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Class balance doomed to worsen after next patch + comparison
werdandi
Member Posts: 336 Arc User
Module 16 was aimed to be a revamp of the gameplay and also to be an opportunity to finally achieve a better class balance.
Unfortunately, the disbalance among dps classes is still there, and will worsen as soon as the patch increasing the enchants stats will be done.
Problem: classes that hit hard and quickly (see comparison figures in the table below), and that don't take ages to stack self-buffs are currently the winners. If the power (omg power creep is back!!!!!!!!!!!!) is increased to satisfy the players that lost their feeling of might (according to the Live stream feedback), it will just accentuate (not proportionnaly) the disbalance in dungeons, because the not-so-hard-hitting players (or with powers that take too long) will not have time to do damage .
I talk about power creep because you should be aware that other dps caps are reached (except combat advantage) as soon as you reach level 80. So more power (radiant enchants)=more damage.
[Unless people that complained of being weak had no idea of the new caps, because it is out of reach of casual players ? Why not creating a small quest with a NPC explaining stats and caps ?]
It is extremely dangerous to move this way now, because you are going to empower even more the quick and hard-hitting classes and the frustration will still be there (because of the resulting increased damage gap between classes) and there will be again the flavor of the month dps classes (actually it is already there but manageable because the 1dps-4buffers team no longer exists)
You are also going to widen the difference between new and old players because the increase is not relative: it was really a relief that the difference was less noticable during the last catch-up modules.
The feeling of might can be ok for doing dailies and weeklies (depending on your current equipment of course), but it is dumb in dungeons, especially when the mechanics of the bosses are not forgiving. Maybe it is just a matter of adjustement and scaling, as some mobs and bosses are now either ridiculously easy or too hard within the same dungeon. Anyway it is better to leave some difficulty so that players can practice and improve their new gameplay
.
I would have sticked to the decrease of mobs resistance (then wait and see), and focused on improving the classes and creating new features, instead of doubling the stats of enchants.
Please please take a look at the table below. I guess there are some mistakes in it (and some powers are broken or not WAI in addition), but I spent quite a long time to create it, giving a general overview. You can see easily the differences between classes. I didn't go into details for at-wills and dailies, but of course traditional at-will classes still get a good chunk of damage from them with added effect. For the dailies, AP gain may vary depending on classes and powers used.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Ox7LyefdrhbCHpSIPODpR3x4Zp42EVJ_KK9I7HVyIuM/edit?usp=sharing
I don't know how to embed the table
@asterdahl @noworries#8859
downloadable table with formula here: https://wetransfer.com/downloads/1f7c015e490fbc34bf97508b32983af720190601154811/1a95c0
Unfortunately, the disbalance among dps classes is still there, and will worsen as soon as the patch increasing the enchants stats will be done.
Problem: classes that hit hard and quickly (see comparison figures in the table below), and that don't take ages to stack self-buffs are currently the winners. If the power (omg power creep is back!!!!!!!!!!!!) is increased to satisfy the players that lost their feeling of might (according to the Live stream feedback), it will just accentuate (not proportionnaly) the disbalance in dungeons, because the not-so-hard-hitting players (or with powers that take too long) will not have time to do damage .
I talk about power creep because you should be aware that other dps caps are reached (except combat advantage) as soon as you reach level 80. So more power (radiant enchants)=more damage.
[Unless people that complained of being weak had no idea of the new caps, because it is out of reach of casual players ? Why not creating a small quest with a NPC explaining stats and caps ?]
It is extremely dangerous to move this way now, because you are going to empower even more the quick and hard-hitting classes and the frustration will still be there (because of the resulting increased damage gap between classes) and there will be again the flavor of the month dps classes (actually it is already there but manageable because the 1dps-4buffers team no longer exists)
You are also going to widen the difference between new and old players because the increase is not relative: it was really a relief that the difference was less noticable during the last catch-up modules.
The feeling of might can be ok for doing dailies and weeklies (depending on your current equipment of course), but it is dumb in dungeons, especially when the mechanics of the bosses are not forgiving. Maybe it is just a matter of adjustement and scaling, as some mobs and bosses are now either ridiculously easy or too hard within the same dungeon. Anyway it is better to leave some difficulty so that players can practice and improve their new gameplay
.I would have sticked to the decrease of mobs resistance (then wait and see), and focused on improving the classes and creating new features, instead of doubling the stats of enchants.
Please please take a look at the table below. I guess there are some mistakes in it (and some powers are broken or not WAI in addition), but I spent quite a long time to create it, giving a general overview. You can see easily the differences between classes. I didn't go into details for at-wills and dailies, but of course traditional at-will classes still get a good chunk of damage from them with added effect. For the dailies, AP gain may vary depending on classes and powers used.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Ox7LyefdrhbCHpSIPODpR3x4Zp42EVJ_KK9I7HVyIuM/edit?usp=sharing
I don't know how to embed the table
@asterdahl @noworries#8859
downloadable table with formula here: https://wetransfer.com/downloads/1f7c015e490fbc34bf97508b32983af720190601154811/1a95c0
Post edited by werdandi#8366 on
2
Comments
Powers don’t exist in a vacuum and a number of class features that contribute to damage are also affected by Power.
Under your logic we shouldn’t see Wizard as favoured DPS even now, because it uses dots to deliver damage.
Obsidian Oath - Warlock
A whole lot of other Obsidian toons as well.
I have found that the party-wide buffs from the old pre-mod 16 skill trees and some companions helped to compensate for this so that the whole party benefited. After mod 16 was implemented, it left Wizards and Rangers focused on themselves... pooling the power that would have otherwise been spread out to team-mates. There isn't even a valid Pathfinder-like build that will let a Ranger heal the party! If there is a worsening imbalance now between classes, this is why. This game was originally built on the principle of Power-share and mod 16 has pulled that rug out from under everybody!
An example of this are my Wizard and Ranger. They were originally built not to be DPS, but true party buffers with a strong control to slow, root, knock-down or stun mobs for extra measure. I arranged power points to chose specific party-buffing skills, Insignia bonuses to trigger passive heals and party-wide crit boosts, and slotted companions that would trigger passive heals or party-wide crit chances. As a result, the lowbie parties I was a part of would always clear challenging content without breaking the game itself... or "spoiling the fun" by rendering a dungeon/skirmish to be a paltry cake-walk.
Mod 16 has not by any means given any DPS class an unfair advantage, otherwise my Wizard and Ranger would not be getting one-shot by mobs, and the parties I have been in wouldn't be suffering multiple deaths!
The overwhelming issue here is that any meaningful power-share has been completely removed from the game mechanics leaving you squishy and dead.
If there was a way to compare your data to the old power-share system, you will see what I mean.
I agree about your arguments concerning deleted buffs, rendering this game now into a more dps orientated game. Low geared player without the adaequat old % gear mixed with new sets and rings struggle. Omnipotent buffs to give partywide invulnerability and skip mechanics are gone, wich is a good decision imo. But with decent gear and right classes you can absolve endcotent easily allready. We are at a point where we allready have been few month ago. Powercreep is real and building a 3men party out of paladin, a range dps (CW prefered, endgeared warlock maybe too) and any healer, you can beat content, when skill and setup(as above) is optimized. You have a disbalance between classes, as allways.
GF seems to underperform as dps tree, CW seems to overperform slightly. OP is capable to handle content easiest by going tank with good burst at mimic phase or heal with near unlimited option to "Bane" or heal at 1. and 2. boss, that's why all want OP to either run as most competent heal ingame actually and better tank option due to burst at boss 1, capable to solo heal boss 2 on top. I also tanked 3. Boss without a healer yesterday(no death) , since DC dropped dead at the start and was too lazy to get up, 2 top performing CW's did all the work- this was near impossible in mod 15 at some bosses. GF-dps needs love same as
warlock needs support in many aspect on both trees, due to ignored feedback before mod release and due to the fact that devs put all their efforts into scaling and fixing this mess.
@obsidiancran3 Actually I did take into account the mechanics, damage buffs of feats and class features from column G to some extent in the column H (unfortunately the formula does not show in the google spreadsheet because I copied pasted the data from the excel data in it) and I added what I left in the "remarks" of column I because some of them were difficult to implement because it involves too many variables (like smolder that counts for more than 20% dps from wizards or crit severity...).
It was also difficult to calculate the output of "divinity" powers overtime and I left them away.
Anyway only columns H and J (this latter is the base damage output of a power overtime) must be looked at. It gives a real idea of the situation, dps-wise, even with the missing procs.
@schietindebux I see rogue first, then cw - ranger in the table, which confirms my impressions (I have to confirm this impression for ranger). Other classes below or way below. Some classes have also ridiculous aoe powers. Just calculate the %difference of the powers you would pick. Maths.
I don't see many gf dps around this mod (in LFM channels), but as for tanking, there are still good gfs, but it seems it require much more skill effort (or stats!) than paladin. Anyway, a tank is not absolutely necessary now, which is sad.
@""caldochaud#4880" your argument "Mod 16 has not by any means given any DPS class an unfair advantage, otherwise my Wizard and Ranger would not be getting one-shot by mobs, and the parties I have been in wouldn't be suffering multiple deaths" makes no sense at all, lol. In this module, nobody has the old-version of annointed army or shepherd devotion anymore. But yes, party buffers are gone. Only a few buffs here and there have survived.
Now we have again power creep and issues with class balance.
There is a difference in AP-gain of classes to start with. My warlock seems to be pretty low on AP gain, the lowest of all classes from my impression combined with the lowest hitting single daily. I can cast Dailies on my DC and OP much more frequently and CW (even CW say they got a bad AP gain) also has a more frequent Daily-output. That´s what I allready recognized on preview month ago. Maybe due to lower AP number per power (+/-10) and SoulScorch not doing anything for AP gain, maybe due to feats like Smoldering Recovery on top.
From my pov they simply should give all classes the same base-AP generation infight, completely independent, giving options by gear or boons to tweakAP gain by yourself.
That would be more transparent and more healthy as having a buggy GF/OP , maybe other classes too with daily-spamming- builds due to broken feats/powers.
I never tried to match the dps of an Oathkeeper, but popping CoP combined with Spirit of Austerity it feels like I can spam Bane (80" range) at 450 mag 20 times in a row without getting drained. Maybe there are allready some builds for an Oathkeeper "Range-dps-build", I wouldn´t be surprised.
I see an advantage in the utility of a Paladin over a GF/Barby-tank in privat runs. Even though some Paladinthreats consider Paladin to be underpowered, I see the class as one of the "winner" of mod 16, not only in terms of healing path.
On my Paladin I can slot "ugly gear" and run anything without issues. On my warlock I have to rethink every stat , piece of gear, companion etc. to be competetive. But even doing so I watch myself being out-dps'd by a lower geared CW with worse setup.
I can´t tell about DC honestly (Arbiter same as Devout) since my own one is not ready to take part in lomm actually. Some Devouts do pretty good, some are underwhelmingly bad tbh..
Average impression is, that Oathkeeper is at a pretty good spot, where you can find "average guys" doing endcontent with not much efforts. So Devout misses a bit same as Soulweaver, maybe Devout needs better Divinity gain, Soulweaver a lot of tweaks and improvements to reach compareable level of performance and fun to play.
I consinder some threats on preview as misleading, same as those "youtuber" are a special kind of species, comparing classes/roles on a "low competence level" when preview started.
On some classes the dps-gap is pretty obvious imo -> GF vs CW, SW drops of also a bit, but not like "halve dps of a TR/CW", in terms of aoe warlock needs improvements, in terms of single dps only small adjustments imo.
I can´t interpret your numbers in a way that proves me wrong or right tbh.
There are also some here that point at Soulweaver being in a good shape and lomm being too easy, accidentally choosing classes to "3-men" lomm, that are more or less essential to do so (OP+CW), stumbeling into that dungeon, missing 2 player (accidentally), since they did not find 2 other dps-classes to join
The only message I pull out of those threats is "feed my ego" same as a bit of "I'd like to present you my epeen, take a close look" , so I stay away.
If someone shows me a combination from Devout/Soulweaver + GF-Tank + Barby/TR/Hunter/Fighter solving endcontent they will get my respect by sure.
> Weird..no one talk about hunter archer. Maybe its not a build.
>
>
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> sadly it never has been
> rogue has a decent ranged/perma-stealth build this mod with whisperknife though....finally.
>
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> Never has been talked about or never has been a build?
It’s possible to play, the problem is most people think “Ranged” means “stay as far away as possible” and thus they end up failing at playing Ranged HR.
It’s not really a build problem.
That said, the Melee Warden is a better DPS build at the moment.
Obsidian Oath - Warlock
A whole lot of other Obsidian toons as well.
I believe that although the table seems like it took some time and consideration into what constitutes as class balance in sheer numbers perspective, this isn't necessarily correct nor can be used in practical sense.
Simply put, it is not applicable as depending upon the situation different classes do have an upper hand, whilst others don't.
Into equation there should also be what type of enemies player is dealing with. What are enemy stats. That would be the crit ratio. Is it under Combat Advantage or not. Whether there are powers which benefit from other powers. What are their cooldown rates. How much HP does the enemy have. What sort of equipment do you use. How much power you have. And there are many more factors to look at.
Ideally, based on all of that, if you optimize your party well enough the run will be smooth and the biggest benefit befalls melee classes like Barbarians, Rogues and some Rangers. Fighters can still hit hard, but this is evidenced the most in Boss battles.
All ranged classes, however, have to build up their powers or keep them all up in order to achieve maximum benefit. Mostly through direct dots. This is not the case in smaller encounters nor it applies to all battles.
For ranged classes to actually have the highest benefit attainable, a lot of enemies would have to be at one place at a time and then factors such as Crit chance, power etc all play an important role in a very narrow timeframe of mere 4-5 sec which takes all time simply to cast. If by any chance there is even the slightest of lag present, casting can be completely wrong and entire rotation will lose it's potency. It takes just 0.5 sec to lose a rotation for a ranged class. Classes like Barbarians or rogues do not really suffer from this as their all attacks are very direct. With rogues you just o forward, cast smoke bomb, use all Encounters, go out, repeat. With Barbarians all you gotta use is already what you always used, hold left-click, use IBS, Frenzy, Crescendo, AoS, Relentless slash, sure strike etc and if your Frenzy and Avalanche of Steel do not hit for 500K each, you're doing something wrong. I've seen IBS going as high as 600k and that was with Barbies who were not even optimized!
The classes now are in somewhat more ideal state than they were back with the buff meta. I say somewhat. Non-ranged classes can still hit for 2x or 3x the amount of damage in contrast to Ranged classes encounter-wise with same or similar power/dmg ratio.
So, yeah, ranged classes are in a horrible state atm.
Back in Buff meta those who utilized faster attack speed we favored above everyone else, leaving all other dps choices in dirt for several mods. Some classes were in dirt for 10 mods or so.
Now I can barely see the difference between Wizard, Warlock, Ranger, Rogue and Barbarian.
Granted, you can find Warlock who will blow you away with their powers! Or a Wizard who will use Rimefire Smolder as the main source of damage. And those will change for sure.
Placing this for reference:
Barbarian log Non-Optimized Barbarian
Rogue log Non-Optimized Rogue
Wizard log Optimized Wizard
Warlock log Optimized Warlock
As you can see, here the Wizard class would be the worst or barely decent DPS class without Rimefire Smolder, whilst all other classes would have superior Encounter damage in contrast.
Granted, I do not feel strongly about overusing Rimefire Smolder for any beneficial damage. As you can see, I WANT MY CLASS, namely Wizard, to be as good as other classes when it comes down to Encounter damage so that we can also manage hits that go beyond 300K at least.
So something has to change there. Either we leave Wizards with dots and Rimefire Smolder mechanic, or with an actually substitute in terms of single target and AoE damage that won't dwell on DoTs for dps.
++++++++++++++++
RIMEFIRE SMOLDER ISSUE
++++++++++++++++
See here, Rimefire Smolder can hit 12 times in a row in one sec. This is rare, however, but it can happen. Picture shows multiple enemies, however.
This equates to 272,462.1 damage for that one sec.
Let's say that for an entire 10-15 sec you use Rimefire Smolder it gives you around 500-600K damage, since it can be random depending upon the situation. And add a bit of other spells to that, that's around 900K. Add one daily Ice Knife that hits between 300k-600K-800K(the latter if you are really optimized), and you get what? Barely 1.4-1.6 mil overall damage in approx 20 sec. Since you have to take care of Rimefire Smolder, you can't just use encounters as they come to you! This is important to understand, you CAN'T spam Encounters/At-wills as a Wizard. It needs to be calculated so that you can utilize Rimefire Smolder. If you do not calculate how to apply Cold/Fire spells, you will have Rimefire Smolder that can't do more damage than Grung's Instincts can.
In that 20 sec timespan, is not at all that much different from any other class. Especially won't be once other two melee classes get optimized with extra power/dmg etc. Note that both Barbarian and Rogue can keep using at-wills without any fear or losing properties. And ranged class like Wizard can't do that. The only time Wizard can would be with the weakest at-will Ray of Frost. You can't even get 100K damage with it alone in a run. It is super inefficient, but fast and helps to freeze a monster to get the benefit from one feature power. But that's it, basically.
So I showed you here that even with Rimefire Smolder that hits like crazy in 1 sec sometimes, melee classes STILL have an upped hand in pretty much all scenarios. And I'm pretty much sure that this Rimefire Smolder mechanic will get attuned to not multiproc, leaving Wizards, once again, pretty much useless and uninteresting to play. And here I am talking about Thaumaturge paragon, which isn't even my main paragon... What can I say about Arcanist? Lightning and Spell Storm almost completely useless.
So, please, don't say how fast casting characters have the upper hand. We see in numbers that it is not the case. If you can press the button to deal 500K damage in an instant, and I have to use 4 encounters and sell left leg to get 1000 more power for 1% dmg, then no, you're not really in a bad position. Trust me.
> @obsidiancran3 Actually I did take into account the mechanics, damage buffs of feats and class features from column G to some extent in the column H (unfortunately the formula does not show in the google spreadsheet because I copied pasted the data from the excel data in it) and I added what I left in the "remarks" of column I because some of them were difficult to implement because it involves too many variables (like smolder that counts for more than 20% dps from wizards or crit severity...).
> It was also difficult to calculate the output of "divinity" powers overtime and I left them away.
>
> Anyway only columns H and J (this latter is the base damage output of a power overtime) must be looked at. It gives a real idea of the situation, dps-wise, even with the missing procs.
If it is 20% of Wizard Damage you cannot ignore it.
Thus your comparison remains meaningless.
I appreciate you spent a lot of time doing it, but it doesn’t even reflect what is going on in game at the moment. That should be the first sign you have a problem.
You started with a hypothesis and set out to prove it true, ignoring factors that could lead to a different outcome.
That’s not a valid approach to investigation.
Obsidian Oath - Warlock
A whole lot of other Obsidian toons as well.
I can just put some raw figures with no additional variables, because I cannot prevent people from using wrong rotations or wrong powers (I know wizards that use Shield in dungeons....).
And anyway, even without these additional procs, you can notice that some classes perform good only with raw powers.
I coud have extended the work to at-wills and dailies, that have their part of "interesting" things (double damage, double daily twice in a row..), + AP gain that is totally different among the classes, but I will be consumed to death before.
The best thing I could do for these latters would be to get some ACT parses showing the % of their damage (it would be a very valuable info for making the comparison more precisely), but again I am going to die
Atm only GF (DPS) need some love, I saw very good players in every other DPS class including Arbiters. I saw very bad players too in every class so seems that skill matters. Maybe even more than mod 15 which is a good thing.
The thing nobody is talking about, is that now, even with all the problems and bugs the game has, any class is viable and can do a good work in the hardest content we have (LoMM), and that is a step forward. In mod 15, not every class was desired for end game content.
And the game has much more DPS characters than any other role, so forming groups is faster too.
More tweaks are needed, but hell people is overeacting with threads like this "the end is coming". We are tired about that.
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Hi!
Ideally, based on all of that, if you optimize your party well enough the run will be smooth and the biggest benefit befalls melee classes like Barbarians, Rogues and some Rangers. Fighters can still hit hard, but this is evidenced the most in Boss battles.
All ranged classes, however, have to build up their powers or keep them all up in order to achieve maximum benefit. Mostly through direct dots. This is not the case in smaller encounters nor it applies to all battles.
For ranged classes to actually have the highest benefit attainable, a lot of enemies would have to be at one place at a time and then factors such as Crit chance, power etc all play an important role in a very narrow timeframe of mere 4-5 sec which takes all time simply to cast. If by any chance there is even the slightest of lag present, casting can be completely wrong and entire rotation will lose it's potency. It takes just 0.5 sec to lose a rotation for a ranged class. Classes like Barbarians or rogues do not really suffer from this as their all attacks are very direct. With rogues you just o forward, cast smoke bomb, use all Encounters, go out, repeat. With Barbarians all you gotta use is already what you always used, hold left-click, use IBS, Frenzy, Crescendo, AoS, Relentless slash, sure strike etc and if your Frenzy and Avalanche of Steel do not hit for 500K each, you're doing something wrong. I've seen IBS going as high as 600k and that was with Barbies who were not even optimized!
The classes now are in somewhat more ideal state than they were back with the buff meta. I say somewhat. Non-ranged classes can still hit for 2x or 3x the amount of damage in contrast to Ranged classes encounter-wise with same or similar power/dmg ratio.
So, yeah, ranged classes are in a horrible state atm.
Back in Buff meta those who utilized faster attack speed we favored above everyone else, leaving all other dps choices in dirt for several mods. Some classes were in dirt for 10 mods or so.
Now I can barely see the difference between Wizard, Warlock, Ranger, Rogue and Barbarian.
So I showed you here that even with Rimefire Smolder that hits like crazy in 1 sec sometimes, melee classes STILL have an upped hand in pretty much all scenarios. And I'm pretty much sure that this Rimefire Smolder mechanic will get attuned to not multiproc, leaving Wizards, once again, pretty much useless and uninteresting to play. And here I am talking about Thaumaturge paragon, which isn't even my main paragon... What can I say about Arcanist? Lightning and Spell Storm almost completely useless.
So, please, don't say how fast casting characters have the upper hand. We see in numbers that it is not the case. If you can press the button to deal 500K damage in an instant, and I have to use 4 encounters and sell left leg to get 1000 more power for 1% dmg, then no, you're not really in a bad position. Trust me.
</blockquote>
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Well I saw ice knife hitting for 1M4, so I guess your buffs were not all set or there was no crit (or you have a lower power
Anyway, when I said "fast casting", it regards also melee classes, sorry for the confusion. Classes hitting hard from the magnitude + having a feat allowing a recovery reduction + autotarget have an advantage:
In melee, only rogues have the recovery option (+AP gain option), combined with high magnitude (on both aoe and single) and movement...
On the other side, you can be "nerfed" for several reasons: slow dots, low movement (last to arrive), slow casting time or slow activation time of the powers, missed target because the target(s) moved (e.g IBS), tab mechanic impossible to achieve properly (fighter?), lol magnitude and effect of a power (not many options available for single or aoe powers), inappropriate choice of build, low ap gain...
As for encounters, no class can spam encounters like crazy now (except maybe hunters?) and I am pretty sure that all classes need to cast their powers in a certain order to get a satisfying damage. Skill still required.
I don't call for nerf of the wizard, the dots are part of the mechanic, and anyway it is not the strongest class from my point of view.
All things to consider for a better balance of the "below" classes, mostly the non "pure" dps classes and the classes without procs .
Can you do a comparison among aII cIasses without crits? We wiII see how wizards are Ieft at the bottom of DD.
After many moduIes, wizards can finaIIy have a nice time, even other cIasses with correct buiIds can easiIy top wizards.
My question about doing this tabIe with not crit at aII is that wizards can do DPS when they crit, that is thanks to 2 feats and 2 passives in both thaumaturge and arcanist; arcanist being a bit Iower as they dont have a way to speed up their Cd's Iike thauma has, if you take away criticaI on a wizard, you wiII remove their source of damage; their base damage is Iame and Iong to cast. Without crit, other cIasses have better outcomes: rogue; ranger, barbarian, arbiter, warIock-fighter-paIadin-wizard.
Why wouId a guardian have a raise in dps when they can raise their shieId and have a good defense, so u're giving then defense and damage? same happens with barbarian, or a heaIer, than can pIace some heaIs and do dps at same time; wizards keep being squishy and their controI isn't as good as ranger/ rogue - roots/ dazes.
If cIasses need to be given some IittIe buffs, im not against that, but nerfing a cIass just because yours isn't at top dps in charts doesnt mean they need baIance. What i do think, is that paIadins and cIerics need to be reworked with that obnoxious divinity mechanic and warIocks'dps and heaI paths need a bit of Iove, the rest of the cIasses are fine for me.
Secondly, this comparison is without crit (anyway, all classes want crit).
Thirdly "base damage is Iame and Iong to cast": weapon damage is the same on all classes now. As for base damage, check warlock and come back to me after...
Do you really think a dps cleric uses any heal spell ? If so, you are mistaken.
And where did you see i want to nerf YOUR class ?
No, that was not me in the log. I stated in my post that I'm using Arcanist build, not Thaumaturge. My class build underperforms by quite a bit since I use Storm Spell feature.
Don't misunderstand, I'm not looking for personal gain or recognition by posting that data. All of it is done with the purpose of showing you that playing as a Wizard who, by your definition of being the absolute unit from the first post, is actually not going to gain anything important in comparison to other classes once the Enchantments are doubled. If anything, Wizard will be left in the dirt.
The Wizard whose data I posted goes with 150k power or so. Rogue and Barbarian in the log were not more than 120k power. And Warlock was almost 170k power. Warlock was a killing machine, always first, always ahead of everyone, and always killing everything in LOMM.
If you've seen Ice Knife hitting for 1.4mil damage in MOD16 based solely on Wizard's power and without any buffs, I'd really like you to show it in some datachart and I do not think that it is mathematically possible with the amount of Power/DMG you can acquire now. Or even if it was, majority of players do not have such inclination in the first place since Daily Powers are severely unusable, so entire focus is on at-will+encounter combinations. With new changes coming, it seems that most AP-gain options are going to go down the drain, artifact-wise.
Do not mistake that just because you can have autotarget spells that they somehow translate to higher damage. That doesn't happen. In fact, most enemies burrow now, or happen to be Driders. You easily lose autotarget with At-Will spells like Ray of Frost. In fact, animation itself is broken once the enemy disappears. For a Wizard, It will appear as if you suddenly start attacking celestial bodies in another galaxy...
Look Arcturia for instance, casting Ice Knife on her can be tricky if there are a few golems up and about. Notably, she teleports across the room, so catching her at all times can be tricky.
You do have casting time and animation on most spells or ranged attacks. And more often than not, by the time you cast an important spell, enemies will already have such low hp or go to a state of animation that does not allow attack. Not to forget the plausible cause of anything interrupting any casting time, ranging from red circles up to enemies who have powers to specifically mess with casters.
I do not believe that there is a substantial issue at hand in terms of power creep. Classes have changed to fit their more original roles, similar to what MOD3 was going to be all about. If you are certain that you'd outperform any other top tier class as a Wizard, I sincerely call you to do so. Melee classes have far better power scaling and we'd easily see melee classes outperforming any ranged dps soon enough, similarly to how it was back in MOD13-15, which I think is a major step backwards.
Again, give me examples of Wizard encounters hitting for 400-500k based on the high enough power. Even with 150k power the Wizard can't hit for more than 400-500K damage. Other classes can with that much power.
Wizards are definitely not "fine" if their entire gameplay consists of utilizing one solitary mechanic to give them damage. That does not constitute as "fine" by any merit, other than Paingiver chart which doesn't really show what class balance actually is.
The way I see your post is "Give melee classes damage boost, I want Barbarian and Fighter IBS piercing high heavens". I do not agree with it.
I would like inferior classes to be looked at: warlock mostly (obvious from the figures and regardless of some few things not wai), gf (but it seems next patch will facilitate the tab mechanic more easily), maybe cleric a bit(this one is difficult to assess because of the divinity mechanics used to cast encounters), maybe gwf but this latter doesn't need much imo (maybe less clunky animations first). Also AP gain to harmonize in the different paths.
As for you playing arcanist, you "nerf" yourself doing so, but i agree that all paths should be as effective (same for archery).
For the enchants, doubling them will definitely creates an additional power creep and "elite" trend (one player running now a 600 stat enchant and one 1000: 400 difference, after patch it will be 1200 and 2000 :800 difference). Add this additional power to big hits (with no slow dots) and see the disaster. Devs should have increased by 20% not by doubling, in order to make a relative and consistent increase. The warlock was a killing machine because he was first on packs and much more power, no rocketscience involved.
No problem for the log with iceknife hitting for more than 1M (it was of course with artefact and buffs): I will post next time I run ACT. But do you know that rogue can do 1M8 lol? I was refering to powers using a tiny zone to place on the ground: they are less forgiving than auto-targeting attacks because you are screwed if mobs get out of it. This statement is valid for all classes. Melee classes have far better power scaling? Please explain.
So at 150k power, you are hitting for 400-500k + dots (mechanic) and you are complaining ? Don't worry, indeed "some" other classes can certainly do this, but not all other classes.
I have 153k power on my warlock (+% damage gear), and I am doing 250k hits average with my encounters (need to recheck my logs, but it can be far less), 650k is with my best single encounter (critting with artefact and stacks of SI) when the target is about to die...
On my cleric, it is very variable, generally more but not 400- 500k.
I don't know for melee classes but as they are complaining as well (especially for feats), my spreadsheet aimed to show an overview of the damage potential , regardless of the player skill and rotation (in melee, it is obvious that rogue has the best damage both in AOE and single, but they want to be buffed too...).
Also, I'm not "nerfing" myself for playing an Arcanist. Not everything is about damage numbers at all times. There is something in enjoying the game for what it is. Of course, I do call for some small upgrades here or there, or downgrades where needs be. But I take MOD16 as the starting ground. The tweaks will come in time. That's for sure. I only hope NOT to have the same old MOD15 stuff where the melee classes where the only reasonable choice for DPS.
For the enchants, doubling them will definitely creates an additional power creep and "elite" trend (one player running now a 600 stat enchant and one 1000: 400 difference, after patch it will be 1200 and 2000 :800 difference). Add this additional power to big hits (with no slow dots) and see the disaster. Devs should have increased by 20% not by doubling, in order to make a relative and consistent increase.
"of course with artifacts and buffs" <- Which artifacts, which buffs. Some specifications, please? No, I don't personally know TRs who can hit for almost 2MIL in a single daily, but I do know TRs who can hit for 3MIL in 3 SEC with their rotation. And it still ends up and adds up to more dps than a Wizard, for instance. Even if a Wizard is using AE daily and a combination of imprisonment, 10 arcane stacks, disintegrate, and repel at once. The thing is, TR encounters are hard hitters. They go on CD and again hit hard. Repeat and repeat. For Wizard? No, you have to keep the stacks of all damage buffs up and ongoing. Now without much AP gain, too.
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I was refering to powers using a tiny zone to place on the ground: they are less forgiving than auto-targeting attacks because you are screwed if mobs get out of it.
Autotarget attacks are not that good anymore. Also, which powers are you talking about? Any specifications?
No, it's not. Some classes can simply raise shield for a moment and continue with their choice of powers. Other classes can have a brief period of immunity and continue as if nothing happened. You miss, not a big deal. You continue from where you were left off.
Casters have the hardest animations and hardest issues because if you miss or by any chance don't hit, the encounter goes on a terribly long CD.
Furthermore, OP has an encounter that has...what...? 0.8 sec CD? Give ME a 0.8 CD encounter : ) If wizards had a 0.8 CD on an encounter that would be using like Arcane stacks instead of Divinity, you'd have an outcry on the forums how Wizzy's are OP.
No, man, I don't have any Encounter that's 0.8 sec CD on a Wizard so it's really, really not the same for all classes. I just GAVE you an example some posts ago
Give it some time and you will see that Melee classes do still have an upper hand. Or simply compare their Magnitude in Encounters.
I do not recall a Wizard having a power that hits for more than 500 magnitude.
So let's compare
Assassin : Assassinate power, cooldown 14.5sec, hitting for a magnitude 600. If stealted, the power is 25% stronger from any direction. On top of that you get a duelist's expertise Feat that passively gives you 0.5% dmg for JUST BEING IN COMBAT, not doing anything at all! And when it ends, you get a bonus of 15% dmg bonus that lasts for 10 sec, which you can use to run to the next group of enemies. Wow! Furthermore, a 10% chance to execute a target that has below 20% HP with a magnitude 200!
Justicar : Relentless Avenger, cooldown 11.4sec, hitting for magnitude 460. Templar's Wrath, cooldown 0.4 sec (divinity 300), hitting for 300 magnitude.
GF : Griffon's Wrath 3 hit combo 875 magnitude, around 11sec cooldown.
For an Arcanist to do this, he needs to use no1 spell Imprisonment + no2 spell Repel cd 9.6 sec + trigger everything available to maximize the damage just to do the EQUAL magnitude damage like others. Not a single spell at wizard is hitting for more than 500 magnitude. Icy terrain is 200, steal time also something low like that... shard of endless avalanche almost 200... it's all very, very low.
So, yes, you have melee classes having more encounters with magnitude damage benefits. Case closed.