I don’t think Arcanist is the strongest class in the Endless Archives or any content but rather seems balanced. Necro feels weakest of the different classes I’ve tried in EA as in all content. Sorc is frustrating once pets are near insta-killed (which should be fixed in addition to non-pet builds having viable heal and dps options). Dragonknight feels strong, and I don’t wish for that class to be nerfed any more than arcanist; rather I hope necro and sorc get some improvements and additional options for viable builds.

Necro is definitely the weakest but I am not sure Arcanist is the strongest. I would say DK and maybe NB is stronger. But I do agree, I wish other classes would be brought up to the level of the top ones. I think DK, NB and Arcanist are just fine.

As for Necro being strong when it launched, that is a myth. Major vulnerability and the harmony jewelry trait were strong but not Necro. I get your point though.

My Templar feels pretty powerful in the Archive, please don’t nerf me!

I'd say Arcanist is best if you want to clear the early arcs easily/quickly. DK and Warden become much more powerful later on when all that matters is survival and how well you synergize with Focused Efforts.

But to answer your question, usually the patch before the next paywall'd slightly overtuned thing comes out, so probably early next year.

phaneub17_ESO wrote: »

Don't expect any major Arcanist "rebalancing" until Q3 of next year at the earliest when Necrom is no longer a chapter and the class is uncoupled with it.

that happens in Q2 when the next chapter releases

ssewallb14_ESO wrote: »

I'd say Arcanist is best if you want to clear the early arcs easily/quickly. DK and Warden become much more powerful later on when all that matters is survival and how well you synergize with Focused Efforts.

This. Arcanist is great in a duo with a tank. Solo it's good, fast at the early stages, but ultimately can't compete with a specialised Endless Archive build. Such builds arguably work on any class. It may be true that DK and warden are best, however while my templar, about which I have posted in this forum, has no pretensions at getting much higher than arc 5, that is partly because I run out of stamina in real life and call it quits at that point. An AOE interrupt, very strong ranged execute, Cleansing Ritual, and Reflective Light dealing fire damage to proc Burning are things Arcanist can't match.

I frequenty see Arcanist at the top of the chart in Combat Metrics during trials, including my own. I've been thinking about that lately. I think the reason is that I always aim to cleave at least 2 targets, because I can, not because it's always necessary to do so. Since Arcanist cleaves by default, I end up inflating my numbers and, thus, I think trial performance of that class is somewhat exaggerated in Combat Metrics numbers and trial logs.

When it comes to the archive, Arcanist ultimately suffers from the same problem as templar, if not more so. You can't block, synergize (fire orbs etc), dodge roll or bash while beaming. This results in those classes running out of steam in later arcs. Players, who succeed regardless, use modifications to the class' native playstyle that arguably result in more class-agnostic builds. The best Arcanist runs I've seen on YouTube don't use the beam or only use it sparingly. At that point I'm convinced these are simply good players who make anything work. It may be that you use crux for shields and heals at that point. Indeed I've heard a YouTuber state they sometimes use Pragmatic only for the shield. I've never played Arcanists that lean on the tank / shielding skills much, but since shields don't benefit from block mitigation, I'm fairly convinced shields look better on paper than they really are in the toughest content. I think there is a reason Arcanist shielding skills are as strong and plentiful as they are, namely that a 4.5s channel isn't otherwise compatible with achieving any tankiness at all. You may quibble about the balance, but I don't think it's far off from where it needed to be. The Arcanist defensive ultimate is also not that great, because it has a total damage cap.

I think what Arcanist has going for it is the skill curve. It's easy to play, but it hits a ceiling. This was reflected in early EA leaderboards. Those were dominated by arcanists. You probably still find a lot of good scorers among them, but when it comes to the highest ones, those go to DKs and wardens or at least equally so.

katorga wrote: »

fred4 wrote: »

ssewallb14_ESO wrote: »

I'd say Arcanist is best if you want to clear the early arcs easily/quickly. DK and Warden become much more powerful later on when all that matters is survival and how well you synergize with Focused Efforts.

When it comes to the archive, Arcanist ultimately suffers from the same problem as templar, if not more so. You can't block, synergize (fire orbs etc), dodge roll or bash while beaming.

This. So much this. I didn't even complete a full solo Arc b4 I said no more. I have not run EA with my Arcanist since.

There's a very simple fix to this, use the morph that gives you a shield and the bastion cp. I haven't made it past Arc 4 to be able to talk about the later Arcs (due to time constraints, I rearly get more than 2 hours of play time in one setting). For the first 4 Arcs, Arcanist in my opinion is by far the easiest.

Despite what has been said above the score board kind of reflects this too (on PC|NA anyway). Arcanists have the highest threshold for getting onto the weekly solo and are higher than DK in highest score, number of Arc 8+ finishes & total points for top 100 of the permanent leaderboard.

Anyway, regardless of which class is "strongest in endless" we have to imagine that some pretty heavy nerfs will be incoming for the class. So getting back on topic, how long before we see these eventual "re-balancing". I agree with most above that it will likely occur around or just before the class becomes crown purchasable. From my memory this happened a lot quicker with the necro than it did the Warden.

When it comes to balancing arcanist, there's only really a few minor things that need to change.

1. Fix the break free bug with its stun (if this hasn't been done in the past few weeks already).
2. Slightly tone down the shields (only a tiny bit and maybe not even necessary)
3. Rework some of the damage away from beam and into runeblades

Change 1. is a bug fix, so the strength of this skill is fine, just has a bug that is/was being abused.

Change 2. is to bring its defense capabilities a bit closer to other classes, but tbh not much is needed here if anything at all.

Change 3. is the biggest change, but not all that big. Beam is making the class feel very 1 dimensional with all of the damage loaded into that skill. Many people enjoyed the feel and functionality of Runeblades (based on feedback given when Arc was released), but noted that its damage was too low to consider using it over the execute + beam combo.

All that really needs to happen with change 3. is reduce the channel time of beam by 1 second (from 5 to 4) and adjust damage values accordingly and increase runeblades damage a little bit. This allows more playstyles of arcanist to be played around with while not completely ruining the class.

Outside of those small changes, really all that needs to be done is a massive QoL overhaul and buff to the weaker playstyles of other classes so they can have better synergizing kits and more flexibility with their bar spaces to run other builds and not feel so far behind.

Things like:

• Granting necro major brutality/sorcery and major prophecy/savagery on good skills in its kit, increasing the speed of skulls projectile, improving the AI of blastbones, improving the functionality of tethers and the corpse mechanic in general.
• Granting sorc a few QoL buffs such as major prophecy/savagery on a skill like lightning form, buffing no-pet sorc to be on par with other classes (instead of 20% behind even necro) so sorc doesn't feel locked/forced into using the pets. Also give a true heal to no-pet sorcs too, something that should have been done years ago instead of giving it to the clannfear (and no, dark exchange is not a heal, its a sustain tool that is being forced into that heal role because there's nothing else)...
• Improving NB dps for group content (trials etc) and doing so in such a way that these buffs to NB are locked to PvE ONLY!.
• Improving warden DPS such that it's not locked to frost staves to get the most out of its class dps abilities and passives (a simple change to 1 passive would fix this) and improve the speed of dive and morphs (same reasoning as the increase to skulls projectile speed).

Likely some other things to address/improve on, but these would be some good starts to make arcanist/DK not feel so overwhelmingly strong comparatively to everything else.

You got to take a look at the classes. Its a serious of trash fights. Classes that are the most aoe based or have very high survivability will inevitably come out on top in this situation. Both dk and arc have very strong shields and aoe. Warden has an aoe major/minor breach and a ton of heals. Templar has a lot of aoe and offensive heals. Based on my server leaderboards, those are the most successful classes. Nb for example is heavily single target focused, its going to be at a disadvantage. Necro is.. well.. zos just hates necros so...

make an arc weave !

OtarTheMad wrote: »

Brakkish wrote: »

New classes are always OP by design. At least until the sales dip and fall off - it's then you will see the nerfbat.

We see posts like "Nerf Arcanist!" ZOS silently giggles with each post of that nature as they see $$ because it reinforces the idea that it IS OP, and hence; players are pushed to playing/buying it.

It's just good business, can't fault em there.
It's poor business to admit it.

But Arcanist isn’t OP. It has plenty of negatives in all modes. It may be easier to get decent dps with but that’s about it. It’s just a balanced class imo. Every upside has a huge BUT attached to it. Even now it’s not even Arcanist that is OP it’s the meta sets like Maarselok etc.

I also wish people would stop saying new classes are OP, that model died when Necro hit. I’ve said it a billion times… major vulnerability and harmony trait were OP not Necro.

But yes it is a good idea to hype up new classes and make them fun to play and market the crap out of them. I think ZOS did a good job with Arcanist. They are fun to play, easier than some other classes to play, have some huge strengths but with those come huge counters.

Agreed. It is really sad to see definition of OP get so muddied. I remember when OP meant actually obliterate bosses/adds and other players in a matter of second. Arcanist is easy to play for sure. Doesn't make it 'OP'. For it to do top dps, player still has to spend quite sometime perfecting the rotation and get all the necessary optimal sets.

Ok, let me restate my original statement.

In my opinion - Arcanist is by far superior to each of the other classes I play (I play them all daily, for years).
And let me also state, that right out of the box, with very little "work" it achieved that status for me. By far; Arcanist is my favorite toon, followed by DK, then Warden. I never get sweaty on Arcanist and is EZ mode for me.

OP in this case is merely semantics.

"OP" is relative.

In my opinion, what sets Arcanist apart from other classes is how pushed their passive design is. Almost all of the passives for Arcanist are universally applicable: adding Weapon/Spell Damage, increasing sustain, penetration, generating resources, increasing Armor or Shields. They are all applicable to playing ESO in almost all situations and builds, and most are not restricted to class Skill lines! They are very generalized and most hardly care about Arcanist.

Granted, there are several the proc on Crux as well, but Crux is spread across the entire Class set. You can't really be an Arcanist without using Crux in some way; it's the whole design of the class.

Compare the Arcanist passives with other classes and you find other classes to be much more restrictive and niche. They either pigeonhole classes into a specific playstyle, or they are limited in usecase, or only benefit a specific class skill line.

That isn't to say that I think Arcanist needs a nerf... I think ZOS needs to buff other classes, specifically in their passives.