Curse

What if... · Dec 12, 2006, 12:34 AM // 00:34

It seems like the problem here comes from the three skills when used in tandem on a non-assassin. SoH + stance cancel sounds okay until DP comes into the picture. Likewise FN is only imbalanced because of DP. I kind of think it's appropiate that sins can just these three skills the way they have, but also somewhat agree that sin should keep them. Scaling the recharge to deadly arts should make that more reasonable without completely stripping the skills use. It could be set on a scale of 1...48...64% or something like that. (my scale is probably a but harsh)

BTW on an earlier comment: 5 energy AOD is ridiculous. That would allow warriors to safely over-extend to ridiculous lengths and always get away with it. Imagine a gank team that is in fact in two places at once. You can't send people back to stop them because they'll just cancel and terrorize your team at the stand. On the other hand, you can't ignore them can you?

Drewfense · Dec 12, 2006, 12:45 AM // 00:45

I am probably the only one who thinks this way and expected to be quoted and called a noob...but fire has never been a pathetic spell line, just unpopular. In the observe mode era, people run what a handful of top guilds run and those few people will overlook strategies.

It sounds silly, but when people talk about fire (even Searing Flames) they often think about themselves playing against it. They make comments like "just spread out and its gg!," but in reality it isn't that simple for the vast majority of opponents and situations. Evidence for pre-nightfall fire ele's being effective? VIBE running a fire ele several seasons ago when they got silver capes. iQ playing one during last season and winning the tournament with it. To a lesser extent, Nu also played an EProd fire ele for quite awhile.

All three of those situtations...the fire eles were flaggers. The reason you don't see many fire eles in gvg is not because the spell line is poor, but you simply do not get the same utility from an ele primary that you do from say a mesmer. This has changed somewhat with GoS Rez, but is still a factor.

Edit: Shard...gg on the glowing gaze response

warriorsmiley · Dec 12, 2006, 12:49 AM // 00:49

People keep on bringing up Blinding Surge. I agree with a upped recharge (6secs) but taking away the duration isnt needed a well timed surge on a aderaline spike or something is all you really need it for.

Symbol · Dec 12, 2006, 12:53 AM // 00:53

Fire is poor because the damage is mediocre (well until NF) and it offers no utility.

warriorsmiley · Dec 12, 2006, 01:01 AM // 01:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by shardfenix

Doesn't see play outs...are you blind? Maybe 8 seconds is good enough, but as of now it's a free heal other, and it's spammable.

Zealous Benediction is fine just the way its a self heal with the same healing power as heal other BUT takes up an elite slot where as heal other doesnt maybe they energy gain should scale up as you put more into prot seeing as its a free heal. They more then likely made it that way so people will actually use it like they normally do then nerf it when it becomes a standard skill.

Isil`Zha · Dec 12, 2006, 01:09 AM // 01:09

Just one quick thing...

Quote:

Originally Posted by shardfenix

I expect a caster class to not have higher DPS that a warrior.

Why? Because it changes the status quo? Afraid of change? Where is it written that warriors must be the biggest damage dealers of all?

Dervishes do have much weaker armor to even it out or course, and with slower but more powerful attacks, they do have other weaknesses. For instance, Protective Spirit is going to stop a Dervish's ability to deal damage much better than it would to an Axe or Sword Warrior, or an Assassin.

Weakness is devastating to a Dervish's DPS output. Whereas on an Assassin weakness can pretty much be shrugged off, since they rely on making many hits to do their damage. Obviously, weakness is less devastating to an ax or sword warrior as well.

On the other end of the spectrum, however, skills such as Empathy, IP, or SS aren't as crippling to a Dervish as it is to an Axe or Sword Warrior - or especially an Assassin (who are devastated by these skills.) Heck, to a Dervish with Sandshards, Reckless Haste actually helps a Dervish.

It all balances out, one way or another

.defekt · Dec 12, 2006, 01:12 AM // 01:12

Destructive Was Glaive....

What if... · Dec 12, 2006, 01:39 AM // 01:39

If anything that skill seems underpowered. It's like mystic sandstorm except worse.

.defekt · Dec 12, 2006, 01:44 AM // 01:44

It's more the fact that it's bugged.

Zuranthium · Dec 12, 2006, 01:46 AM // 01:46

Quote:

Originally Posted by Etrik

Yes, because we all know that the devs made those 3 skills with Eles in mind. I wonder why they're not Estorage-related then?

That was a retarded comment.

I never said they were made for an Elem, now did I. They are a huge benefit to ASSASSIN gankers and happen to work beautifully on Elems as well.

However, many skills are certainly created with ideas of how well it will synergize with or counter something from another class.

The armor bonus on Feigned Nuetrality is probably too high when you look at it in conjunction with Deadly Pardox, I'll admit that, but I don't think the whole combo needs to be nerfed to hell. Just a small tweak.

Quote:

Originally Posted by What if...

BTW on an earlier comment: 5 energy AOD is ridiculous. That would allow warriors to safely over-extend to ridiculous lengths and always get away with it.

Sorry, I forgot to mention that I believe Shadowsteps should disable adrenaline abilities for a small amount of time (without totally emptying the adren pool). In other words, Warriors can NOT use them for sudden spikes. Here's a link to my thread which discusses everything Assassin-related that I think needs an improvement or change:

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...php?t=10060526

~Z

What if... · Dec 12, 2006, 01:57 AM // 01:57

Making Glaive a true item spell might make it better, true. But I still think the skill has worse problems.

Also while maintaining AOD, a warrior could attempt a base gank and force one or so members of a team to return to deal with him only for him to cancel AOD and reappear at the flag stand. That's what I meant by being in two places at once. With one or more warriors running that, opposing teams would constantly be at a disadvantage because the warriors either get your base, or get the stand. No normal split can handle pressure that mobile. That's why AOD is fine now, without other classes running it.

Zuranthium · Dec 12, 2006, 02:27 AM // 02:27

How is that any different than if he used AoD right now? The 5 extra energy isn't a big deal when you consider how much time he's going to be running and regening energy to get to the base and gank.

The 10 energy cost IS a big deal for spiking, but in my theory of reducing the skill to 5 energy it doesn't matter because teleport-adrenaline unloading simply would not work.

A Warrior without a surprise spike and no offensive Elite skill wouldn't be so hot. Which is why if you want that kind of character you'd go Assassin. Teleporting melee spikes should belong to them and not be as useful on any other primary class, just as something like MIND BLAST isn't nearly as useful on a non-Elem primary.

EDIT: Although, teleporting melee spikes could still be done by Dervish. So I guess the best answer is for teleport spells to disable ALL non-Assassin attack skills for a couple seconds.

~Z

What if... · Dec 12, 2006, 02:31 AM // 02:31

10 energy is fairly expensive on a warrior, and it wouldn't be something they could afford to run as often. At 5 energy it would become as accessible as shadow prison.

Zuranthium · Dec 12, 2006, 02:48 AM // 02:48

If they are using AoD solely to teleport to someone at the flagstand and then run away to the opponent's base for a gank, 10 energy isn't really a big deal at all. They will have their energy back by the time they get there.

People DON'T do that currently on their Warriors because 10 energy and -1 energy regen is too much for the Warrior to handle if he wants to be constantly spiking. Which is why Shadow Prison is used.

But, once again, Warriors wouldn't be able to teleport spike and other Elites would be become better choices.

~Z

s w o r d y · Dec 12, 2006, 02:57 AM // 02:57

Quote:

Originally Posted by Drewfense

IAll three of those situtations...the fire eles were flaggers. The reason you don't see many fire eles in gvg is not because the spell line is poor, but you simply do not get the same utility from an ele primary that you do from say a mesmer. This has changed somewhat with GoS Rez, but is still a factor.

The problem has always been that mesmers make great eles. Shatter enchant, e burn, e surge, pp/sd, and now spiritual pain / w demise - all armour ignoring damage that have great 2dy effects like e denial or enchant removal. Take that ele!

s w o r d y · Dec 12, 2006, 03:07 AM // 03:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by Iotan

). I'd rather just see the duration scale more with the attribute or increase the cooldown a bit. I've played gankers with these skills, and if you don't have SoH up, you don't go into their base. Scale it something like (15...60..70) with a recharge of 40. It would still be a useful combo, but it wouldn't be as efficient as it is now.

The same can be done with Feigned Neutrality. Instead of having an automatic 7 regen and 80 armor, scale it from (4...8..9) and (40...90..100) or something. If you want to have the skill save you from any possible damage, then you should need to spec highly into shadow arts.

SoH should be 30sec duration, 30 sec recharge and be a skill so you don't have optional removal, or an enchant, so self removal becomes specialised. So basically it works as a speed boost from your anchor, and after 30 secs you return where you started. That's right, you might actually have to time your pushes into an enemy - imagine that.

Right now it is greater than AoD, Shadow Meld, recall, shadow walk or any other shadow step skill because it gives you full control for the price of a sideshow hot dog.

What if... · Dec 12, 2006, 03:30 AM // 03:30

Shadow Prison is used because it is a instantaneous movement skill with a powerful slow down effect with no investment in deadly arts. By itself, I don't think the -1 energy regeneration, though problematic for the warrior, would hamper energy management at all because of zealous weapon switches which could be used while attacking npcs. We both agree however that its initial cost of ten energy factor into why this tactic isn't used. that and the fact that warriors are supposed to adreno-spike. If we assume the warrior does succeed in passing the enemy to the base and is allowed to attack an npc, the initial cost of five energy would be made up in a small amount of time spent attacking. In that scenario it would have the same energy regeneration as a shadow prison warrior spiking every twenty seconds only this warrior wouldn't necessarily need spikes to pressure base npcs. Actually, depending upon what the spikes are based on, energy usage beyond AOD might not even be a problem. It could use adrenaline to spike an npc or spike someone at the flag stand. Despite the in-game distance between those places, it can do either in the blink of an eye.

Zuranthium · Dec 12, 2006, 04:05 AM // 04:05

How would this Warrior spike someone at the flagstand? When they drop the Aura of Displacement and teleport back they'd have no adrenaline.

~Z

Riotgear · Dec 12, 2006, 04:41 AM // 04:41

Quote:

but you simply do not get the same utility from an ele primary that you do from say a mesmer.

The reason running ele primary for damage became viable with SF is because glowing gaze finally provided a good excuse to put more than 12 points in fire. Otherwise people probably WOULD be running it on Me/E.

The real reason should have been synergy between the lines and need to maximize their effectiveness (which is a large part of why you want mesmers/necros running on their primaries), but this is effectively moot two reasons:

First, if you're not running an energy elite, you run into the crappy attunement system and the skill costs which are balanced around them. Casting something outside of your main line winds up giving you that feeling you get when you try casting a 10e spell on a ranger.

Second, if you are running an energy elite on a dual-element build, you run into attribute thinning and the excessive crappiness of the non-elite skills. I'd have to go into a big long rant as to why, but it would cover the same ground as always: Stupid recharges that require several skills to do the same job, air spiking needing a 16-point attribute investment, fire being inefficient at pressure because practically nothing splashes farther than adjacent, water's damage component being awful and seeming like more of an excuse to raise each spell's energy cost by 5, etc.

Bottom line is that when heal party with no DF bonus is more efficient to run than your own class's abilities, those abilities need work.

EDIT -- Fixed contradictory statements. :P

Farin · Dec 12, 2006, 04:52 AM // 04:52

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wasteland Squidget

One suggestion I've heard for SoH is to make it end when you take damage.

That's a little too drastic. While I hate playing against SoH gankers that would pretty much rape the skill. Not being able to reactivate without being sent back to your origional location would be a much more reasonable modification imho.