Siege weapons are incredibly underpowered.

Supershutze

Given the time it takes to set them up, the relative clumsiness of doing so, the user's vulnerability, and the low rate of fire, siege weapons are basically useless outside of knocking down gates.

There's only really 4 siege weapons you ever see in any numbers; basic and fire ballistas, rams, and oil. All the other siege is very rare, mostly because it's useless in 99% of scenarios, owing entirely to it's very low power.

Pretty much the only thing siege is any good at is knocking down doors and destroying other siege. Killing players is something that almost never happens, *despite there being siege specifically intended for use on other players.*

Given that siege weapon's attacks are telegraphed, the time it takes for the shot to arrive, and the time it takes to actually set one up, they need to do a **lot** more damage. Getting hit by one needs to be a game changing event, not something you can just brush off.

This goes double for the siege with secondary effects, like lightning ballistas or ice trebuchets; their secondary effects are barely noticeable.

Groups currently can just stand in oil, ignoring the golden rule of spacing, easily outhealing incoming damage, with the only real consequence being having to occasionally replace the ram.

Possible solutions? Significantly increase siege damage. Have siege ignore armour and resistances. Have siege apply significant uncleansable debuffs based on the siege. Remove siege telegraphing. All of the above.

Extinct_Solo_Player

Supershutze wrote: »

Given the time it takes to set them up, the relative clumsiness of doing so, the user's vulnerability, and the low rate of fire, siege weapons are basically useless outside of knocking down gates.

There's only really 4 siege weapons you ever see in any numbers; basic and fire ballistas, rams, and oil. All the other siege is very rare, mostly because it's useless in 99% of scenarios, owing entirely to it's very low power.

Pretty much the only thing siege is any good at is knocking down doors and destroying other siege. Killing players is something that almost never happens, *despite there being siege specifically intended for use on other players.*

Given that siege weapon's attacks are telegraphed, the time it takes for the shot to arrive, and the time it takes to actually set one up, they need to do a **lot** more damage. Getting hit by one needs to be a game changing event, not something you can just brush off.

This goes double for the siege with secondary effects, like lightning ballistas or ice trebuchets; their secondary effects are barely noticeable.

Groups currently can just stand in oil, ignoring the golden rule of spacing, easily outhealing incoming damage, with the only real consequence being having to occasionally replace the ram.

Possible solutions? Significantly increase siege damage. Have siege ignore armour and resistances. Have siege apply significant uncleansable debuffs based on the siege. Remove siege telegraphing. All of the above.

Supershutze

[/quote]

Terrified people might actually start using siege weapons?

It's not like they could ever be considered overpowered, given their enormous limitations.

It's also a way of countering ball groups that can't really be co-opted by ball groups themselves.

EdmondDontes

Or is it that cross healing is so OP so it seems like siege is under powered?

starlizard70ub17_ESO

Just last week people were complaining about siege was so over powered.

xylena_lazarow

starlizard70ub17_ESO wrote: »

Just last week people were complaining about siege was so over powered.

The only players complaining about siege are the players who think they should be allowed to stand in red. Oddly enough, this group consists of both ultra-casuals who don't want to learn, and mega-tryhards who for some reason think their "skill" should allow them to engage in anti-skill gameplay like face-tanking and standing in red. How terrible it must be to actually have to pay attention to your surroundings, or give casuals a realistic chance to end the fight...

Most siege engines are extremely underpowered and may as well not exist. The game points new Cyro players towards Normal Fire Ballista as the default siege, and these are extremely weak and useless. The slow effect from Oil Catapults and Ice Trebs is trivially countered. I can solo out-heal a Coldfire Ballista hit on a vampire just by spamming Coag Blood, to say nothing of the groups that stack hundreds of times the healing that one player's one skill can.

Buffing siege would probably be the best way to shake up a stale large scale meta, so that groups or zergs of every skill level are forced to develop more interesting strategies than blobbing together and stacking a million heals.

Necrotech_Master

if i am for whatever reason in a low pop campaign and im soloing a outpost (and i have done this before lol), i usually prefer using 2 stone trebs to beat down the door

i would agree that most siege is just way too weak by itself, the only time they become remotely threatening is high dmg ones like oils when you already have a lot of incoming dmg on a toon that doesnt have great self healing)

as a stam NB, my only real heals are dark cloak, and resolving vigor to have something powerful enough to mostly counter those, the coldfire ones and oil are still rough and sometimes require me using a healing pot in addition to the skill healing if i have no outside source of healing

that being said i have seen many a times where i pop someone with siege and they immediately heal up from it (the one thing i have learned is that siege can technically still trigger occult overload lol, even though they dont proc gear procs lol)

xFocused

Siege is absolutely underpowered. The only ones who complain about the siege are the ones who think they should be able to stand in a red zone and not take any damage.

However, if myself and other players have a killbox set up on the keep front door; IE: Meatbags hitting the entrance with oils...enemies should not be able to just stroll through that AoE damage and take hardly any damage. Either cross healing is too OP or the siege damage is too underpowered. What's the point of using meatbags and oils if they aren't going to deal enough damage to push back enemies?

Holycannoli

xFocused wrote: »

Siege is absolutely underpowered. The only ones who complain about the siege are the ones who think they should be able to stand in a red zone and not take any damage.

However, if myself and other players have a killbox set up on the keep front door; IE: Meatbags hitting the entrance with oils...enemies should not be able to just stroll through that AoE damage and take hardly any damage. Either cross healing is too OP or the siege damage is too underpowered. What's the point of using meatbags and oils if they aren't going to deal enough damage to push back enemies?

Cross healing is too OP. That's basically it.

I do think siege is underpowered - I mean you don't often even see siege shields anymore - but cross healing is totally out of control.

xFocused

Holycannoli wrote: »

xFocused wrote: »

Siege is absolutely underpowered. The only ones who complain about the siege are the ones who think they should be able to stand in a red zone and not take any damage.

However, if myself and other players have a killbox set up on the keep front door; IE: Meatbags hitting the entrance with oils...enemies should not be able to just stroll through that AoE damage and take hardly any damage. Either cross healing is too OP or the siege damage is too underpowered. What's the point of using meatbags and oils if they aren't going to deal enough damage to push back enemies?

Cross healing is too OP. That's basically it.

I do think siege is underpowered - I mean you don't often even see siege shields anymore - but cross healing is totally out of control.

Exactly. I never see zergs running siege shield anymore because well....oils just don't do the damage, lol. Sure, most players roll dodge out of them but even when you are dropping oils on them, they can withstand it

DaisyRay

Just buff the normal siege then?

I am often getting one shotted by lancers and it's very bothersome. I go to do some harmless pvdoor and get killed by a lancer from out of no where. It's really rude.

BoraxFlux

Sieges i.m.*** are a great part of tactics. Supporting groundtroops and layering with other sieges. That combination can make them quite powerful.

Lynxyn

They just need to buff healing reductions and offer more ways to apply them and buff siege. Removing crosshealing deletes the healer/support playstyle that people enjoy even if you don't.

OBJnoob

I don’t think the damage really needs to be buffed but I agree it seems largely ineffective sometimes. Knee jerk fix— make all siege unable to be purged and see how it goes. Because 3 oils is PLENTY of damage to be honest, and yes cross healing is strong, but it’d cost a lot more sustain if you literally had to straight up heal it out. Making it just go away is the real tragedy. Make siege unpurgable OR put a cool down on certain synergies. Maybe you can only purify (off someone else’s synergy anyway,) once every 15 seconds or something. I think anything in this realm would be a good roundabout way to “buff siege,” without making it too strong. Might also help dots be more viable and plaguebreak be less detrimental.

Anyways… the reason I say that instead of just outright buff the damage is because I play in the no cp campaign and I think it already works a little better here than for some of you playing in gray host. As some people have already said, working in concert some oils/meat bags/and whatever else can set up a heck of a kill box in keep defenses. Isn’t that enough? Does it really need to be so strong that it, from 60+ yards away up in a safe tower, can seriously endanger a solo players life? Isn’t it enough that it works great against doors and other siege? Focusing the other teams siege is an infuriatingly effective way to stall out fights.

Sandman929

Like it or not, Cyrodiil is a game of siege and it needs to be impactful. I agree with others that the problem is cross healing...for the most part I feel like siege does plenty of damage against targets that aren't stacking healing

Tevalicious

Supershutze wrote: »

Given the time it takes to set them up, the relative clumsiness of doing so, the user's vulnerability, and the low rate of fire, siege weapons are basically useless outside of knocking down gates.

There's only really 4 siege weapons you ever see in any numbers; basic and fire ballistas, rams, and oil. All the other siege is very rare, mostly because it's useless in 99% of scenarios, owing entirely to it's very low power.

Pretty much the only thing siege is any good at is knocking down doors and destroying other siege. Killing players is something that almost never happens, *despite there being siege specifically intended for use on other players.*

Given that siege weapon's attacks are telegraphed, the time it takes for the shot to arrive, and the time it takes to actually set one up, they need to do a **lot** more damage. Getting hit by one needs to be a game changing event, not something you can just brush off.

This goes double for the siege with secondary effects, like lightning ballistas or ice trebuchets; their secondary effects are barely noticeable.

Groups currently can just stand in oil, ignoring the golden rule of spacing, easily outhealing incoming damage, with the only real consequence being having to occasionally replace the ram.

Possible solutions? Significantly increase siege damage. Have siege ignore armour and resistances. Have siege apply significant uncleansable debuffs based on the siege. Remove siege telegraphing. All of the above.

Please name 1 skill that is a huge AOE and does 25-35k damage or more that you can use every 5-10 seconds... i will wait.

OtarTheMad

The issue is ZOS would see a thread like this and take it that healing needs to be nerfed, again, but that's not the problem. The problem is stacking. HoTs shouldn't stack in PvP. You make it so you can only have one HoT on you at a time and that could make a dent in some groups and siege begins to matter.

Supershutze

OtarTheMad wrote: »

The issue is ZOS would see a thread like this and take it that healing needs to be nerfed, again, but that's not the problem. The problem is stacking. HoTs shouldn't stack in PvP. You make it so you can only have one HoT on you at a time and that could make a dent in some groups and siege begins to matter.

The problem is that heals are way too powerful.

And they're way too powerful because the base tooltip is much higher than a skill that does damage, there's no effective way to counter or mitigate healing, and healing scales off the same stats that damage does, meaning players get it for free.

Stacking makes an awful problem worse, but it's not the cause.

Elendir2am

"Healing is too powerful" is conditioned by PvP/PvE. PvE is still balanced with PvP.

For example, you have mechanic in vKA, which do 10k damage small AoE to every player. Players couldn't be stacked (only 1 AoE on each) and Healers need to be able to heal them through whole executive phase.

At same time, you need situation, when siege weapons can harm group with healing, if you have some focused fire. I don't think, that one hit from siege weapon should be untackleable.

Syrusthevirus187

Siege damage is fine.
It's just irrelevant when everyone has 43 radiant Regens and other hots all going on from randoms who are watching Disney plus and pushing one button.
Maybe take away the red circle telegraphing it.

EF321

Cold fire sieges and oils with Elf bane can hurt a lot.

This isn't even a great example I just recorded, but you can notice how it is way better than regular shots:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mMpvUzs2D00

Tberg725

I’ve yet to see people get threw our kill boxes set up when people try to come threw the front door but I do run with a pvp guild and we set up the right siege

I can’t even tell ya how many people I’ve seen shoot a fire ballista at a door or a regular ballista at people

Jaimeh

Tell that to the stone treb that doesn't even have a telegraph and one shots

jaws343

xFocused wrote: »

Holycannoli wrote: »

xFocused wrote: »

Siege is absolutely underpowered. The only ones who complain about the siege are the ones who think they should be able to stand in a red zone and not take any damage.

However, if myself and other players have a killbox set up on the keep front door; IE: Meatbags hitting the entrance with oils...enemies should not be able to just stroll through that AoE damage and take hardly any damage. Either cross healing is too OP or the siege damage is too underpowered. What's the point of using meatbags and oils if they aren't going to deal enough damage to push back enemies?

Cross healing is too OP. That's basically it.

I do think siege is underpowered - I mean you don't often even see siege shields anymore - but cross healing is totally out of control.

Exactly. I never see zergs running siege shield anymore because well....oils just don't do the damage, lol. Sure, most players roll dodge out of them but even when you are dropping oils on them, they can withstand it

I actually think less people run Siege Shield because it's effectiveness is in a non-mobile position. Which, because certain siege are actually pretty strong at the moment, sitting under a Siege Shield is just asking to be killed.

A well placed Lancer or Cold Fire ballista can wipe an attacking/defending group fairly effectively. I had a few of these moments during the event, where 1 Lancer shot was enough pressure to push an entire group trying to break a siege into execute range, leading to their complete wipe.

Necrotech_Master

the most effective sieges would be:

• oils
• coldfire ballista
• coldfire treb

coldstone treb can hit very hard but with no dot component wont really kill players unless they have less than like 26k hp or already hurt

the rest of them do such low dmg it can be easily healed through/ignored

geonsocal

cold-fire plus elf bane - noted...

(2 items) Adds 1096 Maximum Magicka
(3 items) Adds 129 Weapon and Spell Damage
(4 items) Adds 129 Weapon and Spell Damage
(5 items) While in combat, increases the duration of your Flame Damage over Time abilities by 5 seconds. This effect does not work with beam or channeled effects.

does it work with flaming oil also?

i'm guessing all of our champion points "interact" with siege weapons too?

biminirwb17_ESO

There is an area by the front door of every keep where even a squishy vamp NB can stand, be counted as on the RAM and the oils miss. Just up to people to find it. This is why many experienced groups seem to stand in oils - the oil doesn't hit them.

EF321

geonsocal wrote: »

cold-fire plus elf bane - noted...

(2 items) Adds 1096 Maximum Magicka
(3 items) Adds 129 Weapon and Spell Damage
(4 items) Adds 129 Weapon and Spell Damage
(5 items) While in combat, increases the duration of your Flame Damage over Time abilities by 5 seconds. This effect does not work with beam or channeled effects.

does it work with flaming oil also?

i'm guessing all of our champion points "interact" with siege weapons too?

No, not just cold fire, but all siege fire dots, this includes regular fire ballistas/trebs and oils. It just makes sense using more powerful ballistas and trebs if you are going for such specialized build Oils are really good.

To my knowledge nothing can directly improve siege damage, tested with CP stars, Deadly, Necro Dot passive, DK flame passive.

So, Elf Bane alone is biggest contributor to making your sieges better, but there are several extras that you can add for more oomph here and there:
- Vicious death is quite popular, so you likely already know it procs on siege kills as well
- So does Occult Overload if they have status effect
- Siege dot can apply burning status effect, so holding charged weapon will greatly increase the chance. Extra dot - extra kill potential
- Elf bane will extend burning status by 5 seconds as well! Making it even more likely that they will have status effect on death
- DK passives boost burning damage, as well as VD proc damage
- Healing Done stat increases amount of repairs you do to siege/walls/etc, so backbar powered weapon can save you some time, DK's fragmented shield gives major mending too
- Earthgore has healing done line too, and it's proc will remove meatbag poo under your feet, so you can stay on siege longer
- Add siege shield, purge, volcanic rune / lightweight trap, blinding flare to protect yourself


And that's the "siege build"

geonsocal

@EF321 thank you so much for the info, super helpful

a lot of folks get emotional discussing stuff that kills them in game, i really appreciate you taking the time to share that guidance...

some folks tend to look at siege as cheap, no-skill kills...i love using siege, particularly in open field AvA melees...

i thought VD did not proc off siege? are you sure?

EF321

geonsocal wrote: »

@EF321 thank you so much for the info, super helpful

a lot of folks get emotional discussing stuff that kills them in game, i really appreciate you taking the time to share that guidance...

some folks tend to look at siege as cheap, no-skill kills...i love using siege, particularly in open field AvA melees...

i thought VD did not proc off siege? are you sure?

Yes, definitely sure about VD. I rewatched clip I posted, unfortunately most died behind cover or off screen it seems, but normally I see people dying and VD going off, as well as kills in kill feed made by VD proc, when all I do is siege.

At 0:58 you can see one proc going off, at least partially:



Here at 2:13 these lower direct damage numbers around 5k are VD proc (with OO being that 12800 fixed number and many small dots are burning thanks to charged weapon mostly, big dot tick should be person that detonated the crowd and I suspect that it is lower than usual cecause they are necro with dot resistance passive, but not sure here, still curious about it):



There is a video in other thread around here where a person is procing VD off themselves by dying to ravage health potion, and it does damage to enemy, any "kill" by you counts. I also have strong suspicion that VD will go off if teammate dies to chaosball you are carrying, but it is very hard to test

TechMaybeHic

I think siege is fine at the top end. Some of the siege at the low end like lightning ballista could be better. It's bad enough you approach a keep with 6-8 and players opt to siege and not push out until one side suddenly has a zerg. If both get a zerg, you already have to practically beg people to push out or in. Just sieging back and forth through a hole.