Mech acuity and TTK

ArctosCethlenn

"In other areas, primarily burst damage and overall Time To Kill, we've seen a pretty radical shift to something that's dangerously low."

If you want to address time-to-kill being too low, you have to look at the strongest burst set in game. Mechanical Acuity (with crit damage stacking) is a large part of why burst is so excessively high right now. It gives the player complete control over what should be a random event and there are far more sources of bonus crit damage than there are of crit resistance. There are fewer viable set choices now than there were during the no proc tests in cyrodiil because mech acuity just overshadows everything.

If you at least put it back to 15-20% chance to proc, players will no longer be able to predict and control when the buff fires in order to coordinate burst.

DrSlaughtr

They could replace the auto crit to a significant crit % buff (like say 15%) for 5 seconds. It would still be useful but it wouldn't guarantee 5 crits.

Or you could do an extra 15% crit damage for 5 seconds.

universal_wrath

TheEndBringer wrote: »

They could replace the auto crit to a significant crit % buff (like say 15%) for 5 seconds. It would still be useful but it wouldn't guarantee 5 crits.

Or you could do an extra 15% crit damage for 5 seconds.

With crit being stripped down from meduim armor, this change will only benefit nightblades and light armor users.

Parrot1986

TheEndBringer wrote: »

They could replace the auto crit to a significant crit % buff (like say 15%) for 5 seconds. It would still be useful but it wouldn't guarantee 5 crits.

Or you could do an extra 15% crit damage for 5 seconds.

The set would need a much bigger overhaul with these as this would render it pretty much useless in pve. Without the proc active the stats are pretty poor already and 15% isnt great from pve side.

I’m not a massive pvp player but the sets been in the game for a long time and was changed a whole back to guarantee crit and wasn’t really this strong. Is it not more that impen is now rarely used or stacked less and crits are now much more impactful in pvp?

tsaescishoeshiner

Please don't nerf this set again, at least not severely. It's good-not-great as it is, and 5 seconds every 21 seconds is very easy to avoid, especially with time to kill being increased. If people stun you or roll dodge once or twice during your proc, the whole thing is wasted. When I see that blue light around people's hands, I know to just stall for a few seconds.

And nightblades are a tricky class to use it on, because their skills are all dodgeable and already hard to land. When I get ganked by a nightblade, I don't usually see acuity. Maybe other people's experience differs.

I use the set on one bar on some casual glass cannon builds that are high-risk-high-reward, and I wouldn't want to see this unique set overnerfed.

Disclosure: I can only speak to battlegrounds, dueling, and IC, not Cyrodiil.

vesselwiththepestle

Mechanical Acuity became an issue because of new sources for Crit Damage or buffs to Crit Damage, like Saxhleel Champion... Outside of ganking I see Mechanical Acuity being used by bombers and ballgroups. I don't think it needs a nerf, but if ZOS keeps adding crit damage modifier... Like adding crit damage to medium armor instead of crit rating...

neferpitou73

Don’t nerf acuity the set isn’t the problem. The problem is everyone stacking crit damage multipliers on top of it. Nerf those (via a buff to impen or something)

Lughlongarm

Not true, at all. Watch MalcolM, Kristofer Stamnb build and other.
Most gank builds I have seen, don't use Mech acuity.
There are many builds set ups that can produce 3 sec kill combos.


Mech acuity is fine, together with all the light/heavy attack proc sets, Stuhn's Favor, clever alchemist, Diamond's Victory etc....

WrathOfInnos

TheEndBringer wrote: »

They could replace the auto crit to a significant crit % buff (like say 15%) for 5 seconds. It would still be useful but it wouldn't guarantee 5 crits.

Or you could do an extra 15% crit damage for 5 seconds.

Maybe if it was +50% crit chance, and received a shorter cooldown along with the reduction in power. Less burst, more frequently. This would mean low crit builds running the set would go from 20-30% to 70-80% during the proc instead of 100%, while having minimal effect on PVE (since most players will already have 50% crit and therefore reach 100% still).

In both PVE and PVP, anyone who wanted to reach that 100% would need to invest some in crit (Thief, Precise, Light Armor, etc.). Similar to how the old Necro passive worked (they could get from 50% to 100% with 5 Grave Lord skills, but they couldn’t get from 30% to 100%), but with ~25% uptime spread throughout the fight, not all active for the last 25% of enemy health. If 25% was determined to be the balanced uptime, then it would need a cooldown of 19 or 20s.

universal_wrath

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

TheEndBringer wrote: »

They could replace the auto crit to a significant crit % buff (like say 15%) for 5 seconds. It would still be useful but it wouldn't guarantee 5 crits.

Or you could do an extra 15% crit damage for 5 seconds.

Maybe if it was +50% crit chance, and received a shorter cooldown along with the reduction in power. Less burst, more frequently. This would mean low crit builds running the set would go from 20-30% to 70-80% during the proc instead of 100%, while having minimal effect on PVE (since most players will already have 50% crit and therefore reach 100% still).

In both PVE and PVP, anyone who wanted to reach that 100% would need to invest some in crit (Thief, Precise, Light Armor, etc.). Similar to how the old Necro passive worked (they could get from 50% to 100% with 5 Grave Lord skills, but they couldn’t get from 30% to 100%), but with ~25% uptime spread throughout the fight, not all active for the last 25% of enemy health. If 25% was determined to be the balanced uptime, then it would need a cooldown of 19 or 20s.

This seems like a great idea, I wouldn't mund having my crit rate increase for linger duratiin shorter coolddown rather than 100% short duration longer uptime, it means I can stay in the fight longer. 40-50% crit rate increase seems good for Pvp and ut might make more attractive to use in PvE.

Skoomah

This set already has a 15 second cooldown. What more do you want?

neferpitou73

Skoomah wrote: »

This set already has a 15 second cooldown. What more do you want?

Exactly it’s a really balanced set that takes a degree of skill to use in timing the burst windows. This issue is the sources of crit damage multipliers that are added is continuously increasing

-Major force (+20%)
-Minor force (+10%)
-Minor brittle (+10% taken)
-Major brittle (in the code but not added yet)
-Nightblade/Templar buff (+10%)
-Nightblade bow buff (+10%)
-Axes (+8%)
-shadow mundus (+11% assuming no divines)
-Khajiit (+12%)
-Base crit damage multimplier (+50%)

For a grand total of 141% (assuming I’ve got everything correct).

That’s not even assuming you have harmony rings on for some synergy bombing.

It’s the damage that’s the problem not the set.

.

DrSlaughtr

I wouldn't say it takes skill to use. If you can count to 15 you're golden.

WrathOfInnos

What’s all this about 15s cooldown? The set has a 21s cooldown, and realistically closer to 22s between procs.

If it did have a 15-16s cooldown then I’d be fine with capping the additional crit chance given at around 40%.

The current cooldown is long enough that it’s very rare to see 2 procs while fighting a single opponent in PVP (maybe TTK increase changes this?). So reducing the cooldown would be more about making sure you’re ready for a subsequent opponent. In PVE the cooldown is more significant because uptime directly affects sustained damage.

DrSlaughtr

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

What’s all this about 15s cooldown? The set has a 21s cooldown, and realistically closer to 22s between procs.

If it did have a 15-16s cooldown then I’d be fine with capping the additional crit chance given at around 40%.

The current cooldown is long enough that it’s very rare to see 2 procs while fighting a single opponent in PVP (maybe TTK increase changes this?). So reducing the cooldown would be more about making sure you’re ready for a subsequent opponent. In PVE the cooldown is more significant because uptime directly affects sustained damage.

Sorry, my bad. I forgot it was 21 seconds now.

Lughlongarm

neferpitou73 wrote: »

Skoomah wrote: »

This set already has a 15 second cooldown. What more do you want?

Exactly it’s a really balanced set that takes a degree of skill to use in timing the burst windows. This issue is the sources of crit damage multipliers that are added is continuously increasing

-Major force (+20%)
-Minor force (+10%)
-Minor brittle (+10% taken)
-Major brittle (in the code but not added yet)
-Nightblade/Templar buff (+10%)
-Nightblade bow buff (+10%)
-Axes (+8%)
-shadow mundus (+11% assuming no divines)
-Khajiit (+12%)
-Base crit damage multimplier (+50%)

For a grand total of 141% (assuming I’ve got everything correct).

That’s not even assuming you have harmony rings on for some synergy bombing.

It’s the damage that’s the problem not the set.

.

1)This is an imaginary stacking potential, possible perhaps in an highly coordinated group(you forgot CP btw). But if we consider groups setup we can theorize tons of ridiculous group combos.

2)People tend to forget that going all in crit damage means sacrificing other stats. and BTW, If your pen is low, crits with Lover mundus will do more damage compared to crits with shadow mundus . Try it on golem if you don't believe. Not to mention the lost value when MA is on CD.

Xeniph

The fact is,

if you change it to back to a % chance to proc or a flat %value on proc, it will go back to the list of sets that are not used. Of which there a is already a huge list of.

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

What’s all this about 15s cooldown? The set has a 21s cooldown, and realistically closer to 22s between procs.

If it did have a 15-16s cooldown then I’d be fine with capping the additional crit chance given at around 40%.

The current cooldown is long enough that it’s very rare to see 2 procs while fighting a single opponent in PVP (maybe TTK increase changes this?). So reducing the cooldown would be more about making sure you’re ready for a subsequent opponent. In PVE the cooldown is more significant because uptime directly affects sustained damage.

The set does indeed have a practical 16 second CD. 5 seconds up-time, 16 seconds down. However you are right that it is rare to see it proc twice on the same target because most of the people wearing it are high risk, high reward playstyles.

In the off chance you do see it proc twice, it's not a sustained fight, but rather a total reset of the encounter.

The set is fine and it is outperformed by all sustained damage proc sets.

WrathOfInnos

Xeniph wrote: »

The fact is,

if you change it to back to a % chance to proc or a flat %value on proc, it will go back to the list of sets that are not used. Of which there a is already a huge list of.

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

What’s all this about 15s cooldown? The set has a 21s cooldown, and realistically closer to 22s between procs.

If it did have a 15-16s cooldown then I’d be fine with capping the additional crit chance given at around 40%.

The current cooldown is long enough that it’s very rare to see 2 procs while fighting a single opponent in PVP (maybe TTK increase changes this?). So reducing the cooldown would be more about making sure you’re ready for a subsequent opponent. In PVE the cooldown is more significant because uptime directly affects sustained damage.

The set does indeed have a practical 16 second CD. 5 seconds up-time, 16 seconds down. However you are right that it is rare to see it proc twice on the same target because most of the people wearing it are high risk, high reward playstyles.

In the off chance you do see it proc twice, it's not a sustained fight, but rather a total reset of the encounter.

The set is fine and it is outperformed by all sustained damage proc sets.

Maybe semantics, but I would call that 16s downtime. Similarly, I would say Blastbones has a 3-4s cooldown, and I think it would be wrong to say it has a 0s cooldown, even though a skilled Necro has little to no downtime with Blastbones.

Anyway, just didn’t want anyone reading this thread to think Acuity is active 5/16 seconds = 31% (which could potentially be overpowered on builds going from 10% to 100% crit). In reality it’s 5/21s = 23% max uptime. Not that any of this really matters when fights last <5s so it’s basically 100% uptime.

DrSlaughtr

The thing about acuity in how it is used the players purposefully time their bursts for the cooldown. So the up time is fine. You build your ulti. Wait for acquity to proc then pull back or hide and start counting. After 8 seconds you hit proxy and start your attack.

neferpitou73

Lughlongarm wrote: »

neferpitou73 wrote: »

Skoomah wrote: »

This set already has a 15 second cooldown. What more do you want?

Exactly it’s a really balanced set that takes a degree of skill to use in timing the burst windows. This issue is the sources of crit damage multipliers that are added is continuously increasing

-Major force (+20%)
-Minor force (+10%)
-Minor brittle (+10% taken)
-Major brittle (in the code but not added yet)
-Nightblade/Templar buff (+10%)
-Nightblade bow buff (+10%)
-Axes (+8%)
-shadow mundus (+11% assuming no divines)
-Khajiit (+12%)
-Base crit damage multimplier (+50%)

For a grand total of 141% (assuming I’ve got everything correct).

That’s not even assuming you have harmony rings on for some synergy bombing.

It’s the damage that’s the problem not the set.

.

1)This is an imaginary stacking potential, possible perhaps in an highly coordinated group(you forgot CP btw). But if we consider groups setup we can theorize tons of ridiculous group combos.

2)People tend to forget that going all in crit damage means sacrificing other stats. and BTW, If your pen is low, crits with Lover mundus will do more damage compared to crits with shadow mundus . Try it on golem if you don't believe. Not to mention the lost value when MA is on CD.

That's the thing tho, it's not theoretical, it is what the highest tier groups are running and they can get all those bonuses plus all of the weapon/spell bonuses like major/minor courage, sorcery and brutality plus (to your second point) they can stack all of the defensive buffs they want. The cooldown on MA does not matter because they can kill everything in one burst then kite away while the set is on cooldown. With regards to pen don't forget Balorgh in an ult dump scenario

On individual players I don't think the set is overperforming for the reasons you mention.

EDIT: As an aside here, I realize this might've come off as a whiny anti-ball group post. It's not, I'm just emphasizing how stacking the crit damage like this is affecting group combat.

divnyi

neferpitou73 wrote: »

Skoomah wrote: »

This set already has a 15 second cooldown. What more do you want?

Exactly it’s a really balanced set that takes a degree of skill to use in timing the burst windows. This issue is the sources of crit damage multipliers that are added is continuously increasing

-Major force (+20%)
-Minor force (+10%)
-Minor brittle (+10% taken)
-Major brittle (in the code but not added yet)
-Nightblade/Templar buff (+10%)
-Nightblade bow buff (+10%)
-Axes (+8%)
-shadow mundus (+11% assuming no divines)
-Khajiit (+12%)
-Base crit damage multimplier (+50%)

For a grand total of 141% (assuming I’ve got everything correct).

That’s not even assuming you have harmony rings on for some synergy bombing.

It’s the damage that’s the problem not the set.

.

It's the set that's the problem. Try running natural crit sets in PvP. They just don't work, all this sources of crit damage is not enough to make them work.

People aren't building crit damage in PvP unless that's acuity or cloak.

Skoomah

ANY damage procs it, so it’s actually hard to time the damage. If you miss your burst window of 5 seconds, then this set is useless 75% or 15 seconds at a time. 15 seconds in PvP is an eternity...

FENGRUSH

Skoomah wrote: »

ANY damage procs it, so it’s actually hard to time the damage. If you miss your burst window of 5 seconds, then this set is useless 75% or 15 seconds at a time. 15 seconds in PvP is an eternity...

Not in a meta where it's pretty easy to build out survival and not many pressure mechanics in place outside of burst.

divnyi

Skoomah wrote: »

ANY damage procs it, so it’s actually hard to time the damage. If you miss your burst window of 5 seconds, then this set is useless 75% or 15 seconds at a time. 15 seconds in PvP is an eternity...

Actually really easy if you have it only on one bar.

DrSlaughtr

divnyi wrote: »

Skoomah wrote: »

ANY damage procs it, so it’s actually hard to time the damage. If you miss your burst window of 5 seconds, then this set is useless 75% or 15 seconds at a time. 15 seconds in PvP is an eternity...

Actually really easy if you have it only on one bar.

^^^

neferpitou73

divnyi wrote: »

neferpitou73 wrote: »

Skoomah wrote: »

This set already has a 15 second cooldown. What more do you want?

Exactly it’s a really balanced set that takes a degree of skill to use in timing the burst windows. This issue is the sources of crit damage multipliers that are added is continuously increasing

-Major force (+20%)
-Minor force (+10%)
-Minor brittle (+10% taken)
-Major brittle (in the code but not added yet)
-Nightblade/Templar buff (+10%)
-Nightblade bow buff (+10%)
-Axes (+8%)
-shadow mundus (+11% assuming no divines)
-Khajiit (+12%)
-Base crit damage multimplier (+50%)

For a grand total of 141% (assuming I’ve got everything correct).

That’s not even assuming you have harmony rings on for some synergy bombing.

It’s the damage that’s the problem not the set.

.

It's the set that's the problem. Try running natural crit sets in PvP. They just don't work, all this sources of crit damage is not enough to make them work.

People aren't building crit damage in PvP unless that's acuity or cloak.

I had a natural crit build a couple patches ago, worked fine. The reason they don't work great now is ZOS decided to reduce crit chance for whatever reason. That's a ZOS problem not a MA problem.

MA itself has been in the game since Clockwork City, so 2-3years now? I never heard of it until about a year ago when Icehouse started running it on his bomber. The reason it's getting so much more attention is the increased damage crit can deal. That's not just due to all the sources of crit dmg mentioned above, but due to the free 1k spell and weapon damage ZOS gave (their cited reason for the 10% mitigation increase, but that's another story altogether). That allowed people to run MA instead of the more stat based sets they used to run. If they lowered crit damage by 15-20% the problem with MA goes away (via a buff to impen so it doesn't affect pve).

divnyi

neferpitou73 wrote: »

MA itself has been in the game since Clockwork City, so 2-3years now? I never heard of it until about a year ago

Because it had like 10-15% chance to proc from direct damages, resulting in much less uptime and, more importantly, absolutely unpredictable. I was running it back then before changes and I slotted in on my snipeblade after that, I don't see a reason to swap it out any time soon, it is best burst set possible.

That's not just due to all the sources of crit dmg mentioned above, but due to the free 1k spell and weapon damage ZOS gave

They nerfed snipe the very same patch. Only outstanding gameplay is bomber, and they are reworking it now again this patch.

(via a buff to impen so it doesn't affect pve)

We already had a period in this game when everyone run impen trait without any variation. You want that again?

Crit damage is already -20% for all players.

You don't get average crit mod that would be comparable to slotting pure damage sets. You don't get the flexibility of slotting damage and defensive set, because crits require full dedication. Crit% + Critdamage builds are non-existent in PvP.

Crit damage is not the problem. Free crits are. They are burst in the purest form. OP is correct.

universal_wrath

Top Coordinate groups can busrt anything even if they are,running full defensive sets. What make them strong is being able to kite and ulti dump at same time, MA is just cherry on top for them. If the issue is concerning vall groups, all you havr to do is foght in open field and sustain CC, play attrition war with them and evantually they either get wiped or run away. Playing right into their hand wouldn't do any good.

From personal exp of playing BGs for 2 yeats now, only nightblade and few stamsorcs use it. I almost never seen any other class use it. It is major red flag with proc and player see it proc theur immediate response is back bar block/ heal/ roll and stun, atleast for most exp players. You really need to catch someone off gaurd to kill them with MA because it is useless out side of proc

Gaggin

The real crazy part is theres all these crit damage buffs that are so easy to stack all on one build but no way to mitigate that damage without painstakingly retraiting your armor...

mikey_reach

Crazy how the set has been the same for years and now all the sudden its op. The only reason why acuity is the way it is now is because of 3 things, the nerf to crit chance, the nerf to impen, and the accessibility of crit damage modifiers. All these things combined cause acuity’s effectiveness to skyrocket in pvp i mean literally any class can use it very well hell my magplar and stamsorc use the same setup. Acuity,balorgh and dragurkin and best part is that acuity buffs dragurkin since it benefits from crit damage

WrathOfInnos

Gaggin wrote: »

The real crazy part is theres all these crit damage buffs that are so easy to stack all on one build but no way to mitigate that damage without painstakingly retraiting your armor...

What will it take for players to start using Impen again? Buff it back up to 172 per piece, or all the way to 258?