Time to revisit perfected crushing wall

ajkb78

It's time to revisit the perfected crushing wall set. It was a disappointment from the outset, even at the time magicka classes barely needed any additional penetration (not to mention that you optimise penetration for the front bar where you do most of your damage). But it did provide a tiny increase in damage (by <1k dps). However in recent patches penetration has become so embarrassingly easy to get that it simply has no value at all. It's a 100% let-down as a "perfected" weapon. The whole point of these weapons was that although the basic arena weapons now drop from normal difficulty, thus raising the floor, the perfected ones were a little bit better, thus providing a bit of benefit for players who did the harder version.

Please could you now revisit this set and change the perfected bonus to something less useless? A bit of spell damage or spell crit would be nice, mirroring the weapon crit that stam gets on the perfected maelstrom bow. Even magicka recovery would be better than spell pen. Or health, or armor, or almost any other bonus in the game.

Aznarb

Stop asking thing when something work.
All you'll get is regret..

Suna_Ye_Sunnabe

I don't believe there was ever any intention of making something useful for us. They just had to slap a "perfected" label on it, and, even useless, people still went to farm it again. Mission accomplished, I guess...

CaffeinatedMayhem

THe nice thing is, the perfected version isn't necessary, unless you just want gear that says Perfected.

Also, this was introduced like 2 patches ago, definitely NOT time to "revisit."

WrathOfInnos

I agree completely. I wanted it to give Max Magicka or Spell Crit while on back bar.

However, I’m now convinced the Spell Pen was no accident. The last patch notes make it clear that the devs know Spell Pen is useless for good PVE groups, and they see it as a way to raise the floor without helping the ceiling. I still find it strange that they would use a difficult to obtain weapon as a method to help struggling players, or that back bar penetration actually does much for them.

zvavi

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

I agree completely. I wanted it to give Max Magicka or Spell Crit while on back bar.

However, I’m now convinced the Spell Pen was no accident. The last patch notes make it clear that the devs know Spell Pen is useless for good PVE groups, and they see it as a way to raise the floor without helping the ceiling. I still find it strange that they would use a difficult to obtain weapon as a method to help struggling players, or that back bar penetration actually does much for them.

Best way to help floor is to make the game bugless. the buggier it is, the harder it is to get better, and the more salty endgame becomes.

AinSoph

The problem with this and the Bow is that they're basically delegated to being back bar only because that's where most people put Arrow Barrage/Wall. The perfected bonus is basically meaningless unless they give them the treatment they do to the set bonus and have it active while the skill is up.

carlos424

ajkb78 wrote: »

It's time to revisit the perfected crushing wall set. It was a disappointment from the outset, even at the time magicka classes barely needed any additional penetration (not to mention that you optimise penetration for the front bar where you do most of your damage). But it did provide a tiny increase in damage (by <1k dps). However in recent patches penetration has become so embarrassingly easy to get that it simply has no value at all. It's a 100% let-down as a "perfected" weapon. The whole point of these weapons was that although the basic arena weapons now drop from normal difficulty, thus raising the floor, the perfected ones were a little bit better, thus providing a bit of benefit for players who did the harder version.

Please could you now revisit this set and change the perfected bonus to something less useless? A bit of spell damage or spell crit would be nice, mirroring the weapon crit that stam gets on the perfected maelstrom bow. Even magicka recovery would be better than spell pen. Or health, or armor, or almost any other bonus in the game.

But the whole point was to give it the most useless bonus available. They are trying to “raise the floor.” They are catering to casuals. That is their business model. Probably smart $$$, but sucks for endgame players.

Recapitated

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

I agree completely. I wanted it to give Max Magicka or Spell Crit while on back bar.

However, I’m now convinced the Spell Pen was no accident. The last patch notes make it clear that the devs know Spell Pen is useless for good PVE groups, and they see it as a way to raise the floor without helping the ceiling. I still find it strange that they would use a difficult to obtain weapon as a method to help struggling players, or that back bar penetration actually does much for them.

For some time I didn't see how it could matter what skills I put on which bar. The theory explanations behind Alcast's builds were and are barebones, and I didn't know what deviations mattered and which ones didn't.

All that to say, I wouldn't be shocked if the floor had wall on the frontbar. Then again I don't see the floor doing vMA for <2k pen.

WrathOfInnos

Recapitated wrote: »

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

I agree completely. I wanted it to give Max Magicka or Spell Crit while on back bar.

However, I’m now convinced the Spell Pen was no accident. The last patch notes make it clear that the devs know Spell Pen is useless for good PVE groups, and they see it as a way to raise the floor without helping the ceiling. I still find it strange that they would use a difficult to obtain weapon as a method to help struggling players, or that back bar penetration actually does much for them.

For some time I didn't see how it could matter what skills I put on which bar. The theory explanations behind Alcast's builds were and are barebones, and I didn't know what deviations mattered and which ones didn't.

All that to say, I wouldn't be shocked if the floor had wall on the frontbar. Then again I don't see the floor doing vMA for <2k pen.

Good points, maybe it’s actually intended for players that are running wall and Maelstrom Staff on front bar

Definitely agree that vet Maelstrom weapons should be designed for players that can clear vet Maelstrom and care about stats. Put the Spell Pen on the normal version if anything.

Still I doubt we’ll be getting anything nice, just look at the weapons from the new arena. It takes a lot of knowledge and effort to design that many useless new sets. Each one perfectly crafted to ensure it benefits the end game players zero. Some examples are:
- Buff snipe, but only for melee builds
- Allow healers to give up a buff set for selfish sustain
- Add a weak damage proc to a group debuff skill that DPS builds don’t cast

There’s a fine line between avoiding power creep and just trolling the players. Not sure which side this falls on.

Kurat

It wouldn't make much difference if they replaced pen with anything else, it's still on backbar where most people only spend 10% or less time.
Their goal was to give everyone easy access to the weps to raise the floor abit and gave vet perfected name so people dont cry. Its basically the same weapon and I'm totally ok with it.

WrathOfInnos

Kurat wrote: »

It wouldn't make much difference if they replaced pen with anything else, it's still on backbar where most people only spend 10% or less time.
Their goal was to give everyone easy access to the weps to raise the floor abit and gave vet perfected name so people dont cry. Its basically the same weapon and I'm totally ok with it.

True, the difference would be minimal. That argument works both ways though, since only about 20% of damage is done while on back bar, any stat they chose would affect DPS by < 0.5%. They could’ve made people happy and picked something nice, without any significant balance issues. In the case of Max Magicka it would’ve been more of a QoL change so resources don’t bounce as much on bar swap for builds with a set (like Siroria) or skill (like Inner Light) on front bar only.

Firstmep

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

Recapitated wrote: »

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

I agree completely. I wanted it to give Max Magicka or Spell Crit while on back bar.

However, I’m now convinced the Spell Pen was no accident. The last patch notes make it clear that the devs know Spell Pen is useless for good PVE groups, and they see it as a way to raise the floor without helping the ceiling. I still find it strange that they would use a difficult to obtain weapon as a method to help struggling players, or that back bar penetration actually does much for them.

For some time I didn't see how it could matter what skills I put on which bar. The theory explanations behind Alcast's builds were and are barebones, and I didn't know what deviations mattered and which ones didn't.

All that to say, I wouldn't be shocked if the floor had wall on the frontbar. Then again I don't see the floor doing vMA for <2k pen.

Good points, maybe it’s actually intended for players that are running wall and Maelstrom Staff on front bar

Definitely agree that vet Maelstrom weapons should be designed for players that can clear vet Maelstrom and care about stats. Put the Spell Pen on the normal version if anything.

Still I doubt we’ll be getting anything nice, just look at the weapons from the new arena. It takes a lot of knowledge and effort to design that many useless new sets. Each one perfectly crafted to ensure it benefits the end game players zero. Some examples are:
- Buff snipe, but only for melee builds
- Allow healers to give up a buff set for selfish sustain
- Add a weak damage proc to a group debuff skill that DPS builds don’t cast

There’s a fine line between avoiding power creep and just trolling the players. Not sure which side this falls on.

Almost all the new arena weapons are great for pvp, if not outright op.
Far cry from useless.
Endgame pve isn't the only content in this game.
Also I still remember the massive outcry when vma was introduced as ppl didn't want complete solo content to feel relevant in endgame group content.
Maybe that's why the new weapons aren't pve focused.

ajkb78

CaffeinatedMayhem wrote: »

THe nice thing is, the perfected version isn't necessary, unless you just want gear that says Perfected.

Also, this was introduced like 2 patches ago, definitely NOT time to "revisit."

They have combat standards though. Perfected weapons are supposed to be marginally better than non-perfected. Not enough so it's crucial you have the perfected item to be viable, but enough so you feel good about having it when it drops. Some of the weapons actually do this: the Master's staff gives spell damage as the perfected bonus, the Master's bow adds weapon damage, the maelstrom 2h adds weapon crit. Nothing that makes a massive difference, but it does make a little bit of an improvement and when you get the weapon it feels worth replacing the non-perfected version. The maelstrom staff gives absolutely nothing though. It was bad weapon design when it launched, but it's even worse now that penetration has been buffed across the board. And that's why it merits revisiting even though it was only launched 2 patches ago: it doesn't meet Zos's own combat standards.