Warden 10.1.0 Feedback

ESO_Nightingale

Hey everyone. Short post today.

Not at all happy with these changes if I'm being honest. Will have to test and update the main post later today, but losing the piercing cold ice staff damage entirely looks like it could be devastating for the playstyle. As now it'll have to rely on strong chilled application rates with frost reach versus more DoT or Direct damage.

The Arctic Blast changes look pretty strange as well, but until i know more I'll hold my tongue.

Further Edit:
After some testing, my build seems to be returning about 115-116k which is down 8k from the previous iteration of the build. the only difference with my normal build is that aeries cry seems to perform quite decently and so i've replaced Pillar of Nirn with it as i was getting even lower results with pillar of nirn.

116.9k




115.7k




Additional Points:
Arctic Blast is in a pretty horrible state at the moment.


This is the pitiful damage from the skill itself which i should note wasn't even a problem before since it was already mediocre, it's still heavily being propped up by its chilled proc rate which seems to only be around about 50% per tick now as opposed to it's old proc rate being extremely high on top of either stunning or healing randomly after 2 seconds which feels completely strange. This was not a good change and it needs to go back to the drawing board.

these changes have heavily hurt the frost warden playstyle since now there is next to no reason to use an ice staff at all on the class that people have championed as being unique due to its use of the ice staff. would it hurt to increase specifically our frost damage done to enemies?

i honestly think that if you want to add more tankiness to the line (for whatever reason) then you should update this absolutely useless passive, which is so bad and outdated (falcon's swiftness and betty purges) that everyone has effectively erased it from memory.

Skjaldbjorn

Oh look, we disagree again

I get frost staff loving Wardens probably aren't happy, but for the health of the class as a whole, this is a massive improvement.

Fourme

I couldn't be more happy with the change as a warden, I simply can't believe people are not happy they don't have to play with staves no more, + with the +5% bonus the netch gave us last patch, you can still use it and be relevent, AND, you can just use other weapons as well now, it's a great patch for wardens

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

Oh look, we disagree again

I get frost staff loving Wardens probably aren't happy, but for the health of the class as a whole, this is a massive improvement.

StShoot

Fourme wrote: »

I couldn't be more happy with the change as a warden, I simply can't believe people are not happy they don't have to play with staves no more, + with the +5% bonus the netch gave us last patch, you can still use it and be relevent, AND, you can just use other weapons as well now, it's a great patch for wardens

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

Oh look, we disagree again

I get frost staff loving Wardens probably aren't happy, but for the health of the class as a whole, this is a massive improvement.

i liked to play magden because it was one of the classes that could get away with using staves... Now you will just play the same boring Dw+staff/bow/2handed as every other class in pve.

Also correct me if my math is wrong on this one, but why could you not play other weapons on warden ? Depending on the offensive weapon that you choose you get either: Crit chance/damage; Spell/Weapondamage; Pen; a 12%Direct Or Dot Damage Increase, or the 12 % on the froststaff. Since the Froststaff doesnt have its own offensive Statline you should get roughly the same DPS output on all weapons.
You could even argue that it was better to not use Froststaffs with the old piercing Cold passive, since you could get the Statline of the weapon+ the 2% from piercing cold.
So Zos didnt enable other Weapons on the warden because they were always a viable choice, they just disabled Frostmages which is sad because it was an unique playstyle which will now die.

xylena_lazarow

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

I get frost staff loving Wardens probably aren't happy, but for the health of the class as a whole, this is a massive improvement.

It's a straight 12% damage loss to PvP Warden DD that's replaced by a stalemate passive. That's the opposite of healthy. I could get the damage back by switching to Lightning Staff, so very thematic, right?

React

xylena_lazarow wrote: »

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

I get frost staff loving Wardens probably aren't happy, but for the health of the class as a whole, this is a massive improvement.

It's a straight 12% damage loss to PvP Warden DD that's replaced by a stalemate passive. That's the opposite of healthy. I could get the damage back by switching to Lightning Staff, so very thematic, right?

You can get the damage back by using DW front and having 29.9k hp frontbar, while having an extra 12% block mitigation by using a health or prismatic glyph on a s&b backbar to be over 30k hp on that bar.

It's a logical change. No more double block weapons, and if you want good damage you'll have to sacrifice some HP. They should honestly apply this mechanic to more classes in the game.

Now they just need to nerf polar wind and undo the arctic change and warden will be in a good, reasonably balanced state.

Theist_VII

React wrote: »

Now they just need to nerf polar wind and undo the arctic change and warden will be in a good, reasonably balanced state.

Don’t know how they messed this one up.

When people think of problematic Wardens, Polar Wind is always brought up, not it’s other morph.

Yet the other morph is the one that got hit.

xylena_lazarow

React wrote: »

It's a logical change. No more double block weapons, and if you want good damage you'll have to sacrifice some HP. They should honestly apply this mechanic to more classes in the game.

This is a straight damage buff to the generic permablock turtle-and-combo playstyle that any class can do, as lower hp doesn't matter as much when you're not releasing block outside your ult dump. It's a nerf to the flavorful frost builds, utility hybrid builds, open world brawler bombers... but it buffs permablock DD. Gross. I'd rather fight MagSorcs.

Thanks ZOS for nerfing the new class I learn for the 2nd time this year. Time to reroll NB so I only ever get buffed.

Stafford197

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

Oh look, we disagree again

I get frost staff loving Wardens probably aren't happy, but for the health of the class as a whole, this is a massive improvement.

“Frost staff loving Wardens” are most players who play the class since it’s the only frost mage class. And it’s not as if theyre meta in PvE.
Piercing Cold’s new design is an irritating and bad constant 6 second cooldown proc effect.

Same for the Arctic Blast nerf. Chilled proc chance was reduced and having more front-loaded damage means it is now a much weaker DoT to cast prior to a fight.

Even if we were to not care about balance, the idea of a constant 6 second duration buff effect is just not fun. In other words, bad design.

xylena_lazarow

Stafford197 wrote: »

Even if we were to not care about balance, the idea of a constant 6 second duration buff effect is just not fun. In other words, bad design.

Very good point, adding a layer of micromanagement is anti-fun, on top of the unnecessary damage nerf.

Scyware

I just want stamden to be a thing again, these changes mean nothing to me. At all.

Skjaldbjorn

Scyware wrote: »

I just want stamden to be a thing again, these changes mean nothing to me. At all.

Uh? Stamden got a huge buff the last two patches. Que?

Arjuna1696

Scyware wrote: »

I just want stamden to be a thing again, these changes mean nothing to me. At all.

With a frost glyph on your back bar or just by slotting winters revenge, isn’t this a flat 10% dps increase for stamdens?

Skjaldbjorn

Arjuna1696 wrote: »

Scyware wrote: »

I just want stamden to be a thing again, these changes mean nothing to me. At all.

With a frost glyph on your back bar or just by slotting winters revenge, isn’t this a flat 10% dps increase for stamdens?

Stamden already slots both Winter's and Arctic Blast for DPS. Some run a frost glyph back. You could also run the 20s AoE scribing frost dot. This is basically the easiest passive to activate lol

Skjaldbjorn

Arjuna1696 wrote: »

Scyware wrote: »

I just want stamden to be a thing again, these changes mean nothing to me. At all.

With a frost glyph on your back bar or just by slotting winters revenge, isn’t this a flat 10% dps increase for stamdens?

Not 10% though. ~6%, 11% if you add in the netch from last patch.

Arjuna1696

Oh I’m dumb and was looking at the 6/12% blocking mitigation. 4/8% is still dope. I’ll take a 6% stamden damage buff all day.

Durham

You go out in pvp with less then 30k health. You’re just fodder for Sorcs and night blades.

I can see a polar wind nerf but Artic blast? Come on! Yet nothing even mentioned about the Sorcs Wards or the Crit healing of a Nigh Blade.

haelgaan

Arctic Blast keeps my rear alive in solo arenas and soloing dungeons. nerfing the only burst heal we have is a terribly idea.
and converting it to a DPS skill is worse than non-sense, this is in the 'tank' line of a warden, wtf does a tank need with that??

ZOS, keep your hands off of our burst heal.

Runefang

I wish they’d just change Artic Blast to either instant burst heal, stun or damage. They’ve constantly rebalanced the skill over the years to try and make it work and can’t get it right.

The tooltip will be so confusing now and a delayed burst heal is just dumb.

Araneae6537

Runefang wrote: »

I wish they’d just change Artic Blast to either instant burst heal, stun or damage. They’ve constantly rebalanced the skill over the years to try and make it work and can’t get it right.

The tooltip will be so confusing now and a delayed burst heal is just dumb.

Arctic blast should be damage and stun/slow/chill/something only. There’s already the other morph for a frosty heal.

ESO_Nightingale

haelgaan wrote: »

Arctic Blast keeps my rear alive in solo arenas and soloing dungeons. nerfing the only burst heal we have is a terribly idea.
and converting it to a DPS skill is worse than non-sense, this is in the 'tank' line of a warden, wtf does a tank need with that??

ZOS, keep your hands off of our burst heal.

That's a pretty hostile comment. I don't think you quite understand that just because its the line that gives you tanking stuff, doesn't mean its regulated entirely for tanking. Frost damage skills and frost dps exist within this line as well. You WILL share it and you will like it.

thadjarvis

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

Oh look, we disagree again

I get frost staff loving Wardens probably aren't happy, but for the health of the class as a whole, this is a massive improvement.

Agree with the sentiment but have to see how the changes play out. In my mind there are 6+ wardens.

PvP (hybrid by nature)
Tank
Healer
Frostden
Magden
Stamden

Ie it should NOT always be about frostden. It seems past few years the focus has been to try to be pro frostden and nerf PvP. Thinking about the whole class is better.

Though the fact that the warden solutions are damage done modifiers kinda shows that ZoS is not interested in coming up with a more class synergistic way to make damage work like other classes.

Skjaldbjorn

thadjarvis wrote: »

Though the fact that the warden solutions are damage done modifiers kinda shows that ZoS is not interested in coming up with a more class synergistic way to make damage work like other classes.

Que? I think our damage ramp coming off dealing cold damage is pretty thematic.

Nightblade Critical Damage, Critical Chance
DK: Increased Flame and Poison damage
Necro: Increased Damage over Time
Templar: Crit Damage, increased weapon/spell damage
Sorc: Inverse execute, increased physical and shock damage
Arcanist: Increased status effect damage, weapon damage, penetration and crit damage
Warden: Increased crit damage, chilled damage and damage ramp off frost damage

Not seeing the problem, honestly. The only way it could really be more "thematic" is increased Bleed/Frost, but that would require a complete overhaul of damage types on Warden skills. I think this is perfectly fine as a temporary or long-term solution. Not everything has to be a power fantasy tbh.

Durham

This is not popular at all with Wardens. In PVP it will further reduce the population by over half. Ice wardens already outnumber stamden. Keep in mind most good stamden run artic not polar so you might see a crash in the PvP population. Wardens have been performing about like DKs in the current patch

Personally with the current patch notes just run a night blade they can be anything at the moment.

warich

Honestly the most recent change is how it should be. ZOS stuck a class with a specific weapon after touting "play how you want" for a long time. All this does is give stamden a helping hand out from the ditch it was left in.

I get that you like the ice motif and that's fine, but stamden ceased to exist after the ice staves were grafted onto the class passive.

YandereGirlfriend

Fourme wrote: »

I couldn't be more happy with the change as a warden, I simply can't believe people are not happy they don't have to play with staves no more, + with the +5% bonus the netch gave us last patch, you can still use it and be relevent, AND, you can just use other weapons as well now, it's a great patch for wardens

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

Oh look, we disagree again

I get frost staff loving Wardens probably aren't happy, but for the health of the class as a whole, this is a massive improvement.

"Use other weapons now" = copy/paste DW front-bar like every other class in the game. Oh, joy.

YandereGirlfriend

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

thadjarvis wrote: »

Though the fact that the warden solutions are damage done modifiers kinda shows that ZoS is not interested in coming up with a more class synergistic way to make damage work like other classes.

Que? I think our damage ramp coming off dealing cold damage is pretty thematic.

Nightblade Critical Damage, Critical Chance
DK: Increased Flame and Poison damage
Necro: Increased Damage over Time
Templar: Crit Damage, increased weapon/spell damage
Sorc: Inverse execute, increased physical and shock damage
Arcanist: Increased status effect damage, weapon damage, penetration and crit damage
Warden: Increased crit damage, chilled damage and damage ramp off frost damage

Not seeing the problem, honestly. The only way it could really be more "thematic" is increased Bleed/Frost, but that would require a complete overhaul of damage types on Warden skills. I think this is perfectly fine as a temporary or long-term solution. Not everything has to be a power fantasy tbh.

Changing the damage types is actually one of the easiest and least-effort changes that they could possibly make. We could do that in a literal 5 minutes if ZOS let us fork their code, haha. That they haven't gone this obvious route, and have instead implemented all of these convoluted kludges over the years, is significantly more shocking.

It would be a dream come true for most Wardens to have all of the Stam skills deal Bleed and all of the Mag skills deal Frost. Then boost those damage types in the passives. Class identity would be at an all-time high and we could dispense with this Frankenstein abilities and passives like what we have this patch with AB and Piercing Cold.

Skjaldbjorn

YandereGirlfriend wrote: »

Changing the damage types is actually one of the easiest and least-effort changes that they could possibly make. We could do that in a literal 5 minutes if ZOS let us fork their code, haha. That they haven't gone this obvious route, and have instead implemented all of these convoluted kludges over the years, is significantly more shocking.

It would be a dream come true for most Wardens to have all of the Stam skills deal Bleed and all of the Mag skills deal Frost. Then boost those damage types in the passives. Class identity would be at an all-time high and we could dispense with this Frankenstein abilities and passives like what we have this patch with AB and Piercing Cold.

There has to be a reason they haven't, though. They've had ample opportunity. They changed half of bugs, half of birb, none of shalks, half of bear, etc. I can't speak to what it is, but they clearly have their reasons.

NuarBlack

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

YandereGirlfriend wrote: »

Changing the damage types is actually one of the easiest and least-effort changes that they could possibly make. We could do that in a literal 5 minutes if ZOS let us fork their code, haha. That they haven't gone this obvious route, and have instead implemented all of these convoluted kludges over the years, is significantly more shocking.

It would be a dream come true for most Wardens to have all of the Stam skills deal Bleed and all of the Mag skills deal Frost. Then boost those damage types in the passives. Class identity would be at an all-time high and we could dispense with this Frankenstein abilities and passives like what we have this patch with AB and Piercing Cold.

There has to be a reason they haven't, though. They've had ample opportunity. They changed half of bugs, half of birb, none of shalks, half of bear, etc. I can't speak to what it is, but they clearly have their reasons.

They don't actually play the game.

Skjaldbjorn

The other thing that I think some folks miss with the whole "change the damage type" argument. Sure, that's fine. It won't make anyone really use bird as a spammable because the skill is god awful regardless of which damage type it does. Mag bugs >>>>>>>>> stam bugs. Stam bear >>>>>>>>>>> mag bear. Switching damage types doesn't change either of those. Shalks is competitive on both sides in some respects atm, so there's that.

But changing damage types to appease a power fantasy won't change that we're gonna be using weapon skill spammables and a sprinkling of Warden skills, chiefly shalks, bear, winter's and arctic (maybe). Changing damage types won't alter that one bit.

NuarBlack

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

The other thing that I think some folks miss with the whole "change the damage type" argument. Sure, that's fine. It won't make anyone really use bird as a spammable because the skill is god awful regardless of which damage type it does. Mag bugs >>>>>>>>> stam bugs. Stam bear >>>>>>>>>>> mag bear. Switching damage types doesn't change either of those. Shalks is competitive on both sides in some respects atm, so there's that.

But changing damage types to appease a power fantasy won't change that we're gonna be using weapon skill spammables and a sprinkling of Warden skills, chiefly shalks, bear, winter's and arctic (maybe). Changing damage types won't alter that one bit.

It would be a start and provide a foundation for future changes at least. Right now there seems to be no vision for Warden and other classes.

Plus, classes that seem to have a clearer vision also seem to be doing better. So can't blame people for drawing a correlation.