Thrassian Stranglers Review

WrathOfInnos

This Mythic set item is easily the most significant change to the end game PVE experience in Greymoor, possibly ever. At a full 20 stacks, TS has been found to increase DPS by 30-40%. This is of course offset by the 40% increase to incoming damage, and 40% reduction in healing received and shield size. So trying to heal or shield through sustained damage requires more than double the heal/shield output than before. Numerically the negative affects outweigh the positive, but since optimization and scores are based around maximum damage output, the set is still by far the best option for all damage dealers. Now I’d like to talk about the positive and negative affects of introducing such an item to ESO.

The Good:
- Most importantly, it’s fun. Very fun. This level of power is unprecedented, and has completely revolutionized the feel and pace of content, especially arenas like vMA and vDSA.
- It provides a strong incentive for damage dealers to stay alive, since they will lose all TS stacks on death. This is a great idea, it’s rewarding to those that learn and obey mechanics, and punishing to those that try to stand in red and parse.
- On a group scale, it encourages players to try to carry on and recover a pull if something goes wrong. IMO far too many trial groups call a wipe at the first sign of a problem (a couple deaths or a missed mechanic), now this results in a loss of everyone’s TS stacks, and already it seems like players are more likely to attempt to recover and continue.
- The shield reduction is very interesting as well, as it makes avoiding damage (dodging or moving) much more effective than standing in red and shielding or using Iceheart. This makes fights feel more active and engaging.

The Bad:
- The way stacks are gained is promoting selfish gameplay. To gain a stack requires a killing blow, which means that players have started focusing and executing the small weak enemies in trials to ensure they maximize personal stacks, instead of focusing the large or dangerous enemies to maximize success of the group. This should really be changed so that every player that has dealt damage to an enemy receives a stack of TS when it dies, and of course the max stacks and power level of each stack can be adjusted to account for this. This removes the current RNG of who gets which stacks, and promotes teamwork instead of competition within a group.
- There is currently a bug, where if something is killed by a pet (like Blastbones) nobody gains a stack from it. This would be solved by the same change mentioned in the previous point.
- It’s too powerful. I have always been a supporter of gradual power creep, but the DPS jump in Greymoor is just ridiculous. Some of this is from the overpowered Blood for Blood vampire skill, but most is from Thrassian Stranglers. Those factors combined have resulted in close to 50% DPS increase on some builds (note that Stamina DPS were unaffected by both BFB and TS and have been left far behind, just after they had finally been relatively balanced in Dragonhold and Harrowstorm). This is about 2-3 times the DPS increase we saw from the introduction of Necromancers and Major Vulnerability last year, and even that was a little excessive (leading to the eventual nerfing of everything else in Dragonhold).
- It’s too punishing to progression groups. Wipes will happen frequently when learning content, and building stacks again is too slow and unreliable. Sometimes a player will accidentally light attack or cast a skill before a group is ready to fight a boss, and the fallout from mistakes like this are amplified by TS, to the point where some groups simply will not recover (no way to regain enough stacks during the boss fight, and cannot meet DPS checks without them) and they will have to reset the entire trial to start over. It’s a recipe for frustration and toxicity.

I do think that the highlight of an expansion should be impactful and awesome, however this one is a little excessive. It could easily be capped at 1500 Spell Damage instead of the current 3000 and it would still be very desirable for every Magicka DPS build. This of course should be paired with the negative aspects being reduced, to a maximum of 20% more damage taken and 20% lower healing received and shield size. It should also be a little easier to build max stacks (and slightly less punishing if you lose them), either by keeping the same 150 Spell Damage per stack and capping it at 10 stacks, or alternatively allowing stacks to be gained by multiple players from a single kill and leaving the stack limit high (20-30) to hit the max 1500 Spell Damage. Keep in mind that wearing TS does require dropping either a 5pc set bonus or a monster helm 2pc. At max 1500 Spell Damage you would be gaining roughly 21% damage on skills at the expense of ~6% damage from a set like Mother’s Sorrow or Maw of the Infernal, for a net gain of about 15% (while also being easier to kill).

Edit: I want to clarify the points of rewarding survival while not being too punishing to wipes or deaths. Currently a trial group building full stacks requires 8 x 20 = 160 enemy kills (in reality more since some will be wasted on pets or players at max stacks already) which can be done over the course of about 30 minutes. IMO the punishment for deaths or wipes should be around 3-5 minutes of lower damage, but could reasonably be built back up by the end of most boss fights.

Take Yolnahkriin for example, there are 3 phases that require killing adds, and each of those phases spawns 3 to 6 adds (for most groups, some will get 9). So overall on that fight there will usually be 9-18 adds killed. If stack gain becomes shared among players, this should be about the cap IMO. Contrast that to the current behavior where each DPS comes out of the fight with 1-2 stacks. A death or wipe should cause a temporary setback that will reduce damage done to one boss, but after surviving that encounter you can be back on track without having the reset the instance. 10 stack cap seems about right to me, but I could live with 15 or 20 (the groups that need the help most on Yol will have 18 stacks by the 50% flight). I just use one fight as an example here, but similar add spawns occur in most trial fights.

Also I should add that shared stack building should not be allowed in PVP. Killing blows make more sense there, since groups and battles can get large, and building stacks would be too easy.

zvavi

As always, on point and very well written. Good job.

idk

Very good points. Thank you for contributing these thoughts.

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

[- The way stacks are gained is promoting selfish gameplay. To gain a stack requires a killing blow, which means that players have started focusing and executing the small weak enemies in trials to ensure they maximize personal stacks, instead of focusing the large or dangerous enemies to maximize success of the group. This should really be changed so that every player that has dealt damage to an enemy receives a stack of TS when it dies, and of course the max stacks and power level of each stack can be adjusted to account for this. This removes the current RNG of who gets which stacks, and promotes teamwork instead of competition within a group.

This is an extremely good point and those that have spent time doing serious or even semi-serious raising have seen parse protectors but this mechanics amplifies the effect of someone ignoring mechanics or the group's needs/plan to buff their parse and that is a negative to the raiding community.

Kittytravel

idk wrote: »

This is an extremely good point and those that have spent time doing serious or even semi-serious raising have seen parse protectors but this mechanics amplifies the effect of someone ignoring mechanics or the group's needs/plan to buff their parse and that is a negative to the raiding community.

Why is it negative exactly in a raiding community that seeks the best speed-run; a power creep like this is inevitable. There isn't any no-death or perfect mechanic tracking achievements so something like Thrassian is just par for the course.

In addition to that groups running Thrassian typically just run full mag all with the mythic item on; it doesn't matter who gets a KB then as everyone is inevitably gaining stacks. Thrassian overtakes any MS potential after just 6 stacks so it's optimal to run a full mag DPS group.

Moreso things like this can really only effectively be used by these players that are the outliers; sadly there isn't a way to prove that statement but I'd be genuinely curious of the metrics of clears using Thrassian that don't end with them switching out of it because of wipes and stack loss.

The logic of the item being "punishing" to progression groups is the same logic of allowing high rank PvP players into the same Cyrodiil maps as low ones being "punishing". It's not really; it's an MMO and it's to be expected that not everyone can handle the exact same tier level of play. The choice of Thrassian Stranglers comes with an understanding of adjusting to a zero-risk playstyle because anything that hits you that wasn't supposed to won't just be "inconvenient" anymore.

With all that said I don't think much of this discussion on either side can go very well without some clear metric of checking who was using Thrassian when and how well it went; it'd be nice if ESOlogs had the functionality to sift out by item being worn but unfortunately to my knowledge it doesn't so we can't really check how well it performs in this case. You can check the items manually by looking through group records but man that's a lot of leg work. I've mostly taken to using Thrassian as a very convenient over world-friendly insta-gib item and nothing more but I personally think Thrassian is the only "mythic" item aside from the Sanicfast ring that really took that word and made it feel the way it should imo.

Joxer61

"(note that Stamina DPS were unaffected by both BFB and TS and have been left far behind, just after they had finally been relatively balanced in Dragonhold and Harrowstorm)"


That should be addressed as well......sad and a tad unfair (?) to say the least. Or unbalanced might be a better word....

Tanis-Stormbinder

I personally love this new item (Thrassian Stranglers) as you said it's just plain fun to run. The offset by the 40% increase to incoming damage, and 40% reduction in healing received is well justified. I don't however agree with you that it's to powerful, it put magica based toons in line with stamina toons. We are finally able to compete with stamina dps. I do agree that a change to how the way stacks are gained is needed to promote group gameplay. This is not a set for progression groups but for established trials and time runs it's great.

Zer0_CooL

I just wonder if it would work on a bomb blade in pvp

Qbiken

Good that someone finally started to bring this up. Been using Thrassian for a while now myself and the power creep this item creates is unhealthy for the PvE side of the game. What I fear the most however is that ZOS decides to keep Thrassian as it is at the moment, and then balance future PvE content around the DPS numbers you can achieve with Thrassian.

Jaimeh

Joxer61 wrote: »

"(note that Stamina DPS were unaffected by both BFB and TS and have been left far behind, just after they had finally been relatively balanced in Dragonhold and Harrowstorm)"


That should be addressed as well......sad and a tad unfair (?) to say the least. Or unbalanced might be a better word....

This! It's an indirect negative side effect of Thrassian, the collateral blow to stam DDs. Not to mention that all supports are optimized for mag sustain, since it's dominant right now. I wish stamina was given a comparable mythic item as well.

Tanis-Stormbinder

As much as I love all the Mythic Items I don't want them used as a set meta for any class whether magic or stamina. The offset from the use of these items should have progression groups use safer more established sets.

JTD

Tanis-Stormbinder wrote: »

This is not a set for progression groups but for established trials and time runs it's great.

But it IS a set for progression the dps increase outweighs the negative offset. The shorter the fight the less damage you take and a oneshot is still a oneshit.

Wait i might misunderstand, what do you mean with progression. I mean the players going for the nodeath/speed/hm runs.

itsfatbass

JTD wrote: »

Tanis-Stormbinder wrote: »

This is not a set for progression groups but for established trials and time runs it's great.

But it IS a set for progression the dps increase outweighs the negative offset. The shorter the fight the less damage you take and a oneshot is still a oneshit.

Wait i might misunderstand, what do you mean with progression. I mean the players going for the nodeath/speed/hm runs.

Exactly. Plus I need to actually RUN CONTENT with these things to get more comfortable with them. I'm not gonna prog in a standard setup then when it comes time for score run decide to try Thrass for my first time. Omegalol

ESO_Nightingale

Honestly i think they should restrict the amount of stacks to 5 or 6. I really don't think a set should be this disjointed from other sets even if it is a mythic. And i can easily see it causing many issues in the future.

idk

Kittytravel wrote: »

idk wrote: »

This is an extremely good point and those that have spent time doing serious or even semi-serious raising have seen parse protectors but this mechanics amplifies the effect of someone ignoring mechanics or the group's needs/plan to buff their parse and that is a negative to the raiding community.

Why is it negative exactly in a raiding community that seeks the best speed-run; a power creep like this is inevitable. .

The question baffles me since it seems to be asking why it is negative for a player to ignore mechanics and the group's needs.

It should be obvious. They do not care about the group's results as long as they have their monster parse. In this case, when the group wipes because of their narrow focus the group loses a significant amount of DPS since those running Thrassian Strangler will not have their stacks up for the fight.

Even OP is indicating the negative effect this piece of gear is having for parse protectors. If you have further questions I suggest you direct them to the OP.

butterrum222

I don’t have access to this set yet, but I was wondering if anyone has tried it on a Stam build with the pelinal’s aptitude set.

WrathOfInnos

butterrum222 wrote: »

I don’t have access to this set yet, but I was wondering if anyone has tried it on a Stam build with the pelinal’s aptitude set.

I’ve heard of a few doing that. It works ok, but not really any better than other options. This is because they effectively lose the 15% weapon damage passive from medium armor. It also takes up 6 set pieces, which makes it impossible to fit a monster set and a 5pc set like Lokkestiiz.

Oreyn_Bearclaw

Zer0_CooL wrote: »

I just wonder if it would work on a bomb blade in pvp

@Zer0_CooL
Not well. Going cloak or sneaking removes all stacks. So does dying, which means you probably would spend a lot of time building stacks between bombs.

That said, you can certainly build for this in PVP. I have a build for my sorc that tops out at almost 9k spell damage in PVP. That is of course with everything proc'ed (its not a super realistic build, but it does work). I have a more survivable version that tops our around 7k spell damage.

The rage tells are real, but the downside is also there. It is the glassiest of glass cannons. At max stacks, siege can one-shot you through a shield. Cold fire is my leading cause of death during the event. A modest gank will almost certainly kill you. It really is a kill or be killed, as sneaking is not an option unless you want to re-build stacks. You wont survive a duel (unless your first burst gets them) or being focused by more than two people. That said, as to OPs first point, man its fun. To be totally honest, I have been running Thrassian in PVP for the entire event. Most of the time, at max stacks. My KDR is certainly down, but my Killing blow ratio is north of 70% during the event.

butterrum222 wrote: »

I don’t have access to this set yet, but I was wondering if anyone has tried it on a Stam build with the pelinal’s aptitude set.

@butterrum222
I have. I made a set for VMA and ran through with a stam sorc and with a stam DK. I wanted something with class access to major sorcery because really, you want to stack spell damage (glyphs, major sorcery, etc). Ideal race is probably khajiit or dunmer.

The stats were there, but the increase in incoming damage was VERY noticeable. Far more noticeable then it was on magic. I never took it in a raid or anything, just solo VMA. I think in a raid, there are better options. If your goal is for awesome raw stats, there is potential here. I wish someone that is much better at VMA stam would give this a go. I was close to 7k weapon damage, and well over 70% crit with Thrassian, Pelinals, and Warband (one piece crit from the monster as well). It's the most damage I have ever had on stam character in VMA, but I never pulled off a flawless run with it. One issue is that when you die, you reset and feel very weak out of the gate. Not an issue on stage 1, but on stage 7, it hurts. Speaking of which, getting poisoned on stage 7 was a death sentence in my experience. I was having issues of just dying without really anything specific as the cause other than just one too many small things hitting in that few seconds.

Oreyn_Bearclaw

@WrathOfInnos

Man, I am struggling with this item. It is OP by any definition of the term, but as you said, man is it fun. It will be nerfed. So the conversation should not be whether or not to nerf, it should of course be, how to nerf without making useless. I dont claim to have the answers here. There are tradeoffs to this set. You are squishy and you sacrifice a monster set most likely to run it.

My pushback to a couple suggestions (not saying I am right, just something to think about). If you limit to say 5-6 stacks and lower the damage taken accordingly, it doesnt even become a trade off anymore. It just becomes a requirement. Even at 10 stacks (half the damage but half the damage taken as well), i am not sure its much of a tradeoff. I can make the argument that if all you did was cut the stacks in half, it actually become more powerful (or at least more useful), not less.

You really dont feel the damage until double digit stacks IMO, but the flip side is that once you get over about 15, you do really start to feel it. Whatever is done, you have to figure out away to keep the pressure on the user. That is what makes the trade off fun.

As to the selfish gameplay, maybe in a pickup group, but I havent seen this too much in better organized groups. Most raid leaders I know would tell people to knock that crap off pretty quick if people were just spamming ST executes in a trash fight. I also think the dying aspect of the set does keep it under control to some degree. Until I see godslayer runs with 8DPS at max stacks, I am not as concerned about the trial aspect of it.

While it might not raise the floor in trials (certainly I think this helps good groups better than bad groups), it does raise the floor in 4 man IMO, which might be a more desirable goal than raising it in trials.

The Genie is out of the bottle. First thing I would try would be to simply reduce the spell damage it gives per stack (maybe down to 100-125), but not touch the rest in any way. See what that does, and adjust further if needed. This is of course NOT how ZOS does things...

Another thought I had was to not make the stacks permanent. Give them a cooldown of like 1 minute. Are you going to be able to keep max stacks in a place like VMA? Probably, but not in a trial or PVP setting. (I am worried we have just seen the tip of the PVP iceberg on this one).

Edit: Another thought, cut the damage in half if you are in a group. I really dont care if you are nuking VMA with this. After the nerf to the asylum staff, this makes up for it. People are faster this patch, but not by that much in the grand scheme of things. As to PVP, if you are by yourself, you really arent going to 1vX with this very effectively. Where it honestly shines is in event like Mayhem where its just kind of a Cluster you know what and there are lots of potatoes running around, and it's easy to hang back and pick off low health targets.

WrathOfInnos

@Oreyn_Bearclaw Thrassian Godslayer has been done. Congrats to 4D on this one: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3wLpEj-UtRA

Reducing the Spell Damage per stack is definitely an option, but I think the survivability impacts would need to be reduced by the same amount the damage output is reduced.

It’s also already throttled by group size to an extent. Quick and easy to build 20 stacks in vMA, not too bad in 4 man content either, but in trials the RNG on killing blows makes it unreliable. You may never see 20 stacks. Personally I dislike this inconsistency, and would prefer if it provided a stack to everyone that participated in a kill, even if that meant the value of each stack was reduced (even cut in half). It would also make the set more of an option for healers, who would benefit from the extra Spell Damage to keep everyone with reduced healing alive, but have a difficult time getting killing blows when competing with 8 DPS.

colossalvoids

Was surprised it's effect wasn't halved in the patch notes, but would agree that in vma it's pretty hilarious thing to run.

Oreyn_Bearclaw

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

@Oreyn_Bearclaw Thrassian Godslayer has been done. Congrats to 4D on this one: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3wLpEj-UtRA

Reducing the Spell Damage per stack is definitely an option, but I think the survivability impacts would need to be reduced by the same amount the damage output is reduced.

It’s also already throttled by group size to an extent. Quick and easy to build 20 stacks in vMA, not too bad in 4 man content either, but in trials the RNG on killing blows makes it unreliable. You may never see 20 stacks. Personally I dislike this inconsistency, and would prefer if it provided a stack to everyone that participated in a kill, even if that meant the value of each stack was reduced (even cut in half). It would also make the set more of an option for healers, who would benefit from the extra Spell Damage to keep everyone with reduced healing alive, but have a difficult time getting killing blows when competing with 8 DPS.

Well, there it is. Haha

Any idea on the average number of stacks on the final boss per DPS? And were all of the DPS wearing it the whole run?

The problem with reducing damage done AND reducing the damage taken by an equal amount is that it will become more of a requirement than a tradeoff. If you reduce the spell damage increase by half (say a 1500 spell damage increase), but also reduced all the negative effects by 50%, the trade-off would disappear. You would run it always, all the time, in every content, because the downside just wouldnt be there.

Right now we have a huge upside, and a manageable but fairly severe downside. I think you need to start by either lowering the damage or increasing the damage taken (not both) and see where it lands.

I am certainly not opposed to balancing somewhat differently between a group and solo player, but that seems unlikely from ZOS.

Oreyn_Bearclaw

colossalvoids wrote: »

Was surprised it's effect wasn't halved in the patch notes, but would agree that in vma it's pretty hilarious thing to run.

@colossalvoids

I am surprised it made it live as well if I am being honest. To perhaps play devils advocate:

If you look at the extreme end, someone like Yurkii that can absolutely explode that place, he gained about 4k-5k to his score since this time last year (over the previous asylum staff build). It's faster, but it's not mindbogglingly faster at the extreme end of what people can do. It also got much harder. We have seen scores pushed by more than that amount in VMA in a calendar year in the past.

If you told me (an above average player that knows VMA pretty well) that I had one run for the best possible VMA score with my life on the line, I would take an Asylum staff build from last patch over a thrassian build from this patch. The max potential is less, but the chances you pull off a clean flawless run are better.

WrathOfInnos

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

@Oreyn_Bearclaw Thrassian Godslayer has been done. Congrats to 4D on this one: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3wLpEj-UtRA

Reducing the Spell Damage per stack is definitely an option, but I think the survivability impacts would need to be reduced by the same amount the damage output is reduced.

It’s also already throttled by group size to an extent. Quick and easy to build 20 stacks in vMA, not too bad in 4 man content either, but in trials the RNG on killing blows makes it unreliable. You may never see 20 stacks. Personally I dislike this inconsistency, and would prefer if it provided a stack to everyone that participated in a kill, even if that meant the value of each stack was reduced (even cut in half). It would also make the set more of an option for healers, who would benefit from the extra Spell Damage to keep everyone with reduced healing alive, but have a difficult time getting killing blows when competing with 8 DPS.

Well, there it is. Haha

Any idea on the average number of stacks on the final boss per DPS? And were all of the DPS wearing it the whole run?

The problem with reducing damage done AND reducing the damage taken by an equal amount is that it will become more of a requirement than a tradeoff. If you reduce the spell damage increase by half (say a 1500 spell damage increase), but also reduced all the negative effects by 50%, the trade-off would disappear. You would run it always, all the time, in every content, because the downside just wouldnt be there.

Right now we have a huge upside, and a manageable but fairly severe downside. I think you need to start by either lowering the damage or increasing the damage taken (not both) and see where it lands.

I am certainly not opposed to balancing somewhat differently between a group and solo player, but that seems unlikely from ZOS.

Yeah I guess it’s tough to balance because of that. I just would be opposed to it being something like a 10-15% damage increase, while still reducing survivability by the current 40-60%. Honestly people would still use it because they only care about DPS, but I don’t like the idea of a set that provides more detriment than benefit. I guess it depends on whether it’s intended to be meta for everything.

It is a little awkward that mandatory Thrassian leaves 11 gear slots open, breaking the clean 5-5-2 or 5-3-2-2 setups we’ve used since Summerset. It’s interesting to see the return of 4pc or 1pc sets in the meta, but it’s also kinda limiting and can leave holes in a build. For example, I was trying to make a vMA build the other day with 5 FGD, 2 Slimecraw, 1 Thrassian, and 3 Willpower or Wrath of Imperium, and there was literally nothing I could use as a set to fill the 12th slot. I just had to go a completely different direction with it.

Oreyn_Bearclaw

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

@Oreyn_Bearclaw Thrassian Godslayer has been done. Congrats to 4D on this one: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3wLpEj-UtRA

Reducing the Spell Damage per stack is definitely an option, but I think the survivability impacts would need to be reduced by the same amount the damage output is reduced.

It’s also already throttled by group size to an extent. Quick and easy to build 20 stacks in vMA, not too bad in 4 man content either, but in trials the RNG on killing blows makes it unreliable. You may never see 20 stacks. Personally I dislike this inconsistency, and would prefer if it provided a stack to everyone that participated in a kill, even if that meant the value of each stack was reduced (even cut in half). It would also make the set more of an option for healers, who would benefit from the extra Spell Damage to keep everyone with reduced healing alive, but have a difficult time getting killing blows when competing with 8 DPS.

Well, there it is. Haha

Any idea on the average number of stacks on the final boss per DPS? And were all of the DPS wearing it the whole run?

The problem with reducing damage done AND reducing the damage taken by an equal amount is that it will become more of a requirement than a tradeoff. If you reduce the spell damage increase by half (say a 1500 spell damage increase), but also reduced all the negative effects by 50%, the trade-off would disappear. You would run it always, all the time, in every content, because the downside just wouldnt be there.

Right now we have a huge upside, and a manageable but fairly severe downside. I think you need to start by either lowering the damage or increasing the damage taken (not both) and see where it lands.

I am certainly not opposed to balancing somewhat differently between a group and solo player, but that seems unlikely from ZOS.

Yeah I guess it’s tough to balance because of that. I just would be opposed to it being something like a 10-15% damage increase, while still reducing survivability by the current 40-60%. Honestly people would still use it because they only care about DPS, but I don’t like the idea of a set that provides more detriment than benefit. I guess it depends on whether it’s intended to be meta for everything.

It is a little awkward that mandatory Thrassian leaves 11 gear slots open, breaking the clean 5-5-2 or 5-3-2-2 setups we’ve used since Summerset. It’s interesting to see the return of 4pc or 1pc sets in the meta, but it’s also kinda limiting and can leave holes in a build. For example, I was trying to make a vMA build the other day with 5 FGD, 2 Slimecraw, 1 Thrassian, and 3 Willpower or Wrath of Imperium, and there was literally nothing I could use as a set to fill the 12th slot. I just had to go a completely different direction with it.

LMAO, I lost sleep spinning that exact same gear setup in my head. Especially because literally the day before the Asylum staff nerf, I transmuted and made gold a full set of Willpower jewelry specifically for VMA.

I will play devils advocate to myself. I suppose if you did cut the damage done and taken by equal ammounts (or simply limited to 10 stacks). It might become more of a requirement, but It also might actually serve to raise the floor at that point a bit (it would raise the ceiling as well). It would certainly be a much more viable option if it capped at 10 stacks for prog groups. But again, I worry at that point it just becomes a requirement for any magic build in any content.

I do think it's fair to say that at least in certain content, the pros outweigh the cons. Ultimately, that is the balance that needs looked at. You can set the damage potential wherever you want, the draw back just needs to be appropriate. And it might not be exactly the same percentage.

Edit: Sorry to keep ranting, but things keep popping in my head.

Maybe go the other way with it. Keep the end results where they are at, but make it take 40-50 stacks to get there. You will get there in VMA, maybe some 4 man, but you probably arent maxing it out in a trial or PVP with any consistency.

WrathOfInnos

Yep, it definitely raised the ceiling, which I enjoy seeing, a full new round of World Record runs every couple updates, and groups being able to do content or strats they never could before. It just may have been a little excessive this time, and somehow managed to effect the floor very little (or in some cases even lowered the floor because people will give up something to wear the set, and then have no stacks from dying or wiping).

colossalvoids

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

colossalvoids wrote: »

Was surprised it's effect wasn't halved in the patch notes, but would agree that in vma it's pretty hilarious thing to run.

@colossalvoids

I am surprised it made it live as well if I am being honest. To perhaps play devils advocate:

If you look at the extreme end, someone like Yurkii that can absolutely explode that place, he gained about 4k-5k to his score since this time last year (over the previous asylum staff build). It's faster, but it's not mindbogglingly faster at the extreme end of what people can do. It also got much harder. We have seen scores pushed by more than that amount in VMA in a calendar year in the past.

If you told me (an above average player that knows VMA pretty well) that I had one run for the best possible VMA score with my life on the line, I would take an Asylum staff build from last patch over a thrassian build from this patch. The max potential is less, but the chances you pull off a clean flawless run are better.

For me personally it's not really about getting much better score or more flawless runs (wasn't able to make one in Stranglers, not that i tried it more than a couple of times so far) but a fresh feeling and to be honest it refreshed vma experience for me more than expected.

But as an average player I'd also take Asylum setup back, it still grinds my gears that "standardisation" process effectively killed it and probably took willpower and imperium use with it, at least for me.

Stahlor

The item is great like it is. The damage income, reduced healing and weaker shields are extremely noticeable. Just go to Maelstrom and you will realise that. You can get killed every second.
It may be strong on PC, where plugins show all future incoming damage. On consoles it is a completely different thing and it needs a very skilled player to handle the downsides of Thrassian Strangler.
Please stop *** nerfing all sets, that are extremely fun to play. Otherwise we all end up standing in front of a test dummy using Zaan, Mother Sorrow and Siroria. How boring is that?

Tanis-Stormbinder

Stahlor wrote: »

The item is great like it is. The damage income, reduced healing and weaker shields are extremely noticeable. Just go to Maelstrom and you will realise that. You can get killed every second.
It may be strong on PC, where plugins show all future incoming damage. On consoles it is a completely different thing and it needs a very skilled player to handle the downsides of Thrassian Strangler.
Please stop *** nerfing all sets, that are extremely fun to play. Otherwise we all end up standing in front of a test dummy using Zaan, Mother Sorrow and Siroria. How boring is that?

I have to agree Mythic Items should be OP, as I said before the offsets are reasonable. The only change I would make on this item set is how the way stacks are gained to promote group gameplay.

ccfeeling

Its good item if u can handle it.

I dont feel its op item, at least everyone can use it.

Oreyn_Bearclaw

Tanis-Stormbinder wrote: »

Stahlor wrote: »

The item is great like it is. The damage income, reduced healing and weaker shields are extremely noticeable. Just go to Maelstrom and you will realise that. You can get killed every second.
It may be strong on PC, where plugins show all future incoming damage. On consoles it is a completely different thing and it needs a very skilled player to handle the downsides of Thrassian Strangler.
Please stop *** nerfing all sets, that are extremely fun to play. Otherwise we all end up standing in front of a test dummy using Zaan, Mother Sorrow and Siroria. How boring is that?

I have to agree Mythic Items should be OP, as I said before the offsets are reasonable. The only change I would make on this item set is how the way stacks are gained to promote group gameplay.

If it came down to leaving them alone OR letting ZOS beat them with a nerf hammer, I would prefer they dont touch it. That said, my belief is that it will be nerfed. That is the only reason I am brainstorming ideas that would not leave it useless. I absolutely love these gloves. They have revitalized both PVP and VMA for me. It's not the gloves fault that the new trial is kind of a dud...Haha

WrathOfInnos

Yeah, I highly doubt they will stay as powerful as they currently are. Just hoping that they don’t become entirely useless when the nerf hits. And the goal of this thread was to point out some of the pain points so that they could be addressed at the same time as other inevitable changes.