Curse

wheel · Mar 02, 2006, 04:45 AM // 04:45

Quote:

Originally Posted by Studio Ghibli

Hey, Anet!

How about making MoP an elite and make it so its effect doesn't count as an AoE, like SS?

Yeah, great idea! Let's nerf a skill so that it's abuseable in PvE.

romO · Mar 02, 2006, 04:45 AM // 04:45

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mandy Memory

Sometimes I attack through empathy. My Eviscerate and Exicutioners often kill the mesmer...then I can be healed.

yeah attacking through empathy/spiteful is definetely the way to go. i usually try to combo it with spamming frenzy and using healing sig. if anyone tries to attack you at that time just hit endure and youre invincible!

anyway, on a serious note... as charlie was saying, other npcs need to attain the same changes. its ridiculous how if you heal a single bodyguard, he can solo every single archer from another team at the flagstand at VoD by casting incindiary bonds, fire storm, and maelstrom because they just stand there and let it kill them all at the same time.

Guillaume De Sonoma · Mar 02, 2006, 05:42 AM // 05:42

I've always loved MoP, but the AoE nerf did slow it down. I still say that the skill is usuable. With 8 points in curses its 24 or 26 damage and you can get plenty of damage with it before the foe runs. And if you haven't noticed monsters can't attack you while they run away. It is still usable and it last 30 seconds regardless.

QuixotesGhost · Mar 02, 2006, 06:06 AM // 06:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

It's the other way around, Spiteful Spirit needs to pick up AoE fear as well.

If they want to make things interesting they need to change the way aggro is handled. Right now once aggro is established on a tank it won't break as long as he doesn't move, or they're chased off by AoE fear. But if aggro would shift upon damage or healing, like it does in many other PvE games, things would get fun. If you cast Healing Seed on a tank the monsters should see the fat heals coming in and shift to its caster in response. If they're getting nailed by AoE they should do the same.

Other games do that, and it puts some additional burdens on PvE gameplay - your warriors have to deal a good amount of damage to keep the monsters interested, and your casters have to be less spammy and more tactical to avoid attracting huge amounts of attention. You can still herd the AI around but it's a lot more difficult, and a lot more, shall I say, realistic than it is now.

Oh and while I'm on the subject of AI would you *please* put the AoE fear on non-monster NPCs? That monk henchmen will still happily tank a Maelstrom and die from it is downright silly when an insect would get out of it in 3 seconds.

Peace,
-CxE

Agreed. PvE in this game doesn't get interesting until aggro breaks. I hope factions makes it nigh-impossible to hold aggro, then perhaps we'll see the return of some of these AoEs becuase you won't have an entire team screaming "OMG WTF NOOB" becuase you broke aggro.

Quote:

yeah attacking through empathy/spiteful is definetely the way to go. i usually try to combo it with spamming frenzy and using healing sig. if anyone tries to attack you at that time just hit endure and youre invincible!

He's right, there's times when it's worth it to attack through SS/Empathy. Don't belittle him for saying so.

Sol_Vie · Mar 02, 2006, 06:19 AM // 06:19

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mandy Memory

Sometimes I attack through empathy. My Eviscerate and Exicutioners often kill the mesmer...then I can be healed.

There is no way the AI can make a decision like this, but they could stop casting through backfire. (If empathy made them stop attacking, it would be used to no end...because you wouldnt get attacked....)

Actually it's been seen that some enemies do stop casting spells while Backfire is on them. I've seen them stop skills (not interrupted but stop the skill themselves) mid skill.

Studio Ghibli · Mar 02, 2006, 06:26 AM // 06:26

Well, thanks to those who disagreed with me and supplied a reason as to why.

As for the rest of you who either attacked me or just were plain assholes, die and go to hell.

My fear in -still- using it is that I'm afraid the scatter of the monsters from mark of pain--regardless of the damage--will allow them to switch targets to any number of squishies. In GW's current incarnation, that sucks.

Either way though, people seem to be fine enough with it.

Maybe I'll just do some more testing on it to see how it goes.

dont feel no pain · Mar 02, 2006, 08:01 AM // 08:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by SnoopJeDi

Mark of Pain is still way useful, maybe YOU need to adapt to the change instead of complaining.

Still, the AoE change has changed some things around (traps

)

yeah thats right people feel the same way about mark of pain as you feel about traps

Funda · Mar 02, 2006, 08:16 AM // 08:16

Quote:

Originally Posted by Studio Ghibli

I miss mark of pain.

I miss everything about it.

The sound it made when it fired. The flash of light when you knew it was hitting. The damage.

Everything so wonderful about mark of pain--GONE because of the AoE change. Now the spell's worthless, save for trapping.

Siiiiiigh.

I wish it were allowed back.

Hey, Anet!

How about making MoP an elite and make it so its effect doesn't count as an AoE, like SS?

Hmm...funny you mention this. I was in a PUG group -- with 3-4 guildies from [SoR] or something -- for FoW and someone in the group was saying this EXACT same thing. That they miss the effectiveness of Mark and that they wished it was an elite. Anyway, just thought i'd share that.

And if it was you down in fow yesterday, I was the 3rd monk picked up (one too many) in that PUG.

Hmmm, on second thought, I think you were the one down in FoW with me. Mo/Me -- you had to leave or something (your name was karmic something or other...) lol anyway, carry on.

Studio Ghibli · Mar 02, 2006, 08:33 AM // 08:33

Haha.

That was me, actually.

Karmic, yes.

I was so inspired by our FoW run that I made a post here. ;P

ShadowStorm · Mar 02, 2006, 08:56 AM // 08:56

Here's a fix that I'd like for Mark of Pain. Change it to read:

For 30 seconds, whenever target foe takes physical damage, adjacent enemies suffer from Health Degeneration of 6 for 1 - 3 seconds. If an enemy already suffering from Health Degeneration caused by Mark of Pain would suffer Health Degeneration from Mark of Pain again, the durations are added, not restarted.

And at Curses Attribute level 14 it would go up to 4 seconds of degen.

For those who didn't understand the wording of the hex, here's an example. Basically, If you have a level 12 Curses and you put Mark of Pain on an enemy, then hit the enemy twice with a sword, the Mark would activate twice. The first time it activates, all enemies adjacent to your target would suffer 3 seconds of degen. When the second blow from your sword hits the hexed target again, the enemies adjacent to it would still have 1 and 2/3 seconds of degen left. So, the second blow would increase the duration of the degen to 4 and 2/3 seconds instead of restarting it at 3 seconds. This way, no damage is lost.

That would effectively put out about the same level of damage as the original Mark of Pain, and enemies wouldn't run from it anymore. Unfortunately, the enemies wouldn't be suffering the damage in spikes anymore, so you'd have to wait out the degen to get the full effect. To truly make a degen based version of Mark of Pain, you'd have to scale the degen higher instead of the duration and the 10 pip degen cap would have to be lifted. Oh well, Se La Vi.

Avarre · Mar 02, 2006, 10:26 AM // 10:26

Quote:

Originally Posted by Veneficus

PVE isnt supposed to be a walk in the park.
If you had MoP on you, and you had 4 team mates next to you...would you stand still and let them take damage?

If yes...then i truly give up with people

You'd be surprised... on the ramps up to the forgemaster, where the shadow rangers + beasts are... casters all stand together to nuke rangers, which happily barrage into multi-MoP'ed targets. And they all scream for heals while spamming into SS.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

You can still herd the AI around but it's a lot more difficult, and a lot more, shall I say, realistic than it is now.

Please don't try to play the 'realism' card, because if we start on that road... well lets say AoEs will be somewhat less comfortable with friendly fire active.

Studio Ghibli · Mar 02, 2006, 11:30 AM // 11:30

A degen-based mop.. interesting.

I'd take that, even. ;D

EF2NYD · Mar 02, 2006, 11:40 AM // 11:40

It's fine the way it is. If they changed MoP, they should change any other scattering AoE (firestorm, balth's aura, etc.). They should really have made SS affected as well (only dumb paladins attack next to each other with SS on them).

WasAGuest · Mar 02, 2006, 01:57 PM // 13:57

This is on topic, though it may sound like it isn't:
I love SS and a chang to it would literally kill the spell for me. It's currently my favorite - adding the "broken" aoe AI to it, would break it. As for MoP, same thing happens. To me, it's the aoe AI that is broken simly because the nearly instant fleeing the AI does. I've seen mobs run before they even take damage from the spell(s).
An AI fix towards the now broken "aoe AI fix" is what is needed.
Mobs need to hold the aggro and return to the person they were attacking before they fled. - This would also make it slightly more difficult as casters couldn't just fire off, say Lava Font, and have foes flee away (a good tactic currently for casters, but needs to be changed). Mobs also need to either react slower or have a chance to flee rather than instantly run away. Should be a damage based chance to flee. As it is, using Lava Font again as an example, having no skill in fire magic (meaning dmg 0 - 3 vs some foes) causes all foes to flee. Why would they flee when they are taking that small amout of damage?
Also makes little since to me in that SS and MoP would cause an instant flee effect, especially on high level mobs. They have so many hit points they should be able to take it for longer while still dishing out damage. This would go a long way to making PvE more difficult and unpredictable, since you are not sure you'll get the result you are looking for.

As always, I refer to PvE only.

WOW, look at all the typos, too early to type it would seem

Griff Mon · Mar 02, 2006, 02:45 PM // 14:45

Physical attack Monsters keep on plugging away against Shield of Judgement, I see lots of yellows even after the knockdown. They get up and hit again.

natus · Mar 02, 2006, 02:52 PM // 14:52

I sure do miss the old days where you could go to fow and the warrior could just take out entire mobs, just because of mark of pain, perhaps it would still work if you used some...water ele stuff.

i'd say, make it an elite and/or lower the damage, that way it's not overpowered, yet useful.

boxterduke · Mar 02, 2006, 06:43 PM // 18:43

I was wondering the other day why it was changed to AoE.
I mean if you think about it SS does the same thing plus the hexed foe gets damaged also.
I hope they do not change SS to AoE also.
If they do then bye bye SS/SV necros.

Eugaet · Mar 02, 2006, 06:57 PM // 18:57

I find MoP works well enough when you corner or trap a mob so they can't run. I was having a bit of fun with that in the Furnace last night. Can't do that with henchies, though...

The whole AoE 'nerf' just increases the amount of strategy you have to develop, IMHO. If the tables were turned and MoP (or any AoE spell) was cast on your party, would you all stay huddled together? I'd be trying to get away from the epicenter as quickly as I could, unless I thought I could endure it. I think the change just makes the mobs act more intelligently.

Phoenix Ex · Mar 02, 2006, 08:45 PM // 20:45

What strategy? What I see is AoE nearly NEVER touched by any group I have seen (except SS and Meteor shower). I can find no way to make firestorm work effectively, even with slow and everything I managed to get 4 hits in before they limped out...now is that worth the 15 nrg cost and the long casting time? Supposedly Mark of Pain still works decently, you get some good damage...then every one is running around dodging once the aggro goes out of control, doing no damage at all, at the end Mop might as well not be used.

I don't know why us AoE users are seen as some sort of lazy bum who doesn't want to think. There is a reason why we HAVE to use aggro control with AoE. Look at the end game mussat bosses, bladed aataxes in UW, the grasping insanity in tombs. lvl 28 monsters with like double our hp, infinite nrg, and ridiculous damage. AoE is like the only thing that kills them at a decent speed (next to minions and SS, which is now the new echo nuker). Not everyone has hours on end to kill all those one by one.

So, what's the new incredible strategy? LF MM and SS necro! everywhere. Now let's nerf these and keep nerfing all the high damage skills until everyone are tearing their hair out trying to kill one aataxe.

I hope Anet fix their half done "AI improvement", lower the monster levels! Fix Orion so the henches can be used again! Decrease the cost for AOE! INcrease AOE damage, Range! Add extra effect on them! Anything!

Felg · Mar 02, 2006, 08:55 PM // 20:55

I agree 100%

it's so annoying when I got to the desert with my N/W I started having trouble with the build that had previously worked pretty well thru the game...well I started experimenting wiht new builds and finally I managed to find a good build centered around mark of pain...I could take out huge groups of melee mobs in less than 10 secs without any worries...then bam next day AoE-nerf and that build is now useless

so on to experimenting again...sigh.