In Defense of Major Defile and Befoul

Chilly-McFreeze

E: formatting issues

GrumpyDuckling

@Chilly-McFreeze

This is the second time in as many consecutive posts where you either misquote or incorrectly paraphrase someone else's words, and then argue against your own fictional statements. Please stop making things up.

You wrote,
"But yet you make general comparisons (with e.g. ritual stone, major mending, powered trait on side) to 'prove' that easily accesible defile is balanced (because ritual stone and powered trait are oh so viable on e.g. solo stam builds)."

There isn't anywhere where I made a general comparison using "ritual stone, major mending, powered trait on side" to prove anything. See the first post of the thread where I say, "The defiling quartet of Major Defile, Minor Defile, Befoul, and Siphoner has to compete against ~18 ways to buff and/or strengthen healing. Most solo builds can realistically utilize ~8 of these healing buffs/strengthening tactics, if not more."

Chilly-McFreeze

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Chilly-McFreeze wrote: »

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Checkmath wrote: »

Now it gets ridiculous....nightblades make a sacrifice with slotting incap....
About everything else you were saying with „there are so many hots and mechanics to make healing better“: if you play like this, you arent competitive anymore. Like the statement of having minor and major mending on your class based on gear and backbar weapon...you arent competitive wearing a heal staff on most of the classes. Minor mending from gear, you are joking right? Healing taken bonus from sets, so sanctuary set or something with a healing taken bonus...again you arent competitive anymore. Powered trait and ritual mundus...not competitive.
Everything is not competitive which „could“ increase healing. There is too much sacrifice compared to slotting duroks bane, incap or putting points into befoul, because with both you are competitive with pretty much zero drawback.

Yes, I expressed earlier that I would rather face a telegraphed, predictable, dodgeable, blockable, single target Nightblade ultimate rather than a large, undodgeable, multi-target Eye of the Storm ultimate that allows the player to cast skills and gap close during its duration. You call my opinion and personal preference (which I prefaced by saying it was a subjective stance) "ridiculous," but how does that aid discussion?

I knew when I posted this thread that there would be passionate resistance to my defense of defiling, but vague, general statements such as "you arent competitive wearing a heal staff on most of the classes" and hyperbolic statements such as "Everything is not competitive which 'could' increase healing" don't offer much incentive to consider opposing viewpoints.

You do understand that in a topic about defile people will argue about skills that have a defile on it rather than about skills that have perks of their own but not defile? Bringing in things that have not the slightest to do with the topic at hand doesn't aid the discussion too. You put up a smoke screen to veil that Incap is by no means a sacrifice.

I can't remember when I last died to EotS outside of group vs group play. 1v1 I die to incap, much rather to what it brings with it, but never did I get defeated by the destro ult. And to play down the power of incap, largely due to it's de-/buffs/CC rather than the damage, is quite a stretch.

And isn't it a vague, general statement to say "you guys have powered resto staffs as options to balance out defile"? Please show me an up to date solo stam build with a resto staff.

If you scroll up you will see that the discussion about the Nightblade ultimate originated in reference to sacrifices. I expressed the opinion that a single target ultimate (which is often telegraphed and completely avoidable through a defensive tactic that every character has, dodge) sacrifices a team-aiding, multi-target ultimate (I used Eye of the Storm as an example). So yes, it relates because I am of the opinion that sacrifices are being made by the individual who is choosing to use the Nightblade ultimate for its benefits of stun, defile and increased damage vs. its weaknesses of single target, often telegraphed and dodgeable, and less team aiding. Again, that's my opinion of a choice and sacrifices that are being made.

I'm not sure what you're trying to do by changing the quote I referred to as vague and general from "you arent competitive wearing a heal staff on most of the classes" to "you guys have powered resto staffs as options to balance out defile"?

You changed the meaning of the quote by changing the words and then started arguing against your own made-up statement. This alone makes it difficult to consider the arguments that you're making.

Uh yes, in ZvZ you're better off with an AoE, right. Is that where defile matters? We used to talk about how your list doesn't add up for solo players who can barely utilize any of your given boosts for healing. No one would prefer EotS over Incap in such a situation. There, were it matters, not in 24v24 earth gore parties, incap is and was never a sacrifice. Not to mention that you've got two slots for ults and could run both.
And you mentioned the powered trait and major mending (which ironically is only avaible via resto heavy attacks for some classes) - read: not viable for everything non-mag.
See, you complained about general statements here:

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

I knew when I posted this thread that there would be passionate resistance to my defense of defiling, but vague, general statements such as "you arent competitive wearing a heal staff on most of the classes" and hyperbolic statements such as "Everything is not competitive which 'could' increase healing" don't offer much incentive to consider opposing viewpoints.

But yet you make general comparisons (with e.g. ritual stone, major mending, powered trait on side) to "prove" that easily accessible defile is balanced (because ritual stone and powered trait are oh so viable on e.g. solo stam builds).

Now finally go ahead and tell me what I shall do on my no cp solo stam sorc to a) remain viable and b ) counter major defile.

Oh right, you talked around that and wrote:

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Your no CP solo Stamsorc has access to the following:

Guaranteed Sources of Healing Benefits/Health Return for your No CP Stamsorc
Health Recovery (yes)
Healing can crit (defile does not)
Healing scales with max attribute (defile does not)
Healing scales with spell/weapon damage (defile does not)
Potions
You can even stack the following heals:
Vigor
Crit Surge
Dark Deal
Blood Magic passive
Depending on your stamina weapon(s), heals such as:
Rally/Momentum
Bloodthirst
Blood Craze
Lacerate
Draining Shot

Other Potential Sources of Healing Benefits/Health Return for your No CP Stamsorc
Ritual Stone (no defiling mundus stone counter)
Powered Trait (no defiling trait counter)
Major Mending (depends on backbar weapon)
Minor Mending (depends on gear set)
Healing Done (depends on gear set)
Healing Received (depends on gear set)
Healing Taken (depends on gear set)

All of the above vs. Major Defile and Minor Defile (because Befoul and Siphoner are taken out in no CP). I think that's fair.

It's obvious that a competitive solo build doesn't even has access to half of that.

And each and every point on that list get's cut down by one single, easily accessible debuff. Great. And that you don't have to build for defile (read: don't invest anything) for it to be effective (unlike healing) is actually an advantage for the debuffer! He doesn't has to invest in anything and still get the whole benefit of defile on me. If I wanted all or even a part of the "counters" I'd have a very unviable build.

And your "other potential sources of benefits" are a joke. You know that. We are right back to the original quote about general statements and "Quotes".

Actually, since you mentioned health recovery, a stat that is considered of lesser use by many, I would have to invest entire stats that I'd otherwise had for resistance, damage, attributes, whatever, just to boost it by 130 health regen every two seconds, only for it to be cut down by 30% by someone who does what he always does: e.g. incap. To make health regen work out I had to invest far more than 1 or 2 set boni on it, for example I had to choose a monster set that harmonises with it, a race with a boost on it and still get *** over by a single reverb.

Healing can crit (defile can not) - only partly true: if my heals crit, your defile reduces that boon as well. Another perk of defile being a % debuff.

Healing scales with... - I already discussed that before.

And then again, I could stack a *** of heals - give up bar slots over bar slots I would use otherwise - for an aditional heal - just for it to get debuffed by one single skill/ set. Opportunity Costs.

Mureel

Joy_Division wrote: »

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

I know there are some of you who will vehemently disagree with a stance to keep Major Defile and Befoul in its current state, but please take the time to consider the following reason for why Major Defile and Befoul should remain the same, at least for now:

The defiling quartet of Major Defile, Minor Defile, Befoul, and Siphoner has to compete against ~17 ways to buff and/or strengthen healing. Most solo builds can realistically utilize ~8 of these healing buffs/strengthening tactics, if not more:

Major Mending
Minor Mending
Major Vitality
Minor Vitality
Healing Done
Healing Received
Healing Taken
Health Recovery
Blessed (champion point node)
Quick Recovery (champion point node)
Elfborn (champion point node)
Precise Strikes (champion point node)
Healing can crit (defile does not)
Healing scales with max attribute (defile does not)
Healing scales with spell/weapon damage (defile does not)
Ritual Stone (no defiling mundus stone counter)
Powered Trait (no defiling trait counter)

Yes, Major Defile and Minor Defile offer higher percentages and are often easier to access than Major Mending and Minor Mending, and yes the scaling on Befoul is high, but it stands to reason that these decisions were made to create counterbalance that combats the multitude of benefits that factor into healing.

When you consider all of the above, I think it's logical to conclude that ZOS has done a solid job with the current state of defiling in ESO. I hope it remains roughly the same, at least for now.

Edit on 6/13/18 -- Added Major Vitality, Minor Vitality, Blessed, and Quick Recovery to the list.

This is all on paper. There is zero chance in a competitive PvP fight on a competitive PvP build that actually wants to kill people is going to have all those healing multipliers.

Meanwhile anyone can slap on a disease enchant or better yet just put on a durok's bane set (easier still with jewelry transmorg) and put 100% uptime with a ridiculously scaling befoul from CP which requires zero sacrifice from offensive CPs. Or worse yet, any NB without any gear from an overloaded cheap ultimate that also stuns me and amps their damage.

Point: it is too easy trivial to delete an opponent's healing without much sacrifice. You may deem this necessary because you hate "healbots" but defile destroys people who aren't healbots, which results in the very thing you don't want to see: more block builds that invest so much into damage reduction because if they don;t they're dead.

Moreover, it absoultely makes me want to throw my computer out the window that my magplars healing has been absolutely gutted without defile/befoul, all my good defense skills have been taken away, leaving me with little choice but to rely on block and reactive healing and there is stiil this vendetta out there by people who hate "healbots." How exactly am I supposed to defend myself without healing? That's all my class does! And as far as that list goes, you can add 20 more things to it but in actually Cyordiil (or worse, Batttelgrounds where my stats are crap and I don't have the healing amps that were stolen from my class because of the champion system, this is what my "healbot" is relegated as the only means to defend itself:



and



And still ZOS keeps nerfing Breath of Life. Can I have back blinding Flashes please?

Playing while perma-defile is to the point where it's log out, I'm not dealing with this crap anymore.

This! I've sold my 'house' as far as pvp goes. Who even wants to defend a tin roof shanty?

I really will likely never pvp with my healplar again outside 'my social guild wants to go derp around. Ok I'll go Zerg for the banter and mash purge a lot'

Over it.

Chilly-McFreeze

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

@Chilly-McFreeze

This is the second time in as many consecutive posts where you either misquote or incorrectly paraphrase someone else's words, and then argue against your own fictional statements. Please stop making things up.

You wrote,
"But yet you make general comparisons (with e.g. ritual stone, major mending, powered trait on side) to 'prove' that easily accesible defile is balanced (because ritual stone and powered trait are oh so viable on e.g. solo stam builds)."

There isn't anywhere where I made a general comparison using "ritual stone, major mending, powered trait on side" to prove anything. See the first post of the thread where I say, "The defiling quartet of Major Defile, Minor Defile, Befoul, and Siphoner has to compete against ~18 ways to buff and/or strengthen healing. Most solo builds can realistically utilize ~8 of these healing buffs/strengthening tactics, if not more."

That's in your very opening post. You come up with the conclusion that defile is balanced because there are so many things to boost healing.

"Yes, Major Defile and Minor Defile offer higher percentages and are often easier to access than Major Mending and Minor Mending, and yes the scaling on Befoul is high, but it stands to reason that these decisions were made to create counterbalance that combats the multitude of benefits that factor into healing."

And you included stuff like that, that no one would ever use on a competitive build. Sure, they are there, but unless you're a real heal bot spammer it won't see any use. And that's the very essence of what we are saying. It's okay that defile counters heal bots, but it's not okay that it destroys everyone below a dedicated heal build.

GrumpyDuckling

Chilly-McFreeze wrote: »

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

@Chilly-McFreeze

This is the second time in as many consecutive posts where you either misquote or incorrectly paraphrase someone else's words, and then argue against your own fictional statements. Please stop making things up.

You wrote,
"But yet you make general comparisons (with e.g. ritual stone, major mending, powered trait on side) to 'prove' that easily accesible defile is balanced (because ritual stone and powered trait are oh so viable on e.g. solo stam builds)."

There isn't anywhere where I made a general comparison using "ritual stone, major mending, powered trait on side" to prove anything. See the first post of the thread where I say, "The defiling quartet of Major Defile, Minor Defile, Befoul, and Siphoner has to compete against ~18 ways to buff and/or strengthen healing. Most solo builds can realistically utilize ~8 of these healing buffs/strengthening tactics, if not more."

That's in your very opening post. You come up with the conclusion that defile is balanced because there are so many things to boost healing.

"Yes, Major Defile and Minor Defile offer higher percentages and are often easier to access than Major Mending and Minor Mending, and yes the scaling on Befoul is high, but it stands to reason that these decisions were made to create counterbalance that combats the multitude of benefits that factor into healing."

And you included stuff like that, that no one would ever use on a competitive build. Sure, they are there, but unless you're a real heal bot spammer it won't see any use. And that's the very essence of what we are saying. It's okay that defile counters heal bots, but it's not okay that it destroys everyone below a dedicated heal build.

"And you included stuff like that, that no one would ever use on a competitive build."

This quote from you is a perfect example of the kind of a hyperbolic, general, and vague statement that makes it difficult to take a viewpoint seriously.

Also, from where you stand now, it would take a really strong argument on your behalf to get me to look beyond the fact that you completely changed a quote earlier. For now, I'm going to take a break from our back and forth and revisit it at a later time.

Checkmath

visionality wrote: »

Checkmath wrote: »

@GrumpyDuckling
Templars for example only have breath of life to keep them alive.

Uh ... your idea of a templar healbot seriously is "spams breath of life as his only way to stay alive"?



I recommend googling some PVP templar healer builds, you will be greatly surprised how much more this class has in stack.

i just hope you have more hours on a magplar than me, because every solo magplar heals up with honor the dead pretty much as the only heal on the bar. breath of life spamming is the thing people hate and why defile exists, not because of group healers. group healers either die fast by a coordinated enemy attack or they are left behind alone after the group dies and start bol spamming, because its the best way a magplar can stay alive.

Joy_Division

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Joy_Division wrote: »

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Your example of the Nightblade ultimate focuses in on a single target ultimate attack. This is where we get subjective because I think this is sacrifice by the player using it. I'd much rather face a dodgeable, and often predictable single target ultimate, than an undodgeable AOE ultimate while an enemy spams a gap closer with an immovable pot active.

Oh, that's rich. Please continue telling all of us how Nightblades are making a "sacrifice" to slot and use Incap

To gain stun, defile, and increased damage against a single opponent by using an often telegraphed, dodgeable, and blockable ultimate, the player is sacrificing a team aiding ultimate, or a multi-target ultimate, or an ultimate that has less counters. It's all about choices.

The same applies in reverse. If a player wants a team aiding, multi-target, less counter-able ultimate, then they sacrifice benefits applied by an ultimate like Death Stroke.

No ability in the game at this time has been the grievance of so many players calls to tone down. It is disingenuous to label something perceived to be so powerful as a sacrifice.

GrumpyDuckling

Joy_Division wrote: »

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Joy_Division wrote: »

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Your example of the Nightblade ultimate focuses in on a single target ultimate attack. This is where we get subjective because I think this is sacrifice by the player using it. I'd much rather face a dodgeable, and often predictable single target ultimate, than an undodgeable AOE ultimate while an enemy spams a gap closer with an immovable pot active.

Oh, that's rich. Please continue telling all of us how Nightblades are making a "sacrifice" to slot and use Incap

To gain stun, defile, and increased damage against a single opponent by using an often telegraphed, dodgeable, and blockable ultimate, the player is sacrificing a team aiding ultimate, or a multi-target ultimate, or an ultimate that has less counters. It's all about choices.

The same applies in reverse. If a player wants a team aiding, multi-target, less counter-able ultimate, then they sacrifice benefits applied by an ultimate like Death Stroke.

No ability in the game at this time has been the grievance of so many players calls to tone down. It is disingenuous to label something perceived to be so powerful as a sacrifice.

Disingenuous label? Sacrifice is the perfect word to describe the choice for selecting any ultimate ability. If you build for [x] then you sacrifice [y]. Example:

X = potential stun, defile, and damage boost against one target
Y = team assistance, multi-target, ultimate with less counters, defensive ultimate, healing ultimate

If you want to flip it and build for something else then the same principle applies because you would then sacrifice the potential stun, defile, and damage boost against one target.

Extinct_Solo_Player

Stop defending overtuned stuff just cus its another crutch for you to depend on lmfao.

Koensol

Ragnarock41 wrote: »

Healbots are overperforming, defile is overperforming.


And everyone in the middle is just screwed basically.

Well said. This is what I have been trying to say for ages on this forum. @ZOS, stop the blanket nerfs and blanket counters. Fix things that are overperforming but for the love of sanity, please stop screwing over everything not problematic with these dumb counters. It will only make people spec more into tankyness and healing increased, which does exactly the opposite of what you hoped to accomplish.

ak_pvp

Joy_Division wrote: »

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Joy_Division wrote: »

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Your example of the Nightblade ultimate focuses in on a single target ultimate attack. This is where we get subjective because I think this is sacrifice by the player using it. I'd much rather face a dodgeable, and often predictable single target ultimate, than an undodgeable AOE ultimate while an enemy spams a gap closer with an immovable pot active.

Oh, that's rich. Please continue telling all of us how Nightblades are making a "sacrifice" to slot and use Incap

To gain stun, defile, and increased damage against a single opponent by using an often telegraphed, dodgeable, and blockable ultimate, the player is sacrificing a team aiding ultimate, or a multi-target ultimate, or an ultimate that has less counters. It's all about choices.

The same applies in reverse. If a player wants a team aiding, multi-target, less counter-able ultimate, then they sacrifice benefits applied by an ultimate like Death Stroke.

No ability in the game at this time has been the grievance of so many players calls to tone down. It is disingenuous to label something perceived to be so powerful as a sacrifice.

There are many things competitive to incap. Don't get me wrong, overtuned. But snipe, runecage, wrath, old beam, etc, were/are all worse Xv1 tools due to spammability, high damage and range.

Stibbons

Major Defile and Befoul are just fine like Sload´s. Thats why i play sload´s templar.

Asgari

You are neglecting the fact about how befoul cp works. It scales higher than any other cp and because it is in the green tree which has nothing to do with defile if I’m honest you can stack into it extremely heavily.

Befoul needs it’s % increase cut down some and then it needs to be moved to the red tree.

The green tree is not the place for befoul and will never be balanced being there because of how easily any class can stack major points into it.

You should have to choose between defiling or healing in the red tree / blue tree where your heals and dmg cp matter .

GrumpyDuckling

Asgari wrote: »

You are neglecting the fact about how befoul cp works. It scales higher than any other cp and because it is in the green tree which has nothing to do with defile if I’m honest you can stack into it extremely heavily.

Befoul needs it’s % increase cut down some and then it needs to be moved to the red tree.

The green tree is not the place for befoul and will never be balanced being there because of how easily any class can stack major points into it.

You should have to choose between defiling or healing in the red tree / blue tree where your heals and dmg cp matter .

I disagree with the reasons you are stating for why you think befoul isn't balanced. I make the argument in the first post of the thread that the reason Major Defile and Befoul are easily accessible and stack higher is to counter the multitude of ways in which a player can buff/strengthen their healing.

So far I haven't seen an argument strong enough to justify a change to the current state of defiling in ESO.

LeHarrt91

For someone that uses Medium armor in pvp I find Major and Minor Defile and Befoul extremely potent as i am unable to purge and unless i spec heavily into healing and run a healing monster set i basically just have to disengage.
But as people have said defile and befoul are easy to spec into and the same can be said for mending and healing, and on top of that you can deal decent damage with both.
If there was another Purge (cheaper or one that cost stamina) or if they lowered Befouls % increase that would help Medium armor a lot.
But i understand the defence of Defile as you have the heavy armor templars that purge 5 negative effects and have great healing potential. But then the same can be said for heavy armor Defile Dks that shut down any healing and cripple those who cannot purge.

Feanor

It’s a design problem. ZOS allows building for the very extremes, and so has to try to counter these very extremes. If you implement counters for the very extremes all the builds on the middle ground will be hit way harder than the actual targeted builds.

In other words, the only solution is adjusting the builds on the extreme ends and not the mechanics.

GrumpyDuckling

Feanor wrote: »

It’s a design problem. ZOS allows building for the very extremes, and so has to try to counter these very extremes. If you implement counters for the very extremes all the builds on the middle ground will be hit way harder than the actual targeted builds.

In other words, the only solution is adjusting the builds on the extreme ends and not the mechanics.

Can you elaborate on what you mean when you say adjusting the builds on the extreme ends? What adjustment(s) specifically, and what are the specific extreme ends you are referring to?

Feanor

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Feanor wrote: »

It’s a design problem. ZOS allows building for the very extremes, and so has to try to counter these very extremes. If you implement counters for the very extremes all the builds on the middle ground will be hit way harder than the actual targeted builds.

In other words, the only solution is adjusting the builds on the extreme ends and not the mechanics.

Can you elaborate on what you mean when you say adjusting the builds on the extreme ends? What adjustment(s) specifically, and what are the specific extreme ends you are referring to?

The extreme ends are healbots and permablock builds that crutch on damage proc sets. My opinion is that healing is way too easy in this game. You can see it in PvE also, where healers are judged not by their healing output but by how well they can provide group sustain and buffs and debuffs.

I would lower the possible healing output builds can utilize. In the next step I would also lower the amount of pressure an opponent can apply to another players healing. And the 3rd step of course would be to adjust PvE accordingly.

In my vision this would be healthy for the game:

- Healers in PvE and PvP wouldn’t be reduced to buff bots
- Sustain would have to get adjusted upwards, because Healers could provide less, thus allowing a less heavy attack oriented play style again
- The pressure builds can utilize by attacking an opponents healing would be less, and thus „middle ground“ builds would have it a bit easier

I would adjust this in weekly incremental patches and small steps.

As for tanking I think getting rid of damage proc sets and sets like Ravager or 7th Legion would do the trick. In return one could think about buffing blocking a bit again for PvE.

TheRedRavenTR

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Checkmath wrote: »

@GrumpyDuckling
I didnt go with higher numbers in cps for quick recovery or blessed, because nobody runs that. I for example have 11 points (3%) in blessed and zero in quick recovery, because both doesnt scale well and the benefit is pretty small. Both trees give 15% healing at maximum. So a breath of life with major mending (if that was a thing for templars) and 100 points in both quick recovery and blesses results in 4146 healing (5k base) when countered by major defile with 100cps in befoul.
But why stacking so much into befoul you ask? There are lots of people around going for the defiler job and mostly do that with duroks bane, which in fight cant be really cleansed. So the real difference in here is, that no class has much of access to a lot of healing done or healing received buffs, meanwhile defile is very prevalent. If you want to have really good healing, you really need to build for it. Meanwhile you can be a defiler with ease.
You say you can have different heals at once. This pretty much only applies to stamina classes with vigor and rally, since most magicka classes have one heal ability to heal up. Templars for example only have breath of life to keep them alive.
Health regen is just a dead stat for magicka classes and if stamina classes go for it (via trollking mostly) is because they gave up their only burst heal rally for it.
To the cleansing. I just told you that defile is too prevalent, cleansing against an enemy with reverb bash is no option at all for any class but templar. Its the only class, which can remove such a thing decently. For everyone else is 5k magicka for 2 negative effects no option. Additionally there are defile sources, which permanently debuff, so even cleansing on the templar is senseless in that case.
Putting points into befoul makes you have less sustain, right. But you can keep the high damage from the blue cp at max. The choice should be damage versus befoul and not sustain versus befoul. Anyway sacrificing some sustain atm is no sacrifice at all, since you have free damage everywhere through proc sets.

Healing can be shared, so you can healed by another person or what do you mean there? Even if you get healed by a friend (if you are in a group and not solo) the defile still counts for those heals too. At the same time you can eat damage from the defilers friend, so that argument doesnt make sense at all.

I find it hard to follow the logic with your argument when you say things like 1) "nobody runs [quick recovery or blessed]" and that 2) "no class has much of access to a lot of healing done or healing received buffs, meanwhile defile is very prevalent."

1) Every class has access to quick recovery and blessed, and they need to decide if they want to build for more healing or damage, and more healing received or defense. It's not a strong argument to say that one of the reasons that defiling should be changed is because "nobody," (your words) utilizes healing done and healing received champion point nodes, presumably because they would rather stack damage and defense. That seems like the player's fault for ignoring healing options, not a problem with defiling. I understand that blessed and quick recovery don't scale as well as befoul, but again, that's because there are many more factors (in addition to blessed and quick recovery) that buff/strengthen healing/health return. Don't forget...

2) Classes have potential or guaranteed access to all of the following ways to buff/strengthen healing:
Major Mending
Minor Mending
Healing Done
Healing Received
Healing Taken
Health Recovery
Elfborn (champion point node)
Precise Strikes (champion point node)
Healing can crit (defile does not)
Healing scales with max attribute (defile does not)
Healing scales with spell/weapon damage (defile does not)
Ritual Stone (no defiling mundus stone counter)
Powered Trait (no defiling trait counter)

Yes, Major Defile, Minor Defile, and Befoul offer higher percentages and are often easy to access, but it stands to reason that these decisions were made to create counterbalance that combats the multitude of benefits that factor into healing (see all that are listed above). All defiling has is Major Defile, Minor Defile, Befoul, and Siphoner.

I don't know how to make it any more clear, so here is a visual representation:

Defiling
Major Defile
Minor Defile
Befoul
Siphoner

vs.

Healing/Health Return
Major Mending
Minor Mending
Healing Done
Healing Received
Healing Taken
Health Recovery
Elfborn (champion point node)
Precise Strikes (champion point node)
Healing can crit (defile does not)
Healing scales with max attribute (defile does not)
Healing scales with spell/weapon damage (defile does not)
Ritual Stone (no defiling mundus stone counter)
Powered Trait (no defiling trait counter)

I think, with all this considered, that the current healing vs. defiling balance is good, for now.

But people in cyro have 70%defile every second
While you cant get more than 50% healing with ALL buffs. Which very hard to achieve. I run defile myself on mdk but i think it is overperforming.

GrumpyDuckling

Feanor wrote: »

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Feanor wrote: »

It’s a design problem. ZOS allows building for the very extremes, and so has to try to counter these very extremes. If you implement counters for the very extremes all the builds on the middle ground will be hit way harder than the actual targeted builds.

In other words, the only solution is adjusting the builds on the extreme ends and not the mechanics.

Can you elaborate on what you mean when you say adjusting the builds on the extreme ends? What adjustment(s) specifically, and what are the specific extreme ends you are referring to?

The extreme ends are healbots and permablock builds that crutch on damage proc sets. My opinion is that healing is way too easy in this game. You can see it in PvE also, where healers are judged not by their healing output but by how well they can provide group sustain and buffs and debuffs.

I would lower the possible healing output builds can utilize. In the next step I would also lower the amount of pressure an opponent can apply to another players healing. And the 3rd step of course would be to adjust PvE accordingly.

In my vision this would be healthy for the game:

- Healers in PvE and PvP wouldn’t be reduced to buff bots
- Sustain would have to get adjusted upwards, because Healers could provide less, thus allowing a less heavy attack oriented play style again
- The pressure builds can utilize by attacking an opponents healing would be less, and thus „middle ground“ builds would have it a bit easier

I would adjust this in weekly incremental patches and small steps.

As for tanking I think getting rid of damage proc sets and sets like Ravager or 7th Legion would do the trick. In return one could think about buffing blocking a bit again for PvE.

@Feanor , thank you for elaborating.

I'm with you 100% on making healers (both PVE and PVP) more than buff bots, and adjusting sustain upwards.

On the other end, I don't think getting rid of damage proc sets is the answer for dealing with permablock builds that crutch on damage proc sets. I see heavy armor as more of the problem at the moment. I think that if I want to be really defensive, then I should have to sacrifice damage. Perhaps ZOS could explore reducing damage done by X% per piece of heavy armor worn. That would push tanks more towards defense in heavy armor, and damage more towards medium and light armor.

As your suggestions relate to defiling gameplay, any reduction to overall healing would also mean that we need to reduce defiling as well (obviously, I'm just stating it for clarity).

Thanks for posting. Your proposed changes to healing are insightful.

Toc de Malsvi

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Feanor wrote: »

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Feanor wrote: »

It’s a design problem. ZOS allows building for the very extremes, and so has to try to counter these very extremes. If you implement counters for the very extremes all the builds on the middle ground will be hit way harder than the actual targeted builds.

In other words, the only solution is adjusting the builds on the extreme ends and not the mechanics.

Can you elaborate on what you mean when you say adjusting the builds on the extreme ends? What adjustment(s) specifically, and what are the specific extreme ends you are referring to?

The extreme ends are healbots and permablock builds that crutch on damage proc sets. My opinion is that healing is way too easy in this game. You can see it in PvE also, where healers are judged not by their healing output but by how well they can provide group sustain and buffs and debuffs.

I would lower the possible healing output builds can utilize. In the next step I would also lower the amount of pressure an opponent can apply to another players healing. And the 3rd step of course would be to adjust PvE accordingly.

In my vision this would be healthy for the game:

- Healers in PvE and PvP wouldn’t be reduced to buff bots
- Sustain would have to get adjusted upwards, because Healers could provide less, thus allowing a less heavy attack oriented play style again
- The pressure builds can utilize by attacking an opponents healing would be less, and thus „middle ground“ builds would have it a bit easier

I would adjust this in weekly incremental patches and small steps.

As for tanking I think getting rid of damage proc sets and sets like Ravager or 7th Legion would do the trick. In return one could think about buffing blocking a bit again for PvE.

@Feanor , thank you for elaborating.

I'm with you 100% on making healers (both PVE and PVP) more than buff bots, and adjusting sustain upwards.

On the other end, I don't think getting rid of damage proc sets is the answer for dealing with permablock builds that crutch on damage proc sets. I see heavy armor as more of the problem at the moment. I think that if I want to be really defensive, then I should have to sacrifice damage. Perhaps ZOS could explore reducing damage done by X% per piece of heavy armor worn. That would push tanks more towards defense in heavy armor, and damage more towards medium and light armor.

As your suggestions relate to defiling gameplay, any reduction to overall healing would also mean that we need to reduce defiling as well (obviously, I'm just stating it for clarity).

Thanks for posting. Your proposed changes to healing are insightful.

I don't think heavy armor is the issue, I don't find heavy armor performing all that well while running bow, destro, resto, 2H, or DW. However S&B performs well whether running 5 light, 5 medium, or 5 heavy, S&B is far to effective at mitigation with little sacrifice, it also provides 100% uptime on Major Defile on an instant cast skill that has little to no telegraph and graphically lags on every use.

S&B used to be only used by tanks until players complained that they couldn't use S&B and kill players in PVP. It has since been buffed and is now a staple on the majority of "meta" PVP builds I see. If anything deserves being looked at it is the performance of S&B.

Right now many builds can have very strong offensive capabilities while simply swapping to S&B block lock when focused, followed by misting/sprinting behind a tree to reset. This is to say nothing of builds designed around bursting from S&B bar. S&B is capable enough as a damage bar and the best selection as a defensive bar, it is massively over performing.

As a medium build I can reliably dodge Snipe/Dark Flare outside of the occasional glitch. I cannot reliably dodge Reverberating Bash and when it stuns me the game seems to not recognize I am stunned until the opponent is already well into their burst. There is a seeming stagger effect animation which I seemingly cannot break free from until they have puncture>ultimate.

Chilly-McFreeze

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

On the other end, I don't think getting rid of damage proc sets is the answer for dealing with permablock builds that crutch on damage proc sets. I see heavy armor as more of the problem at the moment. I think that if I want to be really defensive, then I should have to sacrifice damage. Perhaps ZOS could explore reducing damage done by X% per piece of heavy armor worn. That would push tanks more towards defense in heavy armor, and damage more towards medium and light armor.

Huh? But you already do. Heavy is the only armor line that doesn't has an offensive passive since wrath is gone.
Medium got crit chance and weapon damage.
Light has crit chance and penetration.

If you're talking about sets that grant extremely high weapon damage, like Ravager etc., then this is somewhat difficult to value since you can transmute "heavy armor jewelry" into robust + run weapons and don't even have to slot a single heavy piece but could run e.g. 7 medium.

I don't think your suggestion with the reduction of damage done due to heavy pieces is good, especially in a game that thrives on "do what you want", no class-to-role distribution and build diversity. Not to mention that pvp tanks don't serve a real purpose beside trolling newbies and occassional debuffs.

Irylia

Checkmath wrote: »

ok lets do some math then with the typical healbot class, alright?
if i make any mistakes in my calculation, pls say so.
a typical pvp healbot is in heavy armor, has around 30% crit, 37k magicka and around 2.5k spelldamage on his backbar. this results in a base breath of life of around 10k. with minor and major sorcer he reaches around 3.1k spelldamage and a breath of life tooltip of around 11.2k. now lets take an unbuffed breath of life of 10k as baseline.
a heavy armor magplar has access to the following increasing healing done bonus: 8% from minor mending plus from the cp tree blessed. from passives he gets additional 12% at max when low health. lets assume he has 27 points in blesses, resulting in 7% more healing done. ok now the math: 10k*(1+0.08+0.07)=11500 healing (we leave the 12% out, since it only counts when practically dead). now lets half that, since battlespirit is there: 5750 healing.
ok now we get to the healing received part, where defile comes in too. lets assume our templar has 27 points (7%) into qick recovery and is defiled with basic major defile: 5750*(1+0.07-0.3)=4428 healing, which is already less than the base.
with major and minor defile its 5750*(1+0.07-0.3-0.15)=3565
now the enemy has also a lots in befoul, lets say 100 points (was 55% more defile, right?)
5750*(1+0.07-.465-0.2325)=2142 healing with a breath of life, when the base skill heals for 5k in pvp?

ok now the hardcorecase: templar is fully buffed with around 3.1k spelldamage, with the 12% healing from the pretty much dead passive and does a crit against fully defiled:
11.2k/2=5.6k (after battlespirit)
5600*(1+0.08+0.12+0.07)=7112
7112*1.6=11379 with the crit healing
11379*(1+0.07-0.465-0.2325)=4239....still less than the original tooltip unbuffed in pvp, and this is the healbot class. such a heal has probably around a 30% chance, otherwise its around 2.3k maybe.

so back why defile and befoul is problematic: there are too many sources of defile and its too easy to apply defile (constantly). befoul does more than it should. the counters to defile like healing done and received, so basically major/ minor mending and vitality are not accessible for most of the classes (healer class has only minor mending) and with a decent amount of cps spent into blessed or quick recovery you get not enough to counter.

If the magplar is getting 3k spell and 37k mag as a healbot in heavy what gear are you running for them on paper?

My healbots sit at 30-33k mag argonian and 1.9-2.5k spell buffed

This may be a difference in playstyle and needs.

Are they impen/infused ? Spell glyphs
Bars?

Checkmath

Irylia wrote: »

Checkmath wrote: »

ok lets do some math then with the typical healbot class, alright?
if i make any mistakes in my calculation, pls say so.
a typical pvp healbot is in heavy armor, has around 30% crit, 37k magicka and around 2.5k spelldamage on his backbar. this results in a base breath of life of around 10k. with minor and major sorcer he reaches around 3.1k spelldamage and a breath of life tooltip of around 11.2k. now lets take an unbuffed breath of life of 10k as baseline.
a heavy armor magplar has access to the following increasing healing done bonus: 8% from minor mending plus from the cp tree blessed. from passives he gets additional 12% at max when low health. lets assume he has 27 points in blesses, resulting in 7% more healing done. ok now the math: 10k*(1+0.08+0.07)=11500 healing (we leave the 12% out, since it only counts when practically dead). now lets half that, since battlespirit is there: 5750 healing.
ok now we get to the healing received part, where defile comes in too. lets assume our templar has 27 points (7%) into qick recovery and is defiled with basic major defile: 5750*(1+0.07-0.3)=4428 healing, which is already less than the base.
with major and minor defile its 5750*(1+0.07-0.3-0.15)=3565
now the enemy has also a lots in befoul, lets say 100 points (was 55% more defile, right?)
5750*(1+0.07-.465-0.2325)=2142 healing with a breath of life, when the base skill heals for 5k in pvp?

ok now the hardcorecase: templar is fully buffed with around 3.1k spelldamage, with the 12% healing from the pretty much dead passive and does a crit against fully defiled:
11.2k/2=5.6k (after battlespirit)
5600*(1+0.08+0.12+0.07)=7112
7112*1.6=11379 with the crit healing
11379*(1+0.07-0.465-0.2325)=4239....still less than the original tooltip unbuffed in pvp, and this is the healbot class. such a heal has probably around a 30% chance, otherwise its around 2.3k maybe.

so back why defile and befoul is problematic: there are too many sources of defile and its too easy to apply defile (constantly). befoul does more than it should. the counters to defile like healing done and received, so basically major/ minor mending and vitality are not accessible for most of the classes (healer class has only minor mending) and with a decent amount of cps spent into blessed or quick recovery you get not enough to counter.

If the magplar is getting 3k spell and 37k mag as a healbot in heavy what gear are you running for them on paper?

My healbots sit at 30-33k mag argonian and 1.9-2.5k spell buffed

This may be a difference in playstyle and needs.

Are they impen/infused ? Spell glyphs
Bars?

@Irylia
I am sorry, i actually did talk about my build, which surely has more magicka and spelldamage than a healbot templar, therefore also higher tooltips mostly (ok not argonian here...so i am missing that passive of healing received and done). It is not a healbot build actually, but a solo pvp build and therefore has other stats. but that all does not really mean anything, since we talk about the effects and not about tooltips. this was only an example to visualize what is left of healing in a defiled situation.
If you are interested in the build, you can message me privately.

Koensol

Feanor wrote: »

It’s a design problem. ZOS allows building for the very extremes, and so has to try to counter these very extremes. If you implement counters for the very extremes all the builds on the middle ground will be hit way harder than the actual targeted builds.

In other words, the only solution is adjusting the builds on the extreme ends and not the mechanics.

@Feanor Thank you, thank you for speaking reason. This is what I have been saying for ages. Yet ZOS keeps coming up with blanket fixes to counter overperforming things. I really wish they would stop screwing over balanced builds like that and just remove/adjust all the cancer that has slipped into this game.

Irylia

Checkmath wrote: »

Irylia wrote: »

Checkmath wrote: »

ok lets do some math then with the typical healbot class, alright?
if i make any mistakes in my calculation, pls say so.
a typical pvp healbot is in heavy armor, has around 30% crit, 37k magicka and around 2.5k spelldamage on his backbar. this results in a base breath of life of around 10k. with minor and major sorcer he reaches around 3.1k spelldamage and a breath of life tooltip of around 11.2k. now lets take an unbuffed breath of life of 10k as baseline.
a heavy armor magplar has access to the following increasing healing done bonus: 8% from minor mending plus from the cp tree blessed. from passives he gets additional 12% at max when low health. lets assume he has 27 points in blesses, resulting in 7% more healing done. ok now the math: 10k*(1+0.08+0.07)=11500 healing (we leave the 12% out, since it only counts when practically dead). now lets half that, since battlespirit is there: 5750 healing.
ok now we get to the healing received part, where defile comes in too. lets assume our templar has 27 points (7%) into qick recovery and is defiled with basic major defile: 5750*(1+0.07-0.3)=4428 healing, which is already less than the base.
with major and minor defile its 5750*(1+0.07-0.3-0.15)=3565
now the enemy has also a lots in befoul, lets say 100 points (was 55% more defile, right?)
5750*(1+0.07-.465-0.2325)=2142 healing with a breath of life, when the base skill heals for 5k in pvp?

ok now the hardcorecase: templar is fully buffed with around 3.1k spelldamage, with the 12% healing from the pretty much dead passive and does a crit against fully defiled:
11.2k/2=5.6k (after battlespirit)
5600*(1+0.08+0.12+0.07)=7112
7112*1.6=11379 with the crit healing
11379*(1+0.07-0.465-0.2325)=4239....still less than the original tooltip unbuffed in pvp, and this is the healbot class. such a heal has probably around a 30% chance, otherwise its around 2.3k maybe.

so back why defile and befoul is problematic: there are too many sources of defile and its too easy to apply defile (constantly). befoul does more than it should. the counters to defile like healing done and received, so basically major/ minor mending and vitality are not accessible for most of the classes (healer class has only minor mending) and with a decent amount of cps spent into blessed or quick recovery you get not enough to counter.

If the magplar is getting 3k spell and 37k mag as a healbot in heavy what gear are you running for them on paper?

My healbots sit at 30-33k mag argonian and 1.9-2.5k spell buffed

This may be a difference in playstyle and needs.

Are they impen/infused ? Spell glyphs
Bars?

@Irylia
I am sorry, i actually did talk about my build, which surely has more magicka and spelldamage than a healbot templar, therefore also higher tooltips mostly (ok not argonian here...so i am missing that passive of healing received and done). It is not a healbot build actually, but a solo pvp build and therefore has other stats. but that all does not really mean anything, since we talk about the effects and not about tooltips. this was only an example to visualize what is left of healing in a defiled situation.
If you are interested in the build, you can message me privately.

Was just wondering because if you do spec that way your healing is even less efficient due to the incoming damage you take. Which further weakens your healing on top of defile.

Even as a spec heal bot you give up spell power and mag to sustain living with half a dozen pugs banging on you.
There are trade offs to either get thick heals or Be tankier.
And I honestly don’t see healing as an issue unless you have multiple healers in a group all swapping off remembrances and the group. Is pushing 30k hp per person.
Even then you can catch a lot of healers in a dps bomb while they are swapping. Bars or using resto staff to one shot them.

Defile is just over tuned