Heavy armor is so OP in 1.6

Frenkthevile · January 2015

After 8 months of PIJAMAS i finnaly say: YESSS!

Laggus · January 2015

Bouvin wrote: »

dharbert wrote: »

It's not OP, it's common sense. If someone is trying to kill you with a given weapon or skill, which is going to protect you more? Full plate armor, or a bathrobe? Working as it should...,

Where are the heavy penalties to Dodge Roll, Movement Speed, and Sprint Cost for heavy armor users then?

Do all that and you will have no stamina in under 5 secs on PTS right now unless your blocking nothing. Stamina regen sucks is the general feedback so far. Theres so much now that uses up stamina other than simply blocking and theres so much more to block (AoEs).

Mjollnir_NL · January 2015

riverdragon72 wrote: »

Stepping out into Cyrodiil in light armor on PTS, you might as well be naked with a roll of toilet paper for a sheild. I tried to get off the porch at sejanus and the snipers had me dead in less than 10 seconds Nothing was "fixed", the imbalance was just flip flopped.

People should not go to war in there pyjamas, dress or naked. Only if your on long distance. Like drone pilots

Animus_Igneus · January 2015

If you think Heavy Armor users can keep up casting at anywhere near the same rate as Light Armor users you've gotta be taking the ***.

I play a DK All-Heavy tank on the PTS and so far, I've seen my Magicka drain pretty damn fast, I can probably cast high-cost abilities like Talons a handful of times before it's all gone. I'm glad they've made it how it is because before, people would never even consider wearing all 7 pieces of Heavy Armor, they'd generally use it with 2 Light pieces if they used it at ALL.

No more light armor tanks is fine by me - Heavy Armor's been given the defensive boost it needs to make it a more valid choice, nothing wrong with that.

Digiman · January 2015

Nightreaver wrote: »

Overall it I feel it seems fairly balanced. I have no problem accepting Heavy armor offering better protection as long as the tin cans have no problem accepting Light armor offering better DPS.

Same. Which is why I am really hoping cloth magicka users can blast a target to bits in seconds if not dealt with.

I don't want a scenario in PvP where cloth can barely get any damage done to a heavy armor user as he shreds the cloth caster apart in seconds.

Maulkin · January 2015

As somebody who cares for balance, I find comments like the bolded part below and the fact that if gets "Likes" and "Awesomes", as the reason devs largely ignore feedback from the gaming community.

Mjollnir_NL wrote: »

Even if heavy is OP. Was about time. I just kept on running heavy because in my eyes a tank should look like a tank. And talking about the "Tank" it should have a big gun. Just like real tanks.

Don't get me wrong, I've been shouting for heavy armour buffs for months too, but if Heavy Armour became obviously OP and all the meta was wearing heavy, the game would get very stale very quick again.

I just don't understand the vengeful mentality of "A was OP so now B should be OP". God forbid we ever achieve a semblance of balance eh?

Nacario · January 2015

riverdragon72 wrote: »

Stepping out into Cyrodiil in light armor on PTS, you might as well be naked with a roll of toilet paper for a sheild. I tried to get off the porch at sejanus and the snipers had me dead in less than 10 seconds Nothing was "fixed", the imbalance was just flip flopped.

And exactly what did u expect to be different in said situation? Ur light armor, ur defensives are active abilities not passive like heavy armor. Did u think u could walk out in the open and tank those snipers, as u wrote, they were two or more. Im shocked how it took them 10 seconds, sounds like balanced to me!

fromtesonlineb16_ESO · January 2015

To me this thread simply proves yet again that mixing PVP and PVE in one game is doomed to fail every time .. the mechanics needed to get 'balance' in PVP are entirely different from PVE, and as Blizzard have shown for 10+ years and several other games over lesser time it is IMPOSSIBLE to balance both at the same time.

Right now ZOS are swinging the pendulum from one extreme to the other, please one set of players (PVE) and pissing-off another set (PVP) .. it's always the same in hybrid games.

PVP and PVE should be kept separate. There was never a need for ESO to have any PVP it's an artificial addition to the TES genre that will always cause drama and endless nerf-batting as ZOS vainly try to achieve what MMO developers with clearly far more experience and skill than they have, have failed to do before them.

Solanum · January 2015

I don't see why people are so terrified of heavy armor being more survivable then light.

If anything the removal of soft caps favours the armor with reduced costs and increased regeneration %. Light and medium will be far better then they currently are.

Just not passively as survivable, you may have to cast a heal with that endless manapool, or a shield, boohoo.

Mjollnir_NL · January 2015

mike.gaziotisb16_ESO wrote: »

Mjollnir_NL wrote: »

Even if heavy is OP. Was about time. I just kept on running heavy because in my eyes a tank should look like a tank. And talking about the "Tank" it should have a big gun. Just like real tanks.

Don't get me wrong, I've been shouting for heavy armour buffs for months too, but if Heavy Armour became obviously OP and all the meta was wearing heavy, the game would get very stale very quick again.

I just don't understand the vengeful mentality of "A was OP so now B should be OP". God forbid we ever achieve a semblance of balance eh?

Ofcourse i was half joking. It is important that there is something to choise and there should be differences. But whatever ZOS does there will always be something to complain i supose. I am just a normal player. So i get the basics and did read some stuff to make a good build (but in a way i like to play, so heavy). But that is about it. So half of the time i have no clue where everyone is talking about :-) A lot is theory and does not really make a big difference at all. A good player is more important that a perfect build. IMHO

Valencer · January 2015

fromtesonlineb16_ESO wrote: »

To me this thread simply proves yet again that mixing PVP and PVE in one game is doomed to fail every time .. the mechanics needed to get 'balance' in PVP are entirely different from PVE, and as Blizzard have shown for 10+ years and several other games over lesser time it is IMPOSSIBLE to balance both at the same time.

Right now ZOS are swinging the pendulum from one extreme to the other, please one set of players (PVE) and pissing-off another set (PVP) .. it's always the same in hybrid games.

PVP and PVE should be kept separate. There was never a need for ESO to have any PVP it's an artificial addition to the TES genre that will always cause drama and endless nerf-batting as ZOS vainly try to achieve what MMO developers with clearly far more experience and skill than they have, have failed to do before them.

Imbalances in PvP generally translate directly into imbalances in PvE (and the other way around), unless it´s about skills or abilities that are exclusive to one or the other. Do you really think light armour was too strong in PvP but just fine in PvE? I'm sure that's why we've had to put up with "magicka DPS only".

Those damn PvPers ruining my PvE!

Razzak · January 2015

fromtesonlineb16_ESO wrote: »

To me this thread simply proves yet again that mixing PVP and PVE in one game is doomed to fail every time .. the mechanics needed to get 'balance' in PVP are entirely different from PVE, and as Blizzard have shown for 10+ years and several other games over lesser time it is IMPOSSIBLE to balance both at the same time.

Right now ZOS are swinging the pendulum from one extreme to the other, please one set of players (PVE) and pissing-off another set (PVP) .. it's always the same in hybrid games.

PVP and PVE should be kept separate. There was never a need for ESO to have any PVP it's an artificial addition to the TES genre that will always cause drama and endless nerf-batting as ZOS vainly try to achieve what MMO developers with clearly far more experience and skill than they have, have failed to do before them.

I think it is possible, but devs like to point the blame onto the balancing (or other mechanics) itself, as they know players will eat that up and believe it. Years after Wow's devs said that introduction of instanced PVP was to blame for the game not having a balanced classes, players still use this excuse as holy truth.

Balancing cannot happen with armor alone. Like some have already said, heavy armor should be more cumbersome compared to light armor. That is just one of many mechanics that should be involved in balancing. It's definitely not easy, but it's also definitely not impossible.

On the other hand, would MMOs survive for years if there was not a constant balancing issue?

Maotti · January 2015

Hmm. Maybe time for my main to suit up in Heavy Armor again.

Joy_Division · January 2015

It's clear from looking at the responses in the thread that very few people actually read the OP.

I_killed_Vivec · January 2015

Solanum wrote: »

I don't see why people are so terrified of heavy armor being more survivable then light.

If anything the removal of soft caps favours the armor with reduced costs and increased regeneration %. Light and medium will be far better then they currently are.

Just not passively as survivable, you may have to cast a heal with that endless manapool, or a shield, boohoo.

I agree.

I always wondered why people argued that a tank "must" wear heavy armour (particularly as ZOS promised you can play how you want). Why not run around in light armour, as long as you can mitigate the damage?

But there must be a trade-off.

If you forego the passive defences of HA and choose to wear LA for the benefits it gives you, then your defences have to become active.

Just as if you choose to have the passive defences provided by HA you do so at the cost of not having the passives provided by LA...

The real question is one of balance.

As we have seen ZOS have not always been successful at this - the prevalence sticks and dressing gowns, for instance - but only time will tell if they are getting it right now.

fromtesonlineb16_ESO · January 2015

Razzak wrote: »

On the other hand, would MMOs survive for years if there was not a constant balancing issue?

Of course.

IMO MMO longevity stems from a continual supply of new content as well as character progression .. be it vertical or horizontal when no level increase is needed .. and the addition of new skills and also the possible elimination of some; Blizzard have done this twice now in WOW and clearly have taken it too far but per se there's no reason old skills can't be removed if they not longer server a purpose.

'Imbalance' isn't inevitable, but clearly is likely and I'm not arguing against continual 'refinement' .. but these U6 changes, like several before in ESO and large numbers across MMOs of all kinds, is anything but subtle and considered, the nerfbat is swinging violently as it has done before and will do again.

The main driver for this as I see it is constant PVP QQ. Sure, there are some imbalances in PVE but PVE isn't 'competitive' all classes DON'T NEED to be equal, as long as they're VIABLE that's all that matters.

Fivefivesix · January 2015

Aw man that's awesome! I love heavy armor!

Gargragrond · January 2015

After some testing, it seems that heavy armor resource management has taken a huge hit. The constitution passive provides half the resources it used to, and break free reduction is gone. The block cost reduction is still there, but even with that, blocking seems still insanely expensive and quite suicidal. Heavy does have better damage mitigation than light, but you can still get hit for 50% of your hp by a single non-blocked attack.

Currently in live, the heavy provides alternative to light armor shield stacking via the block cost reduction (and block casting), but this playstyle seems no longer viable. I'd guess people complaining about block-casting will be pleased

. Anyway, lot of things have changed and it will take some more time to get a full picture. So far, the medium armor has given me the best results because stamina is now even more critical.

fromtesonlineb16_ESO · January 2015

I_killed_Vivec wrote: »

I always wondered why people argued that a tank "must" wear heavy armour (particularly as ZOS promised you can play how you want). Why not run around in light armour, as long as you can mitigate the damage?

ZOS design for ESO simply exacerbates this hugely.

By allowing all classes to wear all gear they seriously limit the scope the have to put penalties/bonuses on gear which take into account race/class limits.

Where any race can be any class and can wear any armour then what we see is what we get .. some class skills hugely favour some combinations and so they become the 'must haves', like Light Armour is now.

To get to your question, per se there's no reason it can't be done in Light .. the trouble is the class/race/whatever skills needed to provide that mitigation mean used in other contexts (non-tanking) lead to huge OPness; in ESO right now we're surrounded by it.

Cuyler · January 2015

First off, it should be apparent by now that ZOS has no idea what they are doing when it comes to balancing anything in this game.

Second the reason this is an issue is because in PvP there are already DKs that are nearly immortal and this change to HA, along with the 1.6 buff to DKs, will make them 2x more likely to be unkillable. It's just a stupid, stupid mechanic and completely ruins the PvP experience. gg @ZOS

Finally, ZOS has a hard time comprehending that if you buff something to OP status you need to have a counter mechanic that is compromising something from the build. In the case of HA, it needs to make you move slower, cost more stam to perform feats (dodge, run, interrupt etc.) and increase stealth detection radius.

Personally I feel LA being1/4 the armor of HA is a little harsh. Should be more like 50% LA, 75% MA, 100% HA.

danno8 · January 2015

On the PTS I went and made a heavy armour version of the seducer/magnus combo that my Templar currently has a light version of. All the same magicka enchants, and all passives in both lines. I entered PvP.

I run out of magicka super fast compared to light, so I end up standing there with no resources just taking damage until I die.

Blazing Shield
Heavy
cost : 2935 casts (in combat): 5

Light
cost: 2332 casts (in combat): 9

4 more casts is an increase of 80% and makes a huge difference in sustainable DPS.

Vampires Bane
Heavy 15 casts (in combat)
light 27 casts (in combat)

Again an increase of 80%.

There is a huge difference in sustainable DPS, not to mention availability of utility and other useful spells.

OP, I don't know how you have come to your conclusion but clearly for DPS setups light armour (or medium for more stamina based builds) is the way to go.

Lynx7386 · January 2015

Lightning staff vs guy in full METAL armor should do a TON of damage.

Someone has never heard of a faraday cage. Not saying our heavy armor is designed that way, but it could be possible.

Valencer · January 2015

Cuyler wrote: »

Finally, ZOS has a hard time comprehending that if you buff something to OP status you need to have a counter mechanic that is compromising something from the build. In the case of HA, it needs to make you move slower, cost more stam to perform feats (dodge, run, interrupt etc.) and increase stealth detection radius.

Because heavy armour has no drawbacks whatsoever. Especially not the ones you just listed (reduced mobility, greater resource costs...)

They should totally get to nerfing that health regeneration boost. It's crazy good.

Cuyler · January 2015

Valencer wrote: »

Cuyler wrote: »

Finally, ZOS has a hard time comprehending that if you buff something to OP status you need to have a counter mechanic that is compromising something from the build. In the case of HA, it needs to make you move slower, cost more stam to perform feats (dodge, run, interrupt etc.) and increase stealth detection radius.

Because heavy armour has no drawbacks whatsoever. Especially not the ones you just listed (reduced mobility, greater resource costs...)

They should totally get to nerfing that health regeneration boost. It's crazy good.

Maybe I missed where it says HA slows you down, could you provide some evidence? It doesn't have greater resource cost, it buffs health and stam but doesn't reduce the mag cost like LA. That's not the same as increasing costs for sneaking for instance. Again maybe I missed it and you could back up that statement.

The health regen boost being the only buff is an understatement on your part. HA gets all the armor and spell resist. It should only be armor. Spell resist should have to be acquired another way than simply putting on plate.

morvegil · January 2015

I guess you guys are forgetting all the passives now.

eliisra · January 2015

Valencer wrote: »

Because heavy armour has no drawbacks whatsoever. Especially not the ones you just listed (reduced mobility, greater resource costs...)

They should totally get to nerfing that health regeneration boost. It's crazy good.

There are drawbacks, unsure if enough. I did some sloppy spam testing with my template on PT. Light vs. heavy. Same magicka pool 23k and same jewellery with cost reduction and recovery. In light I could use Breath of Life 11 times in a row. In heavy I could use it 9 times in a row.

Add Seducer, Engine guard, Spell symmetry and other restore skills, warlock and magicka potions, cost reduction from CS in the mix and I can totally see myself PvP healing in at least 5 heavy pieces in 1.6. That is if light is still made out of paper.

Orchish · January 2015

Cuyler wrote: »

First off, it should be apparent by now that ZOS has no idea what they are doing when it comes to balancing anything in this game.

Second the reason this is an issue is because in PvP there are already DKs that are nearly immortal and this change to HA, along with the 1.6 buff to DKs, will make them 2x more likely to be unkillable. It's just a stupid, stupid mechanic and completely ruins the PvP experience. gg @ZOS

Finally, ZOS has a hard time comprehending that if you buff something to OP status you need to have a counter mechanic that is compromising something from the build. In the case of HA, it needs to make you move slower, cost more stam to perform feats (dodge, run, interrupt etc.) and increase stealth detection radius.

Personally I feel LA being1/4 the armor of HA is a little harsh. Should be more like 50% LA, 75% MA, 100% HA.

No it won't, not even close to it. Have you even played a DK in heavy in current PTS? Resource management is non existent. You hold block against just a few players and you'll be out of stamina and dead very quickly, and that's without doing any dps at all. The strength of the godlike DK's you are on about just the same as the templars/sorcs are the light wearing shield stackers. The impression i get from your comment is that you are a light armour user and don't like the fact your armour has taken a nerf.

Cathrin · January 2015

GreyBrow wrote: »

Nestor wrote: »

Heavy Armor should give the most protection.

Okay smart guy

Lightning staff vs guy in full METAL armor should do a TON of damage.

Light armor should be weak vs steel, strong vs magic.

Heavy armor should be weak vs magic, strong vs steel.

Medium armor should be just that --> medium vs all.

All of this plus no matter what armor you are wearing, if you are not a Nord, you should freeze to death in Eastmarch

Rioht · January 2015

Completely agree, there should be a much more substancial defecit to spell cost while wearing heavy armor.

Not so much that players have to choose one or the other, aka class balance?

Wifeaggro13 · January 2015

xCHEMISTx wrote: »

One day the skirt wearers and the metal heads will learn to live in harmony.

If they combine we will have a new class called Motley crew.