PTS Patch Notes v2.1

Rhaegar75

Prizax wrote: »

I don't see anything about the Toppling Charge fix (getting stuck), I remember Eric said you guys fixed it with this update, I hope you guys just forgot to write it.

yep yep...a little worried too!!!

eventide03b14a_ESO

@ZOS_GinaBruno Were there any changes to detect pots? They were missing from the list and we want to know how they will effect Nightblade's Cloak and it's morphs.

starlizard70ub17_ESO

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

Question, @ZOS_GinaBruno / @ZOS_JessicaFolsom / @ZOS_KaiSchober



Champion System: Physical builds only need to maximize one star in The Ritual, "Mighty", to get a 25% bonus to all physical damage, and additionally get the extremely valuable Exploiter passive for the flat 10% early on for a cost of 100 champion points and the 12% critical chance passive. Spell builds, however, not only need to invest in the Mage section (30 points in) for their respective critical chance), but also have their attacks split into two sets of damage types which each take different champion investments (100 points maximum per star) resulting in a cost of 200 points to get the same benefit. For primarily elemental-based spell builds, they do not get the Exploiter passive in the process until much later in. Physical builds, meanwhile, can instead take the second 100-points' worth of investment and use it to boost their penetration, and critical damage stars, or move into immediately placing 30 points in The Atronarch section to get the Riposte and Retaliation passives long beforehand, in addition to a fairly small damage benefit in terms of overall DPS from the light/heavy attack boosts in that section.

Is there a potential change to merge the Thamaturge and Elemental Expert stars into one star under The Apprentice section to address this issue? While with enough champion points it can be worked around ultimately, it's an issue on the live servers and the upcoming DLC as it is since the vast, vast majority is nowhere near the rank to do so yet.



I'm also interested as far as... this:

The Apprentice mundus stone is being changed to spell power rather than spell penetration. Overall, medium armor passives exceed light armor ones significantly already, and with this change combined with the much slower ramp-up in spell boosts from the champion system, spell builds will be behind by a large margin on bypassing/reducing resistances on enemies and remain much lower on critical chance. Is this something being looked into to be changed, and if not, can we get a clarification as to the balance reasoning behind it?

For comparison:

-Light Armor drops to 25% of the mitigation amount of Heavy Armor versus 75% that Medium Armor provides
-Light Armor has the same cost reduction (3% per piece equipped) as Medium Armor
-Light Armor has no spell power bonus, while Medium Armor has a five-piece bonus providing 12% weapon power
-Light Armor gets what amounts to roughly a 15% spell penetration bonus (which is overtaken by Maces in the weapon skill lines which provide up to 20%) on most targets from the Concentration passive, leaving it shy ~5% typically off the bat. (Destruction Staves have 10% that only applies to skills in that line, and only brings it a scrap ahead even then).
-Light Armor has a spell critical chance bonus of 10% on Light Armor with a requirement of five pieces equipped vs. a 21% physical critical chance bonus on Medium Armor with no minimum piece requirement that scales at 3% per piece to the maximum.
-Light Armor has a very small amount of spell resistance that is much lower than what wearing Medium Armor provides. Medium Armor also grants a large sneak cost reduction, dodge roll cost reduction, sprint speed boost, etc. to boot.

EDIT: -Additionally, there are only two magic weapon types (Destruction and Restoration staves) which have limited flexibility, and lack significant bonuses such as the flat 5% damage while still keeping your main resource's light/heavy attack available such as Dual Wielding swords, or the option to swap off to daggers for a flat 10% critical chance bonus, at the sacrifice of the extra penetration rating from maces that has them above staves in the first place. I did notice that there are a lot of itemization changes that will help bridge the long-standing gap between spell-oriented and physical/weapon-oriented sets, so at least on the Penetration end of things I'm more interested if this was taken into account when making them and may be tweaked depending on how PTS plays out.

The gap between Light and Medium's protection and raw power from passives is, however, a concern.


EDIT: Another question: The "Resistant" champion passive currently reduces incoming critical healing instead of just damage, a very negative side effect from its bug. Has this been fixed in this patch? I did not see a note regarding it .

So from this very well thought out explanation, it seems 5 piece medium armour with the other two pieces being light or heavy depending on your build, is the way to go in all cases. I would have hoped the devs could have fixed this in 1.7

Draehl

tinythinker wrote: »

Draehl wrote: »

tinythinker wrote: »

Ball Lightning (Bolt Escape morph): Reduced the duration of the orbs from this ability to 1.5 seconds from 6.5 seconds.

But if we have a high recast cost (as mentioned on a recent "ESO Live!") and use this to catch projectiles why nerf the time the ball lasts?

Because it's being used effectively as an even stronger version of Reflective Scales (6.5 seconds vs 4 seconds). Bolt not to run away, but to hide behind the orb, completely nullifying a large portion (or potentially all) incoming caster damage.

Then they can do what they did to Scales and limit the number of projectiles it absorbs in the (longer) duration. Simpler solution.

Possibly, though keep in mind- this is an auxillary morph effect to an inherently mobility focused skill. 1.5s is presumably enough time to help with escaping any possible CC aimed your way. Also, keeping in mind that DK's spell absorb is a base/primary effect for a class who's kit is "stand and fight or die" Even 4 charges at 6.5 duration would be still be too much.

Attorneyatlawl

Joy_Division wrote: »

ShadowHvo wrote: »

• Vampire
o Supernatural Recovery (passive): This passive now only works while any Vampire ability is slotted in your ability bar.


Why... Why nerf Vampirism again..?

The difference between a vampire and a werewolf is that the vampire is PERMANTELY! in their monster form, they carry both weaknesses and strengths at the same time! Give us back our Supernatural Recovery passive, without the need to slot an ability! Its -core- to the vampire experience in ESO, do not take it away please =/

This makes no sense, both in terms of game mechanics AND lore. Even your own lore-writers state that vampires of noxiphilic sanguivoria gain increased health regeneration, yet in the actual game its an outright decrease.

Please, make vampires into a more true elder scrolls experience.. instead of this stuff where you're watering it down to nothing but another skill-line. As a vampire-lorewhore, this is outright depressing to see.

Also please leave our weakness alone, there is no need to decrease it further =/

• WW now also only gains it's recovery bonus while having the WW ultimate on its bar.
• Nerf? You now only take 25% bonus damage from fire as opposed to 40% (was 50%). If only the class I played got such "nerfs."
• If you are going to cite Lore, be sure to mention what happened when your Vampire in Oblivion took a walk on a nice sunny day. *Poof*.

WW still has zero penalty when not transformed. Vampires still take 25% extra fire damage.

ShadowHvo

Joy_Division wrote: »

ShadowHvo wrote: »

• Vampire
o Supernatural Recovery (passive): This passive now only works while any Vampire ability is slotted in your ability bar.


Why... Why nerf Vampirism again..?

The difference between a vampire and a werewolf is that the vampire is PERMANTELY! in their monster form, they carry both weaknesses and strengths at the same time! Give us back our Supernatural Recovery passive, without the need to slot an ability! Its -core- to the vampire experience in ESO, do not take it away please =/

This makes no sense, both in terms of game mechanics AND lore. Even your own lore-writers state that vampires of noxiphilic sanguivoria gain increased health regeneration, yet in the actual game its an outright decrease.

Please, make vampires into a more true elder scrolls experience.. instead of this stuff where you're watering it down to nothing but another skill-line. As a vampire-lorewhore, this is outright depressing to see.

Also please leave our weakness alone, there is no need to decrease it further =/

• WW now also only gains it's recovery bonus while having the WW ultimate on its bar.
• Nerf? You now only take 25% bonus damage from fire as opposed to 40% (was 50%). If only the class I played got such "nerfs."
• If you are going to cite Lore, be sure to mention what happened when your Vampire in Oblivion took a walk on a nice sunny day. *Poof*.

Oh boy oh boy oh boy, I consider the 25% weakness a nerf oh' great replier.

I want vampires to be elder scrolls vampires, that is with its benefits, and weaknesses.

Let me burn in the sun like in Morrowind no matter the stage, and I will love this game forever - On the condition that the vampires get the equal strength too, naturally.

As for Werewolves, they should've never had an increase in recovery in human form to begin with. The big difference between vampirism and lycanthropy is that vampirism is permanent, carrying both weaknesses and strengths at all times. Where on the other hand Lycanthropy is a beastform, that the cursed humanoid can transform into, in order to get BOTH weaknesses and strengths.

The werewolf recovery nerf was long called for, lycanthropy nor vampirism should never be something you just take because its a buff. There should be equal strengths, and equal weaknesses. The current problem with vampirism is especially that Noxiphilic Sanguivoria is so watered down, that Lamae should be ashamed of being the first ever created vampire, and the progenitor to the first vampiric bloodline in the entirety of Nirn.

Soris

@ZOS_GinaBruno "The Battle Spirit buff has been adjusted and now has 30% more damage reduction, 35% less healing received, and 50% less damage shield strength."

Is that bolded part typo or for real? We have 15% already and 50% on top of that = 65% ?
*fingers crossed*

Ipsius

Attorneyatlawl wrote: »

WebBull wrote: »

Without the stam regen there is no reason for anyone to be a WW in PvP.

-Have the dropped sets in the Veteran Dungeons like Healing Staff of Thorns or Worm Cult, been updated to drop in VR16 varieties?[/u]

Now THAT'S something I want to hear about. I've spent forever collecting some of those sets in v12. Can we maybe just have a V-level upgrade for items?

Demonically_Angelic

What about the exploiting of low pop bonus by traveling to player in a none home/guested campaign in cyrodiil?

I swear that was mentioned on other lead up posts/eso live >.<

Baphomet

What about some fixes to the mechanical issues that have been bugging this game since launch?

Just from the top pf my head:

- projectiles incorrectly going through dragon scales.
- eclipse not reflecting back at caster.
- unbreakable fear effect.
- unbreakable CC
- stuck in combat for minutes.
- not being able to use doors.
- not being able to weaponswap when taking damage.
- not being able to dismount.

Just to name a few that are really annoying.

FriedEggSandwich

Storm Atronach is the Daedric Summoning Ultimate, not Storm Calling -_-

Darlgon

@ZOS_GinaBruno

xaraan

MisterJimothy wrote: »

xaraan wrote: »

Magicka Detonation: This ability now adds bonus damage for the amount of targets hit by it with 5% per target, up to a maximum of 25%.

Leave it to ZoS to hear feedback on something and screw up the implementation. Maxing this ability out (along with other changes) makes it just as bad. If it's for anti-zerging, it should have no max or an extremely high max. With that change, it still gives zergs the advantage against a smaller force (even more so with insta-cast).

It's base ability is being nerfed......

Proximity Detonation (Magicka Detonation morph): This ability is now an instant cast. We also increased the detonation time to 8 seconds, and reduced the damage by 28% to compensate

This changes nothing in my point.

Takllin

Demonically_Angelic wrote: »

What about the exploiting of low pop bonus by traveling to player in a none home/guested campaign in cyrodiil?

I swear that was mentioned on other lead up posts/eso live >.<

You cannot travel to player in Cyrodil with the IC update.

Unless they went back on that too.

Draehl

technohic wrote: »

So battle spirit...

The Battle Spirit buff has been adjusted and now has 30% more damage reduction, 35% less healing received, and 50% less damage shield strength.

So this is on top of what is already in place or those are the values they will be? Either way; it seems to be a heavier hit on shields, then healing while damage is least affected. What about abilities that heal based on damage? Or damage based on shield strength (blazing shield)? Are those not affected twice?

The way it was explained a few weeks ago is that healing/damage shields would both be 50% reduced, so I'm assuming the above note is "extra" and not "total"

technohic

Baphomet wrote: »

- not being able to weaponswap when taking damage.

Is this a thing? I have often wondered about swapping weapons wanting to fire a skill off on the other bar and switch back really quick, but it fires off the skill on the other bar. Thought it was me and tried pacing myself a little but to no avail.

SturgeHammer

@ZOS_GinaBruno, some of these combat changes seem to be fairly harsh (probably not intentionally harsh) to Stam Sorcerer builds. Can this be brought to Eric Wrobel's attention, possibly to get some compensatory buffs before this goes live in August?

Preyfar

mordridub17_ESO wrote: »

I really assume the Argonian racial passive was a simple error. A 2% increase to the bonus from potions... every 45 seconds. I assume they also doubled our 3% hp bonus to 6% like they did with Nords and with Wood Elf stamina??? Please??? AT LEAST????

To be honest, I was expecting a meaningless change to Argonian passives, alongside something like "Increased swim speed boost to +53% from +50%", but I was really, REALLY hoping to be pleasantly surprised. <Sigh>

Yeah, I was really hoping Argonians would have racial passives that were improved, but I'm REALLY disappointed. Unless you're a healer Argonians STILL have the single worst passives.

Draehl

Preyfar wrote: »

mordridub17_ESO wrote: »

I really assume the Argonian racial passive was a simple error. A 2% increase to the bonus from potions... every 45 seconds. I assume they also doubled our 3% hp bonus to 6% like they did with Nords and with Wood Elf stamina??? Please??? AT LEAST????

To be honest, I was expecting a meaningless change to Argonian passives, alongside something like "Increased swim speed boost to +53% from +50%", but I was really, REALLY hoping to be pleasantly surprised. <Sigh>

Yeah, I was really hoping Argonians would have racial passives that were improved, but I'm REALLY disappointed. Unless you're a healer Argonians STILL have the single worst passives.

Yep. 5/10/15% total resource gain wouldn't be out of line given the poor overall set of racials compared to the others. Not to mention requiring consumable use versus being truly passive.

technohic

Draehl wrote: »

technohic wrote: »

So battle spirit...

The Battle Spirit buff has been adjusted and now has 30% more damage reduction, 35% less healing received, and 50% less damage shield strength.

So this is on top of what is already in place or those are the values they will be? Either way; it seems to be a heavier hit on shields, then healing while damage is least affected. What about abilities that heal based on damage? Or damage based on shield strength (blazing shield)? Are those not affected twice?

The way it was explained a few weeks ago is that healing/damage shields would both be 50% reduced, so I'm assuming the above note is "extra" and not "total"

Yeah, that is what I am thinking as well but more in just clarifying. Either ways shields are getting nerfed more than heals, heals getting nerfed more than damage and most alarming to me is if something has 2 of those attributes, they take it double.

Attorneyatlawl

@ZOS_GinaBruno / @ZOS_JessicaFolsom ,

"•Bone Shield: Fixed an issue where the player character that activated the synergy would occasionally not get a damage shield, and other allies would instead. The ability synergy now has a unique icon as well."

Has Spiked Bone Shield been fixed so that its damage reflection, listed at 33% of damage absorbed, is doing the proper value? Currently it does one-tenth of the listed amount (roughly 3%) instead of the 30%+ it's described as.

EDIT: •Trap Beast: •This ability now grants the Minor Force buff which increases Critical Damage by 12%.

How long do you receive the buff from this skill for?

Another EDIT: Vampire's "Accelerating Drain" skill only actually grants Minor, rather than Major, Expedition when used on an enemy (the tooltip states Major for a 40% movement speed buff. Has this been fixed in the patch? It could be a very nice morph if it worked as described.

Ipsius

Wood elves seriously have almost the same passive as Argonians (Poison resist, disease resist, +3% stamina or health). Wood elves got their stamina boost increased to 6% but Argonians didn't even get the corresponding boost to our 3% health bonus?? Surely that's an error.

If they're going to make a passive tied to a consumable, how about passively reducing the potion cooldown? Then it's useful to everyone PVP and PVE (even if it's just 5 seconds), plus it allows a build strategy (with max potion-cooldown-reduction jewels).

dday3six

Maybe it's a moot point, but the biggest reason I chose redguard over imperial was because of the interaction between caltrops and adrenaline rush. So I just don't get why there is currently no race change option in the game...

Armann

Nord racial buff was kinda disappointing, was expecting 10-12% max HP and the Frost resist is still low, goes for Dunmer Fire resist as well. But 30% constant HP regen instead of just combat is nice I guess. Altmer NB mage w/Frost staff is going to be sweet, looking forward to that.

@ZOS_GinaBruno Does the damage shield from Frost staff heavy attack only apply for fully charged does it work with partial heavy attacks as well?

Cinbri

@ZOS_GinaBruno Did 2.1 fixed Resistant CP that reducing crit healing on you?

Lorkhan

ok....so.... its the end of stamina nigthblade.....
no problem, back to magika build.

Tonnopesce

Meh... let the tickle war begin!!!

Don't worry ZOS we will find ways to ONESHOT noobs even if you have nerfed damage by 30%

Rhaegar75

Soris wrote: »

@ZOS_GinaBruno "The Battle Spirit buff has been adjusted and now has 30% more damage reduction, 35% less healing received, and 50% less damage shield strength."

Is that bolded part typo or for real? We have 15% already and 50% on top of that = 65% ?
*fingers crossed*

65% decrease is disproportionate to the other changes!!!

Takllin

Lorkhan wrote: »

ok....so.... its the end of stamina nigthblade.....
no problem, back to magika build.

Erm, no. Stam NB will still be really good...

Draehl

technohic wrote: »

Draehl wrote: »

technohic wrote: »

So battle spirit...

The Battle Spirit buff has been adjusted and now has 30% more damage reduction, 35% less healing received, and 50% less damage shield strength.

So this is on top of what is already in place or those are the values they will be? Either way; it seems to be a heavier hit on shields, then healing while damage is least affected. What about abilities that heal based on damage? Or damage based on shield strength (blazing shield)? Are those not affected twice?

The way it was explained a few weeks ago is that healing/damage shields would both be 50% reduced, so I'm assuming the above note is "extra" and not "total"

Yeah, that is what I am thinking as well bur more in just clarifying. Either ways shields are getting nerfed more than heals, heals getting nerfed more than damage and most alarming to me is if something has 2 of those attributes, they take it double.

They said the desired effect was "to have health bars move around less" Meaning:

• We won't die as fast to burst.
• We won't recover from being low health as quickly or as easily as before.
• We won't be completely unkillable via health shields, blocking, and dodging.

This is a very good thing. TTK can get a needed nerf, but bursters will still have a place in softening targets up. Since healers can't top their allies off as easily the burster will still have a good shot at killing their target, just not as ridiculously quickly, with no chance for the receiving player to respond.

Healers will need to manage resources more thoughtfully and spam less as their heals/shields will be less potent. Other considerations such as buffs/debuffs/CC will come into play as alternatives to raw healing.

Tanks will still be effective in PvP even with the block nerfs. With healing and shields being nerfed, and the pace of combat slowing down, they will be able to intelligently block and respond to assisting allies. They will be able to block less, true, but raw mitigation and the attacks they DO block will be all the more important. Again with the diminishing value of heals.

The net winner here is sustained damage/efficient type builds. I currently play this way on live, and its definitely at a competitive disadvantage to being a pure tank or pure nuker. I'm hoping these changes will bring all of the playstyles more into balance.