Preview Build Patch Notes: NW.123.20201203e.3

nitocris83 · December 2020

Greetings all,

Thank you very much for your continued feedback on the Preview! Contained within are the patch notes for NW.123.20201203e.3. Our Goblins were very hard at work on making the companions fall in line. Trust me, it wasn’t pretty.

This build contains mostly further fixes for companions, as well as companion damage adjustments. It also contains updates to the bonuses that the Forte Rating confers. As always, please note that things are still in development, and are subject to change.
The Forte Rating now confers the following:

Known Issues

Master Svardborg and Master Demogorgon are available in the queue list. This is not intended and will be removed in a future patch.
A few older rings have incorrect Ratings.
Armor Penetration references are still being scrubbed by Goblins.
Artifact Off-Hand Modifications mention Companion Influence and do not add to the sheet.
Brada’s Sage shop sells a bonding runestone for 80 copper.
Bel’s Relics have not yet been updated to the new system.
Boulders in Lair of the Mad Mage may be difficult for characters around 25k in Item Level.
Certain Gems, Runestones, Insignias cannot be donated to stronghold coffer.
Dragonborn Passive does not add to the character sheet.
Divine Protection Power contains a typo and does not modify Critical Avoidance total.
Foehammer’s Favor Elixir’s tooltip is missing a word, but now correctly grants its effect.
Goblins are too strong.
Glorious Founder’s Enchantment grants incorrect number of Stats.
Inner Balance power mentions Armor Penetration to function.
Incoming Healing is missing from the Companion Stat Pane.
Miscellaneous text errors (formatting issues like “Chance on hit to increase your deflect by up to 3”)
Some characters do not get automatically respec when loading in, or switching loadouts.
- If you ever deal 0 damage, or notice that your damage is 0, a respec will fix your character
Race Appearance presets appear as white boxes.
Several Enchantment items may display with tooltip irregularities.
- This includes weapon/armor enchantments, which may have outdated references to weapon damage.
Several Potions have mentions of Armor Penetration/incorrect rating in Long Buffs.
Several zones may still be difficult for players to complete.
Vorpal/Holy Vorpal Enchantment’s Critical Strike increase does not display on the character sheet.

General Updates

Bosses now deal additional damage that can be mitigated by raising the Awareness Stat.
- As such, their damage has been reduced to compensate.
Companion damage has been further adjusted.
- Please note that this area is still Work-In-Progress.
- We appreciate all of the feedback/bugs/etc that you’ve been leaving on the following thread:
- https://www.arcgames.com/en/forums/neverwinter#/discussion/1258798/official-combat-adjustments-companions
More critter damage adjustments from player feedback.
Radiant and Empowered Runestones can now be traded for Enchantment/Runestone Choice Packs, which are BoP (Account).

Companions

Bolstered Stats from Companions add to Item Level.
Companion Bonuses should no longer contribute to players in PvP modes.
Companion Ratings should now be in line with a few known issues.
- Known Issue: Tooltips may display incorrectly, or stats may be incorrect on certain companions/companion powers.
- Known Issue: The following Augment Companions have extra bonuses.
  - Chicken Companion
  - Red Dragon Ioun Stone Companion
  - Walter Companion
- Known Issue: The following Companions are lacking the Enhancement Power.
  - Boar Companion
  - Celeste Companion
  - Chultan Tiger Companion
  - Huntmaster Companion
  - Mercenary Companion
- There are also some other known issues with the following companions or their companion bonuses.
  - Angel of Protection Companion
  - Celestial Lion Companion
  - Chultan Hunter
  - Hunting Hawk Companion
  - Fire Archon Companion
  - Fire Eye Companion
  - Incubus Companion
  - Kuo-Toa Companion
  - Lillend Companion
  - Rustmonster Companion
  - Scarecrow Companion
  - Siege Master’s Companion
  - Sylph Companion
  - Tutor Companion
  - Wild Hunt Rider Companion
- Thank you for your continued feedback and Bug Reports on the Companion threads!
The following Companions no longer state that they grant + Total Damage.
- Cryptic Insight correctly states that it grants + %Defense.
- Kenku Archer’s Wisdom correctly states that it grants + %Power.
- Stormrider’s Discipline correctly states that it grants + %Power, although it incorrectly states that it grants % in HP.
- Sergeant Knox’s Wisdom correctly states that it grants + %Defense.
- Werewolf’s Presence correctly states that it grants + %Defense.
- Known Issue: Snowy Fawn’s Instincts incorrectly states that it grants + % Total Damage.
Wayward Wizard’s Wisdom now correctly grants Combined Rating and scales per rank.

Items

Mount Collars have been doubled in Item Level.
- A portion of their Item Level now grants Combined Ratings.
- Known Issue: Unified Regal Collars incorrectly state that they grant Incoming Healing by up to 500% at Max Level. (It’s actually 5%)
- Known Issue: Supportive Regal Collars incorrectly state that they grant Outgoing Healing by up to 500% at Max Level. (It’s actually 5%)
More references to armor penetration have been removed from gear and tooltips.
- Armor Penetration sources mostly become Critical Severity.

Powers

Forte has been adjusted for classes. Please refer to this for the latest information and discussion. https://www.arcgames.com/en/forums/neverwinter#/discussion/1258800/official-combat-changes-forte

Things to Come

Adjustments to Gear Bonuses.
Background adjustments for Character Sheet display.
Miscellaneous text fixes.
UI adjustments the character sheet, which should enable better display of certain Ratings.

hastati96 · December 2020

"A few older rings have incorrect Ratings." - was mentioned as a known issue but this also happens with some of the newest rings. Some 1100 rings provide ~3k stats, some other >16k stats.

reg1981 · December 2020

Great notes! Ty for sharing!

bayaz · December 2020

Fire Archon gives combined ratings and 7.5% combat advantage at mythic. Seems already fixed.

jawsofthelife · December 2020

Why the heck have you changed Wizards' Thaumaturge forte to CA instead of Crit. Chance? Thaumaturges have no source of combat advantage during fights.Wasted stat, it was better before.

bigman99 · December 2020

To add to the off-hand weapon modification issues, the critical severity bonus does not give anything on preview, an old issue that was fixed but seems to have made it onto the new build.

eladonwarps · December 2020

I've only done a little bit of testing since this new version went live, but it does feel like a step in the right direction. Levelling zones and legacy campaign areas now have more distinct enemy ratings (measured by my internal sense of "how long does this actually take to defeat") and it's getting better. I was skeptical before, but this helps.

Still feels like companions aren't quite where they were previously saying they should be, both in terms of Augments giving enough boost and fighting companions doing as much damage as has been forecasted. Here's hoping we can hone in from here.

hustin1 · December 2020

Why do Thaumaturge and Arcanist have identical Forte stats? Since Thaumaturge has all of the chill encounters I would think that Control Bonus should be in the mix. That's the point of stacking chill.

arazith07 · December 2020

hustin1 said:
Why do Thaumaturge and Arcanist have identical Forte stats? Since Thaumaturge has all of the chill encounters I would think that Control Bonus should be in the mix. That's the point of stacking chill.

It was changed based on feedback from the players who wanted the forte stats to be the same across the paths on the same character so they didn't need to have completely different gear setups.

jawsofthelife · December 2020

arazith07 said:

hustin1 said:
Why do Thaumaturge and Arcanist have identical Forte stats? Since Thaumaturge has all of the chill encounters I would think that Control Bonus should be in the mix. That's the point of stacking chill.
It was changed based on feedback from the players who wanted the forte stats to be the same across the paths on the same character so they didn't need to have completely different gear setups.

Paragons are unique as the very classes are. There is no point in having a stat that has 0 sinergy in the that paragon, even if players are unconfortable with that.
Thaumaturges are simply bad at bosses, but are great at AoE. Since you are not getting CA in aoe fights, it's a wasted stat.
I rather have 10~25% Crit. Chance than CA.
Terrible decision, we actually need class balacing now.
We could fix that if hard CC (i.e: stuns, freezes,roots, dazzles, prones and etc) grant players CA. That would do the trick too.

jawsofthelife · December 2020

arazith07 said:

hustin1 said:
Why do Thaumaturge and Arcanist have identical Forte stats? Since Thaumaturge has all of the chill encounters I would think that Control Bonus should be in the mix. That's the point of stacking chill.
It was changed based on feedback from the players who wanted the forte stats to be the same across the paths on the same character so they didn't need to have completely different gear setups.

In further addition: If you play wizard, you might notice that Crit. Chance is much more usefull in ANY of wizards paragons than CA.

Cheers!

hrakh · December 2020

As things are looking right now, stats do NOT contribute equally to DPS. There seems to be a clear priority in stat allocation for maximum damage. While i get it, you want diversity, given the emerging difference in contribution to actual damage you are creating significant advantages for some classes by the secondary forte stats you are assigning.

If your goal is simply to put some classes ahead of others, fine, that has always been part of this game. Every DPS class has had its FOTM moment, followed by endless winging about now being underpowered. I play a warlock, I am very familiar with this state of affairs

But if, as you profess, you are striving for balance. It might warrant a second look. Or some more in depth explanation as to how you see this balancing out.

Right now, I wish I was a ranger (only from the forte perspective mind you

)

kyjle6aka · December 2020

Why group satellites into one category when you still need to upgrade 10 satellites? Make 1 Mythic Companion = 20%. If this does not happen, then personally I will have to spend 20 million AD, and this is only for satellites. At the same time, I still do not have 5 collars and 10 mythical mounts. And this is another 50 million AD (only mounts). Where new players can get so much is unknown. (I'm not a new player). But also change the stones. Having looked at such numbers, I realized that there was no particular desire to improve / buy all this.

boby195 · December 2020

jawsofthelife said:

arazith07 said:

hustin1 said:
Why do Thaumaturge and Arcanist have identical Forte stats? Since Thaumaturge has all of the chill encounters I would think that Control Bonus should be in the mix. That's the point of stacking chill.
It was changed based on feedback from the players who wanted the forte stats to be the same across the paths on the same character so they didn't need to have completely different gear setups.
Paragons are unique as the very classes are. There is no point in having a stat that has 0 sinergy in the that paragon, even if players are unconfortable with that.
Thaumaturges are simply bad at bosses, but are great at AoE. Since you are not getting CA in aoe fights, it's a wasted stat.
I rather have 10~25% Crit. Chance than CA.
Terrible decision, we actually need class balacing now.
We could fix that if hard CC (i.e: stuns, freezes,roots, dazzles, prones and etc) grant players CA. That would do the trick too.

I am totally agree. I liked so much that crit chance on Thaumaturge. Now, maybe you give us a chance to choose crit chance or comb adv or at least take a look at the paragon Shatter Strike and increase that magnitude.

hastati96 · December 2020

jawsofthelife said:

Thaumaturges are simply bad at bosses, but are great at AoE. Since you are not getting CA in aoe fights, it's a wasted stat.
I rather have 10~25% Crit. Chance than CA.
Terrible decision, we actually need class balacing now.
We could fix that if hard CC (i.e: stuns, freezes,roots, dazzles, prones and etc) grant players CA. That would do the trick too.

I think you are not understanding CA correctly. You can get CA in every fight which makes it at least as valuable as crit. It is only about positioning, mostly done by the tank. Only in solo play it might be difficult but can still be achieved by using a fighter companion.

Most people even prefer CA over crit because crit only becomes valuable with a high crit severity so you have to invest in 2 stats, instead of only 1 like with CA, power or accuracy.

darthpotater · December 2020

CA stat is more efficent than crit because you need 2 stats to make criticals effective. I dont get what is the problem with AoE. You can have CA in the AoE spells only need to positioning. Also there are other ways to get CA.

I understand that some people wants crit or other stats, and they will never get everyone happy. Like some of us asking for the same stats for both paragins in classes with the same role, and others angry with that.

Thats why the best solution is to give us a variable forte stat, where we can pick our array of stats (or better, every stat.)

hadestemplar · December 2020

nitocris83 said:

Could you pls poke in back to any dev and ask why warlocks third Forte stat is Awarenes.

Awareness is element which counters Combat advantage. For enemies/monsters and players ( pvp) to have combat advantage against you, need either surround or hit you from multiple sides, or have class feat or other element which would grant Combat advantage against you.

In boss fights awareness make no sense cuz you don't get surrouned.
In dungeon runs, tank gets agroo and get surrounded but not warlock.
Also need to remind, warlock is not clsoe range dps like rogue or barbie or fighter.

So question, why awareness, why not deflect as other ranged dps like cleric or wiz.?

burtr · December 2020

I don't see Fighter in there anywhere. Does that mean Fighters didn't get any updates?

azanik · December 2020

hadestemplar#9918 said:

nitocris83 said:

Could you pls poke in back to any dev and ask why warlocks third Forte stat is Awarenes.

Awareness is element which counters Combat advantage. For enemies/monsters and players ( pvp) to have combat advantage against you, need either surround or hit you from multiple sides, or have class feat or other element which would grant Combat advantage against you.

In boss fights awareness make no sense cuz you don't get surrouned.
In dungeon runs, tank gets agroo and get surrounded but not warlock.
Also need to remind, warlock is not clsoe range dps like rogue or barbie or fighter.

So question, why awareness, why not deflect as other ranged dps like cleric or wiz.?

Please re-read the patch notes about awareness...

justtester · December 2020

hastati96 said:
I think you are not understanding CA correctly. You can get CA in every fight which makes it at least as valuable as crit. It is only about positioning, mostly done by the tank. Only in solo play it might be difficult but can still be achieved by using a fighter companion.

Tbh I often see people doesn't care about CA during mobs clearing, even in IC, plus aoe loadouts are also used in solo and not everyone would like to use active companions. I really think devs should give some choice here.

Even If they doesn't want to follow micky's propose, they can at least give some paragons way to choose crit instead of CA (or vise versa) via some feat or class feature.

mionir · December 2020

Where is the Fighter forte stats?

jawsofthelife · December 2020

hastati96 said:

jawsofthelife said:

Thaumaturges are simply bad at bosses, but are great at AoE. Since you are not getting CA in aoe fights, it's a wasted stat.
I rather have 10~25% Crit. Chance than CA.
Terrible decision, we actually need class balacing now.
We could fix that if hard CC (i.e: stuns, freezes,roots, dazzles, prones and etc) grant players CA. That would do the trick too.
I think you are not understanding CA correctly. You can get CA in every fight which makes it at least as valuable as crit. It is only about positioning, mostly done by the tank. Only in solo play it might be difficult but can still be achieved by using a fighter companion.

Most people even prefer CA over crit because crit only becomes valuable with a high crit severity so you have to invest in 2 stats, instead of only 1 like with CA, power or accuracy.

Gonna do some testing and check if you are right.
Currently CA states that you need to flank mob to benefit from it, in most swarns of mobs this is not possible just with the tank. Unless the game is behaving differently than it states.
It is important to highlight that, every single dps in this game wants to be ahead on dps chart, so nobody waits the tank.
In any case, it is really easy to cap Crit. Severity in preview, due to multiple sources that grant it, including Dex and Vorpal.
The only consistent source of Crit. Chance is companions, right now. So it is much harder to max it than Severity.
And again, I reaffirm that both of Wizards' Paragons greatly benefits from crit chance, even if you need two stats to match the CA, the sinergy is worthy.

hadestemplar · December 2020

azanik said:

Please re-read the patch notes about awareness...

You refer to part:

Bosses now deal additional damage that can be mitigated by raising the Awareness Stat.

I did read it.

But now tell me, what would you pick.

Defensive values which work in any condition, or value which require specific condition.

Also the value which require spefic condition do not give any higher or give less dmg diminishing effect than others.

arazith07 · December 2020

hadestemplar#9918 said:

azanik said:

Please re-read the patch notes about awareness...
You refer to part:
Bosses now deal additional damage that can be mitigated by raising the Awareness Stat.

I did read it.

But now tell me, what would you pick.

Defensive values which work in any condition, or value which require specific condition.

Also the value which require spefic condition do not give any higher or give less dmg diminishing effect than others.

In a boss fight, the boss always has CA now though. Everything else doesn't last long enough to really be much of a threat. Defense and Awareness have the same value, just like Power, ACC, and CA does for DPS. Everything else needs multiple stats to be focused on, or has a RNG chance to get the same effectiveness.

khaozhunter · December 2020

> @burtr said:
> I don't see Fighter in there anywhere. Does that mean Fighters didn't get any updates?

Yes, fighter has the same forte as before, for dps is power accuracy critical avoidance and for tank is defense deflect accuracy

jawsofthelife · December 2020

@noworries#8859

Sry for disturbing you, but I strongly suggest to check this thread.

Cheers.

mrkosuta · December 2020

hello everyone, pinbalwizzard here, so ive noticed there is no mention about guardian fighters, i am testing that class for a several days on preview now. want me to drop detailed explanation?

hadestemplar · December 2020

arazith07 said:

In a boss fight, the boss always has CA now though. Everything else doesn't last long enough to really be much of a threat. Defense and Awareness have the same value, just like Power, ACC, and CA does for DPS. Everything else needs multiple stats to be focused on, or has a RNG chance to get the same effectiveness.

Would you go with defence or with awareness buid if both give same outcome, and that awareness only work in specific condition. ?

Btw, I will still play as warlock, regardless what kind changes would be implemented.

arazith07 · December 2020

hadestemplar#9918 said:

arazith07 said:

In a boss fight, the boss always has CA now though. Everything else doesn't last long enough to really be much of a threat. Defense and Awareness have the same value, just like Power, ACC, and CA does for DPS. Everything else needs multiple stats to be focused on, or has a RNG chance to get the same effectiveness.
Would you go with defence or with awareness buid if both give same outcome, and that awareness only work in specific condition. ?

Btw, I will still play as warlock, regardless what kind changes would be implemented.

As an Arbiter, I was preparing for awareness as a Forte stat, so I was planning for my defensive slots to be defense so I had both. Now that it was changed to deflect though, I have either decide to stack deflect severity to make that deflect useful, or just ignore it and stack defense/awareness. As a DPS, I am only concerned about surviving boss mechanics, aoe's and undodgable damage.

finiplays · December 2020

Bug
- Minstral's Discipline is not granting the +750 Combined Rating and appears to be giving +450 Combined Rating

Preview Build Patch Notes: NW.123.20201203e.3

Comments