Thoughts on the game's issues

Leandor · June 2015

The following is posted for the user @Keron , who sadly is not able to bring this up himself. Credits go entirely to him, also blame. Everything below this line is from him.

_________________________________________________________________________________________

Reading through the PvP-forums these days, seeing the bone-deep hate showing between players or factions or classes, my hope for the game diminish more and more. I do not understand why people act the way they do (nerf this, nerf that, L2P, I'm the best and similar statements) instead of trying to fix the root causes for the issues. This is an attempt to tackle these root causes without going the "nerf sorc" route.

While my perspective is clearly influenced by PvP and is indeed targeted exclusively at fixing PvP, I hope to also get the PvE crowd to comment on it. It's time we stop the vicious cycle of adjusting for one side while messing up the other one. I am making some assumptions in regards to PvE consequences that may be wrong, so please feel free to bunk in with well argued and reasonable (meaning, providing logical reasons for it) critique.

I'll also go on and say that these proposals work only as a package - no cherry picking and selecting. Also, for sure there will have to be re-balancing done for the PvE encounters, as the bottom line here will be: Less damage, more complex healing, no max/maxing anymore. This sentence can probably be used as a TL/DR, as it pretty much sums up my thoughts.

Even though it may sound like it after those couple introductory sentences, I don't think of me as a be-all-end-all authority on fixing this mess, but I have put an extensive amount of time into these thoughts. I would like to ask any and all participants to put similar thought into replies and help with getting a constructive discussion going. Now onto the nitty-gritty of it.

The main reasons for frustrations are the following, listed in my very personal order of importance (which, of course, may be - and probably also is - different for others). Tackling these, without inflicting intolerable consequences for PvE players, is the goal of the following rant. The List:

Lag. Nothing much can be done about it, but it still is the most dire problem in PvP. Just here for completeness' sake.
Blobbing. Even with all measures taken by ZOS, the most efficient strategy in Cyrodiil is still to have more players in a given area than your opponent.
Synergies, a.k.a. Max/Maxing. The possible build synergies, while adding an interesting perspective on build compilation, are just too strong.
TTK. The damage scaling is out of control and damage numbers simply aren't aligned with health pools.

I understand and appreciate that many people have different views on these points, but I would like to ask for patience and actively reading the following wall of text. I'll try to explain the reasoning why I believe the proposed changes would solve most of these issues.

Starting off with the lag problem, it seemingly has two components. One is some kind of player action (most probably one or several abilities) causing excessive server load. This mechanic has been called "lagsploiting" by some and is still in a somewhat dubious state of acknowledgement. I am one of the believers, having experienced unusual lag spikes too often to discount it. The second mechanic is blobbing, which in itself is one of the issues listed above.

Because of this, I do not have any proposals for resolving the lag directly except for "fix your code" - which is admittedly not very helpful. But that brings us directly to the next point.

Even the developers have admitted, that lag is caused by too many players in close vicinity. I kind of see that differently, because a spread out, non-spamming group of players doesn't cause lag, so let's take a look at blobs. Blobs, for me, are groups between 2 and 100 players running in close formation and usually working like a steam roller flattening everything in range. Others use the term "zerg", which I don't like because some smart alec will then say "but 8 is not a zerg". Possibly true, but it can be a blob nonetheless.

In the past, ZOS tried to do things to break up this behaviour, with little to no success. Their latest iteration of measures (magicka detonation) literally went off in their face with blobs using proximity detonation to instantly blow up unlimited numbers of opponents within range. Reason being that ZOS, similar to most participants in these forums, think of group damage as the solution.

This was propagated in context with the AoE target caps discussion, again with the "Zerg-Buster" and also with siege damage increase. I have been saying since August 2014, the time I started with PvP, and continue to say that the most influential reason for blobbing is the healing system we have in ESO. In addition to that we have the Alliance War abilities, which are way too strong for non ultimate abilities (and barrier is way too strong even for an ultimate). So what can be done with minimum effort to reduce the appeal for blobbing?

Wrapped in spoiler tags below are my proposals on a healing revamp. It is extensive and requires quite some adjustment, but I think it is the single most effective measure to break up blobs.

Unify healing spells down to two different mechanics, Multi-Target Heals and Special-Target Heals. All healing spells work with the same base Health-per-Magicka ratio. Multi-target affects 3 targets + the healer himself (4 in total, the ESO group size), Special-target affect one target + healer himself.
Multi-Target Heals: Either AoE heals like healing springs or multi-target HoTs like mutagen. All of these are limited to 4 targets, one being the healer himself. The smart functionality is replaced by proximity. Healer + 3 nearest players get the heal, irrespective of health. These are small heals that need to be spammed in high damage situations. Scaling is done with spell damage only and scaling is low (meaning that you cannot improve the health-per-mana-ratio significantly). To compensate the cuts, range or radius is increased (e.g. healing springs has 15m radius, mutagen has 30m range).
Special-Target Heals: These are targeted heals that heal one target for 100% of base value and the healer himself for 50% and still use the smart healing functionality. In case the healer himself is the lowest health target, he is healed for 150%. Their range exceeds standard damage range, I propose 45m. These are high health, high magicka spells that provide significant heals (base value should be around 33% of average tank health pool if instant cast, 50% if with a cast time) and scale with magicka regeneration only and scaling is strong (meaning that if you max out magicka regeneration, you max out the health-per-magicka-ratio).
Multi-Target-Heals favor group members over non grouped targets, irrespective of small or large group, Special-Target-Heals have the same targeting functionality as todays heals.
An optional proposal that is mainly targeted at PvE healing is the possibility to set a preferred target (e.g. by cycling through group members with a new designated hotkey) that prevails throughout an entire fight (until healer gets out of combat) and makes the special-target-heal always hit the preferred target. This is for tank healing.

What is achieved with these measures? For once, as a healer you need to specialise. Either you go the tank healing route, then you have to max out your magicka regeneration and minimize spell damage (true min/maxing, you sacrifice offence ability for healing) with the secondary attribute magicka pool to allow for more heals within a certain period. If you go the group healer route, you retain some offensive capabilities (you'd still go for max spell damage and max magicka) but you will be inefficient with the largest heals. You also lose the smart healing.

For the blob situation, this means in general that the mindless "if I am damaged, some heal will sooner or later hit me before I die" is gone. Since all multi target heals will now work off proximity, it is in the best interest to always be nearest to one of the healers. In a moving steam roller, this is almost impossible to achieve so the best way is to reduce the steam roller to distinct units working around their respective healers. They can still work together but it's not the "stack on crown"-meta any more.

Today's healing meta is: the more players are within range of the healing spell, the more efficient it will be - it will always heal the lowest health target and it will look at everyone within the area of effect. Overhealing is nigh non-existent with the high damage incoming and the smart healing. This will be strongly reduced by the need for precise positioning. Just one full health player nearer to the healer can make the difference between survival and defeat.

Now this is not the only thing and by itself it will not be enough to break up the blobs, but it is one part of it. The next part is the Alliance War abilities, and here especially Proximity Detonation and Cleanse. These two abilities alone make a blob almost unbeatable in combination with the abundance of status effects that are layered on players. Again in Spoilers below, my proposals to adjust these two ability lines:

Magicka Detonation: Leave the base spell as is. It does decent damage if you build for it but is removable and has a long arming duration. The inevitable morph needs to be tuned to scale less with offence stats, thus resulting in slightly lower damage than the base spell but being unavaiodable. By and large, these two variants of the skill are fine as is. Now, Proximity Detonation has utterly failed it's purpose. It was meant as a defensive tool to break up blobs and is now it's strongest weapon. There's an easy fix, though.
Proximity Detonation. Slightly increase the damage it causes (Point of balance: A magicka based template with 1080 CP, legendary equipment/enchants taylored for magicka damage should cause 25k damage to a naked, unmodified "battle scaled stat template" with zero CP) but make the player it is cast on die from it. You can use it freely as long as you have a spawn possibility (hint: The defenders have that and also have the time to revive those between attack waves, but will lose it before the defensive blob becomes most efficient - when the wall is breached. So I see the potential to exploit this new mechanic as much lower than the existing one) but if you use it in a blob, all that will result is a bunch of dead attackers. Make this the suicide defence ability that it should have been from the beginning.
Purge: The purge ability line is an essential part of the current PvP strategy. The changes need to be slight but effective. The problem in that line, I think, is the healing component of the Cleanse morph - this clearly needs to DIAF. I would modify the base spell to keep the "2 effects from all targets" but remove the duration reduction. Its cost stays the same. The Efficient Purge morph should be the "weapon of choice" for stamina builds. Retain the reduced cost (1/2 of original) but also make it so that it removes only 1 negative effect from all targets in range. It does get the duration reduction, though. Now for the real change.
Cleanse: Remove completely the healing component. In a game where every Jack and Joe has umpteen status effects on himself (afaik, even caltrops counts for the heal, please correct me if I am wrong), this is the single most efficient healing spell a blob has. Instead, change it so that up to 3 negative effects are removed from all targets in range and again grant the duration reduction. Cost is increased by 1/2 as opposed to the base spell. This way, it is the more desireable spell for magicka builds (it is faster than the original) and at the same time loses its imbalanced healing capacity.
Vigor: Although it would also fit in the healing section, I have grouped it here as it is an alliance war skill. I have to admit that I can not reliably comment on this skill, since I have not unlocked it yet, but from a purely theoretical view, this skill should never have included a group heal function as base functionality. In that sense, the base skill should only heal the caster, the self-increasing morph should do exactly that, increase the healing per stamina ratio. The second morph will change it to group healing (making it hit up to 4 targets, caster + 3 nearest targets, similar to the other multi-target heals in this concept). The scaling for all morphs is based on stamina regeneration instead of maximum stamina, similar to the concept for the magicka based heals.
There is one more ability that works better, the more people you have in range, and that is barrier. Since it is an ultimate, it is difficult to balance this without removing its effectiveness completely. In my opinion, the only sensible way is to have it apply a debuff that prevents consecutive barriers. Once a barrier runs out or is used up, the respective player gets a debuff that will prevent further barriers for 15 seconds. If you make this debuff run too long, it destroys barrier as a tool in warfare, if it is too short, it defeats the purpose. In any case, this debuff must be non-removable and barrier needs to be changed that it cannot be overwritten or refreshed (thus making it impossible to "cascade" barriers before they run out).

What do we do with these simple measures? We make the "Zerg-Buster" to be a weapon against blobs instead of the blob's most dangerous weapon and significantly reduce the effectiveness of the "have as many people as possible get as many debuffs as possible to get free heals"-strategy, thus giving siege weapons a real purpose in defeating the blob. At the same time, all of these measures are easily countered by spreading out - exactly what we want to achieve.

The measures described above will make the blob meta much more undesirable than anything ZOS has implemented so far and in my opinion go a large step in the right direction. In the hopes that breaking up the blobs will also to some extend reduce the lag issues, these measures are the most beneficial to implement.

Those alone will not fix PvP, though. While reducing the blob problem will bring many people back to the game, it will at the same time also intensify the other problem we have in PvP, and that is the general TTK/TTL and the "optimizing" game that is played by the top notch players. So to prevent the next fallout after "lagsploitation", this problem needs to be tackled at the same time.

In my opinion, ESO is currently structured in a way that is not readily described by "Min/Maxing" even though most still use this term. In reality, we have a Max/Maxing system. To give an example (even though an overused one), the "glass cannon" damage dealers (magicka sorceror and stamina nightblade) maximize their respective defensive capabilities by maximizing their offensive capabilities.

That is the worst possible approach to balancing a game. Instead of sacrificing their ability to control the fight (a.k.a. defence capabilities) for effectivity (a.k.a. damage output), the sorceror can Bolt Escape and the nightblade can Dodge Roll more, the more they are build for damage. This is what I mean by Max/Maxing. The basic concept of balance and Min/Maxing is that you have to sacrifice one to improve the other.

While my thoughts on this issue are not as extensive as above, I still do have some proposals, as before put into spoiler tags to keep the post structured.

Separate the sources. Offensive capabilities use raw magicka/stamina and spell/weapon damage. Defensive capabilities use health. Mobility uses regeneration.
Defense: Use the often proposed and perfect solution. All damage shields scale of health pool. If you want to be defensive, you stack health and resistance. Using damage shields doubles the effect of this investment, meaning that you can achieve something with little investment, thus not gimping you on the other aspects.
Mobility: There are two main mobility abilities in game, Bolt Escape and Dodge Roll. Instead of using a mechanic like currently on bolt escape (make it more expensive if you use it consecutively) make it so that a player has to sacrifice damage. Instead of making it more expensive, make it cost a percentage of current maximum stamina/magicka instead of base values. Thus, if you minimize the resource pool (thus reducing the abilities cost) and maximize regeneration, you will be able to use the mobility ability extensively because cost and regeneration are similar. Balance point is a template with 1080 CP (all passives unlocked), legendary equipment and maximised regeneration - this template is capable to indefinitely roll dodge/bolt escape. To increase damage output, you then only have the weapon/spell damage attribute remaining. This is the sustain build template - you do less damage but can survive and keep it up.
Offense: keep as is. if you maximise offensive stats, you will limit your survivability as well as your mobility. What is then required is a rescaling of the damage output. Again, take a template with 1080 CP (all passives unlocked) and legendary equipment with full investment in max damage (only weapon/spell damage and stamina/magicka). Make this character do damage that will - under optimum circumstances (stealthed, buffed) - one-shot the unmodified battle levelled stat template with zero CP. Then scale down from there. The one-shot has to be the goal that you just cannot reach in a realistic environment.
For all balancing purposes, only use self-buffs and no provisioning/alchemy buffs (to retain the appeal of these things - with them you can actually break through the balancing point). Use the PTS to get players to help with finding the peak performance point for each balancing task to use as a reference point. This is a purpose of the PTS for the time between major updates.

The purpose of these proposals is to clearly separate what is beneficial for which task. This way, the "glass cannon" is really a glass cannon, instead of the "volcanic glass tank" that they are right now.

I am absolutely clear on the fact that this is an extensive modification of the current game mechanics, but judging by the current tenor in the forums, something like this is what needs to be done. Whether the proposals above could make the difference is for the community to assess. I'm really looking forward to the replies.

Nonetheless, I sincerely hope it's not going to be the complain fest that is to be expected. I just ask that everyone takes the perceived "nerfs" that are proposed above in view of the good intention to recapture the fun in the game. They are made out to be not class specific or centered on class skill adjustments, but instead try to focus on the common denominator. Everyone will feel the impact, to a certain degree.

There are other issues out there as well, e.g. the oft denied macro- or hack-attack guys that stack several abilities inside an impossibly small time frame (check this discussion). I'll not go into those aspects here.

Also, the "nerf bolt escape" or "cloak is OP" stuff doesn't really have a place here. All abilities have a purpose and from a meta point of view are actually balanced - two classes with escape abilities, one with resistance abilities, one with healing abilities - all of them different approaches to withstand an attack. Depending on the kind of attack, some are better suited to certain variants than others but all in all it's more of a flavour thing than an imbalance thing if you look at it honestly.

For all your replies, please try to remember: Dying is normal in PvP. Expecting to never lose a battle means that you are expecting to have an exploit to your advantage.

Changing the Max/Maxing meta to a real Min/Maxing meta will go a long way in resolving all those pet peeves with single abilities/classes.

Over and out.

Kronosphere · July 2015

Leandor wrote: »

The following is posted for the user @Keron , who sadly is not able to bring this up himself. Credits go entirely to him, also blame. Everything below this line is from him.
_________________________________________________________________________________________

Reading through the PvP-forums these days, seeing the bone-deep hate showing between players or factions or classes, my hope for the game diminish more and more. I do not understand why people act the way they do (nerf this, nerf that, L2P, I'm the best and similar statements) instead of trying to fix the root causes for the issues. This is an attempt to tackle these root causes without going the "nerf sorc" route.

While my perspective is clearly influenced by PvP and is indeed targeted exclusively at fixing PvP, I hope to also get the PvE crowd to comment on it. It's time we stop the vicious cycle of adjusting for one side while messing up the other one. I am making some assumptions in regards to PvE consequences that may be wrong, so please feel free to bunk in with well argued and reasonable (meaning, providing logical reasons for it) critique.

I'll also go on and say that these proposals work only as a package - no cherry picking and selecting. Also, for sure there will have to be re-balancing done for the PvE encounters, as the bottom line here will be: Less damage, more complex healing, no max/maxing anymore. This sentence can probably be used as a TL/DR, as it pretty much sums up my thoughts.

Even though it may sound like it after those couple introductory sentences, I don't think of me as a be-all-end-all authority on fixing this mess, but I have put an extensive amount of time into these thoughts. I would like to ask any and all participants to put similar thought into replies and help with getting a constructive discussion going. Now onto the nitty-gritty of it.

The main reasons for frustrations are the following, listed in my very personal order of importance (which, of course, may be - and probably also is - different for others). Tackling these, without inflicting intolerable consequences for PvE players, is the goal of the following rant. The List:
Lag. Nothing much can be done about it, but it still is the most dire problem in PvP. Just here for completeness' sake.

Blobbing. Even with all measures taken by ZOS, the most efficient strategy in Cyrodiil is still to have more players in a given area than your opponent.

Synergies, a.k.a. Max/Maxing. The possible build synergies, while adding an interesting perspective on build compilation, are just too strong.

TTK. The damage scaling is out of control and damage numbers simply aren't aligned with health pools.

I understand and appreciate that many people have different views on these points, but I would like to ask for patience and actively reading the following wall of text. I'll try to explain the reasoning why I believe the proposed changes would solve most of these issues.

Starting off with the lag problem, it seemingly has two components. One is some kind of player action (most probably one or several abilities) causing excessive server load. This mechanic has been called "lagsploiting" by some and is still in a somewhat dubious state of acknowledgement. I am one of the believers, having experienced unusual lag spikes too often to discount it. The second mechanic is blobbing, which in itself is one of the issues listed above.

Because of this, I do not have any proposals for resolving the lag directly except for "fix your code" - which is admittedly not very helpful. But that brings us directly to the next point.

Even the developers have admitted, that lag is caused by too many players in close vicinity. I kind of see that differently, because a spread out, non-spamming group of players doesn't cause lag, so let's take a look at blobs. Blobs, for me, are groups between 2 and 100 players running in close formation and usually working like a steam roller flattening everything in range. Others use the term "zerg", which I don't like because some smart alec will then say "but 8 is not a zerg". Possibly true, but it can be a blob nonetheless.

In the past, ZOS tried to do things to break up this behaviour, with little to no success. Their latest iteration of measures (magicka detonation) literally went off in their face with blobs using proximity detonation to instantly blow up unlimited numbers of opponents within range. Reason being that ZOS, similar to most participants in these forums, think of group damage as the solution.

This was propagated in context with the AoE target caps discussion, again with the "Zerg-Buster" and also with siege damage increase. I have been saying since August 2014, the time I started with PvP, and continue to say that the most influential reason for blobbing is the healing system we have in ESO. In addition to that we have the Alliance War abilities, which are way too strong for non ultimate abilities (and barrier is way too strong even for an ultimate). So what can be done with minimum effort to reduce the appeal for blobbing?

Wrapped in spoiler tags below are my proposals on a healing revamp. It is extensive and requires quite some adjustment, but I think it is the single most effective measure to break up blobs.

Unify healing spells down to two different mechanics, Multi-Target Heals and Special-Target Heals. All healing spells work with the same base Health-per-Magicka ratio. Multi-target affects 3 targets + the healer himself (4 in total, the ESO group size), Special-target affect one target + healer himself.

Multi-Target Heals: Either AoE heals like healing springs or multi-target HoTs like mutagen. All of these are limited to 4 targets, one being the healer himself. The smart functionality is replaced by proximity. Healer + 3 nearest players get the heal, irrespective of health. These are small heals that need to be spammed in high damage situations. Scaling is done with spell damage only and scaling is low (meaning that you cannot improve the health-per-mana-ratio significantly). To compensate the cuts, range or radius is increased (e.g. healing springs has 15m radius, mutagen has 30m range).

Special-Target Heals: These are targeted heals that heal one target for 100% of base value and the healer himself for 50% and still use the smart healing functionality. In case the healer himself is the lowest health target, he is healed for 150%. Their range exceeds standard damage range, I propose 45m. These are high health, high magicka spells that provide significant heals (base value should be around 33% of average tank health pool if instant cast, 50% if with a cast time) and scale with magicka regeneration only and scaling is strong (meaning that if you max out magicka regeneration, you max out the health-per-magicka-ratio).

Multi-Target-Heals favor group members over non grouped targets, irrespective of small or large group, Special-Target-Heals have the same targeting functionality as todays heals.

An optional proposal that is mainly targeted at PvE healing is the possibility to set a preferred target (e.g. by cycling through group members with a new designated hotkey) that prevails throughout an entire fight (until healer gets out of combat) and makes the special-target-heal always hit the preferred target. This is for tank healing.

What is achieved with these measures? For once, as a healer you need to specialise. Either you go the tank healing route, then you have to max out your magicka regeneration and minimize spell damage (true min/maxing, you sacrifice offence ability for healing) with the secondary attribute magicka pool to allow for more heals within a certain period. If you go the group healer route, you retain some offensive capabilities (you'd still go for max spell damage and max magicka) but you will be inefficient with the largest heals. You also lose the smart healing.

For the blob situation, this means in general that the mindless "if I am damaged, some heal will sooner or later hit me before I die" is gone. Since all multi target heals will now work off proximity, it is in the best interest to always be nearest to one of the healers. In a moving steam roller, this is almost impossible to achieve so the best way is to reduce the steam roller to distinct units working around their respective healers. They can still work together but it's not the "stack on crown"-meta any more.

Today's healing meta is: the more players are within range of the healing spell, the more efficient it will be - it will always heal the lowest health target and it will look at everyone within the area of effect. Overhealing is nigh non-existent with the high damage incoming and the smart healing. This will be strongly reduced by the need for precise positioning. Just one full health player nearer to the healer can make the difference between survival and defeat.

Now this is not the only thing and by itself it will not be enough to break up the blobs, but it is one part of it. The next part is the Alliance War abilities, and here especially Proximity Detonation and Cleanse. These two abilities alone make a blob almost unbeatable in combination with the abundance of status effects that are layered on players. Again in Spoilers below, my proposals to adjust these two ability lines:

Magicka Detonation: Leave the base spell as is. It does decent damage if you build for it but is removable and has a long arming duration. The inevitable morph needs to be tuned to scale less with offence stats, thus resulting in slightly lower damage than the base spell but being unavaiodable. By and large, these two variants of the skill are fine as is. Now, Proximity Detonation has utterly failed it's purpose. It was meant as a defensive tool to break up blobs and is now it's strongest weapon. There's an easy fix, though.

Proximity Detonation. Slightly increase the damage it causes (Point of balance: A magicka based template with 1080 CP, legendary equipment/enchants taylored for magicka damage should cause 25k damage to a naked, unmodified "battle scaled stat template" with zero CP) but make the player it is cast on die from it. You can use it freely as long as you have a spawn possibility (hint: The defenders have that and also have the time to revive those between attack waves, but will lose it before the defensive blob becomes most efficient - when the wall is breached. So I see the potential to exploit this new mechanic as much lower than the existing one) but if you use it in a blob, all that will result is a bunch of dead attackers. Make this the suicide defence ability that it should have been from the beginning.

Purge: The purge ability line is an essential part of the current PvP strategy. The changes need to be slight but effective. The problem in that line, I think, is the healing component of the Cleanse morph - this clearly needs to DIAF. I would modify the base spell to keep the "2 effects from all targets" but remove the duration reduction. Its cost stays the same. The Efficient Purge morph should be the "weapon of choice" for stamina builds. Retain the reduced cost (1/2 of original) but also make it so that it removes only 1 negative effect from all targets in range. It does get the duration reduction, though. Now for the real change.

Cleanse: Remove completely the healing component. In a game where every Jack and Joe has umpteen status effects on himself (afaik, even caltrops counts for the heal, please correct me if I am wrong), this is the single most efficient healing spell a blob has. Instead, change it so that up to 3 negative effects are removed from all targets in range and again grant the duration reduction. Cost is increased by 1/2 as opposed to the base spell. This way, it is the more desireable spell for magicka builds (it is faster than the original) and at the same time loses its imbalanced healing capacity.

Vigor: Although it would also fit in the healing section, I have grouped it here as it is an alliance war skill. I have to admit that I can not reliably comment on this skill, since I have not unlocked it yet, but from a purely theoretical view, this skill should never have included a group heal function as base functionality. In that sense, the base skill should only heal the caster, the self-increasing morph should do exactly that, increase the healing per stamina ratio. The second morph will change it to group healing (making it hit up to 4 targets, caster + 3 nearest targets, similar to the other multi-target heals in this concept). The scaling for all morphs is based on stamina regeneration instead of maximum stamina, similar to the concept for the magicka based heals.

There is one more ability that works better, the more people you have in range, and that is barrier. Since it is an ultimate, it is difficult to balance this without removing its effectiveness completely. In my opinion, the only sensible way is to have it apply a debuff that prevents consecutive barriers. Once a barrier runs out or is used up, the respective player gets a debuff that will prevent further barriers for 15 seconds. If you make this debuff run too long, it destroys barrier as a tool in warfare, if it is too short, it defeats the purpose. In any case, this debuff must be non-removable and barrier needs to be changed that it cannot be overwritten or refreshed (thus making it impossible to "cascade" barriers before they run out).

What do we do with these simple measures? We make the "Zerg-Buster" to be a weapon against blobs instead of the blob's most dangerous weapon and significantly reduce the effectiveness of the "have as many people as possible get as many debuffs as possible to get free heals"-strategy, thus giving siege weapons a real purpose in defeating the blob. At the same time, all of these measures are easily countered by spreading out - exactly what we want to achieve.

The measures described above will make the blob meta much more undesirable than anything ZOS has implemented so far and in my opinion go a large step in the right direction. In the hopes that breaking up the blobs will also to some extend reduce the lag issues, these measures are the most beneficial to implement.

Those alone will not fix PvP, though. While reducing the blob problem will bring many people back to the game, it will at the same time also intensify the other problem we have in PvP, and that is the general TTK/TTL and the "optimizing" game that is played by the top notch players. So to prevent the next fallout after "lagsploitation", this problem needs to be tackled at the same time.

In my opinion, ESO is currently structured in a way that is not readily described by "Min/Maxing" even though most still use this term. In reality, we have a Max/Maxing system. To give an example (even though an overused one), the "glass cannon" damage dealers (magicka sorceror and stamina nightblade) maximize their respective defensive capabilities by maximizing their offensive capabilities.

That is the worst possible approach to balancing a game. Instead of sacrificing their ability to control the fight (a.k.a. defence capabilities) for effectivity (a.k.a. damage output), the sorceror can Bolt Escape and the nightblade can Dodge Roll more, the more they are build for damage. This is what I mean by Max/Maxing. The basic concept of balance and Min/Maxing is that you have to sacrifice one to improve the other.

While my thoughts on this issue are not as extensive as above, I still do have some proposals, as before put into spoiler tags to keep the post structured.

Separate the sources. Offensive capabilities use raw magicka/stamina and spell/weapon damage. Defensive capabilities use health. Mobility uses regeneration.

Defense: Use the often proposed and perfect solution. All damage shields scale of health pool. If you want to be defensive, you stack health and resistance. Using damage shields doubles the effect of this investment, meaning that you can achieve something with little investment, thus not gimping you on the other aspects.

Mobility: There are two main mobility abilities in game, Bolt Escape and Dodge Roll. Instead of using a mechanic like currently on bolt escape (make it more expensive if you use it consecutively) make it so that a player has to sacrifice damage. Instead of making it more expensive, make it cost a percentage of current maximum stamina/magicka instead of base values. Thus, if you minimize the resource pool (thus reducing the abilities cost) and maximize regeneration, you will be able to use the mobility ability extensively because cost and regeneration are similar. Balance point is a template with 1080 CP (all passives unlocked), legendary equipment and maximised regeneration - this template is capable to indefinitely roll dodge/bolt escape. To increase damage output, you then only have the weapon/spell damage attribute remaining. This is the sustain build template - you do less damage but can survive and keep it up.

Offense: keep as is. if you maximise offensive stats, you will limit your survivability as well as your mobility. What is then required is a rescaling of the damage output. Again, take a template with 1080 CP (all passives unlocked) and legendary equipment with full investment in max damage (only weapon/spell damage and stamina/magicka). Make this character do damage that will - under optimum circumstances (stealthed, buffed) - one-shot the unmodified battle levelled stat template with zero CP. Then scale down from there. The one-shot has to be the goal that you just cannot reach in a realistic environment.

For all balancing purposes, only use self-buffs and no provisioning/alchemy buffs (to retain the appeal of these things - with them you can actually break through the balancing point). Use the PTS to get players to help with finding the peak performance point for each balancing task to use as a reference point. This is a purpose of the PTS for the time between major updates.

The purpose of these proposals is to clearly separate what is beneficial for which task. This way, the "glass cannon" is really a glass cannon, instead of the "volcanic glass tank" that they are right now.

I am absolutely clear on the fact that this is an extensive modification of the current game mechanics, but judging by the current tenor in the forums, something like this is what needs to be done. Whether the proposals above could make the difference is for the community to assess. I'm really looking forward to the replies.

Nonetheless, I sincerely hope it's not going to be the complain fest that is to be expected. I just ask that everyone takes the perceived "nerfs" that are proposed above in view of the good intention to recapture the fun in the game. They are made out to be not class specific or centered on class skill adjustments, but instead try to focus on the common denominator. Everyone will feel the impact, to a certain degree.

There are other issues out there as well, e.g. the oft denied macro- or hack-attack guys that stack several abilities inside an impossibly small time frame (check this discussion). I'll not go into those aspects here.

Also, the "nerf bolt escape" or "cloak is OP" stuff doesn't really have a place here. All abilities have a purpose and from a meta point of view are actually balanced - two classes with escape abilities, one with resistance abilities, one with healing abilities - all of them different approaches to withstand an attack. Depending on the kind of attack, some are better suited to certain variants than others but all in all it's more of a flavour thing than an imbalance thing if you look at it honestly.

For all your replies, please try to remember: Dying is normal in PvP. Expecting to never lose a battle means that you are expecting to have an exploit to your advantage.

Changing the Max/Maxing meta to a real Min/Maxing meta will go a long way in resolving all those pet peeves with single abilities/classes.

Over and out.

sounds good to me cant argue with much how does this not have more replies?

Leandor · July 2015

Probably because the post is too long to quickly skim through...

Thanks for your reply, I will forward it to @Keron

Erock25 · July 2015

So his non-nerf sorc thread suggests sorc damage shield is determined by health pool and bolt escape costs a percentage of your max magicka (which from reading between the lines means much higher base cost for magicka sorc) . So how is this not a nerf sorc thread again?

Leandor · July 2015

Erock25 wrote: »

So his non-nerf sorc thread suggests sorc damage shield is determined by health pool and bolt escape costs a percentage of your max magicka (which from reading between the lines means much higher base cost for magicka sorc) . So how is this not a nerf sorc thread again?

Please think it through. First, the fact that mobility and max damages depending on different stats means glass canon is a glass canon. You can have a sure frag, but if your opponent is prepared and counters it, you're toast. Or you choose to be mobile, pepper someone with small damage abilities and wear him down slowly but he can't catch you. Both have advantages and both have disadvantages. Min/Maxing.

In regards to shield being based on health: your complaint is just a question of the applied scaling factors. Establish a baseline, e.g. 19k health. For this baseline, hardened ward provides let's say a 10k shield. Now for each 1000 HP you increase above baseline, you get an additional 2k shield. Problem solved. You can get really strong shields, but in that case you have to make cut backs on damage output. Again, Min/Maxing.

That principle explained above would effectively end the "unlimited resources" problem we have in play right now. Try to wrap your head around it, it is not a "nref sorcs" thread, it is a "put every class on the same baseline" thread. All of your complaints also apply to stamina builds and indefinite roll dodges.

Erock25 · July 2015

Leandor wrote: »

Erock25 wrote: »

So his non-nerf sorc thread suggests sorc damage shield is determined by health pool and bolt escape costs a percentage of your max magicka (which from reading between the lines means much higher base cost for magicka sorc) . So how is this not a nerf sorc thread again?

Please think it through. First, the fact that mobility and max damages depending on different stats means glass canon is a glass canon. You can have a sure frag, but if your opponent is prepared and counters it, you're toast. Or you choose to be mobile, pepper someone with small damage abilities and wear him down slowly but he can't catch you. Both have advantages and both have disadvantages. Min/Maxing.

In regards to shield being based on health: your complaint is just a question of the applied scaling factors. Establish a baseline, e.g. 19k health. For this baseline, hardened ward provides let's say a 10k shield. Now for each 1000 HP you increase above baseline, you get an additional 2k shield. Problem solved. You can get really strong shields, but in that case you have to make cut backs on damage output. Again, Min/Maxing.

That principle explained above would effectively end the "unlimited resources" problem we have in play right now. Try to wrap your head around it, it is not a "nref sorcs" thread, it is a "put every class on the same baseline" thread. All of your complaints also apply to stamina builds and indefinite roll dodges.

I do not see how the principle explained above would effectively end the unlimited resources. Nothing in your original post or follow up post says anything about regeneration. In fact, your suggestion of dodge roll costing a % of max stamina would allow magicka specs (especially NB with their godly stam regen) to be the most efficient dodge rollers. I do not agree with this concept at all.

The entire defense section of your post is just nerfing sorc shields and there is no point to it. It is illogical to have shields scale on health because health defense is governed by armor/spell resist while shields have zero mitigation. If anything I'd prefer DK/Temps get their shields scaling on magicka but to a lesser degree than Sorcs. Right now I have 40 some points in bastion and with 31k magicka I get a 12k Hardened Ward. A DK/Temp with similar figures should get only slightly more than they do now with 20k HP as their shields have secondary effects and also they have other forms of defense that the Sorc is lacking.

My position is that Sorcs are not overpowered and stamina builds are their counter and the double nerf of Healing Ward in the update will hurt Sorcs the most. I think the main problem with the game is unlimited resources and these ideas do not change that at all.

Leandor · July 2015

Shields have zero mitigation? Excuse me while I wipe the coffee off my screen.

Shields can't be crit. With the current game, any stamina build has a crit chance of 60% or more. That means, a shield has an effective damage mitigation of close to 33% that cannot be penetrated by any means (even higher if you compare against nightblades). Even magicka builds have 40%+ crit, which means 30% mitigation as well.

If you do not understand what the above proposal would do (which by the way is not my post, but I agree with it in large parts - otherwise I would not have posted it), let me give you some numbers.

Let's say that a single dodge roll would cost 25% of your current maximum stamina. On a magicka build, that would make it cost 25% of ~8k stamina = 2k stamina. This you can reduce by CP and enchants to a value that is maybe half that, lets say 1000 stamina. You can now dodge 8 times, not considering stamina regeneration.

On a stamina build that aims for max damage, you have lets say 25k stamina. The 25% would be 6.2k, with CP and enchants, you can reduce that to 4k (more reduction because the percentage based reductions are more efficient). That means you can do 6 dodges, not considering regeneration.

In order to have a decent availability of dodges, the magicka build would need a regeneration rate of 2000 for indefinite dodges - no magicka build would do that. In order to have indefinite dodges on the stamina build, you would need to have 8000 stamina regeneration, which is far from possible, even with full CP alotment.

But you can build a permanent dodger, if you base him on stamina and limit the stamina pool to, lets say 20k but maximise the regeneration rate. you will get 3000 stamina regeneration on a bosmer werewolf nightblade. 20k pool means 4k cost, with all reductions you get the cost down to 2.5k, making the required stamina reg 5k. with 3k you can dodge enough that you will be able to escape. Not indefinite, but a lot. The consequence is, that with this stamina pool, you will not be the one hit wonder nightblade that wastes everyone with a single snipe.

Now these numbers are pulled out of my arse. For sure they need to be tuned with all of the specific reductions that are available. Maybe you need to tune down the applicable cost reductions for dodge rolling. In all of this, now substitute magicka for stamina and vice versa and dodge roll with bolt escape. Same principle applies.

As to shields:

Erock25 wrote: »

Right now I have 40 some points in bastion and with 31k magicka I get a 12k Hardened Ward.

Well, that number goes up. I have a 11k-something ward in Cyrodiil with 75 points in bastion and 27k magicka on a VR6 sorc with blue food. I have a feeling that you do not understand my point.

The magnitude of shields is not what I criticize. Make shield strength based on health and have hardened provide two times HP as shield, I do not care. What I do care about is that currently, you maximize damage output and simultaneously maximize shield strength - you increase both offense and defense with the same attribute. That has to go.

You want to have strong shields? Maximize defense. You want to have high damage? Maximize offense. You need to make a decision between both, not have both at the same time. If you would just put away your "nerf sorc" glasses for a while and open your mind to what was actually proposed and in what way it was proposed to be implemented, you may actually understand the background.

I do not care if you agree or disagree with the proposal. You have a right to your opinion. But please stop making this into something that it is not at all. You sorcs are not the center of the world. Not everything deals with you.

This is about bringing in line those builds that destroy pvp. Unlimited resources used to make certain builds almost invincible while still letting them deal unlimited damage. Be it magicka sorcerers, stamina nightblades, magicka nightblades or magicka dragonknights.

If you would have taken the time to actually read that part of the above proposal was to also modify the ability damage output calculation to conform to and supplement the changes to defensive abilities, you may have thought differently about it. But no, you have this spiderman meme glued to the backside of your eyes and as soon as you open a thread that mentions shields and sorcs, it is all you see.

That is sad.

Xael · July 2015

Leandor wrote: »

The magnitude of shields is not what I criticize. Make shield strength based on health and have hardened provide two times HP as shield, I do not care. What I do care about is that currently, you maximize damage output and simultaneously maximize shield strength - you increase both offense and defense with the same attribute. That has to go.

You want to have strong shields? Maximize defense. You want to have high damage? Maximize offense. You need to make a decision between both, not have both at the same time.

Making shields scale off health would not only force the allocation of stat points into Health but also the glyphing. At the end of the day we would not only have weaker damage and shields but the min/maxing of something would still be the same. This is not a solution to WHAT YOU THINK the problem in PvP is. I also find it strange you managed to single out the Sorcerer as a problem in PvP. It blows my mind how myopic people are. Without the current state of shields, a Magicka Sorc would be a free kill to practically anyone. Not only that, you are forcing a Magicka based Sorc to play a defensive build. This is not balance, this is pigeonholing.

This is a terrible solution to a problem not everyone agrees exists.

theforgottenking1779 · July 2015

Fix werewolf beserker color and add unlimited werewolf time while in werewolf form

Leandor · July 2015

Xael wrote: »

Leandor wrote: »

The magnitude of shields is not what I criticize. Make shield strength based on health and have hardened provide two times HP as shield, I do not care. What I do care about is that currently, you maximize damage output and simultaneously maximize shield strength - you increase both offense and defense with the same attribute. That has to go.

You want to have strong shields? Maximize defense. You want to have high damage? Maximize offense. You need to make a decision between both, not have both at the same time.

Making shields scale off health would not only force the allocation of stat points into Health but also the glyphing. At the end of the day we would not only have weaker damage and shields but the min/maxing of something would still be the same. This is not a solution to WHAT YOU THINK the problem in PvP is. I also find it strange you managed to single out the Sorcerer as a problem in PvP. It blows my mind how myopic people are. Without the current state of shields, a Magicka Sorc would be a free kill to practically anyone. Not only that, you are forcing a Magicka based Sorc to play a defensive build. This is not balance, this is pigeonholing.

This is a terrible solution to a problem not everyone agrees exists.

It is @Erock25 who singled out the sorc. Neither me nor the OP talk about sorc exclusively in any context.

Also, The main issue with this seems to be that you think that a decent hardened ward should require 28k health. Not the case. Or that you would do zero damage with 30k instead of 35k magicka, just because you have put some points into health. Not the case.

Open your mind. Myopic (nice word, learned something new today, thank you) is the fixation on status quo without giving other possibilities a chance.

That said, maybe the above proposal does indeed require too much change in the game mechanics all around to work. For sure it cannot work in the current framework without changes.

BigTone · July 2015

First, thank you for taking the time to post this. It is clear that this was extensively thought out and you are trying to improve the overall gameplay of ESO.

I want to say that above all else I believe the "blob" meta is what is hurting this game the most. At first i was going to say lag, but then realized that the blob meta causes a good portion of the lag. Unfortunately the most effective way to win at the moment is stacking on crown spamming AoE and timing proxy. This is both boring and lag inducing, completely destroying pvp. Disincentivizing blob play would actually make PvP require more skill and reduce lag significantly. Inevitable detonation was a good idea, but proxy det has been an utter failure. they have mentioned that the move will now increase in strength based on the number of players hit, which is a step in the right direction, but the proxy det morph needs to be removed entirely because it encourages stacking. I also completely agree the something has to be done about purge. The way it works now lets blob groups completely ignore siege damage. I've done over 300,000 damage with a single fire ballista shot and did not get a single kill. I've seen groups stand in siege, get fire rained on their heads, and just purge, barrier, and repeat. How about change the lightning ballista to do more damage with the more targets it hits? How about change purge so that it only affects you and the three people closest to you?

Erock25 · July 2015

Leandor wrote: »

Shields have zero mitigation? Excuse me while I wipe the coffee off my screen.

Shields can't be crit. With the current game, any stamina build has a crit chance of 60% or more. That means, a shield has an effective damage mitigation of close to 33% that cannot be penetrated by any means (even higher if you compare against nightblades). Even magicka builds have 40%+ crit, which means 30% mitigation as well.

This has absolute zero bearing on my point that it makes no sense to stack health with your shield because they both have different values (ie mitigation versus no mitigation) that determine how effective they are.

Leandor wrote: »

If you do not understand what the above proposal would do (which by the way is not my post, but I agree with it in large parts - otherwise I would not have posted it), let me give you some numbers.

Let's say that a single dodge roll would cost 25% of your current maximum stamina. On a magicka build, that would make it cost 25% of ~8k stamina = 2k stamina. This you can reduce by CP and enchants to a value that is maybe half that, lets say 1000 stamina. You can now dodge 8 times, not considering stamina regeneration.

On a stamina build that aims for max damage, you have lets say 25k stamina. The 25% would be 6.2k, with CP and enchants, you can reduce that to 4k (more reduction because the percentage based reductions are more efficient). That means you can do 6 dodges, not considering regeneration.

In order to have a decent availability of dodges, the magicka build would need a regeneration rate of 2000 for indefinite dodges - no magicka build would do that. In order to have indefinite dodges on the stamina build, you would need to have 8000 stamina regeneration, which is far from possible, even with full CP alotment.

But you can build a permanent dodger, if you base him on stamina and limit the stamina pool to, lets say 20k but maximise the regeneration rate. you will get 3000 stamina regeneration on a bosmer werewolf nightblade. 20k pool means 4k cost, with all reductions you get the cost down to 2.5k, making the required stamina reg 5k. with 3k you can dodge enough that you will be able to escape. Not indefinite, but a lot. The consequence is, that with this stamina pool, you will not be the one hit wonder nightblade that wastes everyone with a single snipe.

Now these numbers are pulled out of my arse. For sure they need to be tuned with all of the specific reductions that are available. Maybe you need to tune down the applicable cost reductions for dodge rolling. In all of this, now substitute magicka for stamina and vice versa and dodge roll with bolt escape. Same principle applies.

I think this is just possibly the worst idea I've ever read. You are basically making magicka builds the best dodge rollers. It is illogical and pointless. You are also making Stamina Sorcs the best Bolt Escapers which, I mean, that would be fantastic for my play style but it is absolutely ludicrous.

Leandor wrote: »

Erock25 wrote: »

Right now I have 40 some points in bastion and with 31k magicka I get a 12k Hardened Ward.

Well, that number goes up. I have a 11k-something ward in Cyrodiil with 75 points in bastion and 27k magicka on a VR6 sorc with blue food. I have a feeling that you do not understand my point.

The magnitude of shields is not what I criticize. Make shield strength based on health and have hardened provide two times HP as shield, I do not care. What I do care about is that currently, you maximize damage output and simultaneously maximize shield strength - you increase both offense and defense with the same attribute. That has to go.

You want to have strong shields? Maximize defense. You want to have high damage? Maximize offense. You need to make a decision between both, not have both at the same time. If you would just put away your "nerf sorc" glasses for a while and open your mind to what was actually proposed and in what way it was proposed to be implemented, you may actually understand the background.

You tell me to put away my nerf sorc glasses while what you (your friend, whatever) are suggesting is directly a nerf to sorcs. Also, spell damage is the best way to increase offense. A sorc stacking magicka is basically taking less outgoing DPS (relative to spell dmg increases) in exchange for higher shields. OPEN YOUR MIND!!!

Leandor wrote: »

I do not care if you agree or disagree with the proposal. You have a right to your opinion. But please stop making this into something that it is not at all. You sorcs are not the center of the world. Not everything deals with you.

Sorcs arent the center of the world yet we have basically a full spoiler tag worth of changes devoted entirely to us. Look again at that last spoiler tag list and tell me any suggested changes in there that affect other classes negatively while also remembering that dodge roll is not a class ability. Offense ... same as it is now. Defense .... Sorc shields get nerfed and nothing else changes. Mobility ... Sorc Bolt Escape is nerfed. You can try and spin it any way you want but that is what it is.

Leandor wrote: »

This is about bringing in line those builds that destroy pvp. Unlimited resources used to make certain builds almost invincible while still letting them deal unlimited damage. Be it magicka sorcerers, stamina nightblades, magicka nightblades or magicka dragonknights.

Yes unlimited resources suck but the only resource impacting measure in this proposal is Bolt Escape and Dodge Roll costs, which for some crazy reason, make Stamina Sorcs better at Bolt Escape and Magicka builds better at Dodge Roll. I will repeat that is completely illogical.

Leandor wrote: »

If you would have taken the time to actually read that part of the above proposal was to also modify the ability damage output calculation to conform to and supplement the changes to defensive abilities, you may have thought differently about it. But no, you have this spiderman meme glued to the backside of your eyes and as soon as you open a thread that mentions shields and sorcs, it is all you see.

That is sad.

Where is this ability damage output calculation changes?

Ezareth · July 2015

Too much to read.

Is this a nerf sorc thread?

Do we need a meme in here?

Xael · July 2015

Erock25 wrote: »

Leandor wrote: »

Shields have zero mitigation? Excuse me while I wipe the coffee off my screen.

Shields can't be crit. With the current game, any stamina build has a crit chance of 60% or more. That means, a shield has an effective damage mitigation of close to 33% that cannot be penetrated by any means (even higher if you compare against nightblades). Even magicka builds have 40%+ crit, which means 30% mitigation as well.

This has absolute zero bearing on my point that it makes no sense to stack health with your shield because they both have different values (ie mitigation versus no mitigation) that determine how effective they are.

Leandor wrote: »

If you do not understand what the above proposal would do (which by the way is not my post, but I agree with it in large parts - otherwise I would not have posted it), let me give you some numbers.

Let's say that a single dodge roll would cost 25% of your current maximum stamina. On a magicka build, that would make it cost 25% of ~8k stamina = 2k stamina. This you can reduce by CP and enchants to a value that is maybe half that, lets say 1000 stamina. You can now dodge 8 times, not considering stamina regeneration.

On a stamina build that aims for max damage, you have lets say 25k stamina. The 25% would be 6.2k, with CP and enchants, you can reduce that to 4k (more reduction because the percentage based reductions are more efficient). That means you can do 6 dodges, not considering regeneration.

In order to have a decent availability of dodges, the magicka build would need a regeneration rate of 2000 for indefinite dodges - no magicka build would do that. In order to have indefinite dodges on the stamina build, you would need to have 8000 stamina regeneration, which is far from possible, even with full CP alotment.

But you can build a permanent dodger, if you base him on stamina and limit the stamina pool to, lets say 20k but maximise the regeneration rate. you will get 3000 stamina regeneration on a bosmer werewolf nightblade. 20k pool means 4k cost, with all reductions you get the cost down to 2.5k, making the required stamina reg 5k. with 3k you can dodge enough that you will be able to escape. Not indefinite, but a lot. The consequence is, that with this stamina pool, you will not be the one hit wonder nightblade that wastes everyone with a single snipe.

Now these numbers are pulled out of my arse. For sure they need to be tuned with all of the specific reductions that are available. Maybe you need to tune down the applicable cost reductions for dodge rolling. In all of this, now substitute magicka for stamina and vice versa and dodge roll with bolt escape. Same principle applies.

I think this is just possibly the worst idea I've ever read. You are basically making magicka builds the best dodge rollers. It is illogical and pointless. You are also making Stamina Sorcs the best Bolt Escapers which, I mean, that would be fantastic for my play style but it is absolutely ludicrous.

Leandor wrote: »

Erock25 wrote: »

Right now I have 40 some points in bastion and with 31k magicka I get a 12k Hardened Ward.

Well, that number goes up. I have a 11k-something ward in Cyrodiil with 75 points in bastion and 27k magicka on a VR6 sorc with blue food. I have a feeling that you do not understand my point.

The magnitude of shields is not what I criticize. Make shield strength based on health and have hardened provide two times HP as shield, I do not care. What I do care about is that currently, you maximize damage output and simultaneously maximize shield strength - you increase both offense and defense with the same attribute. That has to go.

You want to have strong shields? Maximize defense. You want to have high damage? Maximize offense. You need to make a decision between both, not have both at the same time. If you would just put away your "nerf sorc" glasses for a while and open your mind to what was actually proposed and in what way it was proposed to be implemented, you may actually understand the background.

You tell me to put away my nerf sorc glasses while what you (your friend, whatever) are suggesting is directly a nerf to sorcs. Also, spell damage is the best way to increase offense. A sorc stacking magicka is basically taking less outgoing DPS (relative to spell dmg increases) in exchange for higher shields. OPEN YOUR MIND!!!

Leandor wrote: »

I do not care if you agree or disagree with the proposal. You have a right to your opinion. But please stop making this into something that it is not at all. You sorcs are not the center of the world. Not everything deals with you.

Sorcs arent the center of the world yet we have basically a full spoiler tag worth of changes devoted entirely to us. Look again at that last spoiler tag list and tell me any suggested changes in there that affect other classes negatively while also remembering that dodge roll is not a class ability. Offense ... same as it is now. Defense .... Sorc shields get nerfed and nothing else changes. Mobility ... Sorc Bolt Escape is nerfed. You can try and spin it any way you want but that is what it is.

Leandor wrote: »

This is about bringing in line those builds that destroy pvp. Unlimited resources used to make certain builds almost invincible while still letting them deal unlimited damage. Be it magicka sorcerers, stamina nightblades, magicka nightblades or magicka dragonknights.

Yes unlimited resources suck but the only resource impacting measure in this proposal is Bolt Escape and Dodge Roll costs, which for some crazy reason, make Stamina Sorcs better at Bolt Escape and Magicka builds better at Dodge Roll. I will repeat that is completely illogical.

Leandor wrote: »

If you would have taken the time to actually read that part of the above proposal was to also modify the ability damage output calculation to conform to and supplement the changes to defensive abilities, you may have thought differently about it. But no, you have this spiderman meme glued to the backside of your eyes and as soon as you open a thread that mentions shields and sorcs, it is all you see.

That is sad.

Where is this ability damage output calculation changes?

@Leandor this pretty much. I would address your reply to me but I feel @Erock25 already beat me to it and hit the nail on the head.

Leandor wrote: »

It is @Erock25 who singled out the sorc. Neither me nor the OP talk about sorc exclusively in any context.

Are we talking about this thread? Because as Erock pointed out there is an entire spoiler singling out the Sorcerer class and playstyle. I don't see how you can expect a Sorcerer to read this thread and not feel like they are being singled out... I think you should go back and read the thread you started and take no credit for. You said you vouche for yourself and the alleged OP, however the alleged OP's own words contradict your statement.

Leandor · July 2015

Erock25 wrote: »

Leandor wrote: »

Shields have zero mitigation? Excuse me while I wipe the coffee off my screen.

Shields can't be crit. With the current game, any stamina build has a crit chance of 60% or more. That means, a shield has an effective damage mitigation of close to 33% that cannot be penetrated by any means (even higher if you compare against nightblades). Even magicka builds have 40%+ crit, which means 30% mitigation as well.

This has absolute zero bearing on my point that it makes no sense to stack health with your shield because they both have different values (ie mitigation versus no mitigation) that determine how effective they are.

It has bearing on your statement that shields provide zero mitigation only absorb. Actually, apart from full heavy, shields provide the strongest mitigation in game by rendering the shielded target effectively immune to crits - like the old impenetrable that got fixed for precisely this reason.

Basing shield strength on health - irrespective of mitigation - is still more logical than basing it on your offensive strength. Why should a defensive ability have anything to do with your offensive capabilities?

Erock25 wrote: »

Leandor wrote: »

If you do not understand what the above proposal would do (which by the way is not my post, but I agree with it in large parts - otherwise I would not have posted it), let me give you some numbers.

Let's say that a single dodge roll would cost 25% of your current maximum stamina. On a magicka build, that would make it cost 25% of ~8k stamina = 2k stamina. This you can reduce by CP and enchants to a value that is maybe half that, lets say 1000 stamina. You can now dodge 8 times, not considering stamina regeneration.

On a stamina build that aims for max damage, you have lets say 25k stamina. The 25% would be 6.2k, with CP and enchants, you can reduce that to 4k (more reduction because the percentage based reductions are more efficient). That means you can do 6 dodges, not considering regeneration.

In order to have a decent availability of dodges, the magicka build would need a regeneration rate of 2000 for indefinite dodges - no magicka build would do that. In order to have indefinite dodges on the stamina build, you would need to have 8000 stamina regeneration, which is far from possible, even with full CP alotment.

But you can build a permanent dodger, if you base him on stamina and limit the stamina pool to, lets say 20k but maximise the regeneration rate. you will get 3000 stamina regeneration on a bosmer werewolf nightblade. 20k pool means 4k cost, with all reductions you get the cost down to 2.5k, making the required stamina reg 5k. with 3k you can dodge enough that you will be able to escape. Not indefinite, but a lot. The consequence is, that with this stamina pool, you will not be the one hit wonder nightblade that wastes everyone with a single snipe.

Now these numbers are pulled out of my arse. For sure they need to be tuned with all of the specific reductions that are available. Maybe you need to tune down the applicable cost reductions for dodge rolling. In all of this, now substitute magicka for stamina and vice versa and dodge roll with bolt escape. Same principle applies.

I think this is just possibly the worst idea I've ever read. You are basically making magicka builds the best dodge rollers. It is illogical and pointless. You are also making Stamina Sorcs the best Bolt Escapers which, I mean, that would be fantastic for my play style but it is absolutely ludicrous.

No. This is making the stamina regeneration stacker the best roll dodger. As I said, the numbers may need to be modified and tuned for it to work as intended. The numbers, taken in conjunction with the possible reductions, need to make sure that you may be able to dodge often if you do NOT maximize your stamina pool in order to maximize damage output.

Yes, weapon damage (or, for that matter, spell damage) do have a larger influence on damage numbers than stamina (respectively magicka) but the margin is small and without maximizing both damage and resource, you will not reach the sweet spot (which is the one hit kill).

Erock25 wrote: »

Leandor wrote: »

Erock25 wrote: »

Right now I have 40 some points in bastion and with 31k magicka I get a 12k Hardened Ward.

Well, that number goes up. I have a 11k-something ward in Cyrodiil with 75 points in bastion and 27k magicka on a VR6 sorc with blue food. I have a feeling that you do not understand my point.

The magnitude of shields is not what I criticize. Make shield strength based on health and have hardened provide two times HP as shield, I do not care. What I do care about is that currently, you maximize damage output and simultaneously maximize shield strength - you increase both offense and defense with the same attribute. That has to go.

You want to have strong shields? Maximize defense. You want to have high damage? Maximize offense. You need to make a decision between both, not have both at the same time. If you would just put away your "nerf sorc" glasses for a while and open your mind to what was actually proposed and in what way it was proposed to be implemented, you may actually understand the background.

You tell me to put away my nerf sorc glasses while what you (your friend, whatever) are suggesting is directly a nerf to sorcs. Also, spell damage is the best way to increase offense. A sorc stacking magicka is basically taking less outgoing DPS (relative to spell dmg increases) in exchange for higher shields. OPEN YOUR MIND!!!

See above. There is a point where stacking spell damage is either not possible or not feasible but stacking magicka still increases both your options (offense and defense). You may have minor reductions (albeit really minor, considering that the accepted formula for magicka-to-spelldamage-conversion reads it as 1:10 where the raw relation on set bonuses is roughly 1:6 without taking into consideration that all class/race/passive percentage bonuses apply to the raw magicka bonus but not the raw spelldamage bonus) in preferring magicka over spell damage, but nothing in the way of significant. Again, this change is applicable to all stamina builds as well, since their balance is the same: maximizing damage output by maximizing stamina does give much more leeway and availability of roll dodging.

Erock25 wrote: »

Leandor wrote: »

I do not care if you agree or disagree with the proposal. You have a right to your opinion. But please stop making this into something that it is not at all. You sorcs are not the center of the world. Not everything deals with you.

Sorcs arent the center of the world yet we have basically a full spoiler tag worth of changes devoted entirely to us. Look again at that last spoiler tag list and tell me any suggested changes in there that affect other classes negatively while also remembering that dodge roll is not a class ability. Offense ... same as it is now. Defense .... Sorc shields get nerfed and nothing else changes. Mobility ... Sorc Bolt Escape is nerfed. You can try and spin it any way you want but that is what it is.

The only two mobility skills that exist in this game and can be used to get away, are bolt escape and roll dodge. Of course these are the ones that are being talked about in this case. Do you really favour the idea to have a stacking 50% cost increase on bolt escape, that will effectively kill stamina sorcs, over a proposal that limits it irrespective of build without putting the stamina sorc at a more severe disadvantage?

Erock25 wrote: »

Leandor wrote: »

This is about bringing in line those builds that destroy pvp. Unlimited resources used to make certain builds almost invincible while still letting them deal unlimited damage. Be it magicka sorcerers, stamina nightblades, magicka nightblades or magicka dragonknights.

Yes unlimited resources suck but the only resource impacting measure in this proposal is Bolt Escape and Dodge Roll costs, which for some crazy reason, make Stamina Sorcs better at Bolt Escape and Magicka builds better at Dodge Roll. I will repeat that is completely illogical.

I answered that one above.

Erock25 wrote: »

Leandor wrote: »

If you would have taken the time to actually read that part of the above proposal was to also modify the ability damage output calculation to conform to and supplement the changes to defensive abilities, you may have thought differently about it. But no, you have this spiderman meme glued to the backside of your eyes and as soon as you open a thread that mentions shields and sorcs, it is all you see.

That is sad.

Where is this ability damage output calculation changes?

It is in there, read again. It is in there in forcing you to choose whether you want to be mobile or maximize damage. It is implicit in the fact that it was said that game mechanics need to be adjusted. It is implicit in the fact that damage output is to be balanced around a common reference state. It is implicit in things like "make sure that one hit is something that is not quite achievable".

I speak for @Keron as well in saying that the intent is not to destroy a class or a playstyle. The intent is that the stamina sorc is similarly able to be customized as a stamina nightblade or a magicka templar. It was an attempt to revive the old "play as you wish" adage.

Leandor · July 2015

Ezareth wrote: »

Too much to read.

Is this a nerf sorc thread?

Do we need a meme in here?

Naa, we don't. Even though @Erock25 's best efforts, I refuse to have this being degraded to a "nerf sorcs" thread. It may be a "adjust sorcs along with all other classes" thread. Print it and read it next time you have a porcelain sit in.

Erock25 · July 2015

The TL;DR for this topic is that he wants to change game mechanics in a way that directly nerf the magicka sorceror on multiple levels while keeping the playing field even for the other three classes.

Leandor · July 2015

The tldr of this topic is that a change in game mechanics to separate scaling of offensive, defensive and mobility abilities on different attributes instead of combining it is proposed.

Actually, let me make this post correct.

TLDR:

Smart Healing is the main incentive for blobbing, here a proposal to make positioning other than "hug crown" important.
Alliance war abilities and their unlimited targets function needs to go - at least for the defensive abilities.
In order to make players take a decision in regards to what is maximised (offensive, defensive or mobility focus), make these scale of different resources instead of combining it.

Ezareth · July 2015

Erock25 wrote: »

The TL;DR for this topic is that he wants to change game mechanics in a way that directly nerf the magicka sorceror on multiple levels while keeping the playing field even for the other three classes.

Right now Sorcs are scaling far better than other classes. I'll pit a 3600 CP sorc against any other class with 3600 CP in the game right now with all else being equal. There are some multipliers that need to be adjusted to "future-proof" the class.

That said, 1.7 is a completely difference ballgame and we only see a small portion that ZoS has let us know about so talking about balance without any knowledge of those changes (and actually testing them on the PTS) is pretty only useful to highlight existing issues.

I'm pretty much in a holding pattern on balance with a few more general balance suggestions.

Resource Regeneration is off the charts...it scales far too well and needs reduced.

Roots need to have a break-immunity cooldown like CC

Bugs and exploits need to be identified and fixed.

Erock25 · July 2015

Leandor wrote: »

The tldr of this topic is that a change in game mechanics to separate scaling of offensive, defensive and mobility abilities on different attributes instead of combining it is proposed.

But don't forget that the only defensive ability that is nerfed is a Sorc's Hardened Ward and that the only mobility ability that is class specific that is nerfed is Bolt Escape!

Ezareth wrote: »

Erock25 wrote: »

The TL;DR for this topic is that he wants to change game mechanics in a way that directly nerf the magicka sorceror on multiple levels while keeping the playing field even for the other three classes.

Right now Sorcs are scaling far better than other classes. I'll pit a 3600 CP sorc against any other class with 3600 CP in the game right now with all else being equal. There are some multipliers that need to be adjusted to "future-proof" the class.

That said, 1.7 is a completely difference ballgame and we only see a small portion that ZoS has let us know about so talking about balance without any knowledge of those changes (and actually testing them on the PTS) is pretty only useful to highlight existing issues.

I'm pretty much in a holding pattern on balance with a few more general balance suggestions.

Resource Regeneration is off the charts...it scales far too well and needs reduced.

Roots need to have a break-immunity cooldown like CC

Bugs and exploits need to be identified and fixed.

@Ezareth I'm curious as to why you think Sorcs are scaling better? I have a lowly 150 or 160 CP so I am not experiencing it myself, but it seems that damage should be scaling as fast or even faster than Sorc shields.

Leandor · July 2015

@Ezareth modified my tldr to be more accurate.

Ezareth · July 2015

Erock25 wrote: »

Leandor wrote: »

The tldr of this topic is that a change in game mechanics to separate scaling of offensive, defensive and mobility abilities on different attributes instead of combining it is proposed.

But don't forget that the only defensive ability that is nerfed is a Sorc's Hardened Ward and that the only mobility ability that is class specific that is nerfed is Bolt Escape!

Ezareth wrote: »

Erock25 wrote: »

The TL;DR for this topic is that he wants to change game mechanics in a way that directly nerf the magicka sorceror on multiple levels while keeping the playing field even for the other three classes.

Right now Sorcs are scaling far better than other classes. I'll pit a 3600 CP sorc against any other class with 3600 CP in the game right now with all else being equal. There are some multipliers that need to be adjusted to "future-proof" the class.

That said, 1.7 is a completely difference ballgame and we only see a small portion that ZoS has let us know about so talking about balance without any knowledge of those changes (and actually testing them on the PTS) is pretty only useful to highlight existing issues.

I'm pretty much in a holding pattern on balance with a few more general balance suggestions.

Resource Regeneration is off the charts...it scales far too well and needs reduced.

Roots need to have a break-immunity cooldown like CC

Bugs and exploits need to be identified and fixed.

@Ezareth I'm curious as to why you think Sorcs are scaling better? I have a lowly 150 or 160 CP so I am not experiencing it myself, but it seems that damage should be scaling as fast or even faster than Sorc shields.

Hardened ward receives a 33% Benefit. Healing Ward receives an (up to) 300% bonus

The Cyrodiil nerf is *additive* not multiplicative with these benefits so because they have a bonus when you couple that with Bastion at 100 CP (25%) which *is* multiplicative your shields will actually increase faster than your damage due to the way the damage reduction is calculated.

Additionally the Defensive CPs *Do* affect damage shields so you can increase the utility of those damage shields further by maxing CP into Magic, Poison, Disease, Fire, Frost, Lightning damage reductions (and dots/bleed reductions I suppose).

This is the main reason these top end players are getting insane sheild stacks. They have a ton of CP and are focusing on pure magicka / bastion / damage reduction CPs (plus several I believe are using an exploit to increase this futher).

By comparison my nightblade with almost 100CP into Mighty (+25% Damage) along with 2800 weapon power is still not able to *hit* for more than 10K with wrecking blow/crit charge.

I'm not on the Nerf Sorc bandwagon but I think a lot of the multiplers need adjusted.

MrGhosty · July 2015

One thing they might help when reading the OP's post is that they are not a game designer for ZOS, they don't have the concrete numbers. What should be looked at is the general idea and consider the numbers,etc they gave as a means of visualizing the concept.

The only issue that gave me pause really was that alot of the heals and some the way abilities work seem like they would require more server checks, which seems like they would contribute as much to the lag in large fights as current problems. That said it was a good read and a good idea.

It has felt like most armor sets in the game, most weapons, playstyles etc are completely useless if you want to be as effective as possible. This gets reinforced by the addition of bosses and encounters that require that same dedication leaving a lot of other possibilities on the cutting room floor. I would love a game that provided a means to still meaningfully contribute but specialize in particular skill sets and these changes seem to be a good step in order to achieve that.

Erock25 · July 2015

Ezareth wrote: »

Erock25 wrote: »

Leandor wrote: »

The tldr of this topic is that a change in game mechanics to separate scaling of offensive, defensive and mobility abilities on different attributes instead of combining it is proposed.

But don't forget that the only defensive ability that is nerfed is a Sorc's Hardened Ward and that the only mobility ability that is class specific that is nerfed is Bolt Escape!

Ezareth wrote: »

Erock25 wrote: »

The TL;DR for this topic is that he wants to change game mechanics in a way that directly nerf the magicka sorceror on multiple levels while keeping the playing field even for the other three classes.

Right now Sorcs are scaling far better than other classes. I'll pit a 3600 CP sorc against any other class with 3600 CP in the game right now with all else being equal. There are some multipliers that need to be adjusted to "future-proof" the class.

That said, 1.7 is a completely difference ballgame and we only see a small portion that ZoS has let us know about so talking about balance without any knowledge of those changes (and actually testing them on the PTS) is pretty only useful to highlight existing issues.

I'm pretty much in a holding pattern on balance with a few more general balance suggestions.

Resource Regeneration is off the charts...it scales far too well and needs reduced.

Roots need to have a break-immunity cooldown like CC

Bugs and exploits need to be identified and fixed.

@Ezareth I'm curious as to why you think Sorcs are scaling better? I have a lowly 150 or 160 CP so I am not experiencing it myself, but it seems that damage should be scaling as fast or even faster than Sorc shields.

Hardened ward receives a 33% Benefit. Healing Ward receives an (up to) 300% bonus

The Cyrodiil nerf is *additive* not multiplicative with these benefits so because they have a bonus when you couple that with Bastion at 100 CP (25%) which *is* multiplicative your shields will actually increase faster than your damage due to the way the damage reduction is calculated.

Additionally the Defensive CPs *Do* affect damage shields so you can increase the utility of those damage shields further by maxing CP into Magic, Poison, Disease, Fire, Frost, Lightning damage reductions (and dots/bleed reductions I suppose).

This is the main reason these top end players are getting insane sheild stacks. They have a ton of CP and are focusing on pure magicka / bastion / damage reduction CPs (plus several I believe are using an exploit to increase this futher).

By comparison my nightblade with almost 100CP into Mighty (+25% Damage) along with 2800 weapon power is still not able to *hit* for more than 10K with wrecking blow/crit charge.

I'm not on the Nerf Sorc bandwagon but I think a lot of the multiplers need adjusted.

So a (133-50=83%) shield multiplied by 1.25 = 103.75% of tool tip value

Instead of 133 * 0.5 * 1.25 = 83.125% of tool tip value.

I see what you mean there but the defensive CPs affecting shield is strength is what is really surprising me. That makes no sense considering shields never had mitigations before. It seems like a simple fix to have defensive CPs do nothing for shields. I wonder if I was the only one out of the magic/elemental/poison/disease resist CP affects shield strength loop, including Zenimax.

Leandor · July 2015

MrGhosty wrote: »

One thing they might help when reading the OP's post is that they are not a game designer for ZOS, they don't have the concrete numbers. What should be looked at is the general idea and consider the numbers,etc they gave as a means of visualizing the concept.

The only issue that gave me pause really was that alot of the heals and some the way abilities work seem like they would require more server checks, which seems like they would contribute as much to the lag in large fights as current problems. That said it was a good read and a good idea.

It has felt like most armor sets in the game, most weapons, playstyles etc are completely useless if you want to be as effective as possible. This gets reinforced by the addition of bosses and encounters that require that same dedication leaving a lot of other possibilities on the cutting room floor. I would love a game that provided a means to still meaningfully contribute but specialize in particular skill sets and these changes seem to be a good step in order to achieve that.

Thanks for actually reading it

actually, what heals do right now is check who is eligible to receive the heals in its range (identify all friendly targets in range), take a snapshot of current health of all these targets in the moment of the cast, evaluate their percentage health in relation to the individual maximum health for all eligible targets, sort the result list from lowest percentage to highest percentage, apply the heal to the three/four/six targets with the lowest health percentage.

For healing springs, this is done for each tick.

The proposed idea has much less calculation effort.

Ezareth · July 2015

Erock25 wrote: »

Ezareth wrote: »

Erock25 wrote: »

Leandor wrote: »

The tldr of this topic is that a change in game mechanics to separate scaling of offensive, defensive and mobility abilities on different attributes instead of combining it is proposed.

But don't forget that the only defensive ability that is nerfed is a Sorc's Hardened Ward and that the only mobility ability that is class specific that is nerfed is Bolt Escape!

Ezareth wrote: »

Erock25 wrote: »

The TL;DR for this topic is that he wants to change game mechanics in a way that directly nerf the magicka sorceror on multiple levels while keeping the playing field even for the other three classes.

Right now Sorcs are scaling far better than other classes. I'll pit a 3600 CP sorc against any other class with 3600 CP in the game right now with all else being equal. There are some multipliers that need to be adjusted to "future-proof" the class.

That said, 1.7 is a completely difference ballgame and we only see a small portion that ZoS has let us know about so talking about balance without any knowledge of those changes (and actually testing them on the PTS) is pretty only useful to highlight existing issues.

I'm pretty much in a holding pattern on balance with a few more general balance suggestions.

Resource Regeneration is off the charts...it scales far too well and needs reduced.

Roots need to have a break-immunity cooldown like CC

Bugs and exploits need to be identified and fixed.

@Ezareth I'm curious as to why you think Sorcs are scaling better? I have a lowly 150 or 160 CP so I am not experiencing it myself, but it seems that damage should be scaling as fast or even faster than Sorc shields.

Hardened ward receives a 33% Benefit. Healing Ward receives an (up to) 300% bonus

The Cyrodiil nerf is *additive* not multiplicative with these benefits so because they have a bonus when you couple that with Bastion at 100 CP (25%) which *is* multiplicative your shields will actually increase faster than your damage due to the way the damage reduction is calculated.

Additionally the Defensive CPs *Do* affect damage shields so you can increase the utility of those damage shields further by maxing CP into Magic, Poison, Disease, Fire, Frost, Lightning damage reductions (and dots/bleed reductions I suppose).

This is the main reason these top end players are getting insane sheild stacks. They have a ton of CP and are focusing on pure magicka / bastion / damage reduction CPs (plus several I believe are using an exploit to increase this futher).

By comparison my nightblade with almost 100CP into Mighty (+25% Damage) along with 2800 weapon power is still not able to *hit* for more than 10K with wrecking blow/crit charge.

I'm not on the Nerf Sorc bandwagon but I think a lot of the multiplers need adjusted.

So a (133-50=83%) shield multiplied by 1.25 = 103.75% of tool tip value

Instead of 133 * 0.5 * 1.25 = 83.125% of tool tip value.

I see what you mean there but the defensive CPs affecting shield is strength is what is really surprising me. That makes no sense considering shields never had mitigations before. It seems like a simple fix to have defensive CPs do nothing for shields. I wonder if I was the only one out of the magic/elemental/poison/disease resist CP affects shield strength loop, including Zenimax.

Yeah it was surprising to me as well. I still doubt more than 1 or 2% of the PvP population really understands the math behind it all though. You don't need to understand the math to fully benefit from the advantage of a particular build or setup but you do need to understand it to see how things scale down the road as numbers increase.

I still think the real issue is the costs of abilities. A shield should expensive, especially relative to an attack ability as it actually shields for more than an attack ability.

The only people I hear of who run out of resources are Templar who spam healers. Every other class can spam damage abilities as fast as their GCD and never run out.

Joy_Division · July 2015

I don't like doing this to people who put a lot of thought and time in well-meaninged proposals, but I see a lot of problems.

As a healer, I don't think you proposals on healing make any sense. I can see what you are trying to do, get the "blob" to separate in 4 man units centered on a healer. But you now just made ever PVE trial in the game impossible to complete. You also removed one of the main functionality of the healing springs spell, which is ranged healing spell specifically designed so that you don't have to be right next to the people you want to heal. The whole proximity thing strikes me as counter-intuitive: you want to get rid of blobs...but force people to blob together to get heals? You want to actually heal people that are injured...but force the spell to heal those who are closest?
It is not the healing component that makes purge powerful, it is the fact that a single member can insulate an entire raid from siege damage, dots, and status effects repeatedly.
The whole mobility thing based of regeneration doesn't work. I'm a DK with lots of stamina, let's just say I dodge roll to avoid an attack. Now I just lost 6000 stamina which is also my resource for attacks. Now I am a magicka Templar, let's say I dodge roll. Now I lost just 1200 stamina which I use for...nothing else really ...and lost no magicka that is my resource for attack. This does not even get into the fact there are other forms of mobility such as mist form, cloak, retreating maneuvers that you do not consider.
Yes, wipe the coffee off your monitor. Yes, shields can't be crit, but they offer no form of mitigation what so-ever. So it's not a flat out damage reduction that you claim it is.

Rune_Relic · July 2015

1.6 2.0 was the opportunity for ZOS to fix all the balance issues.
They made a major attempt....(and I applaud the effort)...but it was way off the mark.
1. lag - increased AoE targets to 50 = no effect and worse lag (as predicted)
2. blobs - proxy det = made blobs even more powerful (as predicted)
3. boss of all trades.. - still happens will high damage ward builds
4. ..removed soft caps - never really balanced extreme builds in the process and now have infinite spam instead.

Do we really want to go through another major balance attempt after this one ?
Sorry to be harsh but ZOS simply aren't capable of balancing a game.
Accept it.
They do awesome graphics and sound though.

/shrugs