with turning me off even more. Keep it up and you'll find yourselves alone, in an empty virtual world about to go offline for good.
Row, row, row your boat, Gently down the stream.
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily, Life is but a dream.
I see your idea here is to increase again the speed of determination gain so a GWWF can go unstoppable more. But. Don't you notice current unstoppable is unreliable vs piercing damage and current DPS burst from other classes? It's been mentioned how GWFs in module 6 PvP go down in seconds due CW, TR burst even when in unstoppable. Going unstoppable more in such situation might not do much considering the amount of debuffs affecting unstoppable DR. But, bigger issue is:
Going unstoppable more with current piercing damage and unstoppable, does not fix how TRs can oneshot unstoppable GWFs with shocking execution.
My suggestion is to go in another direction: making Unstoppable defense more reliable and really able to mitigate incoming damage through the whole class. Tweak determination gain so this does not make GWF overpowered
Stuns:
stuns no being deflected is perfect.
If you make Unstoppable more reliable, btw, the duration buff might be deleted.
I think it would really be better to keep 3s stuns unaffected by deflection and unstoppable/ sprint DR not affected by piercing damage and debuffs. Then tweak the numbers to balance. Like decreasing DR from sprint to 15% non debuffable/ pierceable, keep 30% base for whole class from unstoppable and decrease sentinel DR from unstoppable to 60% all non-debuffable/pierceable, while buffing from sentinel capstone the restoring strike damage by 100% and healing to be not 50% over time but 100% over time.
Now you roughly give sentinel a much better way to increase both offense and defense. Defense would be much better than the other paths and equally divided between passive (unstoppable) and proactive (restoring strike), while burst damage would be lower (doubled RS still way behind 50% buff on IBS and other powers) than DPS paths but would compensate a bit for the intimidation loss.
Loss of intimidation compensated by RS damage buff and, more of all, real increase in survivability through unstoppable DR changes (80% debuffable/pierceable is much less than 60% absolute cut-off from incoming damage, plus extra healing from RS).
DPS paths would have a way to do not get burst down all the time but time usntoppable/ sprint to really mitigate incoming damage.
isnt stun half effective vs player so that means from 4 seconds its 2 seconds base duration?
I dont recall this.
Currently Stuns are affected by CC resist.
Most PVPers have what 25%? So a 3 second stun is more like 2.25 however most classes have stats that have CC resist and races like Halfling as well. So a 3 second stun is actualyl more like 2 seconds in PVP.
THEN it could be deflected which would cut it by the deflect severity - most people is only 50% so it would be a 1 second stun and on TRs who have like 85% severity the stun basically was nothing.
NOW it cant be deflected so its just the tenacity feature. Given we will be able to stack more, I would assume for safe bets anywhere from 30-40% reduction in PVP. Probably 40%.
So 4 seconds will become about 2.5 seconds on average now.
Overall 3-4 seconds is actually LESS of a deal than making it not able to be deflected
Hey all, wanted to drop in and let you all know we are monitoring the PVP performance.
To clarify some things, we are generally fairly happy with where GWFs are in PVE. They are competitive, and do very solid damage for the risks they take being in melee range (where there are more consistent threats to worry about).
However in PVP we want to make a few targeted buffs that should not strongly impact PVE performance. These buffs will not make it for launch, but should go live roughly 2 weeks after launch.
Determination: Determination gain now scales with damage before damage resistance (instead of damage after damage resistance).
Unstoppable: Now increases movement speed by 20% while active.
Takedown: Base stun duration now increased to 4 seconds (up from 3 seconds). This stun can no longer be improperly deflected.
Front Line Surge: Base stun duration now increased to 4 seconds (up from 3 seconds). This stun can no longer be improperly deflected.
We believe these buffs should help improve PVP performance significantly without upsetting the PVE balance greatly.
Thank you all for your continued feedback.
Chris "Gentleman Crush" Meyer
Adding onto this It's great too see these changes, They are a great step towards what we need. Takedown and FLS are definitely often-used in PvP for IV build and the CC change is a plus, they are still hard to land but the reward from them is larger now.
SM needs some love though also, I'm assuming that SM is meant to be seen as the PvE spec and IV as the PvP one, but it'd be nice for both to be viable in either scenario. so I'd suggest Buffing Flourish the same as you have buffed Td/FLS , and decreasing the time before its stun hits so it can be landed against more competent players who can just dodge when the slow animation starts. I also would suggest a buff to Daring shout to make it more valuable in slot so a DPS based SM feels that sacrificing a damage encounter for it mark ability is more justified (usually GWF's go 3 damage encounters as we dont have the luxury of super high damage like a rogue does with Smoke/LB/ITC slotted) Adding base damage to it, or adding a slow to the affected enemies would make it very useful for PvE and PvP.
I feel that a lot of our less-used encounters are overlooked, When I look at my other classes, I can see value in almost all of their encounters, however when I look at my GWF I see skills that just aren't useful enough to be worth the slot. Some of these include Not so fast (damage is too low)Mighty leap (Low damage , unviable) Battle fury (buff isnt strong enough and doesnt affect allies enough) and Grand fissure (nerfed to oblivion, the damage is worse than 2-3 at will hits) I have a few ideas to improve these that add use to the skills (keeping in mind we can have 3 slotted at once so I cant see the impact to PvE being too large, this just adds more options by buffing underperforming/low damage encounters)
Not so fast :Increase damage by about 50% , You can increase it off the base damage, or add a bleed effect for the duration of the slow
Mighty leap : Each level of this power now adds +1 Leap charge, for a max of 4 leaps , Bwam instantly makes this skill not only FUN, but deal good damage by stacking all the leaps together.
Battle Fury : Make the buff affect allies +15% more per rank. so at rank 4 allies benefit from 70% of the buff. This is the change that affects PvE the most so may not be feasible.
Grand Fissure : Bring back its original damage or at least 80% of it, this should deal damage only slightly lower than IBS, Its got higher range than IBS, but it doesnt have the mark effect of IBS. doing this makes it worth slotting over IBS and then we can use Daring shout as our mark when playing Swordmaster,
I hope you take a look at this and consider making some sort of changes towards them. These aren't our main problem, and there are other things more important to look at (such as making Unstoppable DR be on its on layer like CW shield , and the abysmal damage from intimidation now) But these suggestions do add more build options to us and can bring new life to the class. (I can see myself now mighty leaping all over the place while laughing hysterically)
Its great too see that the changes you made in the quoted post are towards what we need. just a tiny bit further and I think we'll be perfect, not too strong, but not too weak.
Adding onto this It's great too see these changes, They are a great step towards what we need. Takedown and FLS are definitely often-used in PvP for IV build and the CC change is a plus, they are still hard to land but the reward from them is larger now.
SM needs some love though also, I'm assuming that SM is meant to be seen as the PvE spec and IV as the PvP one, but it'd be nice for both to be viable in either scenario.
I share these sentiments. I dont understand why Steel Blitz is not improved to work much more LIKE Storm Spell.
1) Why is Steel Blitz % chance so low compared to Storm Spell? I get that SS is off crits but its very common for CWs to have high Crit AND they get EOTS which guarantees crits!
- Steel Blitz needs to be raised to like 25% chance and deal damage similar to the damage that SS does. Remember GWFs are melee and have target caps, GWFs can sit back and AoE an entire group of mobs, get EoTS to proc which just BLOWS UP the mobs. Id even say Steel Blitz should be something like 50% chance given the nature of GWF and target cap versus CWs. Plus Giving up a Feat means we either lose Weapon Master ( VERY valuable Crit chance) OR Destroyer (massive damage boosts). So its not like its a freebie choice AT ALL.
2) Why so SM GWFs have no REAL way to mark targets? This seems to be the biggest issue with the class. Flourish is their unique encounter. Seems like Flourish should add a 'mark' to the target. Id also think it would be wise to re-work Weapon Master Strike to INSTEAD of a debuff, just have it mark the target. It would be a great AoE at will that could be used to mark in melee range.
I share these sentiments. I dont understand why Steel Blitz is not improved to work much more LIKE Storm Spell.
1) Why is Steel Blitz % chance so low compared to Storm Spell? I get that SS is off crits but its very common for CWs to have high Crit AND they get EOTS which guarantees crits!
- Steel Blitz needs to be raised to like 25% chance and deal damage similar to the damage that SS does. Remember GWFs are melee and have target caps, GWFs can sit back and AoE an entire group of mobs, get EoTS to proc which just BLOWS UP the mobs. Id even say Steel Blitz should be something like 50% chance given the nature of GWF and target cap versus CWs. Plus Giving up a Feat means we either lose Weapon Master ( VERY valuable Crit chance) OR Destroyer (massive damage boosts). So its not like its a freebie choice AT ALL.
2) Why so SM GWFs have no REAL way to mark targets? This seems to be the biggest issue with the class. Flourish is their unique encounter. Seems like Flourish should add a 'mark' to the target. Id also think it would be wise to re-work Weapon Master Strike to INSTEAD of a debuff, just have it mark the target. It would be a great AoE at will that could be used to mark in melee range.
If daring shout was a bit stronger SM could use that to mark targets, I think we need our Non damage encounters to be strong enough to slot over another damage encounter, like how other classes can slot defensive encounters and offensive encounters while still being strong , (rogues with smoke/itc , CW with shield , GF with basically everything , cleric with shield.)
Mighty leap : Each level of this power now adds +1 Leap charge, for a max of 4 leaps , Bwam instantly makes this skill not only FUN, but deal good damage by stacking all the leaps together.
Takedown: Base stun duration now increased to 4 seconds (up from 3 seconds). This stun can no longer be improperly deflected.
Front Line Surge: Base stun duration now increased to 4 seconds (up from 3 seconds). This stun can no longer be improperly deflected.
We believe these buffs should help improve PVP performance significantly without upsetting the PVE balance greatly.
Feedback: Swordmaster:Flourish What do you intend to do with this encounter? Its single target and too slow making it very hard to land in PVP. I think it needs faster casting time and lower cooldown to compete with Iron Vanguard: Front Line Surge.
Feedback: Roar Low damage and unreliable skill lock, it just pushes enemy in pvp its just a joke. I think this should just be a 2 sec stun and a 2 sec slow afterwards.
Feedback: Hidden Dagger Major fail encounter a juggernaut wielding twohanded weapon thats fails dagger.
Feedback: Mighty Leap Traveling time is slow, 1 sec silence is unreliable and AOE is small these things makes it undesirable in pvp...... please upgrade
Feedback: Reaping Strike Its melee range so removing the movement speed reduction upon charge up will improve qol, plus its useless when cced.... please improve the damage and charge up speed further.
Went through class features also.
added a quick reason why they are unused / less used, and a suggestion to make them viable if you wanted to take a look also. Again, these are more of something to look at later, not things that we need changing to make us viable, but they do add build variation and spice up the class.
Steadfast DeterminationThe Determination boost from this is irrelevant, I would change this feat to instead make unstoppable 20/30/40/50% stronger and 5/10/15/20% more temp hp (so 6-12 seconds, might need to be scaled so its more like 6-10 seconds)
Remember that you can only have 2 features at one time so would have to give up Weapon master or destroyer for example.
Steel Blitz This is pretty much useless on GWF , Change it too work like storm spell does to keep it in line.
Steel Grace unused mostly, is a reasonably powerful defensive feature, howeverwe already have a lot of CC mitigation (immunity) via unstoppable. on P&P DnD this was more of an offensive feature (Steel Grace (11th level): When you charge with a light blade or a heavy blade that is not a polearm, you can use Containing Strike or Reaping Strike instead of your melee basic attack.) Increased damage after using sprint??
Probably best to just leave it as is.
Ferocious Reaction hp return is too low, Increase Hp gained to 25%, 12.5% in pvp isnt that much and 25% in Pve most mobs that'd cause a problem hit harder than that anyway. still makes it more useful though.
Enduring Warrior1/2/3/4% heal on kill is too low, Make this something like Temp HP on HIT (Hits only, not dots like deep gash) or 2/4/6/8 temp hp on kill.
about ds vs bf, if you choose sm/destroyer (only destroyer seens viable for pve) bf will give a "free" 25% damage bonus (ignoring ibs mark) and that will represent a bonus of temporary hp.
mark is no longer a urgency because, after be overnerfed, unstoppable become a machine recycling of bad encounters ...
the other suggestions I would add charges in roar too. is a <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> damage/cc that can be dinamic if you can repeat i short periods of time... "like a side kick or a jab".
I do not get that fixation with marks or with WMS marking. What the class needs is to remove marks' damage and put all that damage into base encounter and dailies damage. Let the mark system as a GF-class and let us, GWF-class, deal plain damage.
Comments
*if gc say "ok, i find some general problems now, I cant talk about them, so it will be difficult to TEST and deal with gwf until at least May,
* make a list of problems that you guys are lying ahead, and i will do the necessary to try fix", really, everbody i will understand, i will curse some times? maybe.
the problem is this Olympic arrogance of repeating "I'm happy to x". even to use the gateway I lost interest, imagine share the happiness of the devs.
1. Flourish and IBS should have a lower cast time - melee spells with low range and low cast time feel a bit boring.
2. Destroyer class feature should be easier to stack.
3. Unstoppable HP over time shouldn't be effected by power or dmg bonuses it should be a flat amount of HP.
Yeah I feel this too... I was using it in IWD and guild mates where like "WTF - you guys get a TR ability now? Throwing Daggers?"
Its just awkward... Id rather have some sort of gap closer or some other form of melee CC. Give us another option to use.
Golem Dazing Fist: Smashes up to 5 targets with a blast from his Fists, dazing and knocking back up to 5 targets as well as dealing damage.
That could be a great addition OR look at:
Inexorable Shift: You throw yourself at your enemy and knock him back.
(Copy/Paste Savage Advance but as an encounter)
dont forget tenacity and CC resist will lower this quite a bit.
With 26% tenacity plus 10% CC resist from wis, GWF's stuns last forever on live. CC sucks, there should be no CC in PvP that lasts more then 2 seconds ideally. However, we'll see how GWFs are gonna be at m6 launch since these buffs are delayed. May be there won't be a need for them.
While I agree its not the IDEAL change, nevertheless he doesnt seem to be listening to our feedback about what we DO need changed to be viable.
Personally I dont think we need these two encounters stunning longer, what we need is a better "stacking" system for damage boosts, we need temp HP NOT reliant on damage bonuses - Real quick just think about that. You can only gain damage bonuses by constantly attacking your target, you can only gain determination to pop Unstoppable when BEING attacked. Basically it seems to me we cant BOTH BE attacking and GET attacked thus the fact that our damage bonuses are based on attacking means they are OPPOSED to eachother.
Either you will BE attacking, but not gain determination (or very much of it anyways) OR you will be getting attacked, probably CCd or Kited, and THEN youl will need temp HP. Its all backwards LOL.
Honestly what the increased stun time REALLY does for the class is gives us a BETTER chance of getting damage stacks up. Id be fine with a better stack system and less CC as long as we have the tools - like run speed - to KEEP UP with targets instead of getting perma kited and never have any bonuses.
4 seconds too much? What this probably means is really more like ~2.67 seconds in PVP with tenacity and maybe less with CC resist. But yes, Id rather have:
1) Better stacking system
2) Temp HP NOT reliant on Damage bonuses but just a boost
3) Unstoppable DR at a FLAT 30% and given its own layer of DR
4) Intimidation buffed to work like Fire of the Gods - 100% weapon damage every second 15 sconds.
5) remove Hidden Daggers and create "Inexorable Shift" - a Savage Advance encounter, high damage (maybe 75% of IBS), higher CD (maybe 12-14 seconds ISH), Gap closer (just like Savage Advance) that potentially stuns for 2+ seconds (instead of Prones)
6) Roar given a 2 second DAZE
I think these changes ONTOP of the PRE-DR determination gain, and 20% movement IN unstoppable would bring the class inline WITHOUT making stun last 4 seconds (3 is fine without deflect IF we get the proper tools) however WITHOUT better stacking, better DR, better gap closers, better temp HP etc, we will NEED better CC.
remove the SINGLE good encounter/atwill/daily of this class? why not the over nerfed grand fissure, the ex second better encounter/atwill/daily?
to negotiating powers, the class has lost intimidation... stop the bargains, ok?
what you guys need is "savage advanced now comsuming only half of daily bar" or 75% at least; steel defense will be useful (that is, now i can SURVIVE against the new damages) and the battle awareness will have a reason to exist.
in fact, that can be the new battle awareness...
seriously no matter how much + sec's we get on Stun, I would still prefer Prone instead of stun.
stun is still just a joke for pvp-
And yet you make Swordmasters not viable for pvp even further. Why not buff Flourish stun as well? Frontline gets a buff and Flourish gets nothing?
Personally I feel the changes won't solve the main problems in PVP. We still can't dodge TR's SE, we still die (and will die) too fast. The determination change won't help because you only get to spam unstopabble like twice (if you're lucky) before a TR smacks you to death. Most I can do is run like a headless chicken and hide behind pillars with unmanageable damage next mod. As if I'll be able to land any of those stuns.
Suggestion -
Flourish stun duration should be longer (buffed like takedown and frotnline) and should MARK. It will be a fair exchange for the additional mark method IV's get.
The Holy Crusaders guild leader ♚ Mod 10 PVE Destroyer GWF guide ♚ Founding member of the Relentless Alliance
SM needs a mark ability other than IBS , and Grand fissure needs damage increased to be a viable slot over IBS (maybe like 70-80% of ibs dmg) to give us other options for wider AOE in PvP and PvE. At the current damage level its useless for anything other than looking tough
Here's a skill from the fighter class on PnP, that would fit well. medium damage single target encounter with a knockback that marks enemies in aoe.
Drunken Goose of MidNight Express. - 3.3k Paladin , 3.6k GWF , 3.1k GF,
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily, Life is but a dream.
Feedback: proposed GWF changes to determination
I see your idea here is to increase again the speed of determination gain so a GWWF can go unstoppable more. But. Don't you notice current unstoppable is unreliable vs piercing damage and current DPS burst from other classes? It's been mentioned how GWFs in module 6 PvP go down in seconds due CW, TR burst even when in unstoppable. Going unstoppable more in such situation might not do much considering the amount of debuffs affecting unstoppable DR. But, bigger issue is:
Going unstoppable more with current piercing damage and unstoppable, does not fix how TRs can oneshot unstoppable GWFs with shocking execution.
My suggestion is to go in another direction: making Unstoppable defense more reliable and really able to mitigate incoming damage through the whole class. Tweak determination gain so this does not make GWF overpowered
Stuns:
stuns no being deflected is perfect.
If you make Unstoppable more reliable, btw, the duration buff might be deleted.
I think it would really be better to keep 3s stuns unaffected by deflection and unstoppable/ sprint DR not affected by piercing damage and debuffs. Then tweak the numbers to balance. Like decreasing DR from sprint to 15% non debuffable/ pierceable, keep 30% base for whole class from unstoppable and decrease sentinel DR from unstoppable to 60% all non-debuffable/pierceable, while buffing from sentinel capstone the restoring strike damage by 100% and healing to be not 50% over time but 100% over time.
Now you roughly give sentinel a much better way to increase both offense and defense. Defense would be much better than the other paths and equally divided between passive (unstoppable) and proactive (restoring strike), while burst damage would be lower (doubled RS still way behind 50% buff on IBS and other powers) than DPS paths but would compensate a bit for the intimidation loss.
Loss of intimidation compensated by RS damage buff and, more of all, real increase in survivability through unstoppable DR changes (80% debuffable/pierceable is much less than 60% absolute cut-off from incoming damage, plus extra healing from RS).
DPS paths would have a way to do not get burst down all the time but time usntoppable/ sprint to really mitigate incoming damage.
I dont recall this.
Currently Stuns are affected by CC resist.
Most PVPers have what 25%? So a 3 second stun is more like 2.25 however most classes have stats that have CC resist and races like Halfling as well. So a 3 second stun is actualyl more like 2 seconds in PVP.
THEN it could be deflected which would cut it by the deflect severity - most people is only 50% so it would be a 1 second stun and on TRs who have like 85% severity the stun basically was nothing.
NOW it cant be deflected so its just the tenacity feature. Given we will be able to stack more, I would assume for safe bets anywhere from 30-40% reduction in PVP. Probably 40%.
So 4 seconds will become about 2.5 seconds on average now.
Overall 3-4 seconds is actually LESS of a deal than making it not able to be deflected
Adding onto this It's great too see these changes, They are a great step towards what we need. Takedown and FLS are definitely often-used in PvP for IV build and the CC change is a plus, they are still hard to land but the reward from them is larger now.
SM needs some love though also, I'm assuming that SM is meant to be seen as the PvE spec and IV as the PvP one, but it'd be nice for both to be viable in either scenario. so I'd suggest Buffing Flourish the same as you have buffed Td/FLS , and decreasing the time before its stun hits so it can be landed against more competent players who can just dodge when the slow animation starts. I also would suggest a buff to Daring shout to make it more valuable in slot so a DPS based SM feels that sacrificing a damage encounter for it mark ability is more justified (usually GWF's go 3 damage encounters as we dont have the luxury of super high damage like a rogue does with Smoke/LB/ITC slotted) Adding base damage to it, or adding a slow to the affected enemies would make it very useful for PvE and PvP.
I feel that a lot of our less-used encounters are overlooked, When I look at my other classes, I can see value in almost all of their encounters, however when I look at my GWF I see skills that just aren't useful enough to be worth the slot. Some of these include Not so fast (damage is too low) Mighty leap (Low damage , unviable) Battle fury (buff isnt strong enough and doesnt affect allies enough) and Grand fissure (nerfed to oblivion, the damage is worse than 2-3 at will hits) I have a few ideas to improve these that add use to the skills (keeping in mind we can have 3 slotted at once so I cant see the impact to PvE being too large, this just adds more options by buffing underperforming/low damage encounters)
Not so fast :Increase damage by about 50% , You can increase it off the base damage, or add a bleed effect for the duration of the slow
Mighty leap : Each level of this power now adds +1 Leap charge, for a max of 4 leaps , Bwam instantly makes this skill not only FUN, but deal good damage by stacking all the leaps together.
Battle Fury : Make the buff affect allies +15% more per rank. so at rank 4 allies benefit from 70% of the buff. This is the change that affects PvE the most so may not be feasible.
Grand Fissure : Bring back its original damage or at least 80% of it, this should deal damage only slightly lower than IBS, Its got higher range than IBS, but it doesnt have the mark effect of IBS. doing this makes it worth slotting over IBS and then we can use Daring shout as our mark when playing Swordmaster,
I hope you take a look at this and consider making some sort of changes towards them. These aren't our main problem, and there are other things more important to look at (such as making Unstoppable DR be on its on layer like CW shield , and the abysmal damage from intimidation now) But these suggestions do add more build options to us and can bring new life to the class. (I can see myself now mighty leaping all over the place while laughing hysterically)
Its great too see that the changes you made in the quoted post are towards what we need. just a tiny bit further and I think we'll be perfect, not too strong, but not too weak.
Drunken Goose of MidNight Express. - 3.3k Paladin , 3.6k GWF , 3.1k GF,
I share these sentiments. I dont understand why Steel Blitz is not improved to work much more LIKE Storm Spell.
1) Why is Steel Blitz % chance so low compared to Storm Spell? I get that SS is off crits but its very common for CWs to have high Crit AND they get EOTS which guarantees crits!
- Steel Blitz needs to be raised to like 25% chance and deal damage similar to the damage that SS does. Remember GWFs are melee and have target caps, GWFs can sit back and AoE an entire group of mobs, get EoTS to proc which just BLOWS UP the mobs. Id even say Steel Blitz should be something like 50% chance given the nature of GWF and target cap versus CWs. Plus Giving up a Feat means we either lose Weapon Master ( VERY valuable Crit chance) OR Destroyer (massive damage boosts). So its not like its a freebie choice AT ALL.
2) Why so SM GWFs have no REAL way to mark targets? This seems to be the biggest issue with the class. Flourish is their unique encounter. Seems like Flourish should add a 'mark' to the target. Id also think it would be wise to re-work Weapon Master Strike to INSTEAD of a debuff, just have it mark the target. It would be a great AoE at will that could be used to mark in melee range.
If daring shout was a bit stronger SM could use that to mark targets, I think we need our Non damage encounters to be strong enough to slot over another damage encounter, like how other classes can slot defensive encounters and offensive encounters while still being strong , (rogues with smoke/itc , CW with shield , GF with basically everything , cleric with shield.)
Drunken Goose of MidNight Express. - 3.3k Paladin , 3.6k GWF , 3.1k GF,
cryptic plz
Takedown: Base stun duration now increased to 4 seconds (up from 3 seconds). This stun can no longer be improperly deflected.
Front Line Surge: Base stun duration now increased to 4 seconds (up from 3 seconds). This stun can no longer be improperly deflected.
We believe these buffs should help improve PVP performance significantly without upsetting the PVE balance greatly.
Feedback: Swordmaster:Flourish
What do you intend to do with this encounter? Its single target and too slow making it very hard to land in PVP. I think it needs faster casting time and lower cooldown to compete with Iron Vanguard: Front Line Surge.
Feedback: Roar
Low damage and unreliable skill lock, it just pushes enemy in pvp its just a joke. I think this should just be a 2 sec stun and a 2 sec slow afterwards.
Feedback: Hidden Dagger
Major fail encounter a juggernaut wielding twohanded weapon thats fails dagger.
Feedback: Mighty Leap
Traveling time is slow, 1 sec silence is unreliable and AOE is small these things makes it undesirable in pvp...... please upgrade
Feedback: Reaping Strike
Its melee range so removing the movement speed reduction upon charge up will improve qol, plus its useless when cced.... please improve the damage and charge up speed further.
Thank you and more power
Bless you all
added a quick reason why they are unused / less used, and a suggestion to make them viable if you wanted to take a look also. Again, these are more of something to look at later, not things that we need changing to make us viable, but they do add build variation and spice up the class.
Steadfast Determination The Determination boost from this is irrelevant, I would change this feat to instead make unstoppable 20/30/40/50% stronger and 5/10/15/20% more temp hp (so 6-12 seconds, might need to be scaled so its more like 6-10 seconds)
Remember that you can only have 2 features at one time so would have to give up Weapon master or destroyer for example.
Steel Blitz This is pretty much useless on GWF , Change it too work like storm spell does to keep it in line.
Steel Grace unused mostly, is a reasonably powerful defensive feature, howeverwe already have a lot of CC mitigation (immunity) via unstoppable. on P&P DnD this was more of an offensive feature (Steel Grace (11th level): When you charge with a light blade or a heavy blade that is not a polearm, you can use Containing Strike or Reaping Strike instead of your melee basic attack.) Increased damage after using sprint??
Probably best to just leave it as is.
Ferocious Reaction hp return is too low, Increase Hp gained to 25%, 12.5% in pvp isnt that much and 25% in Pve most mobs that'd cause a problem hit harder than that anyway. still makes it more useful though.
Enduring Warrior 1/2/3/4% heal on kill is too low, Make this something like Temp HP on HIT (Hits only, not dots like deep gash) or 2/4/6/8 temp hp on kill.
Drunken Goose of MidNight Express. - 3.3k Paladin , 3.6k GWF , 3.1k GF,
about ds vs bf, if you choose sm/destroyer (only destroyer seens viable for pve) bf will give a "free" 25% damage bonus (ignoring ibs mark) and that will represent a bonus of temporary hp.
mark is no longer a urgency because, after be overnerfed, unstoppable become a machine recycling of bad encounters ...
the other suggestions I would add charges in roar too. is a <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> damage/cc that can be dinamic if you can repeat i short periods of time... "like a side kick or a jab".