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Official M16: Barbarian Feedback

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  • agilestoagilesto Member Posts: 516 Arc User

    asterdahl said:

    hoverist said:

    It seemed to me, from the barbarian-Blademaster a big problem with survivability in dungeons.
    The speed of movement has become low, which is very difficult to run out of the AOE. Immunity to control in Sprint(Shift) and Battlerage(Tab) does not work. Because of this, it is impossible to avoid enemy attacks. This aggravates the removal of temporary hit points.
    Barbarian is a melee warrior and it should be at melee zone.
    I think that the barbarian needs to return temporary hit points and immunity to control, as well as increase the speed of running.
    And, I hope, about the problems with damage to know.

    Thanks for the feedback Hoverist! Every class got a bit slower by virtue of movement speed being removed as a rating, Barbarian still has access to sprint and in our internal playtests Blademasters still have an easy time outrunning AoEs or enemies when they pull threat. That being said, if control immunity has stopped working that is absolutely a bug, so I'll take a look. We are definitely reviewing the survivability of Blademasters closely so feedback on this subject is welcome.
    There has always been a problem with our Sprint, there is always a Delay when we press shift, it is not as responsive as the Warlock sprint is for example.
    Not only that but as opposed to the CW (for example), our stamina still has a delay before regenerating.
  • ltsmithnekoltsmithneko Member Posts: 1,578 Arc User
    edited March 2019
    I'd still prefer to see Spinning Strike and Avalanche of Steel to disappear and have Slam and Indomitable Strength return, no one really likes Spin n' Steel they're just crappy dailies down to their design, plus Slam can take on the new effect you added with Steel slam so that doesn't go to waste. ^-^
  • klayl771klayl771 Member Posts: 36 Arc User

    Also Adamantine Strike Should be added to Unstoppable Spin(rename ofcourse), because you wont use Adamantine Strike if is not modified in some way.

    ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    asterdahl said:

    Thanks for the feedback! Adamantine Strike should still be a DPS gain in full group content (depending on your party), over either other choice due to the strength of the negative condition it applies, but I do understand that it may not be apparent that this is the case. It also may not be very interesting that Adamantine Strike is the right choice in most group play, so I'll definitely be looking at possible adjustments.
    ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    I like how the 4th row feats works adding new effect to powers, focus on AoE dailies, the problem is BladeMaster have three options as AoE daily powers and the feats only support 2 of 3 options available, Spinning Strike and Avalanche of Steel. Even though Adamantine Strike dps is better in group play, when option chosen is Adamantine Strike it just feels bad cause the feats don't support it, is why i suggested adding Adamantine Strike to this row feats.

    ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    asterdahl said:(Avalanche of Steel)

    Thanks for the feedback! Keep in mind that the cast time is taken into account when damage is balanced, so even though you're not attacking, the damage is still there. Obviously, if you clip your encounter cooldowns with air time, that's bad, but if you're just missing out on at-wills, you're still talking about a damage increase. There's also a lot of utility to being able to get so many immunity frames.
    ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    The 5sec cast just feels bad for dps, Avalanche of Steel if use is going to be 80% to 90% of the time for dps, utility part is nice but should take a back sit to dps part of this power.


    and thanks asterdahl for the reply and the great work you're doing with the classes and responding to feedback.
  • arailem#1581 arailem Member Posts: 47 Arc User
    Echoing what others said in that the feats we are given is disappointing. I don't use many of the powers these feats give me on live, and to be stuck picking them is feeling less like giving us variety and more like shoe-horning us into builds that aren't suited for every style of gameplay.

    I keep running into an issue where Relentless Slash keeps getting stuck right before the first swing of the sword, especially when holding down the mouse button it's bound to.
    Sunshine SaltmineIs only game, why you have to be so buttmad?
  • bajancloakbajancloak Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 30 Arc User
    @asterdahl here is some feedback.

    1) Maybe its me, but soloing ESOT is harder at the boss if not impossible. Before I could always sprint out of the way of the bosses attacks, now I seem very slow. Movement for the class seems stiff and not as fluid as before the last patch.

    2) I don't feel a difference in how quickly I gain Rage when I use the feats Steady Rage and Impatience. Still seems painfully slow. That being said I find in general gaining rage takes far to long. Can you advise if they are actually working?

    3) Are you able to share the stats of how much of the playerbase actually use Not so Fast and Mightly leap. I have been playing for 5 years and only recall newbies using those encounters. They really seem to be a waste imo.

    4)
  • klayl771klayl771 Member Posts: 36 Arc User

    ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    asterdahl said:

    In regards to choice #1: You mention that you already take Axethrow and Hidden Daggers, but what is your preferred third encounter in a pure AoE build? This feat column was ultimately aiming to provide two different options and styles of gameplay for filling out an AoE build. In regards to Mightier Leap: keep in mind that you can jump away/adjacent to the enemies and then back to get the effect, you don't need to use this only to close the gap, that was really the gameplay that I had in mind with this feat, really increasing mobility even further during combat, and actually requiring you to aim where there are no enemies for the first jump.
    ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    I can understand what you trying to do here, but the problem is, i have an AoE setup and it will have 1 AoE daily, 1 AoE at-will, and two AoE encounters(Axestorm, Hidden Daggers) and 1 ST encounter just cause i don't like to use Mighty Leap or Not-so-fast plus there's always going to be single target at some point of the play session so single target powers is still very useful.

    In this case, i don't use neither Mighty Leap or Not-so-fast so this 1st row of feats don't do anything for me. But if these feats also include some effect(bleed overtime, mag increase etc.) for Axestorm, Hidden Daggers, these feats would still be useful to me and im not force to take Mighty Leap or Not-so-fast. Even though the added effect for Axestorm, Hidden Daggers can't be strong maybe cause the power them selfs already are strong, it still feels good to spec into these feats(if it affect my setup in anyway meaningful).

    btw Axestorm is an awesome ability.
  • kieranmtornkieranmtorn Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 382 Arc User
    edited March 2019
    Let's Look at the Feats for BladeMaster.

    Tier 1: It really doesn't matter which you take, neither has any value past leveling till you get real skills, since neither Relentless Speed or MIghtier Leap will ever be triggered by my normal powers. (leaving it blank, since there is no value here, and I'm not required to take it to use a higher tier).
    Tier 2: DON'T Take Bloodspiller, unless you are suicidal. Unless you plan on using IBS, you can skip this tier also (I prefer Roar, which would be the skill I would displace on my skill bar, since Hidden Daggers + Axestorm are too good to pass up).
    Tier 3: Over Penetration or Brutal Crit, both solid choices, I took Over Penetration since Armor Penetration stacks so easily.
    Tier 4: Unstoppable Spin or Steel Slam: doesn't matter, neither power should be on your bar. Any daily with an excessive lag on startup is suicide.
    Tier 5: Escalating Rage or Relentless Battle Rage: both solid choices, more a matter of play style at this point.

    So my normal build will only have 2 Feats or 10. My choice is NONE OF THE ABOVE on 3 Tiers.

    (I played as Sentinel, till this last patch, then gave it up as a lost cause, since without defense buffs, and even worse feats, I couldn't see bothering to play as Sentinel. And, I miss Front Line Surge, since nothing worthwhile replaced it).
  • rafamarques#5700 rafamarques Member Posts: 155 Arc User
    iam thinking here... the solution os avalanch of steel in fact are simple. By feat or not, you only need change that earthquate effect to the moment that you give the impulse to jump, fading x secs after hit the ground again.
  • ltsmithnekoltsmithneko Member Posts: 1,578 Arc User

    @asterdahl here is some feedback.

    1) Maybe its me, but soloing ESOT is harder at the boss if not impossible. Before I could always sprint out of the way of the bosses attacks, now I seem very slow. Movement for the class seems stiff and not as fluid as before the last patch.

    2) I don't feel a difference in how quickly I gain Rage when I use the feats Steady Rage and Impatience. Still seems painfully slow. That being said I find in general gaining rage takes far to long. Can you advise if they are actually working?

    3) Are you able to share the stats of how much of the playerbase actually use Not so Fast and Mightly leap. I have been playing for 5 years and only recall newbies using those encounters. They really seem to be a waste imo.

    4)

    They do work if you go to the prior pages I have videos showing they are working.
  • themule#2469 themule Member Posts: 26 Arc User
    rjc9000 said:


    However, what has me mixed is that it seems to be doing pretty much all of my damage.

    These measurements must be taken with a grain of salt. The performance of a class hitting stationary targets that doesn't fight back hardly represents the behaviour of such class in real dungeons, moreso now that we have hard hitting AoEs not only from bosses but also from lesser mobs. The DPS loss taken by classes that need to move around is not accounted for in those charts.

    In your post you suggested reducing the damage of encounters and increasing that of at-wills. It won't work well right now because you need to be close and stationary to deliver multiple hits with at-wills, and that means sure death. Encounters work better now because you can move around while waiting for cd to reset (no DPS loss doing so). In a real scenario, powers like Hidden Daggers and Axestorm would be used even more frequently than at-wills or IBS/Frenzy. Basicly you stay at large, deliver HD and AS then you close in for a IBS/Frenzy and then immediately move away again. Even if we had better mobility, we still would spend a lot of time moving around and not using at-wills.

    We might be able to get the old style cqc of the GWF only while running easier contents or by stacking defense. That btw used to be a theme with the old GWF, some builds did stack defense and there used to be feats that kind of encouraged that. Both Steely Defense and Armor Specialization, two Heroic feats that were common to all GWF paths (Swordmaster or Iron Vanguard, Istigator or Destroyer or Sentinel), rewarded stacking defense.

    I wound't mind having a feat that does something similar to Steely Defense (rewarding stacking defense for DPS). Purely adding power maybe isn't viable anymore, but some kind of bonus, maybe adding to atwill damage, wouldn't be bad.

    How about a feat that adds your defense stat to power in damage calculation for atwills only? Stacking defense means giving up on some offensive enchants for defensive ones. At the moment, combat advantage bonus is not easy to max, and most people would equip enchants (and runestone on the companion) that give that.

    Moving say 10k points from CA to power (via defense) for atwills only is a DPS loss (all powers get reduced damage from reduced CA) so I don't think such a feat would be overpowered.
  • docsc00terdocsc00ter Member Posts: 291 Arc User
    edited March 2019
    Not really sure where to post this, but since it relates to a Barbarian weapon I figured this would be as good a place as any...

    That new Alabaster Set weapon? Looks nifty. But it also looks very oversized for a Dwarf. Not scaling correctly? I mean, it's about 25% longer than my character's height!



    (I'm guessing this is not the final art... but it's worth posting since GWF/Barbarian weapons often scale unusually for us shorter folk...)
    Post edited by docsc00ter on
  • rjc9000rjc9000 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 2,405 Arc User
    edited March 2019



    These measurements must be taken with a grain of salt. The performance of a class hitting stationary targets that doesn't fight back hardly represents the behaviour of such class in real dungeons, moreso now that we have hard hitting AoEs not only from bosses but also from lesser mobs. The DPS loss taken by classes that need to move around is not accounted for in those charts.

    They were done in Lair of the Mad Mage, by the way.

    If you want, @thefabricant can dig up the combatlog and you can import it into ACT to see that it was a Lair of the Mad Mage run.

    And yes, the team did do full pulls from room to room and fought all the bosses (though we couldn't clear boss 2 without "features" due to design oversights).


    In your post you suggested reducing the damage of encounters and increasing that of at-wills.

    In that post, I only suggested to reduce Hidden Daggers due to being an overwhelmingly large portion of the damage dealt during Lair of the Mad Mage, not that encounters as a whole are broken.

    If you checked the proportion of damage, IBS, Axestorm, and Not So Fast don't really make up as large of a proportion of damage.

    The reason I suggested increasing damage of At-wills and reducing the damage of only Hidden Daggers is so the class is not forced into using Hidden Daggers all the time as it pretty much is on live. There would be a bonus to using Hidden Daggers, but not the overwhelming power spike it is now.

    It won't work well right now because you need to be close and stationary to deliver multiple hits with at-wills, and that means sure death. Encounters work better now because you can move around while waiting for cd to reset (no DPS loss doing so). In a real scenario, powers like Hidden Daggers and Axestorm would be used even more frequently than at-wills or IBS/Frenzy. Basicly you stay at large, deliver HD and AS then you close in for a IBS/Frenzy and then immediately move away again. Even if we had better mobility, we still would spend a lot of time moving around and not using at-wills.

    In Lair of the Mad Mage, even though the bosses are annoying as hell (boss 2) or teleporting all over the place (boss 1), there are times where they become nice little loot pinatas you get 10-15 seconds to rotate.

    It's not like we're playing Serious Sam and there's 20 million projectiles always flying at you that force you to stay on the move 24/7.

  • nl54#3191 nl54 Member Posts: 145 Arc User

    Not really sure where to post this, but since it relates to a Barbarian weapon I figured this would be as good a place as any...

    That new Alabaster Set weapon? Looks nifty. But it also looks very oversized for a Dwarf. Not scaling correctly? I mean, it's about 25% longer than my character's height!



    (I'm guessing this is not the final art... but it's worth posting since GWF/Barbarian weapons often scale unusually for us shorter folk...)

    It's just a re-coloring of the Golden Dragon artifact sword.
    Ninurta - 16.1k Half-Orc GWF

    Ereshkigal - 12k Tiefling SW

    Aurora Ravensong - 11.6k Drow CW
  • ltsmithnekoltsmithneko Member Posts: 1,578 Arc User

    Not really sure where to post this, but since it relates to a Barbarian weapon I figured this would be as good a place as any...

    That new Alabaster Set weapon? Looks nifty. But it also looks very oversized for a Dwarf. Not scaling correctly? I mean, it's about 25% longer than my character's height!



    (I'm guessing this is not the final art... but it's worth posting since GWF/Barbarian weapons often scale unusually for us shorter folk...)

    Scaling is worse for DB if ya wanna hit with a tooth pick c:
  • themule#2469 themule Member Posts: 26 Arc User
    Thank you for your answer.
    rjc9000 said:



    These measurements must be taken with a grain of salt. The performance of a class hitting stationary targets that doesn't fight back hardly represents the behaviour of such class in real dungeons, moreso now that we have hard hitting AoEs not only from bosses but also from lesser mobs. The DPS loss taken by classes that need to move around is not accounted for in those charts.

    They were done in Lair of the Mad Mage, by the way.

    If you want, @thefabricant can dig up the combatlog and you can import it into ACT to see that it was a Lair of the Mad Mage run.
    I stand corrected then. I got confused with this one (also posted by @thefabricant):
    image which has actually almost the same shape of the pie chart, and was vs a dummy.

    I don't doubt the log, but I'm interested in the rotations... I count more than 3 encounters in the data you posted, so some powers must have been exchanged at some point. Do you know what rotations they used? I'd also like to know what the stats were, if they had maxed defense it's a different story entirely. I'm assuming once things stabilize it won't be possible to max both offensive and defensive stats at the same time. I mean if this is what we're talking about (another post by @thefabricant):

    And here is a friend of mine's stats:


    Every single stat capped barring deflect, no augment pet.

    then every point I made so far is moot. 313k HP, 65k defense (cap at 80% dam resistance, check), 33k crit resiste (overcap, they never crit, check), 33k deflect (this isn't capped, but is also the less effective defensive stat), 30k awareness (overcap, they have no CA bonus, check). These are the stats of a tank, of course I can believe they don't get one-shotted by red areas.

    All these w/o sacrificing offensive stats (ArPen, crit, accuracy, CA all capped). I don't think this is going to be possibile in MOD16. In any case, it won't be possible for the large majority of the playerbase anytime soon after the release of MOD16.

    On a reasonably geared char, if you go for offense your defense is around 35-40k. (20-30% damage resistance). If you try and balance out, you get maybe 45-50k (40-50%). With 210/220 HPs. In my tests, the latter is barely the minimum to survive. You still have to avoid almost all red areas, and waste a lot of time running around.
    rjc9000 said:


    And yes, the team did do full pulls from room to room and fought all the bosses (though we couldn't clear boss 2 without "features" due to design oversights).


    In your post you suggested reducing the damage of encounters and increasing that of at-wills.

    In that post, I only suggested to reduce Hidden Daggers due to being an overwhelmingly large portion of the damage dealt during Lair of the Mad Mage, not that encounters as a whole are broken.

    If you checked the proportion of damage, IBS, Axestorm, and Not So Fast don't really make up as large of a proportion of damage.
    Since you can't use 5 encounters in the same rotation, I'm assuming at least four weren't being used for the whole run. If it was HD,NsF,As for mobs and HD,IBS,Frenzy for bosses that explains why HD proportion is so high. If they used HD only for bosses (but I can't guess what they used for mobs then), then you'd be right. Mind you, you can still be right and HD being overpowered but you can't tell from the data you showed w/o knowing the rotations used.
    rjc9000 said:


    The reason I suggested increasing damage of At-wills and reducing the damage of only Hidden Daggers is so the class is not forced into using Hidden Daggers all the time as it pretty much is on live. There would be a bonus to using Hidden Daggers, but not the overwhelming power spike it is now.

    Fair enough. I agree on not having a single power being better than all others to the point of being obligatory.

    My point was more like: atwills come into play only if you manage to land a significant amount of them. And you have to stay close to do so. If you can't, their base damage isn't that relevant. I'm talking damage application here.
    rjc9000 said:


    It won't work well right now because you need to be close and stationary to deliver multiple hits with at-wills, and that means sure death. Encounters work better now because you can move around while waiting for cd to reset (no DPS loss doing so). In a real scenario, powers like Hidden Daggers and Axestorm would be used even more frequently than at-wills or IBS/Frenzy. Basicly you stay at large, deliver HD and AS then you close in for a IBS/Frenzy and then immediately move away again. Even if we had better mobility, we still would spend a lot of time moving around and not using at-wills.

    In Lair of the Mad Mage, even though the bosses are annoying as hell (boss 2) or teleporting all over the place (boss 1), there are times where they become nice little loot pinatas you get 10-15 seconds to rotate.

    It's not like we're playing Serious Sam and there's 20 million projectiles always flying at you that force you to stay on the move 24/7.
    In Master Expeditions, some mobs and bosses use AoE attacks sometimes w/o even displaying red areas. And before confusion arises, by AoE I mean they are facing the tank, I'm on the opposite side, the tank doesn't loose aggro, and I'm getting one-shotted. It's not relevant if it's technically AoE or a back attack, point is an attack that hits people w/o aggro.

    As long as that happens, you can't stay close to the mob, hence you can use atwills only occasionally.

  • patcherrkmpatcherrkm Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 127 Arc User
    edited March 2019
    Hi asterdhal, I just had a couple things to mention, most of which is covered but I wanted to reiterate.

    I love the idea of blood spilled but it’s literally killing us in its current form. So umm maybe cap the damage at 50% current health?

    Also why were we changed to have 3 defensive slots on companions. I thought 2 o and 2 d seemed balanced.

    We only have 5 feat columns, but some of the choices seem terrible. The first and 4th column specifically under Blademaster. As a design goal, I would much rather play a game that gives me two awesome choices. Please consider making one choice aoe and one single target. Or just make them both desirable.

    Lastly. A level 80 feat unlock that ends up stunning you during combat? Really? I love trade offs, but they have to be fun. And feats shouldn’t get you killed. And the other choice lowers our damage by 5% no matter what? So I get stunned and possibly die or I just lose damage and play it safe? You’re encouraging people to simply not choose a feat. They should be excited to unlock that feat, not indifferent.

    Thank you btw for all your hard work. Your efforts give us old timers hope.
  • rjc9000rjc9000 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 2,405 Arc User
    edited March 2019



    then every point I made so far is moot. 313k HP, 65k defense (cap at 80% dam resistance, check), 33k crit resiste (overcap, they never crit, check), 33k deflect (this isn't capped, but is also the less effective defensive stat), 30k awareness (overcap, they have no CA bonus, check). These are the stats of a tank, of course I can believe they don't get one-shotted by red areas.

    All these w/o sacrificing offensive stats (ArPen, crit, accuracy, CA all capped). I don't think this is going to be possibile in MOD16. In any case, it won't be possible for the large majority of the playerbase anytime soon after the release of MOD16.

    On a reasonably geared char, if you go for offense your defense is around 35-40k. (20-30% damage resistance). If you try and balance out, you get maybe 45-50k (40-50%). With 210/220 HPs. In my tests, the latter is barely the minimum to survive. You still have to avoid almost all red areas, and waste a lot of time running around.

    Funnily enough, that's not my Barbie, that's @sephiz#1200 (I hope I got Xyrella's handle right).

    When I ran that Lair of the Mad Mage run, my Barbie was sitting at 300k HP, 80k Power, 35k ArmorPen & Accuracy, 52K Crit, 40k CA Bonus, and 33k everything else. I am honestly not sure how Xyrella or everyone else gets their stats that high.

    Definitely having Xyrella's stupid defense will help, I did find I was dodging a lot more than I would on live with 5x Shepherd's Devotion.



    Since you can't use 5 encounters in the same rotation, I'm assuming at least four weren't being used for the whole run. If it was HD,NsF,As for mobs and HD,IBS,Frenzy for bosses that explains why HD proportion is so high. If they used HD only for bosses (but I can't guess what they used for mobs then), then you'd be right. Mind you, you can still be right and HD being overpowered but you can't tell from the data you showed w/o knowing the rotations used.

    That is exactly what I did, Not So Fast+Axestorm on AoE, IBS+Frenzy on single, Daggers all the time, so there was some data being skewed there.

    Note that the log was for the entire run, Sharp didn't give me the log to analyze fight by fight (which would have been more interesting I think).

    I would guess Axestorm would see a bigger % of damage on AoE fights and Daggers less % on AoE due to Axestorm being very good at oneshotting whole bunches of enemies.



    I don't doubt the log, but I'm interested in the rotations... I count more than 3 encounters in the data you posted, so some powers must have been exchanged at some point.

    I posted my rotations/ideas down in the link below, I think there is room for improvement for me rotating. :P

    https://www.arcgames.com/en/forums/neverwinter#/discussion/1246310/dont-panic-and-bring-a-towel-basic-class-guides-for-m16/p2



    In Master Expeditions, some mobs and bosses use AoE attacks sometimes w/o even displaying red areas. And before confusion arises, by AoE I mean they are facing the tank, I'm on the opposite side, the tank doesn't loose aggro, and I'm getting one-shotted. It's not relevant if it's technically AoE or a back attack, point is an attack that hits people w/o aggro.

    As long as that happens, you can't stay close to the mob, hence you can use atwills only occasionally.

    No, I'm with you there on some of the more "interesting" attack ranges and not being able to At-will 24/7.

    I can definitely see, on the bosses (especially 2), waiting for cooldowns wasn't as bad when the huge rock hitboxes made it near impossible to rotate, I pretty much tossed out Daggers, Raged, IBSed, hit a few At-wills, then ran away to dodge.

    I was very worried asterdahl (and/or noworries) would just hit the nerf button and not try to keep Barbie in its competitive DPS state while making adjustments.

  • asterdahlasterdahl Member, Cryptic Developer Posts: 1,258 Cryptic Developer
    Hey everyone! Sorry for the slow responses the last few days—spent the last few days burning down a pile of bugs and making as many adjustments as I could for this week's build. The big feat adjustments are going to have to wait for next week but this week will feature a number of bugfixes including: sentinel's runaway damage boost being fixed, axestorm will now orient up slopes, spinning strike will once again grant control immunity correctly, and bloodspiller will now only cause a small portion of the damage dealt to be returned to the blade master. Additionally, the radius of Not So Fast will be increased to 15', up from 13'.

    Although Sentinel's runaway damage bonus will be fixed, Path of the Sentinel's reduction to damage dealt will be reduced to 10% (down from 30%) and it will now grant a 40% increase to maximum hit points. At the same time, the maximum amount of damage prevented by a full stamina bar will be reduced from 100% of maximum hit points to 50% of maximum hit points.

    These changes mean more effective hit points at the start of a fight for any tank. E.g. If you have 100,000 HP, and you used to block for 100,000—you had a total of 200,000 effective hit points. Now you'll have 140,000 HP, and you will block for 70,000—for a total of 210,000 EHP.

    Naturally, this means that your block is a little weaker, but it's still very powerful given how quickly stamina regenerates. We think these changes feel good, a bit more tank healing is required in group content, and tanks can't shield quite as much so often in PvP. However, we're absolutely still ironing out the details regarding tank durability, so these numbers could be reverted, or changed further, but we'd like to see how everyone feels about these changes. So please send your feedback once you've had a chance to check them out in this week's upcoming build.
  • asterdahlasterdahl Member, Cryptic Developer Posts: 1,258 Cryptic Developer

    asterdahl said:

    Blood Fury feat refers to the Blood Fury power, this seems like it should refer to Primal Fury and doesn't actually heal anything at all.

    In the power bar Bloodletter shows a rage cost of 40, but doesn't have a rage cost.

    Thanks for checking out the changes this week, I can see that you're pretty frustrated with the feat choices right now, and I certainly will consider making drastic changes back towards feats that simply give some sort of passive bonuses that don't change how you build your character if the feedback is strong enough, I did want to address a few specific points though.

    In regards to frustrating slash vs. challenger's slash: (snip)

    In terms of Indomitable Might vs. Sure Slash, these are both single target focused feats. (Snip)

    In regards to Blood Fury vs. Extended Unstoppable, I'm glad to hear that you had a hard time deciding on this feat. Ultimately, that's the goal of the feat choices, there is not meant to be a correct solution, but instead we are hoping to allow you to make the choice that fits with your playstyle more or supports a playstyle you're interested in trying. In regards to Blood Fury, there is a benefit, you regain health based on the damage you deal with Primal Fury, if you're un unstoppable, and you can use it without paying its rage cost. The fact that it cancels unstoppable immediately, just means that you want to try to use it right at the end of Unstoppable. However, if you need health desperately, you could click it at any time during unstoppable. So there's some moment-to-moment choices to be made about how to use it.

    In regards to what powers ignore Undying Instinct, this is basically limited to damage of the type "Unavoidable," like boss ultimate attacks, and isn't very common.

    Although I've taken time to respond to your feedback with information about the design goals and thoughts that went into the feat choices, that doesn't mean I'm not considering making further changes. I do hope you'll continue to play around with them.
    I left the bug report from my original post in as it’s kind of important to the Blood Fury v Extended Unstoppable discussion.

    For solo play I have ended up running Sure Strike, Challenger’s Strike, Bloodletter, Punishing Charge, IBS with Undying as a daily and a single target dps daily (not where I can look and don’t remember all the GWFpower names). That set was the only way I could “safely” clear Waning with the Cleric companion summoned (and even then I died to the boss because she is broken) and similarly the Master Expedition with a rune slotted (only the busted Undead Ogre killed me there).

    I tried Primal Fury with the feat, and as it was not healing (or the healing was so small as to be irrelevant) I had to do a full respec (because that’s the only way you can change Feats atm) to replace it. I certainly understand the idea of triggering it just before Unstoppable runs out, but that’s far less effective (or not working) than hitting with Bloodletter buffed under Unstoppable and getting a heal of up to 200k HP, and still having full immunity for the duration. This becomes particularly important if you combo with Undying, because your using the “don’t die” button when something is stripping all your HP or about to one shot you, so you need to get back to 100% possibly multiple times in succession. (Play experience today.)

    The whole experience of solo play for me has been that the AoE powers make you resolve combat slower vs groups than using the peak single target stuff.

    So back to Frustrating Slash, you’re taking a feat to give threat to a power that doesn’t generate threat for half or more of the time you are using it. Even at tap speed Challenger’s is faster and so you can weave it with the faster attack speed of Sure Strike to build Rage and get Unstoppable going faster. This has been a big deal in my play.

    Sure Slash’s problem is it’s a 10% chance to make a utility power dps. So you cannot weave threat through Sure Strike (with at-wills) because now you have a utility power slotted on the chance it will become a dps power. So the feat is a 2 layered trap. The real point of the other one is that it makes IBS a “starting finisher”, all solo trash pretty much wilts under it this way.

    My frustration with the feat choices is derived entirely from the feeling that on the character sheet these are the most important choices across all classes. But the design philosophy being applied across the classes has been to make them very restrictive for what they do. You keep saying (and thank you so much for saying it on your Sunday morning) that you want players to have freedom to create unique roughly balanced builds and to feel they have options to choose different powers. The way you have been making powers better options is by removing options, or at least placing opportunity cost on those options. Both of these lock players into “cookie cutters” because ultimately a “best” set of gear will evolve and the “best” set of powers will evolve as well, taking feats to try and patch the gap will just worsen the problem.
    Hey Obsidiancran3, thanks for the great feedback! I did want to jump in and specify that frustrating slash's feat does not make sentinel's slash generate more threat, it makes sentinel's slash grant you a buff that increases your threat generated by all actions for its duration. I still may change it, but I wanted to clarify that point, as it certainly would be terrible if it just added more threat to sentinel's slash, unless the bonus was astronomical.
  • asterdahlasterdahl Member, Cryptic Developer Posts: 1,258 Cryptic Developer
    gestrisa said:

    asterdahl said:



    Thanks for the in-depth thoughts on the feats!

    In regards to choice #1: You mention that you already take Axethrow and Hidden Daggers, but what is your preferred third encounter in a pure AoE build? This feat column was ultimately aiming to provide two different options and styles of gameplay for filling out an AoE build. In regards to Mightier Leap: keep in mind that you can jump away/adjacent to the enemies and then back to get the effect, you don't need to use this only to close the gap, that was really the gameplay that I had in mind with this feat, really increasing mobility even further during combat, and actually requiring you to aim where there are no enemies for the first jump.


    In regards to choice #3: Glad you found these choices to be okay. The brutal critical feat is designed to encourage use of critical strike, but may need to be further buffed depending on where the final balance of critical strike lands, so I appreciate the feedback.

    On choice #4: I agree that the choice is too clear cut right now and Unstoppable Spin is certain to get a buff.

    On choice #5: I do believe "Rampage" comes up on the screen when you gain the buff, and it may not have made it into this build, but the battlerage icon should also light up. That said, I will look into making this effect more obvious.

    Thanks for replying @asterdahl . I think I'm gonna give Relentless Speed another chance but I do prefer slotting a single target nuke inside when I go AoE focused for emergencies. As for Mightier Leap's intent, I think the Blademaster's sprint mechanic is already enough to cover that. It feels as though you're trying to sell Mightier Leap as an additional dodging option for Barbies similar to how TR/HR/DCs dodge/slide using their shift skill, and it's a cool idea but a lot of Barbs were already dodging/re-positioning stuff using sprint alone so I am not sure if this will even be popular among Barbarians. There's also the extra action turning the mouse away from to target to jump out and re-target to jump in. It's just way easier to press "shift+s" to move away and create distance.

    Also to clarify regarding Rampage being up, rather than the word "Rampage" and the buff icon go up, I think it'd be way easier if it gets it's own battle effect similar to when Barbarian goes Battlerage/Unstoppable they get a giant'ish/turn red effect. I know it's gonna be extra work for your animators but it'd be great if Rampage gets a similar treatment cuz I'm really liking it's "risky factor" designed into it.




    Adding more artwork to rampage is certainly something I am looking into. In regards to Mightier Leap, the damage is balanced to account for the added time of needing to turn. It's something a few of us had fun with internally, that felt very active and still dealt solid AoE damage, but it's certainly not off the chopping block, and may be reworked.
  • asterdahlasterdahl Member, Cryptic Developer Posts: 1,258 Cryptic Developer
    rjc9000 said:

    Bug(s?): Hidden Daggers
    -The follow up effect seems to only be dealing 200 magnitude damage rather than the stated 300 magnitude.
    -The tooltip doesn't list the duration for the follow up attacks. Or, alternatively, it's proccing on hits after the first. (I am not sure which design in the intended one).


    Feedback: Hidden Daggers.
    Aside from the godawful stepback animation that I have to circumvent by jumping and casting, this power leaves me with mixed feelings.

    Don't get me wrong, this power is great and feels good to use. I like that this power encourages the Barbarian to stop, pause, and wait to use it with Rage. It reduces some of the poor muscle memory, as it gives the Barbie to a similar playstyle as before (getting Rage, staying in Rage, and using At-wills under Rage).

    Lastly, Hidden Daggers brings Barbarian to be within 1% of the DPS level of Wizard and Warlock (as found by @greyjay1 and @thefabricant, the class possibly does more if the player makes no mistakes), which is pretty balanced. Keep in mind that is considering that Hidden Daggers is not giving the correct follow up damage (200 vs 300 magnitude damage), if that is ever correctly fixed, I think Barbarian will pull ahead of those classes by a decent margin (possible 5-10%?).

    However, what has me mixed is that it seems to be doing pretty much all of my damage.


    Seeing as it does not quite mimic the damage distribution envisioned for most classes, I fear that you will nerf it and make the class un fun to play, even though I can see the reasoning as to nerfing it.

    I propose two suggestions:

    -Leave Hidden Daggers as is and update the tooltip to reflect its true status (update the tooltip to say the effect is 200 magnitude and procs per hit done for its duration).
    -Increase At-will magnitude by 100 and eliminate the follow up effect on Hidden Daggers. Then add in/change a feat that lets Hidden Daggers do its current follow up effect for 100 magnitude damage per hit (possibly lower it to 75 if overpowering?)

    The former is easy enough and leaves Barbarian in a decent state, though it has the weakness of locking Barbarian into only being competitive with Hidden Daggers. The latter suggestion is so players aren't locked into a situation where they always need to have Hidden Daggers because of the "great with Hidden Daggers, awful without Hidden Daggers" situation.


    Hey thanks for the great data and feedback! If and more likely when Hidden Daggers does get an adjustment, I assure you that we will be making other adjustments overall before Module 16 launches to ensure that the DPS are close to one another, so if that means buffing other Barbarian powers, I assure you that will happen. We'd rather not have one power be such a key component to a build. Particularly when, as much as hidden daggers can be a fun mechanic, it has always been a bit of a black sheep, theme-wise, and I can completely understand wanting to have a build more based on direct, heavy attacks.
  • ltsmithnekoltsmithneko Member Posts: 1,578 Arc User
    edited March 2019
    @asterdahl I know this might not be in your ball park for changes, but you can at least bring it up to whoever is.

    Regarding Companions slots currently it's class based, so if your a dps DC/Barbie/GF your still stuck with your healing/Tanking path counterpart slots. Currently Barbie dps has 3 def, 1 off, 1 utility. This should really be path based it would make a lot more sense overall in balancing act and filling roles.

    Also Mightier leap doesn't save Mighty leap it's still quite a poor power with or without it, any power that causes a player to go out of their way to miss a target to just hit em in the next go would have to provide a massive follow up hit, or a good dmg buff, but overall because of how limiting the feat is I'd rather not see it at all, same goes from most of the feats that only help one power would be better to have them effect 3-ish powers and beef up those powers that were lacking from the start, not attempt to fix them with feats.
  • rafamarques#5700 rafamarques Member Posts: 155 Arc User
    "In regards to Mightier Leap, the damage is balanced to account for the added time of needing to turn. It's something a few of us had fun with internally, that felt very active and still dealt solid AoE damage"

    Sorry for saying that, but it's the same mistake again since beta.

    Developers are not representatives of the playerbase, but We are. when some of us say "i will leave this game because x or y,", you can believe, this guy represent a biiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiig part of your playerbase that will in fact leave if x or y come to the live.
    That said:
    1 - might leap and not so fast are poor powers. roar too.
    2 - you have enough feedback about feats and class features...
    3 - Battle fury still not interesting.
    4 - you really need take a look to the dynamic of atwills for this class.
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