Ability secondary use

KaironBlackbard · May 5

The ability to slot active abilities as passive would be fun.
You would have a primary and secondary bar, attached to your weapon slots like the active bars.
Abilities slotted here would normally have reduced but constant effects, and reduce max resources or resource generation.
Ultimate would reduce Ultimate regeneration and normally have greatly weaker effects than their active counterparts.
Most abilities would become passive effects or auras.
Some might have an auto cast feature.
Some might have proc conditions.

Beware, because they reduce your maximums, you will have reduced damage if your damage is from the reduced resource.
Choose your skills wisely.

I'm still in the process of designing a theoretical function for each ability, mostly being pulled from ESO Hub.
I've got most of nightblade, weapons and armor and a few guilds.

I would use this, but I also foresee some people hating it because they lost 30 damage when trying it out.
I still think it will be fun.

Soarora · May 5

This could be bad for powercreep and complexity reasons, but could also be a way to implement class diversity (making the classes feel different to play).

KaironBlackbard · May 21

What is "Powercreep"

Soarora · May 21

KaironBlackbard wrote: »

What is "Powercreep"

Powercreep occurs when a game developer adds additional power to the game without buffing previous content, leading to content getting easier and easier. Unfortunately, eso already has a lot of this problem, which is very evident in trials and dungeons but even evident in worldbosses.

This is probably part of why we had U35, which cut the ceiling of damage and led to a lot of people leaving. That said, the ceiling of damage is even higher than it was then now... and U35 was, what, 2 years ago?

KaironBlackbard · May 21

Actually, with my idea, people would lose damage output by slotting actives in the passive section, due to the fact it reduces their max resource instead of costing anything.
Because of that, their damage is reduced.
You have to choose wisely what you slot as passives. Sometimes it might be a buff, sometimes its cost does more harm than good and ends up reducing damage instead of increasing.

KaironBlackbard · May 21

Also, it would only really effect buff abilities. I highly doubt you could use offensive abilities as passives.
Unless they apply their status effects to the offensive ability slotted in the active bar above them?
Possible effect:
Sword and Shield, NB, Lotus Fan slotted in Active Slot 1. Pierce Armor slotted in Passive Slot 1.
With sword and shield equipped, Lotus Fan will also taunt enemies and apply Major and Minor Breach.

This mostly effects buff abilities though:
Refreshing Path - you gain Minor Endurance and Intellect at all times, as well as Major Expedition. You also gain a small heal over time at all times. This buff may radiate to allies within 3-7 meters of you. If it does radiate, it persists on them for 3-4 seconds after they leave the area around you.

Shadowy Disguise:
Free: Counts as slotted for shadow passives. Grants its buffs, acting as slotted.
Reduced Cost: Attacking from stealth is always a critical strike.
Full Cost: Enter stealth faster. Activating stealth in combat has a chance to consume magicka to turn you invisible for 3 seconds, and activates all effects of this ability (next attack within 3 seconds is a guaranteed critical strike.)

Abilities with slotted benefits can be slotted for their effects, or be slotted here to count as slotted.
This is free and provides no additional benefit beyond slotted bonuses.
Costlier variations have more effects, and can even provide altered variations of the ability at all times or by proc. As such, proc abilities may be disabled in NoCP PvP campaigns.

Templar's Aura ability is free to slot, as it is free to cast. It becomes a true aura slotted this way. You, like normal, reap its benefits at all times. But this way, instead of casting for free to pulse to allies, it is instead an aura. Allies within the radius receive the buffs, but they don't have a duration.

Undaunted's Health pool. I forgot its name.
While Slotted passively, reduces your max health, but applies Minor Lifesteal to enemies within 28 meters of you.
Allies within 28 meters of you can activate the synergy once every 30 seconds, or some calculation based on your health recovery and healing received and the cost of the ability to determine how often it would have been castable to determine how often they can use the synergy from you.

Want more examples? Please ask me which abilities you'd like a theory for.

KaironBlackbard · May 23

@Soarora
What would you use with this expansion?
What would you slot?
Do you think it would buff you, or might the combined penalty be so great that it nukes your damage?

Werewolf gets nothing from this btw, as you can't use any non werewolf abilities on the werewolf bar.

Turtle_Bot · May 23

This would be completely broken and power creep the game like crazy.

Example:

Sorc:

Active slot 1:
Crushing Shock (destro skill)
Passive slot 1:
Mages Wrath (cheap execute proc)
I now have 1 button that deals a full spammables worth of damage per cast, interrupts casting enemies, and also has a built in AoE execute proc (or I could go endless fury instead for resource restore on this ability).

Active slot 2:
Haunting Curse (delayed burst)
Passive slot 2:
Crystal Frags/Weapon (cheap burst damage)
My delayed burst now can either reduce the cost of my abilities by 10%, cause the next curse to deal 66% more damage (while costing 50% less) or inflict unique armor debuff when its cast.

Alternative Active slot 2 (for pets):
Elemental Susceptibility (long duration, free to cast major breach + status effect procs)
Alternative Passive slot 2:
Daedric prey (unique buff for pets)
Now I have a 60s long duration free to cast ability that inflicts major breach, procs all elemental status effects and buffs my pet damage by 45% for its duration.

Active slot 3:
Inner Light (mages guild)
Passive slot 3:
Critical Surge (brutality/sorcery + heal on dealing crit damage)
I now have a slotted passive ability (that I don't need to cast), that passively grants major brutality, sorcery, savagery and prophecy as well as 5% max magicka (and 2% max magicka/regen from mages guild passives) that also passively heals me whenever I deal critical damage.

Active slot 4:
Bound Aegis (daedric summoning skill)
Passive slot 4:
Hurricane (sorc armor buff that is also AoE damage over time)
I now have permanent uptime on major resolve, minor resolve, minor expedition and minor protection as well as +8% max magicka on a skill that I don't need to activate at all.

Active slot 5:
Hardened Ward (shield + heal)
Passive slot 5:
Vibrant shroud (AoE burst heal) OR Dark exchange (heal + resource restore)
If I don't want to run the pets, I could combine this instead and have an insane giga heal on top of a huge shield that can either heal allies + grant minor vitality to nearby allies and inflict major maim on nearby enemies or it grants me a burst of resources back that cannot be interrupted + minor berserk (and potentially minor force).

Alternative Active slot 5 (for pets):
Twilight (pet)
Alternative Passive slot 5:
Scamp (pet)
Now every time I heal with matriarch it also creates an AoE DoT that stuns around the matriarch (or I could go the other way where every time I activate the scamps AoE, it also heals itself and 2 allies).

Active Ultimate slot:
Negate (or meteor)
Passive Ultimate slot:
Energy Overload (sorc toggle ultimate that alters light attacks and restores resources)
My ultimate now passively changes my regular light attacks into overloads that restore resources on hit while I have ultimate while also getting to keep saving up for the big burst (or disruptive) ultimate in meteor or negate.

Front bar has a total of 13900 less max magicka and 2300 less stamina.

This is just on the front bar too, now imagine all the extra utility I could add onto an entire back bar worth of skills, such as:

BB Active skill 1:
Steak (class teleport/stun)
BB Passive skill 1:
Race against time (speed buff, snare removal/immunity and crit damage buff).
My class teleport/AoE stun now also grants me major expedition, snare/immobilize removal/immunity and buffs my crit damage (minor force).

BB Active skill 2:
Elemental Susceptibility (major breach + multi-status effects, free to cast)
BB Passive skill 2:
Rune cage (ranged stun that can't be blocked)
I now have a free to cast major breach that also applies a debuff that attempts to stun the target.

BB Active skill 3:
Wall of elements
BB Passive skill 3:
Caltrops
My AoE DoT with burst at the end now also applies AoE major breach and a snare to enemies hit (on the damage morphs that inflict concussed or burning). Basically all forms of wall becomes frost wall but with more damage.

BB Active skill 4:
Structured Entropy (DoT + heal)
BB Passive skill 4:
Cleanse (purges debuffs and heals if it purges anything)
I now have a DoT that heals me and cleanses (+ bonus heal) that is super cheap to cast and lasts a long time.

BB Active skill 5:
Inner rage (ranged taunt)
BB Passive skill 5:
Bone surge (undaunted damage shield)
I now have a ranged taunt that also grants me a significant damage shield that also grants Major vitality, further increasing the shield size and healing taken.

BB Active Ultimate:
Precognition (psijic ultimate)
BB Passive Ultimate:
Spell wall (sword and board ultimate)
I now have a defensive ultimate that resets my health/resources, can be used even when I am CC'd and grants free block and projectile reflection for 7 seconds.

Back bar has a total of 15100 less max magicka and 6000 less max stamina. If we remove cleanse from entropy, max mag is only reduced by 7300, which is tiny (I used the expensive morph of cleanse that also heals, hence why it is so much).
I can also slot the pets as "passive effects" on the back bar so they don't despawn when I bar swap.

On a regular PvE build that would typically have 40k+ max magicka (or max stamina) these reductions bring my max magicka down to 25-30k which is plenty to be able to keep using all of my abilities while getting those bonus secondary effects for free.

Keep in mind that I don't have to cast inner light or bound aegis and would have permanent uptime on the 3 main basic major buffs for damage (brutality/sorcery), crit chance (prophecy/savagery) and armor (resolve).

I also have a free to cast ability on my back bar that inflicts major breach and attempts to stun the target, and a damage over time ability that also passively heals me and cleanses negative effects off me. I have a teleport that makes me immune to most soft CC, a taunt that provides a bonus damage shield and rare buff and a full power spammable that is also an execute.

Even on other classes that don't have the same ability to stack max stats like sorc does, the fact that they can put costly things like buff abilities (armor buffs, etc) on passive abilities like inner-light or camo-hunter to have them permanently active or expensive utility/debuff/CC abilities on a free to cast ability like elemental susceptibility means that even though those classes would have closer to 30-35k max stats (in PvE), they will only be reduced down to 20-25k max stats, which is still plenty to do their thing, especially since the rotations are much simpler and cheaper thanks to not needing to activate expensive abilities/buffs like armor buff/damage buff, etc or debuffs like CC, etc.

This is just for sorc too, a class that typically has minimal secondary effects/buffs/debuffs, other classes would be just as absurd if this were created with the amount of effects, buffs and debuffs they could stack.

It's a cool idea to think about, but it would be a complete nightmare to balance, even if it was just 1 ability slot that could have it.

Just_Attivi · May 23

I do think its a cool idea, but as others have said, good lord this would be broken AF lol. The balancing that would be needed for this is an act that I really dont think ZOS could pull off without first nuking the world and then nerfing the abilities to the point that its not worth slotting any.

an alternative, along the same vein, might be like a class identity twist.

Just spitballin an idea, ive given this like 20 seconds of thought, but its functionally similar to a concept from a different game that implemented it well. this would obviously need that same balancing act that i doubt is possible with this game, but it is fun to think about.
so, example:

Templar: we all think tanky, healy, jabby
Class Twist: select one, from a choice of 3, that embody the templar archetype

Aedric Spear Twist: similar to Burning Light, but based on class skill usage, builds stacks to release extra damage
Dawns Wrath Twist:Based on usage of class skills, after x stacks gives the player a solar barrage like aura, granting major defile to all nearby enemies and major vitality for 4 seconds
Restoring Light Twist: Based on usage of class skills, after x stacks, restore 242 resource to party members within x meters (same value as rune focus). attribute is based on highest max stat of player (tank likely gets health, DPS likely get mag/stam based on what they use)

Im sure that could be fine tuned/made cooler, and definitely would need balancing, idk how many stacks of what would equate to how much uptime of a thing. but an idea like that would simplify the system, allow it to help customize a character to a role, help bring in a little class identity in a way that is easily controlled without introducing too many broken possibilities like turtle pointed out (and if we give it colorful glowy light effects, itll feel like it too! red lights?! DK! Yellow Lights? Templar! Green lights? Arcanist! Night Lights? NB, you lil baby you

)

KaironBlackbard · May 23

Remember, Ultimates as passives reduce ultimate generated. Some so much that ult gen is practically negated. Some even reduce ult capacity, which can reduce the effects of some sets and passive skills. If the cost of both ultimates are great enough, the passive one might reduce capacity so much that you can't even cast your active ultimate.
Some ults however would increase the cost of your main ultimate and grant an altered effect.
Overload for instance would increase the cost of the Ultimate by about 75-150, and on ultimate cast grant you lightning fingers for 15-30 seconds, normally scaling with the active ultimate's duration. Some don't last long so this thing needs a minimum duration.

I think the damage scaling is 20 resource per damage point?
so 13900 less mag would be 695 less magic damage
2300 less stamina would be 115 less physical damage
hmm, I thought it was more potent than that...
10 resource per damage point According to this Reddit reply, don't know about its accuracy.
13900 less mag would be 1390 less magic damage
2300 less stamina would be 230 less physical damage
That's more like what I was thinking.

Let's take Dragonknight's armor ult.
Damage taken is capped at 30-35% max health (instead of 3%).
Ultimate generated reduced by 1 or 2.
Damage Shield Morph (Magma Shell): increase active ultimate's cost by 50%-75% of the cost of this ult, on cast it grants you and nearby allies a damage shield
Poison Morph (Corrosive Armor): Ultimate generation decreased by 2, you ignore 15%-30% of enemy armor. Enhances active ultimate: Casting ult with the cost of this ultimate more than needed, you also upgrade to this ultimate for its normal duration (3% cap, ignore all armor, AoE effect) but cannot generate ultimate for the duration.
Example: If you cast Dragon Leap (125) with enough to proc the upgrade (+200 = 325) then you get both effects at once.
Be warry though, your ultimate generation is nearly nullified.

So be careful what you use. All passive ults reduce generation by at least 1 point, making it take longer before you can cast another ult. Most ults increase cost and grant additional effects to the active ult. Some grant buffs. Some allow for passive effects but most don't.

Some ults have passive effects, and those ones might be able to be slotted for free to gain its passive effect only.
Nightblade: Soul Harvest. While slotted on either bar, any time you kill an enemy gain 10 ultimate.
You can also slot it where it reduces ultimate generation by 1 to cause them to take 5%-10% increased damage from you for 4 seconds any time you hit them. That is a reduced effect from what it normally has (20%, 8 seconds).
It might also allow you to inflict Major Defile any time you hit them. Or that might be an additional 1 reduced ult gen.

You can free slot any ability to gain its slotted effects, but nothing from its active effects.
Abilities slotted passively cannot be slotted actively, and vise versa.
Some abilities might be difficult to translate into a costing passive, like Nightblade's Siphoning Strikes. That one might be free only, as how would its active effect proc? Maybe as a resource restore every 4000 healing received, reducing max health by 4000? That might work.

Now for your first bar, my hypothesis.

Active slot 1:
Crushing Shock (destro skill)
Passive slot 1:
Mages Wrath (cheap execute proc)
When target is below 25% health, you increase the cost of your active attack ability by 2340 Magicka and will also cast Mages Wrath on them after casting the active Ability. If you don't have enough Magicka to cast both, you will only cast the active one.
Counts as slotted on this bar.

Active slot 2:
Haunting Curse (delayed burst)
Passive slot 2:
Crystal Frags/Weapon (cheap burst damage)
Crystal Fragments: Reduce max magicka by 2700. After casting an ability with a cost slotted above it, your next non-ultimate ability cast within 3 seconds costs 10% less. While slotted, casting a non-ultimate combat (attack) ability has a 33% chance to fire a Crystal Fragment at the target.
Crystal Weapon: Reduce Max Stamina by 2295. After casting an ability with a cost slotted above it, your next non-ultimate ability cast within 3 seconds costs 10% less. Increase the damage of your light and heavy attacks by 25%. Your light and heavy attacks reduce enemy armor by 1000 for 5 seconds, this can occur once every 5 seconds.

Alternative Active slot 2 (for pets):
Elemental Susceptibility (long duration, free to cast major breach + status effect procs)
Alternative Passive slot 2:
Daedric prey (unique buff for pets)
Once every 6 seconds, when you cast a damage dealing ability slotted above this one, you also cast Deadric Prey right after it on the same target. You must have enough resource to cast both abilities.

Active slot 3:
Inner Light (mages guild)
Passive slot 3:
Critical Surge (brutality/sorcery + heal on dealing crit damage)
Reduce Max Magicka by 4050. Gain Major Brutality and Sorcery at all times. Dealing Critical damage heals you for 3300 once per second.

Active slot 4:
Bound Aegis (daedric summoning skill)
Passive slot 4:
Hurricane (sorc armor buff that is also AoE damage over time)
Decrease Max Stamina by 2295. Gain Major Resolve and Minor Expedition at all times. Sorry, no damage aura, that'd make this ability broken.
But just in case: While in combat, you generate a damage aura that pulses every 2 seconds, dealing 239 (half) damage each pulse. It grows over time, gaining up to 120% more damage and up to 80% more radius. May have a smaller radius than the normal variation.

Active slot 5:
Hardened Ward (shield + heal)
Passive slot 5:
Vibrant shroud (AoE burst heal) OR Dark exchange (heal + resource restore)
Vibrant Shroud: When you cast an area/conal ability slotted above it, you also cast this ability after it. (Sorry, Hardened Ward doesn't Qualify. Wall of Elements does though. Even if it did qualify, that's 9180 Mag you would need to cast it.)
Dark Exchange: Reduce Max Stamina by 3240. Gain 400 healing per second and restore 300 Magicka per second. Also gain Minor Berserk at all times.

Alternative Active slot 5 (for pets):
Twilight (pet)
Alternative Passive slot 5:
Scamp (pet)
Volatile Familiar: Reduce Max Magicka by 3510. You have a Volatile Familiar at all times. When it dies, it will respawn after a period of time determined by cost and recovery. Likewise, determined by cost and recovery, it will emit a damaging pulse every now and then.

Active Ultimate slot:
Negate (or meteor)
Passive Ultimate slot:
Energy Overload (sorc toggle ultimate that alters light attacks and restores resources)
By having 75-150 more ultimate than needed to cast the active ultimate, you give yourself lightning fingers for 15-30 seconds on cast.

KaironBlackbard · June 5

I wish I could create this in PTS.
In a simple but hopefully understandable fashion.
And be able to submit it for review, in hopes devs might consider it.
Give them a framework so they don't have to do as much to bring it to life.
All they've have to do is check its balancing to make sure nothing is overpowered, or underpowered.