Update 22 Combat Direction

Machete

Let DKs keep wings. If you're gonna nerf it then at least make it go from 55%/60%/65%/70% reduced range damage.

MashmalloMan

Machete wrote: »

Let DKs keep wings. If you're gonna nerf it then at least make it go from 55%/60%/65%/70% reduced range damage.

You won't have to worry about recasting it constantly in 1vX. 50% is very generous. You have other ways of mitigating damage on top of wings if that change hits live.

Use those free GCD's to go on offense or better your defense.

FrancisCrawford

Anhedonie wrote: »

This is huge. And it's a very good change. Can't wait to see them all.

Btw, it's DD, not DPS. DPS means damage per second, it's a stat, not a role. DD means damage dealer or damage dealing, a role. Would be cool if you could fix this typo in game.

While you're correct about etymology, DPS has been used to mean "DD" for longer than DD has, at least in my gaming circles.

xynode

ZOS_BrianWheeler wrote: »

Hey gang!

With Update 22 coming to the PTS in just a few weeks, we want to give you all an update on how we’re approaching combat adjustments this patch. We know there’s a lot of information out there already since the embargo lift and it’s great to see everyone excited about Elsweyr and the Necromancer! However, be aware unless it’s stated from us or included in official patch notes, it’s all subject to change until it’s on the PTS and Live.

With that being said, let’s dive into how we are approaching the Elsweyr update. First off, we are getting the Necromancer ready for prime time! This class was created with three major tenants of play:

• Create a class that feels entirely unique and different than any other class in ESO
• Create a class that embodies Necromancy in Elder Scrolls lore/canon
• Add new gameplay elements via corpses, temporary pets and emphasize positional gameplay

The Necromancer is the first class to have multiple passes by our own players prior to it launching with the Class Reps and members of the community that recently visited the studio. Their feedback has greatly helped our development process, and we believe the Necromancer is setup nicely to fill both Magicka or Stamina roles for healing, tanking or DPS. Thanks again to the fine folks that visited us, and we’re looking forward to everyone trying out the Necromancer on the PTS! .

Over the years of development, there have been numerous changes to class abilities both in function and under the hood with code. These changes have shaped the face of combat in ESO over time, but as the game has evolved with each passing year, we have accrued many changes that have fallen out of vogue. With this update, we are making several adjustments to bring abilities back in line with the current state of the game and create a solid foundation of standards for the future.

In Update 22 we have done a pass on every Class ability looking for errant or missing data. We also made sure abilities follow a coherent pattern of Rank progression that is easy to identify. For example, if an ability morph does damage, the rank progression adds more damage. If an ability morph does healing, the rank progression does more healing.

Ability coefficients and costs have also been audited to ensure that healing or damage within the type of ability (such as a DD, DoT, HoT, Direct Heal) are more consistent. The duration of abilities and sub-effects have been normalized so they adhere to patterns that fall in line with the play-style of ESO, making their use in rotations easier to handle. For example:

• Single Target DoTs have been a long standing group of abilities that were not consistent in their application of damage. Looking at these types of abilities’ duration, tick frequencies, and delays, a consistent pattern of application was missing from ability to ability. Some of these abilities have even be used as "spammable" abilities (Searing Strike), despite that being against their design. In this pass, we've restructured them to follow a standard behavior:
  • If there is an initial hit upon casting one of these abilities, there will always be a delay between the initial hit and the first tick
  • If there no initial hit, there will be no delay
  • Delays (i.e. an ability that doesn’t hit immediately) will always be the same duration as the DoT's frequency in which it ticks.

Next were abilities that were considered out of standards based on the audit pass noted above. Some abilities contained a LOT of functionality (Incapacitating Strike), and others not as much (Teleport Strike) when looking at abilities across the board. Moving forward, abilities within the same “Category” should have a base level of performance but also have something that makes it unique. In doing this pass, we found abilities that had components which were above or below base functionality and made adjustments to bring them in line. In some cases, base damage/healing has been increased make up for the removal of additional functions. In other cases, base damage/healing has been reduced to make up for adding in additional functions.

We also took a high level pass at Class abilities, specifically looking for similar/redundant functions within each class's entire tool kit (like Mark Target granting Fracture and Surprise Attack granting Fracture). While we want there to be different abilities that operate similarly in functionality between your class, weapon, guild, and other skill lines, we want to avoid abilities within the same class to provide multiple sources of the same effect(s). This is an on-going effort for future skill lines, and we are not opposed to revisiting the structure of abilities that have already received this audit. Also note these passes were done in conjunction with the changes noted above regarding coefficient/cost/Rank progression, etc.

In terms of quality of life changes, we’ve heard your feedback about cast times being difficult to incorporate into fluid combat/rotation, and have made adjustments to many abilities with cast times to make them easier to weave and be more reliable. In most of these cases, we have adjusted the damage as well in coordination with cast time adjustments to retain the DPS you’re used to in U21.

There will be a bunch of patch notes coming for PTS soon, so stay tuned! Thanks for reading gang, and if you’ve gotten this far, here’s a little sneak peek:

• Cleave: (Reworked this ability and its morphs) Damage increased by 50%, but removed the bleed from this base ability completely.
  • Carve: Retains the bleed; bleed damage increased by 25%. No longer grants Minor Heroism.
  • Brawler: Removed the bleed from this ability. Increased the Shield granted from this morph by 100% at base, but reduced the bonus scaling per target hit from 100% to 50%. This means at base this ability will be 100% stronger than before, and will be ~14% stronger than previously if you get the maximum bonus.

So happy to see actual calculated "balance " changes and alterations making sense while still retaining the main purpose of particular skills.
Dots being dots, direct damage being direct rather than over spamming cheap dots to gain damage from initial hits and having infinate sustain WITH high damage out put from something that was not designed to be used as such. PLUS seeing a damage shield bonus from brawler that is beneficial for even ONE target rather than JUST AOE situations yet still keeping the "more targets the better" side of it.
Plenty more i could glaze over for sure but in a nutshell i really like the way the combat team is pushing for balance with each update and considering things in a FAIR manner rather than just listening to the tears. You guys are doing an amazing job keep it up!

reprosal

I main a stamblade and quite honestly I don’t care if they lose major fracture from surprise attack or that minor berserk is going.

If it brings more diversity of bringing other classes or bringing other skills, great!

HEBREWHAMMERRR

code65536 wrote: »

ZOS_BrianWheeler wrote: »

In terms of quality of life changes, we’ve heard your feedback about cast times being difficult to incorporate into fluid combat/rotation, and have made adjustments to many abilities with cast times to make them easier to weave and be more reliable. In most of these cases, we have adjusted the damage as well in coordination with cast time adjustments to retain the DPS you’re used to in U21.

That's great to hear. Could I ask that the cast time for sorc frags be removed? Instead of having an unproced frag be a cast-time ability that locks your character into an awkward and potentially dangerous casting animation, why not just further reduce the damage of an unproced frag? Unintentionally getting caught in that animation and having to cancel it is a particularly annoying QoL pain point for sorcs, as it's currently the only ability in the game (at least, that I can think of off the top of my head) that switches back and forth between cast time and instant cast.

(No changes have to be made for proced frags. Just unproced ones.)

And it would finally give new sorcs who are starting out a non-cast-time class spammable--something that all the other classes have.

Yeah and give me a merciless resolve toned down but with 4 light attacks it buffs to double damage. Lol and remove the cost you added.

Starlock

All I feel like I can say at this point is that some of us don’t mind redundancy within class skills. Redundancy grants flexibility with character design, allowing players to pick the skill that fits better flavor-wise with what they envision. Just something to keep in mind.

HEBREWHAMMERRR

Zer0oo wrote: »

Can we also look at on how the abilities "aim"?
Some abilities are really hard to hit on the enemy while other work quite nice in a pvp setting. Especial if it is laggy some abilities are really awful to use.(jabs, brawler,...)

For sure some sort of targeting should be looked at. The “zoo meta” with werewolf / sorc pets everywhere is out of hand and makes targeting sometimes near impossible.

GlorphNoldorin

It sounds like the combat team is thinking deeply about stuff which is good.

However, when I read things like searing strikes and rending will be modified away from being spammables for classes like stam dk and stam sorc it highlights the lack of class skills that can be used as spammables.

Most stam classes can only use weapon skills and crushing weapon as a spammables. Creation of skills that can be used like surprise attack for these other classes is needed.

With this in mind and the only other thing I am concerned about is in the pursuit of standardization of so much of the game, the inherent uniqueness of each class is and has been heavily eroded.

It would be a shame that what we get in the future is......... 4 classes almost the same and necro

Lorkhan

NERF EVERYTHING MWAHAHAAHAAHA

Savos_Saren

Marshall1289 wrote: »

Machete wrote: »

Let DKs keep wings. If you're gonna nerf it then at least make it go from 55%/60%/65%/70% reduced range damage.

You won't have to worry about recasting it constantly in 1vX. 50% is very generous. You have other ways of mitigating damage on top of wings if that change hits live.

Use those free GCD's to go on offense or better your defense.

And when ZOS makes NBs take 50% DOT damage while cloaked (without revealing them) and Sorc wards that only absorb 50% damage- I wonder if you'll be as carefree about these nerfs.

rabidmyers

hell yeah

marius_buys

@ZOS_BrianWheeler
When I read combat changes, all I can think of is ten or more AD players running after a DK trying to kill it in Vivec. Proove me wrong.

BrightOblivion

Savos_Saren wrote: »

Marshall1289 wrote: »

Machete wrote: »

Let DKs keep wings. If you're gonna nerf it then at least make it go from 55%/60%/65%/70% reduced range damage.

You won't have to worry about recasting it constantly in 1vX. 50% is very generous. You have other ways of mitigating damage on top of wings if that change hits live.

Use those free GCD's to go on offense or better your defense.

...and Sorc wards that only absorb 50% damage...

Sooo... Nerfmire, when they added a max health scaling component that cut shields at least in half in PvE?

Been there, done that. Said "no" to the t-shirt.

Wihuri

any plans on giving magicka classes a snare immunity tool? I don't want to be forced into being vampire in pvp, but rather have it as a choice

IlCanis_LupuslI

@ZOS_GinaBruno does this mean stamsorc is getting a class spammable, exicute and usable ultimate?

darkblue5

Balance changes hype. Bring the nerfs! And in a much more limited way the buffs. The game is experiencing power creep in part because 1/3 of the player base QQs about even the suggestion of nerfs.

Nerfs are simply better long term game design than buffs. Also, changing one thing at a time will give more reliable results than changing some 30 things. "Buff everything else up" is asking for ZOS to change 30 odd things often because 1 thing is overperforming. Just nerf that thing.

Heimpai

I didn’t read all the comments but what about magblade? Any buffs?

PvP wise.

John_Falstaff

darkblue5 wrote: »

Balance changes hype. Bring the nerfs! And in a much more limited way the buffs. The game is experiencing power creep in part because 1/3 of the player base QQs about even the suggestion of nerfs.

Nerfs are simply better long term game design than buffs. Also, changing one thing at a time will give more reliable results than changing some 30 things. "Buff everything else up" is asking for ZOS to change 30 odd things often because 1 thing is overperforming. Just nerf that thing.

Three classes perform well this patch, two classes perform abysmally and have objectively lackluster stam specs. Solution? Of course nerf one of those three former classes, it's a no-brainer, right.

Also, seems like Fracture will go from a single-target NB spammable, but it will stay on AoE (sic!) warden spammable. Totally really actually not pay to win strategy. Greed is strong this update. 'Tis the season of paid classes.

Lightspeedflashb14_ESO

John_Falstaff wrote: »

Also, seems like Fracture will go from a single-target NB spammable, but it will stay on AoE (sic!) warden spammable. Totally really actually not pay to win strategy. Greed is strong this update. 'Tis the season of paid classes.

5 seconds vs 18. Delayed damage vs instant. Not spammable vs an actual spammable. Tomatoes vs potatoes. We don't even know if they aren't intending to change the major fracture on sub assault anyways.

John_Falstaff

Lightspeedflashb14_ESO wrote: »

John_Falstaff wrote: »

Also, seems like Fracture will go from a single-target NB spammable, but it will stay on AoE (sic!) warden spammable. Totally really actually not pay to win strategy. Greed is strong this update. 'Tis the season of paid classes.

5 seconds vs 18. Delayed damage vs instant. Not spammable vs an actual spammable. Tomatoes vs potatoes. We don't even know if they aren't intending to change the major fracture on sub assault anyways.

It's not a dot either, simply delayed damage - it just has to be spread out throughout the rotation instead of casting it consecutively, and that also ensures the Fracture uptime. And it being 20x7m AoE is a serious factor, more so in trash fights.

I also think that, if they did mention sNB changes, they wouldn't omit such important change as removal of Fracture from Sub Assault. Sure, remains to be seen, but it's ZOS the talk is about, somehow I doubt they'll change it. Speaking of that, when Claw spammable became a thing, I did say that I worry it's a fickle cruch and ZOS can remove it any time - and response from others was that it was like that since forever and it won't change. Oops.

ESO_Nightingale

John_Falstaff wrote: »

darkblue5 wrote: »

Balance changes hype. Bring the nerfs! And in a much more limited way the buffs. The game is experiencing power creep in part because 1/3 of the player base QQs about even the suggestion of nerfs.

Nerfs are simply better long term game design than buffs. Also, changing one thing at a time will give more reliable results than changing some 30 things. "Buff everything else up" is asking for ZOS to change 30 odd things often because 1 thing is overperforming. Just nerf that thing.

Three classes perform well this patch, two classes perform abysmally and have objectively lackluster stam specs. Solution? Of course nerf one of those three former classes, it's a no-brainer, right.

Also, seems like Fracture will go from a single-target NB spammable, but it will stay on AoE (sic!) warden spammable. Totally really actually not pay to win strategy. Greed is strong this update. 'Tis the season of paid classes.

Well i don't play as much stamden as i should, but i can tell you for sure that you do actually have to aim sub assault with your body and keep it going because of the short duration of the fracture. What is pay to win about something you have to aim every 3 seconds at cost of stamina? maybe the skill does a bit too much damage in your eyes, not hard to see. it's a strong burst tool. i'm fine with that but the fracture aspect of it is absolutely fine and not pay to win.

Stratloc

John_Falstaff wrote: »

Also, seems like Fracture will go from a single-target NB spammable, but it will stay on AoE (sic!) warden spammable. Totally really actually not pay to win strategy. Greed is strong this update. 'Tis the season of paid classes.

Yes, yes, the casuals are gonna throw their money at Morrowind because they want access to that sweet, sweet AoE Fracture. Not because of wanting to try out the Warden class in its entirety and all the content that comes with it, but because of Fracture.

John_Falstaff

ESO_Nightingale wrote: »

John_Falstaff wrote: »

darkblue5 wrote: »

Balance changes hype. Bring the nerfs! And in a much more limited way the buffs. The game is experiencing power creep in part because 1/3 of the player base QQs about even the suggestion of nerfs.

Nerfs are simply better long term game design than buffs. Also, changing one thing at a time will give more reliable results than changing some 30 things. "Buff everything else up" is asking for ZOS to change 30 odd things often because 1 thing is overperforming. Just nerf that thing.

Three classes perform well this patch, two classes perform abysmally and have objectively lackluster stam specs. Solution? Of course nerf one of those three former classes, it's a no-brainer, right.

Also, seems like Fracture will go from a single-target NB spammable, but it will stay on AoE (sic!) warden spammable. Totally really actually not pay to win strategy. Greed is strong this update. 'Tis the season of paid classes.

Well i don't play as much stamden as i should, but i can tell you for sure that you do actually have to aim sub assault with your body and keep it going because of the short duration of the fracture. What is pay to win about something you have to aim every 3 seconds at cost of stamina? maybe the skill does a bit too much damage in your eyes, not hard to see. it's a strong burst tool. i'm fine with that but the fracture aspect of it is absolutely fine and not pay to win.

No, it doesn't do too much damage in my eyes, and I'm not arguing that it should be removed too. I'm arguing that the other (useful, unlike Reaper's Mark) sources of Fracture should not be nerfed, that's the difference. When more buffs, more so group support buffs, are removed from core classes and left in DLC classes, it's not healthy.

@Stratloc , not speaking about casuals. There are categories that will value AoE fracture. Just in case, for vDSA score run, you as a tank most likely want to put on heavy NMG for AoE fracture. So yes, having it often matters.

Stratloc

@John_Falstaff People doing vDSA score runs probably already own Morrowind. I personally think you are overestimating the economical value of that change. At least it sounds like it.

John_Falstaff

Stratloc wrote: »

@John_Falstaff People doing vDSA score runs probably already own Morrowind. I personally think you are overestimating the economical value of that change. At least it sounds like it.

DSA is a core game content. Let's not depict people who want to run for scores as fat cats, sometimes people just want to excel at something without spending additional money.

ESO_Nightingale

John_Falstaff wrote: »

ESO_Nightingale wrote: »

John_Falstaff wrote: »

darkblue5 wrote: »

Balance changes hype. Bring the nerfs! And in a much more limited way the buffs. The game is experiencing power creep in part because 1/3 of the player base QQs about even the suggestion of nerfs.

Nerfs are simply better long term game design than buffs. Also, changing one thing at a time will give more reliable results than changing some 30 things. "Buff everything else up" is asking for ZOS to change 30 odd things often because 1 thing is overperforming. Just nerf that thing.

Three classes perform well this patch, two classes perform abysmally and have objectively lackluster stam specs. Solution? Of course nerf one of those three former classes, it's a no-brainer, right.

Also, seems like Fracture will go from a single-target NB spammable, but it will stay on AoE (sic!) warden spammable. Totally really actually not pay to win strategy. Greed is strong this update. 'Tis the season of paid classes.

Well i don't play as much stamden as i should, but i can tell you for sure that you do actually have to aim sub assault with your body and keep it going because of the short duration of the fracture. What is pay to win about something you have to aim every 3 seconds at cost of stamina? maybe the skill does a bit too much damage in your eyes, not hard to see. it's a strong burst tool. i'm fine with that but the fracture aspect of it is absolutely fine and not pay to win.

No, it doesn't do too much damage in my eyes, and I'm not arguing that it should be removed too. I'm arguing that the other (useful, unlike Reaper's Mark) sources of Fracture should not be nerfed, that's the difference. When more buffs, more so group support buffs, are removed from core classes and left in DLC classes, it's not healthy.

@Stratloc , not speaking about casuals. There are categories that will value AoE fracture. Just in case, for vDSA score run, you as a tank most likely want to put on heavy NMG for AoE fracture. So yes, having it often matters.

I too rather enjoy having options for my debuffs.

iALEXi

Maybe also look at the difference between melee and ranged?
Why is the amount of melee players drastically lowering the last months and everyone is going sorcerer or nightblade bow?
Try fighting AD and you'll see...
Ice blockade is also awesome to fight if you are a melee player, spamming momentum every x amount of seconds.

HankTwo

So, stam DK is losing the ability to use venomous claw as a pseudo class spammable. I really hope you will at least give the class another skill with a stam morph then.

Lord_Zele

sneakymitchell wrote: »

Lord_Zele wrote: »

The Cleave Buff?!
THE BLIND WARRIOR SHALL RISE
CLEAVE, CLEAVE EVERYTHING!

This is sounding very promising so far.

Who knows if it’s going be good with zergs increased to 50% is big. It might out damage wrecking blow @ZOS_BrianWheeler I hope you guys look at wrecking blow/dizzying swing if not cleave will be the new spamable which shouldn’t be as intended like flurry and throwing dagger. Since the buff to light attacks a lot of channeled spamable are being mostly out parred by instant cast. Sure those channel times are good but they need an update since it’s been a year or two since it’s been updated.

Just imagine it with Master's 2h as well. It could be a zerg KILLER.
I'm curious to see what they would do with other abilities as 'flurry' and 'throwing dagger'.
Very interested and will patiently wait it out while I destroy people in Cyrodiil.
Can't wait to YEET people with Cleave though.