Not quite ready to give up on Warden, lets look forward to U36

Mr_Stach · August 2022

A little bit of a repost over here so we can get some more traction, since PTS is over. U35 is a large disappointment for Wardens and although there are some generally nice changes for PvP, Warden took some very large hits in PvE.

Now let's look to the future: U36, Zos this is your Redemption Arc, let's focus in on the issues:

Warden Class identity and Vision (or lack thereof): Warden needs to be refocused, every time there is a good change for warden, there's 5 steps back. We have this cool split focus for Magicka and Stamina for Frost and Bleed, LEAN INTO THAT. Changing Passives should benefit those aspects not make either weaker. Look at Dragonknight, they are a perfect example of Updating Class Damage Types and Class Skills to fit a vison of what a class should be.
Damage Types: Controversial point, Get Rid of Magic Damage, I know a lot of people don't think that Warden just doing Frost makes sense, but we can't be "Master's of Frost" with just 2 working Frost Skills now can we, all of Warden's Magic is magical constructs, all of it can be whatever the Warden needs it to be, allowing it to be frost damage opens up some great possibilities.
Winter's Embrace has both Skills and Passives that need to have passes, Icy Aura is USELESS, Frozen Gate should be completely Reworked (hopefully as a damage skill)
Green Balance Has some skills and Passives that need to be looked over as well, such as Nature's Gift proccing when you heal yourself or Reworking Bursting Vines purely as a self heal.
Animal Companion, In the Past we've talked about making warden less dependent on the Bear, so we've nerfed the bear and buffed Advanced species, Nerfed Advanced Species, Nerfed The Bear Again, Buffed the Bear by giving it Hemo, and Completely reworked Advanced Species and Nerfed the Bear...... Have you thought about making the other Ultimate better? like ever? Stop trying to slap around the bear for doing bear things and make the alternative options more attractive.
Bleed: Stamden was getting so close with the Bleed Damage, all it needs is Passive Synergy, lean into that.
Status Effects:Warden should be the Best at Bleed and Chilled/Brittle in the same way that DK is the best at Burning and Poisoned, their Passives should reflect that.
Scorch: Revert Scorch and Morphs back to U34
Winter's Revenge: Tying a Class Skill to a Weapon Type is a Mistake. Class Skills and Weapon Types should work Independently of each other. I'm sure Zos can think of a more interesting way of making Magicka Warden better without hurting Stamina Warden's use of Winter's Revenge. Rethink this change completely.

Other things to consider:

UI Update for Scorch and Morphs, I'm sick of people's responses of people missing with Scorch as a "L2P Issue" Scorch is the ONLY Skill shot delayed burst in the game. You need to aim it, you need to time it, lower skilled players just miss, get frustrated and leave. Basic Concepts such as Skill Zones should already be built into the game, but I think it's even more essential for Scorch, so I would suggest a simple UI update while it is "charging"

Klingenlied · August 2022

Omg - there is a lot of good stuff here, but first to your picture, that is godly!

Reason not being that I like the proposed change. It would suck massively if I'd needa see any visual clue to see my skills landing. But: Scorch is, in my opionion, the worst iteration of any skillshot in any game I have ever played. It does not get worse fullstop.

If a skillshot gets any indication on where to land, it should be on or during button press, so that you have a few milliseconds to align correctly. Looking up to 9 seconds at a target area? Just more visual noise no ones wants.
So while I am behind a MASSIVE change on this skill, I'd say we finally break outta design-confort zone and add in cooldowns for skills that without cooldowns will never achieve a state where people are happy using it. So just make it activate instantly, slap a damage number on you find appropriate and let it enter a cooldown phase you find appropriate. 6 or 9 seconds would both be nice for stam / magica respective, especially if magica does the debuff aspect and slightly more damage.

On the element (ice and bleed)-side of things? Bring it on. I guess before I was more like: just keep some magic, but honestly? Pretty much everything player suggested seems better then what is done to the class by the devs. So maybe a more unified front may make Warden better in the end?

Besides. If Warden really received a thematic overhaul in regards to the elements and even some animation-tweaks (I guess a few color variations would be enough already to lean more into bleed / frost) that would / should allow for some more ideas or at least confidence in regards to ideas to improve upon the class. As OP mentioned, there is a lot of skills that are useless - even more so then before the patch due to nerfs. Anyway, stuff that is useless means opportunity to improve.

However, stuff to do ASAP to help Warden regain some footing:
#1 give back old 1%/2% to animal companion passive. Especially on Magica, we don't need more pen!
#2 Boost winters revenge dps by 30% Boost winters revenge damage by additional 30% when using an ice staff.

Both changes would not fix the class yet but help as a at least temporary band aid until you have figured out where to move next. I know we are just "the players" and might have no idea where you wanna go. However, we are pretty simple minded. We want to have fun with the classes we play. Simple as that. And because this actually has meaning to us, we take time to post here. So please, hear your community.

LiniFox · August 2022

Warden in PvE dps has lost so much, not just the damage but the fun

Mr_Stach · August 2022

Klingenlied wrote: »

Omg - there is a lot of good stuff here, but first to your picture, that is godly!

Reason not being that I like the proposed change. It would suck massively if I'd needa see any visual clue to see my skills landing. But: Scorch is, in my opionion, the worst iteration of any skillshot in any game I have ever played. It does not get worse fullstop.

If a skillshot gets any indication on where to land, it should be on or during button press, so that you have a few milliseconds to align correctly. Looking up to 9 seconds at a target area? Just more visual noise no ones wants.
So while I am behind a MASSIVE change on this skill, I'd say we finally break outta design-confort zone and add in cooldowns for skills that without cooldowns will never achieve a state where people are happy using it. So just make it activate instantly, slap a damage number on you find appropriate and let it enter a cooldown phase you find appropriate. 6 or 9 seconds would both be nice for stam / magica respective, especially if magica does the debuff aspect and slightly more damage.

On the element (ice and bleed)-side of things? Bring it on. I guess before I was more like: just keep some magic, but honestly? Pretty much everything player suggested seems better then what is done to the class by the devs. So maybe a more unified front may make Warden better in the end?

Besides. If Warden really received a thematic overhaul in regards to the elements and even some animation-tweaks (I guess a few color variations would be enough already to lean more into bleed / frost) that would / should allow for some more ideas or at least confidence in regards to ideas to improve upon the class. As OP mentioned, there is a lot of skills that are useless - even more so then before the patch due to nerfs. Anyway, stuff that is useless means opportunity to improve.

However, stuff to do ASAP to help Warden regain some footing:
#1 give back old 1%/2% to animal companion passive. Especially on Magica, we don't need more pen!
#2 Boost winters revenge dps by 30% Boost winters revenge damage by additional 30% when using an ice staff.

Both changes would not fix the class yet but help as a at least temporary band aid until you have figured out where to move next. I know we are just "the players" and might have no idea where you wanna go. However, we are pretty simple minded. We want to have fun with the classes we play. Simple as that. And because this actually has meaning to us, we take time to post here. So please, hear your community.

I don't think there's anything wrong with a skill having subtle visual cues. Guild Wars 2 Does it too, I think it's important to know where your skill will be effective

Chilly-McFreeze · August 2022

Klingenlied wrote: »

So while I am behind a MASSIVE change on this skill, I'd say we finally break outta design-confort zone and add in cooldowns for skills that without cooldowns will never achieve a state where people are happy using it. So just make it activate instantly, slap a damage number on you find appropriate and let it enter a cooldown phase you find appropriate. 6 or 9 seconds would both be nice for stam / magica respective, especially if magica does the debuff aspect and slightly more damage.

Are you saying Scorch needs to be an instant skill with a long cooldown? Or what skills are you actually talking about?
Beeing able to line up your burst with the delay on scorch is pretty much an essential part of wardens PvP playstyle. Same goes for curse on sorc, blastbones on necros.

#2 Boost winters revenge dps by 30% Boost winters revenge damage by additional 30% when using an ice staff.

Would still force wardens into running a specific weapon type. No one just gives away a 30% damage boost. If you're really on to that ice staff boni then add some utility or prolonging the dot time to save some recasts, but even then...

Mr_Stach · August 2022

I'm still against Class Skills having Weapons tied to them. It basically goes against ESO main philosophy of "Play how you want"

Keep them Separate, let them stand on their own feet.

dmnqwk · August 2022

I spent today going through my builds (1 of each class, half of them perform two roles) and Warden seems the most tolerable for me atm.

My permablock build was wrecked but I came up with a non-permablock tanking build with dps component (about 25-30k ST so good for a 30k resistant tank)

Stamden was interesting in that Sub Assault is now worse than Deep Fissure.
Because of the changes to Winter's Respite making it worthless for me (it's a 15k dot, I can't fit it in without giving up Fetcherflies, which'd cost me 1k penetration now) I can afford the magicka for those 2 magicka skills and I did enough damage I am satisfied stamden is still okay.

Regarding class identity... I am satisfied enough of a percentage of damage can be bleed for Wardens to provide it (though sub ass should be a bleed and not a poison ability) but they do need to work on more frost fun.
Having Screaming Cliff Racer changed to Tundra Cliff Racer and have it provide frost damage would go a long way to helping there - especially if the bonus applied major brittle to off-balance targets for 4 seconds.

Mr_Stach · August 2022

dmnqwk wrote: »

Having Screaming Cliff Racer changed to Tundra Cliff Racer and have it provide frost damage would go a long way to helping there - especially if the bonus applied major brittle to off-balance targets for 4 seconds.

Jyrus_JD · August 2022

I really liked the buff to Arctic blast, I’ve replaced entropy for it and it’s quite fun to use. Just wished it was slightly stronger. I wouldn’t mind if they changed Magden to be completely frost based but I do like the mix of both Magic and frost damage so while a bit meh about it at first I can get over it.

Caribou77 · August 2022

"But: Scorch is, in my opionion, the worst iteration of any skillshot in any game I have ever played. It does not get worse fullstop."

"I'm sick of people's responses of people missing with Scorch as a "L2P Issue" Scorch is the ONLY Skill shot delayed burst in the game. You need to aim it, you need to time it, lower skilled players just miss, get frustrated and leave."

Yes.

In addition to Scorch being the most challenging, slow, and awkward burst in the game, you have those dynamics exacerbated by lag in PVP.

Lining up a line of Scorch against a good player in lag is a very challenging, and it OFTEN MISSES, EVEN WHEN USED BY COMPETENT WARDENS.

So they increase the cost, nerf the damage on the 3 second burst, and here's the real kicker BONUS DAMAGE at 9 SECONDS AFTER you press the button. 9 SECONDS of jockeying around (in lag!) trying to keep it lined up on a decent player you're in combat against. This change, more than any other, makes me 100% certain that not a single person on the Dev Team plays warden. 9 seconds is an eternity in pvp.

The Dev Team's idea of a buff for MagWarden (widely accepted as the weakest pvp class) is to take their only powerful offensive skill and put in on a 9 second delay where you must continually keep focused on tracking the opponent to make it land. Just think, if your opponent is tanky enough to handle one hit from your 9 second deep fissure, you can quickly follow up with another "power shot" in another 9 seconds.

It's nuts how inept this change is.

Klingenlied · August 2022

Chilly-McFreeze wrote: »

Klingenlied wrote: »

So while I am behind a MASSIVE change on this skill, I'd say we finally break outta design-confort zone and add in cooldowns for skills that without cooldowns will never achieve a state where people are happy using it. So just make it activate instantly, slap a damage number on you find appropriate and let it enter a cooldown phase you find appropriate. 6 or 9 seconds would both be nice for stam / magica respective, especially if magica does the debuff aspect and slightly more damage.

Are you saying Scorch needs to be an instant skill with a long cooldown? Or what skills are you actually talking about?
Beeing able to line up your burst with the delay on scorch is pretty much an essential part of wardens PvP playstyle. Same goes for curse on sorc, blastbones on necros.

#2 Boost winters revenge dps by 30% Boost winters revenge damage by additional 30% when using an ice staff.

Would still force wardens into running a specific weapon type. No one just gives away a 30% damage boost. If you're really on to that ice staff boni then add some utility or prolonging the dot time to save some recasts, but even then...

Yes, instant or low delay skill with cooldown is what I wish for. ESO has action type combat. Delayed stuff where you wait almost 10 seconds (!!) for a skillshot to go off is just wrong no matter what angle from you look at. I mean I don't mind only using the skill every 9 or 6 seconds. But I mind this massive delay. 3 seconds was ok. 6 already pretty long and started feeling wrong. Now 9 seconds for magden? Feels really bad.

dmnqwk · August 2022

Mr_Stach wrote: »

dmnqwk wrote: »

Having Screaming Cliff Racer changed to Tundra Cliff Racer and have it provide frost damage would go a long way to helping there - especially if the bonus applied major brittle to off-balance targets for 4 seconds.

Stun is way too powerful for a spammable, sorry.
Perhaps if said immobilized that would be okay, but then no extra damage (because then the primary would be reduced) to compensate and make it a terrible ability.

Mr_Stach · August 2022

dmnqwk wrote: »

Mr_Stach wrote: »

dmnqwk wrote: »

Having Screaming Cliff Racer changed to Tundra Cliff Racer and have it provide frost damage would go a long way to helping there - especially if the bonus applied major brittle to off-balance targets for 4 seconds.

Stun is way too powerful for a spammable, sorry.
Perhaps if said immobilized that would be okay, but then no extra damage (because then the primary would be reduced) to compensate and make it a terrible ability.

Oh yeah this was an old thing and would be too strong. But what I wanted to highlight is Warden having interesting mechanics tied to the Chilled Status.

Mr_Stach · August 2022

Honestly they could do so much with Frost Damage or Warden in General, it's just very unimaginative.

I've been working on some Ideas myself such as retooling Frost Cloak, at this point I think it's ridiculous to have Expansive and Ice Fortress separate, so just slap the Minor Protection onto Expansive Frost Cloak to make room for a new thing in:

You still get your Resistance but now you get an Ice Wraith buddy and while it's active when you target someone you can activate it's Instant On-Demand Stun.

Would it be strong, yeah probably. But I just want to throw so ideas at the wall, it's all the rage right now.

lonnml · August 2022

Mr_Stach wrote: »

Honestly they could do so much with Frost Damage or Warden in General, it's just very unimaginative.

I've been working on some Ideas myself such as retooling Frost Cloak, at this point I think it's ridiculous to have Expansive and Ice Fortress separate, so just slap the Minor Protection onto Expansive Frost Cloak to make room for a new thing in:

You still get your Resistance but now you get an Ice Wraith buddy and while it's active when you target someone you can activate it's Instant On-Demand Stun.

Would it be strong, yeah probably. But I just want to throw so ideas at the wall, it's all the rage right now.

We already have a stun!

merpins · August 2022

Mr_Stach wrote: »

I'm still against Class Skills having Weapons tied to them. It basically goes against ESO main philosophy of "Play how you want"

Keep them Separate, let them stand on their own feet.

Even with the 30% damage increase, it does less damage than it did in U34. If you reduce the damage value by 55%, then increase the new damage value by 30%, it equals 58.5%. Meaning it's a 41.5% reduction in damage. It's bad regardless of if you add a staff to it, now imo.

Caribou77 · August 2022

Footage of a ZOS developer playing warden in pvp would go a long way toward reassuring me that the class will ever be viable (in pvp).

The consistently inept changes make me think that this does not happen.

Necrotech_Master · August 2022

merpins wrote: »

Mr_Stach wrote: »

I'm still against Class Skills having Weapons tied to them. It basically goes against ESO main philosophy of "Play how you want"

Keep them Separate, let them stand on their own feet.

Even with the 30% damage increase, it does less damage than it did in U34. If you reduce the damage value by 55%, then increase the new damage value by 30%, it equals 58.5%. Meaning it's a 41.5% reduction in damage. It's bad regardless of if you add a staff to it, now imo.

based on my testing with a mag warden, its effectively the same amount of dmg per tick as wall of elements now (using a frost staff)

both were ticking about 850-1000 dmg per tick (im not sure if the tooltip is adjusted for winters revenge when your using a staff though)

the only thing i have a problem with really is that the timer doesnt line up well with wall of elements

unstable wall is 10 sec, blockade is 15 sec, winters revenge is 12

Klingenlied · August 2022

Mr_Stach wrote: »

dmnqwk wrote: »

Having Screaming Cliff Racer changed to Tundra Cliff Racer and have it provide frost damage would go a long way to helping there - especially if the bonus applied major brittle to off-balance targets for 4 seconds.

The overall idea of added effects on chill is nice. However, the damage component alone is fine as is, would change it into deals 1/5 of its current damage as a new damage instance to all targets (including first hit one) in a small 3m radius.
The spellpower that right now is on the birds, i would move to magic shalk morph and remove both resistance shreds in exchange. Leave resistance shredding to tanks. When considering final dps output, it should be more about the power of the skills, not asking how much resistance shred or spellpower bonus you needa continue adding until warden does the same amount of damage as the others. I mean +400 spellpower for birds did not yet safe them, did it?

rexagamemnon · August 2022

U35 wasnt just a disappointment for wardens (and calling it a disappointment is a very nice way of putting it), but tragic for all classes really most notably Templar, and 2nd to Templar Dragonknight. And of course my luck Templar,DK, Warden, and Necro are my favorite classes to play (in that order) and Templar And DK got the worst changes of all. ZOS did us all dirty this Update.

etchedpixels · August 2022

Not really noticing much problem on my warden builds. Slightly shifted a few skills but the only Warden build that got noticeably nerfed was the shalks/razor caltrops/dark convergence/cleave build, and that mostly because DC got a much longer cooldown (about time too).

ESO_Nightingale · August 2022

etchedpixels wrote: »

Not really noticing much problem on my warden builds. Slightly shifted a few skills but the only Warden build that got noticeably nerfed was the shalks/razor caltrops/dark convergence/cleave build, and that mostly because DC got a much longer cooldown (about time too).

It's mostly pve dps that got cleaved

Caribou77 · August 2022

Hard nerf to deep fissure will hurt MagWarden badly in PVP, where it was already struggling hard.

Advanced Species, too.

warich · September 2022

I agree whole-heartedly with the original post. The thought you put behind each point makes it evident you know the class, unlike many who have said the changes were "good" and "didn't completely gut the class".

The only thing I would add is leave one of the gate morphs as is, I know several tanks who prefer gate over silver leash.

Thank you so much for your input, I really hope it gets noticed and listened to.

ESO_Nightingale · September 2022

I really hope that over time they begin to heavily lean into bleed/frost.

I'd be okay with next patch if we got a mythic that increases chilled's direct damage in some form whether it be a raw damage increase or my favourite concept, increasing it's damage by making it passively execute. We're so built into chilled proc that the only thing really holding us back is chilled's pitiful damage. Giving up an item slot to do a ton of damage with chilled seems fair to me.

awesomedave55 · September 2022

As a BrittleZenDen main I support this

ESO_Nightingale · September 2022

awesomedave55 wrote: »

As a BrittleZenDen main I support this

It's always been the right side picture lol

The meta brittleden builds have ways tried as hard as possible to use as little frost dps as they could.