This is where spreadsheet balancing falls apart.

Necromancer's entire kit is unreliable. There is no reason their damage numbers should be identical to other classes when their abilities are buggy, require a corpse, or simply have terrible targeting.

I posted earlier this PTS and it was ignored by the devs.

The irony is that ghostly embrace is actually the best it's ever been on live, but only because it's actively broken. I find it hilarious that the ability made it to live because the skills is SO BAD, no one tested it, even the devs!

Live Ghostly Embrace actually feels like a good risk to reward right now because the damage on the tooltip is the damage it deals. It bypasses battle spirit, armor, and block. It's like oblivion damage.

The new version is trash. Awful design.

It should never be balanced against skills like Talons or Acid Spray. They are not even comparable. It deserves to have way more damage attached to it for being such the expensive gamble it is. It doesn't even cc anymore which is huge slap in the face considering what Talons gets.

Yeah, it's quite baffling that you consistently have to hit a target with the first and second patch in order for the Ghostly Embrace to deal comparable damage to Acid Spray (which apparently may happen 32% of the time).

At the moment each patch deals 50% of the damage of other AOE spammables. Maybe that could be increased to 75% instead? I suppose that would make the skill a bit OP if you hit targets with all 3 patches, but yeah, those odds are pretty slim.

Also want to clarify some definitions.
TESo has a skills that is a gamble in nature, and they are usualy channeled or have a cast time attach.
For example sorcs Dark Deal - it has a channel time in which you are vulnerable to interrupts, but if you manage to cover your cast you may get away with channel and benefit from the ability - get a resourse back, get a heal and a set of offensive buffs.
Dark Deal is a risk-reward - you risk by putting yourself in a vulnerable state to then benfit from ability effects.

Ghostly Embrace isnt technicly a gamble, since there is no risks involved, only risk is dumping 4k mana on the ground for no benefit at all. And its not simmilar to Burning Talons or Lotus Fan since theese abilities primary functions isnt plain damage, Talons- AoE root, Fan - gapcloser.

What its actually comparable to now is Arcanists flail, that also have a delay (much less then necromancer 0.3 cast time) but after a delay you have a narrow hitbox that apply everything that is stated on the tooltip - AoE Damage, root, heal, ink debuff, and a single crux. Gravegrasp is also a linear vector AoE that deals 3 instanses of damage separated by 0.333 sec delay (average reaction time is 0.25 for average human, or 0.19 for gamer, source - ergonomics, which is makes every player able to react to each individual circle), instances of damage happen on different location, not all 3 happen on all of the AoE, apply chilled, DoT, and spawn a corpse. So, based on previous calculation lets take a 32% chanse of hitting 2 patches and compare it to the Flail:

Flail : standart AoE damage, heal, root, ink, crux = 5 different effects applied to a target hit.
GE(PTS version): 2 halfs of standart AoE damage, chilled, DoT = 32% of 3 different effects applied to a target hit.
GE(if cc pressure is kept as it is on live): 2 halfs of standart AoE damage, chilled, DoT, slow, root = 32% of 5 effects to a target hit.

And Flail and GE both involved in class-specific resourse mini game. But crux and corpses are really REALLY different in nature. While Arcs can cast skills that consume crux for less power without any crux built, Necros physicly cannot use a half of their kit if no corpses are present. So its much more essential for necro to have a steady supply of corpses, otherwise your abilities like tethers or potency would fire at all vs arcs using a weaker version without a crux? which is why 19% to hit last circle - i.e. spawn a corpse is BAD.19% means that ability requires 5 cast on average to spawn a corpse - which is 5 gcds and 20k mana cost. Blighted Bones require 2k stam, and 2.5s to build up which is also 5 gcds.


And while Flail is also inconvinient to land, arcs have a nice single target CC (paralise or charm) to setup for it vs necro having NONE. And for that reason theese both spells fall to a skillshot categories, skills that require you predicting enemy player next move or making an adequate setup in order to land. Skills that should be better than your average spammable AoE, because of what is stated in previous sentense. They cannot be balanced as something that is convinient to hit.

Suggestion for ZoS:

MAKE A SPREADSHEET FOR A SKILLSHOT TYPE ABILITIES!

To be real tho:

1. Make it a reliable AoE spammable like impulses. Strip overall ability damage output to a 60% of Standart AoE damage BUT with strong short sticky DoT and make it spawn corpses.
2. OR load it back up with CC pressure to justify ability being a skillshot and also do something about its cost, since its to expensive for how often its misses and how extreamly rare niche situations that its good at.
3. OR make its direct damage increase in power with each patch connect, like if you hit first - second should deal 50% more damage, and third should hit for 100% more damage if both previous connect.
4. OR Add another Primary Function to this skill like root or stun or debuff, AND give necro a reliable setup for that skill.

@ZOS_Kevin, Please tell us that you sent feedback over to the devs.

Ghostly, at the very least, cannot lose its cc effects.

Burning Talons doesn't need to be aimed, has no delay, has a cc, deals direct damage, deals damage over time, AND gives a synergy that deals extra damage.

As stated by @necro_the_crafter: Flail needs to be aimed, has a short delay, has a cc, has a high chance to deal direct damage, generates crux that sticks to the user, provides a debuff (abyssal ink), has a heal, and deals increased damage to enemies that are inked, AND costs less than Ghostly.

This is pretty laughable.

Ghostly Embrace must be aimed, has a delay, has no cc, has a chance of applying chill (a status effect that deals 10% of the direct damage of Talons), has a chance of applying damage over time, and has a very low chance of dropping a corpse.

The CC must come back and the reward for the use of this skill needs to be addressed.

There's no time left before the longest gap in game updates. Please do not destroy this skill and then go silent.

Joy_Division wrote: »

One thing I have noticed with ZOS's new skills is that they are way too elaborate and convoluted, often involving a mini-game of sorts, or assume the user can predict the future like Nostradamus.

DK Talons: Press buttons. Enemies get rooted, damage, and provide allies with synergy. End Done. nothing else. Simple. And, effective and FUN.

DK Stone Giant. Press button, cast time (yuck). Low physical damage. Get weird debris field. Press button again (cast time) do more low physical damage. Inflicts new (low) damage taken debuff for 5 seconds. Press button again (cast time), more low physical damage. Press button again (cast time), more low physical damage and (finally) a 2.5 second stun.

Effective? Never been killed by this ability. Fun? People I know call it "poop fist."

There is little that is straightforward in the Nerco kit: the burst heal gives you defile, the spammable has to be cast thrice to get it's full effect, the DoT is a weird summon, the delayed burst can be intercepted/stunned by enemies, it's got to play around with corpses' just to get the same DPS as other classes, Grave Lord's Sacrifice is the pinnacle of unnecessarily complicated ESO skills. Whatever happened to just summoning a bunch of dead stuff, a very basic mechanic, which is every other fantasy game's theme for a Necromancer? Or giving us a Scythe skill that feels good and fun to use?

I wish the devs would just put away their spreadsheet and remember that this game is fast paced, requiring a lot of mobility when they consider updates to abilities.

Yeah, I was one amongst the many who asked for meele stamina stone giant skill, a lot of people wanted to smash enemies faces with a giant rock fist to the face up close and personal. And instead we got a niche group buff that is rarely seen even in PvE. But thanks akatosh DK's toolkit is pretty much complete even without "poop rock"

Also I rarly see this mentioned, but peeople for the most part play videogames for FUN. And roleplay games specificly to enjoy a fantasy. And how chosen class feels inside that game is actualy a very big part of players overall expirience. Not sure for other people, but when I posting a suggestion for a rework, I dont expect that dev will do exactly as I ask, all I express is how I would like to feel my chosen class play, to give an insight into a players perspective.

And there is nothing more frustrating to me, then when a lot of people come here and report on the same issue and it simply doesnt get adressed or in case of necro, sometimes made even worse. And sometimes we get plain stuff like timers increase and named buffs in random places, credit to that, but major issues just slide from patch to patch unattended and unresolved or even worsend.

Urvoth wrote: »

Also there's the new Lotus Fan which gap closes, does AOE damage, applies AOE minor vuln, AND applies an instant, AOE dot. Both Talons and the new Lotus Fan are mechanically better AND have far better effects than Ghostly Embrace.

At least they can adjust AoE of each patch to overlap, so whole middle patch overlaps with first and third


Tis way we have much wider sweetspot in the middle, where all 3 patches hit. Also patches deserve a speed up to 0.25sec down from 0.333sec, with first appearing immidiatly, this way whole ability would fit in timeframe of 1 GCD.