[Suggestion] Stam Regen While Blocking

Solariken

It's fair to say that the vast majority of the playerbase is against the mechanic that disables stamina while blocking. Everyone believes there must be a better solution. Disabling all stamina regen just for tapping block is WAY too punitive. Blocking is a necessary part of combat and should be encouraged.

Rather than reinvent the wheel (again) I would like to suggest that we keep the current mechanic, BUT with a change. Stamina regen should be cut by 50% for 2 seconds after blocking any attack. Ergo, each blocked attack forfeits half of one tick of stamina regeneration in addition to the cost of blocking the attack itself.

This way, players can be a tiny bit more defensive without worrying as much about their stamina pool, and perma-block builds are still kept in check. Also, if you think about it, just standing in a guarded position shouldn't necessarily negate recovery - it's dealing with incoming blows that takes serious effort. I should be able to walk around holding block all day long and never lose stamina recovery UNLESS there is incoming damage.

The motivation for this post came from a super fun 1v1 I had with a stamblade in IC while playing my stamplar. The fight lasted several minutes, but I struggled to have enough stamina to burn him down due to this block mechanic. He would Shadowy Disguise -> Surprise Attack often. This leaves no choice but to block after he pops Cloak, lest I eat a massive Surprise Attack and a stun.

@wrobel, I hope you guys consider this change and I feel strongly that it would be a huge quality of life improvement.

AfkNinja

I can get on board for that. I've felt the no stamina nerf was way too punitive from the start, why are we nerfing skillful play???? Perma block casting is bad and unfair, but 0 stamina regen is just unfair also. 50% seems like a good compromise.

Solariken

AfkNinja wrote: »

I can get on board for that. I've felt the no stamina nerf was way too punitive from the start, why are we nerfing skillful play???? Perma block casting is bad and unfair, but 0 stamina regen is just unfair also. 50% seems like a good compromise.

Yeah, I agree that it was problem before that needed addressing. But I will never understand why they tend to make such massive, sweeping changes to game mechanics like this instead of small incremental adjustments. Baby steps would be healthier for the game.

Lord_Hev

This is needed. At the very least, make this exclusive to 5pc+ Heavy Armor wearers for an attempt at giving Heavy Armor a niche role in PvP.

Smasherx74

Stam regen means One handers can hold their shield up 24/7 while maintain resources which is game breaking. During beta/launch 1 Handers would just spam shield bashes and rekt PVP, and sense there was stam regen while shielding they could do it forever.

Skyy

I like it how it is, you have to actually plan your blocks instead of just holding it non-stop.

DKsUnite

Skyy wrote: »

I like it how it is, you have to actually plan your blocks instead of just holding it non-stop.

Would love to see you time blocks against 4 people 2 being WBs

Vangy

+1 OP. I would love this.

Might make heavy armor stam DK more viable.... And might encourage more tanky builds in PvP. Now its all about burst or go home.

Draxys

Yes please. The giant block nerf is one of the things that castrated magicka DKs. Would love for the tanks class to actually be tanky again.

code65536

Skyy wrote: »

I like it how it is, you have to actually plan your blocks instead of just holding it non-stop.

In PvP, have a bunch of people on you, and see how your "planning" works.

In PvE, go tank the bannermen pulls in vMoL and tell me how you "plan" your blocks. Oh, and remember, if you're tanking the 2-hander, your armor will be at zero. Good luck!

And even if perma-blocking was mostly a PvP issue (but with that high of regen, how exactly are you damaging people again?), the nerf screwed balance in PvE too. It was always too heavy-handed, and, frankly, a bludgeon approach to fixing a problem. No finesse.

Vaoh

This is a pretty good suggestion! Also, provide a way to make Heavy armor more viable for blocking/tanking in general. Better Stamina management and Block cost/damage reduction would help it get on par with Light and Medium armor in its own way.

Bashev

This changes should be added in the heavy armour useless skill tree. There is reduce cost block passive but it needs stamina regen while blocking in order to synergize well.

Valencer

Still don't see how permablocking was ever really an issue. There were counters and someone speccing for maximum block potential lost a lot of sustain and/or damage.(In other words, the guy is literally not much of a threat)

In PvE, it hasnt done much to make things more interesting either. People just expect and demand templar healers now to use shards as a crutch for stamina management.

InBedWithMySelf

Fantastic idea. I still think keeping the full stamina regeneration while bringing old combat back will fix it all, but assuming that will never come since Zenimax never goes back on their decisions, I think what you suggested is probably the best way to go at it. I hate that I don't regenerate stamina out of combat just because I'm blocking.

oibam

DKsUnite wrote: »

Skyy wrote: »

I like it how it is, you have to actually plan your blocks instead of just holding it non-stop.

Would love to see you time blocks against 4 people 2 being WBs

Why should you be able to block 4 players?

Vangy

oibam wrote: »

DKsUnite wrote: »

Skyy wrote: »

I like it how it is, you have to actually plan your blocks instead of just holding it non-stop.

Would love to see you time blocks against 4 people 2 being WBs

Why should you be able to block 4 players?

Even with 50% stam regen you can't. But it does give u a fighting chance if your a good player.

gdefter

why not introduce a mechanic to blocking similar to the consecutive dodge roll 33 % increase while kerping full stamina regeneration?

Solariken

gdefter wrote: »

why not introduce a mechanic to blocking similar to the consecutive dodge roll 33 % increase while kerping full stamina regeneration?

This is an idea I would also support. It makes logical sense too - the more consecutive blocks you perform, the harder it gets to continue soaking the hits.

gdefter

Yeah cause it s basically the same thing,dks would perma block,nbs (stamina) would perma dodge roll,they are quite similar situations,even though the infinite dodge roll was a little gamebreaking.i think the curremt mechanic for dodge roll is satisfying,i can say that even though i mainly play a stamina nb,because it forces you to watch your stamina pool and sustain both damage with abilities and defence with dodge rolls.But blocking with zero stamina recovery is too harsh,when facing a tank it is essencially a battle of stamina pools,if you can make a dk who perma blocks run out of stami.a before activating leap and still have remaining stamina yourself then i imagine you would win this fight 8 times out of 10.

Tankqull

Valencer wrote: »

Still don't see how permablocking was ever really an issue. There were counters and someone speccing for maximum block potential lost a lot of sustain and/or damage.(In other words, the guy is literally not much of a threat)

In PvE, it hasnt done much to make things more interesting either. People just expect and demand templar healers now to use shards as a crutch for stamina management.

nope and that was the problem - or more precise having 60-80%(depending on attacktype) perma reduction had no drawback

RoamingRiverElk

The classes that cannot run need to be able to block to compensate for the lack of escape. Magicka dk, magicka templar.

Skyy

DKsUnite wrote: »

Skyy wrote: »

I like it how it is, you have to actually plan your blocks instead of just holding it non-stop.

Would love to see you time blocks against 4 people 2 being WBs

If four people are attacking just you, you really shouldn't be able to just block through it.

RoamingRiverElk

Skyy wrote: »

DKsUnite wrote: »

Skyy wrote: »

I like it how it is, you have to actually plan your blocks instead of just holding it non-stop.

Would love to see you time blocks against 4 people 2 being WBs

If four people are attacking just you, you really shouldn't be able to just block through it.

If four people are attacking just you, you really shouldn't be able to dodge roll, streak, and cloak through it.

...except... yes you should if you're a good player and they're bad ones. [and obviously you will have invested something in being able to block more]

Witar

Smasherx74 wrote: »

Stam regen means One handers can hold their shield up 24/7

I'm doing this on my magdk even with current 0 regen. Permablocking is ok, it's not that hard to deal with as sorcs and their shields.

Forestd16b14_ESO

Smasherx74 wrote: »

Stam regen means One handers can hold their shield up 24/7 while maintain resources which is game breaking. During beta/launch 1 Handers would just spam shield bashes and rekt PVP, and sense there was stam regen while shielding they could do it forever.

Uh no that's not how it went at all the bash of doom was fixed like 2 weeks after launch reason it got removed is cause of Emperor Dunmer Vampire DKs just bat swarming into zergs perma-blocking. Then DKs got nerfed and players still did it so then Vampires got nerfed and players still did it then finally stamina regen was removed from blocking breaking the tank role. Now what can tanks do in pvp ? Nearly nothing because mitigation is hard capped at 50% and resistance means nothing against penetration effects and heavy armor is in a bad spot and offers little to 0 resource management.

Cause of those players who are still ruining them game to this day with the burst META tanks and mitigation and blocking and all that got over nerfed to be what it is now.

RedFireDisco

I love it.

The only other suggestion I've seen is that block slows your stamina down progressively to a halt over time, reset by stopping, which adds an interesting dynamic.

You can block for a few seconds but can't turtle for ever.

Either way, it needs a bump.

RoamingRiverElk

I really don't get this block hate coming from people. You aren't entitled to win against every build imaginable, 1 vs 1. Sometimes you simply cannot kill someone because they were built to be tankier.

And really, when you block...
1) Your stamina drains per EVERY SINGLE HIT that you take, including light attacks.
2) EVERY SINGLE HIT you take still does damage to you, you don't avoid all of the damage.
3) If you're a magicka dk or a magicka templar, you cannot do LoS in any good, reliable, repeatable way the way mobile classes can. LoS pretty much means, 100% mitigation against (potential) incoming attacks.
4) More and more people will focus on you since you're a stationary target, and you won't lose any of them, unlike with kiting.

The nerf to stamina regen while blocking was EXTREME. And that really shows in the way magicka DKs struggle now. The ones that are left. There are not many of them.

Valencer

oibam wrote: »

DKsUnite wrote: »

Skyy wrote: »

I like it how it is, you have to actually plan your blocks instead of just holding it non-stop.

Would love to see you time blocks against 4 people 2 being WBs

Why should you be able to block 4 players?

Why should you be able to shieldstack through the damage of 4 players?

You can't do that vs 4 good players, sure. But it used to be the same for block.

KatzMainTank

I like this idea. 50% reduction in regen tick was what I was thinking when I saw the forum title too! I'd like to expand on your idea though by incorporating a revised Heavy Armor passive idea....

What if the 50% was reduced by a small percentage depending on how many pieces of Heavy a player was wearing, up to a maximum reduction of 40%. OR...50% regen reduction, with a number value of stamina regen in while in combat which would scale off max stamina and the number of Heavy a player is wearing.

Valencer wrote: »

oibam wrote: »

DKsUnite wrote: »

Skyy wrote: »

I like it how it is, you have to actually plan your blocks instead of just holding it non-stop.

Would love to see you time blocks against 4 people 2 being WBs

Why should you be able to block 4 players?

Why should you be able to shieldstack through the damage of 4 players?

You can't do that vs 4 good players, sure. But it used to be the same for block.

EXACLTY. It's a perma-mitigation with no regen penalty and doesn't put a dent into a decent players mana pool.

Attackopsn

I agree with the OP, didn't read all the responses, but another huge issue with this is it discourages frequent cancelling through block on stamina builds because the regen completely halts. You shouldn't be penalized so heavily for simply animation cancelling. Also, the way buttons are mapped on ps4 any form of rolling, bashing, cc breaking, and any other action that is performed with (button)+L2 will cancel stamina ticks due to the current form of this mechanic.

Jade1986

Smasherx74 wrote: »

Stam regen means One handers can hold their shield up 24/7 while maintain resources which is game breaking. During beta/launch 1 Handers would just spam shield bashes and rekt PVP, and sense there was stam regen while shielding they could do it forever.

People can dodge roll and regen, why cant we block and regen`? Hmmm? Sorcs can cast shield over and over and over and regen, and the list goes on, why punish blocking that much instead of just balancing it.