What Happened To Longer Buff Timers U35?

ThirdEye_PULSE

Here is an excerpt from July 6th wherein the developers talked about their goals for u35:

QUOTE

"As such, coming in Update 35, we are increasing the duration of many of these effects in game, primarily damage over time, buffs, and debuffs. By extending the duration, we hope to reduce the stress of many combat rotations, allowing for you to focus more on the action in front of you rather than the action of juggling buffs and debuffs on your ability bar and making the game far more accessible."

Here is the link to that PTS preview from developers:

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/610438/update-35-combat-preview




What happened to the proposed changes for personal buff timers lasting longer in U35?

Out of all the changes, that was the only one I was really excited about.

Its standard for most MMOs to have long buff timers. I remember selling buffs on EQ as a druid because they would last a half hour so people would buy them to be faster.

I dont think it fits the theme of ESO to have 30 minute buffs. But personal buffs that lasted a minute? Why not? I cant see any downside to personal buffs lasting a minute, unlike the downside i see to DoTs lasting 20 seconds and doing less dmg.

Ksariyu

There are two big reasons I wish they wouldn't extend buff/DoT timers (And why I think they could actually be shorter).

1. This is an action-combat game with a limited hotbar. You only get five active skills per bar, so those five skills better feel impactful and useful. Once you start hitting 30+ seconds on a skill duration, it begins to feel more like a passive skill rather than an active one, and its value feels diminished. Rather than a skill where the player has to pay attention to the situation and determine when a buff would provide the most benefit, it turns into something where you're expected to just have 100% uptime on it, at which point it's not really an active effect anymore. It's the same reason why I think skills like Inner Light and Bird of Prey are boring and should be re-evaluated.
2. Skills with these mid-length durations start to become harder to track during longer fights. At least with the 30-minute buffs of other MMOs you can just kind of forget it once it's applied, and with the 3-5 second effects of MOBAs you're more actively looking for opportunities to use them. At 30 seconds to a minute, I find it just long enough to start escaping my attention but short enough that I'm always breaking my rhythm to barswap and reapply. This is compounded by the fact that most buffs/debuffs are pretty much impossible to track visually in-game, and require constantly scanning the massive list of timers at the bottom of my screen, which is about the most un-immersive thing I can think of to do mid-combat in an action game.

That said, you weren't dreaming. Doubling the timers on most DoTs and HoTs was part of the first week's PTS patch.

ThirdEye_PULSE

Ksariyu wrote: »

There are two big reasons I wish they wouldn't extend buff/DoT timers (And why I think they could actually be shorter).

1. This is an action-combat game with a limited hotbar. You only get five active skills per bar, so those five skills better feel impactful and useful. Once you start hitting 30+ seconds on a skill duration, it begins to feel more like a passive skill rather than an active one, and its value feels diminished. Rather than a skill where the player has to pay attention to the situation and determine when a buff would provide the most benefit, it turns into something where you're expected to just have 100% uptime on it, at which point it's not really an active effect anymore. It's the same reason why I think skills like Inner Light and Bird of Prey are boring and should be re-evaluated.
2. Skills with these mid-length durations start to become harder to track during longer fights. At least with the 30-minute buffs of other MMOs you can just kind of forget it once it's applied, and with the 3-5 second effects of MOBAs you're more actively looking for opportunities to use them. At 30 seconds to a minute, I find it just long enough to start escaping my attention but short enough that I'm always breaking my rhythm to barswap and reapply. This is compounded by the fact that most buffs/debuffs are pretty much impossible to track visually in-game, and require constantly scanning the massive list of timers at the bottom of my screen, which is about the most un-immersive thing I can think of to do mid-combat in an action game.

That said, you weren't dreaming. Doubling the timers on most DoTs and HoTs was part of the first week's PTS patch.

I think of buffs as passive. I keep 100% uptime on all my buffs, especially pvp. At no point do i question "is this the right situation for a buff?" At no point do i think that will ever change... even short duration buffs. Youd either drop it for a more reliable uptime buff if you need higher uptime or you use it in certain situations like stamden doing chaosball BG where wings is amazing.

So i suppose your right about that. Shorter acting buffs which are more like buffs you use situationally should be kept as short timer buffs. But buffs that are expected to always be active like armor buff could easily be extended in duration and would make things smoother. You could focus on outputting more dmg rather than keeping your buffs that are supposed to ALWAYS be active up.

Im not a fan of longer DoT durations. I like rotations and the action of combat. Im fine with buffs the way they are now but if I had to choose one thing for U35 it would have been longer buffs, not DoTs. I personally think longer buffs do more for immersion into combat that the developers want than tweaking anything else.

Hmm. I mean as it is im always glued to either my duration reminder add on or my bottom skill bar where ive changed settings so that it shows seconds and appears above the skillbar when you swap bars. Unless im pvping then i dont have that luxury and it becomes more so muscle memory.

I dont think it would make it harder to have a longer buff to keep it up in my rotation. Some buffs are so short i have to barswap mid pvp combat just to activate that buff and get back to my frontbar. Which is fine im used to it. Just feels very unnecessary at times just to make combat feel more involved.

Im thinking longer duration buffs is going to come in next patch most likely. Probably put it on the backburner because they were focused on the more problematic changes like DoTs.

Nathyiel

I differentiate a few things.

• Maintenance Buff. push a button every 20s/30s for a passive effect with a bonus.But compared to "while slotted", the buff apply to the bar too since it a buff with duration. So having longer duration is good.
• DoT/Hot. In PvP, increasing duration without changing global damage is a nerf.

ThirdEye_PULSE

Nathyiel wrote: »

I differentiate a few things.

• Maintenance Buff. push a button every 20s/30s for a passive effect with a bonus.But compared to "while slotted", the buff apply to the bar too since it a buff with duration. So having longer duration is good.
• DoT/Hot. In PvP, increasing duration without changing global damage is a nerf.

Agreed.

As Ksariyu pointed out, we could break down buffs into two categories as well.

-Situational buffs like wings for Warden. Probably best for those to be short timer.

-Buffs that are calculated into a build with 100% uptime or as near to it as you can manage. These buffs would be beneficial to be on a longer timer.

Longer sticky DoTs on the other hand without equivalent damage to live is a nerf any way you look at it.

Worse, in PVP it threatens to make all sticky DoTs useless just like most static DoTs are on live in most situations. So with DoT changes theyve effectively taken away build diversity. You cant build for static dots in most situations. Now sticky dots are probably going to be useless considering dmg nerf and battle spirit.

I can safely say that the destructiveness to playstyles and diversity in how you play the game wouldnt be effected by raising the duration of most buffs. I cannot say the same for DoTs.

DrSlaughtr

It was the best thing in the update. I'm disappointed they removed it without even saying why.

Having to pop a 3k to 4k buff skill every 20 seconds is one of the reasons why people went oakensoul, and one of the reasons why the ring outperformed because of the drastic difference in sustain.

ThirdEye_PULSE

ninjagank wrote: »

It was the best thing in the update. I'm disappointed they removed it without even saying why.

Having to pop a 3k to 4k buff skill every 20 seconds is one of the reasons why people went oakensoul, and one of the reasons why the ring outperformed because of the drastic difference in sustain.

I was just looking through Reddit today in posts comparing ESO to other MMOs. I saw one year old posts with people talking about ESO combat as: 90% of the time buffing, 10% casting spammables.

Obviously thats a huge exaggeration. However, it does show that many MMO players that have played ESO dont understand why activating your buffs every 10-20 seconds is part of the combat system.

Wish we could get an explanation for why they wanted to do this change and then never talked about it again. This patch cycle has been weird man.

WrathOfInnos

Some of the buff timers were appropriately extended. Molten Weapons, Channeled Acceleration and Radiant Aura all went to 60s. Boundless Storm, Quick Cloak and Ice Fortress were extended to 30s.

It seems many others were forgotten though. I'd like to see longer durations (maybe 60s) on:
- Betty Netch
- Sap Essence
- Spiked Armor
- Green Lotus
- Bound Armaments
- Rune Focus
- Blur
- Mark Target
- Elemental Drain
- Bone Armor
- Momentum
- Siphoning Strikes
- Force Siphon

I'd also like to see longer durations on temporary summons, including:
- Summon Shade
- Skeletal Mage
- Spirit Mender
- Storm Atronach (it is too short on PTS, fine on live)

I would personally draw the line there, and would not extend durations on other skills such as:
- Flames of Oblivion
- Solar Barrage
- Bird of Prey
- Combat Prayer
- Dark Exchange

I would also like to see the duration change to Deep Fissure reverted. 9s is not helpful in any rotation, floor or ceiling. Warden needs to keep its 3s rhythm, and overcasting every 3s is a large DPS loss given that most of the damage is loaded into the 2nd delayed hit.

I could be wrong about which skills were already extended, patch notes are pretty unclear and this is from memory on PTS.

Firstmep

Beacuse despite the multiple post claiming they wanted to raise the floor, this patch was just an excuse to nerf the top end and try to reign in power creep.
I was actually looking forward to longer armor buffs for example, and that's the one thing that made sense in the original combat preview in terms of raising the floor.
But, of course, it's the one thing that didnt make the cut.
All the nerfs did.

ThirdEye_PULSE

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

Some of the buff timers were appropriately extended. Molten Weapons, Channeled Acceleration and Radiant Aura all went to 60s. Boundless Storm, Quick Cloak and Ice Fortress were extended to 30s.

It seems many others were forgotten though. I'd like to see longer durations (maybe 60s) on:
- Betty Netch
- Sap Essence
- Spiked Armor
- Green Lotus
- Bound Armaments
- Rune Focus
- Blur
- Mark Target
- Elemental Drain
- Bone Armor
- Momentum

I'd also like to see longer durations on temporary summons, including:
- Summon Shade
- Skeletal Mage
- Spirit Mender
- Storm Atronach (it is too short on PTS, fine on live)

I would personally draw the line there, and would not extend durations on other skills such as:
- Flames of Oblivion
- Solar Barrage
- Bird of Prey

I would also like to see the duration change to Deep Fissure reverted. 9s is not helpful in any rotation, floor or ceiling. Warden needs to keep its 3s rhythm, and overcasting every 3s is a large DPS loss given that most of the damage is loaded into the 2nd delayed hit.

I could be wrong about which skills were already extended, patch notes are pretty unclear and this is from memory on PTS.

I agree with this. Thanks for your comprehensive post. Some good work.

DrSlaughtr

ThirdEye_PULSE wrote: »

ninjagank wrote: »

It was the best thing in the update. I'm disappointed they removed it without even saying why.

Having to pop a 3k to 4k buff skill every 20 seconds is one of the reasons why people went oakensoul, and one of the reasons why the ring outperformed because of the drastic difference in sustain.

I was just looking through Reddit today in posts comparing ESO to other MMOs. I saw one year old posts with people talking about ESO combat as: 90% of the time buffing, 10% casting spammables.

Obviously thats a huge exaggeration. However, it does show that many MMO players that have played ESO dont understand why activating your buffs every 10-20 seconds is part of the combat system.

Wish we could get an explanation for why they wanted to do this change and then never talked about it again. This patch cycle has been weird man.

I have to spend 40% of my mag and 30% of my stamina just to buff up before attacking.

Channeled Acceleration
Focus
Leeching strikes
Forward Momentum
Shadowy Disguise

Major force on channeled is 32 seconds but the major expedition is only 12. Everyone is faster than you can sneak in pvp without it, so good luck attacking and escaping without it.

Focus has a wonderful ability to just drop because you suddenly leave combat even though you're surrounded by enemies.

Leeching strikes has to a 20 second resource return instead of just being a larger per second tick.

Forward momentum is a great morph with a 40 second timer BUT when you use vat 2h the timer on it still only lasts 20 seconds, so if you are trying to save your damage buff you still have to refresh momentum every 20 seconds.

Then shadowy for resolve and stealth crit, which of course is notoriously expensive despite what other players think.

So it would be nice if at least one or two of those were extended. Hell, if they just made vat 2h last the full momentum duration I'd feel rich with stamina.

ThirdEye_PULSE

ninjagank wrote: »

ThirdEye_PULSE wrote: »

ninjagank wrote: »

It was the best thing in the update. I'm disappointed they removed it without even saying why.

Having to pop a 3k to 4k buff skill every 20 seconds is one of the reasons why people went oakensoul, and one of the reasons why the ring outperformed because of the drastic difference in sustain.

I was just looking through Reddit today in posts comparing ESO to other MMOs. I saw one year old posts with people talking about ESO combat as: 90% of the time buffing, 10% casting spammables.

Obviously thats a huge exaggeration. However, it does show that many MMO players that have played ESO dont understand why activating your buffs every 10-20 seconds is part of the combat system.

Wish we could get an explanation for why they wanted to do this change and then never talked about it again. This patch cycle has been weird man.

I have to spend 40% of my mag and 30% of my stamina just to buff up before attacking.

Channeled Acceleration
Focus
Leeching strikes
Forward Momentum
Shadowy Disguise

Major force on channeled is 32 seconds but the major expedition is only 12. Everyone is faster than you can sneak in pvp without it, so good luck attacking and escaping without it.

Focus has a wonderful ability to just drop because you suddenly leave combat even though you're surrounded by enemies.

Leeching strikes has to a 20 second resource return instead of just being a larger per second tick.

Forward momentum is a great morph with a 40 second timer BUT when you use vat 2h the timer on it still only lasts 20 seconds, so if you are trying to save your damage buff you still have to refresh momentum every 20 seconds.

Then shadowy for resolve and stealth crit, which of course is notoriously expensive despite what other players think.

So it would be nice if at least one or two of those were extended. Hell, if they just made vat 2h last the full momentum duration I'd feel rich with stamina.

Yes. Especially in PVP you notice how draining this is. A good pvp player keeps their buffs up 100% as they go around so that when they get into combat they dont have to rebuff or buff actively right away.

The common pvp player during down time when looking for fights is just cycling through their buffs lol.

Stx

Increasing buff durations to 45 sec/ 1 min would have been a huge quality of life improvement, and would have been good for the game unlike extending dot durations. DoTs are attack spells, buffs are just maintenance. It's not fun having to spend globals every 20 seconds on self buffs.

That's why I enjoy playing with oakensoul so much. It's not because I'm disabled or I suck at the game. It's because not having to recast brutality/armor buffs every 20 seconds makes the game more fun!

Ksariyu

Stx wrote: »

Increasing buff durations to 45 sec/ 1 min would have been a huge quality of life improvement, and would have been good for the game unlike extending dot durations. DoTs are attack spells, buffs are just maintenance. It's not fun having to spend globals every 20 seconds on self buffs.

That's why I enjoy playing with oakensoul so much. It's not because I'm disabled or I suck at the game. It's because not having to recast brutality/armor buffs every 20 seconds makes the game more fun!

So, what if those buffs were just applied passively then? Why even bother having an active skill when it's permanent uptime is required just to hit your baseline stats? Like, Resolve could honestly just be removed from the game entirely and have its armor stats redistributed to heavy armor pieces or passives, because its not like any tank is not using them 100% of the time. At that point it doesn't add anything to the experience, it's just a hurdle for the sake of having one.

ThirdEye_PULSE

Ksariyu wrote: »

Stx wrote: »

Increasing buff durations to 45 sec/ 1 min would have been a huge quality of life improvement, and would have been good for the game unlike extending dot durations. DoTs are attack spells, buffs are just maintenance. It's not fun having to spend globals every 20 seconds on self buffs.

That's why I enjoy playing with oakensoul so much. It's not because I'm disabled or I suck at the game. It's because not having to recast brutality/armor buffs every 20 seconds makes the game more fun!

So, what if those buffs were just applied passively then? Why even bother having an active skill when it's permanent uptime is required just to hit your baseline stats? Like, Resolve could honestly just be removed from the game entirely and have its armor stats redistributed to heavy armor pieces or passives, because its not like any tank is not using them 100% of the time. At that point it doesn't add anything to the experience, it's just a hurdle for the sake of having one.

You could say that about 95% of every MMO. I honestly cant think of any MMO that has buffs like ESO which has such short timers. The point is every buff should be unique for every class. That way, even though its largely a passive source buff, it is unique depending on the class your playing and each and every class brings something to the table.

Why do you think you see trials with 90% of one class for DPS? Because the other 10% is the one or two classes which bring a buff that is needed.

Having to recast a buff every 10-20 seconds isnt fun gameplay. Its simply distracting you from what your actually trying to accomplish by playing the game. To have fun and to dish out damage or tank/heal.

karekiz

Ksariyu wrote: »

Stx wrote: »

Increasing buff durations to 45 sec/ 1 min would have been a huge quality of life improvement, and would have been good for the game unlike extending dot durations. DoTs are attack spells, buffs are just maintenance. It's not fun having to spend globals every 20 seconds on self buffs.

That's why I enjoy playing with oakensoul so much. It's not because I'm disabled or I suck at the game. It's because not having to recast brutality/armor buffs every 20 seconds makes the game more fun!

So, what if those buffs were just applied passively then? Why even bother having an active skill when it's permanent uptime is required just to hit your baseline stats? Like, Resolve could honestly just be removed from the game entirely and have its armor stats redistributed to heavy armor pieces or passives, because its not like any tank is not using them 100% of the time. At that point it doesn't add anything to the experience, it's just a hurdle for the sake of having one.

I do think its a case by base system. Take resolve for instance. Some class armor buffs might be better sutied for shorter duration due to additional benefits <Such as Necro tank passive chains>, while a generic form benefit could be that you indeed have it toggled permanently on your character w/o the hassle of maintaining it. Lose a perk, but easier play.

ThirdEye_PULSE

karekiz wrote: »

Ksariyu wrote: »

Stx wrote: »

Increasing buff durations to 45 sec/ 1 min would have been a huge quality of life improvement, and would have been good for the game unlike extending dot durations. DoTs are attack spells, buffs are just maintenance. It's not fun having to spend globals every 20 seconds on self buffs.

That's why I enjoy playing with oakensoul so much. It's not because I'm disabled or I suck at the game. It's because not having to recast brutality/armor buffs every 20 seconds makes the game more fun!

So, what if those buffs were just applied passively then? Why even bother having an active skill when it's permanent uptime is required just to hit your baseline stats? Like, Resolve could honestly just be removed from the game entirely and have its armor stats redistributed to heavy armor pieces or passives, because its not like any tank is not using them 100% of the time. At that point it doesn't add anything to the experience, it's just a hurdle for the sake of having one.

I do think its a case by base system. Take resolve for instance. Some class armor buffs might be better sutied for shorter duration due to additional benefits <Such as Necro tank passive chains>, while a generic form benefit could be that you indeed have it toggled permanently on your character w/o the hassle of maintaining it. Lose a perk, but easier play.

Yeah. Thats already been defined if you read through this post. Weve been talking about reactive buffs like wings for warden which are situational versus armor buff every class has access too which could easily be long timer without making game worse.

There was one post in particular where the guy made a case for each and every skill.

Reposted that for convience down below.

ThirdEye_PULSE

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

Some of the buff timers were appropriately extended. Molten Weapons, Channeled Acceleration and Radiant Aura all went to 60s. Boundless Storm, Quick Cloak and Ice Fortress were extended to 30s.

It seems many others were forgotten though. I'd like to see longer durations (maybe 60s) on:
- Betty Netch
- Sap Essence
- Spiked Armor
- Green Lotus
- Bound Armaments
- Rune Focus
- Blur
- Mark Target
- Elemental Drain
- Bone Armor
- Momentum
- Siphoning Strikes
- Force Siphon

I'd also like to see longer durations on temporary summons, including:
- Summon Shade
- Skeletal Mage
- Spirit Mender
- Storm Atronach (it is too short on PTS, fine on live)

I would personally draw the line there, and would not extend durations on other skills such as:
- Flames of Oblivion
- Solar Barrage
- Bird of Prey
- Combat Prayer
- Dark Exchange

I would also like to see the duration change to Deep Fissure reverted. 9s is not helpful in any rotation, floor or ceiling. Warden needs to keep its 3s rhythm, and overcasting every 3s is a large DPS loss given that most of the damage is loaded into the 2nd delayed hit.

I could be wrong about which skills were already extended, patch notes are pretty unclear and this is from memory on PTS.

Ksariyu

ThirdEye_PULSE wrote: »

You could say that about 95% of every MMO. I honestly cant think of any MMO that has buffs like ESO which has such short timers. The point is every buff should be unique for every class. That way, even though its largely a passive source buff, it is unique depending on the class your playing and each and every class brings something to the table.

Why do you think you see trials with 90% of one class for DPS? Because the other 10% is the one or two classes which bring a buff that is needed.

Having to recast a buff every 10-20 seconds isnt fun gameplay. Its simply distracting you from what your actually trying to accomplish by playing the game. To have fun and to dish out damage or tank/heal.

We might just be missing something on the communication here, because I agree with all of this. It 100% is un-fun to constantly stop your flow in combat to reapply a buff that you need to have up all the time. That's why other MMOs have those buffs on 30-minute to 1-hour-long durations. Those other MMOs can get away with it though because you have 20+ skills available to you at all times, so losing one slot for that buff doesn't feel so bad. In ESO you only get five per bar, so having a slot taken for a buff you can't do without feels unnecessarily punishing, even worse if it's a "while slotted" buff.

I also agree completely that the trend that every class has access to every buff is part of what's killing class identity. The minor buffs from each class hardly feel like they have any impact if you aren't studying the post-combat logs. So again, when we look at a buff like Resolve, which you can get on every class + the heavy armor line + sets, it makes you wonder why such an essential stat buff isn't just built into the game's passives or the armor itself. It's something that makes you feel like you have a choice but really you don't because you need to have that buff if you're a tank.

Ultimately I think we have the same idea. I'm just presenting an alternate solution.

Amottica

ThirdEye_PULSE wrote: »

Ksariyu wrote: »

There are two big reasons I wish they wouldn't extend buff/DoT timers (And why I think they could actually be shorter).

1. This is an action-combat game with a limited hotbar. You only get five active skills per bar, so those five skills better feel impactful and useful. Once you start hitting 30+ seconds on a skill duration, it begins to feel more like a passive skill rather than an active one, and its value feels diminished. Rather than a skill where the player has to pay attention to the situation and determine when a buff would provide the most benefit, it turns into something where you're expected to just have 100% uptime on it, at which point it's not really an active effect anymore. It's the same reason why I think skills like Inner Light and Bird of Prey are boring and should be re-evaluated.
2. Skills with these mid-length durations start to become harder to track during longer fights. At least with the 30-minute buffs of other MMOs you can just kind of forget it once it's applied, and with the 3-5 second effects of MOBAs you're more actively looking for opportunities to use them. At 30 seconds to a minute, I find it just long enough to start escaping my attention but short enough that I'm always breaking my rhythm to barswap and reapply. This is compounded by the fact that most buffs/debuffs are pretty much impossible to track visually in-game, and require constantly scanning the massive list of timers at the bottom of my screen, which is about the most un-immersive thing I can think of to do mid-combat in an action game.

That said, you weren't dreaming. Doubling the timers on most DoTs and HoTs was part of the first week's PTS patch.

I think of buffs as passive.

But these buffs are not passives so they should not be like passives. It should be a choice to use this action to refresh the passive or to use a different skill.

ThirdEye_PULSE

Ksariyu wrote: »

ThirdEye_PULSE wrote: »

You could say that about 95% of every MMO. I honestly cant think of any MMO that has buffs like ESO which has such short timers. The point is every buff should be unique for every class. That way, even though its largely a passive source buff, it is unique depending on the class your playing and each and every class brings something to the table.

Why do you think you see trials with 90% of one class for DPS? Because the other 10% is the one or two classes which bring a buff that is needed.

Having to recast a buff every 10-20 seconds isnt fun gameplay. Its simply distracting you from what your actually trying to accomplish by playing the game. To have fun and to dish out damage or tank/heal.

We might just be missing something on the communication here, because I agree with all of this. It 100% is un-fun to constantly stop your flow in combat to reapply a buff that you need to have up all the time. That's why other MMOs have those buffs on 30-minute to 1-hour-long durations. Those other MMOs can get away with it though because you have 20+ skills available to you at all times, so losing one slot for that buff doesn't feel so bad. In ESO you only get five per bar, so having a slot taken for a buff you can't do without feels unnecessarily punishing, even worse if it's a "while slotted" buff.

I also agree completely that the trend that every class has access to every buff is part of what's killing class identity. The minor buffs from each class hardly feel like they have any impact if you aren't studying the post-combat logs. So again, when we look at a buff like Resolve, which you can get on every class + the heavy armor line + sets, it makes you wonder why such an essential stat buff isn't just built into the game's passives or the armor itself. It's something that makes you feel like you have a choice but really you don't because you need to have that buff if you're a tank.

Ultimately I think we have the same idea. I'm just presenting an alternate solution.

Ahhhh. Im sorry def a communication issue on my part here. My bad. You make a really good point that i was actually thinking about when i first posted this. Like armor buff for instance. Every class has access to it... would make more sense to build it into the game in a different way.

Yeah. I agree with you 100% too. My apologies. Your approach is rather than taking a bar slot and making it all passive with longer timers, to free up that slot and allow yourself to get that through some other way. Like with heavy armor, perhaps. Just an example, not convinced thats best way to implement your idea but its a good idea.

I can see a couple downsides but it would make tanks feel more unique. Or wearing heavy armor. Give us better benefits for choosing certain playstyles and would bring some class identity/build identity back into game. Weve lost so much of that.

ThirdEye_PULSE

Amottica wrote: »

ThirdEye_PULSE wrote: »

Ksariyu wrote: »

There are two big reasons I wish they wouldn't extend buff/DoT timers (And why I think they could actually be shorter).

1. This is an action-combat game with a limited hotbar. You only get five active skills per bar, so those five skills better feel impactful and useful. Once you start hitting 30+ seconds on a skill duration, it begins to feel more like a passive skill rather than an active one, and its value feels diminished. Rather than a skill where the player has to pay attention to the situation and determine when a buff would provide the most benefit, it turns into something where you're expected to just have 100% uptime on it, at which point it's not really an active effect anymore. It's the same reason why I think skills like Inner Light and Bird of Prey are boring and should be re-evaluated.
2. Skills with these mid-length durations start to become harder to track during longer fights. At least with the 30-minute buffs of other MMOs you can just kind of forget it once it's applied, and with the 3-5 second effects of MOBAs you're more actively looking for opportunities to use them. At 30 seconds to a minute, I find it just long enough to start escaping my attention but short enough that I'm always breaking my rhythm to barswap and reapply. This is compounded by the fact that most buffs/debuffs are pretty much impossible to track visually in-game, and require constantly scanning the massive list of timers at the bottom of my screen, which is about the most un-immersive thing I can think of to do mid-combat in an action game.

That said, you weren't dreaming. Doubling the timers on most DoTs and HoTs was part of the first week's PTS patch.

I think of buffs as passive.

But these buffs are not passives so they should not be like passives. It should be a choice to use this action to refresh the passive or to use a different skill.

I actually went on to explain when someone made a counter argument that i agreed with them further in the post that there are two different kinds of buffs.

-there are buffs that you incorporate into your builds that you expect to have 100% uptime on or close to it. These could be considered passive buffs and could benefit by longer buff durations.

-there are buffs which are situational. Like wings for warden. Or very powerful buffs like flames of oblivion which can output great damage or healing. These buffs should remain short timer buffs.

So i did admit i was wrong in saying all buffs are 100% passive. I hadnt given it enough thought. Theres two different kinds of buffs and they should be treated differently.

EldritchSun

So, the devs introduced a terrible patch, where the only good thing was the extended buff duration, and they just got rid of this? Funny.

ThirdEye_PULSE

EldritchSun wrote: »

So, the devs introduced a terrible patch, where the only good thing was the extended buff duration, and they just got rid of this? Funny.

Lol pretty much. To be fair someone said in this post they extended some timers, but missed many others if you wanna scroll up and see his excellent reply.

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

Some of the buff timers were appropriately extended. Molten Weapons, Channeled Acceleration and Radiant Aura all went to 60s. Boundless Storm, Quick Cloak and Ice Fortress were extended to 30s.

EldritchSun

ThirdEye_PULSE wrote: »

Lol pretty much. To be fair someone said in this post they extended some timers, but missed many others if you wanna scroll up and see his excellent reply.

Great. The patch is gonna hit the live tomorrow and the dev team haven't even finished they started. I can't say this is something extraordinary, Just typical ZoS attitude.

Deleting the game right now, but I'm gonna enjoy reading the forum tomorrow.

ThirdEye_PULSE

EldritchSun wrote: »

ThirdEye_PULSE wrote: »

Lol pretty much. To be fair someone said in this post they extended some timers, but missed many others if you wanna scroll up and see his excellent reply.

Great. The patch is gonna hit the live tomorrow and the dev team haven't even finished they started. I can't say this is something extraordinary, Just typical ZoS attitude.

Deleting the game right now, but I'm gonna enjoy reading the forum tomorrow.

Yeah. I honestly just started playing GW2 for pvp. Been a lot of fun and im not forced to pve at all if i dont want too. Seems its an MMO which supports its pvp a lot better than ZOS. It aint the same but feels a lot less sweaty to have fun.

I still feel invested in the game though. Spent 5 years on and off with this game and thought id always return to it. U35 has essentially killed most of my hope for the future of the game.

Patch cycles is what really killed the game for me. Drastic change after drastic change... in an old game at that.

They could make a classic version starting in One Tamriel update similar to what WoW and Runescape did and i could easily see this being the lesser version of the game, just like RS3 compared to OSRS

Change fatique is the number one reason people quit and never look back. Im feeling the same. U35 was just the line they drew too far for me, after apparently they said theyd chill with wild changes.

Also, selling new DLCs and content with sets and mythics they absolutely know are OP.... thats just bad design. Its short term money at the expense of long term happiness.

EldritchSun

ThirdEye_PULSE wrote: »

I still feel invested in the game though. Spent 5 years on and off with this game and thought id always return to it. U35 has essentially killed most of my hope for the future of the game.

Just my situation, plus I'm missing my characters and my Rivenspire crypt house, then returning. Although, since my interest in doing even mid-game is pretty much dead, even if I buy a dungeon pack and/or a new zone -chapter - I will go no further, than questing and a couple dungeon and trial runs on normal, just to complete the stuff. The rest is totally unplayable for me because of both sledgehammer rebalances and the new sets and skill nerfs having my main necromancer tank destroyed.

Ragnarok0130

EldritchSun wrote: »

ThirdEye_PULSE wrote: »

Lol pretty much. To be fair someone said in this post they extended some timers, but missed many others if you wanna scroll up and see his excellent reply.

Great. The patch is gonna hit the live tomorrow and the dev team haven't even finished they started. I can't say this is something extraordinary, Just typical ZoS attitude.

Deleting the game right now, but I'm gonna enjoy reading the forum tomorrow.

Just like the unfinished hybridization patch. ZoS really needs to finish what they start before upending another part of the game and leaving it unfinished as well.