Curse

yesitsrob · Apr 05, 2007, 05:10 PM // 17:10

ZB only really shined in arenas in the first place, and probably on monk runners too. It was barely gamebreaking. But the nerf is justified.

Seriously though, if skill balances are going to make PVE hard for you then you have other problems.

IMMORTAlMITCH · Apr 05, 2007, 05:18 PM // 17:18

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nadia Roark

You're clearly missing the point.

Let me break it down for you. Old RaO wasn't terrifically more powerful than new RaO. The reason it was imba was because it could be chained; and in the course of doing so the user had a permanent speed boost and attack increase. Add to this that it's a SKILL (not a stance!) that can't be removed and you have one ridiculously overpowered melee elite.

Now lets look at New RaO. With EW down it has the exact same functionality; and even without EW you can keep it up with high Beast and sparing use of Crushing Blow. I'll consider it "touched" when its functionality is actually altered. The only reason people are considering it "nerfed" is because most of them seem to think that you have to run 12 hammer (you don't) and they drop points out of Beast to accomplish this. High Beast also allows your pet to deal more damage in combat, which clearly exacerbates the situation.

Hence, untouched.

RoA isn't that imbalanced imo, EW has a 60 second recharge and is really easy to kill, it got 'tweaked' in the wrong way though. (Nerf or remove the speedbuff from it and either increase the duration or reduce the energy cost, gives people an incentive to use Run As One too)

Quote:

So, for the most part, monks got a nerf (Zealous Benediction was the obvious choice, yes, but it was _required_ to handle the damage inflation), mesmers got a nerf (they have a hard enough time shutting people down as it is, and it's not like they even do damage while at work - Might as well be an interrupt ranger and shut down non-spell skills without having to rely on expensive 10 energy spells too ), and then some skills get damage buffs.

MESMERS ARE FINE AND ZB ISNT THE BEST MONK SKILL

RANGERS AND MESMERS ARE COMPLETELY DIFFERENT

You have no idea what you're talking about, please stick to PvE...

GloryFox · Apr 05, 2007, 05:18 PM // 17:18

Quote:

posted by Gaile Gray
Ritualist:
· Brutal Weapon: increased damage to 10..25, increased duration to 1..45 seconds.
· Consume Soul: decreased recharge time to 2 seconds.
· Spirit's Strength: increased damage to 5..35.
We wanted to improve a few niche skills in the Ritualist line, and we think we've accomplished that with these changes. Consume Soul is very specific skill, so we reduced its recharge time to make it more effective at removing Spirits from play. The fact that Brutal Weapon cannot stack with Enchantments is a bigger drawback than we'd originally thought, so we gave this skill a slight damage boost and a significant duration increase. Spirit's Strength is a fun, niche skill for some builds, and we wanted to make it more rewarding for players who choose to try something creative and different.

I’m not shooting the messenger I like the messenger. However I am shooting the author of the changes for missing an important change that has been suggested (requested) over and over again.

PLEASE MOVE BLOODSONG BACK TO COMMUNING AND MOVE ANGUISHED WAS LINGWAH TO CHANNELING INSTEAD.

There have many many discussions on the forums about this change. In every discussion I have seen the AwL change was in all respects the better choice.

Anguished provides a decent offense, Item, and Spirit Body for powering skills and spells within the channeling line. While moving Bloodsong only weakens (still very weakened) the communing line, and the communing line is already weak form previous unneeded NERF’s.

I say unneeded NERF’s because of the many over powered counters to Spirits and summoned creatures already in the game not used by people (PvP) or monsters (PvE) for some strange reason.

Many Ritualist players have put up with this “change” for the last few months and seriously it does not make sense to have 2 Pain spirits in the same line for PvE or PvP. Instead you moved a vital Communing spirit (only GOD knows why) to channeling for a buff (when there was a better option that made almost all players happy) while weakening the communing line a considerable amount. Communing has become virtually useless with the high cost of spirits that die so fast it was not worth the effort to place them in the skill bar to begin with. Bloodsong allowed for some good communing defense since it allowed for a Spirit Battery to exist with one or two passive defense spirits or spirits form the Summoning line.

As it is now you can still make a decent cannon battery (Channeling + Communing) So moving Bloodsong to channeling does not prevent it’s use. However it does prevent its use when combined with skills from the Summoning Attribute. There is no reason for this removal in comparison to the raw power of the passive offense of a fully loaded Minion Master.

So please ANET please move Bloodsong back to Communing and Anguished was Lingwah to Channeling.

Siddious · Apr 05, 2007, 05:27 PM // 17:27

Quote:

Originally Posted by IMMORTAlMITCH

I don't get why you people complain about mesmers 'being nerfed' so much.

You're not telling me that you're actually using diversion in PvE and 2(!!) extra seconds recharge isn't gonna make it worthless...

Diversion is one of the best skills in the game, as spammable as before makes it really strong even in the hands of a bad player.

People would just spam it on recharge without thinking about it/timing it.

About the soul reaping nerf.. don't form your opinion about it until you've 'seen it in action'

PvE is so easy that you could pretty much use a bar of 8 completely random skills and still succeed.

Mesmers don't get nerfed much? You must be joking.

Lets take a look at the last skill update shall we?

Quote:

Originally Posted by ANET

Mesmer

Wastrel's Demise: increased casting time to 1 second..

Of course that was just the last minor change we had... lets go further shall we?

Quote:

Originally Posted by ANET

Mesmer

Energy Surge: reduced area-of-effect to "nearby."
Spirtual Pain: functionality changed to: "Target foe takes 15..75 damage. If this Spell hits a Spirit, all nearby foes take 15..75 damage, and this Spell recharges instantly."
Mantra of Recovery: decreased Energy cost to 5.
Sympathetic Visage: decreased recharge time to 20 seconds, decreased duration to 4..10 seconds.
Ancestor's Visage: decreased recharge time to 20 seconds, decreased duration to 4..10 seconds.
Illusion of Pain: decreased the amount of healing applied when this Hex ends to 15 per point of degeneration.
Unnatural Signet: now does double damage to summoned creatures.
Price of Pride: decreased Energy cost to 5, decreased recharge time to 8 seconds, decreased Energy loss to 1..7.
Hex Eater Vortex: decreased Energy cost to 10.
Mirror of Disenchantment: decreased recharge time to 10 seconds.
Simple Thievery: decreased recharge time to 0 seconds.
Arcane Larceny: decreased recharge time to 0 seconds.
Arcane Thievery: decreased recharge time to 0 seconds.
Power Flux: decreased recharge time to 10 seconds.
Power Leak: decreased recharge time to 15, decreased Energy loss to 5..20.
Power Block: decreased recharge time to 20.
Power Leech: decreased recharge time to 10.
Panic: Increased casting time to 1 second.

Ones in bold are nerfs.

Now that may not look like much, however it is alot higher than nerfs from the other classes in the update (apart from paragons).

Thankfully this was actually proberly the best update for mesmers yet.

The update before that however:

Quote:

Originally Posted by ANET

Mesmer
Arcane Languor: increased duration to 1..10 seconds.
Distortion: duration now scales with attribute, and you now only lose 2 Energy when this skill triggers.
Drain Enchantment: increased recharge time to 30 seconds, decreased Energy gained to 5..20.
Echo: increased duration to 30 seconds.
Empathy: decreased duration to 5..15 seconds, increased damage to 15..45.
Energy Drain: decreased Energy stolen to 2..9.
Epidemic: decreased Energy cost to 5 Energy.
Ether Signet: decreased recharge time to 60 seconds.
Ethereal Burden / Kitah’s Burden: decreased casting time to 1 second.
Illusion of Pain: decreased casting time to 1 second.
Inspired Hex / Revealed Hex: decreased Energy gained to 4..10.
Keystone Signet: decreased casting time to 1 second.
Mantra of Recall: decreased Energy gained to 10..25.
Overload: decreased recharge time to 3 seconds.
Panic: decreased casting time to .25 seconds.
Power Return: decreased recharge time to 5 seconds.
Psychic Instability: decreased recharge time to 10 seconds.

This is again alot of nerfs compared to the other classes. There were 9 nerfs in this skill balance and 5 of those are Mesmer nerfs.

However the recent skill updates have been heavenly compared to the god awful older updates.

Let me introduce you to one of them...

Quote:

Originally Posted by ANET

Mesmer

Epidemic – Decreased casting time to .25 seconds.

Guilt – Decreased Energy cost to 5.

Hex Breaker – Increased recharge time to 15 seconds.

Soothing Images – Increased Energy cost to 15.

Energy Drain – Skill reworked. New description: “Target foe loses 4..10 Energy. You then gain 2 Energy for each point of Energy target foe lost.” Also increased recharge to 30 seconds.

Energy Tap - Skill reworked. New description: “Target foe loses 4..7 Energy. You then gain 2 Energy for each point of Energy target foe lost.” Also increased recharge to 30 seconds.

Diversion – Increased casting time to 3; Increased recharge to 10 seconds.

Ether Feast – Decreased Energy stolen to 3, increased Health gained per Energy stolen to 17..47

Signet of Weariness – Increased casting time to 2.

Fragility – Decreased Energy cost to 10; decreased recharge to 5; decreased damage to 5..20.

Mantra of Persistence – Decreased duration to 30 seconds. Decreased recharge to 15 seconds.

See that.. only 4 buffs... the rest nerfs. The old updates were horrible for the Mesmer class, weakening them dramatically.

Slowly mesmers are getting weaker and weaker, as well as there primary getting more useless every update.

You can even see from the updates I showed you that Diversion has ALREADY been nerfed before. Same happened to Mantra Of Recall, Energy Drain and Energy Surge.

I far as I have seen. Mesmers get a nerf EVERY skill update.

VinnyRidira · Apr 05, 2007, 05:30 PM // 17:30

I will have to see how the skill nerf's pan out. It seems to me that ele's and necro's have the best of the energy. All the others are at a great disadvantage when it comes to energy, and lets face it energy is the main requirement in this game.

I guess the Dervish may be slightly better to play but why an up close fighter never got proper armour. The Paragon who stands back got the 80 armour.

The Glyph of Lesser Energy cjange should not really make too much of a difference and ele's can get the benefit of slightly more energy savings.

Necro is still the most powerful character to play, if only the Ritualist had the benefit of good energy recovery.

tyche7 · Apr 05, 2007, 05:31 PM // 17:31

Most of this I agree with. There are 3 nerfs that really upset me however.

1. Glyph of lesser energy -- this wasn't overpowered so why the nerf?

2. Soul Reaping -- not even sure how this is supposed to work but that's the backbone to necros! MM's will die out and my necro is a MM )-:

3. "Watch Yourself" -- again - not overpowered

*sigh*

IMMORTAlMITCH · Apr 05, 2007, 05:32 PM // 17:32

Quote:

Originally Posted by Siddious

bla

There's a lot more buff than nerfs in that list and apart from surge and spiritual pain most of those skills have no place in PvE anyway.

If you think mesmers are 'underpowered' you are clueless...

Just because they aren't 'popular' in PvE doesn't mean they're bad, I never had trouble in PvE with my mesmer (or any character for that matter)

c00kie · Apr 05, 2007, 05:37 PM // 17:37

When I heard that mesmers are going to be buffed for pve, I was thinking of finally making a pve mesmer to deck the toon out in some swanky, mesmerizing duds. As such, I stepped into this thread in eager anticipation of some pimpin, radical changes. But whoa! Instead of giving mesmers something like an aoe empathy that the SS necros stole from them, they now get an amazing 10-20 more damage on a 15 sec recharge skill. And another elite to increase spammability of signets one extra time every 20 seconds. Wow. How does that translate into anything significant? Are signet spammers Anet's answer to making pve mesmers a viable option?

Consider some popular uses of signets. Mantra of Inscriptions + Keystone Signet = Roughly 3-4 uses of Signet of Clumsiness in a 20 second period of time. Toss in Signet of Humility in the mix for constant denial of 1 target's elite. Leech Signet + Signet of Disruption for roughly 5 interrupts in that time period. Signet of Disenchantment + Lyssa's Balance can be spammed roughly about 3 times each in the same bracket.

But nothing really synergizes well does it? The way I see it, all these skills do is basically to make the mesmer a minor nuisance for pve mobs while warriors, MMs and such are dishing out the real dps, which is no matter how you paint it, the crux of most pve situations. Maybe there are better ways to synergize signets, but I'm not really motivated to look too hard for them at the moment.

Think about it - Water eles have better snares, Necro's Corrupt Enchanment/Rip Enchantment works pretty efficiently in enchantment removals, SS Necro does the Empathy thing in a more epic scale, Wail of Doom Necro = diversion for attackers, Magebane Shot or Choking Gas Rangers dishe out steady dps along with their interrupts etc. Seems like every Mesmer niche can possibly be filled in with another profession (especially by those dastardy necros - heck, since pve mob don't tend to be especially meticulous in interrupts, you can probably go N/Me with the same Me/x skills for better e-management). Maybe pve mesmers are really just made to prance around in their lingerie armour... Oh, and to look cute firing off their newly enhanced Signet of Clumsiness. How can I ever forget that?

Incentive to make pve mesmer = None at the moment

And the diversion nerf? If people are complaining about the MoR/Diversion spam abuse, well, it was only spammable before because of the reduced energy cost of MoR and Spirit of Failure spam. We already see a nerf in Sof - great - so why don't we just re-nerf MoR and leave diversion alone?

I don't see these changes to the mesmer skill list as being a step in the right direction for "balance".

Bravesoul · Apr 05, 2007, 05:38 PM // 17:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by MSecorsky

And just like that... Otyugh's Cry is no longer the worst skill in the game!

WOOT!

LOL. I second that. I suppose since they are finally giving us decent storage that they had to fix Otyugh's Cry as well.

I mean how long could they leave them both lacking.

IMMORTAlMITCH · Apr 05, 2007, 05:42 PM // 17:42

no one used spirit of failure in conjunction with diversion btw...

yesitsrob · Apr 05, 2007, 05:44 PM // 17:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by tyche7

Most of this I agree with. There are 3 nerfs that really upset me however.

1. Glyph of lesser energy -- this wasn't overpowered so why the nerf?

2. Soul Reaping -- not even sure how this is supposed to work but that's the backbone to necros! MM's will die out and my necro is a MM )-:

3. "Watch Yourself" -- again - not overpowered

*sigh*

1. Yes it bloody well was.

2. Was nered in the wrong way, but it didn't really get more overpowered than soul reaping abbuse

3. Probably isn't. Paragon's having too high of a base armour is the issue imo.

Siddious · Apr 05, 2007, 05:45 PM // 17:45

Quote:

Originally Posted by IMMORTAlMITCH

There's a lot more buff than nerfs in that list and apart from surge and spiritual pain most of those skills have no place in PvE anyway.

If you think mesmers are 'underpowered' you are clueless...

Just because they aren't 'popular' in PvE doesn't mean they're bad, I never had trouble in PvE with my mesmer (or any character for that matter)

I never said that Mesmers get more nerfs than buffs. What I did say however is that Mesmers recieve many more nerfs than other classes (apart from recently with the prargon).

The Great Al · Apr 05, 2007, 05:47 PM // 17:47

Quote:

Originally Posted by tyche7

Most of this I agree with. There are 3 nerfs that really upset me however.

1. Glyph of lesser energy -- this wasn't overpowered so why the nerf?

*sigh*

Because it didn't even make sense for that NOT to be tied to energy storage. It wasn't nerfed for elems; rather, it got a slight slight buff. It was nerfed for other professions because they could basically take Elem as their secondary as use that glyph with the same effectiveness as a primary elem, even though Elems have an energy storage attribute, where that clearly belonged and should have been tied to all along.

Macktar Wang · Apr 05, 2007, 05:49 PM // 17:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by tyche7

Most of this I agree with. There are 3 nerfs that really upset me however.

1. Glyph of lesser energy -- this wasn't overpowered so why the nerf?

2. Soul Reaping -- not even sure how this is supposed to work but that's the backbone to necros! MM's will die out and my necro is a MM )-:

3. "Watch Yourself" -- again - not overpowered

*sigh*

1. Glyph was the best energy management skill in the game - you didn't need to invest anything in it to receive the maximum benefit, so any class could use it (with an Elementalist secondary).

2. If this kills your MM build, then you are doing something wrong. I suggest trying this out before screaming "Anet nerfed my build."

3. Watch Yourself didn't get fixed. Shields Up did.

The reason for these adjustments was to promote a more physical and offensive game in PvP. Shields Up was a great skill for passive defense, and being a shout, it cannot be removed. GoLE allowed 2 monks and an E/Mo to chain Aegis indefinitely with no energy problems.

Mack

Ss Executioner · Apr 05, 2007, 05:51 PM // 17:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by tyche7

1. Glyph of lesser energy -- this wasn't overpowered so why the nerf?

Are you kidding? 5 energy to rid yourself of 30 energy every 30 seconds? That is enourmous and allows teams to power an aegis chain on monks!

Quote:

2. Soul Reaping -- not even sure how this is supposed to work but that's the backbone to necros! MM's will die out and my necro is a MM )-:

The "nerf" on this was done incorrectly. The nerf on soulreaping is not enough the only thing this nerf effected was PvE, not PvP. But who ever said ANet knows the difference between the two. (except in one you get pretty armors and weapons!

)

Quote:

3. "Watch Yourself" -- again - not overpowered

You sir have obviously never played as a Paragon being fueled by these shouts - pretty much keeping his energy great- permenantly keepnig every refrain known to man on everybody permenantly with just one skill - did I mention the +20 armor to everyone making monks warriors?

However Watch Yourself! got fixed on the update previous to this one, shields up got nerfed on this one - which... was completely removing any rangers / paragons from gameplay if yuo had say 2 copies of this. Ridiculous.

-Sam

IMMORTAlMITCH · Apr 05, 2007, 06:00 PM // 18:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by Siddious

I never said that Mesmers get more nerfs than buffs. What I did say however is that Mesmers recieve many more nerfs than other classes (apart from recently with the prargon).

And they might possibly have gotten more buffs than other characters as well..

What's your point? Mesmer skill balance is delicate, as their skills often dont have as 'clear' purposes as damage or healing spells.

Most mesmer skills will never be used in PvE because shut down isn't really required, this doesn't mean they aren't extremely potent in PvP..

Keithark · Apr 05, 2007, 06:05 PM // 18:05

Quote:

Originally Posted by yesitsrob

3. Probably isn't. Paragon's having too high of a base armour is the issue imo.

Are people really wanting paragons to be nerfed even more? I realize most of you are PvP but they are already useless as a req 18 sword in PvE and you want them to be worse?? I made a Paragon when nightfall came out, nerf #1..lots of cussing and then finally figured out a useable build, then nerf #2..my paragon got no more use, nerf #3 found a great use for Paragon..it is a mule. Now with the added storage comming a paragon does not even have a viable use as a mule and there are still posts wanting them nerfed, funny

Legendary Shiz · Apr 05, 2007, 06:12 PM // 18:12

Quote:

Originally Posted by yesitsrob

ZB only really shined in arenas in the first place, and probably on monk runners too. It was barely gamebreaking. But the nerf is justified.

Seriously though, if skill balances are going to make PVE hard for you then you have other problems.

However, I believe ZB was going to get used a lot more commonly with the nerf of GoLE. Because now monks are left with basically 0 emanagement skills. ZB WAS really strong, but like you said not gamebreaking. Thus, I don't see the reasoning behind nerfing it.

blackbird71 · Apr 05, 2007, 06:14 PM // 18:14

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cathode_Reborn

Face it, SR was overpowered but it's still effective. I play my nec often in pve and running low on energy was extremely rare.

Ok, so a necro didn't have to bring an energy management skill to keep the bar full. But before you call SR overpowered, just remember that to use it, a necro has to put a lot of attribute points into an attribute that has only 5 associated skills (none from Prophecies). So generally speaking, the energy gain is about the only benefit from those spent attribute points. It seems pretty balanced to me, but I'll agree with those who say not to allow benefit from spirits. I'd even consider removing the benefit from minions, at least on a semantics basis. How do you reap the soul from something that has been "animated," and is not actually living? However, I see the problems this may cause with the game, so it should probably just be lessened.

Macktar Wang · Apr 05, 2007, 06:15 PM // 18:15

Quote:

Originally Posted by Keithark

Are people really wanting paragons to be nerfed even more? I realize most of you are PvP but they are already useless as a req 18 sword in PvE and you want them to be worse?? I made a Paragon when nightfall came out, nerf #1..lots of cussing and then finally figured out a useable build, then nerf #2..my paragon got no more use, nerf #3 found a great use for Paragon..it is a mule. Now with the added storage comming a paragon does not even have a viable use as a mule and there are still posts wanting them nerfed, funny

Paragons have the luxury of sitting in the mid-line with the armor of a warrior (AL = 80) and the range of a ranger (AL = 70). I don't see how bringing their armor level down to the level of a ranger would be "class killing." I'm sure he isn't suggesting Paragons to come down to the armor class of a caster (AL = 60).