Changes coming to the Control Wizard!

crucial991199 · March 2013

We've heard your feedback about the Control Wizard's lack of control. We're going to be working on several changes for him over the next few weeks. Most notably, the first change will be a pretty sizable increase on the duration for all of his control powers. This change will not affect PVP, so in PVP your control powers will still be at their current duration. I look forward to seeing you all in Beta Weekend 3!

muzrub333 · March 2013

Woot! :cool:

scneedl · March 2013

I liked it before...will probably like it more now

txhawk · March 2013

Longer durations will be nice, but the class also needs more of their powers to be AOE, including at least one AOE CC like the cleric power.

daed76 · March 2013

nice..good to see you are separating pve and pvp balance!

hathahrk · March 2013

Just up your mage a little and you will gain an at will power that inflict AE hit on each third hit

uxigadur · March 2013

A cure for the incontinent wiz, cool! Control!!

I would be ok with a reduction of the cooldown instead. Could work even well when combining spells and won't hurt so much on pvp. But good news indeed.

derangedhero · March 2013

Thank you!
It is quite encouraging to know you care this much about a class being enjoyable.

dollahz · March 2013

I was meaning to post a thread about the control wizard but I havent gotten around to it. The problem with the control wizard is not the duration lengths, but this change will serve as a bandaid for the greater problem. txhawk touched on it a little bit. Control Wizard needs more AOE in PVE. He can fight solo mobs quite effectively. It is when you have multiple mobs charging you is when he becomes less effective.

In PVE, especially at higher levels you are almost always fighting 3-5 mobs at a time.The Control Wizard has a hard time dealing with multiple mobs at once compared to other classes. Most of his skills are single target or 2-target abilities which don't match up with the enemies you encounter. He also has to map a skill to the spell mastery in order to get a decent aoe skill.

Here are some proposed changes that will help the Control Wizard:

-Granting him access to shield earlier. (Glad to see this changes is already on its way)

-Give some of his abilities their Spell Master effects (Either all the time or More often)^{*Expanded on later}

-Quality of life changes (Ill save this point for another post. As it gets mathy and I dont want to hijack the thread)

Which abilities should have their default effect enhanced?
- Chill Strike (Gives it its spell mastery effect by default)
- Icy Terrain (Allow it to be ground targeted by default)
- Repel (AOE by default) (Still on the fence about whether or not he needs this)

These simple changes will be enough to help the Control Wizard be effective against 3-5 mobs in PVE. I don't believe that splitting the durations for PVP and PVE is the answer. There is a more elegant solution if you think outside the box.

daed76 · March 2013

can we get animations that take less time as well? or maybe not make the encounters spells go on cooldown if the mob dies before the spell animation goes through? seemed like the cleric had way faster spell animations.

txhawk · March 2013

hathahrk wrote: »

Just up your mage a little and you will gain an at will power that inflict AE hit on each third hit

Yeah, I got it. Was not impressed.

We need some dependable, always available AOE damage and AOE control, not something that you need to cast three times before it pays off.

finalwinter · March 2013

Very nice!!! glad to hear the wiz is gonna change for the best. It was good, but it needed that + some more aoe and little bit more damage. The priest seemed to be doing more damage than the dd cc toon.

kittykaswick · March 2013

dollahz wrote: »

I was meaning to post a thread about the control wizard but I havent gotten around to it. The problem with the control wizard is not the duration lengths, but this change will serve as a bandaid for the greater problem. txhawk touched on it a little bit. Control Wizard needs more AOE in PVE. He can fight solo mobs quite effectively. It is when you have multiple mobs charging you is when he becomes less effective.

In PVE, especially at higher levels you are almost always fighting 3-5 mobs at a time.The Control Wizard has a hard time dealing with multiple mobs at once compared to other classes. Most of his skills are single target or 2-target abilities which don't match up with the enemies you encounter. He also has to map a skill to the spell mastery in order to get a decent aoe skill.

Here are some proposed changes that will help the Control Wizard:

-Granting him access to shield earlier. (Glad to see this changes is already on its way)

-Give some of his abilities their Spell Master effects (Either all the time or More often)^{*Expanded on later}

-Quality of life changes (Ill save this point for another post. As it gets mathy and I dont want to hijack the thread)

Which abilities should have their default effect enhanced?
- Chill Strike (Gives it its spell mastery effect by default)
- Icy Terrain (Allow it to be ground targeted by default)
- Repel (AOE by default) (Still on the fence about whether or not he needs this)

These simple changes will be enough to help the Control Wizard be effective against 3-5 mobs in PVE. I don't believe that splitting the durations for PVP and PVE is the answer. There is a more elegant solution if you think outside the box.

Could it be that class's are made for grouping instead of playing solo. What your saying sounds like a solo problem.

txhawk · March 2013

kittykaswick wrote: »

Could it be that class's are made for grouping instead of playing solo. What your saying sounds like a solo problem.

Are you trying to suggest that it is good game design to make a class that needs to be carried to the level cap?

dollahz · March 2013

hathahrk wrote: »

Just up your mage a little and you will gain an at will power that inflict AE hit on each third hit

Chilling Cloud is a great skill indeed, but control wizard needs more aoe options then spamming auto attack for a small aoe.

kittykaswick wrote: »

Could it be that class's are made for grouping instead of playing solo. What your saying sounds like a solo problem.

I actually don't have a problem soloing on my control wizard. I dont think any class should need to have to group for normal quests. It should be a optional thing. What I suggested gives control wizard more effective skills to deal with typical mob spawns during linear questing.

On a side note, Control Wizard is an awesome class. I'm a big fan of classes with added layers of complexity. Knowing when and what skills to use together for maximum effectiveness is all part of the allure of the control wizard.

pyrophoria · March 2013

I'm probably not the only one praying for this, but.. Can we move while doing out At-Wills again? That was the highlight of the previous Control Wizard trailer and was hoping it would still be that way for this one. Was just devastating to see that it wasn't there, and surely not the only one. I know there is a kiting issue there, but come on. The Control Wizard is still super squishy and any bit of survivability helps out in the long run. It doesn't have the heals of the Cleric or the placates of the Rogue, it could use a little something something like being able to move.

losbin68 · March 2013

pyrophoria wrote: »

I'm probably not the only one praying for this, but.. Can we move while doing out At-Wills again? That was the highlight of the previous Control Wizard trailer and was hoping it would still be that way for this one. Was just devastating to see that it wasn't there, and surely not the only one. I know there is a kiting issue there, but come on. The Control Wizard is still super squishy and any bit of survivability helps out in the long run. It doesn't have the heals of the Cleric or the placates of the Rogue, it could use a little something something like being able to move.

no that movie was made to suck people into the game and was never meant to show what control wizard was going to be like

warbaby3 · March 2013

Well, it's a start... thanks for listening!

kagetempest · March 2013

This is Great News, I can't wait to try it out during the third beta weekend

bruddajokka · March 2013

Personally I of the opinion that either all the classes be able to move while attacking or none of the classes do.

warbaby3 · March 2013

bruddajokka wrote: »

Personally I of the opinion that either all the classes be able to move while attacking or none of the classes do.

Agreed... I think the best way to make this work would be: 10% movement speed while using abilities (akin to the 5 foot step in D&D).

mogwai · March 2013

how about mobs move while casting too humm? :O

elve · March 2013

warbaby3 wrote: »

Agreed... I think the best way to make this work would be: 10% movement speed while using abilities (akin to the 5 foot step in D&D).

Disagree with that and the previous one - unrooting will make the battles too easy.

wingedkagouti · March 2013

txhawk wrote: »

Longer durations will be nice, but the class also needs more of their powers to be AOE, including at least one AOE CC like the cleric power.

You'll want Steal Time then. It works extremely well with the "Gain Action Points when using Control Powers"-Feat and it's a Stun with an additional debuff when slotted as your Mastery Spell.

gillrmn · March 2013

crucial991199 wrote: »

We've heard your feedback about the Control Wizard's lack of control. We're going to be working on several changes for him over the next few weeks. Most notably, the first change will be a pretty sizable increase on the duration for all of his control powers. This change will not affect PVP, so in PVP your control powers will still be at their current duration. I look forward to seeing you all in Beta Weekend 3!

YAY!!!
*fluttershy style*

Exactly what I wanted!

spellwarden · March 2013

txhawk wrote: »

Longer durations will be nice, but the class also needs more of their powers to be AOE, including at least one AOE CC like the cleric power.

Serious dude. We got longer stuns, please dont rock the boat

spellwarden · March 2013

txhawk wrote: »

Are you trying to suggest that it is good game design to make a class that needs to be carried to the level cap?

In my opinion... yes. Teamwork for the win. Besides. I DONT want more AoE, takes no skill. It is better to have a 1 target CC, which means that CC then becomes a fight in it self.

I was working on a suggestion making force push 3sec cd when it was single target. Think about it, force push with 1 sec stun being the main CC for the class... I would have had a blast.

But this works, the class was fun, simply not usefull

thrynsyst · March 2013

crucial991199 wrote: »

We've heard your feedback about the Control Wizard's lack of control. We're going to be working on several changes for him over the next few weeks. Most notably, the first change will be a pretty sizable increase on the duration for all of his control powers. This change will not affect PVP, so in PVP your control powers will still be at their current duration. I look forward to seeing you all in Beta Weekend 3!

Now, *THIS* is totally unexpected by me, and totally welcome. It *will* make playing the CW quite a bit more fun, as you will then be actually able to *control* a fight, in short, to do what you're supposed to do. I look forward to seeing the changes.

dollahz · March 2013

spellwarden wrote: »

In my opinion... yes. Teamwork for the win. Besides. I DONT want more AoE, takes no skill. It is better to have a 1 target CC, which means that CC then becomes a fight in it self.

I was working on a suggestion making force push 3sec cd when it was single target. Think about it, force push with 1 sec stun being the main CC for the class... I would have had a blast.

But this works, the class was fun, simply not usefull

And a 3 second Repel takes skill? Especially considering all the encounter ability reduction in cooldown. You can permanently keep someone away from you. Now that would be broken. Also no one skill should be the main anything. A great class has all good abilities.

AoE is fine to add to the class as long as the range of the abilities arent out of control. Control Wizard could use some of the AoE it gets from the spell master slot to help him deal with clumped up mobs. The Control Wizard already has the abilities I suggested just not all at the same time.

The problem with splitting PVE/PVP cooldowns/durations is a player gets used to chaining certain skills together when leveling then he goes into PvP and its a totally different experience. This isnt such a big deal in some games such as GW2 where the PVP has its own gear and level. In this game a player will level from 1-60 learning his abilities only to have to relearn what they do when he/she begins to PvP.

I'm a big fan of not moving while casting. I have played Tera, C9, Guild Wars 2, Dragon Nest and Vindictus. Almost all of the big action-based combat games and they all had "floaty" combat. I of all people was not used to this kind of combat, but after two beta weekends. I see the advantages of being held to the ground. You can feel the abilities more and it forces you to be mindful of your positioning. It has some of the most exciting combat Ive seen in a while.

PS. Cant wait till next beta to test out the control wizard some more.

japo1 · March 2013

Thanks, but it needs more AOE effects and more at-will powers to choose from too!

bruddajokka · March 2013

Well that's one change that'll hopefully make a difference. Now all they need to do is
1. Get rid of the Ice. There's more interesting spells by far they could use.
2. Change the class mechanic so you can track your arcane mastery charges, and hitting tab allows you to then use the Spell Mastery version of any of your slotted Encounter powers. Sure you lose the extra encounter power but gain a lot more flexibility.
3. More AOE. Nearly all of the spells in the PhB has both a Control, and a damage component.

Changes coming to the Control Wizard!

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