Curse

rubics · Dec 20, 2006, 08:46 AM // 08:46

Quote:

Originally Posted by Patccmoi

That's really a simplistic view on things and honestly it's just wrong. A lot of people always say that, often when they disagree with the skill being nerfed, but it's really kinda insulting the intelligence of other people. If you think top guilds don't use Spiritual Pain or BSurge, or even RaO and SF depending on the build... well honestly i doubt you do hehe. And yet many in there ARE asking for changes to them. Because when skills are too strong they severly limit options. You CAN counter them, GW has so many skills that everything in there has a counter somewhere (or nearly... shouts aren't very counterable even if 1 necro hex exists). But if the amount of builds that can in a viable way is too low it stalls the metagame.

Why do you think there was sooo many Euro spike last season? Pressure was nearly unusable with things like BSurge on Me/E spikers. The only pressure you saw was Avatar of Melandru Dervs. Avatar of Grenth got some popularity cause it IS a crazy skill but people got used to it and after a while it just wasn't all that efficient anymore because most of the time that warriors/grenth train would just all be constantly blind because of 1-2 BSurge spammers.

Some skills just kill variety in the games and many players hate that. It doesn't mean they won't run them or that they lose against them.

To come back on SP, i know you could just reduce damage by 20 and AOERED ENGINE GO. But personally i'd hate to see that. It'd be just a nuke, but a so-so one with a pretty long recharge. It just doesn't fit Mesmers for me. Domination is punishment. Make it so! I'd rather have SP being TRULY strong, but with a condition to meet, then being so-so conditionless. There is 15713985 so-so conditionless skills in the game, i don't see why we'd need one more. I prefer something that involves tactical play and counters than just another brainless nuked, only toned down.

You're right. I don't mean to be condencending. Certainly some of these skills need to be reconsidered. SF might even be guilty (despite my personal opinion). However, I am challenging everyone to state a standard for what makes a skill broken. It's easy to simply suggest game changes, but I'm not sure that's entirely useful.

Bankai · Dec 20, 2006, 09:23 AM // 09:23

I can only say, if you don't like the AoE on blinding surge- Run something that's not based on enchantments. Run Restoration rits for example. Defensive shouts. Healing monks. There are enough reasons not to use enchantments. And when there's no AoE to stop trains, it's just a blinding flash that's elite.

stueyman2099 · Dec 20, 2006, 09:51 AM // 09:51

My outlook on when a skill is imba is looking at what it does, and comparing that to other skills that do the same/similar thing and look at how much better/worse it does and for what cost.

Blinding Surge: does the same thing as flash, which gets its short cool down from its high cost. in return for cost, surge is elite. then on top of that they added an AoE blind (conditional) and damage. Too much good stuff for one skill. Even as an elite, a spamable 5e blind is damn powerful.

Shadow of Haste: does the same thing as AoD, only it's non elite.

Feigned nutrality: fills the same function as shadow refuge, only 10 times better.

Spiritual Pain: no skill does this much armor ignoring AoE damage with out having to be right in the face of your enemy.

Searing Flames: ele damage, only an ammount that is actualy worth having. I wouldn't be upset to see this one dodge the nerf bat.

Shadow Prison: This is an elite version of some other sin spell from factions. forget what it was called, but it sucked. Teleporting to an enemy once every 20 seconds and having a water hex hit them at the same time for cheap is a bit much. The next best tele for warriors has a 45s recharge mind you, and thats where I think this skill is too strong.

Critical Chop: in theory, this one is fine, basicly prot strike with out the conditional part and a longer recharge in return. Is it too stong? Debatable. I wouldn't be sad to see the interupt go away on this skill, provided it keeps the swing time.

Spoil Victor: Plays like a dom magic hex. Hurts like hell. tone the damage down a bit and I think it'll be fine.

Quicksand effect on Nomads isle: this one didn't bother me for a long time, as no one freaking uses the map. it occurs to me though ,that this effect hits physicals way way too hard. Trigger on skills only please, not auto attacks.

Lorekeeper · Dec 20, 2006, 01:54 PM // 13:54

Quote:

Originally Posted by rubics

However, I am challenging everyone to state a standard for what makes a skill broken. It's easy to simply suggest game changes, but I'm not sure that's entirely useful.

Well i think in several of my posts i made some clear comments about the motives behind my desire for skill changes... and i suggest that these motives should be THE only driving force behind demands for skill changes. For your benefit ill try type them out here for you so you dont have to go searching for my posts.

My desire for skill balance is predicated on the following desirable situation that build makers like me pray for.

*ideal situation*

Freedom of choice between alternative means of achieving a similiar task... where each alternative has strengths and weaknesses none of which give it clear advantage over the other. This allows me to exercise some creativity and personal preference over what i choose to include in my build. And if creativity is allowed... the meta will be soooo much more diverse and exciting and unpredictable.

this kind of build creativity depends upon the skill and experience of your team who give you the confidence to be able to run almost anything you can think of.

However,

*in reality*

This sort of freedom only exists for the highest tiers of GvG teams IF that. It does not seem to exist in the middle and lower tiers although there are exceptions and i do recognise the guilds who strive for originality no matter what rank they are.

This is because there are skills and skill combinations which outshine other alternatives in terms of the following ratio

difficulty:effectiveness

Searing flames fire eles+ RaO thumpers + Blinding surge spammers all have a extremely low difficulty:effectiveness ratio. I describe these skills and skill combinations built around them... as buttonmashers. They take very little experience and skill and yet they still achieve very high levels of effectiveness no matter who is behind the character. Especially blinding surge... which can possibly shutdown multiple melee characters in 1 button click and all it requires is for you to recognise that xxx is a warrior or yyy is a dervish or zzz is a ranger etc. And so in the middle and lower tiers... build makers may have less confidence to run advanced skills and classes because their team mates and themselves arent highly experienced or skilled enough to... so they 'choose' to run these sort of brainless builds in order to achieve some success. Noone likes to lose. And as soon as one of these guilds finds a secret formula to an easy to use build... the rest follow in their success and so we see certain fotms dominating the middle and lower tiers of the ladder (this kind of behaviour is now much much worse with the introduction of the champion title). But this kind of pattern isnt unique to outside the top 20-30... you can also see reocurring themes appearing within the top 20-30 too... for example... euro spike in which spiritual pain takes a front seat. Or ganks squads using shadow of haste and feigned neutrality.

So my argument and motivation behind skill changes is to open up the metagame to choice which will encourage diversity...

in general these skills create a very predictable metagame. So much so that in the recent playoffs, teams commented on how they ''predicted'' other teams to have at least 1 copy of bsurge in their build... so we saw guilds running dual melandrus dervish who are immune to blinding. And they did very very well. And it was those builds i found the most interesting.

Im not complaining that these skills are overpowered and uncounterable... they are counterable and they dont allow one hit kills or guaranteed victories but when the metagame revolves around only a predictable handful of skills and classes.

its time for more choice.

and for us to have more choice... we need to balance skills so they dont make choices for us which is whats happening with the current state of the game.

Frank Dudenstein · Dec 20, 2006, 02:47 PM // 14:47

/agree with above. The following skills only need a nerf because they are so much more effective than the alternatives .. buffing the alternatives would be just as good as a nerf:

Avatar of Grenth: I don't mind this skill, because it makes getting kills easier (offense > defense imo) but it's so much better than any other Enchantment removal that it's hilarious.

Searing Flames: again, I love the fact that Eles can now deal pressure damage. But it's so much better than any other option that it's sick. Don't kill SF too much, and buff the rest of Fire some more...

Blinding Surge: so much better than any other attacker hate that it's funny. 5E 4sec recharge for aoe shutodwn (+damage)??? Compare that to some of the Necromancer curses (lol Soul Bind).

Blinding Surge I especially hate, because it's permanent shutdown for so little investment. I mean, at least with other forms of shutdown, you need to make a serious investment ... Blinding Flash guy needs an elite and pretty much all of his energy for perma-shutdown. A curses guy needs most of his bar and energy (plus more hexes from the rest of the team). But with blinding surge you need, uh, well one elite slot and a piddling amount of energy. Just not fair to the attackers of the world.

Spiritual Pain: This one is just retarded... compare it to every other aoe nuke in the game and tell me one that comes close...

Shadow Prison: I like the skill but hate the fact that it's so usable by warriors. Make it 10E and perhaps that will put it back on an assassin (though it might kill it for assassins too ... not sure what the right answer is here)

Natural Stride: Why does every other comparable skill have a 45 or 60sec recharge?

Harrier's Grasp: Actually all of these Dervish enchants should be reworked so that you have to make an investment into the attribute to get usefulness.

Sandstorm: I love the skill, but would also love it if Shockwave and Unsteady Ground were comparable. And why do Churning Earth/Eruption have such ridiculous recharges? Weren't the ridiculous energy costs and ridiculous cast times enough?

Not that it matters much to PvP, but can someone tell me why Stone Sheath is elite Stoneflesh Aura is not. Was there a mixup somewhere?

Oh well thats all for now...

Patccmoi · Dec 20, 2006, 04:41 PM // 16:41

Quote:

Originally Posted by Frank Dudenstein

Shadow Prison: I like the skill but hate the fact that it's so usable by warriors. Make it 10E and perhaps that will put it back on an assassin (though it might kill it for assassins too ... not sure what the right answer is here)

That's one skill that obviously needs a tweak too. It IS too usable by warriors. 10E would certainly help, and honestly i doubt it would annoy Assassins so much. Assassins often combine the skill with Black Lotus Strike which just refills their energy. I think that warriors would still use it, but it would still be slightly more complicated (Frenzy-Shadow Prison-Crit Chop = 20E). I don't really want the recharge/effect to be nerfed because honestly it would be too comparable to non-elite alternatives otherwise.

Quote:

Natural Stride: Why does every other comparable skill have a 45 or 60sec recharge?

Natural Stride ends when you're hexed/enchanted. Have someone with Parasitic Bond or Wastrel's Worry and he can totally prevent the stance from being used. It also requires pretty high investment in Wilderness (not really a problem for most rangers). Seriously this is an EXCELLENT skill for rangers that opened up the class a LOT, but they made it so it has weaknesses that can easily be exploited with the ends when hexed/enchanted. I would seriously hate to see this skill nerfed because it gave Rangers so much more options in their builds.

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Harrier's Grasp: Actually all of these Dervish enchants should be reworked so that you have to make an investment into the attribute to get usefulness.

Fully agreed on that. Imo Harrier's Grasp should cripple for 1..4..5 seconds. If you don't invest in wind, you can cripple for 1-2 sec. If you actually do invest in wind, 4s cripple on EVERY ATTACK is already incredible for a non-elite. The current duration is absolutely ridiculous.

Quote:

Sandstorm: I love the skill, but would also love it if Shockwave and Unsteady Ground were comparable. And why do Churning Earth/Eruption have such ridiculous recharges? Weren't the ridiculous energy costs and ridiculous cast times enough?

I'd agree here really, but that's a problem for a lot of ele skills. Nightfall introduced the first viable Ele AOEs in GvG (out of like Meteor Shower at VoD and Deep Freeze but that's for snare only). Sandstorm, Searing Flames and Savannah Heat. We used 2 Savannah Heat ele as main build for half last season and it was incredible, it's a skill that still needs to come out in the light but it has serious potential, doubling as really strong 'spike' skill (not really a spike, but let's say insane pressure on a couple of targets for a few seconds) and awesome VoD tool as 2 Savannah simply wipe every NPCs straight. You team a good team build around it but it's a truly viable elite. So ya, NF introduced the first viable AOEs. Nearly everything before that needs to be buffed. Sandstorm is fine, Savannah is fine, and Searing i'm not sure but if it needs a nerf it should be a small one (and i'd hope for slight damage reduction, not AOE, recharge or burning). The answer here is really BUFF THE REST!

And another that some mentioned but wasn't discussed much : Glyph of Lesser Energy. This skill honestly need a nerf. It can save up to .83E/s, which is 2.5 pips of regen. Mantra of Recall at 16 Inspiration (totally ridiculous attrib no one would go for) gives .8E/s. Power Drain, the best Inspiration EManagement, needs over 12 Inspiration before it can net as much IF you use it exactly on recharge (which is kinda ridiculous since it's an interrupt). GoLE is just better than the whole inspiration attribute line without any investment. I know that to maximize its potential you need 2 15E skills, and most of the time non Eles will use it on 15-10E skils, but that's still .66E/s worth of energy. Currently on Mesmer unless i need a hard rez i more or less always ditch Inspiration totally and put a GoLE in there. Shatter Enchant-Spiritual Pain for 5E saves you so much...

I like the skill, but it shouldn't be just better than everything else and attributeless. I think it IS necessary for Eles primary though so i don't really want a clear nerf. It was a great great help to make Eles have decent emanagement without using emanagement elite (Atune + GoLE is very good emanagement atm to use Ele skills). I'd like to see it in EStorage and be 'next 1..2 spells cost 15E less', with breakpoint somewhere around 8-9 ES. For other classes, it would still be as good as it was before the buff, and for Eles it remains as good as it is now. Monks could still use it to Aegis, but it wouldn't allow them to do something like Aegis + gain 10 net E from using ZB on someone below 50% for free.

Seamus Finn · Dec 20, 2006, 09:11 PM // 21:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by stueyman2099

My outlook on when a skill is imba is looking at what it does, and comparing that to other skills that do the same/similar thing and look at how much better/worse it does and for what cost.

Blinding Surge: does the same thing as flash, which gets its short cool down from its high cost. in return for cost, surge is elite. then on top of that they added an AoE blind (conditional) and damage. Too much good stuff for one skill. Even as an elite, a spamable 5e blind is damn powerful.

Shadow of Haste: does the same thing as AoD, only it's non elite.

Feigned nutrality: fills the same function as shadow refuge, only 10 times better.

Spiritual Pain: no skill does this much armor ignoring AoE damage with out having to be right in the face of your enemy.

Searing Flames: ele damage, only an ammount that is actualy worth having. I wouldn't be upset to see this one dodge the nerf bat.

Shadow Prison: This is an elite version of some other sin spell from factions. forget what it was called, but it sucked. Teleporting to an enemy once every 20 seconds and having a water hex hit them at the same time for cheap is a bit much. The next best tele for warriors has a 45s recharge mind you, and thats where I think this skill is too strong.

Critical Chop: in theory, this one is fine, basicly prot strike with out the conditional part and a longer recharge in return. Is it too stong? Debatable. I wouldn't be sad to see the interupt go away on this skill, provided it keeps the swing time.

Spoil Victor: Plays like a dom magic hex. Hurts like hell. tone the damage down a bit and I think it'll be fine.

Quicksand effect on Nomads isle: this one didn't bother me for a long time, as no one freaking uses the map. it occurs to me though ,that this effect hits physicals way way too hard. Trigger on skills only please, not auto attacks.

I can agree with all of this except some of the assassin skills. Shadow of Haste is not really working the same as say AoD.... but in most cases, using up the two slots, it is better. This skill I would have to say I do dislike because it has helped with other skills to foul up the ganking metagame. However, Feigned and Shadow Prison I think need to be dealt with carefully if looking to nerf them. Much like Bsurge, these skills have been pimped out to classes other than sin and are quite possibly even more effective than they would be on sin, or at least get to the point where whatever class is using the skills is basically a sin at heart. It's a little strange I know, but nerfing these skills could be disasterous to a class that is pretty marginalized already. In my opinion, feigned is what keeps sins in the ganking game at all. Certainly on a solo level, could a sin compete with the new natural stride ranger, or a YAA war with shadow refuge as a heal(sure Feigned is ten times better but refuge is border suckage compared to heal sig and troll)? At the same time... guys this is just an enchantment. Even if it can be kept up with very little relapse, one enchant strip, which should be in your build anyhow, and this character is done for. Again with Prison, it has become very effective on a gank sin and nerfing it would hurt sins way more than wars. I don't even think that the tele wars are that strong personally. They can now be part of a caster spike, sure, but the pressure they put out hardly outclasses that of a caster spike(of course, bsurge is probably contributing a lot to that, so I could be wrong). I think bsurge can be nerfed to oblivion and E/mos are still as viable as ever. Nerf some of these sin skills and they will probably start hanging out with the rits when it comes time to gvg.

I don't know about bumping prison to 10 energy since, even with a full 8 skills to use, black lotus doesn't come very close at all to making the cut... Not for ganking at least.

Wasteland Squidget · Dec 20, 2006, 09:13 PM // 21:13

Quote:

Originally Posted by Patccmoi

And another that some mentioned but wasn't discussed much : Glyph of Lesser Energy. This skill honestly need a nerf. It can save up to .83E/s, which is 2.5 pips of regen. Mantra of Recall at 16 Inspiration (totally ridiculous attrib no one would go for) gives .8E/s. Power Drain, the best Inspiration EManagement, needs over 12 Inspiration before it can net as much IF you use it exactly on recharge (which is kinda ridiculous since it's an interrupt). GoLE is just better than the whole inspiration attribute line without any investment. I know that to maximize its potential you need 2 15E skills, and most of the time non Eles will use it on 15-10E skils, but that's still .66E/s worth of energy. Currently on Mesmer unless i need a hard rez i more or less always ditch Inspiration totally and put a GoLE in there. Shatter Enchant-Spiritual Pain for 5E saves you so much...

I like the skill, but it shouldn't be just better than everything else and attributeless. I think it IS necessary for Eles primary though so i don't really want a clear nerf. It was a great great help to make Eles have decent emanagement without using emanagement elite (Atune + GoLE is very good emanagement atm to use Ele skills). I'd like to see it in EStorage and be 'next 1..2 spells cost 15E less', with breakpoint somewhere around 8-9 ES. For other classes, it would still be as good as it was before the buff, and for Eles it remains as good as it is now. Monks could still use it to Aegis, but it wouldn't allow them to do something like Aegis + gain 10 net E from using ZB on someone below 50% for free.

This is a nerf I'm somewhat torn on. GoLE is way stronger energy management than any of the Inspiration skills that saw nerfs last skill balance. However, nerfing it would remove the last really viable energy management option for casters.

Every single caster who could used to go /Me for Inspiration skills, because casters need more than 4 pips to do their job and that was one of the only ways to get it. This season, Inspiration was flattened and the only really good skills left in it were Power Drain and some rather situational skills like Channeling. Casters were able to ignore that by going /E for GoLE instead, but if that gets nerfed there really will be no viable energy management options left. You won't be forcing these casters to use other energy management options, you'll be forcing them out of the game completely.

Say goodbye to Illusion mesmers for a start - no way to supply the 8-10 pips of regen they want to do their jobs. A lot of Dom builds can probably get by with Power Drain so long as they never miss, but they'd be seriously weakened by this change. Whether or not Reaper's Mark guys will still be worth bringing is questionable, but necromancers at least have OOB as a fallback point.

So while this skill is definitely overpowered, I'd prefer to see a nerf to it in tandem with buffs to some other energy management. I don't see the sense to making entire attribute lines unviable for the sake of this one skill change, any more than it makes sense to nerf Ether Prodigy because its returns are better than Energy Boon.

Thomas.knbk · Dec 20, 2006, 09:19 PM // 21:19

If one skill is overpowered, but it's the only think keeping a certain class in the game, it still needs to be nerfed. If the only thing a class could do was an instant death spike, it'd still have to be nerfed, (hypochondria lol). Feigned Neutrality is one of the few good sin skills in the game, but that is no reason not to nerf it.

Symbol · Dec 20, 2006, 10:25 PM // 22:25

But what constitutes "overpowered". A good starting point point (IMO), would be "A skill is overpowered if the team that doesn't run it is at a disadvantage to those that do"

Patccmoi · Dec 20, 2006, 10:52 PM // 22:52

Quote:

Originally Posted by Thomas.knbk

If one skill is overpowered, but it's the only think keeping a certain class in the game, it still needs to be nerfed. If the only thing a class could do was an instant death spike, it'd still have to be nerfed, (hypochondria lol). Feigned Neutrality is one of the few good sin skills in the game, but that is no reason not to nerf it.

I think that the problem with Feigned isn't Feigned itself. Feigned is nice but it CAN'T be kept up all the time or nearly on its own. It's the combo with Deadly Paradox even with no DA investment and more importantly Shadow of Haste that makes it so freaking powerful. Because either they can keep it up nearly permanently (and sometimes not just nearly) or are teleported if they get in trouble so basically you can't ever attack them during its downtime.

Atm, yes it's a really powerful defense but it's an enchant and it's 25s recharge. Make Deadly Paradox effect scale with Deadly Arts (skills activate/recharge 20..44% faster for example which would give same result at high DA but tone it down a lot with no investment) and honestly I'd say nerf Shadow of Haste. This skill is just stupid, shadowstepping away is WAY too easy with that. Killing good gankers with Shadow of Haste is so freaking hard no matter your snares or kds. Maybe Feigned could get a small duration nerf along, but nothing major. Imo it's a needed sin skill.

As for GoLE, i agree actually that it's really helping casters atm. Inspiration was overnerfed imo, with nearly nothing in there being viable emanagement left. If they wanted to nerf monk emanagement (and imo monks are fine as is, i don't like monks having insane energy as it just pushes the metagame towards spike builds and if you want them to have more energy there is always the option of Nec/Para support) there was other ways than destroying inspiration energy gain. Doing something like Drain Enchantment at 2s cast but leaving it with same stats would've take it out of most monk builds but leave it usable for Mesmers and possibly other casters. Necros have Signet of Lost Souls which is really good in pressure builds (which is usually where you see Necros anyway) and Soul Reaping, i don't think their energy is that bad atm. Eles as i said i wouldn't want GoLE to be nerfed for them. Rts are fine for energy. Dervs are fine. Sins are fine. GoLE is really for Mesmers and and Eles atm, and some necro builds (but i've played a lot of Necro builds and rarely feel the need for it).

Mesmers just had the problem of being (imo) very mishandled by ANet since a couple of patches. They are an extremely powerful class but appart of traditional Dom diversion/spike mesmers, the rest is just becoming less viable every patch as Inspiration is repeatedly destroyed because monks are too efficient with it. As you said, Illusion Mesmers now are viable but need something like GoLE or you won't be spamming all that much. Mesmers being the only caster (appart maybe from Rt) that has just no help at all from their primary to manage energy, they absolutely need their Inspiration line for emanagement. And instead of making changes to Inspiration that reduces its efficiency for OTHER classes (like raising cast time by 1s on skills too good on others) they just destroy energy efficiency of skills back to back. Inspiration just needs some help for Mesmer to manage energy again, then you can put GoLE at 1..2 in EStorage for Eles to be fine and i think most casters will be ok.

Seamus Finn · Dec 21, 2006, 01:04 AM // 01:04

Quote:

Originally Posted by Thomas.knbk

If one skill is overpowered, but it's the only think keeping a certain class in the game, it still needs to be nerfed. If the only thing a class could do was an instant death spike, it'd still have to be nerfed, (hypochondria lol). Feigned Neutrality is one of the few good sin skills in the game, but that is no reason not to nerf it.

Actually it is exactly why it should be kept around. Hey guys, Ether prodigy gives way more energy than any other E-Elite.... NERF IT! Who cares if eles wouldn't be viable anymore. And I still don't even think the Deadly Paradox/Feigned Combo can be judged until Shadow of Haste(AKA Ganking for Dummies) is addressed. Still They will probably nerf it all without the curtesy to even improve Refuge a bit.

twicky_kid · Dec 21, 2006, 02:04 AM // 02:04

Just change Shadow Refuge back to its first incarnation. Make the life gain trigger when it ends w/o any other condition.

HolyHawk · Dec 21, 2006, 02:05 AM // 02:05

I was concerned about the glyph of less energy as well, it is indeed powerfull now, but I believe that if other even options were given, it would be better. Having the privilege of chosing amoung two skills make them balanced in some way; restoring the inspiration line to what it used to be might be an option. Right now, it's not so well usable even for mesmers. And to be honest, I would consider monk elites instead of e-drain/mantra very carefully. They are not junky at all. This upcoming skill balanced should focus a little more on buffs than nerfs (but yeah, I do agree that there are some nerfs needed).

Phades · Dec 21, 2006, 03:44 AM // 03:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wasteland Squidget

Blinding Surge isn't a general counter, it's a skill that makes it almost impossible for a single physical to do his job. That seems general because physicals are so crucial to Guild Wars, but in practice Diversion is much more versatile than Blinding Surge.

That is mainly a design issue that causes the near neccesity for phys damage dealers in order to score kills, due to the fact that the majority of spell based damage is slow and weak with no secondary effects compared to monk prot and healing. Blinding surge is something that can help force a bias towards other damage sources to try and arrest the reigns from the all phys environments currently seen now. However, it does not function like some kind of ineptitude/diversion variant flat out stopping key skills. It can temporarially waste a skill, but doesnt straight out lock the skill out like a diversion creates in a hard locking fashion.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wasteland Squidget

Outside of skirmish scenarios the damage from Blinding Surge is inconsequential and the blind effect is all you really care about, which makes it weak when you want to make a push and play offensively.

It depends on if there is "relaible" healing present or not. I dont find the damage inflicted by blinding surge very noticable at all on the hard targets the skill is designed to shut down, even when kept up over long periods of time.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wasteland Squidget

If the enemy has Melandru dervishes or Sight Beyond Sight guys or Signet of Malice you're going to feel pretty useless.

Kinda like trying to solo kill a non afk monk with purely spell based damage. By game concept that appears to be the acceptable norm though through hard counters like that. But then again, that is like using brute force rather than moving around it with a different option. Of course other options arent as attractive compared to melee based damage. There in lies the problem. Some of it has to due with AI, others just the raw math in application of skills.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wasteland Squidget

I'm not saying Blinding Surge isn't effective - it's an overpowered skill that manages to be very versatile, but it's not a general counter because there are a lot of builds and situations where it just isn't effective. Diversion is good against any build or tactic, and it's good both offensively and defensively. Compare directly to Blackout and Gale - both incredibly useful skills that pull their weight against any build, but balanced by their drawbacks.

I would loosely define the latter as overpowered, since they are in fact good in nearly any situation opposed to something that has more limitations than a easily re-applied blind. Yet, it still can be achieved through e-prodigy blinding flash spam. Blinding surge just feels like an inverse answer to a scythe user. Potential aoe blind in exchange for constant potential aoe melee damage. Unfortunatly assassins get caught up in that flak. Its not as common to have warriors and rangers with enchantments on them regularly that are also self applied.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wasteland Squidget

The other difference is fun factor. When Prophecies was being designed Arenanet went to great lengths to avoid hard locks of characters (in stark contrast to their competitors.) After release they nerfed both Gale and Blackout because the two in combination were hard-locking characters for long periods of time, preventing them from accomplishing anything.

It took ANET a rather long time to nerf gale to get it out of the hands of warriors and for blackout to be less attractive to rangers. As far as general fun factor is concerned, i think that is a rather slippery slope to be going for since there have been many trends within the game that become staples and arent all that fun to run or play against. Actually running up against similar builds long enough takes some of the fun out of the game right off the bat, since there are not as many execution elements that a fps or fighting game possess within GW. Personally i really dislike playing against character + pet/minion/spirit, simply due to point and clicking not being efficient or effective typically and dislike wasting time tabbing through targets and find to be playing against them, regardless of overal effect to be not fun.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wasteland Squidget

However, with Nightfall they added crazy skills like Ebon Dust Aura and Blinding Surge, which essentially make an asymmetric trade with one physical. These skills singlehandedly overpower condition removal (except possibly Signet of Malice), creating a situation where the physical character is permanently locked down and there's really not much his team can do about it. Hard locks are simply not fun from a gameplay perspective, and they're exactly what these skills allow and promote. Harrier's Grasp is a similar problem.

Yeah, but then you end up having to accept responses like skill disable hard locks like sig of humility, diversion, gale etc which effectivly reverses the exact same situation just changing the offender and the victim around. It doesnt make much sense to automatically accept one, but ignore the other.

Quote:

Originally Posted by JR-

Linking Blinding Surge to Energy Storage makes absolutely no sense at all, skill wise.

Eles have had cross conditional skills in active play for awhile. Many of which were easily countered making it void entirely. Then you have things like lions comfort linking direct attribute levels to both strength and tactics. Nothing like direct failure has been done yet, but i dont think its out of the realm of possibility. I do not know if that is the best answer for blinding surge and keeping with profession themes though.

Quote:

Originally Posted by JR-

If Anet didn't intend Fast Casting to benefit other spell lines, why didn't they just limit it to the Mesmer profession?

Personaly, i am more inclined to ask as to why mesmers get it in the first place considering the nature of interupts and the already low .25s cast time that fast casting has virtually zero impact on. Then add into that the cast time multipliers that exist and other straight up shutdown options and ask why they need it in the first place? A lot of their skills are on low cast times, even ignoring the interupts. Its only a few here and there, one of the more notable being diversion, that really get a good boost from it.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Patrograd

Why do Eles *have* to be better spikers than mesmers?

Because eles typically dont have alot of inherent utility built into the damage and its overpriced. Basically if you are only doing damage, it had better be worth the overal investment, including rate of sucess, time spent activating, overal effect versus cost, and so on. The fact that the bulk of ele skills simply dont achieve this and the odd minority of mesmer skills do is just a misnomer on top of being out of place with the bonus effects mesmers have.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wasteland Squidget

This is a nerf I'm somewhat torn on. GoLE is way stronger energy management than any of the Inspiration skills that saw nerfs last skill balance. However, nerfing it would remove the last really viable energy management option for casters.

I was rather surprised with the inspiration nerf as well. However when i think about how every non ether prodigy caster profession turned to only inspiration for energy management that also had bonus effects on top of the management, it is not as much of a shock in the end.

Personally i think that the glyphs should have been more scalable to begin with and under energy storage. I do not see too many signets in other professions with a fixed effect, especially ones that would be considered as useful as glyph of lesser energy.

Riotgear · Dec 21, 2006, 05:22 AM // 05:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by Phades

Blinding surge is something that can help force a bias towards other damage sources to try and arrest the reigns from the all phys environments currently seen now.

They did arrest the reigns, the problem is that casters went and did the only thing they could do: Spike. Balance is best-achieved by adding options, not eliminating them.

For blinding surge, perhaps adding some sort of conditionality would be the best course? i.e. make the blind EXTREMELY short if the target's attacking, but cause a considerable damage increase?

The AOE isn't a bad idea per se, as it's a good IDEA for keeping melee trains under control, but that requires an ideal balance environment where melee isn't the only standard for projecting damage threat (outside of hex or spike of course).

As far as GoLE, I'm not exactly sure what to make of it simply because the inspiration nerfs made such an impact. By any measure, it is a bit too strong for something that requires no attribute investment whatsoever, especially on builds which have traditionally used their secondary strictly for energy management. It would be a tremendous boon to elementalists if it were linked to energy storage, but then either the issues with inspiration have to be addressed, or classes that were hard-hit by the inspiration nerfs need to have their skills adjusted for efficiency, which would probably be a much more complicated task than just kicking inspiration back up a notch.

Phades · Dec 21, 2006, 05:59 AM // 05:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by Riotgear

It would be a tremendous boon to elementalists if it were linked to energy storage, but then either the issues with inspiration have to be addressed, or classes that were hard-hit by the inspiration nerfs need to have their skills adjusted for efficiency, which would probably be a much more complicated task than just kicking inspiration back up a notch.

The inspiration thing is hard because only ether signet nets energy and does nothing else similar to other energy gain skills. Perhaps it would be the first candidate for a buff, a recharge reduction seems easy enough. I am not sure how much wouldnt be too much though. I havent tried to use the skill seriously.

Even mantra of recall can serve as a makeshift cover enchantment, even though that style of play has faded to the wayside since ch1. Otherwise, you are looking at various ways to either counter or deny your opponent while gaining energy. It seems kinda silly to be honest. Actually, other energy gain skills sometimes have drawbacks, like in the necromancer lines. This kind of comparison is like putting vapor blade side by side with shatter enchantment and then releasing the "mesmer" version of vapor blade that did some damage, but did more if they were enchanted and removed a enchantment while in all likelyhood costing less energy and having a faster base casting time.

twicky_kid · Dec 21, 2006, 06:41 AM // 06:41

Leave GoLE alone and buff inspiration.

Come on 3 energy net for a drain enchant and 30 recharge. It used to be 8 with a 20 recharge. Over 3 castings now you gain 9 energy where you used to gain 24. That's a huge difference.

The inspiration nerf also killed any hopes of mantra of recovery being used. I could also name a lot more skills that are useless because the inspiration line is no longer there to make up for other skill's inefficiency.

Riotgear · Dec 21, 2006, 08:46 AM // 08:46

Quote:

Originally Posted by twicky_kid

Come on 3 energy net for a drain enchant and 30 recharge. It used to be 8 with a 20 recharge. Over 3 castings now you gain 9 energy where you used to gain 24. That's a huge difference.

First off, your numbers are off. It used to have a 25 recharge. It used to net 7 energy at 9 inspiration, now it nets 4. There is no level of inspiration where it used to net 8 and now nets 3.

Second, its former 7 net every 25 seconds is 0.28e/sec.

Glyph of Lesser Energy on two 10e spells is 0.5e/sec. Using it on a 10e and a 5e is 0.33. Plus you're more efficient at something or other because you have more attribute points.

What if... · Dec 21, 2006, 12:27 PM // 12:27

While I would prefer to see inspiration magic spells returned to their pre-nerfed state, I'm doubtful that will happen. I have to wonder what kind of energy management balance the developers are looking for when they make these skill changes. At what point are skills like MoR and OoB really balanced?