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Cevni's Criticism Concerning Cyrodiil
Cevni
✭✭
Topics
1. Introduction
2. The AoE cap and changes to Oil
3. Sieging of Keeps and Forward Camps
4. The Campaigns
5. Balancing (Mainly Class Issues)
6. Blocking
7. Weapon Swapping
8. Racials
1. Introduction
This post contains a multitude of opinions being backed up by facts and observations, if you do not like this, I would recommend you to stop reading. It also contains issues that should be posted both in the Alliance War and the Combat sections of the forum. I will post the entire thing the General Section and link to it from both parts of the forum. It will contain posts about class balance coming from a Dragonknight. However I have people from all classes backing my opinions and I have played all classes at vr10+. All of these opinions are also through the eyes of a pure PvPer who plays exclusively in small groups. I also play on the EU server, I do not know if the problems that I take up are as relevant on the US server but I can’t imagine them not being.
2. The AoE cap and changes to Oil
I figured these two points would be logical to take up at the same time. Currently there is a maximum amount of targets that Area of Effect abilities can hit, this maximum number is 6. There is and has been several skills who due to bugs were not affected by this target cap (Most DK abilities in the start, Streak more recently and currently the synergy from Nova and its morphs) all of them has been fixed or is about to be fixed, these were only examples and there might be skills that I have missed. There is also skills that are unaffected by it or has a raised target cap on purpose (Barrier, Purge, Retreating Maneuver).
In addition to this all siege weapons is unaffected by it. This target cap causes large groups to stack up in close knit formations known as “Deathballs”, “Trains” or “Zergballs”. These groups are close to invincible as you hit only a very tiny portion of the players in the blob with your Area of Effect skills which is easily outhealed by their many healers, while these players spam Player Based Area of Effect skills to kill anything going near to them.
I am of the opinion that the AoE cap should be completely removed as it adds no valuable gameplay to the game. I do however believe that any step closer to this is a step forward and that even if it won’t be completely removed an increased target cap, damage falloff per target (with a minimum possible damage of 50% for example) or anything similar would be better than the current system.
I am also of the belief that healing should retain its target cap this is to make sure that large groups of players actually can die (even with these changes outnumbering the enemy would still be beneficial as you can split your forces, have more sieges etc). Regarding that this would lead to increased ultimate gain and increased healing, I do not see the issue with this, if people stack up that much, they should get AoEd down, numbers is already a large boon in this game without some artificial advantage.
The counter to the “Deathball” gameplay used to be to try to use oil in primarily the small flag room in emperor keeps/outposts and in similar chokepoints in gatekeeps even though this was already close to useless due to there always being a large number of dedicated “Purgers” (players spamming the skill “Purge” or more specifically the morph “Efficient Purge”). The change that is about to come to oil would render this strategy impossible thus making the “Deathballs” even more invincible.
I believe that the change would be acceptable only if it comes with a removal of the skill “Rapid Maneuver” and its morphs and making the “Flaming Oil” debuff unremovable by “Purge” and all other debuff removing skills (possibly barring ones only affecting yourself) as in the current state trying to use oil from above (as I guess is its intended use considering the change to it) is close to impossible as the “Deathballs” move at such a high speed into the keeps/outposts.
However keeping the AoE cap and doing the “Flaming Oil” change at the same time will lead to an even larger disaster of gameplay then it is right now where the only thing that could possibly matter is who has the largest “Deathball”.
The removing of the AoE cap would be a large benefit to all players not running the “Deathball” playstyle, this includes both single target damage dealers, area of effect damage dealers and solo players whose playstyle varies.
The AoE damage dealer would benefit as it would be able to deal larger amounts of damage to stacked up groups where AoE damage should be effective.
The single target damage dealer would benefit as players would no longer stack up thus providing situations where single target damage would be preferred to AoE damage (this is supported by player density calculations that I won’t take up in this thread to conserve space as it will be a long one anyway).
All “non-deathball” players would benefit from not being overrun by a tiny blob consisting of an abnormal amounts of players. It would also make the gameplay more intuitive as stacking up to avoid Area of Effect abilties feels extremely counter-intuitive.
In addition to all the gameplay benefits, it would also help reduce server load. This is due to the act of assigning targets for AoE skills is such a “heavy” operation for the server compared to just calculating the damage of abilities. It would also cause players to actually not stack up spamming the skill “Healing Springs” which is the largest cause of server lag/crashes right now as it, it would however not solves the issue of the guilds running the “Deathball” stacking up to crash the server by everyone spamming this skill in 1 spot, this needs to be addressed in some other way (should be easily trackable I think and giving a 12 hour/1day ban to every player participating in this each time it is done seems like the right level of punishment)
3. Sieging of Keeps and Forward Camps
I would first like to say that I believe that everything that is currently being sold by the “Siege Merchants” in ESO should be free (or use a currency only usable to buy these items) as you are currently punished by buying from them by spending AP that you could spend on powerful gear (some of it is atleast and all of it should be in my opinion). Making it free would also make new players have a better chance of getting into Cyrodiil.
There is another of the larger issues in this game even though it is in my opinion dwarfed by the AoE cap issue yet I will still bring this issue up as I feel it needs to be discussed. Currently the fastest and easiest way to travel in Cyrodiil is to suicide and spawn at a forward camp, this feels counter-intuitive and is known as “blood-porting”, I will talk more about this later and will first bring up another issue that is closely linked to it.
Right now keep walls/doors are falling at extremely fast speeds when sieged by 14+ Covenant/Dominion/Pact Ballistae to the point where you even with a 75% horse sprinting all the way from the closest keep the moment it comes under siege have an extremely tiny chance of getting there in time this leads to a large number of “PvE caps” of keeps especially if the attack comes at a keep where the attack is not expected and thus has no one waiting there ready to drop a forward camp for players to “blood-port” to.
This is something that feels very strange as any keep that you do not have some poor person standing in doing nothing at all but waiting for the enemy is doomed while “blood-porting” also feels like a strange way of travel. However, simply increasing the health of walls would lead to sieges for small groups of players to be even slower and more boring than they already are.
I would propose reducing the siege cap to 8 (or some other number that might be more fitting for attackers that is, defenders should not have one) “Covenant/Dominion/Pact Ballistae/Stone Trebuchets” while leaving other siege unaffected by the siege cap, this means that smaller groups would be largely unaffected by this while larger groups would have slower sieges yet still have some benefit (“Fire Ballistae” for example).
This, while also increasing the health of Walls but not doors as to make the main gate the more conventional way of entering a keep as opposed to something that very rarely occurs in addition to this the siege limit, should be for each side of the keep separately and not for the entire keep as 1 large unit.
In addition to this keeps should become instantly marked as under siege but without losing their respawning ability and teleport ability as soon as a wall/gate comes under 75% of their health and it should first be impossible to respawn at or teleport to once the outer wall is down. I do however think that they could have a system where the maximum amounts of players being able to teleport to/respawn at a keep that has been attacked could be capped as they would still be able to slow down the attackers and allow for reinforcements to arrive for the defenders while creating a system where people would have to ride between keeps.
Regarding “Forward Camps” I think that they should be limited to your own group and that you would have to be within its range to spawn and it and their range should be reduced massively (radius could be about as long as between a resource and its keeps opposite side) and possibly have a spot inside the inner wall of keeps where defenders could put one (one per group that is, they should ignore collision with each other if they are from different groups, possibly not visible to friendly players not in your group even) this spot would be intended to be another objective inside keeps to be occupied by attackers before going to the flags.
I also believe that there could also be a system where you after spawning at a camp (wouldn’t apply if another player actually ressed you) would be unable to use siege equipment that has the ability to damage walls as to make repairing between “waves of attackers” a possibility.
This also naturally ties into my next point, repairing right now is silly, I have seen walls go from 0% to 100% in a matter of a few seconds, this feels strange and unintended. A cap on how many players (I would suggest 4 players) can repair a wall at a time would help with this and also making it so that you can’t repair the outer wall unless the inner wall is at 50% or more would be beneficial I believe as it would mean that the outer wall can’t suddenly go up while you are sieging the inner wall. I also think that repair kits should be one free to buy.
In addition to this I believe that “Covenant/Dominion/Pact Ballistae” should be free as to make sieging less excruciatingly expensive however to prevent “troll sieges” a maximum number of sieges per player and keep side could be 2 and you would only be able to use your own ballistae.
I would also like to talk about the flags inside keeps. Currently large groups of players can take the flags even when there is enemies and guards still alive and at the flags, I think that flags should be unable to turn if there is even one player from the defending faction at the flag, however flags should also in general turn very fast if there is no enemies at them, this is really only an issue if you are 1-3 players trying to turn a flag yet I still felt it needed to be mentioned.
4. The Campaigns
I believe that the campaign change from the old system was a complete failure and this opinion is shared by every single person that I know well in this game (not saying there is not players liking the new campaigns just that I currently do not know any). The old system had its problems with buff campaigns, emperor trading and dead campaigns yet the new one faces much larger issues.
On the EU server there is currently only 4 campaigns to pick from (Blackwater Blade doesn’t count) Chillrend (blue buff campaign where you get swarmed if you attack anything), Haderus (yellow buff campaign where you get swarmed if you attack anything), Thornblade (unless you really love “Deathballs” you probably hate this) and Azura’s Star (same as Thornblade but way fewer players and with a beyond ridiculous night presence from blues, they bring a 20+ person train at 2 am including the emperor to take everything they lose back, also AD is always outnumbered here to a ridiculous degree).
On the old campaigns I had only heard of “Deathballs” even with 70+ /played out of which 90% or more of the time was in Cyrodiil, I played on the EU server “Wabbajack” which was a red buff campaign, however they were rarely more than 2 bars of players so we (my guild which averaged 12 players or so online in cyrodiil) could actually fight them and they did not know about the AoE cap or they just hadn’t figured out the “Deathball” “strategy” and we actually had good fights against players who didn't just stack up in a “Deathball” to become invulnerable to AoE attacks. And I have heard of similar things from the other players I know from all factions from different servers.
The new campaign and the “Deathballs” is what has caused more than half of my guild to quit the game because the PvP were simply not any fun anymore. I believe that in addition to a removal of the AoE cap either bringing back the old campaigns or creating a large number of new campaigns with a very low player cap (24/48 would be good numbers for each faction imo, these numbers are of course not final and it is just a suggestion) would bring most of those players back and these are not the only players who have quit the game because of this issue.
5. Balancing (Mainly Class Issues)
Nightblades
I will start with what I think is a large issue. Nightblades are currently underpowered and they are being even further nerfed for no real reason in the next patch (sneak damage lowered). I am among the players who does in no way benefit from a higher sneak damage yet I think that the players who decide to play an assassin character should have the ability to do so efficiently and even before the nerf to sneak damage I do not see a problem. Yes, I get instagibbed several times but if I find them outside sneak they usually just die. I believe that whenever I get instagibbed from sneak by someone running “Camouflaged Hunter” I deserve it because I have put myself in a position where I would get instagibbed or had too slow of a reaction time.
Furthermore that there is also a skill that is supposed to counter this, “Radiant Magelight” which allows you to see nearby stealthed targets and reduces damage taken from sneak attacks by 50% however this ability is currently bugged and does nothing, fixing it would be a better solution then nerfing sneak damage.
I also believe that all melee attacks which currently has a range of 5 meters should have their range increased to 6 meters as to make them less awkward to use as melee is already at a disadvantage to ranged and the 5 meter ranged abilities feel very clumsy and awkward.
Continuing on the note of Nightblades, they are currently underpowered in PvP at least their melee build is and there is a few simply weird things about their skills. For example “Blur” and “Veiled Strike” have obviously been misplaced, they do not fit in their current skill lines and the passives in their respective skill lines fit the other one much better. I believe their positions should be switched.
In addition that they have a lot of passives improving critical strike chance/damage which is currently pointless because everyone runs at least 4 impenetrable pieces of armor. They also lack any form of instant defensive ability that is comparable in power to Streak, Hardened Ward, Green Dragon Blood, Dragon Fire Scales, Blazing Shield or Breath of Life and no Shadow Cloak doesn’t count as it is not only extremely bugged, it has a very short duration and really only delays your death in the same way spamming mist form delays your death without really achieving anything (which is coincidently what a lot of nightblades do instead of cloaking). They have other strengths but the lack of a solid defensive ability is very hard to make up for and I do not believe they currently have enough other good things to make up for it.
Sorcerers
My next subject will be a class which on the other hand is in no way underpowered. Sorcerers are currently one of the in my opinion 2 strongest classes, they have the best shield for shieldstacking, they have powerful synergies with destruction/restoration staff (Surge), they got a spammable teleport which does good damage and applies crowd control to a large amount of players (Streak), they got the hands down best ultimate in the game (Negate Magic) and to top it of they got multiple powerful other spells such as “Encase”, “Crystal Fragments”, “Dark Exchange” and multiple others.
I am completely fine with sorcerers dealing good damage and having large amounts of crowd control all from a safe range, this should however in that case come at the expense of survivability and mobility something they are certainly not lacking right now. I believe that shieldstacking completely needs to be removed, it should be possible to chase a “streak” spamming sorcerer and “streak” (also please add a crowd control immunity timer to the disorient from this ability) should not be usable as an actual damaging skill (I have seen 5 streaks from different sorcerers on my death recap too many times to count).
Templars
Then there is Templars. I do not believe that they are in any way whatsoever underpowered, quite the opposite, I believe they are on the same level of power as sorcerers. They have a very powerful Player Based Area of Effect that also doubles as a powerful survival effect, it is of course “Blazing Shield” I am talking about, when confronted about this ability the usual response is something along the lines of “just don’t attack them”, this is silly, in a game based largely around Area of Effect abilities, avoiding to attack one specific target is very hard, not to mention that while you are not attacking the templar, they are spamming “Puncturing Jabs” and “Blazing Spear” at you.
I believe that Blazing Shield should have some sort of downside, this could be the old magicka regen penalty as it is now overly spammable, an increased cost everytime you use it like streak has or inability to be healed while it is up (or some sort of combination of these).
“Puncturing Jabs” and “Blazing Spear” is 2 other abilities I would like to write a few words about, they are currently both lacking crowd control immunity timers, this means that if you are out of stamina you will get chain stunned to death with no ability to survive at all.
Also, Blazing Spear’s damage portion (which I believe is a bit too high) is not blockable but its stun portion is, blocking the stun portion draws a large amount of stamina while you still take full damage, either it should not draw stamina or the damage should be reduced by blocking it.
Templars also have one of the strongest Player Based Area of Effect Crowd Control skills; “Blinding Flashes”, not only does this skill spam itself (every 2 seconds), it makes all nearby enemies get a 50% miss chance and it off-balances frequently which lowers their blocking making them vulnerable to “Puncturing Jabs” spam.
They currently have a very strong Area of Effect ultimate in “Nova” as well, especially the “Solar Prison” morph which gives the “Gravity Crush” synergy which hits for a very large amount of damage and has no target cap this is sadly however being changed as it was previously one of the few ways to actually kill 24 stacked up people on a flag.
In addition to this Templars have the overbuffed templar healing ultimate. When one of them is up every player being healed by it in the room is close to unkillable and there is no way to interrupt it right now, it felt like it was in a good spot where they had crowd control immunity but were still interruptible, otherwise I see no problems with healing templars.
Dragonknights
Now I feel forced to also discuss Dragonknights as I have taken up all the other classes, I currently believe that Dragonknights are in an okay spot, they got a few really good spells such “Dragon Fire Scales”, which is really good when facing people who are either blind or dumb and spam their projectiles into it (there is plenty of those and reflecting those projectiles gives ultimate to fight the real threats), they have a strong self heal in “Green Dragon Blood” and they got good damage from spells like “Burning Talons”, “Flame Lash” and “Unstable Flame”.
The only skill that I do not like that they have is actually their strong shield, “Igneous Shield”, which also synergises powerfully with “Green Dragon Blood”. I believe that the shield from this shouldn’t be 100% stronger on yourself and only apply on heals to other people aswell as shield stacking in general being completely removed.
Two Handed
About the changes coming to the weapons I am positive about all of them except one, the 2 hander is actually being nerfed in PvP even though it is already a weak weapon, they are removing one of the really good passives from it and replacing it with one that does nothing in PvP (try doing a fully charged 2 handed attack in PvP) while removing the 2 seconds root from “Stampede” and replacing it with a slow which will weaken it immensely.
There was also promised a buff for “Cleave”, currently its damage is increased by 10% in the next patch, but its in my opinion strongest morph, “Carve”, gets nerfed to 2 ultimate extra per target instead of 3 which makes it overall weaker. Furthermore, there was supposed to be an increase in its radius (according to some official statement), this is what is actually really badly needed for this skill. The rest of 2 hander is however being buffed to a more reasonable level.
Destruction Staff
The Destruction Staff I believe has one skill that should get a small decrease in damage but not too much (10-15% would be good I think) and that other than that it will be fine in the next patch, this skill is of course “Impulse)
Restoration Staff
The next weapon I would like to talk about is the Restoration Staff, most players run around with one of these, I believe that it has a few skills that should be somehow changed mainly “Healing Springs” this skill just heals for too much, I believe it should have its healing reduced by maybe 30% or so as to make it more comparable to other heals. The other thing about it is that it has no instant “simple heal” it only has healing over time effects and the closest it gets to a normal heal is “Healing Springs” and “Healing Ward”, it should get something similar to the templar skill “Rushed Ceremony” obviously replacing some other skill, not sure which though.
Armor
Regarding armors there is a few things I would like to discuss. The first thing is that the armor skills “Immovable”, “Annulment” and “Evasion” should only be usable if you wear 4 or more of the corresponding type of armor as right now “Immovable” is being used mainly by people wearing 7 pieces of light armor (and a stick).
Damage Shields
I would also like to talk once more about shieldstacking and damage shields in general. I believe that shield stacking should be done away with. In addition to that skills should work as normal when you attack them, such as the nightblade skill “Strife” healing for 0 and your attacks generating 0 ultimate when attacking shields.
Healing
Healing should also prioritize people in your group over people outside of your group, this should be a toggleable option so you can choose, preferably with like a slider where you could pick like how many % less someone not in your group would have to be at be prioritized (an example would be that it would go from 0-1000% and if at 0% it would work like now, and if at 500% a group member with 90% hp would have the same prio as a non-group member with 50%.
Stamina Builds
There is also the issue of stamina builds being too weak right now, this is something that I can’t think of any good fixes for right now, but making class skills work like ultimates (takes highest from weapon damage and spell damage and the highest from magicka and stamina) would be a good start.
Impenetrable
There is another issue that needs to be discussed, this is the impenetrable trait, it is currently far too powerful and since there is no other options, all PvPers wear 4-7 pieces of it (sometimes infused on large pieces). It should be changed so that it reduces crit damage by 0.1% per 1 impenetrable rating (legendary pieces got 100 and would reduce by 10%) this would like the current impenetrable not apply to sneak attacks or skills that are guaranteed to crit (Critical Charge mainly).
Animations
There is a few skills that you often lack the ability to see at all or lack the ability to know if they are friendly or not, this should be remedied I believe.
Negate Magic (and morphs) are not nearly visible enough and it needs a clearer indicator whether it is friendly or not.
Dragonknight standard (and morphs) needs a clearer indicator whether it is friendly or not.
Consuming Darkness (and morphs) needs a clearer indicator whether it is friendly or not.
There is probably more of these skills who needs these changes, this was just the ones that felt the most important and the ones annoying me the most.
Friendly/Hostile siege indicators would be appreciated but might have been an intended decision to leave out but I am among the players who would appreciate them.
6. Blocking
I am actually one of the players that believe blocking is currently working very well and does not need any changes at all, the time to kill in this game is ridiculously low without blocking but with blocking and if they removed shield stacking it feels like it is where it is supposed to be.
7. Weapon Swapping
This is an issue I would like to speak of. I think that it should be changed so that you have 1 bar with 10 skills and 2 ultimate abilities. You would still however have the ability to swap which weapon is currently active and this could potentially be made able to switch in what order the skills appear. This would solve atleast somewhat solve the problem with weapon swap being so unreliable. It would also allow be a nice thing for people using “Inner Light” as it would only take 1 slot up on the bar, for Nightblades with different amounts of health on their 2 bars (the fortitude passive) and it would allow for a more diverse combat I believe.
Also, make shields enchantable either as a weapon/jewelry piece or make the enchant on it apply to both bars (when weapon swapping you lose health/stamina/magicka even if you got a shield on both bars and they have the same enchantment)
8. Racials
As a minmaxer, racials is something that is important to me, in this game they are extremely potent and there goes no day where I do not regret my race choice for example I am a redguard Dragonknight, I would really badly prefer to be a Dunmer, I picked what I thought would be best when I started the game and and had very little knowledge of it and then I got Emperor a few times and a high PvP rank and I don’t know if I could get all of that again by leveling a new character. This means that I am always unhappy with my character yet there is no solution for this.
I believe that 1 race change should be allowed (perhaps as a reward for completing Cadwell’s Gold) as players are otherwise punished constantly for a choice they most likely did when they had no knowledge of the game.
Another idea is for racials to be removed (or changed to something “pointless” like the argonian swimming speed) without anything of value really being lost as that would allow players to simply pick their favorite race and not the one with the best bonuses. This feels especially important now as some races have gotten completely useless bonuses that looked powerful from the start, like Khajiits, 10% sneak dmg used to be very good, not so much anymore. 6% weapon crit is pointless as everyone wears Impenetrable and Health Regen is just weak.
Edit: Added a part about animations that I forgot to add initially.
Edited by Cevni on October 25, 2014 1:10AM 1. Introduction
2. The AoE cap and changes to Oil
3. Sieging of Keeps and Forward Camps
4. The Campaigns
5. Balancing (Mainly Class Issues)
6. Blocking
7. Weapon Swapping
8. Racials
1. Introduction
This post contains a multitude of opinions being backed up by facts and observations, if you do not like this, I would recommend you to stop reading. It also contains issues that should be posted both in the Alliance War and the Combat sections of the forum. I will post the entire thing the General Section and link to it from both parts of the forum. It will contain posts about class balance coming from a Dragonknight. However I have people from all classes backing my opinions and I have played all classes at vr10+. All of these opinions are also through the eyes of a pure PvPer who plays exclusively in small groups. I also play on the EU server, I do not know if the problems that I take up are as relevant on the US server but I can’t imagine them not being.
2. The AoE cap and changes to Oil
I figured these two points would be logical to take up at the same time. Currently there is a maximum amount of targets that Area of Effect abilities can hit, this maximum number is 6. There is and has been several skills who due to bugs were not affected by this target cap (Most DK abilities in the start, Streak more recently and currently the synergy from Nova and its morphs) all of them has been fixed or is about to be fixed, these were only examples and there might be skills that I have missed. There is also skills that are unaffected by it or has a raised target cap on purpose (Barrier, Purge, Retreating Maneuver).
In addition to this all siege weapons is unaffected by it. This target cap causes large groups to stack up in close knit formations known as “Deathballs”, “Trains” or “Zergballs”. These groups are close to invincible as you hit only a very tiny portion of the players in the blob with your Area of Effect skills which is easily outhealed by their many healers, while these players spam Player Based Area of Effect skills to kill anything going near to them.
I am of the opinion that the AoE cap should be completely removed as it adds no valuable gameplay to the game. I do however believe that any step closer to this is a step forward and that even if it won’t be completely removed an increased target cap, damage falloff per target (with a minimum possible damage of 50% for example) or anything similar would be better than the current system.
I am also of the belief that healing should retain its target cap this is to make sure that large groups of players actually can die (even with these changes outnumbering the enemy would still be beneficial as you can split your forces, have more sieges etc). Regarding that this would lead to increased ultimate gain and increased healing, I do not see the issue with this, if people stack up that much, they should get AoEd down, numbers is already a large boon in this game without some artificial advantage.
The counter to the “Deathball” gameplay used to be to try to use oil in primarily the small flag room in emperor keeps/outposts and in similar chokepoints in gatekeeps even though this was already close to useless due to there always being a large number of dedicated “Purgers” (players spamming the skill “Purge” or more specifically the morph “Efficient Purge”). The change that is about to come to oil would render this strategy impossible thus making the “Deathballs” even more invincible.
I believe that the change would be acceptable only if it comes with a removal of the skill “Rapid Maneuver” and its morphs and making the “Flaming Oil” debuff unremovable by “Purge” and all other debuff removing skills (possibly barring ones only affecting yourself) as in the current state trying to use oil from above (as I guess is its intended use considering the change to it) is close to impossible as the “Deathballs” move at such a high speed into the keeps/outposts.
However keeping the AoE cap and doing the “Flaming Oil” change at the same time will lead to an even larger disaster of gameplay then it is right now where the only thing that could possibly matter is who has the largest “Deathball”.
The removing of the AoE cap would be a large benefit to all players not running the “Deathball” playstyle, this includes both single target damage dealers, area of effect damage dealers and solo players whose playstyle varies.
The AoE damage dealer would benefit as it would be able to deal larger amounts of damage to stacked up groups where AoE damage should be effective.
The single target damage dealer would benefit as players would no longer stack up thus providing situations where single target damage would be preferred to AoE damage (this is supported by player density calculations that I won’t take up in this thread to conserve space as it will be a long one anyway).
All “non-deathball” players would benefit from not being overrun by a tiny blob consisting of an abnormal amounts of players. It would also make the gameplay more intuitive as stacking up to avoid Area of Effect abilties feels extremely counter-intuitive.
In addition to all the gameplay benefits, it would also help reduce server load. This is due to the act of assigning targets for AoE skills is such a “heavy” operation for the server compared to just calculating the damage of abilities. It would also cause players to actually not stack up spamming the skill “Healing Springs” which is the largest cause of server lag/crashes right now as it, it would however not solves the issue of the guilds running the “Deathball” stacking up to crash the server by everyone spamming this skill in 1 spot, this needs to be addressed in some other way (should be easily trackable I think and giving a 12 hour/1day ban to every player participating in this each time it is done seems like the right level of punishment)
3. Sieging of Keeps and Forward Camps
I would first like to say that I believe that everything that is currently being sold by the “Siege Merchants” in ESO should be free (or use a currency only usable to buy these items) as you are currently punished by buying from them by spending AP that you could spend on powerful gear (some of it is atleast and all of it should be in my opinion). Making it free would also make new players have a better chance of getting into Cyrodiil.
There is another of the larger issues in this game even though it is in my opinion dwarfed by the AoE cap issue yet I will still bring this issue up as I feel it needs to be discussed. Currently the fastest and easiest way to travel in Cyrodiil is to suicide and spawn at a forward camp, this feels counter-intuitive and is known as “blood-porting”, I will talk more about this later and will first bring up another issue that is closely linked to it.
Right now keep walls/doors are falling at extremely fast speeds when sieged by 14+ Covenant/Dominion/Pact Ballistae to the point where you even with a 75% horse sprinting all the way from the closest keep the moment it comes under siege have an extremely tiny chance of getting there in time this leads to a large number of “PvE caps” of keeps especially if the attack comes at a keep where the attack is not expected and thus has no one waiting there ready to drop a forward camp for players to “blood-port” to.
This is something that feels very strange as any keep that you do not have some poor person standing in doing nothing at all but waiting for the enemy is doomed while “blood-porting” also feels like a strange way of travel. However, simply increasing the health of walls would lead to sieges for small groups of players to be even slower and more boring than they already are.
I would propose reducing the siege cap to 8 (or some other number that might be more fitting for attackers that is, defenders should not have one) “Covenant/Dominion/Pact Ballistae/Stone Trebuchets” while leaving other siege unaffected by the siege cap, this means that smaller groups would be largely unaffected by this while larger groups would have slower sieges yet still have some benefit (“Fire Ballistae” for example).
This, while also increasing the health of Walls but not doors as to make the main gate the more conventional way of entering a keep as opposed to something that very rarely occurs in addition to this the siege limit, should be for each side of the keep separately and not for the entire keep as 1 large unit.
In addition to this keeps should become instantly marked as under siege but without losing their respawning ability and teleport ability as soon as a wall/gate comes under 75% of their health and it should first be impossible to respawn at or teleport to once the outer wall is down. I do however think that they could have a system where the maximum amounts of players being able to teleport to/respawn at a keep that has been attacked could be capped as they would still be able to slow down the attackers and allow for reinforcements to arrive for the defenders while creating a system where people would have to ride between keeps.
Regarding “Forward Camps” I think that they should be limited to your own group and that you would have to be within its range to spawn and it and their range should be reduced massively (radius could be about as long as between a resource and its keeps opposite side) and possibly have a spot inside the inner wall of keeps where defenders could put one (one per group that is, they should ignore collision with each other if they are from different groups, possibly not visible to friendly players not in your group even) this spot would be intended to be another objective inside keeps to be occupied by attackers before going to the flags.
I also believe that there could also be a system where you after spawning at a camp (wouldn’t apply if another player actually ressed you) would be unable to use siege equipment that has the ability to damage walls as to make repairing between “waves of attackers” a possibility.
This also naturally ties into my next point, repairing right now is silly, I have seen walls go from 0% to 100% in a matter of a few seconds, this feels strange and unintended. A cap on how many players (I would suggest 4 players) can repair a wall at a time would help with this and also making it so that you can’t repair the outer wall unless the inner wall is at 50% or more would be beneficial I believe as it would mean that the outer wall can’t suddenly go up while you are sieging the inner wall. I also think that repair kits should be one free to buy.
In addition to this I believe that “Covenant/Dominion/Pact Ballistae” should be free as to make sieging less excruciatingly expensive however to prevent “troll sieges” a maximum number of sieges per player and keep side could be 2 and you would only be able to use your own ballistae.
I would also like to talk about the flags inside keeps. Currently large groups of players can take the flags even when there is enemies and guards still alive and at the flags, I think that flags should be unable to turn if there is even one player from the defending faction at the flag, however flags should also in general turn very fast if there is no enemies at them, this is really only an issue if you are 1-3 players trying to turn a flag yet I still felt it needed to be mentioned.
4. The Campaigns
I believe that the campaign change from the old system was a complete failure and this opinion is shared by every single person that I know well in this game (not saying there is not players liking the new campaigns just that I currently do not know any). The old system had its problems with buff campaigns, emperor trading and dead campaigns yet the new one faces much larger issues.
On the EU server there is currently only 4 campaigns to pick from (Blackwater Blade doesn’t count) Chillrend (blue buff campaign where you get swarmed if you attack anything), Haderus (yellow buff campaign where you get swarmed if you attack anything), Thornblade (unless you really love “Deathballs” you probably hate this) and Azura’s Star (same as Thornblade but way fewer players and with a beyond ridiculous night presence from blues, they bring a 20+ person train at 2 am including the emperor to take everything they lose back, also AD is always outnumbered here to a ridiculous degree).
On the old campaigns I had only heard of “Deathballs” even with 70+ /played out of which 90% or more of the time was in Cyrodiil, I played on the EU server “Wabbajack” which was a red buff campaign, however they were rarely more than 2 bars of players so we (my guild which averaged 12 players or so online in cyrodiil) could actually fight them and they did not know about the AoE cap or they just hadn’t figured out the “Deathball” “strategy” and we actually had good fights against players who didn't just stack up in a “Deathball” to become invulnerable to AoE attacks. And I have heard of similar things from the other players I know from all factions from different servers.
The new campaign and the “Deathballs” is what has caused more than half of my guild to quit the game because the PvP were simply not any fun anymore. I believe that in addition to a removal of the AoE cap either bringing back the old campaigns or creating a large number of new campaigns with a very low player cap (24/48 would be good numbers for each faction imo, these numbers are of course not final and it is just a suggestion) would bring most of those players back and these are not the only players who have quit the game because of this issue.
5. Balancing (Mainly Class Issues)
Nightblades
I will start with what I think is a large issue. Nightblades are currently underpowered and they are being even further nerfed for no real reason in the next patch (sneak damage lowered). I am among the players who does in no way benefit from a higher sneak damage yet I think that the players who decide to play an assassin character should have the ability to do so efficiently and even before the nerf to sneak damage I do not see a problem. Yes, I get instagibbed several times but if I find them outside sneak they usually just die. I believe that whenever I get instagibbed from sneak by someone running “Camouflaged Hunter” I deserve it because I have put myself in a position where I would get instagibbed or had too slow of a reaction time.
Furthermore that there is also a skill that is supposed to counter this, “Radiant Magelight” which allows you to see nearby stealthed targets and reduces damage taken from sneak attacks by 50% however this ability is currently bugged and does nothing, fixing it would be a better solution then nerfing sneak damage.
I also believe that all melee attacks which currently has a range of 5 meters should have their range increased to 6 meters as to make them less awkward to use as melee is already at a disadvantage to ranged and the 5 meter ranged abilities feel very clumsy and awkward.
Continuing on the note of Nightblades, they are currently underpowered in PvP at least their melee build is and there is a few simply weird things about their skills. For example “Blur” and “Veiled Strike” have obviously been misplaced, they do not fit in their current skill lines and the passives in their respective skill lines fit the other one much better. I believe their positions should be switched.
In addition that they have a lot of passives improving critical strike chance/damage which is currently pointless because everyone runs at least 4 impenetrable pieces of armor. They also lack any form of instant defensive ability that is comparable in power to Streak, Hardened Ward, Green Dragon Blood, Dragon Fire Scales, Blazing Shield or Breath of Life and no Shadow Cloak doesn’t count as it is not only extremely bugged, it has a very short duration and really only delays your death in the same way spamming mist form delays your death without really achieving anything (which is coincidently what a lot of nightblades do instead of cloaking). They have other strengths but the lack of a solid defensive ability is very hard to make up for and I do not believe they currently have enough other good things to make up for it.
Sorcerers
My next subject will be a class which on the other hand is in no way underpowered. Sorcerers are currently one of the in my opinion 2 strongest classes, they have the best shield for shieldstacking, they have powerful synergies with destruction/restoration staff (Surge), they got a spammable teleport which does good damage and applies crowd control to a large amount of players (Streak), they got the hands down best ultimate in the game (Negate Magic) and to top it of they got multiple powerful other spells such as “Encase”, “Crystal Fragments”, “Dark Exchange” and multiple others.
I am completely fine with sorcerers dealing good damage and having large amounts of crowd control all from a safe range, this should however in that case come at the expense of survivability and mobility something they are certainly not lacking right now. I believe that shieldstacking completely needs to be removed, it should be possible to chase a “streak” spamming sorcerer and “streak” (also please add a crowd control immunity timer to the disorient from this ability) should not be usable as an actual damaging skill (I have seen 5 streaks from different sorcerers on my death recap too many times to count).
Templars
Then there is Templars. I do not believe that they are in any way whatsoever underpowered, quite the opposite, I believe they are on the same level of power as sorcerers. They have a very powerful Player Based Area of Effect that also doubles as a powerful survival effect, it is of course “Blazing Shield” I am talking about, when confronted about this ability the usual response is something along the lines of “just don’t attack them”, this is silly, in a game based largely around Area of Effect abilities, avoiding to attack one specific target is very hard, not to mention that while you are not attacking the templar, they are spamming “Puncturing Jabs” and “Blazing Spear” at you.
I believe that Blazing Shield should have some sort of downside, this could be the old magicka regen penalty as it is now overly spammable, an increased cost everytime you use it like streak has or inability to be healed while it is up (or some sort of combination of these).
“Puncturing Jabs” and “Blazing Spear” is 2 other abilities I would like to write a few words about, they are currently both lacking crowd control immunity timers, this means that if you are out of stamina you will get chain stunned to death with no ability to survive at all.
Also, Blazing Spear’s damage portion (which I believe is a bit too high) is not blockable but its stun portion is, blocking the stun portion draws a large amount of stamina while you still take full damage, either it should not draw stamina or the damage should be reduced by blocking it.
Templars also have one of the strongest Player Based Area of Effect Crowd Control skills; “Blinding Flashes”, not only does this skill spam itself (every 2 seconds), it makes all nearby enemies get a 50% miss chance and it off-balances frequently which lowers their blocking making them vulnerable to “Puncturing Jabs” spam.
They currently have a very strong Area of Effect ultimate in “Nova” as well, especially the “Solar Prison” morph which gives the “Gravity Crush” synergy which hits for a very large amount of damage and has no target cap this is sadly however being changed as it was previously one of the few ways to actually kill 24 stacked up people on a flag.
In addition to this Templars have the overbuffed templar healing ultimate. When one of them is up every player being healed by it in the room is close to unkillable and there is no way to interrupt it right now, it felt like it was in a good spot where they had crowd control immunity but were still interruptible, otherwise I see no problems with healing templars.
Dragonknights
Now I feel forced to also discuss Dragonknights as I have taken up all the other classes, I currently believe that Dragonknights are in an okay spot, they got a few really good spells such “Dragon Fire Scales”, which is really good when facing people who are either blind or dumb and spam their projectiles into it (there is plenty of those and reflecting those projectiles gives ultimate to fight the real threats), they have a strong self heal in “Green Dragon Blood” and they got good damage from spells like “Burning Talons”, “Flame Lash” and “Unstable Flame”.
The only skill that I do not like that they have is actually their strong shield, “Igneous Shield”, which also synergises powerfully with “Green Dragon Blood”. I believe that the shield from this shouldn’t be 100% stronger on yourself and only apply on heals to other people aswell as shield stacking in general being completely removed.
Two Handed
About the changes coming to the weapons I am positive about all of them except one, the 2 hander is actually being nerfed in PvP even though it is already a weak weapon, they are removing one of the really good passives from it and replacing it with one that does nothing in PvP (try doing a fully charged 2 handed attack in PvP) while removing the 2 seconds root from “Stampede” and replacing it with a slow which will weaken it immensely.
There was also promised a buff for “Cleave”, currently its damage is increased by 10% in the next patch, but its in my opinion strongest morph, “Carve”, gets nerfed to 2 ultimate extra per target instead of 3 which makes it overall weaker. Furthermore, there was supposed to be an increase in its radius (according to some official statement), this is what is actually really badly needed for this skill. The rest of 2 hander is however being buffed to a more reasonable level.
Destruction Staff
The Destruction Staff I believe has one skill that should get a small decrease in damage but not too much (10-15% would be good I think) and that other than that it will be fine in the next patch, this skill is of course “Impulse)
Restoration Staff
The next weapon I would like to talk about is the Restoration Staff, most players run around with one of these, I believe that it has a few skills that should be somehow changed mainly “Healing Springs” this skill just heals for too much, I believe it should have its healing reduced by maybe 30% or so as to make it more comparable to other heals. The other thing about it is that it has no instant “simple heal” it only has healing over time effects and the closest it gets to a normal heal is “Healing Springs” and “Healing Ward”, it should get something similar to the templar skill “Rushed Ceremony” obviously replacing some other skill, not sure which though.
Armor
Regarding armors there is a few things I would like to discuss. The first thing is that the armor skills “Immovable”, “Annulment” and “Evasion” should only be usable if you wear 4 or more of the corresponding type of armor as right now “Immovable” is being used mainly by people wearing 7 pieces of light armor (and a stick).
Damage Shields
I would also like to talk once more about shieldstacking and damage shields in general. I believe that shield stacking should be done away with. In addition to that skills should work as normal when you attack them, such as the nightblade skill “Strife” healing for 0 and your attacks generating 0 ultimate when attacking shields.
Healing
Healing should also prioritize people in your group over people outside of your group, this should be a toggleable option so you can choose, preferably with like a slider where you could pick like how many % less someone not in your group would have to be at be prioritized (an example would be that it would go from 0-1000% and if at 0% it would work like now, and if at 500% a group member with 90% hp would have the same prio as a non-group member with 50%.
Stamina Builds
There is also the issue of stamina builds being too weak right now, this is something that I can’t think of any good fixes for right now, but making class skills work like ultimates (takes highest from weapon damage and spell damage and the highest from magicka and stamina) would be a good start.
Impenetrable
There is another issue that needs to be discussed, this is the impenetrable trait, it is currently far too powerful and since there is no other options, all PvPers wear 4-7 pieces of it (sometimes infused on large pieces). It should be changed so that it reduces crit damage by 0.1% per 1 impenetrable rating (legendary pieces got 100 and would reduce by 10%) this would like the current impenetrable not apply to sneak attacks or skills that are guaranteed to crit (Critical Charge mainly).
Animations
There is a few skills that you often lack the ability to see at all or lack the ability to know if they are friendly or not, this should be remedied I believe.
Negate Magic (and morphs) are not nearly visible enough and it needs a clearer indicator whether it is friendly or not.
Dragonknight standard (and morphs) needs a clearer indicator whether it is friendly or not.
Consuming Darkness (and morphs) needs a clearer indicator whether it is friendly or not.
There is probably more of these skills who needs these changes, this was just the ones that felt the most important and the ones annoying me the most.
Friendly/Hostile siege indicators would be appreciated but might have been an intended decision to leave out but I am among the players who would appreciate them.
6. Blocking
I am actually one of the players that believe blocking is currently working very well and does not need any changes at all, the time to kill in this game is ridiculously low without blocking but with blocking and if they removed shield stacking it feels like it is where it is supposed to be.
7. Weapon Swapping
This is an issue I would like to speak of. I think that it should be changed so that you have 1 bar with 10 skills and 2 ultimate abilities. You would still however have the ability to swap which weapon is currently active and this could potentially be made able to switch in what order the skills appear. This would solve atleast somewhat solve the problem with weapon swap being so unreliable. It would also allow be a nice thing for people using “Inner Light” as it would only take 1 slot up on the bar, for Nightblades with different amounts of health on their 2 bars (the fortitude passive) and it would allow for a more diverse combat I believe.
Also, make shields enchantable either as a weapon/jewelry piece or make the enchant on it apply to both bars (when weapon swapping you lose health/stamina/magicka even if you got a shield on both bars and they have the same enchantment)
8. Racials
As a minmaxer, racials is something that is important to me, in this game they are extremely potent and there goes no day where I do not regret my race choice for example I am a redguard Dragonknight, I would really badly prefer to be a Dunmer, I picked what I thought would be best when I started the game and and had very little knowledge of it and then I got Emperor a few times and a high PvP rank and I don’t know if I could get all of that again by leveling a new character. This means that I am always unhappy with my character yet there is no solution for this.
I believe that 1 race change should be allowed (perhaps as a reward for completing Cadwell’s Gold) as players are otherwise punished constantly for a choice they most likely did when they had no knowledge of the game.
Another idea is for racials to be removed (or changed to something “pointless” like the argonian swimming speed) without anything of value really being lost as that would allow players to simply pick their favorite race and not the one with the best bonuses. This feels especially important now as some races have gotten completely useless bonuses that looked powerful from the start, like Khajiits, 10% sneak dmg used to be very good, not so much anymore. 6% weapon crit is pointless as everyone wears Impenetrable and Health Regen is just weak.
Edit: Added a part about animations that I forgot to add initially.
Guild Leader of Crimson Malice - Azura's Star EU
Guild Leader of The Batman Brigade - Azura's Star EU
Arrius Mine Dweller (Previously Cevni) - V14 - Redguard Dragonknight - Former Emperor - PvP Rank 33
3 Times Emperor on Wabbajack (Cevni)
1 Time Emperor on Azura's Star (Cevni)
Cevni (Previously Cheatni) - v14 - Dunmer Dragonknight - Former Emperor - PvP rank 23
1 Time Emperor Blackwater Blade (Cheatni)
1 Time Emperor Chillrend (Cevni)
1 Time Emperor Azura's Star (Cevni)
Guild Leader of The Batman Brigade - Azura's Star EU
Arrius Mine Dweller (Previously Cevni) - V14 - Redguard Dragonknight - Former Emperor - PvP Rank 33
3 Times Emperor on Wabbajack (Cevni)
1 Time Emperor on Azura's Star (Cevni)
Cevni (Previously Cheatni) - v14 - Dunmer Dragonknight - Former Emperor - PvP rank 23
1 Time Emperor Blackwater Blade (Cheatni)
1 Time Emperor Chillrend (Cevni)
1 Time Emperor Azura's Star (Cevni)
26
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Voodoo✭✭✭✭nice post, well thought out and articulated. Waiting on justice system as my preferred way to pvp and so have no experience with cyrodiil issues but your post does sound like a good alternative to alot of the problems I read coming from there.Edited by Voodoo on October 22, 2014 11:48PM2 -
DragonWitch✭✭Awesome, loved it.
Now let's hope a certain "somebody's" reads it
And you're Kruppe. You must be - who else in this city tries to eat with his nose when his mouth is filled?
-Torvlad Nom
"Now, now. Quarters are cramped and nerves are frayed and Ublala's cramped brain is fraying our nerves without quarter..."
-Tehol
Hello, soldiers, look at your mage, now back to me, now back at your mage, now back to me. Sadly, he isn’t me, but if he stopped being an unascended mortal and switched to Sole Spice, he could smell like he’s me. Look down, back up, where are you? You’re in a warren with the High Mage your cadre mage could smell like. What’s in your hand, back at me. I have it, it’s an acorn with two gates to that realm you love. Look again, the acorn is now otataral. Anything is possible when your mage smells like Sole Spice and not a Bole brother. I’m on a quorl.1 -
ExiledKhallisi✭✭✭✭✭
5. Balancing (Mainly Class Issues)
Nightblades
I will start with what I think is a large issue. Nightblades are currently underpowered and they are being even further nerfed for no real reason in the next patch (sneak damage lowered). I am among the players who does in no way benefit from a higher sneak damage yet I think that the players who decide to play an assassin character should have the ability to do so efficiently and even before the nerf to sneak damage I do not see a problem. Yes, I get instagibbed several times but if I find them outside sneak they usually just die. I believe that whenever I get instagibbed from sneak by someone running “Camouflaged Hunter” I deserve it because I have put myself in a position where I would get instagibbed or had too slow of a reaction time.
Furthermore that there is also a skill that is supposed to counter this, “Radiant Magelight” which allows you to see nearby stealthed targets and reduces damage taken from sneak attacks by 50% however this ability is currently bugged and does nothing, fixing it would be a better solution then nerfing sneak damage.
I also believe that all melee attacks which currently has a range of 5 meters should have their range increased to 6 meters as to make them less awkward to use as melee is already at a disadvantage to ranged and the 5 meter ranged abilities feel very clumsy and awkward.
Continuing on the note of Nightblades, they are currently underpowered in PvP at least their melee build is and there is a few simply weird things about their skills. For example “Blur” and “Veiled Strike” have obviously been misplaced, they do not fit in their current skill lines and the passives in their respective skill lines fit the other one much better. I believe their positions should be switched.
In addition that they have a lot of passives improving critical strike chance/damage which is currently pointless because everyone runs at least 4 impenetrable pieces of armor. They also lack any form of instant defensive ability that is comparable in power to Streak, Hardened Ward, Green Dragon Blood, Dragon Fire Scales, Blazing Shield or Breath of Life and no Shadow Cloak doesn’t count as it is not only extremely bugged, it has a very short duration and really only delays your death in the same way spamming mist form delays your death without really achieving anything (which is coincidently what a lot of nightblades do instead of cloaking). They have other strengths but the lack of a solid defensive ability is very hard to make up for and I do not believe they currently have enough other good things to make up for it.
Dragonknights
Now I feel forced to also discuss Dragonknights as I have taken up all the other classes, I currently believe that Dragonknights are in an okay spot, they got a few really good spells such “Dragon Fire Scales”, which is really good when facing people who are either blind or dumb and spam their projectiles into it (there is plenty of those and reflecting those projectiles gives ultimate to fight the real threats), they have a strong self heal in “Green Dragon Blood” and they got good damage from spells like “Burning Talons”, “Flame Lash” and “Unstable Flame”.
The only skill that I do not like that they have is actually their strong shield, “Igneous Shield”, which also synergises powerfully with “Green Dragon Blood”. I believe that the shield from this shouldn’t be 100% stronger on yourself and only apply on heals to other people aswell as shield stacking in general being completely removed.
Armor
Regarding armors there is a few things I would like to discuss. The first thing is that the armor skills “Immovable”, “Annulment” and “Evasion” should only be usable if you wear 4 or more of the corresponding type of armor as right now “Immovable” is being used mainly by people wearing 7 pieces of light armor (and a stick).
Stamina Builds
There is also the issue of stamina builds being too weak right now, this is something that I can’t think of any good fixes for right now, but making class skills work like ultimates (takes highest from weapon damage and spell damage and the highest from magicka and stamina) would be a good start.
Impenetrable
There is another issue that needs to be discussed, this is the impenetrable trait, it is currently far too powerful and since there is no other options, all PvPers wear 4-7 pieces of it (sometimes infused on large pieces). It should be changed so that it reduces crit damage by 0.1% per 1 impenetrable rating (legendary pieces got 100 and would reduce by 10%) this would like the current impenetrable not apply to sneak attacks or skills that are guaranteed to crit (Critical Charge mainly).
6. Blocking
I am actually one of the players that believe blocking is currently working very well and does not need any changes at all, the time to kill in this game is ridiculously low without blocking but with blocking and if they removed shield stacking it feels like it is where it is supposed to be.
I agree with most of everything you said.
Nightblades:
-No, they are not under powered.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_teBL8dbe4k#t=105
Dragonknights:
-Reflective Scales completely nullifies some builds. It should reflect 1 projectile per cast.
-Talons should be able to be broken out of by break free, and should have its magicka cost increased.
Armor:
-Agree100%
Stamina Builds:
-Are almost on par, the only thing they truly need is for Dodge/block/roll to have its own resource bar.
Impenetrable:
-If they nerfed impenetrable that badly everyone would be getting pew pew'd by players with 70%+ crit
Blocking:
-You think its working very well?! Do you play the same game as me?
-360 degree blocking needs to be nerfed it should be frontal only.
-It should also drain stamina while u are blocking to prevent permanant blocking.
-The ability to block while casting should be completely removed from the game
>>>>>>>>(DC)Guild Master of Biestas 250+ Active Members<<<<<<<<||||||Vr14 Sorc: Darkened Soul vr14 Templar: Tiffaney||||||“Let your plans be dark and impenetrable as night, and when you move, fall like a thunderbolt.”
― Sun Tzu, The Art of War4 -
Xsorus✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭✭✭ExiledKhallisi wrote: »
5. Balancing (Mainly Class Issues)
Nightblades
I will start with what I think is a large issue. Nightblades are currently underpowered and they are being even further nerfed for no real reason in the next patch (sneak damage lowered). I am among the players who does in no way benefit from a higher sneak damage yet I think that the players who decide to play an assassin character should have the ability to do so efficiently and even before the nerf to sneak damage I do not see a problem. Yes, I get instagibbed several times but if I find them outside sneak they usually just die. I believe that whenever I get instagibbed from sneak by someone running “Camouflaged Hunter” I deserve it because I have put myself in a position where I would get instagibbed or had too slow of a reaction time.
Furthermore that there is also a skill that is supposed to counter this, “Radiant Magelight” which allows you to see nearby stealthed targets and reduces damage taken from sneak attacks by 50% however this ability is currently bugged and does nothing, fixing it would be a better solution then nerfing sneak damage.
I also believe that all melee attacks which currently has a range of 5 meters should have their range increased to 6 meters as to make them less awkward to use as melee is already at a disadvantage to ranged and the 5 meter ranged abilities feel very clumsy and awkward.
Continuing on the note of Nightblades, they are currently underpowered in PvP at least their melee build is and there is a few simply weird things about their skills. For example “Blur” and “Veiled Strike” have obviously been misplaced, they do not fit in their current skill lines and the passives in their respective skill lines fit the other one much better. I believe their positions should be switched.
In addition that they have a lot of passives improving critical strike chance/damage which is currently pointless because everyone runs at least 4 impenetrable pieces of armor. They also lack any form of instant defensive ability that is comparable in power to Streak, Hardened Ward, Green Dragon Blood, Dragon Fire Scales, Blazing Shield or Breath of Life and no Shadow Cloak doesn’t count as it is not only extremely bugged, it has a very short duration and really only delays your death in the same way spamming mist form delays your death without really achieving anything (which is coincidently what a lot of nightblades do instead of cloaking). They have other strengths but the lack of a solid defensive ability is very hard to make up for and I do not believe they currently have enough other good things to make up for it.
Dragonknights
Now I feel forced to also discuss Dragonknights as I have taken up all the other classes, I currently believe that Dragonknights are in an okay spot, they got a few really good spells such “Dragon Fire Scales”, which is really good when facing people who are either blind or dumb and spam their projectiles into it (there is plenty of those and reflecting those projectiles gives ultimate to fight the real threats), they have a strong self heal in “Green Dragon Blood” and they got good damage from spells like “Burning Talons”, “Flame Lash” and “Unstable Flame”.
The only skill that I do not like that they have is actually their strong shield, “Igneous Shield”, which also synergises powerfully with “Green Dragon Blood”. I believe that the shield from this shouldn’t be 100% stronger on yourself and only apply on heals to other people aswell as shield stacking in general being completely removed.
Armor
Regarding armors there is a few things I would like to discuss. The first thing is that the armor skills “Immovable”, “Annulment” and “Evasion” should only be usable if you wear 4 or more of the corresponding type of armor as right now “Immovable” is being used mainly by people wearing 7 pieces of light armor (and a stick).
Stamina Builds
There is also the issue of stamina builds being too weak right now, this is something that I can’t think of any good fixes for right now, but making class skills work like ultimates (takes highest from weapon damage and spell damage and the highest from magicka and stamina) would be a good start.
Impenetrable
There is another issue that needs to be discussed, this is the impenetrable trait, it is currently far too powerful and since there is no other options, all PvPers wear 4-7 pieces of it (sometimes infused on large pieces). It should be changed so that it reduces crit damage by 0.1% per 1 impenetrable rating (legendary pieces got 100 and would reduce by 10%) this would like the current impenetrable not apply to sneak attacks or skills that are guaranteed to crit (Critical Charge mainly).
6. Blocking
I am actually one of the players that believe blocking is currently working very well and does not need any changes at all, the time to kill in this game is ridiculously low without blocking but with blocking and if they removed shield stacking it feels like it is where it is supposed to be.
I agree with most of everything you said.
Nightblades:
-No, they are not under powered.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_teBL8dbe4k#t=105
Dragonknights:
-Reflective Scales completely nullifies some builds. It should reflect 1 projectile per cast.
-Talons should be able to be broken out of by break free, and should have its magicka cost increased.
Armor:
-Agree100%
Stamina Builds:
-Are almost on par, the only thing they truly need is for Dodge/block/roll to have its own resource bar.
Impenetrable:
-If they nerfed impenetrable that badly everyone would be getting pew pew'd by players with 70%+ crit
Blocking:
-You think its working very well?! Do you play the same game as me?
-360 degree blocking needs to be nerfed it should be frontal only.
-It should also drain stamina while u are blocking to prevent permanant blocking.
-The ability to block while casting should be completely removed from the game
Blocking is working perfectly right now, your suggestions would only nerf stamina builds even more.https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXpX7JMwRXtczc5GTrIYRIw
ESO and GW2 PvP videos6 -
ExiledKhallisi✭✭✭✭✭xsorusb14_ESO wrote: »Blocking is working perfectly right now, your suggestions would only nerf stamina builds even more.
Explain how a dozen builds can hold block permanently and not run out of stamina with multiple people attacking them reducing damage by 70% is "working perfectly"
It would not nerf stamina builds.. One of the main problems with stamina builds is attacking someone and doing *** damage because everything is blocked while your enemy does crazy magicka damage to you WHILE blocking that you cant block.Edited by ExiledKhallisi on October 23, 2014 3:55AM>>>>>>>>(DC)Guild Master of Biestas 250+ Active Members<<<<<<<<||||||Vr14 Sorc: Darkened Soul vr14 Templar: Tiffaney||||||“Let your plans be dark and impenetrable as night, and when you move, fall like a thunderbolt.”
― Sun Tzu, The Art of War2 -
HomerSamson✭✭✭I'm sorry, but I lol'd this. You bring up several good points (that have been brought up many, many times before) but I can't abide a race change. Class, fine. But if you don't like your race because it doesn't fit the FOTM, tough.5 -
Xsorus✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭✭✭ExiledKhallisi wrote: »xsorusb14_ESO wrote: »Blocking is working perfectly right now, your suggestions would only nerf stamina builds even more.
Explain how a dozen builds can hold block permanently and not run out of stamina with multiple people attacking them reducing damage by 70% is "working perfectly"
It would not nerf stamina builds.. One of the main problems with stamina builds is attacking someone and doing *** damage because everything is blocked while your enemy does crazy magicka damage to you WHILE blocking that you cant block.
Even as a stamina build you will run out of stamina in pvp while blocking unless you specifically build for by equipping block cost reduction jewelry enchants. Even with that just getting some like dark shades thrown on you will gut your stamina fairly quickly. If they're blocking a lot in pvp you can bet they're built for it.
And it is a nerf for stamina builds, because it's one of the few mitigations a stamina user has access to and is effective at. Magicka users will simply start using shields and immovable more to provide their mitigation and cc immunity.
This is coming from someone who is primarily a heavy stamina user. So I know exactly what will happen in pvp and how it'd break it for stamina builds. The fact that you are losing to people blocking and don't understand how pvp works in this game does not change that facthttps://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXpX7JMwRXtczc5GTrIYRIw
ESO and GW2 PvP videos4 -
tplink3r1✭✭✭✭✭
✭blinding flashes... that was a joke, right? it has a 5 METERS RANGE, its useless in PvP and in my opinion the worst templar ability.
also, theres no more AOE cap in pvp.
Edited by tplink3r1 on October 23, 2014 5:41AMVR16 Templar
VR3 Sorcerer0 -
Xsorus✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭✭✭blinding flashes... that was a joke, right? it has a 5 METERS RANGE, its useless in PvP and in my opinion the worst templar ability.
also, theres no more AOE cap in pvp.
Blinding flashes is one of the most annoying abilities in pvp to fight against.https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXpX7JMwRXtczc5GTrIYRIw
ESO and GW2 PvP videos1 -
RoamingRiverElk✭✭✭✭✭I also mostly play PvP and prefer small group PvP that is lag-free and where your skills matter (small group vs small group, or small group vs big group (as long as not train)). I play EP on EU (Hopesfire -> Haderus, Bow of Shadows -> Azura & Thornblade (night-time)).
- I agree with Cevni on AoE caps and the changes to oil. Purge currently applies to too many people per use. You should be able to purge a few people, but not as many as is currently possible. I do not want oil to be changed the way it is being changed. There definitely should be a way for a *skilled* small group of people to be able to have an impact in Cyrodiil.
- Keep repair kits are way too expensive in AP in the non-veteran campaign and in general for small groups who defend/attack successfully.
- I think that camps should cost AP so that they cannot be spammed totally without care
- I have no issue with 'blood-porting'. It is not required to have someone stand watch at a remote keep, all you need to do is place a camp there if you feel it is vitally important to have that keep.
- Sieging a keep should be something that is possible for a small group (even two players) to do. The current system is fine with me.
- I think that there should be two kinds of Forward Camps - general ones and group camps. Perhaps the group camps could only be placed outside a certain distance from a keep (just beyond a resource and onwards, for example). Ideally there would be no overlapping problems, but I also would want to keep it so that burning enemy camps remains a good tactic when sieging.
- The limited sieging timer after spawning at a camp sounds good to me for the reason Cevni mentioned.
- I like it that you can 'surprise repair' the outer wall in a sneaky manner, so I wouldn't want this changed.
- I wouldn't want the flags to turn faster if there are no keep defenders at them even though I too would benefit from that when taking a resource by myself or when trying to take an outpost quickly with one or two more people. I think that it is good that flags don't turn very fast. However, it *is* frustrating when you're standing alive at the flag (by yourself or with others) and the keep changes ownership simply due to the numbers of enemy players who are also standing there. If something could be done about that, I'd be all for it.
The Campaigns:
I totally agree with Cevni on the campaigns, and I sure am not the only one! Not a day goes by that we don't lament the current situation of the campaigns. At least with the old campaigns, you could choose whether you wanted to play in a big zergy campaign or in a smaller one.
Perhaps one solution would indeed be to create campaigns with a much smaller population cap, or the ability for players to create instances of smaller maps (say, one fourth of the current Cyrodiil map) where they could either have random people join, or where they could themselves determine which guilds/groups will participate, and how long the smaller campaign will last. Or, preferably we could have both smaller population cap campaigns, and new, smaller maps.
There needs to be options for those who do not like to zerg or play against zergs.
Nightblades & bow users: I would want to be very careful about the balancing regarding nightblades in that magicka nightblades are very different to bow/stamina nightblades. Also, very importantly, I definitely wouldn't be nerfing DK scales just because those who specialize in bow are not effective against them usually. DKs do not have ranged attacks of their own really, other than the passive scales. There is the option to use crushing shock, but that attack does not do a lot of damage quickly, and equipping a staff also leaves a DK more vulnerable to melee attacks, which is where a DK will usually be. The scales are easily avoidable (big wings!) and there are plenty of other skills that can be used in case a DK does flap their wings. My main is a DK, but do I complain about not being able to do active ranged attacks if I choose to equip sword&shield on both bars, or about enemies who go invisible, after which I cannot find them? No. Or about sorcerers who bolt away? No. If I want to be able to have a chance to catch a sorcerer, I slot shield charge. That in turn takes up a slot in which I could have had something else. This game is about choices. You can either specialize in one thing, or have a more general build. I too would love to be able to do everything, but I can't. If you want to *specialize* (there are two weapon bars) in bow (oh, how many times I have heard a sorcerer or a templar curse a bow user...
), you have to accept that there are some drawbacks to it too. (And you can even simply change these things by getting out of combat and using the Wykkyd add-on.)
Templars & active armor skills:
I have to slot immovable on my bar mostly for one reason: templars. Whenever I see a templar, immovable goes up. First I really hated having to do that and having to sacrifice some other skill for it, but... it is simply what I must do if I want to survive against a templar as a DK. Otherwise the templar will inevitably eat up my stamina in seconds / stun-lock me until I'm dead. There is simply no way around it for me: immovable it is. There really should be some kind of a measure in place so that templars cannot use the same skill over and over again, killing the enemy by getting their health down from high to low just by spamming one skill. Give us immunity after the first strike. Also, some people have expressed wanting there to be a requirement that you could, for example, only use immovable if you were wearing four heavy armor pieces or more. As long as the templar abilities are as they are, immovable simply must stay the way it is.
When it comes to blazing shield, I wonder if the designer of the game thought about templars as rather benign creatures who heal and maybe make a few attack moves if they are attacked while they are healing their allies. However, reality is that many templars play very 'aggressively', and that is when blazing shield becomes a very strong skill. I suppose it can be kept as it is though, we can't nerf *everything* in this game. ^^
I feel that sorcerers, like DKs, are pretty much fine. The nerf to harness magicka is already making sorcerers weaker. But they have been dying in PvP, just like the other classes have.
Graphical issues:
Batswarm needs a clearer indication of whether it is a friendly batswarm or an unfriendly one. The sorcerer ultimate that silences you needs to have a clearer marker on the ground (both friendly and unfriendly ones).
Shield-stacking:
I think that shield-stacking is fine. I don't want people to start dying faster than they already are in Cyrodiil.
Healing: You should have the option to choose how healing is prioritized.
Impenetrable: Crit damage reduction would seem to be the way to go with this.
Traits and set items: Also regarding other traits with set items: please add a feature where crafters can change the traits in items. Some lootable items are awful when it comes to the traits they have. What would be the use for training or exploration on a v12 item? With impenetrable being as important as it currently is in PvP, it is making sets with other traits much less appealing.
Blocking: I like blocking as a mechanic the way it is. Even if that means that it is also hard for me to hack through someone else's stacked shields and block.
Race change: The possibility to change race would be good (just make it expensive / only available once every four months).Edited by RoamingRiverElk on October 23, 2014 5:57AMDalris Aalr - Magicka (Stamina) DK | Dalfish - Magicka Sorc | Dal Aalr - Magicka Warden | Dalrish - Mag/Stam NB | Irana Aalr - PvE Templar0 -
Vatter✭✭✭✭✭Obviously you play a DK sword and board as your main or you prefer that character the most.
- blocking should not be 360*. it should be 180* and the mitigation values should depend on what you are blocking with
- casting while blocking should be removed immediately. If I can't sprint and cast at the same time then you shouldn't be able to block and cast at the same time
- Damage from AOE abilities should be nerfed by 50% and healing AOE should be nerfed by 25% while in pvp. They can remain full power in PVE though.
-All aoe target caps should be removed.
- Damage from stealth from bows needs a major nerf. A single skill should not be taking away 60-80% of my health when fired once. ( have 3500 health)
- All PVP buffs should be removed, period. the only buff you should get is if your side is out numbered and the strength of that buff should be based on population.
- You should have the option to decide which pool roll, break free, block and sprint deduct from. *example- if I'm a stamina build, I can make roll, break free etc deduct from magicka instead of stamina.* this will help with stamina builds.
- Armor skills like annulment, evade, immovable should only be usable if you have 5 pieces of that armor on.
- shield stacking should be done away with. only 1 shield active at a time. buff shield skills accordingly.
- Heavy armor needs a huge buff. Its currently almost useless. Armor should mean something.
- If you are a vampire or werewolf your fighters guild skill line should be removed until you cure the disease. buff the 3 lines to be competitive.
-Reflective scales should only reflect spells not arrows.
- Talons, biting jabs, spear shards, encase, pretty much anything that causes loss of character control, root, stun, fear, etc. should have a cc break and immunity to ALL cc effects. increase the cost of the break and increase the immunity timer.
- Streak should only be an action for defense. the disorient, ultimate gain and damage should be removed as well as the extra magicka cost for spamming.
-Blazing shields damage return should be removed. in place have the bursting bubble restore resources to surrounding players in its radius. one morph could be health and stamina and the other could be health and magicka.
- Templars need more mana management. restoring spirit should be 10% or 12% not 4%
- Dual wield and nb's should have better synergies with each other. buff em.
- I like the idea with the healing. you should be able to prioritize who gets what.
-Animation canceling needs to go. get rid of it.
-2 handed and dual wield skill lines need to be buffed. You shouldn't feel like a vegetarian swinging a giant sword.
- Once you respawn at a forward camp you should have a cool down timer until you can respawn again at any camp. 10 mins or so.
-Siege damage should effect EVERYONE in the blast area. friend and foe alike should take damage. This would add spice to keep take overs.
- all siege equipment and repairing material should be purchased with gold. not alliance points.
- there should be the option to purchase up to 20 more guards per keep and 10 more per resource with gold. guards should be placed in strategic keep locations (courtyard, wall, inner keep etc etc)
The weapon swap falls under the bugs that have plagued this game since launch. sadly ZOS doesn't want or know how to fix these game breaking bugs. ( desyncs, disconnects, freezes, lag, can't interact with environment) This game had so much potential. It's really sad its in the state its in.
Its funny we sit here and take a good chunk of time to write these posts only to have them be completely ignored. Whatever.
7 -
Turelus✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭✭✭
This would make a siege of any keep damn frustrating vs any organised group that can focus fire. Right now if you're trying to take a wall down vs a group who know how to call and follow targets with counter fire the only advantage you have is the placement of more siege weapons than they can keep up with dropping.I would propose reducing the siege cap to 8 (or some other number that might be more fitting for attackers that is, defenders should not have one)
From my own times commanding raids and calling focused fire we have been able to drop large a siege of weapons faster than our enemies can keep up, with the wall only eventually breaking because they outnumbered our siege weapons.
Assuming you can get an entire wall for fire ballistas (damn randoms and their meatbags!) it's possible to drop one hostile siege weapon per volly with those under bubbles taking two sometimes three.@Turelus - EU PC Megaserver
"Don't count on others for help. In the end each of us is in this alone. The survivors are those who know how to look out for themselves."1 -
TehMagnus✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭My criticism would be towards ZOS that, as the story goes, allows exploiters such as Emperors running like rabbits with what seems like unlimited stamina that none can catch or CC to be allowed to return to the game after less than a week of ban if you know what I'm saying OP.
Edit: That being said, I do recognize many of the things OP say is true in many many many aspects.
The change in campaigns killed all the fun in PVP and rendered PVE unfair for the players in EP/EU. Back in the day, it was fun to go to small campaigns such as wabba to do small scale fighting and then move to the big campaigns for bigger fights (when they weren't too laggy).
Regarding the AOE cap, it is a big issue (I think I read somewhere ZOS was going to remove the AOE cap and reduce the damage so that the more you hit, the less damage you do to the last players to get hit so this change would be welcomed).
As for the wabbajack campaign, the people you where facing knew very well how zergs/deathballs worked at the time, they just despised that kind of game play and still do. Prolly the reason we don't have a buff campaign TBH.Edited by TehMagnus on October 24, 2014 1:58PM0 -
Tuttebel✭✭✭- Streak should only be an action for defense. the disorient, ultimate gain and damage should be removed as well as the extra magicka cost for spamming.
- all siege equipment and repairing material should be purchased with gold. not alliance points.
Great post, I disagree on these 2 points.
Bolt Escape already has a defensive morph called Ball of Lightning.
Streak is very much offensive and needs to stay that way.
If I have to buy everything in Cyrodiil I use with gold, you won't be getting any more forward camps or siege equipment from me. Can promise you that.
Not everyone sits on a mountain of gold, still have to find my first purple motif ever. (VR 14 hated by the rng since lvl 1). The pvp sets are useless to me as they are ... might aswell spend that AP on usefull stuff.
Impulse and it's morphs should have been a sorceror skill instead of destruction staff. The skill is fine, it just gets abused by all classes. Other classes have other aoe's ...
Also, if shield stacking has to go then impenetrable should only apply to physical damage. If I have to choose between a shield for physical or magical ... you should have to choose between impenetrable and spell resist.
Stay moist,
"lex parsimoniae"1 -
Gedalya✭✭✭✭✭This post contains a multitude of opinions being backed up by facts and observations, if you do not like this, I would recommend you to stop reading.
Lol!
Also, thanks for taking the time to write something nuanced on the subject; major kudos for that!0 -
Oughash✭✭✭✭Great post, OP. I don't agree on all your points, but I very appreciate the time spent writing them. ZOS needs to have a REAL conversion about PvP with its player base. Communication on these issues, which are raised over and over again on these forums, has been basically nil.
When it works, ESO PvP is the most fun I've had playing games in a decade. When it doesn't work, it is keyboard-smashing aggravation.1 -
Valymer✭✭✭✭✭A lot of good points, but I'm not sure how you can say this:
"I am completely fine with sorcerers dealing good damage and having large amounts of crowd control all from a safe range, this should however in that case come at the expense of survivability and mobility something they are certainly not lacking right now."
and this:
"I currently believe that Dragonknights are in an okay spot"
...in the same post3 -
Erock25✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭His class balance points are way off. NB underpowered? DK are just 'okay'. I'd give you more lols if I could.You earned the 500 LOLs badge.
You received 500 LOLs. It ain't no fluke, you post great stuff and we're lucky to have you here. +50 points6 -
Cevni✭✭Regarding the people saying that nightblades aren't underpowered I do not mean in a duel setting but in a "real" setting like the siege of a keep etc
FOTM is Flavor of the month, the racial imbalance has been like this since launch and racials are currently a huge bonus: Why should the first/second choice you do in the game decide if your character can ever be optimal?HomerSamson wrote: »I'm sorry, but I lol'd this. You bring up several good points (that have been brought up many, many times before) but I can't abide a race change. Class, fine. But if you don't like your race because it doesn't fit the FOTM, tough.
This would make a siege of any keep damn frustrating vs any organised group that can focus fire. Right now if you're trying to take a wall down vs a group who know how to call and follow targets with counter fire the only advantage you have is the placement of more siege weapons than they can keep up with dropping.I would propose reducing the siege cap to 8 (or some other number that might be more fitting for attackers that is, defenders should not have one)
Fair point that I did not think about, having free sieges might solve this, however it was the only solution to the stupidly fast sieges that are being carried out by large groups at the moment that doesn't involve making it impossible for small groups to siege.My criticism would be towards ZOS that, as the story goes, allows exploiters such as Emperors running like rabbits with what seems like unlimited stamina that none can catch or CC to be allowed to return to the game after less than a week of ban if you know what I'm saying OP.
Edit: That being said, I do recognize many of the things OP say is true in many many many aspects.
As for the wabbajack campaign, the people you where facing knew very well how zergs/deathballs worked at the time, they just despised that kind of game play and still do. Prolly the reason we don't have a buff campaign TBH.
Is this really the place for this? And on that note that group is currently a "deathball" so that is just wrong, if you really feel the need to discuss this you can do so with me in private messages, in game or even in a separate thread regarding just this issue.A lot of good points, but I'm not sure how you can say this:
"I am completely fine with sorcerers dealing good damage and having large amounts of crowd control all from a safe range, this should however in that case come at the expense of survivability and mobility something they are certainly not lacking right now."
and this:
"I currently believe that Dragonknights are in an okay spot"
...in the same post
Would you please elaborate on that? I am at a loss.His class balance points are way off. NB underpowered? DK are just 'okay'. I'd give you more lols if I could.
Well Nightblades currently lack a reliable defensive ability which is their main problem (cloak has been bugged since release). I also used Dragonknights as the "base" for my class balancing post as they are the class that I know the best and a class I think has both one weaker class (nightblades) and has two stronger classes (templars and sorcerers)Guild Leader of Crimson Malice - Azura's Star EU
Guild Leader of The Batman Brigade - Azura's Star EU
Arrius Mine Dweller (Previously Cevni) - V14 - Redguard Dragonknight - Former Emperor - PvP Rank 33
3 Times Emperor on Wabbajack (Cevni)
1 Time Emperor on Azura's Star (Cevni)
Cevni (Previously Cheatni) - v14 - Dunmer Dragonknight - Former Emperor - PvP rank 23
1 Time Emperor Blackwater Blade (Cheatni)
1 Time Emperor Chillrend (Cevni)
1 Time Emperor Azura's Star (Cevni)1 -
Sublime✭✭✭✭1. Thanks for spending so much time on writing such an elaborated pot on Cyro!!
2. I think the way ZOS is currently (new skill in AvA line + change to AOE caps) adressing trains is a large step in the right direction and might not Need any further consideration. All depends on the way they roll it out and how the players react.
3. I do not agree on your class impalance Review, i think most classes fill their positions pretty neatly, the templar might need a slight buff, but that might also be because I didn't get blazing shield spammed for a couple of days.
4. Impenetrable isn't an issue for me right now, since it is pretty easy to work around it right now: go for spell pen, magicka & spell power -> 700-800 frags (non-crit, i almost never crit though)
5. Regarding the campaigns I partially agree: I don't mind the zergballs right now but I'm also not group PvPing, I however think that this problem should only be discussed after the implementation of the new AvA skills, since they might remove the squads, which would change the whole situation in Cyro. Similar thing can be said about the Imp. City.
6. Forward Camps and Siegeing is something I mostly agree on you, especially on the part with the fast repairing, where I think your solution is worth trying out. Sieging keeps however, your method would probably drasically favour large organized groups, I however don't know a solution for that. Concerning Forward camps I'd suggest they remain public access but that their range gets changed as you suggested. This involves making the siege engines free (no currency that can be spent on gear) so that new players can easily buy one and have a better Integration. This would also promote the replacement of a disappeared camp after usage.
Greez,
SublimeEU | For those who want to improve their behaviour: the science behind shaping player bahaviour (presentation)0 -
Semfim✭✭✭Nice post Cevni! Hate being destroyed by you in Cyro but almost everything makes sense, in particular the need for armor actives to be usable only with 5 pieces equiped (among other stuff).
ZOS pls listen!!0 -
Turelus✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭✭✭@Cevni I do agree with you that siege times are too fast BTW, I just feel the weapon cap for only the attackers might break the balance.
I like a lot of the stuff you posted up, so thanks to taking the time for a good breakdown, let's hope ZOS take some of it on board.@Turelus - EU PC Megaserver
"Don't count on others for help. In the end each of us is in this alone. The survivors are those who know how to look out for themselves."0 -
Nihil✭✭✭While I do agree with quite a few of your thoughts (at least the rational maybe not the fixes as I haven't had time to think about those) I figured I would give a counter view points to at least the class balance you brought up.
With your view point on NB, I am guessing the complaint is mainly from a stamina view point (as only 2/3 of the skills that NB have in magicka that are affected by the change even would ever be thought to be used from stealth). The idea that this is a Nerf that is primarily focused on their class is very bias. Each class has the means to stealth attack, it is just more players who wanted too choose NB. In all reality what this does is give NB a theoretical better Stealth attack opener then other classes (due to 10 % increase to crit damage meaning more as almost everything in this game is addative). The play style for stealth openers will have to change, but the advantage they do give is still going to be there.
When we compare class balance we have to take as many side factors out as possible...stamina builds to stamina builds, and magicka builds to magicka builds in other words. Magicka builds have shown that they are just as competitive in comparison to other classes magicka builds. While NB non ultimate defenses are slightly gimmicky (and buggy) they do have one of the better defensive ultimates in the game, and are possible the fastest ultimate building class in the game. Throw in that they just got an amazing buff to death stroke (which might work well into an ambush build), I don't think they are as under powered as is normally perceived.
Follow that to your description to sorc ( I can't comment on templar at all as I have yet to even play the class so have very bias, and uninformed, opinion on that class). It seems like your big complaint with sorc's is their capability for mobility added in their defensive ability. Some things to remember, the main shield stacking build for sorcs are taking a huge hit this next update for sustain. With the changes to harness magic they will not have as much resources available to both attack and use their defensive abilities (streak / hardened ward), and seeing as our main heal outside of critical surge (risky to rely on in pvp) is dark conversion we really don't have even close to a reliable heal in comparison to other classes (to be able to use dark conversion one must not rely on block casting as it eats up stamina really fast, and must keep enough magicka to get far enough away from combat with streak / ball lightning so to not be interrupted while channeling). To top it off, these abilities are mainly effective when looking at magicka builds, sorcs shield is the only class shield that is derived from max magicka, and our heal drains stamina (with bad conversion rate of ~ 1:1.2) so making it not as useful for stamina builds. I by no means tho are trying to imply that sorcs are weak, but the build that a lot of sorcs are running is going to be taking a major hit this next update)
I would say wait for the bashing on shield stacking till after the changes to harness magic fully roles out. With limiting it to activating the return on mana 3 times per use of skill it is just slightly returning more mana then the spell cost. And with out the damage reduction that was taken off of it, the main classes that can really take hold and run with the shields would be NB (which have no class shields) and DK as they have the best ultimate for mitigating damage (which they could do even if only allowed one shield).
(side note, I prefer playing stamina sorc so I don't even get good benefits for shields stacking as all the shields I could use is based off of magicka)0 -
TehMagnus✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭Is this really the place for this?
I think it is, I think a big part of the problems in Cyrodill is because ZOS is too nice on exploiters. Perma ban them or give them a 1 month ban at first offense and perma ban on 2nd and a lot of issues would be solved. 4 days ban is like an invitation to exploit and harm the experience of hundreds of players.
Seeing exploiters do insane [snip] and still play after getting reported by half of the other alliance is what made me stop PVP.Edited by TehMagnus on October 27, 2014 2:42PM1 -
Mojomonkeyman✭✭✭✭✭
✭Your efforts are appreciated, Cevni. I think you make a lot of good points but some points on balance are just not very...objective. I disagree heavily on your assessment of DKs, NBs and Sorcs.
NBs are pretty much the strongest class right now and will be for sure after the final nail in the coffin for harness with 1.5. NB ressource management beats everything else in the game since DKs rely very much on ultimates for that. NBs have the greatest variety of builds at their disposal. NBs can tank like a DK, can dps like noone else (range or melee, both viable, for reference soulac`s range build or araxleaons` melee one), can heal like a boss, have an excellent escape tool AND all that without being reliant on shields.
Sorcerers have been hit very hard with the first harness nerf, will be hit even harder with 1.5. They are there for the negates, what else cant be done better by another class? Running away? Sweet.
The only sorcerers you see still running around successfully (please dont count firebat impulse spammers, any 5 year old can do that, but thats the combination of flawed balance (impuls) and sharpened bug) are the ones who would be at least equally successful with any other class, you know, the good players disregarding class differences.
Be honest, did you ever fight a non s&b sorcerer who didnt stack shields and you had the feeling he was a threat in an open fight without sneak-horse-ambushing yadda yadda?
I honestly don`t think so, if you did meet such a sorc, then please pm me his name as we play on the same server, I want to meet and learn from that master.
Best regardsEdited by Mojomonkeyman on October 27, 2014 3:59PMKoma Grey, Chocolate Thunder, Little Mojo, Dagoth Mojo & Mojomancy1 -
Cevni✭✭
My viewpoint on nightblades is what they bring to a group and how good they are in general. The argument about it not being a nightblade specific nerf doesn't really hold, when I get attacked or see players with the builds getting nerfed they are in atleast 99/100 cases nightblades.With your view point on NB, I am guessing the complaint is mainly from a stamina view point (as only 2/3 of the skills that NB have in magicka that are affected by the change even would ever be thought to be used from stealth). The idea that this is a Nerf that is primarily focused on their class is very bias. Each class has the means to stealth attack, it is just more players who wanted too choose NB. In all reality what this does is give NB a theoretical better Stealth attack opener then other classes (due to 10 % increase to crit damage meaning more as almost everything in this game is addative). The play style for stealth openers will have to change, but the advantage they do give is still going to be there.When we compare class balance we have to take as many side factors out as possible...stamina builds to stamina builds, and magicka builds to magicka builds in other words. Magicka builds have shown that they are just as competitive in comparison to other classes magicka builds. While NB non ultimate defenses are slightly gimmicky (and buggy) they do have one of the better defensive ultimates in the game, and are possible the fastest ultimate building class in the game. Throw in that they just got an amazing buff to death stroke (which might work well into an ambush build), I don't think they are as under powered as is normally perceived.
I actually disagree with this, I believe the strongest builds for each class should be compared, whether they are stamina or magicka is irrelevant from a class balance point of view. This is especially true because some classes have synergies with magicka/stamina builds.Follow that to your description to sorc ( I can't comment on templar at all as I have yet to even play the class so have very bias, and uninformed, opinion on that class). It seems like your big complaint with sorc's is their capability for mobility added in their defensive ability. Some things to remember, the main shield stacking build for sorcs are taking a huge hit this next update for sustain. With the changes to harness magic they will not have as much resources available to both attack and use their defensive abilities (streak / hardened ward), and seeing as our main heal outside of critical surge (risky to rely on in pvp) is dark conversion we really don't have even close to a reliable heal in comparison to other classes (to be able to use dark conversion one must not rely on block casting as it eats up stamina really fast, and must keep enough magicka to get far enough away from combat with streak / ball lightning so to not be interrupted while channeling). To top it off, these abilities are mainly effective when looking at magicka builds, sorcs shield is the only class shield that is derived from max magicka, and our heal drains stamina (with bad conversion rate of ~ 1:1.2) so making it not as useful for stamina builds. I by no means tho are trying to imply that sorcs are weak, but the build that a lot of sorcs are running is going to be taking a major hit this next update)
I would say wait for the bashing on shield stacking till after the changes to harness magic fully roles out. With limiting it to activating the return on mana 3 times per use of skill it is just slightly returning more mana then the spell cost. And with out the damage reduction that was taken off of it, the main classes that can really take hold and run with the shields would be NB (which have no class shields) and DK as they have the best ultimate for mitigating damage (which they could do even if only allowed one shield).
(side note, I prefer playing stamina sorc so I don't even get good benefits for shields stacking as all the shields I could use is based off of magicka)
The thing about the harness nerf might be right. However Sorcerers do have a semi-reliable heal Hardened Ward>Healing Ward. Also Dragonknights also have a shield derived from max magicka Obsidian Shield (and morphs).
Besides my main hatred for shield stacking mainly comes from the fact that attacking a shield doesn't give ultimate and doesn't count as you dealing damage (for Strife (and morphs) and similar things).@Cevni I do agree with you that siege times are too fast BTW, I just feel the weapon cap for only the attackers might break the balance.
I like a lot of the stuff you posted up, so thanks to taking the time for a good breakdown, let's hope ZOS take some of it on board.
The idea was basically that the actual keep wall would serve as a "cap" as the cap right now is very rarely used and feels pointless.Is this really the place for this?
I think it is, I think a big part of the problems in Cyrodill is because ZOS is too nice on exploiters. Perma ban them or give them a 1 month ban at first offense and perma ban on 2nd and a lot of issues would be solved. 4 days ban is like an invitation to exploit and harm the experience of hundreds of players.
Seeing exploiters do insane [snip] and still play after getting reported by half of the other alliance is what made me stop PVP.
Agreed, lets blame bugs on the player and tell them to "just stop playing" really doesn't work when your team is 12 players and trying to hold the last emperor keeps against 100+ people and zou are also the emperor. Besides most players abuse bugs everyday anyway, like anyone with a sharpened weapon, anyone who uses silver bolts against a DK with wings and so on. But if you banned all these players there really wouldn't be many players left, so when does it start counting as an exploit in your high and mighty opinion? But yeah I get that you are here to troll and I will just not reply anymore to you.Mojomonkeyman wrote: »Your efforts are appreciated, Cevni. I think you make a lot of good points but some points on balance are just not very...objective. I disagree heavily on your assessment of DKs, NBs and Sorcs.
NBs are pretty much the strongest class right now and will be for sure after the final nail in the coffin for harness with 1.5. NB ressource management beats everything else in the game since DKs rely very much on ultimates for that. NBs have the greatest variety of builds at their disposal. NBs can tank like a DK, can dps like noone else (range or melee, both viable, for reference soulac`s range build or araxleaons` melee one), can heal like a boss, have an excellent escape tool AND all that without being reliant on shields.
Do you really consider Nightblades to be the best class for a small group? I just don't see what they bring, DKs got tankiness and AoE CC and an AoE healing reduce, Sorcers got negate (and other things), Templars got their healing, tankiness, insane damage and arguably the hardest hitting AoE in the game (gravity crush synergy), Nightblades got well veil which is okay but usually not enough to turn the tide. Also what is this excellent escape?
They still have streak (AoE cc), Shattering Prison (talons with less dmg but range), Surge (better healing/dmg) and well negate is still without a doubt the best ultimate in the game.Mojomonkeyman wrote: »Sorcerers have been hit very hard with the first harness nerf, will be hit even harder with 1.5. They are there for the negates, what else cant be done better by another class? Running away? Sweet.
I do count them as that is an actual build atm and can't be disregarded even though I really find Negate>Streak>Fire Ring spam to be alot worse to face down then Streak>Bats>Fire Ring spam. But if we don't count them, right now atleast there is a lot of really annozing s&b/resto staff sorcerers running around with a stupid amounts of shield, seemingly unending magicka and the usual stuff, but this might not be an issue in 1.5 because of the harness nerf.Mojomonkeyman wrote: »The only sorcerers you see still running around successfully (please dont count firebat impulse spammers, any 5 year old can do that, but thats the combination of flawed balance (impuls) and sharpened bug) are the ones who would be at least equally successful with any other class, you know, the good players disregarding class differences.Guild Leader of Crimson Malice - Azura's Star EU
Guild Leader of The Batman Brigade - Azura's Star EU
Arrius Mine Dweller (Previously Cevni) - V14 - Redguard Dragonknight - Former Emperor - PvP Rank 33
3 Times Emperor on Wabbajack (Cevni)
1 Time Emperor on Azura's Star (Cevni)
Cevni (Previously Cheatni) - v14 - Dunmer Dragonknight - Former Emperor - PvP rank 23
1 Time Emperor Blackwater Blade (Cheatni)
1 Time Emperor Chillrend (Cevni)
1 Time Emperor Azura's Star (Cevni)0 -
Nihil✭✭✭
NB bring quite a bit to the group, the stealth build was just one optional build. Depending on the build they are (from what I have seen) the second best class for running into the thick of battle and surviving, this does mean using viel of blades (and sorcs can counter it but in actual practice I don't see the sorcs doing this all the time, for me I don't always have my ultimate up).
My viewpoint on nightblades is what they bring to a group and how good they are in general. The argument about it not being a nightblade specific nerf doesn't really hold, when I get attacked or see players with the builds getting nerfed they are in atleast 99/100 cases nightblades.With your view point on NB, I am guessing the complaint is mainly from a stamina view point (as only 2/3 of the skills that NB have in magicka that are affected by the change even would ever be thought to be used from stealth). The idea that this is a Nerf that is primarily focused on their class is very bias. Each class has the means to stealth attack, it is just more players who wanted too choose NB. In all reality what this does is give NB a theoretical better Stealth attack opener then other classes (due to 10 % increase to crit damage meaning more as almost everything in this game is addative). The play style for stealth openers will have to change, but the advantage they do give is still going to be there.
As a sorc I stealth attack when I go in with a build that can (bow), I will take as much of a hit with this reduction as any NB will who stealth attack, so does this mean my class was altered any less? There was a debate on the forums for a while (when they changed nightmothers set to not stack) and a lot of people were saying that Sorcs were supposedly the better gankers. I mention this just to show at one point in time there were a lot of Sorcs also stealth killing.When we compare class balance we have to take as many side factors out as possible...stamina builds to stamina builds, and magicka builds to magicka builds in other words. Magicka builds have shown that they are just as competitive in comparison to other classes magicka builds. While NB non ultimate defenses are slightly gimmicky (and buggy) they do have one of the better defensive ultimates in the game, and are possible the fastest ultimate building class in the game. Throw in that they just got an amazing buff to death stroke (which might work well into an ambush build), I don't think they are as under powered as is normally perceived.
I actually disagree with this, I believe the strongest builds for each class should be compared, whether they are stamina or magicka is irrelevant from a class balance point of view. This is especially true because some classes have synergies with magicka/stamina builds.
The synergies for stamina builds mainly lie in the passives for the class and 2-3 active abilities, other then that most stamina builds will be very dependent on the weapon. Even with your view point the NB comes out very high up in combat, their strongest build is currently a magicka build, (which is true for all classes currently), when comparing classes you still need to take things separately, you can compare magicka builds in more of a controlled environment, then also test stamina builds in a controlled environment. I forget the scientifical term for doing so but it is how experiments are best run (least amount of outside variables).
To pull off the hardened ward > healing ward you need 500 some mana, and to be able to keep up the shield for 5 seconds after casting healing ward, with the old shield stacking this was easy, but as armor / blocking do not apply when you have a shield up, this means that the player needs to do 1k damage to get rid of harness ward ( most builds 2-3 attacks and figuring an attack per second leaving 2 attacks left) and the rest of the attack eats away at the health gain we would of gotten. To benefit best from this you also still need to be at low health. In the middle of combat when we most need healing (players specifically focusing us) this is not so easy to pull off unless we teleport away first (depleting ~ 600 mana for 2 teleports).Follow that to your description to sorc ( I can't comment on templar at all as I have yet to even play the class so have very bias, and uninformed, opinion on that class). It seems like your big complaint with sorc's is their capability for mobility added in their defensive ability. Some things to remember, the main shield stacking build for sorcs are taking a huge hit this next update for sustain. With the changes to harness magic they will not have as much resources available to both attack and use their defensive abilities (streak / hardened ward), and seeing as our main heal outside of critical surge (risky to rely on in pvp) is dark conversion we really don't have even close to a reliable heal in comparison to other classes (to be able to use dark conversion one must not rely on block casting as it eats up stamina really fast, and must keep enough magicka to get far enough away from combat with streak / ball lightning so to not be interrupted while channeling). To top it off, these abilities are mainly effective when looking at magicka builds, sorcs shield is the only class shield that is derived from max magicka, and our heal drains stamina (with bad conversion rate of ~ 1:1.2) so making it not as useful for stamina builds. I by no means tho are trying to imply that sorcs are weak, but the build that a lot of sorcs are running is going to be taking a major hit this next update)
I would say wait for the bashing on shield stacking till after the changes to harness magic fully roles out. With limiting it to activating the return on mana 3 times per use of skill it is just slightly returning more mana then the spell cost. And with out the damage reduction that was taken off of it, the main classes that can really take hold and run with the shields would be NB (which have no class shields) and DK as they have the best ultimate for mitigating damage (which they could do even if only allowed one shield).
(side note, I prefer playing stamina sorc so I don't even get good benefits for shields stacking as all the shields I could use is based off of magicka)
The thing about the harness nerf might be right. However Sorcerers do have a semi-reliable heal Hardened Ward>Healing Ward. Also Dragonknights also have a shield derived from max magicka Obsidian Shield (and morphs).
Besides my main hatred for shield stacking mainly comes from the fact that attacking a shield doesn't give ultimate and doesn't count as you dealing damage (for Strife (and morphs) and similar things).
Obsidian shield is based on max HP, try eating a stamina and health food and it will raise the shield strength (unless this was just changed rescently, tested it like a month or so back).
Shields have that strength, but they also have the downfall of not being affected by blocking and your armor. The only thing that affects how much damage is dealt to them is mitigation skills (which every class has an ultimate for that but sorcs, templars isn't as great tho) or plain dodging. When the game first came out shields were viewed in a lot of players eyes as useless due to their cost vs what they gave. It was very easy to burst down one shield, and made the time to cast it and the mana associated with it not always that good.0 -
joedamarsiob16_ESOSoul ShrivenI play a Nightblade and I frequently run with Cevni in Cyrodiil. We share many of the same views and he enlisted my help in writing this eloquent rant.
If I had my way I would run my single target stealth based crit build. However, because of the way PvP works I have to run an AoE Sap Essence Spamming build, just so I can remain competitive against the large numbers of players I come up against. On Azura's star the Dominion are almost constantly outnumbered, which Im not complaining about, I like the challenge. What I am complaining about is the way that large zergs of 20+ people feel the need to constantly destroy our camps when there are only 3 of us defending, and that personally we do not get any buffs that could help us hold against such large numbers.
With the camp burning I understand that there is little or nothing that can be done about that, I can merely wish that the Enemies wouldnt be so scared of 3 defenders. My main grievance is with having no way to even the playing field when we come up against large numbers. Some of my suggestions include cheaper siege costs, more damage from siege, faster Ultimate gain, OR REMOVING THE DAMN AOE CAP. Just things that give us a little boost so that the entire map doesnt get Nightcapped.
Another slightly unrelated note, the first campaign I played on was Scrourge where I met alot of new friends and learned how to become a better PvPer. However, since ZOS decided to 'accidentally' delete it and then give us nothing to make up for it, they have all lost hope with the game and have quit. I would greatly appreciate if ZOS would at least comment on this, apologize for their mistake or admit that they deleted the campaign purposefully.
After Scourge I played on Hopesfire, a low population Campaign where I managed to get to the number one spot on the Dominion, sadly I never managed to take Emperor as the Pact held on with all their might. Now, both of these campaigns where fairly low population, I never once saw any of the Alliances with more than 1 bar population. So it came as quite a shock to be suddenly forced into a unrelenting unstoppable *** ball. I think that they should either bring back the old Campaign format, and find other, better ways to prevent Emperor Farming, which still occurs, or add several smaller Campaigns designed for the way I like to PvP, small scale skirmishes where my frame rate doesnt hit the floor because of all the AoE. I was excited when I heard ZoS had made a small 4v4 capture the flag map and then wondered why they were keeping it solely for that one Convention, why not release it into the game?
In my opinion, if PvP continues the way it is you are going to find more and more people quitting the game and moving on to new ones. For a game that really tries to drive home a 'Play it your way' mentality, dont you think that you should be allowed to PvP the way you want? To be offered a choice between large scale zergs and smaller scale skirmishes? And why isnt there a dedicated dueling system yet? Addressing those various PvP situations and allowing players to choose which one they enter would greatly improve the game and would make me, and alot of other players very happy indeed
Thanks
Dimost.
"Heh, I'd better cut down on the ale. Starting to see things, I am..." - Blind Moth Priest, Circa 3E 433
RIP Scourge- 2014-2014, Gone but not forgotten.1 -
Valymer✭✭✭✭✭joedamarsiob16_ESO wrote: »
In my opinion, if PvP continues the way it is you are going to find more and more people quitting the game and moving on to new ones. For a game that really tries to drive home a 'Play it your way' mentality, dont you think that you should be allowed to PvP the way you want? To be offered a choice between large scale zergs and smaller scale skirmishes? And why isnt there a dedicated dueling system yet? Addressing those various PvP situations and allowing players to choose which one they enter would greatly improve the game and would make me, and alot of other players very happy indeed
Anytime this is brought up, the resounding consensus seems to be that changes like this aren't happening because the majority of the playerbase consists of PvE casuals who don't want any additional PvP options, even if they are completely optional. Hell, there are still people campaigning for a PvE version of Cyrodiil, lol.
Unfortunately it is a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy. I wish we could somehow compare the ratio of PvPers to PvErs immediately after launch to the ratio now. I bet that droves of hardcore PvPers left the game due to technical issues and a clear lack of development in that area.0
