The state of Empower

xthrshx

End game trials are now less accessible for newer and inexperienced players. Removing empower as a useful trial buff isn’t helping them. If that was their intent, they’re woefully off the mark.

merpins

It's a dead buff for 99% of players, even though it's such a common buff. I understand the intent, but I also understand that their reasoning os flawed.

Billium813

merpins wrote: »

It's a dead buff for 99% of players, even though it's such a common buff. I understand the intent, but I also understand that their reasoning os flawed.

IMO, they had three options:

1. Remove it from the game
2. Make it incredibly niche
3. Change it entirely

Option 1 would look too bad and option 3 would take too much work. They went with option 2, which I think is the easiest, but also the laziest option. But even option 2 "requires" further changes to sets and skills that used to push the buff on content (like trial sets and LA sets/skills!), and they didn't do those changes.

"Meh, let's just throw out some duration extensions on some skills, that'll fix it". That rationale is emblematic of the ENTIRETY OF U35! All surface intention, no deeper thought.

VaranisArano

amgame308_ESO wrote: »

Billium813 wrote: »

amgame308_ESO wrote: »

Billium813 wrote: »

jaws343 wrote: »

So yeah, an optimized trial group has no need for it. And that is fine because that is the point. But, players who want to run heavy attack spam builds will find this to be a huge buff.

Aegis of Galenwe is trial gear though. But now Empower isn't applicable to trials groups?

The original point WAS for Empower to be a trials buff for LA weaving. So they added Empower to all these skills and abilities. It was too strong or rather created too much of a skill gap for new players, so they abandoned it.
Now, Empower has morphed into a non-Trials buff mostly applicable to solo, sorc summoner, low DPS builds. But we are left with all these skills where Empower was meant to be used with! They aren't going to move Empower around to be on skills where it is applicable though

Do you have a thread from ESO that states Empower was for LA weaving?

Disclaimer: The storied history of Empower is long and cumbersome. There used to be Major/Minor Empower, it used to buff your next attack (not just LA/HA) specifically, and there were even stacks of Empower. It has been changed multiple times in all kinds of versions. When I said "original point", I will admit I was embellishing since the whole buff has been changing repeatedly since 2015 down to what we have now.

I couldn't find a specific post that stated "Empower is for weaving". The best I could find is an old PTS update from 2018 that specifically changed Empower to target LA (https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/413283/pc-mac-patch-notes-v4-0-5-summerset-amp-update-18). However, in my opinion, it feels pretty obvious if you just look at the updates they have done to it and what skills/sets they put it on that it's expected to be used with weaving. The current incarnation, on Live, buffs LA/HA damage... who would care about that other than 1) new players, 2) weaving ?

It's on Aegis of Galenwe, which is a trials set, so they must expect it to have end game potential. What would be the point of giving 11 allies Empower to buff their LA/HA damage if not for weaving? You expecting the DPS in your raid to just start spamming LAs & HAs when they get the buff? Unless you buff the damage +200%, no one is going to do that b/c it'd be a DPS loss. Yes, LA/HA could fit into a rotation as a regular action, but that's essentially "weaving", just slower and less potential for damage.

They actually referenced light attack weaving in those notes. I'll agree with you on Empower at this point. My whole argument was LA weaving was never intended. Now those sets are seemingly useless.

Now I really don't understand what they are doing. Why change it? To give low end players a chance at content? I thought that was what the normal modes were for. You still get to see it but you just can't get the best gear because you're not one of the best players. Oh well. I'll still play the game. Maybe just a different direction because of some new devs.

It's kind of irrelevant that Light Attack weaving wasn't intended from the beginning when ZOS has since told players to do it in a Level Up Advisor tooltip.

Nathyiel

Billium813 wrote: »

merpins wrote: »

It's a dead buff for 99% of players, even though it's such a common buff. I understand the intent, but I also understand that their reasoning os flawed.

IMO, they had three options:

1. Remove it from the game
2. Make it incredibly niche
3. Change it entirely

Option 1 would look too bad and option 3 would take too much work. They went with option 2, which I think is the easiest, but also the laziest option. But even option 2 "requires" further changes to sets and skills that used to push the buff on content (like trial sets and LA sets/skills!), and they didn't do those changes.

"Meh, let's just throw out some duration extensions on some skills, that'll fix it". That rationale is emblematic of the ENTIRETY OF U35! All surface intention, no deeper thought.

answers #4 : keep Empower as Heavy Attack only. remove weaving. change some spam skill to replace Light attack. change other skill for short cooldown/proc/reactive ability/...

Billium813

Nathyiel wrote: »

Billium813 wrote: »

merpins wrote: »

It's a dead buff for 99% of players, even though it's such a common buff. I understand the intent, but I also understand that their reasoning os flawed.

IMO, they had three options:

1. Remove it from the game
2. Make it incredibly niche
3. Change it entirely

answers #4 : keep Empower as Heavy Attack only. remove weaving. change some spam skill to replace Light attack. change other skill for short cooldown/proc/reactive ability/...

Your option 4 is my option 2. Moving Empower to only fully charged HAs IS making it an incredibly niche buff that 99% of players doesn't care about. Yes, they removed it from being used in weaving. That was probably a good thing, but they changed to something no one cares about. The only people spamming fully charged HAs are new players and players that passed out with their finger on the button. It's such a DPS loss to do fully charged HAs that no one will bother.

hisoka

if you are doing any hard content you will not benefit from it at all now its a useless buff