Update 6 info from Jessica

reften

Feel this post needed it's own thread. If wrong, flame away, but this is a great info that was buried in the alliance war forum.

ZOS_JessicaFolsom wrote: »

@Agrippa_Invisus - Thank you for the detailed post. We genuinely appreciate you sharing your concerns with us. We've answered each question in line, below.

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

1. Armor types and their effectiveness -- LA needs a durability nerf the size of Tamriel, HA needs love in a severe way.

Don't worry; Update 6 is on its way! When it arrives, items will provide spell resistance and armor, making heavy armor more useful. In addition, soft caps are going away, so heavy armor won't have its effectiveness reduced.

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

2. Blockcasting -- This, combined with the LA sustainability/durability balance issues, is what leads to the 'Ubertank DK' that is so universally loathed. ZOS, you're smart, figure out a way around this mechanic.

We agree that block casting is an issue, but our main focus has been on balancing and polishing other features for 1.6. We did spend some time on this problem, but in the end we decided to take a little more time to get the right solution for this instead of rushing out a “fix” that could potentially introduce more problems.

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

3. Stamina vs Magicka AEs -- There is no good reason that Steel Tornado is blockable while Impulse/Blockade aren't. This alone prevents Stamina from standing in the same place damage-wise in group situations. The same with Brawler and other 2H area abilities. Either both stamina and magicka AEs should be blockable or neither should be. I lean towards both should be.

In Update 6, we're making magicka-based area-of-effect abilities blockable.

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

4. AE Damage Scaling -- AE abilities should never substitute for single target abilities for damage. There's zero reason that Impulse should even approach skills like Crushing Shock or Lava Whip for single target damage. AEs make their DPS back by hitting multiple targets (and then some) for their cost. I don't care one whit if this requires PvE re-balancing, it's an imbalance in the current system.

If you are using the version of Impulse that deals damage over time, it can be effective to weave into a single target rotation every 10 seconds. Just spamming Impulse is going to do less single-target damage than spamming Lava Whip or Crushing Shock.

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

5. Block Cost in LA -- Take the block cost reduction from the 1h/Shield line and stack it into the HA line so that HA + Shield = 1.5 block cost, while LA + Shield = terrible blocking. This has impact on both points 1 and 2.

This will no longer be an issue in Update 6—heavy armor will be much stronger.

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

6. Stacking Ground Effects -- They're invisible half the time due to spell effect culling, they contribute hugely to the lag, and frankly are being used in silly ways (blockade of fire through the grate of an inner ring keep over front door anyone?). Make it so, universally, any ground effect erases the previous cast and replaces it -- much akin to how Cinder Storm or Caltrops work. It's time for things like this to start behaving in the same manner.

In Update 6, you'll only be able to have one Wall of Fire active at a time. We also reduced the number of particle effects associated with some abilities, focusing on those that had the largest impact on performance.

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

7. Siege Damage -- Siege Weapons need to hit players way, way harder than they do. It needs to be very dangerous to be within range of a siege line's artillery. As it currently is, it's easier than ever to mitigate and heal through siege damage, even when storming a breach. As long as you don't linger, you'll make it through fine, and it is players who are far more dangerous.

We're actually adjusting damage in Update 6 so that siege damage can't be mitigated by armor. This adjustment comes in conjunction with damage scaling due to player character and monster rebalancing throughout the game in Update 6.

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

8. Keep Wall / Door HP and Siege Times -- It is way, way too fast to slam down an empty keep. Even at rank 5, with 245K walls and 195K doors, I've dropped an empty keep in 2:30 (two minutes, 30 seconds) from first siege dropped to flags flipped to Ebonheart. There's very little time to react to this, especially if it's an outlying keep like Drakelowe, Brindle, or Dragonclaw. I think it's time to up the HPs of keeps or reduce the damage siege does to them -- whichever is easier to code. More fights, more sieges, less ninja flipping.

We're increasing the heal value of the wall upgrade in Update 6, but we’ll also look into adding more HP to the doors. We'll see how player survivability vs. other siege weapons feels with the removal of armor mitigation in conjunction with door/wall destruction timing. Regardless, we can work on changing the timing to give your allies a better opportunity to respond.

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

9. The Nikel Corridor -- Make this a more interesting place to fight. Add some cottages, huts, a village or two (easily destroyed and forgotten by Oblivion's time period), anything to make it so that area is as lively as other areas of the map.

Sure, we can look into that!

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

10. Buff Servers -- Kill buffs outside of the PVP zone. It's time for Buff servers to die the death they deserve.

This is something we've discussed at length and continue to have conversations about. We initially made the buffs as an incentive for PVP, but in the long run, using campaigns as a “buff server” has been more of a crutch than the intended bonus. We've seen your feedback and concerns about this—we'll continue to discuss it internally and see what we can do.

Bloodystab

Thanks for collecting this stuff.

Terror

^this is good

WebBull

Love it but when you combine all changes, really makes Bow and/or S&B even more mandatory. Also going to be extremely hard to take a defended keep.

Sallington

WebBull wrote: »

Love it but when you combine all changes, really makes Bow and/or S&B even more mandatory. Also going to be extremely hard to take a defended keep.

This is my biggest concern. Nightcappers have just as easy of a time doing their thing controlling the map overnight, then everyone has a way harder time taking it back.

Tiitus

love it when pvp QQ effects pve... sorcerers only legit aoe (until impulse cuz obviously our class skill aoe's are horrible) is destro fire wall, seeing as how we can no longer stack the effect in pve as well, the skill becomes just as useless as lightning splash, crappy damage and very short duration.

Woolenthreads

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

3. Stamina vs Magicka AEs -- There is no good reason that Steel Tornado is blockable while Impulse/Blockade aren't. This alone prevents Stamina from standing in the same place damage-wise in group situations. The same with Brawler and other 2H area abilities. Either both stamina and magicka AEs should be blockable or neither should be. I lean towards both should be.

ZOS_JessicaFolsom wrote: »

In Update 6, we're making magicka-based area-of-effect abilities blockable.

If they are removing the Softcap as stated then they should make the Stamina based AoE unblockable otherwise it's going to be a nightmare fighting people because they'll all pull on their block, making it a war of attrition.

aco5712

Woolenthreads wrote: »

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

3. Stamina vs Magicka AEs -- There is no good reason that Steel Tornado is blockable while Impulse/Blockade aren't. This alone prevents Stamina from standing in the same place damage-wise in group situations. The same with Brawler and other 2H area abilities. Either both stamina and magicka AEs should be blockable or neither should be. I lean towards both should be.

ZOS_JessicaFolsom wrote: »

In Update 6, we're making magicka-based area-of-effect abilities blockable.

If they are removing the Softcap as stated then they should make the Stamina based AoE unblockable otherwise it's going to be a nightmare fighting people because they'll all pull on their block, making it a war of attrition.

When your in the middle of a zerg fight, you drain stamina pretty quick even with aoe not effecting block. Now if you hold block you will lose stamina so quickly it won't be a issue in my books.

reften

aco5712 wrote: »

Woolenthreads wrote: »

Agrippa_Invisus wrote: »

3. Stamina vs Magicka AEs -- There is no good reason that Steel Tornado is blockable while Impulse/Blockade aren't. This alone prevents Stamina from standing in the same place damage-wise in group situations. The same with Brawler and other 2H area abilities. Either both stamina and magicka AEs should be blockable or neither should be. I lean towards both should be.

ZOS_JessicaFolsom wrote: »

In Update 6, we're making magicka-based area-of-effect abilities blockable.

If they are removing the Softcap as stated then they should make the Stamina based AoE unblockable otherwise it's going to be a nightmare fighting people because they'll all pull on their block, making it a war of attrition.

When your in the middle of a zerg fight, you drain stamina pretty quick even with aoe not effecting block. Now if you hold block you will lose stamina so quickly it won't be a issue in my books.

Builds will have to adjust...maybe can't have all in magicka and health anymore. This is a good thing. have to decide, with multiple choices being good.

GreyRanger

Thanks for dropping this in this forum, I would not have seen it otherwise.