Curse

Wyat Hawke · Oct 28, 2007, 10:52 AM // 10:52

I do not really know if nerfing Shadow Prison to a 30 sec recharge will be that good, since most people probably would use [skill]Beguiling Haze[/skill] instead. And that is a lot more gimmicky in my eyes

Perhaps give it a 25 second recharge instead of 30? Or just shorten the duration of the snare, so they have to bring an extra hex for the black lotus/spider combo...

IMMORTAlMITCH · Oct 28, 2007, 11:07 AM // 11:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by holymasamune

Divert hexes: 5 energy. remove 1..2 hexes from target ally and all nearby allies. ally gains 2..38 health per hex removed. lose 3 energy for each additional ally affected. 3/4 cast.

I don't like this change, I really don't think there's a way of changing this skill so it's worth bringing but not overpowered, it's just a niche skill cause it's useless if you don't play vs hexes (and even then it's just a target for humsig)

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Word of healing: heal target other ally and up to 2 additional allies adjacent to that ally for 10..78 health. additional 10..78 health if below 50%. 6 second recharge.

Make it selfcastable and change the recharge to 2s

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Shield of deflection: 7 recharge. 1...7 duration.

1..5 Duration is fine tbh, it's supposed to stop spikes, not kill pressure.

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Healing light: in addition, heal up to 2 additional allies adjacent to target for 10...58 health. 5 recharge.

Don't like this change either, make it 2r 3/4c and maybe increase the amount it heals slightly.

Ritualist:

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Ancestor's rage: 28..100 damage. 12 recharge.

I don't really know what should be done with this, the damage should definately be lowered but Idk if changing the recharge is enough, an idea is had is half the damage and make it 3-4r so it's more smiting prayerish and not so spikish.

Splinter Weapon deserves a slight nerf tbh, but nothing too significant.

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Mending refrain: 3 health regen at 13-16 motivation.

Why would you nerf this? In essence it's pretty strong I guess, but it's not ran as it is so a nerf really isn't neccesary.

A change to paragons I would like to see is Shouts/Chants giving a set number of energy (based on leadership, like leadership/3) regardless of how much allies are affected, this will make targetted shouts/chants more viable which promotes more active gameplay.

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Siphon speed: 7 recharge.

I'd go as far as to change it to 10r.

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Deaths retreat: 15 recharge.

Disagree, return on split monks is a big enough nuissance as it is, dont need them to bring this skill too. In fact I'd even bring return up to 20r.

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Hex eater vortex: 10 recharge.

I really don't like how hex eater vortex plays, it basically destroys water eles while being nothing more than a spike tool against actual hex builds, I would opt for decreasing the recharge to 8r but making the damage something like 45 per hex on the target (with maybe a cap of 135 damage) but keeping the ench removal.

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Imagined burden: 6..18 duration. 20 recharge.

Crippling anguish: 7..16 duration. 15 recharge.

Maybe drop the energy cost down to 10e too.

Also, Auspicious Incantation needs to die, this skill needs to die, and actually interesting inspiration skills like Inspired Hex and Drain Enchant need to be reverted to their old stats.

Also Glyph Lesser needs to be changed to 7...15 energy (reaching 15 energy at 9 energy storage) because with spell cancelling etc this is so much better than any other energy management, which isnt so much a problem on eles but with aegis faking till you get a fast cast it's pretty retarded.

Also I'd like to see heal party changed to 10e with a 1c and slightly less health gain to compensate.

Otherwise not such a bad list.

Wasteland Squidget · Oct 28, 2007, 11:48 AM // 11:48

Cleaned up this thread so there's more actual balance discussion. Arenanet will never delete professions from the game. If you really want to post about that, go put it in Sardelac with the rest of the silly suggestions.

This thread is about actual balance discussion. If you have a change to propose, or would like to argue other people's changes, go ahead. But this isn't the place for suggestions that have no basis in reality.

Aera · Oct 28, 2007, 01:07 PM // 13:07

[skill]Warmonger's Weapon[/skill] really needs a nerf; about 14 seconds of free interrupts, come on :/

I'd suggest increasing the recharge to 30 and the duration to 1...9

[skill]Hundred Blades[/skill] I'd like to see this buffed, by adding like 3...10 damage to it, the only swordwarriors you see these days are cripslash

[skill]Avatar of Melandru[/skill] Chance functionality to: Whenever you succesfully hit with an attack, you lose two conditions. Increase the duration slightly again.

The rest has already been mentioned really.

TheOneMephisto · Oct 28, 2007, 01:28 PM // 13:28

Good changes. TBH, blessed light might even need a slight healing boost, or there's a suggestion running around that it should add a "heal for another 30-40ish is a hex is removed."

I'm not so sure about all the AoE healing stuff that you're pushing, mostly because I don't really think that buffing something to adjacent range will help it that much. It's simply too hard to control getting that additional heal and even harder to get the additional heal on someone who actually needs it. I'd rather the skills were just changed so that they were worth it as single-target heals like they were meant to be.

I really like that horns change btw. One thing I'd like is to push assassins away from their reliance on hexes, as most of the good assassin builds have always centered on hexes to power out the black line, which makes them only good in hex overload and split builds. If you could have a character like a siphon strength guy (who I really like) actually do something useful at the stand in a non-hex build, that would be awesome.

As others have said, the clumsiness/ineptitude hexes need to have lowered duration, however, I really like how they play and have since their first reign in TA, and I don't want them to be pushed out of the meta. If the shorter duration kills them, you could maybe change them to "the next 1...2 attacks," as it wouldn't cause as many problems in such a short timeframe.

I like the suggestion of making HEV only deal damage depending on the number of hexes on the target. However, I'd suggest something more like "Remove 1 hex. For each remaining hex, deal X...60 damage (max 130)." That would make it do no damage for only removing one hex but have it reach max power at around 3-hex stacks.

jaeharys targaryen · Oct 28, 2007, 01:43 PM // 13:43

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Shadow prison: 30 recharge. Moves 50% slower.

i like how you made it worse than its non elite version.

Shuuda · Oct 28, 2007, 01:50 PM // 13:50

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Originally Posted by jaeharys targaryen

i like how you made it worse than its non elite version.

I actaully agree with that, I think that change is a tad overkill. Prehaps compensate with reducing the cost to 5 enegy, or/and leave it as 66% slower.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wyat Hawke

I do not really know if nerfing Shadow Prison to a 30 sec recharge will be that good, since most people probably would use [skill]Beguiling Haze[/skill] instead. And that is a lot more gimmicky in my eyes

I disagree, Haze is very very easily countered. It has no snare, little duration and high cost, I doubt it could very become viable in anything high end.

TheOneMephisto · Oct 28, 2007, 02:19 PM // 14:19

GolE->bhaze?

The thing about SP isn't necessarily that it's an elite shadow step with a low recharge, it's because it's such massive bar compression. It has your hex for the black line, your snare, and your shadow step all in one skill. BHaze might have a nice side effect, but you still have to carry another snare/speedboost and something to meet the black requirements (probably siphon speed, but that has its own problems) and on top of that, now you have to find some energy management to deal with the cost.

Lord Natural · Oct 28, 2007, 04:02 PM // 16:02

Ritualist

Ancestor's Rage - Lower the damage a little, to match the other rit attacks.

Splinter Weapon - Too easy to spam given its ridiculous effectiveness at VoD and in certain choke points.

Warmonger's Weapon - Increase cost to 15e.

Necromancer

Rend Enchantments - Remove monk from the skill description.

Corrupt Enchantment - 15 recharge. Scale degen duration to match.

Assassin

Assassin's Remedy - 30 recharge.

Shattering Assault - 12 recharge. Bad memories of Grenth.

Shadow Prison - 30 recharge.

Death's Charge - 45 recharge.

Death's Retreat - 30 recharge.

Recall - Range reduced to half-radar, if such a thing is even possible. I suspect hitting its recharge or energy wouldn't have a great effect on the skill.

Ranger

Rampage as One - Duration reduced to 0...10 (or change to bow attacks).

Other thoughts

I'm just tired of a metagame drenched in sin and rit, 2 badly designed classes in my opinion. Teleportation is a bad game mechanic and weapon skills are not much better. It's like all the lamest elements of HBs are migrating to GvG. On a side note, I still think the reliance on LoD is unfortunate. My first thought when considering OP skills was humsig, until I realized it was never a problem in the past and only is now because of the total dependance on LoD. Healing in general needs some re-working. IMO buff healing and scale back block wars a little more such that sword and hammer are once again viable.

edit:

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A change to paragons I would like to see is Shouts/Chants giving a set number of energy (based on leadership, like leadership/3) regardless of how much allies are affected, this will make targetted shouts/chants more viable which promotes more active gameplay.

I like this idea.

Burton2000 · Oct 28, 2007, 04:29 PM // 16:29

I dunno besides pehaps a slight change to ancestors and maybe splinter i'd consider rits a fairly balanced class now in gvg.

TheOneMephisto · Oct 28, 2007, 04:35 PM // 16:35

Rits aren't horrible currently, though some of their skills are too strong. Basically, they're used as runners that aren't as good as monks at protecting bases but are pretty good at buffing melee and really good at blowing things up at VoD.

But ancestors and splinter definitely need changes. Lower the damage on both of them please, or you could even change the functionality of ancestors to less damage but make it also set things on fire.

Burton2000 · Oct 28, 2007, 05:07 PM // 17:07

I would like to see buffs to weapon of warding though and if they buff warding a buff to mending grip lowering the recharge to say 4 or reduce cast time to 3/4.

That way offensive elites can be used on the runner while still being able to survive and defend the base.

Count to Potato · Oct 28, 2007, 05:13 PM // 17:13

I think to promote lacerate, i dunnno this just idea im sure this could exploted, change it from when it dies everyone under 90% health become bleeding, just change it to when it dies everyone startd bleeding and up recharge to 30 secs

Symbol · Oct 28, 2007, 05:52 PM // 17:52

I like most of the monk and rit changes. I think most of your sin nerfs are pretty bad, and miss the point.

You want to nerf SP sins, hit SP or BLS. No need to dick around nerfing the other stuff, which is actually useful outside of SP.

I agree with the clumsiness duration nerf, but don't touch ineptitude. Taken in isolation it's nothing fantastic, the only reason it's seeing play because most illusion elites are trash.

Quote:

Originally Posted by TheOneMephisto

I really like that horns change btw. One thing I'd like is to push assassins away from their reliance on hexes, as most of the good assassin builds have always centered on hexes to power out the black line, which makes them only good in hex overload and split builds. If you could have a character like a siphon strength guy (who I really like) actually do something useful at the stand in a non-hex build, that would be awesome.

Disrupting Stab: 5e 1/2s 8r. Increase spell disable to 5...20s OR remove disable and make it inflict dazed for 1...4s if it interrupts a spell.

Leaping Mantis Sting: 5e 1/2s 8r. If it hits a moving foe you do an additional +10...40 damage and inflict cripple for 3...15s.

Mark of Instability: 10e 1/4s 15r. Change functionality to "Interrupt target foe. Target foe is hexed with Mark of Instability for 20 seconds. The next time target foe is hit by a dual attack that foe is knocked down"

Exhausting Assault: Let it follow both a lead or an offhand.

Viper's Defense: 5e 15r. Change to "For 5 seconds the next attack against you is blocked. If you block an attack skill your attacker is knocked down and poisoned for 5...20 seconds"

Promotes interrupts and moves away from hex builds. Something like LMS - Jungle - Trampling could be pretty solid if you consistently land the cripple. Viper's is just there to give the sin a decent active defense option (right now the stuff they have is better on monks) which maybe will allow them to take a more active role without getting linebacked to death.

Riotgear · Oct 28, 2007, 06:05 PM // 18:05

The SP bar has two points that make it stupid: The start and the end. Shadow Prison covers Expose, prevents your target from kiting, lets you completely ignore positioning, and gives you a primer for a lead-skipping attack that pays you to use it.

And yes, nerfing it to 30 would make it only marginally better than Dark Prison, so Dark Prison needs to get hit too. Remember that Dark Prison used to be 45, and it's not that it isn't too good at 30, it's that nobody cares because there isn't anything else on the SP bar worth swapping for an elite. If SP were nerfed to 45 or 15 energy, I wouldn't be surprised if people ran Dark Prison on the same bar with no elite. Ultimately, Shadow Prison as a skill has promoted degenerate play in every format it's been viable in because it lets your melee everything that makes melee challenging, and instead play something with the complexity of caster spike.

BLS provides a lead skip and funding for the rest of the combo. The condition used to be difficult to satisfy, now it certainly isn't. There isn't really any number-tweaking that could make it balanced (especially considering its major alternative, GPS, doesn't pay for itself), although changing it to a lead would probably kill it on all of the gimmick bars.

The end, BoS+Impale. Compared to the old Horns+Twisting or Twisting+BoS, the new BoS+Impale lets you keep the KD and gives a massive amount more damage without really sacrificing anything but a skill slot and still get your DW, courtesy of buffed Impale.

Both skills need to be cut back significantly. Impale's considerable damage+DW contributes to the instagib component and the 70-ish damage is not really needed for any non-gimmick Assassin bar. BoS needs to be 10 energy, possibly even hit harder than that. For a skill that provides about as much "true" damage as TF provides with damage and a DW, 5 energy is far too cheap.

Snow Bunny · Oct 28, 2007, 06:19 PM // 18:19

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Originally Posted by Wasteland Squidget

SP sins, as usual, could use a serious hit. And, as usual, they will not get one.

A nerf to Avatar of Melandru doesn't make much sense. Melandru is easily one of the most interesting and player-intensive skills on that character's bar, because of the way it allows you to freely push around the map while it's up. You can go around the battlefield in relative safety, push onto a split, imbue people, and still create a significant flagstand threat. It's only while the Melandru form is down that that guy becomes an uninteresting character without a lot of tactical options. I can see increasing Wearying's recharge to slow the Deep Wound spam, but nerfing Melandru itself pushes that character towards less interesting play.

SP still remains one of the most retarded skill ever conceived of. A snare and shadow stepping in one handy, accessible package. Nerf this for sure.

Granted, when Melandru's is down, tactical options are down and the character is uninteresting, and much less useful. But the problem I have with AoM is that if you push hard enough with your trees in the first 2 minutes, you have win. It was DrE vs. someone else on the burning isle (don't remember the match, must've been a week ago or something) where DrE got trounced by the fact that the opposing trees just vaulted through the lava and smashed through. Games shouldn't be over in 2 minutes, or 3, or four.

The fundamental mechanic of AoM is retarded. If it was like Dwayna, which is remove hexes when they attack then it'd be better I think. Imagine if Dwayna's was invulnerability to hexes. GG on that :P

TheOneMephisto · Oct 28, 2007, 06:24 PM // 18:24

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Originally Posted by lacasner

The SP bar is so easily countered i dont know if its even worth completely destroying. Let the nubs keep their 1234567 and you can run your good builds which are actually effective against good players.

And that's why everyone and their mothers are running the dual SP sin 1 monk split right now? And that's why it was probably the most popular build in the recent tourney?

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Originally Posted by Snow Bunny

The fundamental mechanic of AoM is retarded. If it was like Dwayna, which is remove hexes when they attack then it'd be better I think. Imagine if Dwayna's was invulnerability to hexes. GG on that :P

I'm pretty sure that people would just bsurge the Dwayna's and laugh tbh. And it wouldn't have wearying strike, which pretty much means that it would suck and no one would run it.

Razz L Dazzle · Oct 28, 2007, 06:31 PM // 18:31

For Monks:
Bless Light: A desirable candidate for a buff. If the -5 energy when hex is removed is added, i think it needs an additional heal to make it viable, such as double divine favor bonus.

-I don't like the adjacent bonus ideas. Promoting people standing on top of each other, probably in a ward, is not the type of play i'd like to promote.

-Heal Light (E)- [5- 3/4- 4] could use a buff, as it has potential. 3/4 second cast. Slightly lower heal (80-88 @14) , but heals nearby allies as well.

Words of Comfort-5- 3/4 cast 4 recharge. add the conditional heal for each condition that ally is suffering. Could be a nice heal verse condtion stacks, more on par with dwayna. Most spells dealing with condi's are 3/4's why not this one?

Dwayna's Sorrow- change the death clause to if ally goes below 50% health. Possible candidate for light party wide heal. Change the 30 second duration of course, not sure what the duration should be.

Patient spirit- would like to see this skill improved. Current heal and 3 second wait not worth it.

@Mesmers

Clumsiness and Ineptitude last too long. Reduced duration could make intesting gameplay rather than, constant spam.

Auspicious- gives too much energy. Basically conjure nightmare reads, ally suffers -8 degen for 13 seconds and you gain 48 energy. Sounds balanced right? Lower total energy gained, conjure nightmare should not fill my energy bar.

Budding improvement in this line however.

Buffs-
Feedback- 5 energy pls. 25 recharge
Drain enchantment- still underpowered.
Complicate - 15 recharge
Guilt- recharge buff

Ranger- i'd like to see

Melandru Arrows-24 second prep duration.
Debilitating shot- 10 energy at 12 marks
Barbed Arrows- no longer easily interrupted

Dual rangers haven't been seen much, outside of trapper condi overloads. I always enjoyed this gameplay, if it weren't as overpowered i think bringing it back would be a good addition. Reduce shields up would be needed.

-cheers

Hyper Cutter · Oct 28, 2007, 06:43 PM // 18:43

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Originally Posted by Wasteland Squidget

If anything on that bar needs a hit, it is Wearying Strike (again.) Melandru actually adds some interesting gameplay and tactical options to the bar. Wearying Strike, meanwhile, promotes uninteresting spikey gameplay.

personally, I think Wearying Strike and Wounding strike need to switch places (with some tweaking to both, such as removing Wearying's weakness clause). A conditional Dismember should not be elite...

Quote:

Originally Posted by Snow Bunny

The fundamental mechanic of AoM is retarded. If it was like Dwayna, which is remove hexes when they attack then it'd be better I think. Imagine if Dwayna's was invulnerability to hexes. GG on that :P

Dwayna removes a hex on any skill use, I believe...

TheOneMephisto · Oct 28, 2007, 06:46 PM // 18:46

Quote:

Originally Posted by Razz L Dazzle

Patient spirit- would like to see this skill improved. Current heal and 3 second wait not worth it.

One thing I was thinking about for this spell might be to make the enchantment end if the target takes a hit over X...Y damage. So maybe like:

This enchantment ends if target ally takes over 80...60 damage from one attack/spell.

or

This enchantment ends if target ally takes over 100 damage total.