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Feb 23, 2010, 09:36 PM // 21:36
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#1 |
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Desert Nomad
Join Date: Apr 2009
Guild: FaZ
Profession: D/
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Aura of Holy Might
Ok, you all know the song and dance by now. Enchantment juggling sucks, because it only offers damage, utility, and defense (all of which it fails horribly at relative to other options). The only other thing dervishes could be useful for is the scythe. However, due to inferior energy management, no decent maintainable IAS, and no synergy between it's weapon and primary attribute, there is simply no reason to use the dervish, because the only thing it has worth doing (swinging the scythe) can be done better by both assassins and warriors (due to their superior IASs, greater amount of armor, and primary attributes that actually synergize with melee weapons). It wouldn't be a problem if the dervish equivalents of Enduring Scythe and Critscythe had something to offer that the other two lacked (such as how Critscythe has more damage than Enduring Scythe, but lacks access to SY!). However, they really don't have any meaningful edge of their own.
Fortunately, turns out fixing this isn't hard. Again, it's not a problem for a given class to do more damage with the scythe than the dervish so long as the dervish can still bring something meaningful to the table that the other guy can't. This means that it's not necessary for dervishes to use the scythe better than, say, assassins, because scythe sins are locked into A/D. Probably the best thing a dervish could potentially bring with a scythe build that would justify it's use over similar builds with more damage would be SY, because most of the other things a dervish could do are inferior to other options or simply do not synergize with melee (casting a one second spell, for example, means one less scythe attack, and considering how much damage scythes do, that's maybe a hundred damage you just lost). So, then, the only thing that really needs to be done is make the dervish deal more damage with the scythe than a warrior. The advantage here is that doing so would not remove the purpose of playing enduring scythe, either, because warriors would still be more armored. Does that matter very much in HM PvE? No, not very much, but neither is the damage difference I'm proposing. Long story short, an enduring scythe warrior who takes SY for their third pve skill has about 10-15 more dps than a comparable dervish build against a lvl 30 HM monster (turns out in that situation, dervishes get about 100 dps, so the warrior is about 10-15% more effective). The easy fix? Make AoHM (on top of it's current functionality) offer a +1 damage bonus with the scythe for each rank of mysticism. After the effects of asuran scan, IAS, and the fast attacks that scythe builds usually employ, this translates to about 20 more dps at 10 mysticism. It should also provide a nice boon to scythe builds that aren't uber optimized like this (such as avatar builds, which could really use the help), making them more desirable in a party as well. So, there you go. No balance issues to worry about, no one has to be nerfed or made obsolete, and dervishes finally get something worth doing. Everybody wins. Also, since this post is too long already...How I got those numbers |
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Feb 23, 2010, 09:48 PM // 21:48
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#2 |
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Furnace Stoker
Join Date: Mar 2007
Guild: Our Crabs Know True [LOVE]
Profession: R/
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Would be more reasonable (in my opinion) to make AoHM more like Critical Agility, Seed of Life, Elemental Lord, and There's Nothing to Fear. Make the damage boost based on Mysticism. Does 10% plus 4% for every 3 points in Mysticism. Currently, as 12 Luxon/Kurzick, the skill maxes out at 32% damage boost. With 15/16 Mysticism it would do 10+4(5)=30%. And you can still scale it with the title, but it would be the damage alone that got buffed? Not really sure, wasn't intending to propose this, so I didn't figure anything extravagant. But Warrior and Sin could still use this for a 10% damage boost, while a Derv could use it for up to a 30% boost.
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Feb 23, 2010, 09:55 PM // 21:55
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#3 |
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Desert Nomad
Join Date: Sep 2007
Location: Northeastern Ohio
Guild: LaZy
Profession: P/W
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Also, take that pesky Holy Damage type change off of it so you can actually use things like orders/conjure
But yes, AoHM needs to be tied to mysticism. Mysticism isn't exactly inferior energy management persay, because most people aren't smart enough to think around the box and make a hero cast a low recharge enchantment on you or something. It's the health gain part that needs to go, and replaced with something a bit more useful to dervishes. |
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Feb 23, 2010, 10:00 PM // 22:00
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#4 | |
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Wilds Pathfinder
Join Date: Nov 2007
Guild: Still looking
Profession: Rt/
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Quote:
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Feb 23, 2010, 10:12 PM // 22:12
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#5 | |
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Desert Nomad
Join Date: Apr 2009
Guild: FaZ
Profession: D/
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Quote:
The main problem I could see is that if you link the damage bonus to mysticism, you're left with the the question of how to link the skill to the kurzick/luxon title at all. But I guess if you left the holy AoE linked to the titles, it would work. Doesn't matter to me how dervishes become useful, as long as they do it without putting anyone else in the same hole they've been in. Technically speaking, I like my idea a little better because it doesn't involve pushing other builds out of the meta unnecessarily, but eh, warriors would still have HB+WA and sins would still have MSDB, so I wouldn't have any complaints with a fix like yours. |
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Feb 23, 2010, 11:05 PM // 23:05
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#6 | |
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Krytan Explorer
Join Date: Aug 2009
Profession: W/D
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Quote:
I like swinging scythe with my warrior. Last edited by Hells Fury; Feb 23, 2010 at 11:15 PM // 23:15.. |
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Feb 24, 2010, 04:33 AM // 04:33
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#7 | |
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Desert Nomad
Join Date: Jul 2006
Profession: D/
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Quote:
2. Eliminating the Mysticism health gain for one of the following (or any direct damage augmentation to be on par with Wars and Sins):
3. A comprehensive skill balance looking at
Basically, look at Mysticism skills. The only thing Mysticism has going for it is Avatars, and thats still not great even when you can keep them up 100% of the time in PvE. There are a few marginal skills such as Sand Shards, which is useless in PvE HM unless you like seeing 1's all over, but fixing the Mysticism attribute, making Derv's dominant in their own weapon, and changing skills that aren't useful in 99.9% of situations would go a long ways towards a fix. I challenge Anet here and now to do something about making the Dervish balanced and competitive, ensuring that the class has a spot in high-end PvP and PvE play. You have till shortly before GW2 release to fix what you started. I won't be buying GW2 with the hope you finally got class balancing down, instead I want proof beforehand. You don't do it, then you know what game I won't be playing in the future. Your move Anet. |
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Feb 24, 2010, 02:31 PM // 14:31
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#8 | |
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Krytan Explorer
Join Date: Sep 2007
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First of all AohM needs to stop changing the damage type to holy damage as it makes the scythe unusable together with barbs/MoP/order.
Also, fixing AohM so that it actually deals only +21-32% and not +44-74% damage would also do the game good. I don't like the suggestion of the OP as it would be rather a hotfix than an actual solution to the problem. Quote:
Grenth's Fingers, Dust Cloak, Staggering Force, Balthazar's Rage, Heart of Holy Flame, Zealous Renewal: (PvE) Deals additional 20% damage, preferably when the enchantment ends, this way GF, DC and SF will benefit twice from EBSoH. Reduce recharge from 10 to 6-8, from 12 to 8-10 and from 15 to 10-12 seconds. This way, the enchantments will deal about the same damage as if you had attacked with your scythe. Irresistible Sweep, Twin Moon Sweep: (PvE) Reduce activation time to 3/4 seconds. Without a fast activation time no attack skill can cope against Eremite's Attack and Mystic Sweep. Pious Assault: (PvE) Reduce activation time to 3/4 seconds, reduce energy cost to 5 energy, instant recharge if enchantment was removed (maybe remove Deep Wound). Same reasoning as above, also an enchanment strip that is always available. |
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Feb 24, 2010, 02:44 PM // 14:44
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#9 | |
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Lion's Arch Merchant
Join Date: Oct 2009
Location: Netherlands
Guild: Utrecht Usurpators
Profession: D/
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Quote:
But I like Mysticism the way it is right now, and the health gain from it is far from useless. Thanks to Mysticism, if you use a few tank skills, you can get rid of all your healers and use protters instead, which is more efficient and a definite edge over other classes. |
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Feb 24, 2010, 03:04 PM // 15:04
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#10 | |
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Desert Nomad
Join Date: Sep 2007
Location: Northeastern Ohio
Guild: LaZy
Profession: P/W
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Quote:
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Feb 24, 2010, 05:51 PM // 17:51
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#11 | |
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The Greatest
Join Date: Feb 2006
Profession: W/
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Quote:
I'm not saying don't do it, I'm just saying don't think that nerfing scythe warriors/assassins is going to make dervishes any better or wanted. |
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Feb 24, 2010, 09:34 PM // 21:34
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#12 | |||
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Desert Nomad
Join Date: Apr 2009
Guild: FaZ
Profession: D/
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Quote:
Linking SY to strength would remove the only good build Paragons have, effectively removing all purpose in playing them. It would be the paragon equivalent of nerfing HB, WA, DS, Earthshaker, whatever good axe elites exist, and WE to the point of uselessness all at the same time. To touch SY is to touch Paragons as a class, because they rely on that skill just to be relevant. Is it right that some skills are used as well by secondary professions as by primaries? Sure, so long as the secondary is not able to make the primary redundant. That is the case with the dervish, and in that regard it has it worse than any profession (even edging out the mesmer slightly). In other words, paragons and dervishes and such relying on SY to be meaningful is a symptom of warriors being so overpowered relative to them. Quote:
As for making AoHM not change damage type, I actually don't really see the point. Scythes have no place in physical-support heavy teams to begin with, because HB+WA can trigger those sorts of things far better than scythes. To take a scythe user into a party that uses those things is like, well, bringing a dervish instead of a scythe warrior.  I've said it before, and I'll say it again; enchantment juggling will never be able to compete with scythes for damage unless they get the biggest buff in the game's history. The mere act of wasting one second to cast a 1/4 second spell (can't forget the 3/4 second aftercast) means you lose out on one scythe attack, and therefore lose a ton of DPS (as much as 50-100, even, depending on your build; and that's after armor!). And that doesn't even count the enchantment stripping itself. It's just not going to happen, and no amount of toying with the numbers will change that. The problems with the dervish are so ingrained, and the game so old and undersupported, that anything but a bandaid fix is a pipe dream. Furthermore, those sorts of major changes open the door to abuse and further imbalances because so much can result that was unforseen. Quote:
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Feb 25, 2010, 02:26 AM // 02:26
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#13 | ||||
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Krytan Explorer
Join Date: Sep 2007
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Quote:
Quote:
A sin with Death Blossom, Moebius Strike and a 33% IAS deals ~60 single target DPS and ~30 DPS to all adjacent foes to the initial target. A dervish with an Aura of holy Might that actually increases the damage by only 25% and a 33% IAS deals ~60 DPS to every target it hits. Also, reducing the overall damage would make shutdown more viable; not by much, but it has to start somewhere. Quote:
A dervish has rarely a place in caster heavy teams nor in physical heavy teams. Quote:
- Bring enchantment stripping attack skills (Irresistible Sweep, Twin Moon Sweep, Pious Assault) on the same level as Mystic Sweep and Eremite's Attack, either by giving them also a fast activation time or by removing the fast activation time from MS and EA. - Reduce the insane amount of damage from auto attacks, "nerf" AohM (it doubt it was ever intended that this enchantment increases the damage for up to 74%). - Increase the damage of PBAoE enchantments by ~20%, reduce their recharge time by ~20%. By my calculations this would make a dervish that uses "enchantment juggling" a little better than a scythe dervish damage-wise. |
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Feb 25, 2010, 06:26 AM // 06:26
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#14 |
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Desert Nomad
Join Date: Apr 2009
Guild: FaZ
Profession: D/
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With a 33% IAS, it only takes .89 sec to attack with daggers. The limiting factor, therefore, is MS's recharge time of 2 sec. Hence, you can get one DB off every two seconds, which means 86/2=43 AoE dps.
Now, because MSDB deals a huge amount of single target damage (far more than it's AoE damage), unless enchantment juggling either beats it's AoE dps by a significant margin or provides something extra that is significant (which really, it currently doesn't, compared to the other options that exist), then there's no point in it. Let's take your numbers there and run with them on a best case scenario. That best case scenario, is, of course, Mirage Cloak. We'll assume you have infinite energy, for simplicity's sake. at 12 earth prayers that's 63 damage (I'll call that 60 for ease of calculation). 25% of that is 15, so now you're at 75 damage (we'll say this goes down to 38 after HM armor is considered). It takes 1/4 of a second to cast. But then there's the 3/4 sec aftercast delay. So, before we even get into the enchantment stripping, that's only 38 damage. Now, let's compare this to the build I used to make my calculations in this thread, which gives you like 60 if I recall correctly (100 against the primary target). Now, since half the scythe attacks in the build activate in less than a second but I'm too lazy to figure out the average, we'll call it 1 sec average. Your enchantment stripping method will, at best, be equal in effectiveness to the scythe attacks in the zealous vow build (twin moon sweep would be slightly better if it were instant recharge, but it isn't in your idea, and to make it so would be a HUGE buff). So, in a given 2 second period, your dps is still lower, even with your ideas and the ridiculous assumption that one would actually be able to afford spamming mirage cloak. Now, you could remove the aftercasts on PBAoE enchantments, but then you run into the energy problem again. And even with 25% less recharge time on all PBAoE skills, it still wouldn't be nearly enough to allow you the power to spam a mirage cloak - equivalent spell every 2 seconds (or even every 6 seconds), which you would need to do before you could begin to compete with a zealous vow build (or MSDB, for that matter). And, once again, there's all the potential balance issues to consider, because these would be big changes. You know what the one class is that is currently able to spam mirage cloak (via signet of pious light)? Elementalists (specifically those that use ER). What happens when they try their hand at this? Sure, I'd love it if PBAoE became the dervish's niche (whenever I think about it, I get this awesome image of the dervish swinging his scythe, and enemies going flying or getting knocked around or whatever from the huge release of magic). But I just don't see it as a realistic goal. It's fraught with peril, is likely to either not work or create more problems than it solves, and requires a lot of work. And the way I see it, the more we try to push these sorts of solutions (instead of the simple ones that are actually simple to implement and wouldn't be likely to have major side effects), the more unlikely it becomes that dervishes will get a fix at all. I mean, if you could figure out a way to get it to work without running into any of those problems, I'd go for it. But I don't think it's possible (who knows, though; I've been wrong before ).
Last edited by reaper with no name; Feb 25, 2010 at 06:32 AM // 06:32.. |
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Feb 25, 2010, 07:21 AM // 07:21
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#15 |
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Frost Gate Guardian
Join Date: Apr 2009
Profession: D/
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We can't just tie AoHM to mysticsm because mysticsm sucks $$$$. Most builds I use never use mysticsm. Zealous Vow gives better energy management anyway. Before we can fix scythe damage, we have to fix mysticsm or do both at the same time.
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Feb 25, 2010, 07:35 AM // 07:35
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#16 |
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Desert Nomad
Join Date: Apr 2009
Guild: FaZ
Profession: D/
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Exactly. This suggestion does both.
Besides, why aren't you using mysticism? It has HoF, the best IAS you're going to get short of a PvE skill or cons (and if you're going to use the former, either your DPS will instantly drop or you'll lose SY). You only need 6 or 7 points in wind prayers anyway for zealous vow. |
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Feb 25, 2010, 03:00 PM // 15:00
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#17 | |
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Krytan Explorer
Join Date: Sep 2007
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Quote:
If the target has less than 50% health you can reduce the time between two DB to ~1,9 seconds once per oppenent, after that the recharge of MS will limit the use of DP to every ~2,89 seconds again. Well with Mystic Sweep, Eremite's Attack and 33% IAS you are able to attack 5 times every ~4,5 seconds, which is about the same number of attacks as a axe/sword with 33% IAS. I agree, without a rework of Mystic Sweep and Eremite's Attack enchantment juggling will be nearly impossible to made valid. |
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Feb 25, 2010, 09:03 PM // 21:03
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#18 |
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Desert Nomad
Join Date: Sep 2007
Location: Northeastern Ohio
Guild: LaZy
Profession: P/W
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How about eliminating the scythes ability to hit multiple enemies, but instead give that trait to some of the attack skills themselves. Just thinking out loud here. I just dislike the concept of the innate AoE damage scythe has. It make balancing it against other melee weapons pretty miserable.
If I were a dev, my main fear to giving dervishes a maintainable IAS is the fact that scythes have the ability to hit three people, thus skyrocketting your DPS. Although if I were also a dev, I'd keep in mind that MS/DB sins do more AoE damage than scythes any day, and without such limitations as the dervish faces. The idea just popped in that instead of buffing dervishes, maybe we should take everything back a peg. Death Blossom's damage, both AoE and not, need to be halved, about. Make is so that, although still good, it isn't as OMG broken as it is right now. and it IS broken. Run the combo, slap Orders/SoH on yourself, and watch stuff drop like flies. No other melee weapon can compete with that output. Critical Agility needs to get rid of that armor bonus. In fact, due to the fragile nature of sins from a fundamental level, maybe even make it take away armor (I'd say no more than -10). Then it's a good tradeoff. speed for fragility. Warrior's endurance needs a better downside. None of this "no more than 25 energy" crap, when warriors only HAVE about 20 energy without modifiers. That's nowhere near a downside. I say either lower that threshold a lot, or get rid of it altogether for something else. capping it at about 15 energy at high Strength will still be very good energy management for warriors spamming energy attacks, but it leaves them at a very low level. Along with that, I'd make it so that you ONLY gain energy upon using an attack skill. Even that might not be enough of a downside. Hell, maybe make IT lower your armor as well. Again, just thinking out loud on all of this. |
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