Since Undeath is nerfed for PVP...

DoonerSeraph · July 9

Can Vampires in PVE get something? It has been mostly relegated as a liability to both the character and the allies in group (not being able to being healed if using Blood for Blood or any morph of Frenzy, missing out on buffs). The damage in vampire skills is mostly bad (even the spammable is not that great, and it is by far the best damage skill they have).

Some pain points Vampire has in PVE

The passives are extremely punishing (especially the extra cost of non-vampire skills). The active skills are already limited, after all there is only 5 of them and you cannot make a usable build in any role with them because they spread themselves thin (stun, damage, utility). This leaves most characters gimped with their class, guild, and weapon skills, for abilities that frankly, are not worth it. No one was playing Vampire 4 unless they really wanted to run invisible, and everyone that was using Vampire 3 is now gonna drop to 1 for the nerfed Undeath. There is basically no incentive to be Vampire 3 or 4.
Being unable to receive heals, and due to that, certain set buffs such as Spell Power Cure and other sets tanks your damage. Maybe give them a 80% heal reduction from other sources instead of a flat 100% unable to be healed? It feels only Nightblade can play vampire characters with such limitation.
One of the damaging skills is a channel (Drain), which is pretty bad to use unless the payoff is very big (such as Templar's execute). Maybe this could be made an instant tether?
The stun is mostly there I believe to fill gaps for classes that do not have a reliable stun, however with Scribing, maybe this skill can be reworked into something else? Also the whole direction of enemies looking at you is inconsistent and sometimes buggy.
Frenzy as an idea is very cool, but it only reinforces the second point, if you don't have reliable self heals such as a nightblade, all Frenzy will do is put you into a dangerous position where a light tap will kill you at the wrong time. If this procced damage taken conditions such as Sea Serpent's Coil (an exception to the rule that Health cost is not damage taken) it could provide a niche use.
Blood Mist seems to have an identity crisis, feels like a cross of Hurricane and Streak, with the annoyances of both and half the effectiveness. Maybe leave the mobility to Mist Form and Elusive, and make the area on Blood Mist bigger and stronger. You trade mobility for damage/healing instead of having this weird ability to rotate in a PvE situation where it can put you into a bad spot.
No support sets, really. Talfyg is basically worse than Julianos, and Vampire Lord seems more like a debuff challenge set than anything else. It worsens your character if you try to use it. Vampire Cloak gives you a buff that is very common. The theme itemization is just not there, especially for damage characters.
Perfect Scion is really, really bad. Reducing the hefty penalties that should not be there (at least, not that much) in the first place does pale in comparison of even the mediocre damage that Swarming Scion has. The ultimate locks you into an animation, disrupting the flow of combat, even it it fully heals you, it just feels janky and awful (this is valid for both morphs, btw, although no one ever uses Perfect Scion). Vampires some cool effect with free damage on Materialize, maybe this could make a comeback in Perfect Scion in some way, shape or form?

Those are just some points of someone who tried multiple times to make a vampire character (as a magicka NB, which is the easiest one to make), and it just fell flat. The skill line is spread too thin, has no identity aside from taking a high risk for a low reward. Either the risks and punishments need to be toned down, or the bonus (except Undeath) needs to be way better. I agree that Vampire should not be mandatory, but ideally it should be a sidegrade, an alternative way of playing, instead of a downgrade or upgrade. Right now, playing Vampire in PVE is a massive downgrade, and even more on a non Nightblade character.

EDIT: Added point about Scion, fixed some typos and and mistakes.

ESO_player123 · July 9

My question is why nerfs were made (again) for both PvP and PvE. Why not make restrictions under battle spirit or whatever it is that distinguishes PvP from PvE (since it was a big problem specifically in PvP).

Major_Toughness · July 9

ESO_player123 wrote: »

My question is why nerfs were made (again) for both PvP and PvE. Why not make restrictions under battle spirit or whatever it is that distinguishes PvP from PvE (since it was a big problem specifically in PvP).

I mean this change has zero effect on PvE. If anyone uses vampire in PvE it is purely for Vampire drain to get ultimate back, which was level 1. Now they get undeath. That's a buff.

TX12001rwb17_ESO · July 9

Major_Toughness wrote: »

ESO_player123 wrote: »

My question is why nerfs were made (again) for both PvP and PvE. Why not make restrictions under battle spirit or whatever it is that distinguishes PvP from PvE (since it was a big problem specifically in PvP).

I mean this change has zero effect on PvE. If anyone uses vampire in PvE it is purely for Vampire drain to get ultimate back, which was level 1. Now they get undeath. That's a buff.

Do you think everything is related to combat?

I use Vampirism because I can turn invisible when sprinting which lets me ignore trash mobs and get away from guards, I use Vampirism so I can reach areas with Mist Form that normally only Sorcerors could reach.

Firstmep · July 9

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

Major_Toughness wrote: »

ESO_player123 wrote: »

My question is why nerfs were made (again) for both PvP and PvE. Why not make restrictions under battle spirit or whatever it is that distinguishes PvP from PvE (since it was a big problem specifically in PvP).

I mean this change has zero effect on PvE. If anyone uses vampire in PvE it is purely for Vampire drain to get ultimate back, which was level 1. Now they get undeath. That's a buff.

Do you think everything is related to combat?

I use Vampirism because I can turn invisible when sprinting which lets me ignore trash mobs and get away from guards, I use Vampirism so I can reach areas with Mist Form that normally only Sorcerors could reach.

And how the undeath nerf affect your playstyle then.

DoonerSeraph · July 9

ESO_player123 wrote: »

My question is why nerfs were made (again) for both PvP and PvE. Why not make restrictions under battle spirit or whatever it is that distinguishes PvP from PvE (since it was a big problem specifically in PvP).

To be honest, I don't even mind Undeath being nerfed it if was a problem in PvP, the problem is the rest of the kit is basically awful, especially in PvE, it is simply not viable to play vampire in PvE.

Wuuffyy · July 9

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

Major_Toughness wrote: »

ESO_player123 wrote: »

My question is why nerfs were made (again) for both PvP and PvE. Why not make restrictions under battle spirit or whatever it is that distinguishes PvP from PvE (since it was a big problem specifically in PvP).

I mean this change has zero effect on PvE. If anyone uses vampire in PvE it is purely for Vampire drain to get ultimate back, which was level 1. Now they get undeath. That's a buff.

Do you think everything is related to combat?

I use Vampirism because I can turn invisible when sprinting which lets me ignore trash mobs and get away from guards, I use Vampirism so I can reach areas with Mist Form that normally only Sorcerors could reach.

This change relates to combat. If you don't care about combat, this change does not affect you

.

Spectral_Force · July 10

At this point I'll put my accelerationist hat on and hope the nerf to Undeath will make most people drop vampire, which prompts ZOS to revamp our active skills a few years down the line when they realise the skill line is a mess and that Undeath was seriously inflating the vampire toon count. I don't mind a nerf to our passives if it will eventually bring about a buff to the active skills, because as powerful as Undeath was, a simple damage reduction at low health does not in any way make your character feel like a vampire.

Good_VS_Evil · July 10

It really is shocking that they basically said "Hey guys, enjoying your Vampires? Well guess what...we are taking away 20% Damage Mitigation and giving you absolutely NOTHING in return, enjoy!"

They have to realize this makes Vampirism Stage 2/3/4 absolutely pointless and basically makes it so that if you do want to play at those stages for whatever reason you are effectively shooting yourself in the leg.

I am all for them taking away 20% Damage Mitigation so long as they also give something back to the class in other areas to compensate for the loss of its best skill.

TX12001rwb17_ESO · July 10

One thing I want to know is how do people know Undeath was the problem? did it ever occur to them that maybe they are just not as strong as they think they are? besides most players are fully covered in PvP, how do you know they were not just wearing heavy armor or just had very high critical resistance?

master_vanargand · July 10

I think the talented game creators at ZoS have tested this PTS many times and created it.
If ZoS decides to nerf Undeath, there is no way for us to reverse that decision.
And we don't need to look for vampire experts or professors among the players.
ZoS knows everything.

katorga · July 10

Overall, of huge buff for ball groups.

Jman100582 · July 10

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

One thing I want to know is how do people know Undeath was the problem? did it ever occur to them that maybe they are just not as strong as they think they are? besides most players are fully covered in PvP, how do you know they were not just wearing heavy armor or just had very high critical resistance?

Having undeath can be the difference between being hit for a 20k spec bow vs a 15k spec bow. It makes you extremely tanky vs execute damage as well, in situations where there is a Templar holding beam on you it is an extremely strong (not just strong actually, NECESSARY) passive. It’s a nerf, and a deserved one too

Jman100582 · July 10

Good_VS_Evil wrote: »

It really is shocking that they basically said "Hey guys, enjoying your Vampires? Well guess what...we are taking away 20% Damage Mitigation and giving you absolutely NOTHING in return, enjoy!"

They have to realize this makes Vampirism Stage 2/3/4 absolutely pointless and basically makes it so that if you do want to play at those stages for whatever reason you are effectively shooting yourself in the leg.

I am all for them taking away 20% Damage Mitigation so long as they also give something back to the class in other areas to compensate for the loss of its best skill.

Vampire isn’t a “class” it is more like an augmentation. And for the vast majority of people, they take it for the mitigation in pvp. Just because stages 3 and 4 are effectively useless doesn’t change how busted the mitigation was. The mitigation is weaker and is now more accessible, which I still don’t like personally. I’d rather it still be at stage 3, so the mitigation comes with more sustain drawbacks and isn’t essentially “free”

And even with the mitigation nerf, vampire is still a strong skill line. Blood for blood is a very strong dueling spammable, arterial burst is a good spammable for open world mag builds. Vamp form is a strong defensive/offensive ult as not only does it give you iframes, it makes you hit like a truck. Mist form is a movement skill with major evasion and if you’re able to fit it on your skill bar it’s a good option. Frenzy is good for gankers, as well as the strike from the shadows passive. Just because undeath got a proper and healthy balance change doesn’t mean vamp is bad. There is still loads of utility

Lystrad · July 10

ESO_player123 wrote: »

My question is why nerfs were made (again) for both PvP and PvE. Why not make restrictions under battle spirit or whatever it is that distinguishes PvP from PvE (since it was a big problem specifically in PvP).

I think the problem with vampire that leads stuff like this to happen is that vampire isn't really.... interactive in the same way werewolf is. They mentioned before that the reason vampire got completely overhauled in the past was because people were only taking it for the old resource passive because it had no downside other than cosmetic and just made your character better.

If lots of people are becoming Vamps for just undeath, and saying that the drawback to being that stage of vamp feels very negligible, they're probably considering that a similar pattern as before in which case, given how long it took them to nerf undeath I would assume the change is only partially for balance reasons with the other part being a re-evaluation of vampire.

Personally I think a much easier fix for this would be to have the vampire passives weak on their own, but have them buffed by slotting/using vampire abilities. Like, maybe undeath is base 10% and reverted to being stage 3 or higher, and then while scion is slotted it scales from 10-30% as your health decreases but only on scion's bar. Maybe slotting frenzy reduces the tier requirements for all vampire passives by 1. I feel like there is a lot of creative space they could work in to get people to use more than just passives.. I do feel if they take that road though alot of the active abilities need to be looked at too, like frenzy needs to do more than just being the most forgettable part of nightblade bow and shooting yourself in the foot.

StarOfElyon · July 10

Stage three should give you a PvE bonus that doesn't act as another buff to nightblades in PVP.

Toanis · July 10

Major_Toughness wrote: »

I mean this change has zero effect on PvE. If anyone uses vampire in PvE it is purely for Vampire drain to get ultimate back, which was level 1. Now they get undeath. That's a buff.

How often were you down to 30% health in PVE and would haved survived if you had taken 20% less damage?
How often were you down to 30% health in PVP and survived?

1-10% is a rounding error in either game mode, at 3000 health what difference does it make whether you're hit for 4000 or 3600?

CameraBeardThePirate · July 10

Toanis wrote: »

Major_Toughness wrote: »

I mean this change has zero effect on PvE. If anyone uses vampire in PvE it is purely for Vampire drain to get ultimate back, which was level 1. Now they get undeath. That's a buff.

How often were you down to 30% health in PVE and would haved survived if you had taken 20% less damage?
How often were you down to 30% health in PVP and survived?

1-10% is a rounding error in either game mode, at 3000 health what difference does it make whether you're hit for 4000 or 3600?

1-10% is not a rounding error lmao.

Are Minor and Major Protection considered "rounding errors"? Of course not, because they're excellent buffs.

Undeath will still be a good passive post nerf - it's practically free now with no downsides.

Toanis · July 10

CameraBeardThePirate wrote: »

Toanis wrote: »

1-10% is a rounding error in either game mode, at 3000 health what difference does it make whether you're hit for 4000 or 3600?

1-10% is not a rounding error lmao.

Whether at full health with 1% mitigation or at 10% health with 10%, incoming damage is just reduced by 1% of your max health. Irrelevant - if they can gank you at max health, 1% reduction won't help, and if they can't finish you at 10% health you don't need the 10% mitigation

It gets more interesting in the middle at 10-20% mitigation with the current Undeath. Won't help too much against a self-respecting ganker, but having to deal 6000 dps instead of 5000 is a hard pill for the target audience of this nerf.

Reducing that to 5300 dps is an accidental perfect weave. Neither player will notice that there is a 5% reduction in effect. But it also won't change what a Stage 3+ vampire is built for, as there aren't that many options.

IMO getting 1-10% at Stage 1 is okay. Lose some sustain get some mitigation. Might make vampirism more interresting for those who have no interest in going full bloodfiend. We've come a long way from vampirism being a mandatory sustain buff.

TX12001rwb17_ESO · July 11

Jman100582 wrote: »

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

One thing I want to know is how do people know Undeath was the problem? did it ever occur to them that maybe they are just not as strong as they think they are? besides most players are fully covered in PvP, how do you know they were not just wearing heavy armor or just had very high critical resistance?

Having undeath can be the difference between being hit for a 20k spec bow vs a 15k spec bow. It makes you extremely tanky vs execute damage as well, in situations where there is a Templar holding beam on you it is an extremely strong (not just strong actually, NECESSARY) passive. It’s a nerf, and a deserved one too

You don't need Vampirism to be tanky, my Templar Tank has 4700 critical resistance and about 35k health and I literally use the laugh emote in the middle of PvP against actively gankers trying to kill me.

Jman100582 · July 11

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

Jman100582 wrote: »

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

One thing I want to know is how do people know Undeath was the problem? did it ever occur to them that maybe they are just not as strong as they think they are? besides most players are fully covered in PvP, how do you know they were not just wearing heavy armor or just had very high critical resistance?

Having undeath can be the difference between being hit for a 20k spec bow vs a 15k spec bow. It makes you extremely tanky vs execute damage as well, in situations where there is a Templar holding beam on you it is an extremely strong (not just strong actually, NECESSARY) passive. It’s a nerf, and a deserved one too

You don't need Vampirism to be tanky, my Templar Tank has 4700 critical resistance and about 35k health and I literally use the laugh emote in the middle of PvP against actively gankers trying to kill me.

If you’re saying you have a build that is designed specifically to tank that happens to be tanky, then congrats. I would hope so. “You don’t need vampirism” the average dps build (ie, rally cry + another set) does in fact need vampirism, in order to survive. There is a massive difference with and without. Sometimes I die and I go “wow how did that do so much damage” and I look and check and sure enough, my vamp stage 3 ran out 7 mins ago. It is quite literally meta for a reason, there’s really no way to argue against that. 99% of cyrodiil is a stage 3 vampire because (shockingly) it does actually make you tanky

StaticWave · July 11

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

One thing I want to know is how do people know Undeath was the problem? did it ever occur to them that maybe they are just not as strong as they think they are? besides most players are fully covered in PvP, how do you know they were not just wearing heavy armor or just had very high critical resistance?

Don't even attempt to go there buddy.

StaticWave · July 11

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

Jman100582 wrote: »

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

One thing I want to know is how do people know Undeath was the problem? did it ever occur to them that maybe they are just not as strong as they think they are? besides most players are fully covered in PvP, how do you know they were not just wearing heavy armor or just had very high critical resistance?

Having undeath can be the difference between being hit for a 20k spec bow vs a 15k spec bow. It makes you extremely tanky vs execute damage as well, in situations where there is a Templar holding beam on you it is an extremely strong (not just strong actually, NECESSARY) passive. It’s a nerf, and a deserved one too

You don't need Vampirism to be tanky, my Templar Tank has 4700 critical resistance and about 35k health and I literally use the laugh emote in the middle of PvP against actively gankers trying to kill me.

Okay now walk out of your Ritual + Rune, get on your front bar instead of back bar and fight them.

TX12001rwb17_ESO · July 12

StaticWave wrote: »

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

Jman100582 wrote: »

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

One thing I want to know is how do people know Undeath was the problem? did it ever occur to them that maybe they are just not as strong as they think they are? besides most players are fully covered in PvP, how do you know they were not just wearing heavy armor or just had very high critical resistance?

Having undeath can be the difference between being hit for a 20k spec bow vs a 15k spec bow. It makes you extremely tanky vs execute damage as well, in situations where there is a Templar holding beam on you it is an extremely strong (not just strong actually, NECESSARY) passive. It’s a nerf, and a deserved one too

You don't need Vampirism to be tanky, my Templar Tank has 4700 critical resistance and about 35k health and I literally use the laugh emote in the middle of PvP against actively gankers trying to kill me.

Okay now walk out of your Ritual + Rune, get on your front bar instead of back bar and fight them.

It is on his front bar but I never said he had high physical resistance, I just said he had high critical resistance which i should add is granted via a little set called impregnable Armor.

You would be surprised how little damage people do in PvP when your critical resistance is nearly 5000.

Major_Toughness · July 12

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

StaticWave wrote: »

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

Jman100582 wrote: »

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

One thing I want to know is how do people know Undeath was the problem? did it ever occur to them that maybe they are just not as strong as they think they are? besides most players are fully covered in PvP, how do you know they were not just wearing heavy armor or just had very high critical resistance?

Having undeath can be the difference between being hit for a 20k spec bow vs a 15k spec bow. It makes you extremely tanky vs execute damage as well, in situations where there is a Templar holding beam on you it is an extremely strong (not just strong actually, NECESSARY) passive. It’s a nerf, and a deserved one too

You don't need Vampirism to be tanky, my Templar Tank has 4700 critical resistance and about 35k health and I literally use the laugh emote in the middle of PvP against actively gankers trying to kill me.

Okay now walk out of your Ritual + Rune, get on your front bar instead of back bar and fight them.

It is on his front bar but I never said he had high physical resistance, I just said he had high critical resistance which i should add is granted via a little set called impregnable Armor.

You would be surprised how little damage people do in PvP when your critical resistance is nearly 5000.

Who are you talking about, who is "he"

Remathilis · July 12

Make vampires a skin and werewolf a polymorph. ZoS has done everything but at this point.

TX12001rwb17_ESO · July 12

Major_Toughness wrote: »

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

StaticWave wrote: »

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

Jman100582 wrote: »

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

One thing I want to know is how do people know Undeath was the problem? did it ever occur to them that maybe they are just not as strong as they think they are? besides most players are fully covered in PvP, how do you know they were not just wearing heavy armor or just had very high critical resistance?

Having undeath can be the difference between being hit for a 20k spec bow vs a 15k spec bow. It makes you extremely tanky vs execute damage as well, in situations where there is a Templar holding beam on you it is an extremely strong (not just strong actually, NECESSARY) passive. It’s a nerf, and a deserved one too

You don't need Vampirism to be tanky, my Templar Tank has 4700 critical resistance and about 35k health and I literally use the laugh emote in the middle of PvP against actively gankers trying to kill me.

Okay now walk out of your Ritual + Rune, get on your front bar instead of back bar and fight them.

It is on his front bar but I never said he had high physical resistance, I just said he had high critical resistance which i should add is granted via a little set called impregnable Armor.

You would be surprised how little damage people do in PvP when your critical resistance is nearly 5000.

Who are you talking about, who is "he"

Are you trolling? if you took 2 seconds to read it you would know I was talking about my character.

StaticWave · July 17

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

StaticWave wrote: »

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

Jman100582 wrote: »

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

One thing I want to know is how do people know Undeath was the problem? did it ever occur to them that maybe they are just not as strong as they think they are? besides most players are fully covered in PvP, how do you know they were not just wearing heavy armor or just had very high critical resistance?

Having undeath can be the difference between being hit for a 20k spec bow vs a 15k spec bow. It makes you extremely tanky vs execute damage as well, in situations where there is a Templar holding beam on you it is an extremely strong (not just strong actually, NECESSARY) passive. It’s a nerf, and a deserved one too

You don't need Vampirism to be tanky, my Templar Tank has 4700 critical resistance and about 35k health and I literally use the laugh emote in the middle of PvP against actively gankers trying to kill me.

Okay now walk out of your Ritual + Rune, get on your front bar instead of back bar and fight them.

It is on his front bar but I never said he had high physical resistance, I just said he had high critical resistance which i should add is granted via a little set called impregnable Armor.

You would be surprised how little damage people do in PvP when your critical resistance is nearly 5000.

I run Rallying Cry on my Sorc. I remember last week I was dueling a NB and my stage 3 vamp expired before I entered the duel. It was super difficult to stay alive at low HP. I was wondering why I couldn't recover against this specific player when normally I don't have that issue. So I checked my vamp 3 status and saw that it's been 30 minutes since vamp 3 expired lol.

I redueled him after getting vamp 3 and the difference was, let's just say it was huge lol. 15% mitigation at 50% is no joke.

Major_Toughness · July 17

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

Major_Toughness wrote: »

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

StaticWave wrote: »

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

Jman100582 wrote: »

TX12001rwb17_ESO wrote: »

One thing I want to know is how do people know Undeath was the problem? did it ever occur to them that maybe they are just not as strong as they think they are? besides most players are fully covered in PvP, how do you know they were not just wearing heavy armor or just had very high critical resistance?

Having undeath can be the difference between being hit for a 20k spec bow vs a 15k spec bow. It makes you extremely tanky vs execute damage as well, in situations where there is a Templar holding beam on you it is an extremely strong (not just strong actually, NECESSARY) passive. It’s a nerf, and a deserved one too

You don't need Vampirism to be tanky, my Templar Tank has 4700 critical resistance and about 35k health and I literally use the laugh emote in the middle of PvP against actively gankers trying to kill me.

Okay now walk out of your Ritual + Rune, get on your front bar instead of back bar and fight them.

It is on his front bar but I never said he had high physical resistance, I just said he had high critical resistance which i should add is granted via a little set called impregnable Armor.

You would be surprised how little damage people do in PvP when your critical resistance is nearly 5000.

Who are you talking about, who is "he"

Are you trolling? if you took 2 seconds to read it you would know I was talking about my character.

Sorry I didn't realise you spoke about yourself in third person.