Curse

Savio · Mar 03, 2006, 06:18 AM // 06:18

Finally updated!

Update - Thursday March 2

General

Updated Adrenaline behavior so that death removes all Adrenaline.
Updated Exhaustion behavior so that if you cast an Exhaustion spell while your maximum energy is below 10, your maximum energy can be reduced to below zero.
Fixed a bug that allowed attack speeds to stack past 33%.
Fixed a bug that prevented attack debuffs from reducing a target more than 33% (maximum is 50%).
Fixed a bug that kept speed boosts from having an effect on you if you had a debuff slowing you by 50%.
You are no longer considered "attacking," "using a skill," or "casting a spell" while you are running to get in range of a target.
Fixed a bug that caused attack skills with non-weapon attributes to calculate damage and critical hit chance incorrectly.
Clarified various skill descriptions

Equipment

Added two +30 Health, Received Damage -5 (Chance: 20%) shields to the PvP character creation screen; updated monster drops to make the Received Damage -5 (Chance: 20%) drop possible.
Shields on the PvP character creation screen with the “while Hexed” bonus now have +60 Health and -3 damage reduction.
Reduced the Lieutenant's Helm Hex duration bonus to 20%, and added it to the PvP character creation screen.
Increased the Monk’s PvP Ascetic Leg Design to +2 Energy to match the armor bought off of vendors.
Increased the PvP hammer with additional damage while hexed to 20%.

Mesmer

Mantra of Resolve: increased Energy cost to 10..4 when interrupted.
Distortion: increased Energy cost to 4..1 when you "evade" attacks.
Signet of Weariness: reduced area-of-effect to nearby foes.
Mantra of Recovery: reduced Energy cost to 10.
Ignorance: decreased casting time to 1 second.
Chaos Storm: decreased casting time to 1 second.
Epidemic: decreased Energy cost to 10.
Ineptitude: increased damage to 30..135.
Fevered Dreams: increased duration to 10..25 seconds.
Energy Drain: decreased recharge time to 25 seconds.
Energy Tap: decreased recharge time to 25 seconds.
Blackout: increased recharge time to 12 seconds.

Necromancer

Offering of Blood: increased sacrifice to 20%.
Unholy Feast: reduced number of targets affected to 1..4; increased damage to 10..65; reduced recharge to 20 seconds.
Enfeebling Blood: reduced recharge to 5 seconds; reduced sacrifice to 10%.
Chilblains: Poison now only lasts 10 seconds.
Deathly Chill: increased unconditional damage to 5..50; decreased conditional damage to 5..35.
Shadow of Fear: reduced recharge time to 5 seconds.
Plague Sending: reduced cast time to 1 second; increased recharge time to 5 seconds; fixed a bug that caused this skill to transfer default durations instead of remaining duration.
Blood Renewal: fixed a bug that allowed the heal to heal twice when stacked.
Insidious Parasite: fixed a bug that prevented the numbers from displaying.
Mark of Subversion and Soul Leech: changed their damage from normal to life stealing to match their skill descriptions.
Order of the Vampire: no longer triggers if you have other Necromancer Enchantments on you.

Elementalist

Gale: increased Energy cost to 10.
Conjure Flame: no longer removes Enchantments.
Inferno: increased damage to 30..135.
Fire Storm: decreased cast time to 2 seconds.
Rust: decreased recharge time to 15 seconds.
Conjure Frost: no longer removes Enchantments.
Conjure Lightning: no longer removes Enchantments.
Whirlwind: decreased recharge time to 8 seconds.
Flame Burst: increased damage to 15..120.
Rodgort's Invocation: increased damage to 15..120.
Mark of Rodgort: decreased recharge time to 5 seconds.
Lava Font: increased damage to 5..35 per second.
Searing Heat: increased damage to 5..35 per second.
Lightning Javelin: decreased recharge time to 2 seconds.
Mist Form: decreased cast time to 1 second.
Lightning Surge: fixed a bug that caused this skill to not trigger properly when its duration was reduced.

Monk

Mend Ailment: increased recharge time to 5 seconds.
Holy Veil: increased recharge time to 12 seconds.
Shield of Regeneration: increased duration to 5..13 seconds.
Purge Signet: reduced recharge time to 20 seconds.
Shielding Hands: reduced cast time to .25 seconds.
Resurrect: reduced cast time to 6 seconds; increased recharge time to 5 seconds.
Restore Life: increased recharge time to 5 seconds; increased percentage of Health the target party member is returned with to 20..65%.
Scourge Sacrifice: decreased cast time to 1 second.
Watchful Spirit: decreased cast time to 1 second.
Shield of Deflection: increased armor bonus to 15..30.
Aura of Faith: decreased recharge time to 15 seconds.
Peace and Harmony: skill reworked. Now ends if ally casts a Spell on target foe or deals damage to a foe; reduced recharge time to 30 seconds.
Unyielding Aura: decreased recharge time to 15 seconds; when this Skill ends, it now exploits the ally's corpse.
Mark of Protection: now only disables your skills for 5 seconds.
Healing Hands: increased the amount healed to 5..35; now triggers on damage instead of attack.
Live Vicariously: increased amount healed per swing to 2..17.
Light of Dwayna: decreased recharge time to 20 seconds.
Martyr: increased cast time to 1 second.
Heal Party: increased recharge time to 2 seconds.
Balthazar's Aura: fixed a stacking bug.

Warrior

Eviscerate: increased adrenaline cost to 8 swings.
"I will avenge you!": reduced attack speed to 25%; fixed a bug that caused this skill to trigger off of dead ally minions.
Thrill of Victory: decreased recharge time to 8 seconds.
Bull's Strike: now triggers on moving instead of fleeing.
Defensive Stance: increased duration to 5..20 seconds.
Crude Swing: increased damage to 1..20.
Shield Bash: Skill reworked. "The next attack skill against you is blocked. If the attack was a melee attack skill, that skill is disabled for an additional 15 seconds, and the attacker is knocked down."
"Shields up!": now blocks 50% of the time.
Defy Pain: decreased adrenaline cost to 6 swings.
Protector's Strike: reduced swing time to .5 seconds; increased recharge time to 3 seconds.
Griffon's Sweep: increased damage to 5..20.
Deflect Arrows: now ends only when you successfully hit with an attack.
Warrior's Endurance: increased duration to 10..23 seconds.
Dwarven Battle Stance: now also increases attack speed by 10%.
Disciplined Stance: reduced recharge time to 45 seconds.
Wary Stance: reduced recharge time to 45 seconds.
Riposte: increased damage to 20..80.
Deadly Riposte: increased damage to 15..75.
Shield Stance: decreased recharge time to 45 seconds.
Flurry: fixed a bug that reduced your damage more than 25%.
Thrill of Victory: fixed a bug that caused you to gain a little bit of Health when you hit with the attack.
Gash: fixed a bug that caused this skill to deal its damage twice; increased damage to 5..20.
Bull's Charge: now triggers on moving foes instead of fleeing foes.

Ranger

Dust Trap: reduced Blindness duration to 3..8 seconds.
Crippling Shot: increased Energy cost to 15; Crippled duration now scales 1..8.
Power Shot: increased damage to 10..25.
Precision Shot: increased damage to 10..25.
Determined Shot: increased damage to 5..20.
Maiming Strike: decreased recharge time to 5 seconds.
Scavenger Strike: increased damage to 10..25.
Symbiotic Bond: increased Health regeneration to 1..3 pips.
Bestial Pounce: decreased recharge time to 10 seconds.
Feral Lunge: increased damage to 5..35.
Melandru's Assault: increased damage to 5..35; decreased recharge time to 5 seconds.
Predator's Pounce: increased damage to 5..35.
Brutal Strike: increased damage to 5..35; increased conditional damage to 5..35.
Practiced Stance: increased bonus duration to 30..150%.
Melandru's Resilience: increased Health regeneration to 3 pips.
Quick Shot: fixed a bug that caused the arrow to move at a normal speed.
Determined Shot: increased damage to 5..20; fixed a bug that prevented the arrow from being "blocked" or "evaded"; fixed a bug that stopped this skill from recharging when missed from obstruction.

Guild Battle Updates

Added silver and gold trims for the guild capes of tournament season winners and runners-up.
Improved the paths that guild NPCs take when running out of their guild hall during Victory or Death.

Map and Quest Updates

Kepkhet Marrowfeast, Queen of the Scarabs, has brought her brood to the desert, drawn by the plentiful corpses of griffon, minotaur, and even other scarabs. The insect brood now infests the "Prophets Path," so travelers be warned!
Removed chests from Dreadnought’s Drift and Ice Floe.
Fixed a non-aggressive Charr group located in Regent Valley.
Fixed a problem in the "Army Life" quest where Old Mac talked to Joe even if he was dead.
Moved the spirits in the Underworld to help them avoid blocking enemy pathing.
Fixed the entrance to Beacon's Perch from Lornar's Pass so you can't sneak around the edge of the zone portal.
Fixed a bug with the "Slaves of Menzies" quest where players had to kill more enemies than the Shadow Overlords to complete each step of the quest.
Fixed a signpost pointing the wrong direction in Divinity Coast.
Fixed a bug in the "Khobay the Betrayer" that required the players to kill all his guards to complete the quest instead of just Khobay as the Quest Log indicates.
Fixed a bug that prevented anyone but Necromancers from getting the "Recruits for Hollis" quest after completing first mission, "The Great Northern Wall."
Fixed a number of locations where Aidan, Cynn, Devona, and Mhenlo were not appropriately displaying as Henchmen.
Fixed a zone portal in Bergen Hot Springs that was zoning players to various parts of the outpost other than the zone portal.
Removed an NPC who had no functionality from Stingray Strand.
Fixed a bug that prevented you from having to click on the gravestone to complete the "Husband's Epitaph" quest.
Removed a potential chest exploit from the "Deserters" quest.
Fixed a crafter in Deldrimor Bowl so he could no longer be killed by monsters.
Fixed a bug in the "Hungry Devourer" quest that allowed the Junipers to be killed before the players arrived, preventing the players from getting food for Joe.
Fixed a bug in the "Elementalist Path" quest where the target NPC was not at its quest marker.
Fixed some maps where the same bosses were spawning multiple times: Ice Caves of Sorrow, Kessex Peak, and Deldrimor Bowl.
Fixed miscellaneous bugs with the wurm monster AI.

User Interface Updates

Expanded availability of Japanese language support to include non-Japanese accounts.
Fixed a target calling bug that prevented secondary called targets from being promoted to the primary called target when the previous primary called target expired.
Fixed several bugs that caused the incorrect display of Energy.
Changed the color of GM chat text from green to purple.

Studio Ghibli · Mar 03, 2006, 06:23 AM // 06:23

1). Order of the Vampire: no longer triggers if you have other Necromancer Enchantments on you.

.. so you can no longer use vampire and pain?

2). Shield of Regeneration: increased duration to 5..13 seconds.

Yay! I love sor.

When I'm in FoW, I alternate between shielding hands and SoR. Dance, dance!

3). "I will avenge you!": reduced attack speed to 25%; fixed a bug that caused this skill to trigger off of dead ally minions.

o noes iwayz ;p

4). Dwarven Battle Stance: now also increases attack speed by 10%.

Ooo. :O

5). Disciplined Stance: reduced recharge time to 45 seconds. / Shield Stance: decreased recharge time to 45 seconds.

OOOO. <3s for the stance.

6). # Riposte: increased damage to 20..80. / # Deadly Riposte: increased damage to 15..75.

Nice.

Makes me want to have a sword stancer even more now. ;D

7). Bull's Charge: now triggers on moving foes instead of fleeing foes.

Nice little fix for people who thought ROFL I WILL WALK BACKWARDZ

8). Kepkhet Marrowfeast, Queen of the Scarabs, has brought her brood to the desert, drawn by the plentiful corpses of griffon, minotaur, and even other scarabs. The insect brood now infests the "Prophets Path," so travelers be warned!

Ouch. :frowns: While I didn't farm there that often, I did enjoy farming there nonetheless. I guess that's one less place, then. Scarabs are nasty.

--

And that's it.

Nice little patch. Love the stancer buffs. :d

Surprised, however, that there weren't any "adjustments" to spinal shivers, especially considering Anet's stance on AoE coding and farming.

Valerius · Mar 03, 2006, 06:25 AM // 06:25

k-rad... some nice changes

Elena · Mar 03, 2006, 06:25 AM // 06:25

you jerk i wanted to post that oh well beastmastery got a boost wee^^ oh and i love the anti farming update haha Queen Of Scarabs will have many off farming monks to eat giggle Defy pain will be on my pve warrior as soon as i get it ^^

VitisVinifera · Mar 03, 2006, 06:26 AM // 06:26

mostly minor skill tweaks.......

except IWAY is officially nerfed

be interesting to see what this affects...just glad spiteful spirit wasn't touched. But that Order of the Vampire message about can't be triggered with other necro enchants....that means the orders necro is nerfed? Didn't think that was unbalanced.

looking forward to seeing what's in Prophet's Path

Tsunami Rain · Mar 03, 2006, 06:28 AM // 06:28

wow some nice changes

cant wait for next week

Manic Smile · Mar 03, 2006, 06:29 AM // 06:29

Iway = Owned

anyone want one of those new shields

Mercury Angel · Mar 03, 2006, 06:30 AM // 06:30

There's a lot of good stuff, but I'm a bit disappointed. A surprising number of ideas people said were used, including a number of things I said myself, but there's a lot of stuff that missed the buff stick that needed it direly. IMO, Elite skills should be at the top of the priority list for balancing, as they're often cornerstones of builds. But skills like the Mind spells were totally skipped over.

But, that's more of a have-not issue. What they actually did change was mostly good, and it's still definitely a step in the right direction.

Ishmaeel · Mar 03, 2006, 06:31 AM // 06:31

Quote:

Originally Posted by VitisVinifera

looking forward to seeing what's in Prophet's Path

Lots and lots of scarabs that place traps and use degenaration / poison skills. Kinda neat.

Oh, also a new NPC is present in Augury Rock, just next to the exit to Prophet's Path. He reveals the secret about the scarabs.

zoozoc · Mar 03, 2006, 06:31 AM // 06:31

wow, for the first time ever, they didnt nerf everything into oblivion, amazing. They also buffed a ton of skills. So far its looking good, and cripple shot is still usable, yay. Same with blackout. Hm..they lowered the cast time of restore life to 5 seconds. Still to long for gvg, but if you have someone with a good fast casting, it could possibly be an alterative to the usual rez sig. Oh and peace and harmony looks like it might be a good alternative to OoB, since you sacrifice 20% dmg now.

Tsunami Rain · Mar 03, 2006, 06:33 AM // 06:33

Removed chests from Dreadnought’s Drift and Ice Floe.
^*cries*

EternalTempest · Mar 03, 2006, 06:34 AM // 06:34

Looks good

Will be bringing out my fire ele to see the new results

Lots of buff's this time around, very good.

Bye Bye Iway

TwinRaven · Mar 03, 2006, 06:34 AM // 06:34

Nooooooo! nerfed my dust trap.....my precious....can't blind you as I did before...my precious is angry....grrrrr

LordMahal · Mar 03, 2006, 06:34 AM // 06:34

I was just in the game... didnt see most of these changes. ie.. gale for me is still 5 energy and Mark of rodgort doesnt recharge in 5 seconds. Dont know how this could be.

SchwarzKnight · Mar 03, 2006, 06:34 AM // 06:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by Savio

[*]Changed the color of GM chat text from green to purple.

Methinks our lady Gaile had some say in this change

lyra_song · Mar 03, 2006, 06:36 AM // 06:36

Bulls Charge---> YES!

Dwarven Battle stance---> YES!!

SKull Crack----> NOOOO!!!!

T_T

Kepkhet Marrowfeast, Queen of the Scarabs, has brought her brood to the desert, drawn by the plentiful corpses of griffon, minotaur, and even other scarabs. The insect brood now infests the "Prophets Path," so travelers be warned! <----HAHAHAHAH OMG YES!!

Vilaptca · Mar 03, 2006, 06:37 AM // 06:37

New shield mods are awesome.

The Scarabs in the desert are fun, and killing the Monk boss out there will get me Mark of Protection quite a bit earlier than before.

I actually don't think OoV got nerfed. You just have to wait for OoP to end. Which means the few seconds that I could have both up just won't be happening anymore. Or while I happen to have both up, only OoP will be working.

EternalTempest · Mar 03, 2006, 06:38 AM // 06:38

Nice on the Helm, lower it's ability and make sure pvp can use it to make it fair.
Stopped in by HA - there cheers overall about iway - kinda strange to see.

zoozoc · Mar 03, 2006, 06:38 AM // 06:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

Iway = Owned

well besides the fact that they fixed a bug making iway i believe attack 50% faster instead of the normal 33%, and that iway is changed to increase speed to 25%, it really isnt nerfed. It will still probably mow over bad balanced pugs, but at least a really good HoH team can actually win against it without bringing loads of warriors hate and not making a mistake.

Zakarr · Mar 03, 2006, 06:39 AM // 06:39

Anet didn't do anything to Warrior's Cunning skill. That is pretty useless, costs too much energy, too high recharge, too low duration.