Official M16: Paladin Feedback

asterdahl · April 2019

Hey everyone! During our livestream today some of you were asking if I was still alive due to my sluggish responses recently and I just wanted to update you all that I am still very much alive, but that I have been devoting all of the evening time I had dedicated to replying to these threads to getting everything locked down ahead of our internal gold deadline so that our QA department has sufficient time to hammer on things ahead of launch. I have been skimming through posts as much as possible and hope to square away some time soon to answer more questions. In the meantime, I'd like to apologize for how quiet I've been.

I recently finished a big adjustment pass on both Paladin paragon paths. This includes a major overhaul of feats, as well as an overhaul of the Justicar's tab mechanic that will make it to preview this week. The Justicar's tab mechanic will now be "Divine Champion" which drains divinity over time to double the effect of your auras on yourself and any allies within 30' (indicated by a visual effect on the ground), and automatically blocks 50% of incoming damage from all directions using your stamina. You will be able to attack and take normal actions while Divine Champion is active, and you will also be able to turn it off at any time. A 5 second cooldown will be incurred once it is deactivated.

Divine Palisade will still be usable, replacing your standard block when Divine Champion is active. Divine Palisade now also heals you and allies within its area of effect over time.

I've also made some adjustments to regenerating divinity that should make divinity generation more active. For the Justicar, Justicar's Charge has been adjusted so that it is not significantly weaker against a single slow-attacking enemy than it is against many fast-attacking enemies. There is now a "pool" of divinity that Justicar's Charge may restore, whenever it restores divinity, this pool is partially depleted. The pool regenerates on its own over time, and resets out of combat.

Once you empty the pool, blocking will not return much divinity until it replenishes, so you can use block as you would normally to prevent damage. It may sound a bit complicated, but the short explanation is: as long as you don't avoid blocking for massive lengths of time, you should never have "wasted" divinity that you could have restored by blocking.

There are two new feats that tie into divinity regeneration for Justicar as well, one feat strengthens the effect of Justicar's Charge if you'd like to double down on that style of play, and the other "Divine Pursuit," adds divinity regeneration to your at-will attacks for the next 10 seconds after you activate a spell that costs divinity. With this feat, you can focus more on active divinity regeneration in combat by attacking.

Oathkeeper will also receive two new feats that tie into divinity regeneration. The first, "Divine Focus" will allow you to build a stack of focus for every second you channel divinity. Once you reach 10 stacks, you will gain the effect of "Focused Action,"
similar to Justicar's Divine Pursuit, this will cause your at-wills to regenerate some divinity for the next 10s. Stacks of focus will last quite a while, so you don't need to channel divinity to build all 10 stacks in one go, and time it so that you receive Focused Action when you want it.

A reworked "Prayer of Opportunity" will provide an alternative divinity restoration technique, granting all your actions a 5% chance to give you a stack of Prayer of Opportunity. You will be able to store 3 prayers and whenever you Channel Divinity a single prayer is consumed granting a chunk of divinity all at once.

These are just a few of the changes coming to Paladin this week, with a focus on making divinity management more engaging, providing more viable power choices, and breaking up the pacing of combat more for Justicar so it doesn't feel like playing a turtle. I hope you'll take some time to check out the changes on Friday, and look forward to your feedback!

majorcharvenak · April 2019

Thanks for the update @asterdahl. Looks promising but will have to wait and see how they work in practice.

Any word on when the oath of devotion mechanic will be unlocked and what it will do?

obsidiancran3 · April 2019

Excited to see how this all works!

kacsanever · April 2019

obsidiancran3 said:
> @kacsanever said:
> Incidentally can we get the same number of stat points as the other classes? (+1 Str and Dex or just +2 Str would be great.)
> Why do you want +STR on a Paladin? My last experience/experiment was that, both tank and heal path get increased damage from INT (divine based attacks->magic damage). Have they changed it?
> What else would STR give for a Pala?
> I do understand DEX b/c of increased CritSev and MovSpeed.

Str is Stamina Gain.

If both Str and Dex start at 10, that would be best as it gives the most flexibility for people.

You are right, I forgot about stamina gain.

silvergryph said:
BUG?:The new starting attribute array for Paladin totals to 72 points, whereas all other classes total 74 points. This is not due to a weighted system such as D&D's point buy. They don't match up to any D&D point buy system. For example, in 5e point buy the point values for the current starting arrays would range from 32 points (Cleric) up to 37 points (Barbarian). No, they appear to just be all composed of 74 points divided as the devs saw fit. Except Paladin at 72 points.

Paladin: STR: 8, CON: 12, DEX: 8, INT: 12, WIS: 14, CHA: 18

The other classes for reference:
Barbarian: STR: 18, CON: 14, DEX: 14, INT: 8, WIS: 10, CHA: 10
Cleric: STR: 10, CON: 10, DEX: 10, INT: 15, WIS: 16, CHA: 13
Fighter: STR: 16, CON: 16, DEX: 14, INT: 8, WIS: 10, CHA: 10
Ranger: STR: 16, CON: 12, DEX: 16, INT: 10, WIS: 8, CHA: 12
Rogue: STR: 13, CON: 13, DEX: 18, INT: 8, WIS: 10, CHA: 12
Warlock: STR: 8, CON: 14, DEX: 12, INT: 16, WIS: 8, CHA: 16
Wizard: STR: 8, CON: 10, DEX: 12, INT: 18, WIS: 14, CHA: 12

Suggested Array: STR: 10, CON: 12, DEX: 8, INT: 12, WIS: 14, CHA: 18
OR
STR: 10, CON: 12, DEX: 10, INT: 12, WIS: 14, CHA: 16

Good catch. I support the later distribution.

dewolff · April 2019

I am really glad to see changes are applied so that we are less dependent on 'unreliable' divinity income, as I mentioned once before. Moreover because we now also get the chance to not just manage our divinity expenses, but also our income, which I personally welcome.

The description of our new Tab-power feels like a more engaging power to me than that we currently have. It appears to be a divine skill that truly fits a paladin and I'm curious to try it out on the preview.

So thanks for the effort put in to make these changes! It's is still too early to comment on the outcome, but at first sight I find them positive and I can't wait to try them out on the preview.

anoreksja · April 2019

@asterdahl
Both Justicar and Oathkeeper path need Cleansing Touch (Encounter) in an unchanged form as in 15 mod,
because this is the basic skill PvP that allows to break free from immobilization skills CW/SW/TR/GF etc..

anoreksja · April 2019

Generally not only in PvP Paladins should have a control break since they can function as a tank, so Cleansing Touch is a very important encounter skill

obsidiancran3 · April 2019

To confirm a prior report, our shield in Mod16 doesn't stop the fear effect from Yuan-ti. This is the red AoE centered on the Yuan-ti. On live at the moment Sanctuary blocks this effect.

Neither Sanctuary nor Shield block the charm effect that places the eye above the Yuan-ti so this is the same behavior in both versions.

-----
Radiant Charge: with a 1.9s cast time, this spell has a glitch.
You can cast Radiant Charge, activate anything, which cancels the Radiant Charge without effect or cost. However if you cancel in this way you still get the VFX for the power, so it looks like it has cast successfully.

The main problem I have with Radiant Charge is the cast time is so long and the animation so slow and vision obscuring that by the time I'm sure it has actually cast (per the above bug) the prone/stun from it is finished. The prone would seem to need to double in length, or be applied after the animation/cast time is completed.

majorcharvenak · April 2019

anoreksja said:
@asterdahl
Both Justicar and Oathkeeper path need Cleansing Touch (Encounter) in an unchanged form as in 15 mod,
because this is the basic skill PvP that allows to break free from immobilization skills CW/SW/TR/GF etc..

Maybe they SHOULD swap Divine Touch for Cleansing Touch in the powers layout. The heal isn't much on CT but it costs less DT and would give both paths the ability to remove negative effects (especially if they fix it to remove the effects in a small area). Useful for both PvE AND PvP.

emilemo · April 2019

Ha! I actually suggested Tab being turned into a toggle of sorts with an on/off functionality somewhere in this thread

. What @asterdahl describes above finally sounds like an ability for a powerful, holy warrior. Yet, it looks like the party benefit would still be quite meager /Auras are currently at 2%, with this new Tab = 4%/

Feats overhaul + new Feats = Great!

The new blocking divinity pool thing sounds fishy. Gonna have to wait and see how it performs

Overall thanks for the update!

jase2cool · April 2019

Nice changes , "Divine Champion" is a good cant wait to test this out.
I do hope it does not cost too much divinity to keep it up as we do need to use divinity for encounters .

asterdahl said:

Divine Palisade will still be usable, replacing your standard block when Divine Champion is active. Divine Palisade now also heals you and allies within its area of effect over time.

I do hope Divine Palisade no longer cost 60 Divinity per second as it replaces our block option during Divine Champion mode.

silvergryph · April 2019

kacsanever said:

silvergryph said:
BUG?:The new starting attribute array for Paladin totals to 72 points, whereas all other classes total 74 points. This is not due to a weighted system such as D&D's point buy. They don't match up to any D&D point buy system. For example, in 5e point buy the point values for the current starting arrays would range from 32 points (Cleric) up to 37 points (Barbarian). No, they appear to just be all composed of 74 points divided as the devs saw fit. Except Paladin at 72 points.

Paladin: STR: 8, CON: 12, DEX: 8, INT: 12, WIS: 14, CHA: 18

The other classes for reference:
Barbarian: STR: 18, CON: 14, DEX: 14, INT: 8, WIS: 10, CHA: 10
Cleric: STR: 10, CON: 10, DEX: 10, INT: 15, WIS: 16, CHA: 13
Fighter: STR: 16, CON: 16, DEX: 14, INT: 8, WIS: 10, CHA: 10
Ranger: STR: 16, CON: 12, DEX: 16, INT: 10, WIS: 8, CHA: 12
Rogue: STR: 13, CON: 13, DEX: 18, INT: 8, WIS: 10, CHA: 12
Warlock: STR: 8, CON: 14, DEX: 12, INT: 16, WIS: 8, CHA: 16
Wizard: STR: 8, CON: 10, DEX: 12, INT: 18, WIS: 14, CHA: 12

Suggested Array: STR: 10, CON: 12, DEX: 8, INT: 12, WIS: 14, CHA: 18
OR
STR: 10, CON: 12, DEX: 10, INT: 12, WIS: 14, CHA: 16
Good catch. I support the later distribution.

rainer#8575 actually noticed it. Rainer has a great document tracking M16, and I gave him corrected starting attributes obtained via the character creation screen on an empty Preview account. Rainer asked if I was sure because Paladin didn't add up to 74 like the rest. So, I checked them all to verify and decided to report it here.

majorcharvenak · April 2019

Confirmed @asterdahl! Two paladins in a party could impact divinity regeneration for the Justicar if they receive heals from the Oathkeeper. I'm working with my guildie to get his ACT logs but we did a test in both Dread Ring AND in SoT. Against both sets of mobs, and with him draining his divinity via bane, he was not able to get any divinity regeneration while blocking due to the presence of Divine barrier from my heals. Was using, Divine Touch, Divine Shelter and Lay on Hands with the feat that grants a barrier. As I mentioned in an earlier post, the barrier appears to have priority over block when mitigating damage. It will be an issue in party play, especially the RQs if you wind up with two pallies in the tank and heals slot. If one of them either can't change to another loadout or doesn't have one, one of them might have to drop. Don't get me wrong, I like the barrier. Its an interesting feature that makes it stand out from the other healers, but it needs to be second in priority after block when receiving hits, otherwise it looks really dicey to have two different paladins in the same group.

Edit: Now that I think about it, will the barrier impact other classes outside of the paladin if they are under the effects of the barrier and have powers that require them to take damage for some kind of benefit?

fns2005 · April 2019

> @asterdahl said:
> There are two new feats that tie into divinity regeneration for Justicar as well, one feat strengthens the effect of Justicar's Charge if you'd like to double down on that style of play, and the other "Divine Pursuit," adds divinity regeneration to your at-will attacks for the next 10 seconds after you activate a spell that costs divinity. With this feat, you can focus more on active divinity regeneration in combat by attacking.

Oathkeeper will also receive two new feats that tie into divinity regeneration. The first, "Divine Focus" will allow you to build a stack of focus for every second you channel divinity. Once you reach 10 stacks, you will gain the effect of "Focused Action,"
similar to Justicar's Divine Pursuit, this will cause your at-wills to regenerate some divinity for the next 10s. Stacks of focus will last quite a while, so you don't need to channel divinity to build all 10 stacks in one go, and time it so that you receive Focused Action when you want it.

A reworked "Prayer of Opportunity" will provide an alternative divinity restoration technique, granting all your actions a 5% chance to give you a stack of Prayer of Opportunity. You will be able to store 3 prayers and whenever you Channel Divinity a single prayer is consumed granting a chunk of divinity all at once.

These seems like great feat upgrades for divinity regeneration for the Pally. Are Clerics getting anything like this??

emilemo · April 2019

Well well, two patches away from m16 going live and we finally have feats and passives that more of less gvie a unique feel to the class. That being said I really dislike the loss of the Feat granting BO cc immunity. All Justicar CC protection is now tied to either Blocking or Tab which imo is a bad idea. Tab depletes D like crazy, good luck recovering that in a dungeon, your only hope to be a tank would be Vow since you're fresh out of divinity.

Why do we have a choice between a feat affecting At Wills and a feat affecting an Ecnounter /Baneful Strikes vs Burning Vengeance/ ? That makes no sense, something that enhances at wills should not contend with something which enhances an encounter.

Sheltering light vs Shield of the gods - sorry but wasting a whoe Feat /considering we only get 5/ for the small benefits it adds to some Daily which you may or may not use is bad. Its bad! Its an extremely situational usage and not that great effect either and I have to waste a whole Feat on it?

I'll test this weekend and write up some more however Im going back to one of my earlier statements that the dev team in fact has no idea how to make the Justicar tick / even if you guys do have a vision for the class - @asterdahl /

majorcharvenak · April 2019

Hmm...The new feat Spirit of Austerity gives quite a nerf to Smite and Bane. After testing it in Barovia and Chult, I'm not certain its worth the associated reduced divinity cost to slot it. I could see maybe taking it if I put together a strictly group heals loadout but not soloing. Losing half the damage might just be a price too high.

Bug: There seems to be quite a bit of animation canceling with smite since this patch, @asterdahl. Smite will start and the audio effects will kick, but it will not follow through with the overhead strike if another power is pressed soon afterward. In my case, it was a valorous strike follow - up.

The boost for healing for Cure, Divine Touch, Shelter, and Sanctuary are less than I'd hope for but still seem to get the job done as well as they can in solo play (as far as Divine Touch and Shelter are concerned anyway). Group play might be another matter and will need to test.

Oathkeeper STILL does not possess a means to remove negative effects from multiple party members. Cleansing touch DOES that on a devotion paladin on live. Why was this ability removed and the effects limited to one target?

While I'm pleased that the Oath of Devotion mechanic was unlocked, I was afraid of and subsequently underwhelmed by what it does with respect to adding the barriers to our heals. Barriers which I'm looking to test on other classes to find out if the inclusion of said barrier hampers other classes ability to boost various abilities from damage they received. Unless you changed it with this patch, the Barrier is still struck first BEFORE the block.

A mixed bag all-around. Off for more testing.

skrewfaz3d · April 2019

I played my paladin in a couple expeditions and it feels better (more active) and I noticed that Smite creates a lag when used. Bane is solid. The new tab function is a divinity killer which keeps smite very weak often.

obsidiancran3 · April 2019

Thanks @majorcharvenak you figured out what is happening to Smite for me!

So far I am pretty happy with these changes, I am able to see and construct a Justicar for solo and party play that actually plays differently and the party one manages to remain a dynamic play experience.

@emilemo yes Binding Oath lost its CC immunity, but Burning Light’s new block (via feat) and the combo that makes with Binding Oath and Sacred Weapon is quite nice.

I have been able to reach the first boss of LotMM, still need to get rotations sorted exactly, but overall the situation seems much improved.

One thing I noticed is that Augments no longer give 100k HP, which means there has been a significant reduction in shield effectiveness. However we have very good access to a large amount of DR so with experience the net change should be fine.

Once I have played some more this weekend I’ll have more comprehensive feedback.

jimmypdt · April 2019

So I just tested out the Tank and Healing paragon paths for OP. First off, credit where credit is due. Well done!! Things are coming together in both paths (still a little work to be done but more testing is required first before commenting on it). Of what I have tested, and I still have a lot to test in regards to different powers and feat combinations, one of the major things I have notice is with the Oathkeeper. It seems that the oathkeepers heals give a really nice barrier to whoever is heal (even more when its a crit). This is really nice but worrisome. I feel like this might make tanking useless if the OP can just put shields on the DPSs. More testing is required but this kind of jumped out at me while testing a few things. If anyone else has tested this and can comment on it please do!!
I wish you the best,
OPTank_

obsidiancran3 · April 2019

@jimmypdt given how fast things can clear 450k HP and our shield in LotMM I’m not worried about Oathkeeper shields negating tanks.

I am worried about Oathkeeper shields shutting down Divinity recovery for Justicar though, given how much more useful our new Tab mechanic is and the need to keep Divinity charged to use it.

codeteller · April 2019

Healers really need a better interface.
The reticle for doing damage is insufficent to this new model of healing
we need to see our entire party, and others in our trial as applicable and be to heal them directly rather than w a targeting reticle

majorcharvenak · April 2019

WHAT THE EVER-BLOOMING HECK @asterdahl!?!

You gave them WINGS? Not ONLY did you give the Justicars an additional mechanic with Divine Champion with some great effects when coupled with Divine Palisade, you gave them FRIGGIN WINGS with the animation?

No more complaints from the Justies are allowed in these forum pages! Nothing but glowing praise and hosannas from the favored of the two paragons from here on out! You got your wings! *turns and smites a kobold while grumbling at the unfairness of it all*.

Sarcasm aside folks, it REALLY IS both a nice effect and power. Hoods off to you @asterdahl.

karvare · April 2019

Augments are bugged in HP given. Mine shows 468k HP then, at times, 566k HP. While killing vamps in lowest level of Under Mountain it was again 566k HP. I logged out and when I returned it was 468k HP. All Friday night after patch.

armagus02 · April 2019

After testing the Oathkeeper in dungeons I have to say the latest patch is such a large improvement to the class! Divinity isn't as taxing and can quickly be recovered due to the various feats and tie-ins to skills. Healing itself still feels a bit underwhelming but considering we get a feat that doubles temp HP given when a heal crits, personally, I think that is fine.

As others have posted, the smite animation skill feels really clunky and strange and doesn't finish if you try to use an encounter power or At-Will during it's animation.

Still wondering if we can get the old Cleanse back that is AOE and removes a single debuff. Right now the current Cleanse on preview would be very difficult to utilize due to how players and companions constantly move around and targeting with it would be a huge pain since it only hits one target. Having it as an AOE would be nice. You could adjust it so that it doesn't recover any HP, up the divinity cost and allow it as an AOE that needs to be aimed (like Divine Touch).

Obviously things might change again before MOD 16 comes out but I am definitely impressed with these recent changes. Nice work guys!

gormenghast1 · April 2019

gormenghast1 said:
In its place I would love to see implemented something like the 5th edition paladin feature "Avenging Angel", with radiant wings sprouting from the back of the paladin and a mechanic that could give him an hard taunt for 10 seconds, a 10% damage debuff in a 20' radius and a movement bonus due to the mobility granted by his celestial wings.

I knew that the someone would have loved the idea and the wings look great!

All the changes are more than interesting and give plenty of room to discover valid builds. The animations identify the class much more than before and give the feel of a radiant champion, instead of a generic tank. It really feels better to see the Paladin fight now and I'd like to congratulate on the good work done.

Merits have to be given where they deserve; thank you Asterdahl for your continuous work and the goals achieved

greyjay1 · April 2019

Currently you always overwrite Divine Barriers, this often results in overwriting a big barrier with a weaker one.
Is this by design? It surely is annoying, especially with some of the new feats focusing on crits.

It would be awsome if Divine Barriers could only be overwritten by stronger ones, even if that means they may fall off.

crit:

non-crit:

majorcharvenak · April 2019

greyjay1 said:
Currently you always overwrite Divine Barriers, this often results in overwriting a big barrier with a weaker one.
Is this by design? It surely is annoying, especially with some of the new feats focusing on crits.

It would be awsome if Divine Barriers could only be overwritten by stronger ones, even if that means they may fall off.

crit:

non-crit:

I put this in my feedback in an earlier post and asked the same question. No answer so I assume its WAI. Definitely makes me think twice about spamming Divine Touch and or Shelter. I'm left thinking the best way to top off a player if they're under shield is either through Cleansing or Cure.

majorcharvenak · April 2019

tryingfeedback#2848 said:

majorcharvenak said:
WHAT THE EVER-BLOOMING HECK @asterdahl!?! You gave them WINGS? Not ONLY did you give the Justicars an additional mechanic with Divine Champion with some great effects when coupled with Divine Palisade, you gave them FRIGGIN WINGS with the animation? No more complaints from the Justies are allowed in these forum pages! Nothing but glowing praise and hosannas from the favored of the two paragons from here on out! You got your wings! *turns and smites a kobold while grumbling at the unfairness of it all*.

Sarcasm aside folks, it REALLY IS both a nice effect and power. Hoods off to you @asterdahl.
Sarcasm full blast yea sure they are wings but they are trimmed so you cannot fly, you just flop around ontop of the ground attempting to fly and bump youre butt and leave skidmarks attempting to be a angel.

I think you have to die in battle for them to start working, Trying.

Official M16: Paladin Feedback

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