Healing ward lost the upfront heal?

polgarah

profundidob16_ESO wrote: »

I am convinced that the people behind the scenes there that look into these sort of questions (Gilliam the rogue for instance) and all this in cooperation with the class representatives here on the forums are anything but ignorant so they do have a plan and know perfectly what they're doing but the total lack of transparency from ZOS towards the players is just staggering.

I really wish that everytime BEFORE making changes ZOS would communicate to the player community their vision, their combat balance plan and the resulting intended changes we can expect. Us players having to look at and analyzing their actions and mini notes and then 'guess' their global intentions and plan is soo frustrating.

And guess what ? After we succesfully 'guess' their intentions they eventually have to communicate them anyway by responding or elaborating in the patch notes.

the spoiler notes in some of the changes are super interesting but not enough. We want to know the big plans and shifts in combat and mechanics. We players need to hear the devs say things like for example: "We devs screwed up by making dps players way to selfsufficient, trivializing healers and now we're going to start a series of changes to fix that mistake". Then no one will have to question it and understand why some of these changes are intended.

As proof and illustration I've just picked 4 clear developer comments, 4 pieces that start to show the bigger picture to us players:



Developer Comment:

For the Swallow Soul morph, we wanted to retain the current functionality of dealing high damage, while also providing healing utility to yourself. The amount of healing provided to the group with Strife was so high that there wasn’t enough tradeoff with the morph choice. Now you can still get that super powerful group utility as before, but now it comes at a cost of reduced damage. This is the Funnel Health morph.

translation: you cannot have and huge dmge and huge healing, we devs intend it so that you must choose between biggest healing or biggest dmge


Developer Comment:

We want all classes to be intentional about when they land stuns on the enemy, and not have it coupled with an already highly damaging attack.

translation: you cannot have and big cc and dmge at the same time. You as a player need to choose between using cc or doing dmge.


Developer Comment:

Damage shields are very powerful because they can be used to instantly reduce incoming damage, and allow the user to stack offensive stats while also being very difficult to kill. Adding a cast time and increasing the duration makes this an ability to use proactively before damage happens, or at opportune times during combat.

translation: you cannot have maximized protection and doing maximized damage at the same time. You as a player need to choose which skill of those 2 you choose to cast.


Developer Comment:

Damage shields from multiple sources cannot be stacked. We want healing absorption to follow this same ruleset.

translation: we don't want players to become overpowered by stacking healing/shielding mechanics.



Edit: Announcing their plans for gameplay and balance would be a very nice section for ESO Live as well by the way. I don't know who we need to address for this but I'm hereby bringing it to the attention of the following persons:

@ZOS_RobGarrett

@ZOS_GinaBruno

You have several good points but in the matter of this threat they also said: "2k healing is too strong"

profundidob16_ESO

That's right, they said:

Developer Comment:

"The goal of Steadfast Ward and morphs is to protect low health targets while other sources of healing are restoring their health. The Healing Ward morph was too powerful because it was providing both a strong shield and healing to the target."


the way I interpret that message is: if you are a dps or tank then this bonus healing -that can crit heal btw- on top of the shield is simply too much protection for a role that specs into dps (or tanking for that matter). And if you are a healer casting this skill then you have enough other sources of healing to follow up on the instant shield and patch people up so you don't need it. So again it fits the general plan of: choose between speccing into dps or healing/protection but not to get both on 1 and the same skill that all roles can equip.

Minno

profundidob16_ESO wrote: »

That's right, they said:

Developer Comment:

"The goal of Steadfast Ward and morphs is to protect low health targets while other sources of healing are restoring their health. The Healing Ward morph was too powerful because it was providing both a strong shield and healing to the target."


the way I interpret that message is: if you are a dps or tank then this bonus healing -that can crit heal btw- on top of the shield is simply too much protection for a role that specs into dps (or tanking for that matter). And if you are a healer casting this skill then you have enough other sources of healing to follow up on the instant shield and patch people up so you don't need it. So again it fits the general plan of: choose between speccing into dps or healing/protection but not to get both on 1 and the same skill that all roles can equip.

That change was generated based on PVE feedback only. That's why they are saying the heal is too strong.

PVP is different matter.

TheYKcid

profundidob16_ESO wrote: »

arkansas_ESO wrote: »

"The goal of Steadfast Ward and morphs is to protect low health targets while other sources of healing are restoring their health. The Healing Ward morph was too powerful because it was providing both a strong shield and healing to the target."

...but I don't have other sources of healing. Does ZOS think there's some third morph of Vigor that costs magicka? Or do they think I'm about to put two shields and three HOTs on my backbar when I can just respec to stam and get by with Vigor and Troll King alone in heavy armor?

you still don't get it do you ? This is not a solo game ! YOU as dps are not supposed to have AND all the healing AND all shields AND all tankiness. This is a multiplayer game. You're supposed to be working together with a healer who has *blah blah blah*

A solo Stamden had far greater defense and offense than a Magsorc.

Better passive tankiness (heavy armor & minor protection) as well as healing. Not just heals-over-time (vigor) but also burst healing to recover from big burst damage (spores, with automatically-applied major mending for even crazier tooltips). Not to mention near-impunity to ranged builds thanks to shimmering.

Much better damage too. One can easily attain 5k+ weapon damage with a Fury+7th build—numbers a Sorc could only dream about. Shalks + DB hits harder than a sorc combo with less counterplay options.

Sustain is far better due to netch and a more passive defensive playstyle, and can be managed even with two full 5pc damage sets—meanwhile Sorcs run two 5pc sustain or mitigation sets and still fall short. Don't forget than Stamden sustain is getting several buffs next patch.

Mobility is far better too, due to forward momentum and speed pots.

When a Stamden can do all this solo, without ever stepping near a healer or any kind of support, why do you think sorcs are the ones who should be nerfed?

profundidob16_ESO

agreed. It will be a real challenge for ZOS to implement changes to the current state of ESO that fix balance things nicely but in a fair way for both PVE and PVP without hurting one of both at the same time. I seriously wonder if it is even possible at all. Its for a reason that other truly successful pvp games have either separated pvp skills completely from pve or at least changed the way those shared skills behave in both scenario's since they too had come to the conclusion that pve and pvp are not compatible enough to be married using the same skills Honestly I wouldn't want to be in their shoes right now...

profundidob16_ESO

TheYKcid wrote: »

profundidob16_ESO wrote: »

arkansas_ESO wrote: »

"The goal of Steadfast Ward and morphs is to protect low health targets while other sources of healing are restoring their health. The Healing Ward morph was too powerful because it was providing both a strong shield and healing to the target."

...but I don't have other sources of healing. Does ZOS think there's some third morph of Vigor that costs magicka? Or do they think I'm about to put two shields and three HOTs on my backbar when I can just respec to stam and get by with Vigor and Troll King alone in heavy armor?

you still don't get it do you ? This is not a solo game ! YOU as dps are not supposed to have AND all the healing AND all shields AND all tankiness. This is a multiplayer game. You're supposed to be working together with a healer who has *blah blah blah*

A solo Stamden had far greater defense and offense than a Magsorc.

Better passive tankiness (heavy armor & minor protection) as well as healing. Not just heals-over-time (vigor) but also burst healing to recover from big burst damage (spores, with automatically-applied major mending for even crazier tooltips). Not to mention near-impunity to ranged builds thanks to shimmering.

Much better damage too. One can easily attain 5k+ weapon damage with a Fury+7th build—numbers a Sorc could only dream about. Shalks + DB hits harder than a sorc combo with less counterplay options.

Sustain is far better due to netch and a more passive defensive playstyle, and can be managed even with two full 5pc damage sets—meanwhile Sorcs run two 5pc sustain or mitigation sets and still fall short. Don't forget than Stamden sustain is getting several buffs next patch.

Mobility is far better too, due to forward momentum and speed pots.

When a Stamden can do all this solo, without ever stepping near a healer or any kind of support, why do you think sorcs are the ones who should be nerfed?

Good point. You are saying that besides magicka dps and their shields there are other complete OP and broken mechanics or combinations that are in no way balanced. You even gave a great example. I agree completely and if ZOS intends to take their balancing crusade serious those will get the nerf bat too, sooner or later.

CatchMeTrolling

This update is pretty much morrowind v2

dagonbeer

@ZOS_RobGarrett If you are intent on nerfing healing ward, then at least buff either blessing of restoration/combat prayer and/or mutagen/rapid healing. Right now both of those pale in comparison to the versatility and power of vigor with no specific weapon requirement.

reja

Comments bellow are mostly PVP related.

Removing the heal out of the Healing Ward, makes magicka light armor classes die instant once in execute phase. Not only that the execute will do constantly its full damage but execute costs twice less than the Healing Ward.

Sload's Semblance + any oblivion damage will require way more to be countered which brings the feeling that things are imbalanced.

This specific change is the biggest nerf compared to any of the changes on this patch which hits the magicka classes so hard. If this change is called balanced than ZOS is bringing the balance to be unfair compared to stamina.

A little offtopic here but I will mentioned it since I was trying to fight with a lot of combinations of healing abilities and sets with healing ward but nothing works: The Asylum's Restoration Staff's tooltip says that it reduces the cost of magicka and stamina healing abilities by a % after using blessing of protection but it does not affect Refreshing Path for example.

ZOS should start listen to us. I am a member since 2014 and I still play the game as a subscriber but this patch is a good opportunity to force us leave.

profundidob16_ESO

following up on our discussion of yesterday...fresh from the press today:


https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/437982/class-reps-meeting-notes-september-25

now THIS is a great example of the sort of 'clear communication' I was hoping for. THIS shows us clearly not only the exact change itself but also what the big plan behind it is and how those changes fit in it from the dev's perspective. This is what I would call clear and transparent communication towards the playerbase that completely avoids misinterpretations which in turn lead to pointless and unnecessary discussions and emotional reactions. NO translation needed this time around

GJ on communication imho @ZOS_GinaBruno !


Now we can all have a cheerful discussion about colors and tastes and whether you are fond of these changes or not but at least after reading the announcement everyone will be on the same page when discussing instead of guessing.

ps: content-wise it seems that my 'translations' yesterday of the big plan behind the changes were quite accurate which means -knowing we understand where things are headed- we can now more or less start predicting what changes to expect in future balance changes and start adapting to them. I don't know about you but for me that removes alot of worry and question marks.

zammo

Just posted this in the pvp section, and it triggered me as I was typing, so thought i'd add it here where it's probably more relevant.

HaruKamui wrote: »

Doesn't healing ward still heal when it expires?

It does, but if there's nothing left of that shield at the end of it's 6 second duration due to being beaten on, then no heal. Raises a good point though. The Devs cited...

"The goal of Steadfast Ward and morphs is to protect low health targets while other sources of healing are restoring their health. The Healing Ward morph was too powerful because it was providing both a strong shield and healing to the target."

...they took the guaranteed "small" heal rather than pinching a bit from the potential "big" heal. I don't agree with that quote anyway. Ward Ally is designed with that goal in mind, if the same were true of Healing Ward, it would never have had a healing element. The skill is in the restoration staff tree ffs.

At this point, may as well just run ward ally to guarantee you the bubble, assuming it's gonna get beaten away anyway.

profundidob16_ESO

agreed. I was thinking just the same as you only yesterday, that I'm going to change my morph to ward ally since the heal on healing ward is pointless in practise where it sounded good on paper.

An emergency skill is not used when there is no oh *** moment when there is one it gets slashed away serving it's full purpose. Having a shield on your self for the same price and on top of that within the same global cooldown is therefore better in practise.

imho Healing ward should be reworked within this light to make it useful

Mystrius_Archaion

profundidob16_ESO wrote: »

agreed. I was thinking just the same as you only yesterday, that I'm going to change my morph to ward ally since the heal on healing ward is pointless in practise where it sounded good on paper.

An emergency skill is not used when there is no oh *** moment when there is one it gets slashed away serving it's full purpose. Having a shield on your self for the same price and on top of that within the same global cooldown is therefore better in practise.

imho Healing ward should be reworked within this light to make it useful

Exactly.
They pretty much killed Healing Ward. It's a pointless morph and will be completely unused.

profundidob16_ESO

Mystrius_Archaion wrote: »

profundidob16_ESO wrote: »

agreed. I was thinking just the same as you only yesterday, that I'm going to change my morph to ward ally since the heal on healing ward is pointless in practise where it sounded good on paper.

An emergency skill is not used when there is no oh *** moment when there is one it gets slashed away serving it's full purpose. Having a shield on your self for the same price and on top of that within the same global cooldown is therefore better in practise.

imho Healing ward should be reworked within this light to make it useful

Exactly.
They pretty much killed Healing Ward. It's a pointless morph and will be completely unused.

I gave it some thought and I think came up with an possible solution. Since the heal at the end is pointless anyway and in the new big ZOS plan shields are supposed to be mostly emergency tools anyway, how about we remove the heal and double the duration on the healing ward morph ? This way a dedicated healer can preemptively help out with shielding people up during his 'rotation' besides using it as an emergency tool. Also the morph choice becomes then: standard duration shield on yourself and and an extra shield other person at the same time or simply double duration shield on only the lowest person.

@ZOS_RobGarrett

Aldul

Now, I feel encouraged even more, not to run destro / resto. Crit Surge heal and / or Twilight, there you go. I don't need necropotence to run the heal pet. Really strong 1vX sorcs were using heal ult anyhow when kiting and as a get-away.
The loss of the 3rd bar is unbearable, though, I'm missing skillslots to incorporate everything I need to keep me going destro / destro. Sorc gameplay will become even harder. Whoever said pvp sorc was easy-mode was either a hippocrit or a very, very gifted tactitian.

Aldul

Banana wrote: »

They must want everyone to go stamina

I have that impression since 1.6

zammo

profundidob16_ESO wrote: »

Mystrius_Archaion wrote: »

profundidob16_ESO wrote: »

agreed. I was thinking just the same as you only yesterday, that I'm going to change my morph to ward ally since the heal on healing ward is pointless in practise where it sounded good on paper.

An emergency skill is not used when there is no oh *** moment when there is one it gets slashed away serving it's full purpose. Having a shield on your self for the same price and on top of that within the same global cooldown is therefore better in practise.

imho Healing ward should be reworked within this light to make it useful

Exactly.
They pretty much killed Healing Ward. It's a pointless morph and will be completely unused.

I gave it some thought and I think came up with an possible solution. Since the heal at the end is pointless anyway and in the new big ZOS plan shields are supposed to be mostly emergency tools anyway, how about we remove the heal and double the duration on the healing ward morph ? This way a dedicated healer can preemptively help out with shielding people up during his 'rotation' besides using it as an emergency tool. Also the morph choice becomes then: standard duration shield on yourself and and an extra shield other person at the same time or simply double duration shield on only the lowest person.

@ZOS_RobGarrett

Because the shield is smashed off you in <6s anyway.

You only cast Healing Ward at low health, otherwise the ward is tiny. You're at low health because you're getting beaten on. The reason you can't count on the end heal is because there's a good chance the ward will be worn down to nothing by the guy still beating on you. You will never see the extended duration of the ward.

They could have reduced the strength of the shield outside of the 300% scaling, which in itself would reduce the size of the final heal. They could have reduced the 300% scaling, which again would reduce the size of the final heal. They could have made the final heal tick for a smaller percentage of the shield value remaining. What they did was take the only guaranteed element of the skill.

This change hurts some a lot more than others. Anyone missing a burst heal is out of luck. At this point, my light armour melee magblade will finally be put to pasture.

profundidob16_ESO

"Because the shield is smashed off you in <6s anyway."


I know but ZOS position on the shields is clear: extra healing on shields on this morph is what made it too strong in both pve and pvp scenario's. So that must and will dissapear anyway. The incoming shield nerf is inevitable but once you accept it, my propsed change would make 1 morph the pvp morph (ward yourself and ally) and the other pve where it does make sense. Either way it's gonna be a loss.

The only way to make healing ward still acceptable to use in pvp would by adding resistance to the shield or minor toughness but that's the same as healing in the end and what made the shield too strong in the first place so that will never be accepted. That's why I don't even propose something like that

dagonbeer

No healing ward changes in 4.2.2. Just keeping this up so the devs don't forget about it. Magicka classes need the upfront heals (except maybe magplars)

brandonv516

Any thoughts into what you are going to do with Healing Ward now ZoS?

It doesn't make sense anymore. You can't possibly benefit from the ward's post heal in PvP.

NyassaV

@ZOS_RobGarrett I was previously invested/really drawn to the previous function of this ability, and losing it makes me less interested in it, and the game as a whole, for the future. Not to mention it renders a lot of magicka classes un-viable in PvP environments.

NyassaV

Any word on this matter?

Mystrius_Archaion

profundidob16_ESO wrote: »

Mystrius_Archaion wrote: »

profundidob16_ESO wrote: »

agreed. I was thinking just the same as you only yesterday, that I'm going to change my morph to ward ally since the heal on healing ward is pointless in practise where it sounded good on paper.

An emergency skill is not used when there is no oh *** moment when there is one it gets slashed away serving it's full purpose. Having a shield on your self for the same price and on top of that within the same global cooldown is therefore better in practise.

imho Healing ward should be reworked within this light to make it useful

Exactly.
They pretty much killed Healing Ward. It's a pointless morph and will be completely unused.

I gave it some thought and I think came up with an possible solution. Since the heal at the end is pointless anyway and in the new big ZOS plan shields are supposed to be mostly emergency tools anyway, how about we remove the heal and double the duration on the healing ward morph ? This way a dedicated healer can preemptively help out with shielding people up during his 'rotation' besides using it as an emergency tool. Also the morph choice becomes then: standard duration shield on yourself and and an extra shield other person at the same time or simply double duration shield on only the lowest person.

@ZOS_RobGarrett

Doesn't work because it has crap strength unless they're near death, so can't be properly used pre-emptively. It's balanced around being an emergency-button, so they're forgetting their own design and working at cross-purposes.

NyassaV

Healing ward is near useless yay

lucky_dutch

Yeah this one is one of those changes I don’t get tbh. Shield stacking had to go but this was literally the only emergency heal that Magsorc and Magblade had

dagonbeer

I get the feeling that this is a PvE change, but that wouldn't make sense, since 90% of PvE healers are templars or wardens anyway.

brandonv516

Another patch and Healing Ward still looks inferior with these changes.

Please don't just neglect this morph.

dagonbeer

Yes, please don't forget about this ZOS. With stamina you have a strong on demand HoT (vigor) and burst heal (Rally) to get you out of execute range after a burst. With magicka you are reliant on your class heals.

Either that, or buff the other heals in the resto line.

profundidob16_ESO

Mystrius_Archaion wrote: »

profundidob16_ESO wrote: »

Mystrius_Archaion wrote: »

profundidob16_ESO wrote: »

agreed. I was thinking just the same as you only yesterday, that I'm going to change my morph to ward ally since the heal on healing ward is pointless in practise where it sounded good on paper.

An emergency skill is not used when there is no oh *** moment when there is one it gets slashed away serving it's full purpose. Having a shield on your self for the same price and on top of that within the same global cooldown is therefore better in practise.

imho Healing ward should be reworked within this light to make it useful

Exactly.
They pretty much killed Healing Ward. It's a pointless morph and will be completely unused.

I gave it some thought and I think came up with an possible solution. Since the heal at the end is pointless anyway and in the new big ZOS plan shields are supposed to be mostly emergency tools anyway, how about we remove the heal and double the duration on the healing ward morph ? This way a dedicated healer can preemptively help out with shielding people up during his 'rotation' besides using it as an emergency tool. Also the morph choice becomes then: standard duration shield on yourself and and an extra shield other person at the same time or simply double duration shield on only the lowest person.

@ZOS_RobGarrett

Doesn't work because it has crap strength unless they're near death, so can't be properly used pre-emptively. It's balanced around being an emergency-button, so they're forgetting their own design and working at cross-purposes.

you're right. Good point !

So how about putting a few sec of major vitality on it then ? By itself the shield would not be stronger but a healer might patch you up better after

TheYKcid

How is this still not addressed 2 PTS versions later? It was specifically pointed out in the rep notes that healing ward is too weak without the heal.