PTS Update 20 - Feedback Thread for Sorcerer

Minalan

ZOS_RobGarrett wrote: »

Hey all,

Just wanted to let you know we've been monitoring the feedback on this thread and elsewhere on the forums. Clearly there's a lot of concern around the impact of adding a cast time to Conjured Ward and Annulment.

First I'd like to talk about our motivation with the change. We believe choices between damage output and survivability make combat more interesting. There are a number of areas within our system that could better adhere to this philosophy, but these self-cast damage shield abilities stood out as being particularly out of line. It was too easy to throw a bunch of effective health on yourself while making a minimal sacrifice in terms of DPS itemization and rotation. This applied to both PvE and PvP scenarios.

The addition of a cast time makes that choice between damage output and survivability more deliberate and strategic. However, as many of you have pointed out, there are several potential issues with this solution. We identified many of these risks prior to PTS, and we're actively monitoring feedback from the community, Class Reps, and PTS testers.

If we decide to make significant changes to the abilities, those changes would not appear until at least PTS 3. However, we agree Conjured Ward and Annulment are too easy to interrupt in PvP, so we'll be making both spells immune to interrupts for PTS 2. We'll also be meeting with the Class Reps next week to discuss the changes.

In the meantime, we encourage you to continue experimenting, evaluating, and providing feedback.

Two damage sets, heavy armor, loads of stamina, swift rings, and 4- 5K weapon damage.

Best mobility in the game with major exp, swift, and gap closers
Excellent damage
Good enough sustain
Excellent defense with heavy armor, blocking, and Dodge roll
Excellent range damage with bows
Great healing with troll king, vigor, pots

Tell me where the sacrifice is here? The trade off? I can't find it.

Shielding is expensive and time consuming, limiting offense just to survive another GCD. They require sustain sets just to be able to cast them im reaction to pressure. If you want to balance shields, then make it so they cannot stack. Making them critable or adding a cast time is absolutely horrendous.

Light armor builds use shields, you need five pieces of light to even equip one. It is not a heavy armor tank defense mechanic.

karekiz

Tried it on PTS:

***PVE - non hardcore raider point of view - Do DLC vet dungeons as main thing as I like small party difficult content****

1. I agree - shield spamming isn't a great mechanic.

The issue stems that cast times aren't a great mechanic either. It is essentially a nerf to PvP sorcs while completely destroying the feel of PvE sorcs. Most ***Non*** pet sorcs generally look like:

Blockade / Liquid Lightning / Curse - Passive / Passive
Force Pulse / Crystal Fragment / Shield - Passive / Passive

Notice something? No cast times. You can weave without stopping. It is fluid and dynamic in the rotation changes slightly due to RNG of Frag. It is fun.

No sorc in their right mind wants to go from 100 to 0 with a cast time. We already suffer sustain issues. The sorc "Sustain" ability. I would gladly take a nerf to shields if we were given...something as non pet sorcs. Our sustain ability was changed, and generally wasn't ever used because of cast time.

Lets look at it from a Dungeon point of view. Pre-emptive casts work for tank, not for DPS. As stated before we suffer from sustain issues. You think were going to really suffer randomly casting shields to stop dmg "In case it happens". If its about to happen usually one second is very tight. Lets take a simple mechanic that a sorc would have to deal with.

Lets look at something simple. Bloodroot poison stranglers. They spawn and immediately spit on you. It hurts. Currently you can Immediately shield to give healer some room while you run to clear it with range attacks. Now you have to wait 1 second and hope it doesn't spit a 2nd attack at you. I know it is doable, but other classes such as stam can easily vigour and get out quicker. I suppose it isn't that big a deal, but its the little things that add up.

Nerfing shield spamming is fine, but we need to react to dmg. No non pet sorc is going to add shields into a rotation or try to "predict" a RNG spell/attack on themselves. You cast them *as* you take dmg.

My suggestion:

Add a penalty for both vigour/shield. Yes both. They both will need to be nerfed is this to help solve something. The faster you spam Vigour/shield either 2 things happen:

1. You can only cast X per second <one second per cast, but instant cast>. A debuff similar to Balance that applies and removes the effect if cast too quickly.
2. Add more cost per cast. You can spam, but you will eventually end up Out of Mana unable to attack and spam.

This in effect does what you want, while retaining the quick reaction to save ourselves from a mistake during an encounter.


*Edit: BTW the animation is terrible

Emma_Overload

I still don't understand why they couldn't have gone to a Major/Minor system for shields! Harness and Conjured Ward could both be Major so they couldn't be stacked. They could even give Sorcs a passive that increases shield size so we could still feel "special'.

Faulgor

It's astonishing how everyone's talking past Rob. No wonder they don't take this "feedback" seriously.

He's just reiterating what the community has been saying for years, that defensive and offensive capability shouldn't derive from the same stats, items or abilities. That you should have to make a choice. He made it also clear that shields are just one issue that particularly stood out in this regard, and more changes are likely to come.

FInally! I for one agree 100% with the analysis and direction, albeit the proposed solution of adding a cast time has numerous issues, which have already been raised a few times between all the wailing and tantrums. I'm looking forward to the next PTS patch and the future of ESO in general.

ZOS_Mika

We have removed a handful of non-constructive/bashing comments. Please ensure that all feedback remains civil and constructive.

Natas013

WuffyCerulei wrote: »

Bumi Rockafella wrote: »

WuffyCerulei wrote: »

Can we get a dev response on the outrage of the shield cast time, please?

theyre probably waiting until the next set of pts notes are out to comment on everything, im confident that the amount of dissatisfaction with these changes will bring will make the devs remove the cast time. But hey, people have made really dumb decisions when the alternative has a better outcome. Ball in your court zos.

I hope they actually listen to us all. It would look terrible on their part to plug their ears and go "la la la" at all the anger.

*COUGH COUGH* Dark Brotherhood.

Lord_Eomer

ZOS_RobGarrett wrote: »

Hey all,

Just wanted to let you know we've been monitoring the feedback on this thread and elsewhere on the forums. Clearly there's a lot of concern around the impact of adding a cast time to Conjured Ward and Annulment.

First I'd like to talk about our motivation with the change. We believe choices between damage output and survivability make combat more interesting. There are a number of areas within our system that could better adhere to this philosophy, but these self-cast damage shield abilities stood out as being particularly out of line. It was too easy to throw a bunch of effective health on yourself while making a minimal sacrifice in terms of DPS itemization and rotation. This applied to both PvE and PvP scenarios.

The addition of a cast time makes that choice between damage output and survivability more deliberate and strategic. However, as many of you have pointed out, there are several potential issues with this solution. We identified many of these risks prior to PTS, and we're actively monitoring feedback from the community, Class Reps, and PTS testers.

If we decide to make significant changes to the abilities, those changes would not appear until at least PTS 3. However, we agree Conjured Ward and Annulment are too easy to interrupt in PvP, so we'll be making both spells immune to interrupts for PTS 2. We'll also be meeting with the Class Reps next week to discuss the changes.

In the meantime, we encourage you to continue experimenting, evaluating, and providing feedback.

Seriously if cast time stay on shield, I may rage quit ESO

Today its Sorc than Tomorrow its some other class.

ZOS team is either not serious regarding ESO future or want Veteran Players to simply leave.

Minalan

Faulgor wrote: »

It's astonishing how everyone's talking past Rob. No wonder they don't take this "feedback" seriously.

He's just reiterating what the community has been saying for years, that defensive and offensive capability shouldn't derive from the same stats, items or abilities. That you should have to make a choice. He made it also clear that shields are just one issue that particularly stood out in this regard, and more changes are likely to come.

FInally! I for one agree 100% with the analysis and direction, albeit the proposed solution of adding a cast time has numerous issues, which have already been raised a few times between all the wailing and tantrums. I'm looking forward to the next PTS patch and the future of ESO in general.

Learn the game mechanics.

Damage and healing (ie survival) are affected by weapon damage. It's no different than Max Magicka (which scale damage and shields).

ZOS was right to ignore an ill informed community up to this point.

ol_BANK_lo

ZOS_RobGarrett wrote: »

Hey all,

Just wanted to let you know we've been monitoring the feedback on this thread and elsewhere on the forums. Clearly there's a lot of concern around the impact of adding a cast time to Conjured Ward and Annulment.

First I'd like to talk about our motivation with the change. We believe choices between damage output and survivability make combat more interesting. There are a number of areas within our system that could better adhere to this philosophy, but these self-cast damage shield abilities stood out as being particularly out of line. It was too easy to throw a bunch of effective health on yourself while making a minimal sacrifice in terms of DPS itemization and rotation. This applied to both PvE and PvP scenarios.

The addition of a cast time makes that choice between damage output and survivability more deliberate and strategic. However, as many of you have pointed out, there are several potential issues with this solution. We identified many of these risks prior to PTS, and we're actively monitoring feedback from the community, Class Reps, and PTS testers.

If we decide to make significant changes to the abilities, those changes would not appear until at least PTS 3. However, we agree Conjured Ward and Annulment are too easy to interrupt in PvP, so we'll be making both spells immune to interrupts for PTS 2. We'll also be meeting with the Class Reps next week to discuss the changes.

In the meantime, we encourage you to continue experimenting, evaluating, and providing feedback.

Rob, although you are getting lots of different feedback on this post, this is the type of summary I have been saying needs to be done upfront all the time. Don't just drop massive changes with little to no understand of what you were thinking.

Apache_Kid

ZOS_RobGarrett wrote: »

Hey all,

Just wanted to let you know we've been monitoring the feedback on this thread and elsewhere on the forums. Clearly there's a lot of concern around the impact of adding a cast time to Conjured Ward and Annulment.

First I'd like to talk about our motivation with the change. We believe choices between damage output and survivability make combat more interesting. There are a number of areas within our system that could better adhere to this philosophy, but these self-cast damage shield abilities stood out as being particularly out of line. It was too easy to throw a bunch of effective health on yourself while making a minimal sacrifice in terms of DPS itemization and rotation. This applied to both PvE and PvP scenarios.

The addition of a cast time makes that choice between damage output and survivability more deliberate and strategic. However, as many of you have pointed out, there are several potential issues with this solution. We identified many of these risks prior to PTS, and we're actively monitoring feedback from the community, Class Reps, and PTS testers.

If we decide to make significant changes to the abilities, those changes would not appear until at least PTS 3. However, we agree Conjured Ward and Annulment are too easy to interrupt in PvP, so we'll be making both spells immune to interrupts for PTS 2. We'll also be meeting with the Class Reps next week to discuss the changes.

In the meantime, we encourage you to continue experimenting, evaluating, and providing feedback.

Anyone that thinks that cast times make combat interesting is a goober. Cast times make combat clunky and most importantly NOT FUN

kookster

Faulgor wrote: »

It's astonishing how everyone's talking past Rob. No wonder they don't take this "feedback" seriously.

He's just reiterating what the community has been saying for years, that defensive and offensive capability shouldn't derive from the same stats, items or abilities. That you should have to make a choice. He made it also clear that shields are just one issue that particularly stood out in this regard, and more changes are likely to come.

FInally! I for one agree 100% with the analysis and direction, albeit the proposed solution of adding a cast time has numerous issues, which have already been raised a few times between all the wailing and tantrums. I'm looking forward to the next PTS patch and the future of ESO in general.

I agree that you shouldn't be able to go 100% damage and it also gives you crazy defense. Though I don't think a cast time is the best solution honestly. But at least it is being looked into.

Koolio

BANK_IT_HERE wrote: »

ZOS_RobGarrett wrote: »

Hey all,

Just wanted to let you know we've been monitoring the feedback on this thread and elsewhere on the forums. Clearly there's a lot of concern around the impact of adding a cast time to Conjured Ward and Annulment.

First I'd like to talk about our motivation with the change. We believe choices between damage output and survivability make combat more interesting. There are a number of areas within our system that could better adhere to this philosophy, but these self-cast damage shield abilities stood out as being particularly out of line. It was too easy to throw a bunch of effective health on yourself while making a minimal sacrifice in terms of DPS itemization and rotation. This applied to both PvE and PvP scenarios.

The addition of a cast time makes that choice between damage output and survivability more deliberate and strategic. However, as many of you have pointed out, there are several potential issues with this solution. We identified many of these risks prior to PTS, and we're actively monitoring feedback from the community, Class Reps, and PTS testers.

If we decide to make significant changes to the abilities, those changes would not appear until at least PTS 3. However, we agree Conjured Ward and Annulment are too easy to interrupt in PvP, so we'll be making both spells immune to interrupts for PTS 2. We'll also be meeting with the Class Reps next week to discuss the changes.

In the meantime, we encourage you to continue experimenting, evaluating, and providing feedback.

Rob, although you are getting lots of different feedback on this post, this is the type of summary I have been saying needs to be done upfront all the time. Don't just drop massive changes with little to no understand of what you were thinking.

@ZOS_RobGarrett

That definitely should have been the Developer Note on that change

Lord_Eomer

Apache_Kid wrote: »

ZOS_RobGarrett wrote: »

Hey all,

Just wanted to let you know we've been monitoring the feedback on this thread and elsewhere on the forums. Clearly there's a lot of concern around the impact of adding a cast time to Conjured Ward and Annulment.

First I'd like to talk about our motivation with the change. We believe choices between damage output and survivability make combat more interesting. There are a number of areas within our system that could better adhere to this philosophy, but these self-cast damage shield abilities stood out as being particularly out of line. It was too easy to throw a bunch of effective health on yourself while making a minimal sacrifice in terms of DPS itemization and rotation. This applied to both PvE and PvP scenarios.

The addition of a cast time makes that choice between damage output and survivability more deliberate and strategic. However, as many of you have pointed out, there are several potential issues with this solution. We identified many of these risks prior to PTS, and we're actively monitoring feedback from the community, Class Reps, and PTS testers.

If we decide to make significant changes to the abilities, those changes would not appear until at least PTS 3. However, we agree Conjured Ward and Annulment are too easy to interrupt in PvP, so we'll be making both spells immune to interrupts for PTS 2. We'll also be meeting with the Class Reps next week to discuss the changes.

In the meantime, we encourage you to continue experimenting, evaluating, and providing feedback.

Anyone that thinks that cast times make combat interesting is a goober. Cast times make combat clunky and most importantly NOT FUN

These skills will simply die like lot of other skills i.e. impulse, scattershot etc

JamesDX

ZOS_RobGarrett wrote: »

Hey all,

Just wanted to let you know we've been monitoring the feedback on this thread and elsewhere on the forums. Clearly there's a lot of concern around the impact of adding a cast time to Conjured Ward and Annulment.

First I'd like to talk about our motivation with the change. We believe choices between damage output and survivability make combat more interesting. There are a number of areas within our system that could better adhere to this philosophy, but these self-cast damage shield abilities stood out as being particularly out of line. It was too easy to throw a bunch of effective health on yourself while making a minimal sacrifice in terms of DPS itemization and rotation. This applied to both PvE and PvP scenarios.

The addition of a cast time makes that choice between damage output and survivability more deliberate and strategic. However, as many of you have pointed out, there are several potential issues with this solution. We identified many of these risks prior to PTS, and we're actively monitoring feedback from the community, Class Reps, and PTS testers.

If we decide to make significant changes to the abilities, those changes would not appear until at least PTS 3. However, we agree Conjured Ward and Annulment are too easy to interrupt in PvP, so we'll be making both spells immune to interrupts for PTS 2. We'll also be meeting with the Class Reps next week to discuss the changes.

In the meantime, we encourage you to continue experimenting, evaluating, and providing feedback.

The only damage shield that is a real issue for being too strong is healing ward, the one that didn't get changed...

NBrookus

ZOS_RobGarrett wrote: »

Hey all,

Just wanted to let you know we've been monitoring the feedback on this thread and elsewhere on the forums. Clearly there's a lot of concern around the impact of adding a cast time to Conjured Ward and Annulment.

First I'd like to talk about our motivation with the change. We believe choices between damage output and survivability make combat more interesting. There are a number of areas within our system that could better adhere to this philosophy, but these self-cast damage shield abilities stood out as being particularly out of line. It was too easy to throw a bunch of effective health on yourself while making a minimal sacrifice in terms of DPS itemization and rotation. This applied to both PvE and PvP scenarios.

The addition of a cast time makes that choice between damage output and survivability more deliberate and strategic. However, as many of you have pointed out, there are several potential issues with this solution. We identified many of these risks prior to PTS, and we're actively monitoring feedback from the community, Class Reps, and PTS testers.

If we decide to make significant changes to the abilities, those changes would not appear until at least PTS 3. However, we agree Conjured Ward and Annulment are too easy to interrupt in PvP, so we'll be making both spells immune to interrupts for PTS 2. We'll also be meeting with the Class Reps next week to discuss the changes.

In the meantime, we encourage you to continue experimenting, evaluating, and providing feedback.

@ZOS_RobGarrett I appreciate the official statement given that you waded into a lot of anger. I strongly encourage the team to reach out to the end game raiders that are completing the newest vet trials and talk to them about how shields are essential to dealing with mechanics.

Coming from a PVP viewpoint, 1 second cast time penalizes sorc for mitigating damage when they are already penalized for using Streak for getting away from damage. Mag sorc has no decent heal or other form of mitigation. If you want sorcs to have to make build choices that don't revolve around shields, you need to give them some class choices. If feels like the team is nerfing a major class mechanic and hoping players figure something out to deal with it, like happened in the wake of the blocking nerfs. (Inside tip: it was painful for players to have to cobble together something out of other half-working mechanics.)

I'm not sure why mitigating damage is always on the chopping block for nerfs, yet damage never is. If you want to balance damage with mitigation, you can't just keep nerfing one side of the equation. Why is there no penalty for thoughtlessly spamming the hardest hitting skills, yet there are penalities for block, reflects, dodge, streak and now shields? Why is there no cloak or healing penalty, if mitigation is a bad thing? No, those are not suggestions.

TTK is already under a second from the target's viewpoint for gank builds. Under 5 seconds in many cases for open world combat. If balancing damage is a problem, look at the damage.

UrQuan

ZOS_RobGarrett wrote: »

Hey all,

Just wanted to let you know we've been monitoring the feedback on this thread and elsewhere on the forums. Clearly there's a lot of concern around the impact of adding a cast time to Conjured Ward and Annulment.

First I'd like to talk about our motivation with the change. We believe choices between damage output and survivability make combat more interesting. There are a number of areas within our system that could better adhere to this philosophy, but these self-cast damage shield abilities stood out as being particularly out of line. It was too easy to throw a bunch of effective health on yourself while making a minimal sacrifice in terms of DPS itemization and rotation. This applied to both PvE and PvP scenarios.

The addition of a cast time makes that choice between damage output and survivability more deliberate and strategic. However, as many of you have pointed out, there are several potential issues with this solution. We identified many of these risks prior to PTS, and we're actively monitoring feedback from the community, Class Reps, and PTS testers.

If we decide to make significant changes to the abilities, those changes would not appear until at least PTS 3. However, we agree Conjured Ward and Annulment are too easy to interrupt in PvP, so we'll be making both spells immune to interrupts for PTS 2. We'll also be meeting with the Class Reps next week to discuss the changes.

In the meantime, we encourage you to continue experimenting, evaluating, and providing feedback.

Hey @ZOS_RobGarrett has your in-house team tested the 1 second cast time for shield by completing all vet trials on hard mode with a group heavy on magicka DPS (sorcs in particular, but this impacts all magicka DPS)?

What were the results?

Minalan

JamesDX wrote: »

ZOS_RobGarrett wrote: »

Hey all,

Just wanted to let you know we've been monitoring the feedback on this thread and elsewhere on the forums. Clearly there's a lot of concern around the impact of adding a cast time to Conjured Ward and Annulment.

First I'd like to talk about our motivation with the change. We believe choices between damage output and survivability make combat more interesting. There are a number of areas within our system that could better adhere to this philosophy, but these self-cast damage shield abilities stood out as being particularly out of line. It was too easy to throw a bunch of effective health on yourself while making a minimal sacrifice in terms of DPS itemization and rotation. This applied to both PvE and PvP scenarios.

The addition of a cast time makes that choice between damage output and survivability more deliberate and strategic. However, as many of you have pointed out, there are several potential issues with this solution. We identified many of these risks prior to PTS, and we're actively monitoring feedback from the community, Class Reps, and PTS testers.

If we decide to make significant changes to the abilities, those changes would not appear until at least PTS 3. However, we agree Conjured Ward and Annulment are too easy to interrupt in PvP, so we'll be making both spells immune to interrupts for PTS 2. We'll also be meeting with the Class Reps next week to discuss the changes.

In the meantime, we encourage you to continue experimenting, evaluating, and providing feedback.

The only damage shield that is a real issue for being too strong is healing ward, the one that didn't get changed...

I see you haven't looked at it on PTS.

It lost the up front heal (gone from the tool tip).

It's also critable, so it will never stay up long enough to do it's job.

technohic

ZOS_RobGarrett wrote: »

Hey all,

Just wanted to let you know we've been monitoring the feedback on this thread and elsewhere on the forums. Clearly there's a lot of concern around the impact of adding a cast time to Conjured Ward and Annulment.

First I'd like to talk about our motivation with the change. We believe choices between damage output and survivability make combat more interesting. There are a number of areas within our system that could better adhere to this philosophy, but these self-cast damage shield abilities stood out as being particularly out of line. It was too easy to throw a bunch of effective health on yourself while making a minimal sacrifice in terms of DPS itemization and rotation. This applied to both PvE and PvP scenarios.

The addition of a cast time makes that choice between damage output and survivability more deliberate and strategic. However, as many of you have pointed out, there are several potential issues with this solution. We identified many of these risks prior to PTS, and we're actively monitoring feedback from the community, Class Reps, and PTS testers.

If we decide to make significant changes to the abilities, those changes would not appear until at least PTS 3. However, we agree Conjured Ward and Annulment are too easy to interrupt in PvP, so we'll be making both spells immune to interrupts for PTS 2. We'll also be meeting with the Class Reps next week to discuss the changes.

In the meantime, we encourage you to continue experimenting, evaluating, and providing feedback.

Why not just change what they scale off of if your intention is to give up offense for defense?

I didn't like using shields before and definitely won't now. It's the same reason templars wouldn't use a big heal with a cast time. 1 second and you're dead.

Nicko_Lps

The_Patriarch wrote: »

ZOS_RobGarrett wrote: »

Hey all,

Just wanted to let you know we've been monitoring the feedback on this thread and elsewhere on the forums. Clearly there's a lot of concern around the impact of adding a cast time to Conjured Ward and Annulment.

First I'd like to talk about our motivation with the change. We believe choices between damage output and survivability make combat more interesting. There are a number of areas within our system that could better adhere to this philosophy, but these self-cast damage shield abilities stood out as being particularly out of line. It was too easy to throw a bunch of effective health on yourself while making a minimal sacrifice in terms of DPS itemization and rotation. This applied to both PvE and PvP scenarios.

The addition of a cast time makes that choice between damage output and survivability more deliberate and strategic. However, as many of you have pointed out, there are several potential issues with this solution. We identified many of these risks prior to PTS, and we're actively monitoring feedback from the community, Class Reps, and PTS testers.

If we decide to make significant changes to the abilities, those changes would not appear until at least PTS 3. However, we agree Conjured Ward and Annulment are too easy to interrupt in PvP, so we'll be making both spells immune to interrupts for PTS 2. We'll also be meeting with the Class Reps next week to discuss the changes.

In the meantime, we encourage you to continue experimenting, evaluating, and providing feedback.

Perhaps you don't remember, but when the forums went ape over the Morrowind sustain nerfs proposed on PTS, ZOS doubled down and refused to revert them. Now, ZOS has been trying to walk back those nerfs in one form or another over the last few patches. I'm quite sure that history will repeat itself.

Im quite sure too, but he problem is they are extremely unreliable and NON trustworthy.

They do not deserve our time+money investment, they have 0 clue on the impact of their changes. The main focus in this game is to please the forum warrior nightblades that seen the clip with the breton nighblade killing everyone and they constantly crave for 1 hit kills on pvp. DK's first victim Sors 2nd and biggest victim of these whineblades.


ZoS sent me once in WoW, now they send be again to WoW.

UrQuan wrote: »

ZOS_RobGarrett wrote: »

Hey all,

Just wanted to let you know we've been monitoring the feedback on this thread and elsewhere on the forums. Clearly there's a lot of concern around the impact of adding a cast time to Conjured Ward and Annulment.

First I'd like to talk about our motivation with the change. We believe choices between damage output and survivability make combat more interesting. There are a number of areas within our system that could better adhere to this philosophy, but these self-cast damage shield abilities stood out as being particularly out of line. It was too easy to throw a bunch of effective health on yourself while making a minimal sacrifice in terms of DPS itemization and rotation. This applied to both PvE and PvP scenarios.

The addition of a cast time makes that choice between damage output and survivability more deliberate and strategic. However, as many of you have pointed out, there are several potential issues with this solution. We identified many of these risks prior to PTS, and we're actively monitoring feedback from the community, Class Reps, and PTS testers.

If we decide to make significant changes to the abilities, those changes would not appear until at least PTS 3. However, we agree Conjured Ward and Annulment are too easy to interrupt in PvP, so we'll be making both spells immune to interrupts for PTS 2. We'll also be meeting with the Class Reps next week to discuss the changes.

In the meantime, we encourage you to continue experimenting, evaluating, and providing feedback.

Hey @ZOS_RobGarrett has your in-house team tested the 1 second cast time for shield by completing all vet trials on hard mode with a group heavy on magicka DPS (sorcs in particular, but this impacts all magicka DPS)?

What were the results?

Brother, if you really think that they test what they change i really am envious of your hope and great expectations!

Kagukan

"The addition of a cast time makes that choice between damage output and survivability more deliberate and strategic."

I wear light armor. I am already a squishy mess. I mainly use a shield as a reaction to taking massive damage. If I am taking massive damage I am focused on surviving and therefore I am not doing damage. Even with an instant cast shield there are plenty of times where I am on the edge of death.

I do not stack different shields. I only use 1. Yes I will refresh that shield in an instant but that uses resources. If pressure is sustained my resources run out and therefore no more shield and a dead squishy mag sorc.

In PVP that one shield I use will often be gone in 1 or 2 hits. Even with none stop refreshing it can be burned through by a single player. And like I mentioned before. If pressure is sustained even by a weak dps pvp player then bye bye resource pool and hello dead mag sorc.

If stacking different shields is the issue then do something about that. Adding a cast time doesn't seem necessary though. I love playing my mag sorc. I enjoy this game. I buy 6 month ESO+ subs. I buy crowns. If the cast time goes through to live I will try it, i will try different things. I will not change from mag sorc however. I have too much time invested into this character and have 0 desire to start another. I am seriously concerned this added cast time to shields will be game breaking for me. I do not want to quit playing this game but if it is no longer fun then what is the point?

Apache_Kid

Lord_Dexter wrote: »

Apache_Kid wrote: »

ZOS_RobGarrett wrote: »

Hey all,

Just wanted to let you know we've been monitoring the feedback on this thread and elsewhere on the forums. Clearly there's a lot of concern around the impact of adding a cast time to Conjured Ward and Annulment.

First I'd like to talk about our motivation with the change. We believe choices between damage output and survivability make combat more interesting. There are a number of areas within our system that could better adhere to this philosophy, but these self-cast damage shield abilities stood out as being particularly out of line. It was too easy to throw a bunch of effective health on yourself while making a minimal sacrifice in terms of DPS itemization and rotation. This applied to both PvE and PvP scenarios.

The addition of a cast time makes that choice between damage output and survivability more deliberate and strategic. However, as many of you have pointed out, there are several potential issues with this solution. We identified many of these risks prior to PTS, and we're actively monitoring feedback from the community, Class Reps, and PTS testers.

If we decide to make significant changes to the abilities, those changes would not appear until at least PTS 3. However, we agree Conjured Ward and Annulment are too easy to interrupt in PvP, so we'll be making both spells immune to interrupts for PTS 2. We'll also be meeting with the Class Reps next week to discuss the changes.

In the meantime, we encourage you to continue experimenting, evaluating, and providing feedback.

Anyone that thinks that cast times make combat interesting is a goober. Cast times make combat clunky and most importantly NOT FUN

These skills will simply die like lot of other skills i.e. impulse, scattershot etc

I can't see myself playing any class that utilizes these skills in any content pve or pvp if this goes live. Ill just play something else until they realize the error of their ways.

JamesDX

Minalan wrote: »

JamesDX wrote: »

ZOS_RobGarrett wrote: »

Hey all,

Just wanted to let you know we've been monitoring the feedback on this thread and elsewhere on the forums. Clearly there's a lot of concern around the impact of adding a cast time to Conjured Ward and Annulment.

First I'd like to talk about our motivation with the change. We believe choices between damage output and survivability make combat more interesting. There are a number of areas within our system that could better adhere to this philosophy, but these self-cast damage shield abilities stood out as being particularly out of line. It was too easy to throw a bunch of effective health on yourself while making a minimal sacrifice in terms of DPS itemization and rotation. This applied to both PvE and PvP scenarios.

The addition of a cast time makes that choice between damage output and survivability more deliberate and strategic. However, as many of you have pointed out, there are several potential issues with this solution. We identified many of these risks prior to PTS, and we're actively monitoring feedback from the community, Class Reps, and PTS testers.

If we decide to make significant changes to the abilities, those changes would not appear until at least PTS 3. However, we agree Conjured Ward and Annulment are too easy to interrupt in PvP, so we'll be making both spells immune to interrupts for PTS 2. We'll also be meeting with the Class Reps next week to discuss the changes.

In the meantime, we encourage you to continue experimenting, evaluating, and providing feedback.

The only damage shield that is a real issue for being too strong is healing ward, the one that didn't get changed...

I see you haven't looked at it on PTS.

It lost the up front heal (gone from the tool tip).

It's also critable, so it will never stay up long enough to do it's job.

It wasn't quoted in the patch notes, I was not aware, another ninja nerf it seems...

Morimizo

Apache_Kid wrote: »

ZOS_RobGarrett wrote: »

Hey all,



The addition of a cast time makes that choice between damage output and survivability more deliberate and strategic.

Anyone that thinks that cast times make combat interesting is a goober. Cast times make combat clunky and most importantly NOT FUN

Agreed; I have to wonder if these mechanics are applied to their real lives as well:

For instance, when their wife/girlfriend says, 'I love you' or 'Do I look fat in this dress?' there is always a 'meaningful' pause of one second before answering.

Or while navigating their phone aps, every press/swipe is delayed by a 'reflecting' interim to insure accuracy, and, of course, enjoyment.

Or when the proximity sensor in a luxury car senses a collision, the brakes cannot be applied for a one-second 'just-to-make-sure' diagnostic.

Delays are not entertaining; in fact, most would refer to them as LAG, and would rightly curse their existence. And attempt to fix them.

That's a hint.

Chilly-McFreeze

-

Faulgor wrote: »

It's astonishing how everyone's talking past Rob. No wonder they don't take this "feedback" seriously.

He's just reiterating what the community has been saying for years, that defensive and offensive capability shouldn't derive from the same stats, items or abilities. That you should have to make a choice. He made it also clear that shields are just one issue that particularly stood out in this regard, and more changes are likely to come.

FInally! I for one agree 100% with the analysis and direction, albeit the proposed solution of adding a cast time has numerous issues, which have already been raised a few times between all the wailing and tantrums. I'm looking forward to the next PTS patch and the future of ESO in general.

It's bad balancing to single out one defense mechanism for a "change", in this case blatant nerf, while all others, who scale in the same way (read: higher dmg/ res pool = higher damage = better defense, ie heals) remain untouched. Either do all at the same time or don't do them at all. All this change will archieve is putting ward-classes at the bottom of the barrel.

It doesn't help that changes only come every 3 months.

OtarTheMad

So how many skills have a cast time now for Sorcs? I have only spent a little time in PTS, crazy schedule this week and usually testing Wardens, have we gone from Togglemancer to Cast-Timemancer?

iCaliban

ZOS_RobGarrett wrote: »

Hey all,

Just wanted to let you know we've been monitoring the feedback on this thread and elsewhere on the forums. Clearly there's a lot of concern around the impact of adding a cast time to Conjured Ward and Annulment.

First I'd like to talk about our motivation with the change. We believe choices between damage output and survivability make combat more interesting. There are a number of areas within our system that could better adhere to this philosophy, but these self-cast damage shield abilities stood out as being particularly out of line. It was too easy to throw a bunch of effective health on yourself while making a minimal sacrifice in terms of DPS itemization and rotation. This applied to both PvE and PvP scenarios.

The addition of a cast time makes that choice between damage output and survivability more deliberate and strategic. However, as many of you have pointed out, there are several potential issues with this solution. We identified many of these risks prior to PTS, and we're actively monitoring feedback from the community, Class Reps, and PTS testers.

If we decide to make significant changes to the abilities, those changes would not appear until at least PTS 3. However, we agree Conjured Ward and Annulment are too easy to interrupt in PvP, so we'll be making both spells immune to interrupts for PTS 2. We'll also be meeting with the Class Reps next week to discuss the changes.

In the meantime, we encourage you to continue experimenting, evaluating, and providing feedback.

Im going to say this as gently as I can. Its ok that you guys had a bad idea. Its ok that you came with an objectively *** way to "fix" something that wasnt broken. Its ok that your idea of "fun" and "choice" doesnt interact with reality. We have all been there. The only thing you can do to make this worse is to double down on your *** choice and not revert it.

Revert the cast time change. Light armor builds do not need a nerf in pvp. Medium armor builds did not need a nerf in pvp.

Vogtard

ZOS_RobGarrett wrote: »

However, we agree Conjured Ward and Annulment are too easy to interrupt in PvP, so we'll be making both spells immune to interrupts for PTS 2.

Thank you for the info. The uninterruptible cast is at least a step in the right direction.
Still, a casting light armor user is a dead light armor user cursing the animation clunkiness.
If you really want to keep the cast time, maybe consider something weavable like 0.5s and give Major Protection during the cast.

karekiz

Faulgor wrote: »

It's astonishing how everyone's talking past Rob. No wonder they don't take this "feedback" seriously.

He's just reiterating what the community has been saying for years, that defensive and offensive capability shouldn't derive from the same stats, items or abilities. That you should have to make a choice. He made it also clear that shields are just one issue that particularly stood out in this regard, and more changes are likely to come.

FInally! I for one agree 100% with the analysis and direction, albeit the proposed solution of adding a cast time has numerous issues, which have already been raised a few times between all the wailing and tantrums. I'm looking forward to the next PTS patch and the future of ESO in general.

I agree with you

I would like a separate Healer/defensive stat that would effect shields/heals. Though I am sure a lot of people would rage at that and I can't talk about Vet trial balance as I have only done Vet craglorn trials and I still use shields there. It would also completely hurt Tank/3 DPS combo for vet dungeons as DPS would no longer be able to sustain HP and tanks couldn't be invulnerable without a dedicated healer.

Cast time are just meh though.

Nicko_Lps

Vogtard wrote: »

ZOS_RobGarrett wrote: »

However, we agree Conjured Ward and Annulment are too easy to interrupt in PvP, so we'll be making both spells immune to interrupts for PTS 2.

Thank you for the info. The uninterruptible cast is at least a step in the right direction.
Still, a casting light armor user is a dead light armor user cursing the animation clunkiness.
If you really want to keep the cast time, maybe consider something weavable like 0.5s and give Major Protection during the cast.

0.5 sec during cast when zerglings spam their purge-healingsprings-destroults-blablabla will be like 6 seconds cast.

Now if you survive this, you will make a new fan of your skills in this game

Minalan

JamesDX wrote: »

Minalan wrote: »

JamesDX wrote: »

ZOS_RobGarrett wrote: »

Hey all,

Just wanted to let you know we've been monitoring the feedback on this thread and elsewhere on the forums. Clearly there's a lot of concern around the impact of adding a cast time to Conjured Ward and Annulment.

First I'd like to talk about our motivation with the change. We believe choices between damage output and survivability make combat more interesting. There are a number of areas within our system that could better adhere to this philosophy, but these self-cast damage shield abilities stood out as being particularly out of line. It was too easy to throw a bunch of effective health on yourself while making a minimal sacrifice in terms of DPS itemization and rotation. This applied to both PvE and PvP scenarios.

The addition of a cast time makes that choice between damage output and survivability more deliberate and strategic. However, as many of you have pointed out, there are several potential issues with this solution. We identified many of these risks prior to PTS, and we're actively monitoring feedback from the community, Class Reps, and PTS testers.

If we decide to make significant changes to the abilities, those changes would not appear until at least PTS 3. However, we agree Conjured Ward and Annulment are too easy to interrupt in PvP, so we'll be making both spells immune to interrupts for PTS 2. We'll also be meeting with the Class Reps next week to discuss the changes.

In the meantime, we encourage you to continue experimenting, evaluating, and providing feedback.

The only damage shield that is a real issue for being too strong is healing ward, the one that didn't get changed...

I see you haven't looked at it on PTS.

It lost the up front heal (gone from the tool tip).

It's also critable, so it will never stay up long enough to do it's job.

It wasn't quoted in the patch notes, I was not aware, another ninja nerf it seems...

And you're... Somehow... surprised by this?

Healing ward was a great skill to cast after resing someone. The instant heal and shield gave them a fighting chance to put themselves together.

Now, notsomuch.