Nerf Wrecking Blow

manny254

frozywozy wrote: »

WRX wrote: »

Would also add, mendo offered tons of advice on how to avoid it.

But regardless, its much stronger than any other single target skill because of the heavy attacks, and after the cast, it lands immediately 1 second after.

That would be like if jabs landed all 4 hits, at once.

Once Stam DK and Stam sorc has an instant direct damaging stamina skill, I wouldn't mind making Wrecking bow bashable, until that happens there is no reason to make it work that way. Otherwise you just make surprise attack and jabs even better than they already are.

Except jabs is less effective then wb.

frozywozy

manny254 wrote: »

frozywozy wrote: »

WRX wrote: »

Would also add, mendo offered tons of advice on how to avoid it.

But regardless, its much stronger than any other single target skill because of the heavy attacks, and after the cast, it lands immediately 1 second after.

That would be like if jabs landed all 4 hits, at once.

Once Stam DK and Stam sorc has an instant direct damaging stamina skill, I wouldn't mind making Wrecking bow bashable, until that happens there is no reason to make it work that way. Otherwise you just make surprise attack and jabs even better than they already are.

Except jabs is less effective then wb.

I'm sorry but it's alot easier to avoid a WB than it is to avoid Jabs. Plus, with the broken CC breaking mechanism, it makes jabs even better if you take more than 1 second to cc break. Any respectful player can easily avoid pretty much ALL wrecking blows in any fight unless he is severely outnumbered.

I do agree that in some situations, the range of WB is way too large and should be fixed.

josh.lackey_ESO

Recremen wrote: »

Then you just go out of range in another direction and make sure you have a snare immunity of some kind up. Or don't walk into caltrops. It's really no worse than jabs or crystal fragments or something, it's just a solid single-target skill.

The only snare immunity I am aware of is Retreating Maneuvers and Shuffle, both of which cost a lot of stamina to cast. Magicka builds can't manage that, or we will get stunlocked because we can't break free. I think Wrecking Blow is not so much of an issue for stamina builds because they can be much more evasive than magicka builds.

You are telling me to Fossilize the WB spammer, but I prefer to hit them with Flame Reach, at least that creates a little distance. Regardless, they simply break free, gap close, then start spamming WB again. Rooting them does nothing, because I am, myself, either rooted or snared. So I can't walk through them. I can't dodge roll; I don't have the stamina for it. I can't even Dragon Leap them because you can't Dragon Leap when you're rooted (Yet another way magicka DK is screwed over -- you have to charge your ult AND have enough stamina to dodge in order to leap!)

Crystal Fragments doesn't hold a candle to Wrecking Blow for a few reasons. (These points are valid for Dark Flare, too.)

• Frags can be reflected.
• The cast animation for Frags is hard to miss.
• The cast time for Frags is 10% longer than the cast time for Wrecking Blow.
• The cast of Frags is interruptable.
• You also have the travel time of the projectile to take defensive action. So you end up with about 50% more time to react than you get with Wrecking Blow.
• Instant Frags are harder to see coming, but the Sorc's hands glow a very noticeable purple when it procs. And even with no cast time, there is still the travel time of the projectile.
• Frags is Magic damage.

The Magic damage part is really, really important. Magic damage is at an extreme disadvantage right now. Let me illustrate with more bullet points.

• 100 CP into Spell Shield gives you a 25% bonus to Spell Resist. Compare that to either of the three Armor Focus passives, which give you a mere 13% Physical Resist bonus at 100 CP.
• 100 CP into Hardy gives you a flat 25% reduction to Magic damage. There is no way to reduce Physical damage.
• Heavy and Medium armor users already have fairly high resist values. Heavy passives further increase this amount.
• Immovable provides Spell Resist and Evasion lets you dodge spells. (Annulment doesn't absorb weapon attacks, though.)
• Light armor users receive bonus Spell Resist, and can also use Annulment for a damage shield against Magic damage.
• Gear Sets to mitigate damage strongly favor stamina builds. Something like Reactive lets you laugh at Frags, while there is nothing comparable for magicka builds.

All that said, you can build to max out weapon damage and stamina, and your Wrecking Blow will hit like a truck, and you still end up with a lot of sustain because Rally and Vigor scale with those values. You also have very high defenses because you can dodge, break free, and block without worrying too much about stamina cost, and because you still have good spell resist. You can flat out ignore magicka since it serves no essential function.

Magicka builds can't treat stamina that way, because we still need stamina for essential functions. We also end up wearing light armor most of the time, which still gives us good spell resists, but we have terrible physical resist. So with a magicka build, it ends up that everyone has high defense against your damage, and you have very low defense against weapon attacks.

Even with magicka being at a huge disadvantage overall right now, I can still hold my own pretty well. Right up until someone starts spamming wrecking blow on me, and then I am toast. Because there simply is no defense against it, and there is no way to counter it. It hits much harder than it should, and there are zero drawbacks to using it. In practice and on paper. Not only that, but it's mechanics are widely reported as being broken: range checks, line of sight issues, hitting people mid-dodge, etc. Most solid attacks hit me between 4k and 6k. But WB regularly hits me for 7k or 8k, even over 9k on occasion. Nothing else hits me this hard, not even ultimates, except for the occasional Take Flight (because it's the only Physical damage ult.)

As far as making it interruptable, this might help depending on lag. There is a delay between when you push the button and when Crushing Shock actually hits. You might get it to go faster by animation canceling it, but I usually don't. Magicka users can't actually bash very much because of the cost. I can't speak to Venom Arrow. That said, what is the range for Bash? I don't think it's 7 meters.

frozywozy

josh.lackey_ESO wrote: »

Rooting them does nothing, because I am, myself, either rooted or snared. So I can't walk through them. I can't dodge roll; I don't have the stamina for it. I can't even Dragon Leap them because you can't Dragon Leap when you're rooted (Yet another way magicka DK is screwed over -- you have to charge your ult AND have enough stamina to dodge in order to leap!)

Roots are probably the best counter to WB spam. Talons or mines for example are very effective. Simply use them and then go behind your target forcing him to dodge roll so he can face you again.

Solariken

Poxheart wrote: »

Wrecking blow's range could use some adjusting. Hate it when you're 10+ meters away from somebody using that skill and you still get hit (even when there's no lag).

This plus the self-empowering aspect of the skill are the only things I don't like about it.

riverdragon72

When nightblades have their gap closer respect terrain,line of sight,minimum distance issues, fear spam maybe ........... oh never mind, like thats ever going to happen..

KenaPKK

My only problem with WB these days is that it hits through block, dealing full damage and knocking you back, like a quarter of the time. This occurs consistently in lagless conditions and only becomes more frequent in lag.

(It's sad that lag is such a constant in our play that it must be taken into account in all of these discussions.)

SRIBES showed some reproducible bugs with WB the other day, and it blew my mind. The move is easily counterplayed in theory, but it's so buggy that its counterplay often can't be applied.

Ryuho

KenaPKK wrote: »

My only problem with WB these days is that it hits through block, dealing full damage and knocking you back, like a quarter of the time. This occurs consistently in lagless conditions and only becomes more frequent in lag.

(It's sad that lag is such a constant in our play that it must be taken into account in all of these discussions.)

SRIBES showed some reproducible bugs with WB the other day, and it blew my mind. The move is easily counterplayed in theory, but it's so buggy that its counterplay often can't be applied.

This + insane range!

Lava_Croft

Immovable Potions make me see imaginary thought bubbles above Wrecking Blow spammers that contain nothing but question marks.