Hi,
I feel that the feat Inner Balance is very lackluster on several points, compared to Sudden Verdict:
- It requires unoptimal stats, it requires crit=accuracy (fine) and arpen=ca (CA should be 50K above ArPen for a capped char)
- Even if you get the most of it (and you shouldn't if you have a capped char), for most rotations, the divinity gain is lower than if you're using Sudden Verdict, and you don't have the damage potential of Sudden Verdict
I think that a good idea would be that it increases divinity per pip by 0 to 100% based on how low your divinity is (0 when you're at max divinity, 100 when you're at minimum divinity). It would synergize better with class feature such as divine equilibrium, and feated divine glow, and it keeps approximately the same divinity / pip (50% increased divinity per pip is around 20-25 from what I read and personal tests) but allows clever divinity management by staying near half-divinity.
Of course, the values could be tweaked if 0-100 is too strong.
If not, at least change it to ArPen = Accuracy and Defense = Deflect or something like that, it would make more sense
Comments
Nevertheless, how about they look at our lack luster class features? Not even a single one is worth mentioning except expanded faith. Alas, you won't ever see a buff.
"Just go healer you damn cleric! "says the dev :P
So, in this case, it means that you would need 2 at-wills pips converted to divinity after each encounter.
It's already better than 4, but still not great.
However, in the case of Angel of Death, you also use feated divine glow, which always gives 5 pips, meaning 225 divinity for Sudden Verdict build, or 325 for Inner Balance. It's once every 30s, so it's not that often, but you need to constantly have divinity if you use Angel of Death, otherwise you just can't cast any power.
This means that you will need to use at-wills and convert pips to divinity.
Now, this becomes pure theorycrafting, because there is no fight that's long enough (and where DPS cleric is wanted) for this to happen, but you want a divinity cost around 1100 for 30 FF with Angel Of Death build, meaning you need to restore 260 divinity for each FF (a bit more, but we will suppose that the 4 more are compensated through passive gain and D.Glow effect. It might even be more than that).
Sudden Verdict : 159 to restore after each FF when banking pips = 3.53 at-wills (we can use numerical values because it's on a big period of time, we're just using means)
Inner Balance: 195 to restore after each FF when banking pips = 3 at-wills
However, I'm not using the Angel of Death build, so I might be wrong on some points... But I think it would work out that way
I just prefer Inner balance because it works allways, and you dont have to be waiting to khow if it proc for deciding what to do. I allways find myself hitting tab by mistake in the middle of the sudden veredict charge, consuming half of the pips or something like that. Also it tends to fail to charge all the pips with even the slightest lag.
In conclusion, Sudden Veredict may be better, but i dont like how it works, so I use Inner balance.
Btw can you also test if doomsayer and Divine equilibrium are added to you critical sev/CA or are they additive to our damage? I am pretty sure that DE is added to our crit/sev because it just doesn't offer much dps increase at all to be worth it.
Otherwise, in early game, either you're useless because the DPS are too strong, or either the DPS are too weak and I would do a better job and it's boring
I advise using Healing Word when running with people that move too much and/or are too weak, because it's a good heal if they are never full health. Also, always pray, it will help with divinity (even if it's not super fun)
But I'm enjoying Arbiter more than Devout, I have to admit it
The biggest issue really is one that Cryptic have created in that my healer is just an alt that I only run to get into random queues and events quicker. The new requirements to have a healer and a tank means that queues take ages to pop for my main (a ranger) and all I want is to farm AD or get currency from events. So, instead I run a sub-optimal healer (it only has +7.5% outgoing healing), which, whilst I do try and play it properly, isn't necessarily good for the party and I'm basically relying on other members of the group to be well spec'd to get the dungeon done quickly. Whilst far from ideal, I'm sure I'm not the only player taking this approach as a result of the new party requirements.
I don't agree with the issue you gave. I like the changes on the queues, and the idea behind it (showing that tanks / heals are required early). I also think too much lvl 80 queue for leveling queue. It's unfun to only follow someone tearing through everything, and the AD from the queue is minimal compared to other queues.
My biggest issue is that Healing as a cleric isn't very fun. It becomes once you reach end-game where you are very much required, but before that, it's boring. I advise playing as an "off-dps" when you're queueing into easy queues, since healing isn't really required in most of them.
I think the Devout paragon should be funnier to play, by needing to attack to improve your heals or something like that... Now it's praying and wait for people to get damaged, heal them and repeat. And stressful "heal-checks" where you spam heal and need stats, but no proper gameplay or rotation (see Boreworm)
I'm afraid on PC my cleric and ranger are nowhere near end game, so I tend to stick to RLQ and RIQ. On console both my characters are much better, but even my main on there is borderline endgame (a little under really), so again, I don't have much experience in those queues and tend to stick on the earlier queues (still quicker to pop on console though atm).
I can wait a lot longer than a dungeon takes to complete with my ranger on PC at the moment, whereas, the queues drop pretty quickly still for the healer, so it's no contest in terms of farming. At the end of the day, why else would you do anything other than lomm if not for the AD?
I agree that trailing higher level players can be a spoiler when levelling, especially if you're doing a dungeon for the first time, but don't forget that Cryptic started all this a while back by choosing to mix player levels in dungeons in order to improve pop-times for queues. There was of course scaling to compensate for that, but prior to mod 16, the scaling was pretty ineffective and high level players remained way too op in lower dungeons. Mod 16 was meant to address that, only it went a bit too far the other way and resulted in the mass backlash from players. imo, the latest patches have toned scaling down a little too much (just talking random queues here) and even my ranger on PC (16 or 17k, I forget which) can pretty much rush content again as well as ignore the red zones. I never understood why scaling was so hard for the devs to get right, but then, I don't have access to the code, so it's difficult to criticise.
From what I read, i get the impression Cryptic are too focused on new and future projects and have left a skeleton crew to keep NW ticking over (whilst it still turns a profit, it's still worth a little investment). I think mod 16 was their "big" re-adjust for the future and I'm not convinced it'll ever receive quite the love and attention many players are looking for again. That doesn't mean to say I think it's dead or anything, only that it will never be the big company focus it was a few years ago (inevitably). There will still be new mods for the foreseeable future of course and you never know, that mythical new class might even appear one day... maybe. But I think the level of bugs in live content wont change too much and balancing and scaling will only receive tweaks rather than re-works. I could be wrong of course, I don't have a crystal ball.