Necrotic Orb alternative morph?

EgoRush

Necrotic Orb is a great skills, the morph for Mystic Orb especially is often pivotal in large groups for maintaining magicka resources for the team. However, there's a distinct lack of mechanisms to get stamina back in similar ways except from Repentance, which is Templar specific. I was thinking it would be great if the other morph of Necrotic Orb, Energy Orb, instead returned stamina to the team. This could open up healing in general to other classes without restricting stamina-build teams to Templar healers. I'm not sure if many people make use of the Energy Orb morph, but I know plenty of people that would kill for a method to return stamina as a NB/DK/Sorcerer healer.

Any thoughts on this?

Flameheart

Not just Repentance, templar Spear Shards fill up stamina too (but the later needs clicking the X for synergy), but you won't always have a templar.

Maybe Zenimax thought Evil Hunter would be enough...but you are somewhat right, if you highlight the fact that the possibilities of magicka recovery support for others outweigh the possibilities for stamina recovery support in this game and its current skill system.

Nahz

@ZOS_RichLambert could I trouble you for a /lurk?

I think this is a great suggestion. However, as a sorcerer, I like having access to a healing ability which doesn't require a restoration staff. Would it be too OP for the mystic orb morph to restore both magicka and stamina?

With the changes in update 7 that will prevent players from regaining stamina while blocking, templar healers will have another major advantage over healers of other classes in that they have class skills which restore stamina to their group members. Those skills will be invaluable during long, resource-intensive battles. Altering necrotic orb to restore stamina will allow the other classes to be competitive.

My only concern with this suggestion is that I'm sure people will be spamming the orbs like crazy in pvp, which would be like ringing the dinner bell for the lag monster. Perhaps it could be given a limitation similar to healing springs in that each player can only have one (or maybe two) orb(s) out at a time?

RoyJade

Healing spring don't have any limit

In fact, templar will have a great advantage is no change is done to class skill because of the non-stamina regen while blocking. So, I suggest nerfing repentance and spear synergy (or better : block their effect while blocking), or give to the other classes more advantages (best solution IMO, I don't like nerf). And I would like a group healing ability for sorc, even one who heal only one ally !

EgoRush

@Nahz, good point about PvP - I didn't think about such repercussions to my suggestion. It would be a game-changing skill in Cyrodiil giving people vast sources of stamina. Sigh, it was just an idea to help balance stamina return to classes. Magicka return gets: Elemental Drain, Force Siphon, Mystic Orbs, Spell Symmetry/Balance...there are so many ways to return magicka. Yet only a Templar is capable of returning stamina efficiently to other users.

Maybe there's a better way to implement a stamina return ability than my suggestion.

RoyJade

Yes, by changing a useless ability like Blood Altar for example.
Give Blood Altar a stamina regen + stamina synergy ability, and it will probably be better for non templar healers. Nearly useless in pvp (1.5 sec incant + too small radius), better than now, I don't see all repercussions but I like the idea.

Flameheart

RoyJade wrote: »

Yes, by changing a useless ability like Blood Altar for example.
Give Blood Altar a stamina regen + stamina synergy ability, and it will probably be better for non templar healers. Nearly useless in pvp (1.5 sec incant + too small radius), better than now, I don't see all repercussions but I like the idea.

Good point. It would make that ability (noone really uses right now, neither in PvP nor in PvE) somewhat more important. The whole Undaunted skill line has some mediocre skills (besides bone shield and orb) that might need a change. In addition just one skill in this line is stamina based (bone shield), all others are magicka based.

EgoRush

@RoyJade yes! Even better! The Blood Altar! I didn't mention it because it's such a useless ability I had all but forgotten it existed...no offence to anyone that does use it.

This would be far less game breaking than a morph of Necrotic Orb giving stamina.

ZOS_RichLambert

I like the Blood Altar suggestion. Will dig into it more with Eric.

... er I mean /lurk.

-rich

Attorneyatlawl

Speaking of undaunted skills, any eta on spiked bone shield being fixed? The damage reflect does around 1/10th of what it should be right now and has been broken for a long time, now . It's supposed to be 33% but instead does around 3.3%.

Furor

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

Speaking of undaunted skills, any eta on spiked bone shield being fixed? The damage reflect does around 1/10th of what it should be right now and has been broken for a long time, now . It's supposed to be 33% but instead does around 3.3%.

Did you mean it's suppose to be doing 33.33%... Repeating of course.

Nahz

RoyJade wrote: »

Healing spring don't have any limit

What I meant by the limit is that (after 1.6 I believe) each player can only have one healing springs circle active at a time; though players can immediately cast in again in the same, or a different area. A limit like this on necrotic orb would mean that casting orb while you already have an orb flying around would cause the first orb to disappear.

Although I don't see orbs spammed too much in PVP right now, I do think this is a preventative measure that should be implemented regardless of whether or not orbs are altered to restore stamina. The restoring effects of the skill could be buffed appropriately to make it worthwhile to have only one orb out at a time. This is a topic for another thread, though.

EgoRush wrote: »

@Nahz, good point about PvP - I didn't think about such repercussions to my suggestion. It would be a game-changing skill in Cyrodiil giving people vast sources of stamina. Sigh, it was just an idea to help balance stamina return to classes. Magicka return gets: Elemental Drain, Force Siphon, Mystic Orbs, Spell Symmetry/Balance...there are so many ways to return magicka. Yet only a Templar is capable of returning stamina efficiently to other users.

Maybe there's a better way to implement a stamina return ability than my suggestion.

Considering there are several methods of restoring magicka to group members, maybe it wouldn't be terrible to change all three versions of necrotic orb to restore 1 resource each? Necrotic could restore magicka, mystic could restore stamina, and energy could restore health (though from a semantic perspective, I think it would make more sense for stamina to be restored by energy...). This would mean this skill wouldn't benefit directly from morphing, as it would be entirely dependent on your play style and what resource you want to restore. I don't think leaving a skill unmorphed is a bad thing if it means that version fits your play style. This would actually allow for more customization if implemented to other skills as well (I never understood why there wasn't a morph of the sorcerer's dark exchange which allowed you to convert health to stamina and magicka).

RoyJade wrote: »

Yes, by changing a useless ability like Blood Altar for example.
Give Blood Altar a stamina regen + stamina synergy ability, and it will probably be better for non templar healers. Nearly useless in pvp (1.5 sec incant + too small radius), better than now, I don't see all repercussions but I like the idea.

I've actually never used blood altar before (I've always preferred ring of preservation); do you drop the altar at your location, or can you place it a distance away from you (similar to the healing springs circle)? If you drop it where you're standing, that means 1.5 seconds that my squishy healer is in the middle of the battle. This would add a bit of challenge to effectively deploying the altar; one which templars do not have to deal with, as they can throw their shards. It wouldn't be too bad for me because I play as a sorcerer, so I have access to conjured ward (plus, I could just bolt escape into the battle, then bolt escape out). I've already had to learn to work around this type of mechanic because I like using ring of preservation on my group.

I could see this being a challenge for nightblade healers in particular, though, as they don't have access to a class-based shield. However, I suppose a nightblade could use shadow image to quickly remove itself from the middle of battle. I'm not familiar enough with the play styles of other classes to effectively comment on how much of a challenge this mechanic would actually be for them.

That being said, a major advantage (like you mentioned) to altering blood altar would be that it couldn't be spammed in PVP (though you would definitely see a few altars stacked on flags). I primarily PVP, so that is a very attractive perk to me.

ZOS_RichLambert wrote: »

I like the Blood Altar suggestion. Will dig into it more with Eric.

... er I mean /lurk.

-rich

Green Dragon Blood altar? :P

I was actually thinking blood altar would be a good ~altar~native to necrotic orb for restoring stamina, but I like the mobility and instant-cast nature of orb a lot. If I'm gonna spend 1.5 seconds casting an ability, I would really prefer for it to not be stationary as that means the enemy has a great target for red zones.

Valnas

Lurkburt! Please look at vamp drain (Stam drain but rediculous conditions for pvp use w/ no recastabilty, basically a global cool down and immunity to deal with), and sorcs lack of stam management (dark deal). These two channels could help magical hybrid builds exist again. Diversity is good

Attorneyatlawl

Valnas wrote: »

Lurkburt! Please look at vamp drain (Stam drain but rediculous conditions for pvp use w/ no recastabilty, basically a global cool down and immunity to deal with), and sorcs lack of stam management (dark deal). These two channels could help magical hybrid builds exist again. Diversity is good

Yeah, I'd much rather there just be the standard CC immunity for using it on someone. Currently, it's a shared one-minute immunity when anyone casts it on an enemy, before anyone can use it on them again , and in most fights that means once per enemy period .