Why the Conjure nerf was a bad idea.

For one, it's made the game more dependant on items, which isn't good. A skill now requires you to have a certain item to use, that can't be right...

Also, why would you want to take an elemental hilt (or string, whatever) over a Zealous hilt? It's just not smart, so now the skill is pretty pointless to anyone but those who don't know about the uses of a Zealous upgrade. Conjure/Zealous is now viable for only Dragon Swords, since they have inherent fire damage. This means favoring 2 already overused skill lines; Sword and Fire.

The nerf was executed poorly, and the issues with Conjure could be handled in a much better way... Instead of forcing you to have a certain hilt, why not just have it part of the spell, that it converts your current damage type to whatever elemental damage of the Conjure you're using?

Conjure Flame
Lose all enchantments. For 60 seconds, your attacks do fire damage and strike for an additional 1-13 damage.

Conjure Lightning
Lose all enchantments. For 60 seconds, your attacks do lightning damage and strike for an additional 1-13 damage.

Conjure Frost
Lose all enchantments. For 60 seconds, your attacks do cold damage and strike for an additional 1-13 damage.

That isn't exactly a nerf then is it nash? I actually like how they worked the nerf in, this way there is a good tradeoff that you have to sacrifice energy to get the extra damage of the conjure. I'm not sold on it though, because it does have all the drawbacks you mentioned as well, and the dragon sword loophole.

Right now conjures are the only way to get a max dps, and there should be some sort of major drawback involved with boosting your dps as significantly as conjures let you.

Stacking Barbs + Weaken Armor gives you more damage than Conjure. Sure, it's just one skill compared to two, and so on... But claiming you need it to max out your DPS isn't true.

Atleast the latest nerf was not the way to go.

Um, I need clarification on the term "nerf". I'd seen it before and thought it was gamer slang for "removed, without warning or explaination" but the way y'all are using it here that doesn't seem to be right.

Dave III

Nerf this!

nerf means weaking, in general. Think of the nerf toy.

As for the topic at hand, I think that stacking buffs was a problem and the devs realized this. I'm not saying that this is the solution I would have chosen, but I'll live with it.

About the zealous mod being better than having a conjured weapon, now that is a problem with the zealous mod, isn't it?

You suggesting they nerf Zealous?

Ah, Thank you. Now I know. And knowing is half the battle. ^_^

Dave III

Consider it this way. As a Warrior or a Ranger is there ever a situation where you'd consider another upgrade besides Zealous? If not, there's a problem.

GI Joe!!!

At least Dragon Swords look the coolest...

Well, is that problem that Zealous is too good, or that the others are bad, is another question.

Right. It could be that everything else is sitting too low. It could be that Zealous is standing too high. But if it's heads and shoulders above everything else, it's indicitive that something's wrong somewhere. If you fix it by nerfing it or by buffing everything else, it doesn't matter. It's the imbalance of power that's the concern. If you have a variety of item mods you want to create a diverse scene where people can have actual options. If one's the clear-cut winner then there's no diversity there's just a right way and a wrong way of doing things. It's degenerative and that's the problem.

Personally, I'd say it's pretty hard to buff everything up because energy is that huge. Properly played a Zealous grip can give just a Warrior a caster's level of regeneration. You'd have to make the other grips extremely powerful to make people consider leaving that alone. But it's a bit hard to dip a Zealous grip a lot lower than what it is - the problem's at the high end where people are cutting every corner they can, for a novice player that +1 en per hit is probably pretty well balanced. It's just htat it's very abuseable if you know what you're doing. I don't know how to solve it. But then again, it's not my job to solve the problem, the devs get paid for such things, not me and I'll leave it in their hands as long as I can point out that there *is* a problem.

Well, the other upgrades are pretty pointless, I can't think of one useful. Course, I haven't seen all upgrades though (is there a list?).

last i heard, GWG was working on one.

Seems to be Conjure used to be more powerful, like (1..17) instead of (1..13) or something like that. When they nerfed the damage, I assumed it was because of how useful that was to a W/E and the like. The way it works now, however, I wonder if bumping the damage back up might help bring balance. If Conjure were more powerful, an elemental hilt might start looking more attractive than a zealous one...

yeah the other bonuses are all rather minor in comparison.

Off the top of my head, we have (not sure which pieces have what)

+30 health
+4 armor
+4 armor against physical (higher?)
+4 armor against elemental (higher?)
+% damage against a species
+4 vampiric, -1 health regeneration
+1 energy gain, -1 energy regeneration
elemental mods
lengthen conditions (specific)
lengthen hexes
lengthen enchantments
+8% speed, -% critical

If anything, I think Dragon Swords are just the tip of the iceburg for weapons... Perhaps we'll have other Elemental Swords and such with "cool looks"... Makes sense that they'd carry the idea of the Dragon sword over to other weapons, even bows... perhaps there's even a flaming bow we have yet to see?

I think it's still too early to judge the balance of the items as we've yet to see them all. Well, some of us may know more about this than others...

The "cool stuff" (weapons, items, armor, etc.) are where I think the bulk of the reward system should cover: since there's a level cap (And I think it's a really good idea, so we don't need to go into that old chestnut again), then "Bragging Rights" becomes the primary reward for playing the game. The Dragon sword doesn't have to be any better than the average "best sword you can buy", it just has to look cooler and be the reward for some ridiculous challenge that only someone who really wanted it would go through. Which would leave out a lot of the l33t n00bs, since they would only want it, not be willing to work for it.

At least, that's the way it'd happen in Dave Land. ^_^

Dave III

That's the one thing about this change that I don't care for - you get to work around it simply by using the right piece of equipment. The fact that it's an absurdly popular piece of equipment doesn't help.


Because that wouldn't really be a nerf. The idea was to limit the applicability of a Conjure, to force a Warrior or Ranger to make sacrifices if he wanted to use it. Just changing your damage type to elemental damage wouldn't have been an effective nerf. We're trying to fight off buff stacking here, after all.

I'd have still rather just hit the damage, but this nerf would have been ok if not for the Dragon Sword loophole.


It also costs you a ton of time and energy, is particularly vulnerable to removal, and is horrendously inflexible when it comes to changing targets or adjusting to new tactical situations. The net result is that Barbs and Weaken Armor are PvE skills, while Conjures are the best damage amplifiers available.


As a Ranger I'd want to have a selection of Zealous, Vampiric, and Ebon weapons. Sundering weapons obviously have a place, but that's as more of a 'safe' choice than a power choice. I'd want one but it's a fallback option. Warriors want Zealous and Vampiric weapons, both Dragon and non-Dragon versions. Again, I'd like to have a Sundering weapon as weapon #4, but it's tricky to squeeze in with all the situational weapons you want.

If I only got one weapon it'd be a Zealous one 90% of the time - energy is just that important. But it's similarly important to have fallback plans, as evasion or blocking can make switching to even a normal weapon more reasonable.


Upgrade parts I know of:

Hilts/Hafts/Strings:

Ebon: Earth damage
Fiery: Fire damage
Icy: Cold damage
Shocking: Lightning damage
Furious: 20% Chance of double adrenaline on hit
Barbed: Lengthens Bleeding duration
Crippling: Lengthens Crippled duration
Cruel: Lengthens Deep Wound duration
Heavy: Lengthens Weakness duration
Poisoner's: Lengthens Poison duration
Zealous: +1 energy gain per hit, -1 energy regeneration
Vampiric: +4 health stolen per hit, -1 health regeneration
Sundering: +10% Armor Penetration


Pommels/Grips:

Warding: +8 Defense vs. Physical
Shelter: +8 Defense vs. Elemental
Defense: +4 Defense
Fortitude: +30 Health
Swiftness: +10% attack speed, -% criticals (removed from game?)
Enchanting: +20% enchantment duration
Attribute: 20% chance of +1 to attribute when using skills
Monsterslaying: +% damage vs. species (can't say I paid much attention)

I never saw the lengthens hex duration upgrade - anyone confirm it or its name?

Peace,
-CxE

And why not? Seems most of the others damage buffs for Warriors/Rangers are for physical damage.