PTS Feedback Thread for Templar Balance Improvements

danno8

Cinbri wrote: »

After testing Templar changes for some time here is my feedback:
Radiant Aura - sadly only real buff this patch. However must admit zos did great job here coz finally both morphs of Aura became viable. With change of Radiant Aura in addition to frost tanking, problems of templar's sustain finally shifted to better side, skill diversity with this change is increased incredibly. Morph literally apply aoe Drain that equal in battle to 800 mana regen. I already planning to switch to this morph over Repentance.
However I need confirmation if side effect of revealing upon applying debuff is intended or not:

Also I see one weakness with it: magickasteal debuff is not visible on enemies and without tracking addons it is impossible to determine if it works. Elemental Drain and Siphon Spirit both easily visible and ally see it debuff still on enemy, Blood Altar have large visual circle to show area od effect. However Radiant Aura don't have any visual effect and if it will be applied by templar noone will see any sign of it. I suggest to add visual effect upon proc of debuff: a. either blue flash proc like warlock/lich sets. b. small visual effect that will be removed in U13: essence flowing upon proc of Siphon Spirit.

Honor the Dead - sadlt fount that it still have no visual effect of mana return Also fount that this bug with mana returns still wasnt fixed.
Backlash - buff wont make skill any viable in pvp. Mechanic of storing damage should be removed and skill must deal damage after expiring without storing as there is no way to achieve cap stored damage in pvp. Removing storing wont change anything for PvE, so...
Also storing mechanic still have 2 bugs from live: 1. It ignore Battle Spirit. 2. damage shields bugging storing mechanic.
Radiant Destruction - decreasing damage is hurting, however we can live on with it. The negative change is that Radiant Glory seriously affected by it and healing is now too small, making this morph no longer viable. It should get small healing buff.
Healing Ritual - now paradise for healbots, and sadly I don't see it as good change, except that skill finally became viable. Probably answer on requests to make BoL as cast time ability: now it AoE BoL with 1.5sec cast time that also completely ignore LoS - will be exploited by healbtos through walls and doors. Also due to mcurrenta mechanic described below in paragraph 2 it will perfectly synnergize with bomb groups.
It has 2 bugs:

1. Hasty Prayer morph still have visual effect, buff, and sound effect of old mechanic when it applied healing tick after some time. Since it no longer doing it - must be removed to not misleading people. 2. Either intended mechanic or bug - sometimes skill ignore healing treatment in PvP: healing allies removing Major Gallop buff, however healing allies with Hasty Prayer doesn't remove speed buff, i.e. templar can run with bomb group while affected by speed buff, spam Hasty without suffering from removal of it.

Blazing Spear - it is understandable desire to tone down too strong skill (lets be honest it was too strong) to increase diversity: Blazing for PvE and damage, Luminous for PvP and functionality. However it will create situations when Templar will loose CC capability entirely in current state:
1. Luminous morph is not working.
2. Eclipse got nerfed and became even less viable CC.
3. Javeling is too weak and expenisve. Compare it to DK stone Fist skill: one morph of it either apply huge AoE burst healing, 2nd is playing as CC-execute skill that deal 2x more damage to CCed enemy. Now compare it Javeling morphs...
1. Not a single smart PvPer will choose Luminous over Blazing because of new mechanic: Disorient from Luminous was added to be able to compete with perma-blocking builds, however later changes made it breakable on damage, and since Luminous can't store damage before break like DK Fossilize - it breaking immideately, creating *** situation where if you want to use it against permablockers and just to CC enemy, you just granting him CC Immunity for free and thus this morph simply dead. To show how *** it looking as example: I fighting enemy 1v1 with applying dots on him and wana CC him to drain stamina, it will end so:

Even in 1v1 enemy instead of getting CCed and forced to break free will be CCed for 0.01 milisecond and immideately will get CC immunity FOR FREE.

Ways to fix it:
a. make Desorient of this skill to store damage like Fossilize.
b. remove Disorient but in return make this skill that you obviously wanna make PvP skill to be unblockable, since blocking AoE affecting only PvP. In addition fix Eclipse to grant viable CC.
2. Eclipse and Total Dark not just wasn't buffed by current change but also got nerf, pushing this already dead skill into greave further. It used to be unique class single target CC, like Rune Prison of sorc or Fossilize of DK, but now it is dead. Here is arguments:
a. Majority of enemies in Cyro are not affected by this change:

a. Stamina Sorc melee attacks won't be reflected. b. Magicka Sorc was affected by it but now will mostly be unaffected by it too thx to new nerf. c. Magicka Dragonknight is melee/aoe spells that immune to reflect. Scales no longer can be disabled by bubble. d. Stamina Dragonknight is melee/dot skills that immune to reflect. e. Stamina NB is melee skills that immune to reflect. f. Magicka NB was affected by nerf to Strife may force them to choose over Destro-staff ability, and thus will be immune. g. Magicka Templar melee skills and can simply purge and thus unaffected by skill. h. Stamina Templar melee skills and can purge and thus unnafected by skill i. Bow skilline only most dangerous skill is Snipe, but Snipe has larger distance of cast than Eclipse, and thus buble simply can't counter it in fair state. j. Bosses and large adds in PvE immune to ability.

^^And despite it's uselessness Eclipse was nerfed even further - beams no longer can be reflected, i.e. Eclipse lost ability to reflect destro-stafff spammable dps ability. This is side change to counter Scales, however it affecting also Eclipse.

I sad that noone noticed how it will end with new meta. Let me recap: 6 from 8 builds already fully immune to skill, while only 2 builds could be affected. And now Strife was nerfed(good thing I believe tho): this will make Crushing Shock ability tempting to use for magicka NB; magicka Sorc's main dps ability is Crushing Shock, while their hard-hitting abilities already mostly ignore reflect coz it no longer can intercept and reflect back projectiles that already launched

. With changes to beam those 2 last builds will be stoped being affected by Eclipse...
It is good that skill lost target cap but when skill doesn't work against anyone it has no point if you can cast it on 1 enemy or 50.
My suggestion that i see as only way to fix it is also related to Unstable Core morph:
Unstable Core - this morph have a huge problem as it still affected by Enduring Rays passive, making it duration from 5 sec to 6.5, that is literally 25% dps nerf. This unacceptable, morph must be removed from being affected by passive.
So, back to fixing Eclipse, it must get 2 treatments -
1. It must gain back ability to reflect all melee and range attacks no matter if they are stamina or magicka.
2. It must be returned to 1 target cap.

1. Firstly it should start working against enemies. As i showed above it might completely stop working against everyone. 2. If skill will become usefull(1st treatment), with current uncapped it will be came too strong in compare to other morph Unstable Core: why would you use UC if you can use Total Dark on everyone and not just apply time bomb but also reflect things.

So, to fix terrible situation when class left without any CC - just make Eclipse to what it was. I still rember time when used Total Dark instead of Spear Shards because of how good it was. It is just that simple.
___________________________________________________________________
@Wrobel don't leave it as it is.

I agree with basically everything here.

Have to be very careful with Radiant Aura as it will agro every single enemy in PvE in a 28m circle around you. I hate being ganked, but a 28m AoE reveal is ridiculous. Hope they fix that.

Eclipse will never again (again) be used since other CC options, will actually CC the enemy and force them to break free and/or damage them. Eclipse won't work against most skills, and it's a joke that they are calling Crushing Shock a beam. No channel time, no beam in my opinion.

The extra damage on Backlash makes it do more damage than Reflective Light in the same 6 seconds according to my testing, and it is only 1300 magicka. However this depends on your crit ratings since Backlash can't crit but reflective can. You will easily hit the cap in PvE but I still wouldn't use it in PvP.

Luminous definitely needs a damage store up if it is to be the "go through block" stun that other class have in PvP.

And yah, HtD 75% health requirement is still broken and gives no magicka return (unless the player is STILL under 75% AFTER the heal), making this morph absolutely pointless over BoL.

danno8

Lore_lai wrote: »

Re: Hasty Prayer - I really do hope they give it the Line-of-Sight treatment because if not this will be horrible. Especially if it can heal on different elevations, ignoring LoS, like Wall of Elements can damage (speaking of, when is that sort of nonsense getting fixed?).

Wall of Elements? That's the least of our problems. Eye of the Storm goes through walls, ceilings and floors right now. And it just got a buff if you use Lightning staff, lol.

Honestly they should have nerfed EotS by 21% and just reduced the Ultimate cost to 200.

Lore_lai

danno8 wrote: »

Lore_lai wrote: »

Re: Hasty Prayer - I really do hope they give it the Line-of-Sight treatment because if not this will be horrible. Especially if it can heal on different elevations, ignoring LoS, like Wall of Elements can damage (speaking of, when is that sort of nonsense getting fixed?).

Wall of Elements? That's the least of our problems. Eye of the Storm goes through walls, ceilings and floors right now. And it just got a buff if you use Lightning staff, lol.

Honestly they should have nerfed EotS by 21% and just reduced the Ultimate cost to 200.

Of course - I said "like" Wall (just giving one example) - I imagine there are other AoEs that behave like that and their effects go through ceilings, and I agree about how they handled EotS "nerf" (lol), sorry *cough* "balance" but that is for another topic.
My concerns were about Hasty Prayer spammers that can just hide and heal through ceiling (if it works like that, which would be bad).

DHale

Ladies and gentlemen please test radiant aura the new magicdrain only procs on one enemy regardless of the number hit. I am keeping repentance. Test done breath of life to get magic under 50 ran into a pack of 6 mobs ritual of retribution radiant aura magic back... lol. One mob. Great job.

evedgebah

We used to have Blinding Flashes, which was a very fun skill to use in PVE on trash pulls and PVP. If I could suggest a change to Eclipse to make it worthwhile - make it Blind. It even matches with the name.

Joy_Division

@Cinbri - thank you for the detailed eedback, of which I agree with everything except two things that I would like you to clarify:

• Blazing Spear is too strong? It's a good, versatile, unique to be sure, but too strong? Its damage was meh and very avoidable and the lesser range is very noticeable in Cyrodiil. What ZoS did was make it into a lackluster Lightning Splash that tanks will want in PvE. It eliminates the sort of interactive counterplay that makes ESO's combat appealing. Where are my CCs? Blinding flashes. Gone. Blazing Spear. Gone. Eclipse. Worthless. Sweeps stun. Gone. All I have is javelin, which is obscenely expensive, moves a target I might not want to move, and has no actual status effect like fear or fossilize.
• Eclipse: I do agree with your analysis that it is basically useless because the biggest threats in Cyrodiil are not projectiles. So, reflecting everything is a good idea. Limiting to 1 cast ... why? The bad guys can still just break out of it

timidobserver

@Cinbri

I honestly stopped reading at blazing spear being too strong. Blazing spear is one of the last things I am concerned about being hit by in PvP.

Sheuib

Neowit wrote: »

Please add a gradient cost increase to Breath of Life, or do something which stops this terrible block/heal meta.

Just no. It is the only effective defense for a magicka templar. And, if they a magicka templar is block casting heals and you can't run them out of stam in 4 hits the problem is you. Additionally, you would effectively eliminate the role of PVP healer let alone what it would do to PVE. Stop asking for things just because you can't deal with it. Plenty of other people are able to kill templars.

Koensol

Joy_Division wrote: »

@Cinbri - thank you for the detailed eedback, of which I agree with everything except two things that I would like you to clarify:

• Blazing Spear is too strong? It's a good, versatile, unique to be sure, but too strong? Its damage was meh and very avoidable and the lesser range is very noticeable in Cyrodiil. What ZoS did was make it into a lackluster Lightning Splash that tanks will want in PvE. It eliminates the sort of interactive counterplay that makes ESO's combat appealing. Where are my CCs? Blinding flashes. Gone. Blazing Spear. Gone. Eclipse. Worthless. Sweeps stun. Gone. All I have is javelin, which is obscenely expensive, moves a target I might not want to move, and has no actual status effect like fear or fossilize.
• Eclipse: I do agree with your analysis that it is basically useless because the biggest threats in Cyrodiil are not projectiles. So, reflecting everything is a good idea. Limiting to 1 cast ... why? The bad guys can still just break out of it

Completely agreed. It is like Zenimax doesn't want templars to have any viable control mechanic. These templar changes have just been all over the place.

majulook

No reliable CC is going to make no one want to be a Templar healer. You will have to become some sort of mix of DPS with heal on the side.

Doing daily Trails and Undaunted, will soon mean that a dedicated DPS just to protect the Templar healer, why would anyone want that? I guess that everyone will be adding heal staff to all characters, since soon no more Templar healers for daily Trials or Undaunted are going to be wanted in group or available as they cannot defend themselves.

It seems that Templars are now only squishy dedicated healers. Who only with sneak, perseverance, multiple full soul gems will be able to solo alot of PVE (areas that have multiple groups of enemy).

the_man_of_steal

How is a magplar going to deal with 3 snipers in the poison VMA level unless he can stun one of them... Our mobility is horrific already, and without a ranged stun now we are really screwed. Magplars are already a seldom used class in VMA... This one change will completely eliminate them from VMA and will eliminate DPS magplars from PVP.

Either give us a mag stun, or give us tokens in VMA so we can pick our own rewards before these changes go live. Completely unfair that some ppl have to run VMA literally thousands of times and now are faced with the future prospect of not being about to stun.

...I thought this game favored versatility...

Please consider this one change for magplars' sake.

danno8

DHale wrote: »

Ladies and gentlemen please test radiant aura the new magicdrain only procs on one enemy regardless of the number hit. I am keeping repentance. Test done breath of life to get magic under 50 ran into a pack of 6 mobs ritual of retribution radiant aura magic back... lol. One mob. Great job.

Perspective.

You don't have to reapply it to each and every mob, so it is as useful for trash pulls as it is for single target burns (something that can not be said of for Elemental Drain or Siphon Spirit.) It is the equivalent of 800 magicka regen on the stat sheet. That's pretty huge. Per enemy would have been ridiculous.

Also, this was covered on page 1, by myself.

Sheuib

Does anyone know if the magicka steal debuff actually steals magicka from the target?

21% damage reduction on RD is way to much. I might as well just keep spaming dark flare. My dark flare hits for more until about 35% health. It hits about the same as a RD tic until about 15%. And, that was before the nerf. With a 21% damage reduction there is really no point in using RD over dark flare. Might be worth it for PVE boss fights in the last 15% of health but definitely no point in PVP. Plus the added aoe debuff from dark flare is a big bonus in PVP.

technohic

I want to get on and test to see if it breaks illuminating shards soft CC. Not that shards would be any less useless if it doesn't.

Soris

Removal of CC from Blazing Spears isn't a good change.

Paraflex

Sheuib wrote: »

Neowit wrote: »

Please add a gradient cost increase to Breath of Life, or do something which stops this terrible block/heal meta.

Just no. It is the only effective defense for a magicka templar. And, if they a magicka templar is block casting heals and you can't run them out of stam in 4 hits the problem is you. Additionally, you would effectively eliminate the role of PVP healer let alone what it would do to PVE. Stop asking for things just because you can't deal with it. Plenty of other people are able to kill templars.

The main reason you can do this is heavy armor gives you amazing protection and resources like mag/Stam back so you can block cast for ever due to this. Templars in Heavy Armor have it easy. They should have to sacrifice sustain wearing heavy but that's not the case at all. This is my problem with Templars and I main a Templar healer everyday and think it's to strong. Weak ones die Strong ones are the last one dead on the battlefield.

Giving BOL a cost increase isn't the first solution or caster timer although it's something I'd consider.

Heavy Armor is the problem. Joy Division can complain about NB Burst in pve all he wants. You could still run heavy armor if they killed the sustain you get from constitution and players would be forced to run all three jewelry pieces mag recovery or cost reduction and still run heavy.This is why Templars can still dps.

Heavy Armor with no mag recovery from constitution forces people to run sustain enchants on jewelry while still getting protection. You won't have amazing dps either if your forced to get sustain wearing heavy.

As far as PVE goes this won't hurt Trial healers or dps running heavy armor concerned about sustain...no one runs heavy armor in pve for dps or healing just tanks that like to spam obsidian shield.

Paraflex

Heavy armor serves a good purpose for protection but it doesn't need to fix two problems for Sustain and Armor.

There's a reason Stam sorcs run black rose

There's a reason Mag sorcs are running Heavy Kags/Seducer. The sustain and protection from heavy armor is to good.

Remove mag recovery from the constitution passive its one change that will have a huge impact on sustain which indirectly lessens Dps in general.

This also means less healing because Templars won't have 3 spell dmg enchants

Elsterchen

nvm

caeliusstarbreaker

I wear viper because my main damage ability is a dodgeable channel, effected by two cp stars.
I have the most expensive single target, dodgeable, reflectable, blockable CC in the game.
I do not have helping hands, dark deal, or siphoning attacks to help sustain.
My best buff requires me to touch a 4 meter circle every 8 seconds.
I only have 2 skill points in the whole dawns wrath tree. For 4% reduced cost.
I use empowering sweep as a defensive ultimate, but it only lasts 6 seconds and the more mitigation for enemies hit would work great... If a .5m difference in elevation wouldn't make me miss....when Eots is hitting on different floors with los checks.

I am a stamplar.

Lore_lai

caeliusstarbreaker wrote: »

I wear viper because my main damage ability is a dodgeable channel, effected by two cp stars.
I have the most expensive single target, dodgeable, reflectable, blockable CC in the game.
I do not have helping hands, dark deal, or siphoning attacks to help sustain.
My best buff requires me to touch a 4 meter circle every 8 seconds.
I only have 2 skill points in the whole dawns wrath tree. For 4% reduced cost.
I use empowering sweep as a defensive ultimate, but it only lasts 6 seconds and the more mitigation for enemies hit would work great... If a .5m difference in elevation would make me miss.when Eots is hitting through whole floors.

I am a stamplar.

Now just imagine how "amazing" Stamina Templar would be if Purifying Ritual would get nerfed like some people advocate.
Also Rune Focus is more like ~2m in diameter.

Stamina Templar definitely needs some TLC, especially in the sustain department, more so now that they have killed Claptrap (RIP EG).

caeliusstarbreaker

Lore_lai wrote: »

caeliusstarbreaker wrote: »

I wear viper because my main damage ability is a dodgeable channel, effected by two cp stars.
I have the most expensive single target, dodgeable, reflectable, blockable CC in the game.
I do not have helping hands, dark deal, or siphoning attacks to help sustain.
My best buff requires me to touch a 4 meter circle every 8 seconds.
I only have 2 skill points in the whole dawns wrath tree. For 4% reduced cost.
I use empowering sweep as a defensive ultimate, but it only lasts 6 seconds and the more mitigation for enemies hit would work great... If a .5m difference in elevation would make me miss.when Eots is hitting through whole floors.

I am a stamplar.

Now just imagine how "amazing" Stamina Templar would be if Purifying Ritual would get nerfed like some people advocate.
Also Rune Focus is more like ~2m in diameter.

Stamina Templar definitely needs some TLC, especially in the sustain department, more so now that they have killed Claptrap (RIP EG).

I mean we could also talk about how the game can't distinguish which enemy is closest to me to receive the 140% dmg boost on jabs of the enemies are too close too.

In all seriousness though, stamplar probably could use some love... But I do pretty well for myself in pvp.

usmcjdking

caeliusstarbreaker wrote: »

I wear viper because my main damage ability is a dodgeable channel, effected by two cp stars.
I have the most expensive single target, dodgeable, reflectable, blockable CC in the game.
I do not have helping hands, dark deal, or siphoning attacks to help sustain.
My best buff requires me to touch a 4 meter circle every 8 seconds.
I only have 2 skill points in the whole dawns wrath tree. For 4% reduced cost.
I use empowering sweep as a defensive ultimate, but it only lasts 6 seconds and the more mitigation for enemies hit would work great... If a .5m difference in elevation would make me miss.when Eots is hitting through whole floors.

I am a stamplar.

Should rename Major Evasion to Aedric Spear Immunity.

Joy_Division

Paraflex wrote: »

Sheuib wrote: »

Neowit wrote: »

Please add a gradient cost increase to Breath of Life, or do something which stops this terrible block/heal meta.

Just no. It is the only effective defense for a magicka templar. And, if they a magicka templar is block casting heals and you can't run them out of stam in 4 hits the problem is you. Additionally, you would effectively eliminate the role of PVP healer let alone what it would do to PVE. Stop asking for things just because you can't deal with it. Plenty of other people are able to kill templars.

The main reason you can do this is heavy armor gives you amazing protection and resources like mag/Stam back so you can block cast for ever due to this. Templars in Heavy Armor have it easy. They should have to sacrifice sustain wearing heavy but that's not the case at all. This is my problem with Templars and I main a Templar healer everyday and think it's to strong. Weak ones die Strong ones are the last one dead on the battlefield.

Giving BOL a cost increase isn't the first solution or caster timer although it's something I'd consider.

Heavy Armor is the problem. Joy Division can complain about NB Burst in pve all he wants. You could still run heavy armor if they killed the sustain you get from constitution and players would be forced to run all three jewelry pieces mag recovery or cost reduction and still run heavy.This is why Templars can still dps.

Heavy Armor with no mag recovery from constitution forces people to run sustain enchants on jewelry while still getting protection. You won't have amazing dps either if your forced to get sustain wearing heavy.

As far as PVE goes this won't hurt Trial healers or dps running heavy armor concerned about sustain...no one runs heavy armor in pve for dps or healing just tanks that like to spam obsidian shield.

That's 45K health. In your "amazing protection" heavy armor. A real set with Impen. Not Trainee trash.



2511+5110+10066+1078+4802+8645+2719+1886+6729+5802=48270 damage. With 50% Battle Spirit.

I got killed in 2 seconds. Got stunned. CC broke. Died before I could get a skill off. What's a joke is that Zenimax's "fix" for the whole proc set problem would have done nothing.

Now you and Zenimax want me to run around in Light Armor with 25K health, right? Game is a joke. Every mechanic in this game is totally busted because players can keep pushing the numbers to ridiculously high levels. Heavy armor is not amazing protection. It's required for anyone who actually wants to press a few buttons before getting instantly vaporized.

NBs wonder why their trial DPS sucks and why Zenimax doesn't boost their skills, it is because of abusive crap like that. In what universe is it even compelling gameplay that a very high health build in heavy armor gets insta-killed?. This isn't even Call of Duty. It's a joke and why so many people can't stand the NB class.

maxjapank

Joy is right. The reason we wear heavy armor is for the extra health and mitigation from over the top burst. I would love to wear light armor. But until damage is toned down some, I likely won't. Also, I think many of the Temps who are wearing heavy armor are using at least two Magicka recovery glyphs on their jewelry to make up for the loss from light armor, unless they are using a set that provides Magicka regen or reduction.

I don't think taking away from Constitution is the answer. But I do think wraith could be toned down.

Elsterchen

caeliusstarbreaker wrote: »

I wear viper because my main damage ability is a dodgeable channel, effected by two cp stars.
I have the most expensive single target, dodgeable, reflectable, blockable CC in the game.
I do not have helping hands, dark deal, or siphoning attacks to help sustain.
My best buff requires me to touch a 4 meter circle every 8 seconds.
I only have 2 skill points in the whole dawns wrath tree. For 4% reduced cost.
I use empowering sweep as a defensive ultimate, but it only lasts 6 seconds and the more mitigation for enemies hit would work great... If a .5m difference in elevation wouldn't make me miss....when Eots is hitting on different floors with los checks.

I am a stamplar.

I am a stamplar, too.

I agree on everything said already and i like to add some more:

I am a templar and use vigor or barrier for healing - everything else either takes too long or is too expensive.

(Actually ... 'nuf said... if you do not understand pls read the last sentence again)

I try empowering sweep once in a while, but i find barrier or rend more usefull in the end. Mostly bc of the fact that within 6 s i won't be able to tear down a naked skeleton ... or simply anything bigger then a 1 hp spider.

I usually survive ganking attemps, i got alot of ways to get health and/or stam back, I know when and how to block... but in the end i die bc i have to decide to either stay vital OR be able to do dmg. Adding to it, running away isn't an option for me, bc I have to stay in "my house" to stay alive and i am not fast nor stealthy nor do I own any fancy escape mechanism.

If i decide to fight ... and get a chace to do so, fights usually take minutes (... and not 1 Minute ... rather 3 - 10). Usually my enemies get bored fighting me and tend to just run off after a while, successfully if NB or sorc, I may say. Usually its only DKs that (just like me) have to see it through till the (long, long) end.


All of this is no issue in PVE, ofc.

So, can someone elude me on how the new balancing of templars is going to improve my situation? Yes, @ZOS_GinaBruno ?

Petty pls, we templars are close to extinction in PVP. In my campain we have 1200 active players in my alliance. Only 33 of them are templars. And yes, last round of improvements on stamina based chars really helped: I am able to survive 1v1s and even win 2 vs 1 scenarios (That is if my enemies allow me to actually fight them and don't run off after a while). What I don#t understand is why we get a nerf - we just got close to beeing actually fun.

Cinbri

Joy_Division wrote: »

@Cinbri - thank you for the detailed eedback, of which I agree with everything except two things that I would like you to clarify:

• Blazing Spear is too strong? It's a good, versatile, unique to be sure, but too strong? Its damage was meh and very avoidable and the lesser range is very noticeable in Cyrodiil. What ZoS did was make it into a lackluster Lightning Splash that tanks will want in PvE. It eliminates the sort of interactive counterplay that makes ESO's combat appealing. Where are my CCs? Blinding flashes. Gone. Blazing Spear. Gone. Eclipse. Worthless. Sweeps stun. Gone. All I have is javelin, which is obscenely expensive, moves a target I might not want to move, and has no actual status effect like fear or fossilize.
• Eclipse: I do agree with your analysis that it is basically useless because the biggest threats in Cyrodiil are not projectiles. So, reflecting everything is a good idea. Limiting to 1 cast ... why? The bad guys can still just break out of it

1. Blazing Spear is skill with highest utility in game:

it is range AoE, not melee with caster as source of radius attack it is 8m AoE not 5 or 6 it has ground based AoE DoT DoT can proc strong Burning Light passive DoT literally make it as 8m AoE reveal ability it has strongest in-game synnergy of restoring 25% of stamina synnergy also apply buff of restore stamina with 50% uptime it has range strong stun capability.

This current high utility lead to next:
a. no point to choose Solar Barrage over Blazing Spear.
b. While Luminous was always morph that should provide CC, while Blazing is more offensive damage(and in new thread Rich confirmed this), over time Blazing became main CC for templars(including me). Luminous Shards doesn't provide even half of Blazing utility.
c. PvP healbots spam this skill in battle mostly for strongest synnergy but yet they also gaining all that utility provided by skill.
In addition to gutted all other class CCs it led to stupid situation when spammable AoE became main source of CC. Just 1 skill, that originally shouldn't serve this role. Now, when CC capability will be removed it will uncover terrible problem of class CC capability that I already mentioned and people won't be able to ignore it anymore and hopefully wine will get to zos attention:
a. Javelin is terrible skill.
b. Luminous Shards that should serve for CC just doesn't work.
c. Eclipse as last CC skill completely lost it usefullness.
If Luminous Shards will be fixed there will be finally point to choose between morphs. Templars won't be able to achieve everything by spamming 1 skill, it will be either high damage with good enough utility, or average damage with high utility and solo/small-scale offensive capability.

2. Regarding Total Dark - as I already mentioned it will make Total Dark 10 times stronger than Unstable Core. firstly: possibility to use it on several enemies is huge strength. For that reason Unstable Core is very strong skill for burst your opponents down:
Here is my Recount based on 20 min of 2vX on TF:

As you can see this is already top damage, and as i already mentioned in last post right now it has huge weakness when Enduring Rays decreasing its damage approximetly for 25%. Now add this 25% damage to recount and it will make it even more stronger. Not to mention that next update it will get small side buff that it not expire upon target death that will make it in battle against zerg much much more stronger.
TD will have much higher utility than UC:
By its own Total Dark is somewhere inbetween Scales and Fossilize: people claim it is weak coz it is CC ability, but well, Fossilize is 1 cap target that apply strong CC in addition to other utility of skill, and it is not making this skill any weaker, nope, this skill still one of the best CC skills. Same will be with Total Dark if it will return to what it was - reflect of all attacks.
a. PvP is all about burst - imagine how stamina build trying to burst you down while bubbled and in return deal high damage to himself, forced to break free and dealt additional damage from time bomb. And all this only from 1 skill with 7 sec cooldown.
b. From my experience spam skill on more than 2 target is useless and loss of utility.
c. This skill might not just reflect of abilities but also have nice side effects - it heal you for each reflect, also might completely disable target if target is out stamina (imitation of Silence effect on both magicka and stamina players), also each reflect means not just no waste of your own HP but also saved stamina, and once again not only for you but for any ally target nearby.
d. It costs same as BoL. Unlike BoL it has time frame of usability, but in return utility from using it is much higher than provided by cast of 1 BoL.
e. In addition add AoE damage i showed above to all this utility
And lastly: when skill reflect all attacks - people will be forced to break CC immideately, it means that running to bunch of enemies you still will be capable of spam Eclipse simply coz every enemy will break it at same second.
Here is gif from my previous post that should show what i talknig about:

Here is what will happen from casting 1 Total Dark : 1. Heavy attack that nowdays can reach like 10k damage will be reflected back. 2. Crystal Frags that can deal same damage will be reflected back. 3. Light attack will be reflected back. 4. None of those attacks will drain my HP 5. None of those attacks will drain my stamina. 6. those 3 reflects will proc 3 healing ticks that nowdays can reach up to 20k crit healing. 7. enemy will be CCed and forced to Break Free. 8. Time Bomb will explode upon enemy cc breaking. 9. During his being disabled by CC and his defense shredded by his own attacks I can counter attack. 10. If there would be any enemy nearby I can cast bubble on him too and once again provide to myself all of the utility.
^^^So, as recap, without cap: 1.it will be much stronger than any other classes unique CCs like Fossilize. 2. Unstable Core even not suffered from Enduring Rays won't be able to compete with TD as it will deal damage in adition to all utility.
________________________________________________________________________
But sadly all of those just a theorycrafting based on my experience of using ability during old times when it was working. Without adding possibility to reflect all attacks in addition to current pts changes all this utility is equal to ZERO.

timidobserver wrote: »

@Cinbri

I honestly stopped reading at blazing spear being too strong. Blazing spear is one of the last things I am concerned about being hit by in PvP.

90% of PvP templars are healbots in heavy armor with 1593 spelldamage. You seriously expecting them to hit you so hard?! Sorry, but even my HP vampire regen highr than their damage. And once again they use this skill not for damage but for utility provided by sinnergy, AoE damage is just nice add for them.

Nifty2g

evedgebah wrote: »

I have just finished another round of PTS Testing, specifically on Fire vs Shock Staff and our skills.

All tests were made with the same gear, traits, buffs, etc on the new and shiny target skeletons in the privacy of my home.

For Reflective Light and Radiant Oppression, the Illuminate passive was active for these numbers, as it was for Dark Flare, which was always empowered. Those buffs were NOT up for the other skills. These numbers are the critical hit value (because I wanted to test in gear, and I had an over 50% crit rating), not tooltip, and so I could compare with live later on. I also did not allocate any of the new CP yet, so these are 561 numbers. The important thing is not the number itself, but it's relative value compared to the others.

.	Reflective	Radiant	Sweeps	Blazing Sp	Ritual	D.Flare
DW	7261+3326	8895	4714	7687+1643	2796	24833
Fire	6603+3265	8798	4292	6998+1497	2545	24277
Shock 	7131+3024	8380	4632	7557+1616	2545	22760

For all skills, Dual Wield was more potent than using either staff. Fire Staff only helped Dark Flare and Radiant Oppression (unsurprising). All of our other main DPS class skills are AOE and are buffed by lightning staves with the exception of Ritual of Retribution, which is buffed by neither staff (is this a bug?).

Well think about it, would you like to do 5% all around damage with swords and gain an extra 5pc
or 8% single target abilities
or aoe damage

Lightspeedflashb14_ESO

Nifty2g wrote: »

evedgebah wrote: »

I have just finished another round of PTS Testing, specifically on Fire vs Shock Staff and our skills.

All tests were made with the same gear, traits, buffs, etc on the new and shiny target skeletons in the privacy of my home.

For Reflective Light and Radiant Oppression, the Illuminate passive was active for these numbers, as it was for Dark Flare, which was always empowered. Those buffs were NOT up for the other skills. These numbers are the critical hit value (because I wanted to test in gear, and I had an over 50% crit rating), not tooltip, and so I could compare with live later on. I also did not allocate any of the new CP yet, so these are 561 numbers. The important thing is not the number itself, but it's relative value compared to the others.

.	Reflective	Radiant	Sweeps	Blazing Sp	Ritual	D.Flare
DW	7261+3326	8895	4714	7687+1643	2796	24833
Fire	6603+3265	8798	4292	6998+1497	2545	24277
Shock 	7131+3024	8380	4632	7557+1616	2545	22760

For all skills, Dual Wield was more potent than using either staff. Fire Staff only helped Dark Flare and Radiant Oppression (unsurprising). All of our other main DPS class skills are AOE and are buffed by lightning staves with the exception of Ritual of Retribution, which is buffed by neither staff (is this a bug?).

Well think about it, would you like to do 5% all around damage with swords and gain an extra 5pc
or 8% single target abilities
or aoe damage

Or 8% more single target DPS plus weaving damage and sustain
Or 8% more AOE damage plus sustain and dmge from weaving

This change makes a destro staff much more appealing to temps.

Soris

ZOS_RichLambert wrote: »

[*] Stun Removal on Blazing Spear – This change falls into the “simplify” category. We increased the duration of the damage on this ability to simplify the rotation. In addition we removed the stun component. Now the morph choices are more damage or more resources and disorient. (CC)

I think this is not a simplification but flat out nerfing the ability. Spear dot itself wasn't a good dmg source but a good source to proc the burning light passive.
The stun on the other hand, was crucial in PvP and it was serving as a "home defence" tool when you cast it on yourself to gain a split second of fresh air when the enemy vomiting all his hate on you.
Without this stun magplars have to use the javelin to do the same defensive move. Why are you forcing us to use one extra skill?
Now i can hear "use the focused charge" Well, Focused Charge doesn't working in melee range. It is hard to use as defensive tool since you have to gain some distance when enemy keep hugging to you.

UppGRAYxDD

Or 8% more single target DPS plus weaving damage and sustain
Or 8% more AOE damage plus sustain and dmge from weaving

This change makes a destro staff much more appealing to temps.

This is exactly why you duel wield front and lightning destro on backbar to utilized undodgeable lightning destro hvy/med attacks to put minor vulnerability and a poison on your enemy before switching bars to dps with duel wield. Also allows you to use your destro ulti and anicancel the cast time by swaping bars, and most importantly it will give you the option to run destructive clench for a replacement CC due to the blazing shards nerf.