Sage Intense Form

Veno butterfly forme/imbued forme has no mana decrease, so since barb damage decrease was like the equivilant of this, I don't think it was an accident at all. o-o
...I hope they fix the buff that demon barbs in-forme are supposed to get that essentially lowers the crit. of anyone that attacks them by 5% soon !

Flarephoenix - Dreamweaver wrote: »

I think this update was intentional and aimed at balancing the cultivations a little more while giving sage a much needed damage boost, demon still has the higher damage overall with crit-rate boosts, more powerful armageddon and more controls skills for PvP.

The point here seems to be there is no trade-off. If option A has everything option B does and more, what point there is for option B to exist? When it came to to True form, the trade-off is quite clearly more dmg for demon, more defenses for sages. Now? If They took the reduction off sage true form, sage will hit plain harder in true form. Demon will have only have crits, sage will have higher DPH and defenses when it comes to true form. Which really isnt balanced.

If this was intended, I am going to bother with OHT culti and change to sage myself. Well would if I could force myself to spend 100m+ in books on toon, which has turned into my kittyshop. The buffs alone have made wish I had gone sage instead though, drives me crazy every single time I buff on my barb. Then again this might be the reason I finally change and gear barb enough to be useful in TWs.

The damage reduction itself was from a time much earlier in the game before the OP gear we have now, what's to say the developers didn't reach the conclusion that it's takes too much from a barb's damage output at endgame? I've seen enough players consider the extra physical defense gained by sage a poor trade-off with the gear available now for the damage they lose, advice is always roll demon as you gain a lot more damage and other bonuses where the defense gained by sage does not compare.

I agree it's not a fair move but the barb cultivations were never truly balanced and that became more obvious as more powerful gear became available.

Flarephoenix - Dreamweaver wrote: »

The damage reduction itself was from a time much earlier in the game before the OP gear we have now, what's to say the developers didn't reach the conclusion that it's takes too much from a barb's damage output at endgame? I've seen enough players consider the extra physical defense gained by sage a poor trade-off with the gear available now for the damage they lose, advice is always roll demon as you gain a lot more damage and other bonuses where the defense gained by sage does not compare.

I agree it's not a fair move but the barb cultivations were never truly balanced and that became more obvious as more powerful gear became available.

Actually difference was marginal: -50% weapon from True Form, +10% from Titans, -10% from Poison Fang, +25% from A&H Mastery = -25%. 25% weapon attack though is seriously marginal on endgame builds, under 5% DPH difference. If I can remember correctly, Barb has bout 600% weapon damage multiplier on endgame, 25% / 600% x 100% = 4.1%. On other hand Sage had same advantage to DPH on humanoid.

But I do agree sage was UP. Still they took idiotic way of balancing it if this was intentional, kinda like they did with sage archer buffs. Demon barbs are left with Flesh Ream, though imo sage is almost as good. Demon Roar seems more useful in PvP, though I don think sage is bad either. Demon sunder is still awesome in comparison, arma is still better. Some other skills are bout equal (Like Shapeshifting intensity) imo but the rest? Sage is just plain better with changes.

ye they just boost Saga barbs power with this update ,
now i feel like dumb if i stay on Demon.

Haila - Sanctuary wrote: »

I should wait things out a bit...

Guessing its this.


Kind of makes me roar that for 3+ years some of us have compared culti and thought "more dd/aggro or more defenses?" and based our demon culti choice on appraising damage and aggro over a bit more survivability. Now they just give sages the dd/aggro benefit and give demons... 6 seconds -5% crit chance. Has to be a bad programming writeup or oversight.

If it is to "balance" classes I think its ridiculous. Sage made their choice. Balancing (usually) means one class gets one benefit and the other gets an equal but different benefit. This is just copying skills to balance.

In otherwords, it should be demon's get apples and sage gets an equal amount of oranges to have different but balanced culti options, pick what you prefer. Instead it's demons get apples and sage gets an equal amount of oranges and 3 years later lets give them apples so they have apples too.

Im sage now but wanted to swich to demon as im going APS. I'll just make a second barb though and have both a demon and a sage one so i wont ever have to think about this again.

So gimme back my FC soon please !

People are moving too fast on the switching over to sage from demon. It's only been 1 day since the update. The future brings new skills for the panda. I can bet that all those that switch, which is what pwi wants people to do so they make money off of them, will be regretting it later when the new skills come.

I'm very much looking forward to this one:

Feast of the Demons [again not a demon skill, just barb form skill]
Consume 1 Spark.
Accuracy increases by 300%, Defense Level by 40 for 60 seconds.
Can not be removed.
Requires Panda form to use.
Cooldown is not shared.

The Sage full attack bonus was confirmed to be a mistake, check the "undocumented changes" thread in the general discussion section and see for yourself. Ill even post it for ya!

http://pwi-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=1574821

Anyways, I feel like I wanna discuss this a little more than just being upset over it. As a demon barbarian myself, the only thing I really feel iffy about is the chi gain advantage that sage barbs have received.

Lets do some easy calculations shall we? (Because everyone knows that only archers can do hard math).


1) Let's do the potential chi gain of a demon barb first.

(Calculation's are not in-battle because it would need include differences in bestial rage)

(Also keep in mind that demon buff also gives team mates 20 chi each cast...but we're being selfish here, who cares about other people? b:victory)

The only chi gain skill of a demon barb is BKI, this can be casted every 5.5 seconds (total casting + cooldown), costs 495 mana to use, and will result in an extra 35 chi.

Mana Chi Time

495 = 35 @ 2.5s
990 = 70 @ 8s
1485 = 105 @ 13.5s
1980 = 140 @ 19s
2475 = 175 @ 24.5s
2970 = 210 @ 30s
3465 = 245 @ 35.5s
3960 = 280 @ 41s
4455 = 315 @ 46.5s
4950 = 350 @ 52s
5445 = 385 @ 57.5s
5940 = 399/400 (full) @ 63s


2) Sage Chi Gain

Now, Sage Barbs now have two different ways of gaining chi, the standard Sage skill (forgot name) and now the super transformation skill!
-Chi gain skill is instant and has a minute cooldown
-Adv. Tiger form gives 20 chi instant and then every 3 seconds for 100 mana

Mana Chi Time

0 = 50 @ 0s
100 = 70 @ .5s (because it takes time to move clicker)
200 = 90 @ 3.5s
300 = 110 @ 5.5s
400 = 130 @ 7.5s
500 = 150 @ 9.5s
600 = 170 @ 11.5s
700 = 190 @ 13.5s
800 = 210 @ 15.5s
900 = 230 @ 17.5s
1000 = 250 @ 19.5s
1100 = 270 @ 21.5s
1200 = 290 @ 23.5s
1300 = 310 @ 25.5s
1400 = 330 @ 27.5s
1500 = 350 @ 29.5s
1600 = 370 @ 31.5s
1700 = 390 @ 33.5s
1800 = 399/400 @ 35.5s

In conclusion: In the chi department Sage barbs are far better off than Demons.
1) More efficient in mana food costs
2) Can be used rapidly while tanking (given situations where possible) for quick chi, but demons take too long to cast and may lose agro by then

Any other benefits of the new form (NOT INCLUDING THE FULL DAMAGE!) just list em.

I would say that sage tiger form should be increased in mana cost just to balance it.

I can just see it now: "sage barb lf: ***". The only reason I felt sorry for demon venos was because of the idiocy of so many squad makers. The 11-37k you spend to make a squad yourself can be worth it.

Crixxix - Raging Tide wrote: »

LOL ^ I agree. It wasn't a mistake, it's how it's supposed to be. Also, this is something that a MOD posted, not a GM. This is the way it's meant to be, and I'll tell you what, demons still have it just as good, if not better. 5% chance to avoid a crit is really useful, especially in NW when you got 3 sins and a seeker on your bum. So quit QQ'ing because we finally get to do just as much damage as when we're in human form. Demon barbs need to uninstall anway.

When dealing with high crit rate characters, whats the difference of an extra 5%, 30% and 35% wont make that much of a difference (I dunno how accurate those numbers are, its just an example)? However, I can imagine it would be useful against magic classes where their crit rate is so low it would make a difference in that scenario.

Anyways, I'm not QQ'ing. I simply stated the imbalance between the two true form skills. Originally the differences between the two skills were meant as a balancing act (which I think most people agreed were fair when that was the case).


Another question..really, why should demon barbs uninstall? That was the most nonsequitur (and stupid) statement I've really ever seen in a real discussion.