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DC PVP, the true story
x0rda
Member, Neverwinter Knight of the Feywild Users Posts: 10 Arc User
So, i've been playing the DC for quite a while now. I'm at 12.9 something GS, well i'm close to 13k.
So i've been reading people saying the DC is fine and all in PVP.
Heheh well nothing could be further from the truth. We are so utterly broken that i fail to see that cryptic will ever be able to fix the class to a workeable state.
I'm all rank 9/8 defense enchants, my Damage reduction is at 39,5, with AS and foresight this is alot higher ofcourse.
I've respecced more times than i care to even count. Short story all are broken, some are less so.
The obvious choices are feated foresight and healing step, but nothing of it will matter in the end.
Of all the classes we scale the WORST BY FAR with gear. I've seen 10k GS <insert class> do WAY WAY better than i do. Sure i can dominate against the just dinged 60's in 7-8k GS no worries there. BUT if i get against any classin my bracker of GS i'm dead. And i mean DEAD.
As a Control Wizard i just laugh at ANY DC, between choke/freeze/stun from rays there is rarely a chance to get off any spell at all.
And the WORST of it all is the no comments from cryptic if this is working as designed or if they see that something is actually wrong with the class. If they stated that things are working as they think it should i wouldnt be much bothered and i would just roll one of my other toons and never ever look back at the DC.
So in no perticular order of things that are broken.
Casting animation, OMG it's so slow that ANY class with ANY CC will lock you down from casting. Unless they are <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font>... And the amount of CC that classes can put out is just way broken in pvp.
Mitigation vs classes that spec for Damage, dont even know where to begin, with my gear standing in AS i'm still hit for 10-15k damage. Theres no way i can heal that damage.
PvP, how score is being done. I mean come on! TR's get high score for killing ****, if they also kill stuff in the circle they get ALOT of bonus (tower defense bonus) where's my bonus for keeping them alive?
So in short, i'm out CC'ed, i'm way off on mitigation off the damage that's being done, and i cant heal self/others fast enough.
Now i do enjoy the DC in PvE, but as it stands now in PVP it's just not fun. Now theres some stuff i can still improve on my DC, i can get maybe 2-300 more defense by unslotting my rank 9's vs 10's. I can get my perfect vorpal instead of greater.
But i would not advice anyone to spend ANY more playtime invested towards improving the DC cuz as it stands now it's just flawed. The only way forward is that cryptic steps up and tells me that they think it's fine ( i can just drop from ever playing more pvp) or they admit that something is wrong and they are actually working on fixing us.
I encourage everyone to file bugreports / GM help ingame to see if we can get a response.
If they just admit that everything is fine i can just move along and jump on the <insert other class> bandwagon and actually have some fun in PvP.
Cheers all you DC's out there.
So i've been reading people saying the DC is fine and all in PVP.
Heheh well nothing could be further from the truth. We are so utterly broken that i fail to see that cryptic will ever be able to fix the class to a workeable state.
I'm all rank 9/8 defense enchants, my Damage reduction is at 39,5, with AS and foresight this is alot higher ofcourse.
I've respecced more times than i care to even count. Short story all are broken, some are less so.
The obvious choices are feated foresight and healing step, but nothing of it will matter in the end.
Of all the classes we scale the WORST BY FAR with gear. I've seen 10k GS <insert class> do WAY WAY better than i do. Sure i can dominate against the just dinged 60's in 7-8k GS no worries there. BUT if i get against any classin my bracker of GS i'm dead. And i mean DEAD.
As a Control Wizard i just laugh at ANY DC, between choke/freeze/stun from rays there is rarely a chance to get off any spell at all.
And the WORST of it all is the no comments from cryptic if this is working as designed or if they see that something is actually wrong with the class. If they stated that things are working as they think it should i wouldnt be much bothered and i would just roll one of my other toons and never ever look back at the DC.
So in no perticular order of things that are broken.
Casting animation, OMG it's so slow that ANY class with ANY CC will lock you down from casting. Unless they are <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font>... And the amount of CC that classes can put out is just way broken in pvp.
Mitigation vs classes that spec for Damage, dont even know where to begin, with my gear standing in AS i'm still hit for 10-15k damage. Theres no way i can heal that damage.
PvP, how score is being done. I mean come on! TR's get high score for killing ****, if they also kill stuff in the circle they get ALOT of bonus (tower defense bonus) where's my bonus for keeping them alive?
So in short, i'm out CC'ed, i'm way off on mitigation off the damage that's being done, and i cant heal self/others fast enough.
Now i do enjoy the DC in PvE, but as it stands now in PVP it's just not fun. Now theres some stuff i can still improve on my DC, i can get maybe 2-300 more defense by unslotting my rank 9's vs 10's. I can get my perfect vorpal instead of greater.
But i would not advice anyone to spend ANY more playtime invested towards improving the DC cuz as it stands now it's just flawed. The only way forward is that cryptic steps up and tells me that they think it's fine ( i can just drop from ever playing more pvp) or they admit that something is wrong and they are actually working on fixing us.
I encourage everyone to file bugreports / GM help ingame to see if we can get a response.
If they just admit that everything is fine i can just move along and jump on the <insert other class> bandwagon and actually have some fun in PvP.
Cheers all you DC's out there.
Post edited by x0rda on
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Comments
So much /facepalm worthy stuff in this wall of text I don't know where to start...
* TWITCH * YOUTUBE * MY GUIDES *
Honestly it's not just PvP. The design of the DC is absolutely awful, and half of our mechanics are bugged anyway. Just take a gander at any of the other class' feat trees. They're so much better than ours it's like a big joke. And on top of that, Life Steal and Regen are our best bet for healing ourselves... an we're the "healer" in the game.
Much of the problem with PvP has to do with being CC-locked. We have no way to counter this. No amount of gear, builds, or playstyle can change that. This is why people say you need Regen. It will continue to heal us while we're CC-locked.
There are really two ways to go:
1) Be the most durable punching bag you can be, and let your team play for you. You will never kill anyone this way, nor will you be that great at healing, either.
2) Maximize damage/healing output and hope you can get in a few lucky spells before you're killed. You will be effective in the brief moments you are not at the graveyard.
Take a look at gctrl's videos:
http://www.youtube.com/gctrlpvp
On his burst cleric videos, he is mostly doing #2. He's doing good damage, but he doesn't have any opponents focusing on him. He's more or less left to free cast. "Making them disappear", he faces a CW 1v1, but defeats the CW by getting the potion and critting on the pre-nerf Hammer. In my experience, this is very unlikely to happen. I would assume the videos are cherry-picked.
In his "tanking" videos, you'll see he does nothing but serve as a punching bag. lol
This one is really cute at about 0:40 when the opponent DC throws Hammer at him and does like 3500 damage. Sure, he's in AS, and sure, he deflected one of the hits. What a joke!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nG7Ja-4IP5g
If anything, I think the videos show just how broken then DC is... not that it's viable with certain builds. That's an odd definition of "viable" you have. There is always a trade off between defense and offense, but I don't know any other class who has two extremes like this, where any kind of compromise means you'll be completely ineffective.
How is being nearly as tanky as a pre-nerf sentinel GWF, being able to hold points solo, contesting points against multiple enemies long enough for your team to rotate to you and help, or healing/mitigating damage your teammates take while the enemy struggles/wastes a large amount of time trying to kill you ineffective?
There are many things broken about this game, do DC's have it the toughest out of all the classes? Yes. Are there ways to make your life easier as a cleric and actually be effective in pvp? Yes.
* TWITCH * YOUTUBE * MY GUIDES *
In other words, have you ever considered focusing on CC and damage, while keeping the shield only to do some heals? when i play pvp, i can get top kills with my DC. No kidding. I'll admit i'm a huge fan of terrifying insight in pvp. It's just awesome with brand of the sun.
And if you want kills, use dots + the divine mode of your at-will (not soothing like). With this there is NO way you don't get the kill, unless the TR has lashing blade available.
This is my point, exactly! You can make yourself a punching bag and serve as bait. So can a GF or GWF, except when they do it, they still also have damage output and CC. Yes, you can hold points to some degree. But if the enemy is wasting time trying to kill you, then you are successful not because of your tanky build, but because your opponents aren't reactive enough to change strategies. Probably due to the novelty of it, because honestly, no DC is going to build that way unless they specifically want to PvP like this.
Our control spells are pitiful. Chains is mediocre. It's not bad, but it's not great. It seems "nice" because it's one of our two CC's that's not a complete joke, with the other one being Sun Burst's knockback. What else do we have? Break the Spirit in divine mode stuns for at most one second. The prone effect from Guardian of Faith lasts at most one second. The "knock-up" effect from Flame Strike actually has a longer duration than either Divine BtS or GoF.
We do have a few slows, but they hardly give us an advantage which I can break down by class if you need me to. We can add a 0.5 second stun to Flame Strike with 5/5 Righteous Flames. Oh and Hammer of Fate has a medium knockback on it, I guess we can add it for completeness.
Of all the classes, we actually have the least amount of CC available to us, which is a big part of the problem. We also have no defense against CC whatsoever.
As for DoT's, that's generally the best way to go in PvP since they can still tick after you've been killed. However, I hate to burst your bubble about our DoT's, but here's some news for you: BotS only applies ONE stack of Terrifying Insight on initial damage. Go try it on a dummy. You will see that the initial hit does normal damage, the next three ticks do an extra 4% damage, and then the stack drops off and the final three ticks do base damage again. This is just ONE example of subtle bugs that are absolutely everywhere in the DC mechanics.
Oh, and only the initial damage of our DoT's benefits from Armor Penetration. None of the ticks benefit at all from ArmorPen. Anyway, it seems like you were suggesting that BotS would keep your stacks of Terrifying Insight up as it ticks, but I am sorry to say that it doesn't work that way. So whatever else your say is probably also based on false assumptions or expectations that the game does what the tooltips say.
Punishing Light is actually rather good (and DOES apply TI on every tick), and frankly should be free to use. Even with the recent changes, you can still only channel it for about 8 seconds with three full pips of DP (it uses 12% of a bar per tick). Being able to move at walking speed is a unique feature in the game and would give the DC a minor advantage to balance out some of it's weaknesses. I suspect this was the original intent from looking at the character creation for the DC:
Of course like anything else that has given the DC an advantage, it was nerfed heartily. I do not understand why the developers are so intent on not just making sure the DC isn't overpowered, but making sure it doesn't feel powerful at all. Ever. It's as if there is some logic that it must be the weakest of all the classes. Perhaps because it can heal? Perhaps because it can fill a support role? I don't know.
And as far as "punching bag" and "glass cannon" builds go, I feel like any of the other four classes could focus on those extremes and outperform the DC in those roles without sacrificing nearly as much damage or utility. But the real question is, why would they want to? Their classes are mostly viable in PvP without having to go to such lengths.
For the record, I do use a DPS build for PvP. But I don't usually use BotS, I use Astral Seal to keep up procs and Sacred Flame for maximum At-will DPS and generation of DP.
Unlike GWF/GF, DC can't maintain a significant level of damage or CC while doing so (obviously excluding solo content, which can be facetanked with no healing powers or potions whatsoever if you have the passive healing and mitigation feats and the MH set bonus).
I've played DC and observed others playing DCs with equivalent or even better gear than mine (maybe they have a Perfect Vorpal instead of my Greater or rank 10s where I have 8s, so the very best of what's available), and none of us are invincible. The closest some of my peers manage is to feverishly swap main armor pieces in the middle of combat to gain extra Soulforged procs, but that little trick can be done by anyone, not just DCs.
Sure, if you're facing off against an uncoordinated bunch who can't manage to focus their CC and most damaging encounters on you, you can skate around the node forever and even kill them if they don't run off first or receive heals. However, if your opponents are remotely competent and decently geared, they will know how to neutralize you. That's where you depend on having a great team that will control/kill them, because you sure won't be in much of a position to do so yourself.
When I play CW, I don't really care how stacked the enemy DC is, because they can't overcome my CC and damage. Even if they're rocking a DPS setup, their odds of killing me first are very slim (3 dodges vs. 2, 4 vs. 3 encounter powers, generally shorter cooldowns, vastly superior CC options...) If they come with friends, all I have to do to limit their effectiveness until I can get to them is to keep them pushed out of the way and on the defensive until they can be dealt with. Heck, even the most defensive DC is still fairly vulnerable to something as simple and easy as a Shocking Execution from a TR if it's timed intelligently.
All of this isn't to say that DCs are pitiful across the board or that there are no effective ways to play them, but I agree that there are no truly effective compromises in build and power selection. Without gimmicky defensive setups or absurdly specific offensive setups, the class can't do either terribly well, much less at the same time to any significant degree.
In short: DC is supposed to be a "Leader" class, and it doesn't really exemplify this role. I don't know why Cryptic is so afraid to buff up the DC and make it more attractive to play. Healers should be versatile and powerful; it's typically part of the player's compensation package for choosing to play a class on which their entire team depends to do its job at all times :P
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NIGHTSWATCH
Because a DC can't tank. We can can be "tanky", in that we take a lot of damage before we die. As far filling the Defender role, we can't do that. We can't build enough threat, and we have no way to avoid CC effects. No block, no unstoppable. That said, a part of being "tanky" is achieved through healing, buffing, and debuffing. We can't really do those things while we're CC'd.
Furthemore, unlike a GWF and GF, we can do very little damage this way.
Hey i know that we have ways to do "ok" in pvp. And i can facetank 3 people on a node, IF they are badley geard and dont know what they are doing. As an example if a rogue was in same situation with good gear against 3 bad, he will probably kill all 3 and then cap the node. I dont expect to kill all 3 in that situation, i'm quite happy with the punchingbad setup on my DC if it actually worked better against CC cuz as it is now it's WAY WAY WAY to easy to negate our mitigation/healing.
I'm happy for you that you feel that you are full of awsome in pvp.
A big part of the problem is CC, i have no way to heal myself during getting CC'ed. I dont care about getting a gazillion kills. But i do want to be able to fight with an equally geared class and be able to stay alive. And that is not the situation at the moment.
We are negated too easily.
I went up against a CW that was trying to use the WORST of their skills in pvp, steal time/icy terrain/shield and i dont remember last.. He DESTROYED ME, i bareley got a spell off.
I just find this verry hard to accept, so if cryptic just goes on to say that they find the class fine as it is. I'll just move along.
Anyway, your build and setup is something that i've built my own play upon and i apreciate the time you've put in to share it with the others.
If we need a tank, why would we need the damage from GF/GWF? And "tanky" (heal, take more damage,buffing,debuffing) is way more efficient than tank.
I dont know - i play all classes and so far i havent meet a single DC that even pose a small threat to any of my char.
If other classes are OP i dunno but DC is in a bad state and i shelfed mine (pray bot).
I've even let DC's unload on my chars and still easily kill em.
I did start as DC and actually started playing other classes to be able to find ways to kill them as DC's and its just not happening - there is noway you stand any chance against any other class with similar gear in the hands off a capable player.
I have a hard time thinking my skill level drops by 500% just for logging into my DC - i would like to see video's where DC owns similiar geared people before i believe it.
We are definitely dominating, and we are always about to win.
Do you play with a guild that recognizes they have to peel and keep you alive to win, or do you play with randoms where everyone runs around like chickens all kill crazy bloodlusted?
When you change from playing one way to the other do you notice a difference.
I am not very well versed in PVP so would like to know.
I am in a PvP guild, however I usually pug my DC as it is very low geared heh. When I do play with my guild of course I personally do better because they defend me and in turn I can keep healing them. I don't see why pugs can't understand this concept =/
When doing pug matches against lower GS players blue regen gear is probably your best bet, that's what I'm wearing as it was very cheap on the AH. In matches with stronger opponents you want high survivability so they don't focus you quickly.
Edit: I have my PvP survivability cleric build posted in the temple if you want to check it out, even with my low GS I do extremely well.
We are definitely dominating, and we are always about to win.
If your argument against the claims of positioning undergo Cryptic: If I make a million sacrifices, at least I can BREATHE A LITTLE (and narrowly) as a CLERIC (or LEADER!), I feel reportedly loathed their comments.
Nice thanks for answering ill check it out.
Been wanting a regen build to try out for a while, just have to grab the gear. So far my experience is trying to do my daily and getting destroyed over and over and over until my whole team but me quits.
I always feel bad lol. Sometimes i go with my guildie cleric buddy as well cause we are always on together. Usually before it starts my team sees double cleric and just quits before we start ha.
With my wisdom i should be the hardest to CC person on the board.
My CC which clearly states lasts for seconds only lasts for .1 seconds against anybody.
I dont get why its backwards. I should be the hardest to CC and should have the second most effective CC. Instead i am the easiest to CC and my CC does nothing.
even at 27 wisdom thats 17% less CC, the average CW cc is about 1 second and GF prone can last as long as 2.3 seconds. so you only get .17 - .39 of a second in reduction, it's fairly useless =/
In retrospect I probably would have made a dwarf cleric for STR/CON and the 10% chance to ignore knockback/knockdown
with practice you can dodge CC quite well, and dropping an AS when you know it's about to happen helps a lot.
Hmm... if I didn't hate leveling cleric so much I might reroll a dwarf lol. I hope they allow race changes in the near future.
We are definitely dominating, and we are always about to win.
Yea i guess that makes sense. But answer me this.
All my CC resist adds up to whopping go screw yourself.
How do others resist my 5 second CC if CC resist is so bad? (outside of GWF which has CC immunity sometimes.) Once again, genuinely curious i have a GF and a DC high level every other class is only like @ lvl 20. (leveling via leadership and invoke ftw!)
GF is the bane of DC's as they can chain prone for like 7 seconds along with their daily. It's pretty easy to dodge the first bull charge with a little practice but once they catch you with a prone they will be able to follow it up with more unless you dodged a couple times.
This is the big problem for most DC's in pugs. You need your team to watch your back for you to continue to heal them, and they simply don't lol. In their mind that GF is busy <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> you so they can go target the enemy TR or CW instead heh. When you get a competent team though DC can be quite a lot of fun.
I would say work on dodging at least one of the prones, and slotting prophetic action could help. I know it sounds really bad just reading it, but it has saved me numerous times by absorbing a large damage or CC ability.
We are definitely dominating, and we are always about to win.
Either your guildmates are awful or your trolling. Or maybe they felt sorry for ya and let you win. How are you going 1v1 with your guildmates anyway?
Being able to take a lot of damage is not the same as being a tank. I explained this in my last reply.
You are working under the assumption that the control resist mechanic actually works. In all likelihood, it does nothing. That said, the problem isn't the occasional CC, it's being CC-locked by opponents chaining their CC powers on you.
It's none of the above, and you would do well to listen to any advice he has to offer, he's one of the better players in one of the best pvp guilds on the Beholder server. Even though I hold my own pretty well in PvP, I've personally benefited from advice he's offered, and you'd do well to ask him questions rather than make accusations.
The way you duel your guild mates is to form two teams and queue at the exact same time, then confirm that both teams get the queue pop at the same time. You end up with a match with both groups then no one caps any points. You can then duel and skirmish each other off point as long as you want, it's the way most serious pvp guilds practice.
Guys I'm in the best PvP guild on Dragon and I am totally undefeated 1v1. No one has ever beat me and no one ever will. Anyone who doesn't win everytime just like me is doing something terribly wrong. I am so much better than you guys, but I am not going to offer ANY information how this even even remotely possible. But I will have my cronies chime in if anyone questions me and confirm everyone should take my advice, even though all I have said is that I win all the time and everyone else sucks. Isn't that good advice?
See how that works. Now I'm on even footing for credibility, since I made a post asserting that I was on a web forum. Obviously on web forums, people always tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth so help them Kelemvor.
Except of course the claims you make in constructing your argument are not factual, and your credibility suffers for it.
I would put it on youtube but I'm not paying the $37.00 dollars for fraps full usage. I might be able to get a good example of my 1v1s with the free 30 seconds they give you. I'll have to see.
There's also the slight chance that you're on the beholder server, then I can show you how I tank.
They may or may not be. How can you know?
Afterburner records video and it's free. Actually, I'm beholder. I could record the footage.
That'd be great. Then I could finally silence all the ignorant people of the DC forum.
It'd also be nice if you could link me the site to download afterburner. You could PM it to me if that's not too much trouble.