Skill Balances

ewoksrule

ewoksrule

Active Member
Here is a link to an article with some confirmed changes

http://pc.ign.com/articles/644/644916p1.html

Ill post the meat below:

Spirits

We like the concept of Spirits overall, but there were a few things we felt we needed to improve. For example, the fact that so many Spirits could exist in one area caused the frame rate to decrease and created pathing obstacles, as well as making Spirits extremely difficult to counter. Now when you cast a Spirit, all other allied spirits within the newly cast Spirit's range are destroyed. Additionally, Spirits will no longer affect other Spirits. We also tweaked the costs and effects on other spirits, including Nature's Renewal and Quickening Zephyr.


* Nature's Renewal: no longer removes all Hexes and Enchantments when cast; doubles the cost of maintained Enchantments

* Fertile Season: reduced duration to 15..45 seconds

* All Spirits: Spirit effects no longer affect other Spirits (example: Fertile Season no longer adds Health and armor to other Spirits); also, when a Spirit is cast, it destroys all other allied Spirits of the same type within its range


Lightning vs. Fire

The primary difference between lightning and fire damage is that lightning is meant to be a very powerful single target damage line, while fire should be a very powerful multi-target line. We felt that Chain Lightning was a little too powerful in terms of multi-target damage, and we felt that some of the basic fire spells like Fireball and Meteor where a little too expensive for the damage they did. We reduced the damage and effect of Chain Lightning and lowered the costs on some of the fire spells to help bring these more into balance.


* Meteor: lowered Energy cost to 5

* Fireball: lowered Energy cost to 10 and recharge time to 7

* Chain Lightning: increased cast time to 3 seconds; decreased damage to 10..85; lowered maximum distance between targets


Zero Recharge

We were concerned that skills with low casting time and zero recharge time were causing an imbalance, as they allowed players to trigger other spells like Zealot's Fire at an extremely rapid rate. To improve the balance, we added a small amount of recharge time to these spells. We also touched up some other skills (like Putrid Explosion) that had very powerful chain reaction effects, which we felt were difficult to counter.


* Draw Conditions: added 1 second recharge time

* Divine Boon: added 1 second recharge time

* Putrid Explosion: increased recharge time to 5 seconds


Underused Skills

We took some time to look at skills we felt were under-used (like Panic, Spinal Shivers, Dwarven Battle Stance, and a few others) and tried to either reduce their cost or increase their effects. Often we find the best way to balance something is to increase the effectiveness of its counters; this can be a very tricky thing to do, but it often provides more interesting play.


* Panic: increased duration to 10..25 seconds; increased AOE to "nearby foes"

* Spinal Shivers: increased duration to 10..40 seconds

* Dwarven Battle Stance: increased duration to 5..11 seconds
 
Hmmm...when is this going into effect? I like the fact that meteor and fireball cost less energy now. I'm thinking that you'll see more fire mages in PvP now. (I'll probably be one of them) Some of the other skills mentioned, I don't even know what they are or do. It sounds good overall. Especially the way spirits work now. Anybody PvPing this weekend? I'm thinking about trying it out since the rewards are astronomical. I can group with you guys for some arena matches.
 
I'm glad for the change to Fireball as well, 15 energy was really excessive for the damage output, and it was a far inferior spell to Chain Lightning. Now, Fireball seems like the better choice since Fireball doesn't cause Exhaustion.
 
Yay for the Elementalist changes. Now I'm really torn. I have about five different Elementalist builds that I want to try and only one Elementalist to use at this moment.

Regarding the spirit nerfing (let's call it what it is), I am very disappointed. Clearly A-Net listened to the whining of people who could't beat spirit groups in PvP. Yet they didn't list that as being the reason and they also did nothing about the Invincimonk build. How is that fair?

I agree that spirits can cause movement problems, but only being allowed to cast ONE spirit PER GROUP is RIDICULOUS! That really angers me. They just destroyed the way trapper groups work by making that change. :mad:
 
ewoksrule said:
when a Spirit is cast, it destroys all other allied Spirits of the same type within its range
Click to expand...

Note, it only says others of the same type and within range. I'm not an expert on spirits or the spamming tactic, but I would think with a trapping group, you would just have to coordinate spirit types, but it does limit you a bit. Also, the intent of the spirit is to provide a benefit to the ranger within the AoE. The spirit spamming tactic was just an inventive alternate use that ANet decided to balance.

Mr_Slice said:
they also did nothing about the Invincimonk build.
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If you read the article header that ewok didn't include in his post, it says this is "a short list of some of the changes given to us by developer ArenaNet. While it's not everything, it's a start." I am not familiar with the Invincimonk, but there may yet be some more coming that affects them.

As for the improvements to fire - nice. My ele is currently set for fire. I do want to try out the other types, but this may make it harder for me to give it up :)

One thing is for certain. PvP is going to be interesting this weekend as everyone attempts to adjust to all the changes. Sort of a leveling of the playing field for groups like us who are relatively new to PvP as everyone looks for the new ideal team build.
 
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"also, when a Spirit is cast, it destroys all other allied Spirits of the same type within its range"
well i think they are saying u can have more than 1 spirit, just 1 spirit of each kind at a time
 
Thanks, guys. I missed that part about it only affecting spirits of the same type. However, I still don't understand the difference in spamming any other skill and spamming spirits or wards. I'm just bugged that when a strong PvP strategy is discovered it gets nerfed instead of forcing the players to be inventive and come up with a counter-build. It's not the end of the world, but since it affects my main, I can't help but be a little annoyed.

I think I'll ask A-Net about this stuff on Sunday when I see them at PAX.
 
Yeah, my main char isn't affected by anything announced yet. If it is, I am sure I will be annoyed a bit too. I will probably be looking for an updated list a bit. We may need to be ready to revise whatever tactic we want to try.

Although it will be a moot point soon, I think the appropriate counter to the spirit build would involve necros with soul reaping. Spirits do trigger SR even on timed death.

Also, it just occured to me that the Hydras outside Augry Rock use meteor. With the lower ene cost, this could change the balance slightly on some of the PvE fights.
 
As for the invicimonk build, Divine Boon is a popular skill in the skill set, as it has no recharge time, an extremely fast cast time and is only 5 energy to cast. So they are giving it a 1 second recharge time, which won't affect me too much but could affect other monks who use it extensively to deal out smiting damage.
 
I know that if this affected your favorite build, it must hurt a bit. Change like this are inevitable, however, and I think it can be a positive thing. From reading in the forums, it seems that the Spirit-spamming and Air Spike teams were beginning to become pretty much "cookie cutter" builds and ppl were complaining about how boring that got. Well this will send everyone back to the drawing boards and refresh new ideas for combos and team builds.

Personally I think its great, because I am just now entering the PvP realm and our guild is just stepping in to the GvG spotlight. Having the playing field balanced and shooken up right before this is great. Now ppl who have hundreds of hours with these builds can't rely on them anymore and it gives us a better chance. Some changes, now and then, should be looked at as fresh meat.

Nobody likes "nerfs" in the MMO world, but as Christians lets try to be the standout example and look for every positive in these changes. When our fellow professions say "Can you believe the crud Anet pulled on our class?" Responding with a positive outlook will show much better character. Lets not add to the whining that is all over the message boards right now.

I am not saying that anyone is whining here, every comment has been mature and great so far. You guys all rock! There is always room to share our frustrations with one another. That is what makes the fellowship good, when we can support and uplift someone that is hurting.

I read the "non-Christian" message boards and just wanted to warn us not to get caught up in the worthless complaining that is happening everywhere.
 
Nice post Syd.

I think most of us visit the non-Christian message boards as well (I think I caught Slice posting on GameFAQs :eek: ). So, it's also important to keep in mind that we are representing Christ there as well, which is something that I occasionally forget as I get sucked into a silly flame war.
 
[toj.cc]WildBillKickoff said:
Nice post Syd.

I think most of us visit the non-Christian message boards as well (I think I caught Slice posting on GameFAQs :eek: ). So, it's also important to keep in mind that we are representing Christ there as well, which is something that I occasionally forget as I get sucked into a silly flame war.
Click to expand...

Touche!

But ya know, if you saw me there, it mean you were there as well. ;) I'm actually a longtime paying user of Gamespot. I'm pretty active within their system, but I never post on the archaeic GameFAQ side of the house. Hehe.
 
UPDATE... I field-tested the new skill balances on my air elementalist and my "invincemonk" (I like that term, slice) to see how they were affected. Some observations:

- Chain Lightning has been reduced slightly in potency, and its effective "chain" range is reduced, but it recharges faster. It is easier to interrupt, as I discovered, but it is still viable in the PvE arsenal, and still has a reasonable "chain" distance. One drawback is that the shortened recharge can tempt one into accumulative exhaustion if you're not judicious with it. It's a pretty even trade between casting time, power, and recharge, from what I can tell, and is well-balanced enough to keep my fire magic on the shelf for now.

- The "Invincemonk" build was affected slightly by the changes to Boon and to Protective Bond. The Protective Bond change is more significant, although it does not negate the solo build as much as I originally thought it would. With a major rune of protection (15 prot total) and the requisite spells the net loss for each hit on me is 1 energy. This is a bit of a juggle but with Bonettis and the Blessed Signet I was still able to down several Hydras with no problem. I did not take it into the underworld, but preliminary chatter at the Temple seems to indicate that UW runs are still viable with superior runes and the proper equipment.

Although not everyone will like the changes, overall I think they are good. As I said earlier, I really like what they did for some of the Mesmer (and to a lesser extent the Necro) spells.

(Original Post)

Looks like the "Invincimonk" build has been significantly tinkered with, and in more ways than one. Aside from raising divine boon to 1 second, protective bond is now 6...3 energy lost per hit, which severely handicaps (if not destroys outright) the now-popular protect-smite build. ArenaNet has heard your cries and delivered. :)

As for the other changes... most of them are welcome changes. Raising pets armor to 80 at level 20 was a change that makes pets more viable for high level PvE. The enhancements to the Mesmer spells were also quite welcome.

On the other hand, some of the chain lightning changes are a bit disappointing for PvE, although I understand the PvP-related switch. I suppose it's back to fire for PvE now.

Mr_Slice said:
How does that Chain Lightning change affect the spiker teams?
Click to expand...

CL is raised to 3 seconds of casting time, which makes it somewhat easier to interrupt. Also, CL doesn't "stretch" as far now when it comes to hitting the second and third targets. It doesn't necessarily negate spike teams (by definition, lightning is designed to spike a single target) but it does reduce its effectiveness, especially against mulitiple foes.
 
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