Bash weaving

Altyrann

While bash does substantial damage, bash weaving will be a way to squeeze out an extra few k of damage, adding complexity and increasing the gap between players. Why not have it to do trivial damage and just interrupt?

John_Falstaff

Alert! Alert! After all those light-bringing nerfs, it was discovered that something still differentiates experienced from newbies! Nerf immediately!

Seriously though, the gap was just decreased in a most disgusting, brainless, ill thought-out and lazy way, and you want to eradicate last remnants of what makes difference. I literally imagine how half the lazy populace first rejoiced - yay, now we can also parse those numbers, in your face, people who practice a lot - and then, with dismay, suddenly saw that pesky tryhards have discovered a way to make do and use some skill at least to raise the ceiling a couple of thousands dps. Inequality! Horror!

validifyedneb18_ESO

Probably a good idea. If LA now sustain the sustain cost of bash weaving will become less of an issue once again. Would seem counterproductive to "fix" the LA/HA situation only to re-enable this much-much-much worse meta.

Altyrann

John_Falstaff wrote: »

Alert! Alert! After all those light-bringing nerfs, it was discovered that something still differentiates experienced from newbies! Nerf immediately!

Seriously though, the gap was just decreased in a most disgusting, brainless, ill thought-out and lazy way, and you want to eradicate last remnants of what makes difference. I literally imagine how half the lazy populace first rejoiced - yay, now we can also parse those numbers, in your face, people who practice a lot - and then, with dismay, suddenly saw that pesky tryhards have discovered a way to make do and use some skill at least to raise the ceiling a couple of thousands dps. Inequality! Horror!

Thanks for that thoughtful response.

Please note I am in no way against differentiation or skill allowing for higher damage. I just find bash weaving is a really strange way to do this that looks and feels awful. I am also very much against differentiation being based on being able to hit buttons repetitively at high speed and would rather the skill come down to selecting the right things to do at the right moment.

John_Falstaff

Altyrann wrote: »

John_Falstaff wrote: »

Alert! Alert! After all those light-bringing nerfs, it was discovered that something still differentiates experienced from newbies! Nerf immediately!

Seriously though, the gap was just decreased in a most disgusting, brainless, ill thought-out and lazy way, and you want to eradicate last remnants of what makes difference. I literally imagine how half the lazy populace first rejoiced - yay, now we can also parse those numbers, in your face, people who practice a lot - and then, with dismay, suddenly saw that pesky tryhards have discovered a way to make do and use some skill at least to raise the ceiling a couple of thousands dps. Inequality! Horror!

Thanks for that thoughtful response.

Please note I am in no way against differentiation or skill allowing for higher damage. I just find bash weaving is a really strange way to do this that looks and feels awful. I am also very much against differentiation being based on being able to hit buttons repetitively at high speed and would rather the skill come down to selecting the right things to do at the right moment.

I do understand; and I do agree it is a strange way. I was against nerfing S&B puncture/low slash and buffing the weird shield bash skill too, because bashing someone for damage is about the weirdest thing imaginable, and boy ESO is full of weird things.

But gist is, this request comes at bad time, because top damage was gutted across the board, and people don't even know yet if it's even possible to clear harder content (looking at vSS HM portal phase) that imposes hard requirements on individual damage output. I see nerfs; I don't see buffs to compensate them, and in such situation, a call for more nerfs just goes against the grain.

And then there's another consideration: ESO is all about fast-paced combat. It's about button-mashing with high speed. And once we began changing it, it will perpetuate itself. First people "with low APM" find the climb to LA weaving too steep and not fun. Then low APM doesn't allow them to move out of red timely, so nerf red please, remove it from the game. Then they can't dodge one-shots from mobs (hello vMHK), so remove situations when they need to dodge. And so on, and so forth. Ultimately, it's all button-mashing, it's all exercise in doing multiple things fast in response to what happens on the screen.

Altyrann

Mostly agree, especially on the overall damage position which looks severely down across the board right now, though I think your points on escalation may be getting a little overdone.

On the button pressing at high speed, an online game powered by geriatric gerbils is, in my eyes, better suited to a smaller number of actions, well selected and timed, rather than trying to cram 3 or 4 things into every second. This should still allow for player skill in getting selection and timing right (while still dodging, blocking, not standing in red etc.) while being far less susceptible to performance = connection. I also just find bash weaving ugly purely from an aesthetic perspective.

If I were looking at it, I'd likely end up with ability + weave every second as a reasonable but not excessive pace of button mashing, but look at rotations and skills again so there was more skill in selecting the right buff / DoT at the right moment. This is particularly bad at the moment with spammables relatively strong and other things relatively weak compared to previous patches (see Stamplar for an extreme example).

John_Falstaff

Thing is, what you're suggesting is to completely rework the combat (not the topic of the current patch, and I don't see it happening) to be more like old tab-target MMOs, with slower pace and more focus on selecting right skill for right moment rather than fast-paced combat. For one, I don't know why do we need another such MMO to begin with - it sure will appeal to some audience, but this game is five year old, you can't just go ahead and turn it into WoW. And for another, I find bash weaving nerf an odd choice of target to start such transition. Bash weaving is not part of why ESO is not WoW, it's only a crutch that lets players squeeze a couple more thousands dps, and it's going to be more popular now because ZOS made an oopsie again and potentially made some content unplayable, and experienced people are trying to adapt and use their experience (in ESO-styled way, button mashing) to do their best. Nerf bash-weaving, and damage drops even more, but it won't make combat experience any more WoW-like.

Bottom line, your request is twofold. Aesthetics-wise, sure, nerf bashes but buff LAs back or buff skills. Combat-style-wise, I don't see a point in suddenly doing one-eighty and starting to target ESO for people who can't click two buttons a second. If they can't click two, they can't survive vet content anyway, and the only thing it'll achieve is to make everything sluggish and not worth playing - if I want to play chess, I go to different server.

Altyrann

The specific thing I'm suggesting is just to nerf bash damage (though utterly on board with whatever balancing needs to be done to keep total damage output sensible, whether this is buffing ability damage or not hitting light attacks so hard). I'm not suggesting the removal of weaving or changing any other mechanics.

The rest is just rambling response, but definitely not a suggestion that we fundamentally change the game, just revert some of the more recent changes that have made rotations and skill selection the least interesting they have been in a number of cycles. Buffs and DoTs are currently severely underused.

John_Falstaff

Oh, I'm not against that change per se. I'm okay with not having to do bash-weaving, and it's especially weird that LA now does less damage than bash, it's just not intuitive. I'd be totally fine with making former a degree better than latter, and some skill buffs to keep damage more or less the same as on live. It's more of "what, I was gutted and now proposal is to make me do even less?" sort of reaction. I'm all for good performance with sensible (and to me, preferably still fast-paced and fluid, that's eso style) rotation.

Altyrann

Hoping they have just not looked at total damage yet and are just after feedback on how the new light / heavy attacks feel.

Given how damage gated some stuff is a big nerf would not be great.

LiquidPony

Altyrann wrote: »

John_Falstaff wrote: »

Alert! Alert! After all those light-bringing nerfs, it was discovered that something still differentiates experienced from newbies! Nerf immediately!

Seriously though, the gap was just decreased in a most disgusting, brainless, ill thought-out and lazy way, and you want to eradicate last remnants of what makes difference. I literally imagine how half the lazy populace first rejoiced - yay, now we can also parse those numbers, in your face, people who practice a lot - and then, with dismay, suddenly saw that pesky tryhards have discovered a way to make do and use some skill at least to raise the ceiling a couple of thousands dps. Inequality! Horror!

Thanks for that thoughtful response.

Please note I am in no way against differentiation or skill allowing for higher damage. I just find bash weaving is a really strange way to do this that looks and feels awful. I am also very much against differentiation being based on being able to hit buttons repetitively at high speed and would rather the skill come down to selecting the right things to do at the right moment.

But those things aren't mutually exclusive.

LA weaving and bash weaving *are* "selecting the right things to do at the right moment".

Altyrann

LiquidPony wrote: »

Altyrann wrote: »

John_Falstaff wrote: »

Alert! Alert! After all those light-bringing nerfs, it was discovered that something still differentiates experienced from newbies! Nerf immediately!

Seriously though, the gap was just decreased in a most disgusting, brainless, ill thought-out and lazy way, and you want to eradicate last remnants of what makes difference. I literally imagine how half the lazy populace first rejoiced - yay, now we can also parse those numbers, in your face, people who practice a lot - and then, with dismay, suddenly saw that pesky tryhards have discovered a way to make do and use some skill at least to raise the ceiling a couple of thousands dps. Inequality! Horror!

Thanks for that thoughtful response.

Please note I am in no way against differentiation or skill allowing for higher damage. I just find bash weaving is a really strange way to do this that looks and feels awful. I am also very much against differentiation being based on being able to hit buttons repetitively at high speed and would rather the skill come down to selecting the right things to do at the right moment.

But those things aren't mutually exclusive.

LA weaving and bash weaving *are* "selecting the right things to do at the right moment".

I mean less of the split second repetitive stuff, and more at a broader level. You should already always weave and it's getting to the stage where you should bash fairly regularly with sustain changes. I personally think always adding weaving to ability every time is enough to do on the metronomic every second type basis, especially given how it gets more and more sensitive to convection and server the more things you try to pack into each second. I'm more interested in seeing proper decision making on whether to use a buff or reapply a DoT early, which is becoming less common with DoTs being weak relative to where they have been.

John_Falstaff

Altyrann wrote: »

LiquidPony wrote: »

Altyrann wrote: »

John_Falstaff wrote: »

Alert! Alert! After all those light-bringing nerfs, it was discovered that something still differentiates experienced from newbies! Nerf immediately!

Seriously though, the gap was just decreased in a most disgusting, brainless, ill thought-out and lazy way, and you want to eradicate last remnants of what makes difference. I literally imagine how half the lazy populace first rejoiced - yay, now we can also parse those numbers, in your face, people who practice a lot - and then, with dismay, suddenly saw that pesky tryhards have discovered a way to make do and use some skill at least to raise the ceiling a couple of thousands dps. Inequality! Horror!

Thanks for that thoughtful response.

Please note I am in no way against differentiation or skill allowing for higher damage. I just find bash weaving is a really strange way to do this that looks and feels awful. I am also very much against differentiation being based on being able to hit buttons repetitively at high speed and would rather the skill come down to selecting the right things to do at the right moment.

But those things aren't mutually exclusive.

LA weaving and bash weaving *are* "selecting the right things to do at the right moment".

I mean less of the split second repetitive stuff, and more at a broader level. You should already always weave and it's getting to the stage where you should bash fairly regularly with sustain changes. I personally think always adding weaving to ability every time is enough to do on the metronomic every second type basis, especially given how it gets more and more sensitive to convection and server the more things you try to pack into each second. I'm more interested in seeing proper decision making on whether to use a buff or reapply a DoT early, which is becoming less common with DoTs being weak relative to where they have been.

Thing is, everyone already has proper decision making about such things, weaving or no weaving. You're going into an ice tomb in vSS? Reapply your dots early and hit shield. You're about to maximize your burst on Archcustodian while its shield is down? Better buff up ahead of time not to lose GCD on rebuffing during the burn. You're about to kite Storm? Use Swallow Soul one more time to get HoT ticking on you. And so on, and so forth. Game is literally chock full of such decisions, in most content you can't just stand and parse.

ZarkingFrued

What in the world is even going on here? If bashing increases dps, THEN LEARN HOW TO DO IT. Is it impossible to do that? Is it really that bad that someone puts more effort into something and gets more out?

WrathOfInnos

They literally just buffed bash weaving to its current level a few months ago. Now all of a sudden the “high APM” DPS ceiling is too high and the skill gap is too wide. Not sure why Light Attack weaving is taking the blame, it hasn’t changed in years.

Altyrann

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

They literally just buffed bash weaving to its current level a few months ago. Now all of a sudden the “high APM” DPS ceiling is too high and the skill gap is too wide. Not sure why Light Attack weaving is taking the blame, it hasn’t changed in years.

Light attack weaving makes sense and even looks sensible. You hit something with a weapon and hurt it. Great.

Bash weaving with light attack weaving starts to get clunky (on a good fibre connection here but while weaving light attacks is normally alright, doing that and bash weaving is much more hit and miss, even when doing just that at a dummy with no distractions). More than that, weaving light attacks plus bashing looks utterly ridiculous.

I get that right now it does damage. I get that right now to maximise damage you need to use it. I'm suggesting that getting substantial damage (from an interrupt) is a bad answer and could be changed while looking at the wider combat pattern because it congests gameplay and, while there seems to be an intent to make stuff more intuitive, is really quite counter-intuitive (magic user does as much damage from interrupting by bashing with a stick as from shooting magic fire at an enemy???).

WrathOfInnos

You’re not wrong. Honestly, combat should just be rolled back to Elsweyr patch or earlier. Everything since then has been a train wreck.