PTS Update 46 - Feedback Thread for Classes & Abilities

SaintJohnHM · May 5

It looks like we waited two weeks to confirm they're going ahead with these massively bad changes to make the game less fun for many many players, no substantive improvements have been made. Skeever poop.

TheDarkRuler · May 5

This weeks patch notes just confirm to me that ZOS way of handling PTS is just "We want to do it that way". If you have feedback, we do it either way.

Varana · May 5

Channelled beams are not damage over time.

Words have lost all meaning.

While we're at it, can we classify Polar Wind as "fire damage", Magma Shell as a "summoned pet", and Blocking as "out of combat"?
No particular reason, just for fun, because apparently, that's how ESO works now.

Also, please convey specifically this feedback to the developers. I'm serious.

katorga · May 5

Varana wrote: »

Channelled beams are not damage over time.

Words have lost all meaning.

While we're at it, can we classify Polar Wind as "fire damage", Magma Shell as a "summoned pet", and Blocking as "out of combat"?
No particular reason, just for fun, because apparently, that's how ESO works now.

Also, please convey specifically this feedback to the developers. I'm serious.

seriously, wuh?

So all beams have to be Direct damage so they don't get over buffed by subclassing necro?

sans-culottes · May 5

PrinceShroob wrote: »

Really? 11.0.3 took two weeks for balance changes and that's all you do? You don't address the community's concerns about subclassing at all? What can I say except "we warned you"? Adding subclassing this way to a decade-old game is like trying to add a new piece to chess.

Case in point: you're concerned about Rapid Rot's effect on damage over time skills, so you just arbitrarily and nonsensically make beams--which definitionally deal damage over a period of time--not be considered damage over time abilities rather than addressing the underlying issue, that you were not and are not prepared for the level of damage increase subclassing has enabled. And rather than saying mea culpa, it's full steam ahead. I really have no words.

@PrinceShroob is exactly right. This is less a balance strategy and more a sidestep. Beams aren’t DoTs now? That isn’t a design clarification. It’s a retreat from a problem subclassing created but the system can’t contain.

The patch notes read like a series of evasions rather than meaningful adjustments. Subclassing opened floodgates the devs were clearly unprepared for. Instead of reworking the framework or even acknowledging the scale of the disruption, we get terminology reassignments and vague gestures at control.

And to be clear, I actually agree with the idea that rigid class lines were always a poor fit for TES. But if ZOS wants to bring ESO in line with classic Elder Scrolls flexibility, then it will require a serious redesign of the underlying structure: reintroducing spell schools, building coherent mechanics into universal archetypes, and replacing visual incoherence with thematic integration. Subclassing, as implemented, does none of that.

CameraBeardThePirate · May 5

@ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_BrianWheeler @ZOS_Kevin The corpse changes introduced this PTS cycle will kill corpse consumers in PvP.

Corpses were already too short duration. Cutting the duration in half was a bad decision that makes Necro much more micro-managey and difficult to play.

Cutting the corpse+pet limit from 10 to 5 in PvP is also a bad change. Many corpse consumers require more than 1 corpse to reach their full effect. With a shorter duration, and 2 or 3 "slots" for your corpses being taken up by Blastbones, Ghost, and Minion, there are now a number of abilities that will never reach their full efficiency.

Animate Blastbones, Necrotic Potency/Deaden Pain, Enduring Undeath, and the Necro Class Script are gutted by these changes. These skills/effects were already average at best, and are now basically worthless in PvP.

I am begging you to revert the corpse changes or buff these abilities BEFORE LIVE. Killing these abilities and taking months to fix them would be more than frustrating for a number of players that enjoy them.

ZhuJiuyin · May 5

Are you serious? There are very few updates to the combat balance, which doesn't seem like a report card that players have to wait for two weeks. So disappointing.
Many feedbacks were ignored, such as the poor skill distribution of Sorc, and the fact that the Dark Magic skill line is a damage skill line with most skills and passive abilities being substandard.
Instead of reworking the Necromancer's GLS, they just changed the types of all "beam" skills (can't say for sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing, but I think it's a lazy, one-size-fits-all fix that will likely cause bigger problems in the future, such as a bigger power boost with Merciless Charge)
If ZOS really intends to launch U46 with the current battle balance, then the exodus of U35 will happen again, and people may even miss U35 because U46 completely shattered the balance.

PrinceShroob · May 5

sans-culottes wrote: »

The patch notes read like a series of evasions rather than meaningful adjustments. Subclassing opened floodgates the devs were clearly unprepared for. Instead of reworking the framework or even acknowledging the scale of the disruption, we get terminology reassignments and vague gestures at control.

Indeed. Since the first patch notes for 11.0.00, the developers have been on the back foot desperately trying to contain the monster they created with a series of fixes to specific interactions--interactions that would not have existed without this poorly-conceived abomination of a "feature." It's like trying to keep the Titanic afloat by dumping the water out with buckets.

Stx · May 5

The less time you spend balancing skill lines, the higher chance subclassing has to fail as a system. The forum player base is split pretty much down the middle as far as if subclassing is even a good idea. Implementing it without proper attempts to balance for it is a death sentence.

I think this weeks notes have some great changes in there, but overall it’s not nearly enough. I hope there is more to come over the next three weeks.

SaintJohnHM · May 5

ZhuJiuyin wrote: »

Are you serious? There are very few updates to the combat balance, which doesn't seem like a report card that players have to wait for two weeks. So disappointing.
Many feedbacks were ignored, such as the poor skill distribution of Sorc, and the fact that the Dark Magic skill line is a damage skill line with most skills and passive abilities being substandard.
Instead of reworking the Necromancer's GLS, they just changed the types of all "beam" skills (can't say for sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing, but I think it's a lazy, one-size-fits-all fix that will likely cause bigger problems in the future, such as a bigger power boost with Merciless Charge)
If ZOS really intends to launch U46 with the current battle balance, then the exodus of U35 will happen again, and people may even miss U35 because U46 completely shattered the balance.

Yep. I really don't know what they were doing these two weeks besides trying to rationalise to themselves this massive overhaul is a good idea while ignoring all feedback.

Dreadwar · May 5

Have we officially moved to the rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic stage?

Twohothardware · May 5

Cominfordatoothbrush wrote: »

Regarding the patch notes, my disappointment in seeing the communitys feedback seemingly not considered at all is immeasurable. Some of us LIKE the old classes, it's ridiculous for this patch to go forward with multiclasses being so much more powerful

If subclassing wasn’t noticeably stronger than just the basic classes as they stand now there would be no point in adding it to the game.

It would have been the same crap we got with Scribing and Class based sets. Nerfed and watered down until there was no advantage over just using the existing meta.

Arthtur · May 5

That was a "large chunk" of combat changes? I think i live in a different universe but whatever.

DK stuff time.
Nice to see cost reductions on skills but those arent enough. Those buffs dont make up for the previous nerfs.
We lost 200 magicka and stamina per second just from nerfs to passives and thanks to buffs we get back 150 magicka/s if we only use Burning Talons and around 205/s if we use all 3 skills buffed. But nothing about stamina loss.
I mainly use stamina morfs on DK so... sight
And thats without counting Reduction cost enchant nerf which is another 200 magicka/s nerf.
So overall my main is still losing 250 magicka/s and 200 stamina/s....

Battle Roar was nerfed because Pillager and other sources of ulti gain were making it go crazy. And now Pillager was gutted by 60% which is a big nerf... but BR nerf wasnt reverted. Event tho the thing that made it look so broken is gone now. Whats the point?

Anyway, DK STILL needs sustain buffs for solo play (for anything where we dont have a pocked healer with sustain buffs) or he will be miserable to play.
Consider:
a) Giving DK a sustain passive in Draconic Power skill line with a power of 150 magicka and stamina per second (or at least 100)
b) Giving DK a skill that gives some sustain just like other classes have with power around 200 magicka and stamina per second. Like Templar on Major Resolve skill or something like that. I dont like that approach but its better than having to suffer.
c) Further reducing the cost of Burning Talons to around 2300. As right now this skill even with a buff still costs 2 times more than other options for semi spammable. At 2300 it would be more expensive than other options by around 50% (when counting per s cost) but it would be enough to resolve DK magicka sustain problems.

In the end, i just want to be able to play my DK in peace. Thats it. I dont care about doing 150k dps+. I just dont want to suffer because sustain is bad.
Anyway i gave "constructive feedback". I did my "job".

Twohothardware · May 5

PrinceShroob wrote: »

Really? 11.0.3 took two weeks for balance changes and that's all you do? You don't address the community's concerns about subclassing at all? What can I say except "we warned you"? Adding subclassing this way to a decade-old game is like trying to add a new piece to chess.

Case in point: you're concerned about Rapid Rot's effect on damage over time skills, so you just arbitrarily and nonsensically make beams--which definitionally deal damage over a period of time--not be considered damage over time abilities rather than addressing the underlying issue, that you were not and are not prepared for the level of damage increase subclassing has enabled. And rather than saying mea culpa, it's full steam ahead. I really have no words.

The game needed a damage increase. The average player base can’t complete the dlc vet dungeons or any recent vet trial and players in PvP have become so tanky there is a 15 minute time to kill in the game.

Cominfordatoothbrush · May 5

Twohothardware wrote: »

Casual players will have strong

Cominfordatoothbrush wrote: »

Regarding the patch notes, my disappointment in seeing the communitys feedback seemingly not considered at all is immeasurable. Some of us LIKE the old classes, it's ridiculous for this patch to go forward with multiclasses being so much more powerful

If subclassing wasn’t noticeably stronger than just the basic classes as they stand now there would be no point in adding it to the game.

It would have been the same crap we got with Scribing and Class based sets. Nerfed and watered down until there was no advantage over just using the existing meta.

Strongly disagree, the point would be the same as it ostensibly is now - to make your own thematic builds. My problem isn't that I think they should be weaker than single class builds, but that there should be enough of a drawback that there is some semblance of parity between them. This is how multi classing in most RPGs works - there are powerful combinations of classes, but you lose out on enough of the high level stuff of each that it evens out

And that's not even true of scribing. Granted there aren't many hard hitting dps scribing skills other than banner, there are many utility scribed skills that are used in every raid

Twohothardware · May 5

Cominfordatoothbrush wrote: »

Twohothardware wrote: »

Casual players will have strong

Cominfordatoothbrush wrote: »

Regarding the patch notes, my disappointment in seeing the communitys feedback seemingly not considered at all is immeasurable. Some of us LIKE the old classes, it's ridiculous for this patch to go forward with multiclasses being so much more powerful

If subclassing wasn’t noticeably stronger than just the basic classes as they stand now there would be no point in adding it to the game.

It would have been the same crap we got with Scribing and Class based sets. Nerfed and watered down until there was no advantage over just using the existing meta.

Strongly disagree, the point would be the same as it ostensibly is now - to make your own thematic builds. My problem isn't that I think they should be weaker than single class builds, but that there should be enough of a drawback that there is some semblance of parity between them. This is how multi classing in most RPGs works - there are powerful combinations of classes, but you lose out on enough of the high level stuff of each that it evens out

And that's not even true of scribing. Granted there aren't many hard hitting dps scribing skills other than banner, there are many utility scribed skills that are used in every raid

It makes no sense why there should be expected parity between base classes and an optimized build using subclassing. Base classes are full of healing and tanking skills and passives in one or more of their skill lines so that each class has the potential to fulfill any of the games three roles, DPS, tank or healer.

If you’re building a DPS character many of those skills and passives do nothing for your damage. It only makes sense that if you replace those tank and healing skills and passives with more DPS focused ones that your characters DPS is going higher.

Same thing if you’re a tank or a healer and with subclassing you drop the useless DPS skills and passives.

PrinceShroob · May 5

Twohothardware wrote: »

The game needed a damage increase. The average player base can’t complete the dlc vet dungeons or any recent vet trial and players in PvP have become so tanky there is a 15 minute time to kill in the game.

A serious question: do you believe that players are unable to complete veteran DLC dungeons because the potential maximum damage of their skills is too low? Players do not deal sufficient DPS because they do not know how to perform the role--they do not know what skills to slot, how to distribute their attributes, or what sets to wear. Hell, when I was a newer player, I ran around using Mage's Wrath as a spammable because I didn't know that better skills existed, wore medium armor because I remembered Morrowind and I thought it was just a balance between protection and mobility, and split my attribute points evenly because I figured it couldn't hurt to have more health and stamina. I was using skills only because they cost Magicka and I treated them like spells. I didn't even know that you could wear more than one set. And I carefully read all my tooltips and tried to gauge which options were better--a lot of people don't seem to know what their skills do.

Many players are just running around slapping monsters with light attacks. Do you think that Necranistblade is going to benefit them?

This is going to increase the gap between players of different skill levels, and it's already a chasm. It's like saying "a gun is much stronger than a sword!" and not telling you which end you point towards the other guy.

What the game needs to improve player damage is an actual tutorial that teaches things like using skills and sets and weaving--you have to learn that these things exist before you can even learn you're doing it wrong. That's its own can of worms.

Damage increases at the top end don't occur in a vacuum--they directly impact the difficulty of veteran and hard mode content. Moving your parse from 50k to 70k means nothing when the goalposts are sliding and you now need 120k. And most players--those ones who can't clear veteran dungeons--don't even know what their parse is because they don't know parsing exists.

Cominfordatoothbrush · May 5

Twohothardware wrote: »

It makes no sense why there should be expected parity between base classes and an optimized build using subclassing. Base classes are full of healing and tanking skills and passives in one or more of their skill lines so that each class has the potential to fulfill any of the games three roles, DPS, tank or healer.

If you’re building a DPS character many of those skills and passives do nothing for your damage. It only makes sense that if you replace those tank and healing skills and passives with more DPS focused ones that your characters DPS is going higher.

Same thing if you’re a tank or a healer and with subclassing you drop the useless DPS skills and passives.

This is mostly only true of the dlc classes, the base game classes use skills from every tree as dps skills. But aside from that, yeah that's kind of my point. It's bad design that there is zero drawback to multiclassing

CaptainRele · May 5

This is what we had to wait another week, in an extremely short pts cycle, for? Rewriting the dictionary on what kind of damage a giant, 4 second laser beam is? Explaining what direct damage means is already hard enough without having to add on asterisks of "and also fatecarver is direct damage because subclassing was too powerful". If rapid rot + fatecarver is the problem, why not just change rapid rot to not buff channeled skills rather than gaslight us that a damage over time skill is somehow 10 instances of direct damage?
Lot of points to make. Still no adjustments on sorc for the extremely limited mindset of "the only sorcs that exist are pet sorc dps and non pet sorc dps" (tanks exist, thanks, please don't punish us further), templar beam is still way too long and leaves no margin for error on keeping up Relequen stacks, still indecisive for what on earth piercing cold should be, Zenas' still nerfed into being unusable in raids...
And good lord, nerfing pearls of ehlnofey AND pillagers profit into the dirt because the monster that is subclassing is too powerful??? We're nerfing more sets now too because the high end is too strong? How is this not punishing monoclassing? This is not a fun system if we're being forced into it just to crawl back to where we used to be. Bringing pillagers down to less than half efficiency is brutal considering it already has a cooldown. And say goodbye to pairing heroism trample with pearls.
And now that it's week 4 with less than a month to release, I can barely hold onto hope for things to improve. We weren't listened to at all. We said subclassing was too powerful, and the response has not been "you're right, sorry, we'll nerf it" instead it is proving to be "yes, so we will nerf everything else around it on the assumption you will use it". Subclassing doesn't come with the content pass, people did not pay for this. There's no obligation to deliver it on June 2nd. It's not to late yet to delay it!

TempestM · May 5

CaptainRele wrote: »

This is what we had to wait another week, in an extremely short pts cycle, for? Rewriting the dictionary on what kind of damage a giant, 4 second laser beam is? Explaining what direct damage means is already hard enough without having to add on asterisks of "and also fatecarver is direct damage because subclassing was too powerful". If rapid rot + fatecarver is the problem, why not just change rapid rot to not buff channeled skills rather than gaslight us that a damage over time skill is somehow 10 instances of direct damage?!

It's still wild that after 10 years there's no clear way in game to read what type of damage your ability does, or what armor enemy has, etc

necro_the_crafter · May 5

Insane lack of creativity. Subclassing opens up six quadrilion new opportunities to make game mechanics make sense and correspond with players power fantasy, make base classes more specialised on role and type of damage they do, add more diversity to damage types in general, improve guilds/weapon/armor skills to allow for new specialised specs via subclassing, something that game had been deperatly lacking since u35, introduce skill vfx customization to prevent everyone from becoming "rainbow warriors", unless they chose to become one... Instead we are bending game mechanichs to not make any sense for the sake of fixing the holes in the current system... I'm speachless.

ZhuJiuyin · May 5

necro_the_crafter · May 5

ZhuJiuyin wrote: »

It will be fine, just wait until...

Renato90085 · May 5

[

Twohothardware wrote: »

PrinceShroob wrote: »

Really? 11.0.3 took two weeks for balance changes and that's all you do? You don't address the community's concerns about subclassing at all? What can I say except "we warned you"? Adding subclassing this way to a decade-old game is like trying to add a new piece to chess.

Case in point: you're concerned about Rapid Rot's effect on damage over time skills, so you just arbitrarily and nonsensically make beams--which definitionally deal damage over a period of time--not be considered damage over time abilities rather than addressing the underlying issue, that you were not and are not prepared for the level of damage increase subclassing has enabled. And rather than saying mea culpa, it's full steam ahead. I really have no words.

The game needed a damage increase. The average player base can’t complete the dlc vet dungeons or any recent vet trial and players in PvP have become so tanky there is a 15 minute time to kill in the game.

yesterday I teach 7 new player finished they first Vdsr clean,they 21m parse is 60-85k and all 1bar sorc,the 5carry is 2tank 1 healer 2dps
We use 50min come in last boss room, they Willing sound our teach and order so we twin and reef have some clean pull, we wipe some time in swim because for they this is new mechanism(never see this in other place
and I alway go pug Vtrail or dungeon teach or carry too,but most player just don't know what thing they need do,don't what is parse or build they join pug just meta player video say this set is best
you can buff 500k new build in 1 patch, but if average player still only light attack and stand in aoe attack they still stuck in dungeon

IncultaWolf · May 5

TheDarkRuler wrote: »

This weeks patch notes just confirm to me that ZOS way of handling PTS is just "We want to do it that way". If you have feedback, we do it either way.

It's always been this way, update 35, destroying templar jabs, destroying stalking blastbones, arctic blasts, etc. Despite pushback from pretty much the entire playerbase

mmtaniac · May 5

I dislike every changes now somehow because class will not be unique anymore. It's not feel special anymore. Im alone with this weird thinking?

ZhuJiuyin · May 5

Fatecarver was changed to direct damage in patch notes-v11-0-3, which makes it more suitable for Arcanists to use Kazpian's Cruel Signet, because other classes don't have area direct damage spam, while Arcanists have Fatecarver and Cephaliarch's Flail.

Now, pair it with Merciless Charge & Born Wildstalker....
Arcanists will continue to be a T0 class, and other classes will be severely hurt by subclassing and will not even be suitable for the new Trials sets.

The Arcanists meta will continue to dominate the game

Zyaneth_Bal · May 5

CameraBeardThePirate wrote: »

@ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_BrianWheeler @ZOS_Kevin The corpse changes introduced this PTS cycle will kill corpse consumers in PvP.

Corpses were already too short duration. Cutting the duration in half was a bad decision that makes Necro much more micro-managey and difficult to play.

Cutting the corpse+pet limit from 10 to 5 in PvP is also a bad change. Many corpse consumers require more than 1 corpse to reach their full effect. With a shorter duration, and 2 or 3 "slots" for your corpses being taken up by Blastbones, Ghost, and Minion, there are now a number of abilities that will never reach their full efficiency.

Animate Blastbones, Necrotic Potency/Deaden Pain, Enduring Undeath, and the Necro Class Script are gutted by these changes. These skills/effects were already average at best, and are now basically worthless in PvP.

I am begging you to revert the corpse changes or buff these abilities BEFORE LIVE. Killing these abilities and taking months to fix them would be more than frustrating for a number of players that enjoy them.

Give up, game’s dead

acastanza_ESO · May 5

You are being bombarded with a laser beam, it is obviously direct damage and always should have been, I support this change.

CaptainRele · May 5

acastanza_ESO wrote: »

You are being bombarded with a laser beam, it is obviously direct damage and always should have been, I support this change.

"Direct damage" does not mean "bombard". Direct damage is the opposite of damage over time, in the same way single target and area of effect are opposites. A single beam that deals continuous Damage over a period of Time cannot by definition be direct damage. Words have meaning.