PVP Balance in U37 - In Depth Balance Suggestions

React

It's no secret that there are a myriad of balance issues plaguing PVP. Most players seem to agree that the issues are primarily healing and mitigation being too high. This has resulted in a stale meta that many players find boring and generally unenjoyable. As we are now in the second consecutive patch with nearly the exact same meta, it is vital that zenimax makes some adjustments in U37 to avoid the PVP population dwindling into nothing.

While these are broad, overarching issues that are compounded by numerous things, there are certain scenarios where there are outliers which are clearly the primary causes. It is impossible to go over every factor contributing to these issues, but I hope to go over the aforementioned outliers and scenarios in this post so that Zenimax might consider these things when making balance changes in the upcoming U37.

Individual Surviability

First, I want to touch on what makes individual players too difficult to kill. By focusing on what makes one specific person hard to kill, rather than looking at scenarios where other players are present, it is much easier to pinpoint specific outliers with individual survivability. While there are several class-specific outliers, I am not going to focus on these as I mainly want to point out the overarching issues rather than the more specific ones.

1) Vampire Undeath - This passive is far too strong. You incur certain penalties to become a vampire - these penalties are significant, but this passive vastly outweighs those penalties. The vast majority of players choose to incur these penalties for this passive alone, as most specs do not actually utilize a single other passive OR active ability in the line. At a maximum of 30% mitigation, this passive is tied with the other two strongest sources of PVP mitigation in the game, both of which are extremely niche and largely inapplicable in most scenarios (reactive armor and psjic channel passive). This passive is largely responsible for the instances where players are able to infinitely survive, often recovering from extremley low HP or eating multiple execute abilities that would have otherwise killed them.

Vampire undeath doesn't need to be made useless. It can remain a strong source of low-health mitigation at the reasonable tradeoff of sustain/health regen/flame damage, but it must be adjusted so that the value and threshold are slightly lower. I would suggest lowering the value to 15-20% mitigation and lowering the activation threshold to 30% hp, but having the mitigation become fully active at 30% HP. Instead of ramping up from a high health threshold and providing a ton of overall passive mitigation that becomes overwhelmingly powerful at low HP, it will instead be a source of reliable and strong mitigation in clutch moments where you take large amounts of damage and end up in this dangerous threshold of HP. You could even buff other parts of vampire to compensate for this loss of value in this particular passive - for example, strike from the shadows could proc off of any vampire ability rather than just mist form. There are also several VERY underused vampire abilities that could be revisited to make them more interesting and applicable.

2) Combat Medic Support Passive - This is the strongest PVP healing modifier in the game, and it is attached to a passive you get for free at all times just for standing on the grounds of a keep or resource. The strength of this passive overshadows many of the strongest healing modifiers in the game, such as major vitality/major mending, the 10% healing modifier CPs, etc. There is a very noticeable difference in the amount of healing players are able to generate when this passive is active - which largely contributes to many never-ending fights and seemingly invincible groups within keeps and on resources.

I would suggest that this passive be reduced to 5% at max. It is okay to give a small healing boost for free in keep fights where there may be NPCS or siege contributing damage, but it should be a small bonus modifier rather than the strongest healing modifier in the game.

3) Major Evasion - This is another extremely strong mitigation buff. Since hybridization entered the game, major evasion has become much more accessible. Builds that primarily use magicka abilities and wouldn't have had access to evasion are now able to acquire it through sources such as medium armor and blade cloak. This buff vastly reduces the amount of damage that most ultimates deal, neutering the primary tools used to deal "burst damage" to players/groups of players. The effects are even more noticeable from the perspective of classes with AOE as their primary damage components - such as templar(jabs), warden(shalks), and necro(blastbones).

Major evasion should be reduced in value to 15%. This is a minor nerf and won't reduce the value of evasion for people that used it previously - however, it will allow for setups that rely on AOE ultimates and burst abilities to perform slightly better against these targets.

4) Sustain through CP - The difference in sustain between CP and No-CP is incredibly drastic. Most players are able to have infinite amounts of sustain in CP environments with very little investment, resulting in the ability to endlessly block/dodge/heal. This is very problematic as it removes the ability to wear people down - something that used to be the primary method of killing tankier players or those with high healing. It also negates the need to perform heavy attacks or even pay attention to your resources, which is damaging to the depth of PVP combat.

There are several sustain CP nodes in PVP that are problematic, and should be adjusted. The first CP node that should be adjusted is survival instincts. This CP node provides an absolutely absurd amount of stamina sustain. The seemingly niche requirement is a farce - with the wide availability of status effects in the game, this CP node is almost always active on you in combat when you are being hit by other players. Additionally if you get a permanent status effect bugged on you, a bug which most players are aware happens CONSTANTLY, you will have this buff active on you indefinitely until you reset your game. This node should be reduced to 10%. At 10% it remains a strong stamina sustain tool, but isn't quite as broken as it is currently.

Another problematic "sustain" node is Pain's Refuge. This node provides a maximum of 20% mitigation, which is by far the strongest mitigation CP node (overshadowing blue mitigation nodes by a whopping 14%). As a solo player I certainly appreciate that this node provides me with exponentially more mitigation as I become more outnumbered, but the maximum value is simply too strong. In order to bring this value closer in line with the blue damage/mitigation nodes, I would reduce it's maximum to 10%. With the reduced effectiveness, the requirement of having 2 effects for 2% can be reverted - the new CP node would give you 1% mitigation for every 1 effect, maxing 10% with 10 or more effects on you.

5) Healing CP nodes - The healing CP nodes are 10% in value still, which is a strong modifier (on par with major vitality & mending). These should be reduced to 6% in standardization with the damage and mitigation nodes. This will reduce overall healing by a small amount in PVP, but will specifically nerf the outlier scenarios where players choose 3-4 defensive CP nodes and are nearly impossible to kill by a player using 3-4 offensive CP nodes.

6)High HP in PVP - Once upon a time, high HP was something only attainable by tanks. Over time there have been numerous sources of HP added to the game, and the average HP has continuously increased. On PC NA, we have reached a point where it seems like your average player has around 30-35K HP, with many even having upwards of 35k. High HP isn't terribly problematic by itself, but when combined with high healing and high mitigation it becomes very troublesome. You simply cannot deal the damage required to kill a person with 35-40k HP in many scenarios, especially when they have things like the vampire undeath passive or the support combat medic passive active, or when they are receiving healing from other players.

While I personally think that the best solution is to hard cap the HP through battlespirit in the 30-33k range, I understand that this solution is not ideal for many players and is in contrast with Zenimax's vision of "play how you want". Instead of capping the HP, I would target sources of HP that are unnecessary or too easily accessible. First, I would recommend flat out removing Ayleid wells from PVP. While they are an interesting concept, the health they provide is problematic. Alternatively they could be changed to provide a small amount of each non-hp max stat (mag/stam) so that they remain a point of interest in cyrodiil. Next, I would recommend removing the emperor alliance health buff altogether. I know that this buff was just adjusted in U36, but it is a huge source of HP for one alliance at a time. Again, this could be adjusted to be a small amount of non-hp max stats instead of being removed entirely if that seems more suitable. Another source of max health that should be evaluated is the warden maturation passive. This is one of the only % modifiers of max stat left in the game after most were removed years ago, and it is an extremely high percentage. With the average health being so high in PVP now, this passive often grants between 3k-5k HP to those that receive it. In order to reduce the effectiveness of this passive, and to standardize it with the lack of % base max stat buffs, I would adjust it to instead provide a flat 1k-1.5k HP. The last adjustment to max HP I would suggest is a rework of the "armor of the trainee" and "druid's braid" sets. These sets are a cool addition to the game to fill the slot that is left empty in a build that utilizes a 5-5-2-1-1 layout, but the fact that the HP is on the first line is somewhat problematic. Instead of making these sets a 2pc rather than a 1pc, I would simply suggest that the buffs be re-ordered. For example, Trainee could be 1pc) max mag 2pc) max stam 3pc) max hp, and druid could be 1pc) max stam 2pc) max mag 3pc) max hp, etc.

Group Survivability

Next, I want to talk about a behavior that is becoming an issue on the PC NA server. This behavior is often referred to as "Ball Grouping", or the stacking of 12 players in a tightly stacked group. I want to stress that I do not have an issue with coordinated group play. Cyrodiil is a large scale environment, and 12 man groups are a crucial part of that environment! However, the current meta for these groups is egregiously imbalanced. What these groups are currently doing has allowed them to become nigh unkillable, even when facing other groups doing the same thing. Often times these groups spend entire evenings without ever fully wiping, being present in the same locations for hours on end. This is problematic for many reasons, but one of the number one concerns for the general population is the performance impact of this playstyle. Historically we know that these sorts of groups cause performance problems due to the vast number of calculations they cause from the non-stop coordinated spamming of abilities. On PCNA even with our new server hardware, the servers are starting to perform terribly during primetime hours as there are 4-6 of these groups present on the map at any given moment. This is far less problematic when these groups are capable of dying, as they will spend time out of combat and thus cast far fewer abilities. I am going to touch on a few of the outlier balance issues with these groups that I think need to be adjusted immediately.

1) Heal over time stacking - Currently, these 12 man groups are non-stop spamming Radiating Regen and Echoing Vigor. If you watch them play, or if you stand inside of them as a member of their faction, you will notice on your buff tracker that you have 4-6 radiating regens and 4-6 echoing vigors on you at any given moment. The amount of healing per second these players have from these two abilities alone is astronomically high - before even considering the other sources of healing they have such as sets and passives. When you attempt to deal damage to these groups, they instantly regenerate any amount of it within 1-2 seconds of it being dealt - making them virtually unkillable in most scenarios.

In my opinion, this is the most significant issue with this playstyle currently. It is causing an extreme number of server calculations which results in poor performance for everyone, and it is allowing these groups to take obscene amounts of damage. The most ideal solution to this problem is to limit all sticky HOTS and ground HOTS to two of a given morph on a given player at a time. For example, Player A can have two casts of radiating regen on them and two casts of echoing vigor on them at any given time. Player A can also have two casts of radiating regen on them as well as two casts of rapid regen, the other morph, on them. This should also apply to ground HOTS because if it is not applied to ground hots, these groups will immediately shift to stacking 6+ of specific ground hots as they move - for example, they will have 6+ people use healing springs.

This has no significant impact on PVE. Outside of very niche scenarios, there are almost no examples of trials or dungeons where you need/would have more than two casts of any of these skills active at a given time. If this is truly a concern despite being a non issue, zenimax could potentially add the limitation through battlespirit - although that may be out of the capabilities of battlespirit as I understand it.

The only other possible solution I could think of other than limiting these heals is to drastically reduce their effectiveness in large groups, although this seems like a much more unfriendly change to your average cyrodiil player. The example of this would be a change to battlespirit (SO PVP ONLY) where in groups larger than 6, you receive 35-50% reduced healing from other players. Obviously this wouldn't be ideal for many people, and I think the initial proposal of limiting the casts to two per person is much more viable.

2) Earthgore - Earthgore is an extremely strong tool when it comes to negating burst damage. Right now, the only realistic counterplay to a "ball group" is to negate them or instantly kill them with ground based synergies + players using the harmony trait. Both of these methods of counterplay are completely nullified by earthgore - without the players wearing it needed to actively do anything at all to activate the set.

I think earthgore makes sense as an AOE healing set with a long cooldown. If it procs more or less automatically on someone that hits 50% hp and heals 6 people inside of it for a 3k heal each second, it is a strong defensive tool. But if it procs and instantly absorbs all ground based effects, it is effectively removing any possible counterplay to the groups using it. I would suggest that instead of absorbing ground effects, the set be adjusted to do one of two things. It should either read "When you heal an ally below 50% HP, you conjure a pool of blood underneath them that heals everyone (6 person cap) for x healing per second", with X being around 3k after battlespirit, OR it should read "When you heal an ally below 50% HP, you conjure a pool of blood underneath them that heals them for X healing per second, and instantly removes all negative effects from them". Both of these versions would keep earthgore as a strong group defensive tool that automatically denies large bursts, but would prevent it from completely removing the counterplay to ball groups through the removal of negates & ground effects.

3) Snow treaders - I personally think snow treaders are a reasonably balanced mythic. The problem is that when a "ball group" uses them on 12 players, they further remove methods of counterplay in the form of roots and snares. While the drawback of not being able to sprint would normally be significant, this drawback is massively negated by the spamming of mobility abilities by specialized players within the group. While the group is still not quite as fast at maximum as they could be if they incorporated sprinting, they are much faster overall as they do not suffer any slowdowns whatsoever.

Outside of these groups, the snow treaders are an extremely niche and little used mythic. I personally think that reworking them would be extremely beneficial to PVP. Instead of removing your ability to sprint, I would suggest that the treaders instead do the following "Reduces the movement speed bonus of sprint by 25% (from 50%). Reduces the effectiveness of snares applied to you by 50%, increases the root immunity of dodge roll to 4s. You can still be affected by roots."

This new version of snow treaders seems very interesting as a mobility option that is not quite as limiting as the live version, but is FAR less applicable for the groups that are using them for a borderline exploitative playstyle right now.

4) Overall Health, mitigation, healing - While the aforementioned 3 things are the primary issues with ballgroups currently in my opinion, they are not the only problems. I wanted to add this fourth point just to note that if the changes I suggested above are made to vampire undeath, combat medic, max health, and major evasion, most of the remaining problem points with ball groups will be addressed and we can enjoy a version of cyrodiil where there is counterplay to this playstyle, without removing it from the game as an option for players that enjoy coordinated group play.

WoppaBoem

While comprehensive if one adds up all your asking is the ZOS famous sledge hammer approach. Lets change everything and see how it goes. I believe in smaller steps. I would be good to do 2 things and see how it effects combat like undead passive to 20% still scale from 99% health and lower or 50% (30% is to late to have meaningful effect especially on my server with zergs having constant jezus beamer against solo's) and reduce the healing near keeps to 10%.

Always an option is to increase damage but they recently reduced all damage because of PVE overperforming and game breaking numbers by DPS.

But anyhow if the pendulum swing to hard one side we get in these roller-coaster patches again that ZOS just tries to see what sticks and works. Less is more to find real balance but that something has to be done yes that would be good, baby steps.

gariondavey

Good post @React

TechMaybeHic

Thank you for taking the time to type this all up.

Overamera

Regarding 4) Sustain through CP. As a magsorc main we really need all the sustain we can get. We already have to run sustain mundus, recovery glyphs etc. A lot of builds out there also use wretched vitality because we need that much sustain. Unlike other classes that have enough sustain can run dmg glyphs, dmg mundus etc. So if sustain CPS got nerfed we would need to run infused jewerly with sustain glyphs perhaps and lose on max mag. But this only effects magsorc mostly. Other reason why magsorc need changes.

React

Overamera wrote: »

Regarding 4) Sustain through CP. As a magsorc main we really need all the sustain we can get. We already have to run sustain mundus, recovery glyphs etc. A lot of builds out there also use wretched vitality because we need that much sustain. Unlike other classes that have enough sustain can run dmg glyphs, dmg mundus etc. So if sustain CPS got nerfed we would need to run infused jewerly with sustain glyphs perhaps and lose on max mag. But this only effects magsorc mostly. Other reason why magsorc need changes.

As mentioned right at the top of the post, there are class-specific outliers on both ends of the spectrum that I specifically did not cover here. Everything I mentioned contributes to the overarching issues, despite certain underperforming specs benefiting from them. I promise that anything here that magsorc benefits from, nearly every other class benefits from far more.

Magsorc should absolutley receive signifcant buffs, and I hope that happens in U37. These changes are not being suggested because of magsorc.

AdamLAD

Agree with everything besides pains refuge. It's the first thing zenimax has ever introduced for outnumbered gameplay. If they changed everything else you just mentioned then pain's refuge wouldn't be a problem. My main issue is healing. Cross healing is absolutely mental, someone who just stands and light attacks will not die if someone is just spamming healing on them. Absolutely broke. Overall healing needs to be nerfed HARD and then cross healing even harder. I'm sick to death of people going from 1% to 100% in less than a second constantly. The ratio from actual dps players to healers is ridiculous. Since healing is so good, loads of players have just resorted to being one. It absolutely kills PvP. No one dies. Way way to many healers. Needs serious adjustments ASAP. I have noticed that healers now have healers and as soon as (if they even do) die. Every single other person dies soon after in there group. People are getting crutched by cross healing. Mitigation is not the issue. People will die regardless of how much Mitigation you have. It's healing that is the serious issue.

WiccaWitch

Agree with every word.
PvP in a bad shape right now and is needed some TLC.
I think at this point we all understand ZoS investing more into PvE and ditching PvP because PvP simply doesn't pay well compared to PvE (housing ,crown store , cosmetics etc etc) but I think what @React suggests is the only logical way to revive PvP without investing too many resources into code change and other modifications.

I've been around for many years and as much as I'm trying to stay positive and support ZoS hard work and dedication - PLEASE LISTEN TO US PVPERS ! something needs to change !
We invested so much time and MONEY into this game. Crowns and ESO Plus subscription..We deserve to voice our thoughts and we deserve YOU to respond and let us know what are YOU doing to stop this ship from sinking.

Aces-High-82

The elephants in the room are primarily Heal scaling via weap/spell dmg and secondarily crossheal stacking. Simple fixes: reduce damage scaling via max resources further while heal does scale of resources and each healing skill can only apply once per target

React

AdamLAD wrote: »

Agree with everything besides pains refuge. It's the first thing zenimax has ever introduced for outnumbered gameplay. If they changed everything else you just mentioned then pain's refuge wouldn't be a problem. My main issue is healing. Cross healing is absolutely mental, someone who just stands and light attacks will not die if someone is just spamming healing on them. Absolutely broke. Overall healing needs to be nerfed HARD and then cross healing even harder. I'm sick to death of people going from 1% to 100% in less than a second constantly. The ratio from actual dps players to healers is ridiculous. Since healing is so good, loads of players have just resorted to being one. It absolutely kills PvP. No one dies. Way way to many healers. Needs serious adjustments ASAP. I have noticed that healers now have healers and as soon as (if they even do) die. Every single other person dies soon after in there group. People are getting crutched by cross healing. Mitigation is not the issue. People will die regardless of how much Mitigation you have. It's healing that is the serious issue.

As a primarily solo player, I too appreciate how pains refuge works. That said, I still think the value is too high - even if it doesn't negatively affect me. The existence of this CP node adds to the imbalance of mitigation vs damage available through CP.

Healing is problematic in many scenarios, yes. I do think we are in a meta that justifies the existence of reliable burst heals for most specs in the game though. I also believe if the other things I've suggested are properly adjusted, the healing won't seem as problematic as it does now.

Aces-High-82 wrote: »

The elephants in the room are primarily Heal scaling via weap/spell dmg and secondarily crossheal stacking. Simple fixes: reduce damage scaling via max resources further while heal does scale of resources and each healing skill can only apply once per target

I do not think that heals scaling from the same source as damage is an issue. The existence of this scaling is what allows the solo & outnumbered PVP that many of us enjoy to be viable.

I do think they could rebalance this scaling, though. For example, if they were to make it so that you need a similar amount of weapon damage + max stat for your heals and damage to be good, it could deter people from stacking into max health the way they do now.

A good example of this would be how right now, you can have good damage by stacking weapon damage in the 6-8k range, while only having 20-24k max resources. This allows people to spend their attributes points on health, and to use food like the bear haunch which covers all of their hybrid sustain.

If they made it so there were significant jump points in damage/healing effectiveness at different thresholds of max stat, it would encourage people to once again build into those stats rather than health to hit those jump thresholds. I think a system like this would be beneficial to the game, but I do not think that uncoupling the healing or damage from either the max stat or weapon damage is a good idea.

DrSlaughtr

I'm going to point this out for the 50th time.

If you nerf Undeath, you are not nerfing DKs or any build that already has an investment into mitigation. You know, the people you're mad about.

Diminishing returns. The more sources of mitigation to have the less it keeps. If you have 33k armor and are blocking with s/b or ice staff with points spent into the passive CPs, Undeath isn't giving you 30% mitigation at near death. It's drastically small to the point that most of those builds wouldn't even miss it if it was gone.

Meanwhile, low armor builds get much better value out of it. As someone who runs NBs with 10k armor without resolve, Undeath is much more effective than if I am on my DK or warden.

So if you want to kill all damage nightblades easier, I guess gut Undeath by you aren't killing the tank meta runners any easier.

And before you ask, "well durr why do they run it then?"

Because those classes have been good sustain so there is very little drawback. Also most players think you're getting 30% mitigation so they invest in it no better what.

React

DrSlaughtr wrote: »

I'm going to point this out for the 50th time.

If you nerf Undeath, you are not nerfing DKs or any build that already has an investment into mitigation. You know, the people you're mad about.

I'm not "mad" about any class specifically. Every player in cyrodiil is a vampire, and 90% of them are using it exclusively for the undeath passive. Nobody should gain that level of mitigation passively with such inequivalent drawbacks.

DrSlaughtr wrote: »

So if you want to kill all damage nightblades easier, I guess gut Undeath by you aren't killing the tank meta runners any easier.

This is flat out untrue. I understand that your pvp experience is pretty much exclusively limited to playing a vampire nightblade ganker, but if you'd spend some time on the "tankier" classes you keep referring to as a non-vamp, you would immediately become aware of how drastic the difference in survivability is when undeath isn't present, even with high mitigation to begin with.

I've recently spent time playing as a non-vamp with several friends when we were preparing for a group v group tournament. The difference in mitigation, especially at low health, is astronomical without undeath.

DrSlaughtr wrote: »

Because those classes have been good sustain so there is very little drawback. Also most players think you're getting 30% mitigation so they invest in it no better what.

Nightblade has some of the best sustain in the game - I would know, since I main the class. It benefits from undeath just as much as any other class.

Aces-High-82

React wrote: »

AdamLAD wrote: »

Agree with everything besides pains refuge. It's the first thing zenimax has ever introduced for outnumbered gameplay. If they changed everything else you just mentioned then pain's refuge wouldn't be a problem. My main issue is healing. Cross healing is absolutely mental, someone who just stands and light attacks will not die if someone is just spamming healing on them. Absolutely broke. Overall healing needs to be nerfed HARD and then cross healing even harder. I'm sick to death of people going from 1% to 100% in less than a second constantly. The ratio from actual dps players to healers is ridiculous. Since healing is so good, loads of players have just resorted to being one. It absolutely kills PvP. No one dies. Way way to many healers. Needs serious adjustments ASAP. I have noticed that healers now have healers and as soon as (if they even do) die. Every single other person dies soon after in there group. People are getting crutched by cross healing. Mitigation is not the issue. People will die regardless of how much Mitigation you have. It's healing that is the serious issue.

As a primarily solo player, I too appreciate how pains refuge works. That said, I still think the value is too high - even if it doesn't negatively affect me. The existence of this CP node adds to the imbalance of mitigation vs damage available through CP.

Healing is problematic in many scenarios, yes. I do think we are in a meta that justifies the existence of reliable burst heals for most specs in the game though. I also believe if the other things I've suggested are properly adjusted, the healing won't seem as problematic as it does now.

Aces-High-82 wrote: »

The elephants in the room are primarily Heal scaling via weap/spell dmg and secondarily crossheal stacking. Simple fixes: reduce damage scaling via max resources further while heal does scale of resources and each healing skill can only apply once per target

I do not think that heals scaling from the same source as damage is an issue. The existence of this scaling is what allows the solo & outnumbered PVP that many of us enjoy to be viable.

I do think they could rebalance this scaling, though. For example, if they were to make it so that you need a similar amount of weapon damage + max stat for your heals and damage to be good, it could deter people from stacking into max health the way they do now.

A good example of this would be how right now, you can have good damage by stacking weapon damage in the 6-8k range, while only having 20-24k max resources. This allows people to spend their attributes points on health, and to use food like the bear haunch which covers all of their hybrid sustain.

If they made it so there were significant jump points in damage/healing effectiveness at different thresholds of max stat, it would encourage people to once again build into those stats rather than health to hit those jump thresholds. I think a system like this would be beneficial to the game, but I do not think that uncoupling the healing or damage from either the max stat or weapon damage is a good idea.

lol yeah asking for balance but want to continue being Rambo....

React

Aces-High-82 wrote: »

React wrote: »

AdamLAD wrote: »

Agree with everything besides pains refuge. It's the first thing zenimax has ever introduced for outnumbered gameplay. If they changed everything else you just mentioned then pain's refuge wouldn't be a problem. My main issue is healing. Cross healing is absolutely mental, someone who just stands and light attacks will not die if someone is just spamming healing on them. Absolutely broke. Overall healing needs to be nerfed HARD and then cross healing even harder. I'm sick to death of people going from 1% to 100% in less than a second constantly. The ratio from actual dps players to healers is ridiculous. Since healing is so good, loads of players have just resorted to being one. It absolutely kills PvP. No one dies. Way way to many healers. Needs serious adjustments ASAP. I have noticed that healers now have healers and as soon as (if they even do) die. Every single other person dies soon after in there group. People are getting crutched by cross healing. Mitigation is not the issue. People will die regardless of how much Mitigation you have. It's healing that is the serious issue.

As a primarily solo player, I too appreciate how pains refuge works. That said, I still think the value is too high - even if it doesn't negatively affect me. The existence of this CP node adds to the imbalance of mitigation vs damage available through CP.

Healing is problematic in many scenarios, yes. I do think we are in a meta that justifies the existence of reliable burst heals for most specs in the game though. I also believe if the other things I've suggested are properly adjusted, the healing won't seem as problematic as it does now.

Aces-High-82 wrote: »

The elephants in the room are primarily Heal scaling via weap/spell dmg and secondarily crossheal stacking. Simple fixes: reduce damage scaling via max resources further while heal does scale of resources and each healing skill can only apply once per target

I do not think that heals scaling from the same source as damage is an issue. The existence of this scaling is what allows the solo & outnumbered PVP that many of us enjoy to be viable.

I do think they could rebalance this scaling, though. For example, if they were to make it so that you need a similar amount of weapon damage + max stat for your heals and damage to be good, it could deter people from stacking into max health the way they do now.

A good example of this would be how right now, you can have good damage by stacking weapon damage in the 6-8k range, while only having 20-24k max resources. This allows people to spend their attributes points on health, and to use food like the bear haunch which covers all of their hybrid sustain.

If they made it so there were significant jump points in damage/healing effectiveness at different thresholds of max stat, it would encourage people to once again build into those stats rather than health to hit those jump thresholds. I think a system like this would be beneficial to the game, but I do not think that uncoupling the healing or damage from either the max stat or weapon damage is a good idea.

lol yeah asking for balance but want to continue being Rambo....

What do you mean by this? That solo play just shouldn't be possible?

Every single thing that I suggested be nerfed in the top half of this post is something that I, a solo player, currently benefit greatly from. I use evasion, I use undeath, I use the combat medic passive, I have 30k+ hp with attributes into hp and 1pc trainee, I use both survival instincts and pains refuge, and on several classes I use the 10% heal cps.

I just don't think that the heal scaling should come from a different source than the damage scaling.

Urzigurumash

DrSlaughtr wrote: »

If you nerf Undeath, you are not nerfing DKs

Undoing the ubiquity of Undeath would be a 13% damage nerf to DK Flame Skills, which is why I maintain DK (formerly known as MagDK) will probably never be properly balanced in PvP so long as this Vampire Penalty exists.

Otherwise I understand what you are saying and generally agree, NB is "supposed" to be a Vampire, DK is "supposed" to crutch on Heavy Armor instead - something that was thrown off-balance here is that HP Regen was subjected to Battlespirit but Mag and Stam Regen were not.

Urzigurumash

DrSlaughtr wrote: »

And before you ask, "well durr why do they run it then?"

Because those classes have been good sustain so there is very little drawback. Also most players think you're getting 30% mitigation so they invest in it no better what.

Let me add: no they run it because it's more absolute Mitigation on any build.

The old Undeath, which didn't kick in until low Health, was directly contrasted with HP Regen which helped keep you out of low Health - especially with Troll King, especially with Orgnum's.

Altogether, you lost more of your Power Budget when you combined Heavy Armor and Vampirism than you do now that HP Regen is subject to Battlespirit. I said it then and I'll say it now - HP Regen was never balanced in this game against Healing, it was balanced against Mag and Stam Regen, clearly, just look at the array of delicious Orcish foods. Not to necessarily say anything regarding Regens and Battlespirit should be changed now, but it's a point to consider when we talk about Mitigation vs Sustain in regards to Undeath.

As others have said - what would happen if HP Regen were unnerfed? We'd enjoy more HP Regen at Stage 3. Undeath would have to be changed back to low Health only to balance the two out.

Aces-High-82

Oh yeah, I'd like to run 11k HP regen Stamsorc again.

Aces-High-82

React wrote: »

Aces-High-82 wrote: »

React wrote: »

AdamLAD wrote: »

Agree with everything besides pains refuge. It's the first thing zenimax has ever introduced for outnumbered gameplay. If they changed everything else you just mentioned then pain's refuge wouldn't be a problem. My main issue is healing. Cross healing is absolutely mental, someone who just stands and light attacks will not die if someone is just spamming healing on them. Absolutely broke. Overall healing needs to be nerfed HARD and then cross healing even harder. I'm sick to death of people going from 1% to 100% in less than a second constantly. The ratio from actual dps players to healers is ridiculous. Since healing is so good, loads of players have just resorted to being one. It absolutely kills PvP. No one dies. Way way to many healers. Needs serious adjustments ASAP. I have noticed that healers now have healers and as soon as (if they even do) die. Every single other person dies soon after in there group. People are getting crutched by cross healing. Mitigation is not the issue. People will die regardless of how much Mitigation you have. It's healing that is the serious issue.

As a primarily solo player, I too appreciate how pains refuge works. That said, I still think the value is too high - even if it doesn't negatively affect me. The existence of this CP node adds to the imbalance of mitigation vs damage available through CP.

Healing is problematic in many scenarios, yes. I do think we are in a meta that justifies the existence of reliable burst heals for most specs in the game though. I also believe if the other things I've suggested are properly adjusted, the healing won't seem as problematic as it does now.

Aces-High-82 wrote: »

The elephants in the room are primarily Heal scaling via weap/spell dmg and secondarily crossheal stacking. Simple fixes: reduce damage scaling via max resources further while heal does scale of resources and each healing skill can only apply once per target

I do not think that heals scaling from the same source as damage is an issue. The existence of this scaling is what allows the solo & outnumbered PVP that many of us enjoy to be viable.

I do think they could rebalance this scaling, though. For example, if they were to make it so that you need a similar amount of weapon damage + max stat for your heals and damage to be good, it could deter people from stacking into max health the way they do now.

A good example of this would be how right now, you can have good damage by stacking weapon damage in the 6-8k range, while only having 20-24k max resources. This allows people to spend their attributes points on health, and to use food like the bear haunch which covers all of their hybrid sustain.

If they made it so there were significant jump points in damage/healing effectiveness at different thresholds of max stat, it would encourage people to once again build into those stats rather than health to hit those jump thresholds. I think a system like this would be beneficial to the game, but I do not think that uncoupling the healing or damage from either the max stat or weapon damage is a good idea.

lol yeah asking for balance but want to continue being Rambo....

What do you mean by this? That solo play just shouldn't be possible?

Every single thing that I suggested be nerfed in the top half of this post is something that I, a solo player, currently benefit greatly from. I use evasion, I use undeath, I use the combat medic passive, I have 30k+ hp with attributes into hp and 1pc trainee, I use both survival instincts and pains refuge, and on several classes I use the 10% heal cps.

I just don't think that the heal scaling should come from a different source than the damage scaling.

Choice between healing or damage would be balance.... no?... yes?

Urzigurumash

Aces-High-82 wrote: »

Oh yeah, I'd like to run 11k HP regen Stamsorc again.

Of course, better to move forwards than backwards with most things that have otherwise improved balance - but perhaps not with the Undeath scaling.

That old contrast with HP Regen is similar to really anything else that keeps you closer to Max HP - armor, blocking, healing, other percentile mitigations. There are still diminishing returns yes but all of those things were less useful when Undeath didn't kick in until Low Health, because they're investments in means specifically to not be at Low Health. I.e., you got absolutely nothing out of it most of the time, rather than a little all of the time as now. Also note Last Stand long being the only source of Major Heroism and how it combines with DK's Battle Roar to help get out of Low Health quickly - no Streak or Cloak on a DK to spend Mag on at Low Health, that goes to Dragon Blood / Frag Shield.

So when React says:

React wrote: »

I would suggest lowering the value to 15-20% mitigation and lowering the activation threshold to 30% hp, but having the mitigation become fully active at 30% HP. Instead of ramping up from a high health threshold and providing a ton of overall passive mitigation that becomes overwhelmingly powerful at low HP, it will instead be a source of reliable and strong mitigation in clutch moments where you take large amounts of damage and end up in this dangerous threshold of HP.

Sounds right to me - so that Undeath would again be a more specific and exclusive avenue to Tankiness, rather than just an additional layer of Tankiness thrown on top of all the other available avenues.

Maybe it's just me, Vampirism should be

Good for Thieves
OK for Mages
Bad for Warriors

That's why I recommend a Mummy Sub-Class that could fulfill the Undead fantasy from the other side up, Good for Warriors, Bad for Thieves.

TechMaybeHic

Aces-High-82 wrote: »

React wrote: »

Aces-High-82 wrote: »

React wrote: »

AdamLAD wrote: »

Agree with everything besides pains refuge. It's the first thing zenimax has ever introduced for outnumbered gameplay. If they changed everything else you just mentioned then pain's refuge wouldn't be a problem. My main issue is healing. Cross healing is absolutely mental, someone who just stands and light attacks will not die if someone is just spamming healing on them. Absolutely broke. Overall healing needs to be nerfed HARD and then cross healing even harder. I'm sick to death of people going from 1% to 100% in less than a second constantly. The ratio from actual dps players to healers is ridiculous. Since healing is so good, loads of players have just resorted to being one. It absolutely kills PvP. No one dies. Way way to many healers. Needs serious adjustments ASAP. I have noticed that healers now have healers and as soon as (if they even do) die. Every single other person dies soon after in there group. People are getting crutched by cross healing. Mitigation is not the issue. People will die regardless of how much Mitigation you have. It's healing that is the serious issue.

As a primarily solo player, I too appreciate how pains refuge works. That said, I still think the value is too high - even if it doesn't negatively affect me. The existence of this CP node adds to the imbalance of mitigation vs damage available through CP.

Healing is problematic in many scenarios, yes. I do think we are in a meta that justifies the existence of reliable burst heals for most specs in the game though. I also believe if the other things I've suggested are properly adjusted, the healing won't seem as problematic as it does now.

Aces-High-82 wrote: »

The elephants in the room are primarily Heal scaling via weap/spell dmg and secondarily crossheal stacking. Simple fixes: reduce damage scaling via max resources further while heal does scale of resources and each healing skill can only apply once per target

I do not think that heals scaling from the same source as damage is an issue. The existence of this scaling is what allows the solo & outnumbered PVP that many of us enjoy to be viable.

I do think they could rebalance this scaling, though. For example, if they were to make it so that you need a similar amount of weapon damage + max stat for your heals and damage to be good, it could deter people from stacking into max health the way they do now.

A good example of this would be how right now, you can have good damage by stacking weapon damage in the 6-8k range, while only having 20-24k max resources. This allows people to spend their attributes points on health, and to use food like the bear haunch which covers all of their hybrid sustain.

If they made it so there were significant jump points in damage/healing effectiveness at different thresholds of max stat, it would encourage people to once again build into those stats rather than health to hit those jump thresholds. I think a system like this would be beneficial to the game, but I do not think that uncoupling the healing or damage from either the max stat or weapon damage is a good idea.

lol yeah asking for balance but want to continue being Rambo....

What do you mean by this? That solo play just shouldn't be possible?

Every single thing that I suggested be nerfed in the top half of this post is something that I, a solo player, currently benefit greatly from. I use evasion, I use undeath, I use the combat medic passive, I have 30k+ hp with attributes into hp and 1pc trainee, I use both survival instincts and pains refuge, and on several classes I use the 10% heal cps.

I just don't think that the heal scaling should come from a different source than the damage scaling.

Choice between healing or damage would be balance.... no?... yes?

No. That would be a shift I'm game design

Sergykid

mostly u talk from cyro or cp pvp, both and each bad when representing balance.
for bg pvp, just these points of urs:

vampire undeath is balanced, that defense is "up to" 30%, and starting from already low hp. U r in execute range and worse when this goes into effect.
Also cost is not just sustain, it's also less health recovery (already weak but still a 3-5% mitigation loss (when comparing cmx without vamp penalty) ), and also more fire damage taken which is all the worse in this burning debuff and dk meta.

major evasion is but not as good as u make it appear, i also don't see it used often. Looking through cmx i see less than half of attacks aoe and those not top damagers.

high health was too high because of burst potential, now players come back to ~30k hp instead of 35. And culprit was damage which is weirdly high this patch for no apparent reason

u should rename to "cp cyro pvp"

React

Sergykid wrote: »

mostly u talk from cyro or cp pvp, both and each bad when representing balance.
for bg pvp, just these points of urs:

vampire undeath is balanced, that defense is "up to" 30%, and starting from already low hp. U r in execute range and worse when this goes into effect.
Also cost is not just sustain, it's also less health recovery (already weak but still a 3-5% mitigation loss (when comparing cmx without vamp penalty) ), and also more fire damage taken which is all the worse in this burning debuff and dk meta.

You are incorrect on multiple points here. First, undeath starts scaling from 99% HP now. This was adjusted at some point in the past few years. This means that by the time you hit 50% HP, you are already receiving approximately 15% mitigation from undeath. This also means that by the time you hit ~55% HP, you are taking less flame damage than a non vampire would. Health recovery is not a "5% mitigation loss" after being reduced by vampire. It is halved in pvp and ticks once every two seconds. Unless you were building into it, the nerfed version is a non-factor in your PVP survivability.

Sergykid wrote: »

major evasion is but not as good as u make it appear, i also don't see it used often. Looking through cmx i see less than half of attacks aoe and those not top damagers.

Major evasion absolutley is as good as I am suggesting. Every serious group will either be in heavy armor, or will have a source of major evasion on their players/for their group. Most solo builds that can afford to be in medium armor will do so for elude. Your point about CMX is nonsensical - AOEs won't be in the "top damage" because they aren't high DPS abilities. They tend to be mostly burst abilities such as ultimates, blastbones/fissure, spammables like jabs, etc. Having major evasion vastly reduces the threat of AOE ultimates and bursts, which the majority of players do use.

Sergykid wrote: »

high health was too high because of burst potential, now players come back to ~30k hp instead of 35. And culprit was damage which is weirdly high this patch for no apparent reason

I don't know which server you're on, but the health on PC NA is absolutely closer to and in excess of 35k. The vast majority of people I talk to agree that it is an issue. The general consensus is that damage isn't "weirdly high" either - most classes struggle to kill anyone on their own, and the vast majority of players can simply not fight back and face tank any damage you can do to them, regardless of the sets both of you are wearing.

Sergykid wrote: »

u should rename to "cp cyro pvp"

Undeath, max HP, and evasion are all still very problematic in no-CP.

DrSlaughtr

I agree with pretty much everything React said. I only one little issue and one commentary.

Commentary first, high health. While I don't know if flat out limiting health is the right way to go, there's no denying that seeing 90% of DAMAGE DEALERS running around with upwards of 42k health is problematic. I suggested awhile back to make role selection in PVP matter, with specific buffs and debuffs associated with what you choose, while not necessarily limiting you to only those roles.

For example, if I had tank selected, I would give a mitigation and health buff, but a damage and pen debuff.

If I select healer, I get a healing given and received buff, while getting a damage debuff.

And finally with DPS, you get a damage and pen buff but a mitigation and healing given debuff.

"Play Your Own Way" may be great for fighting overland monsters and running through delves, but it makes balancing PVP impossible.

My other point is about Undeath.

I completely agree that is is overused but simply nerfing it down to 15% and changing the threshold overwhelmingly will harm pure DD builds that run sub 20k armor, which are not the builds that are causing all the issues. Due to diminishing returns a 33k armor DK does not get the same effect. Yes, it still matters for the DK and yes, sustain (as you pointed out) is so overtuned through the various CP slottables that the negative effects of vampire are negated, ultimately those builds will not be drastically harmed by the lowered amount and I imagine they will still gladly run it.

I think what you should see is it being completely useless on a high mitigation build and extremely effective on a totally pure DD build. What if it has a scale based simply on armor? At 10k armor, it begins a sliding scale, and ultimately offers no assistance once you're at soft cap?

P.S.

Tie healing to max resource and not damage, because having 8k buffed damage shouldn't make you the best healer in the game.

Sergykid

React wrote: »

undeath starts scaling from 99% HP now. [...] This means that by the time you hit 50% HP, you are already receiving approximately 15% mitigation from undeath.

don't remember, forgot this change. Was there specified the % ? 15% def at 50% hp is good, i suppose if true then total % could drop to 20-25%

React wrote: »

Health recovery is not a "5% mitigation loss" after being reduced by vampire.

i speaked from battlegrounds, non vamp i see 5-8% at mitigation coming from health rec, and on vamp it's ~3%. It varies across builds and fights obviously, i know it's small but i just specified it.

React wrote: »

AOEs won't be in the "top damage" because they aren't high DPS abilities. They tend to be mostly burst abilities such as ultimates, blastbones/fissure, spammables like jabs, etc. Having major evasion vastly reduces the threat of AOE ultimates and bursts, which the majority of players do use.

aoe attacks are top damage, speaking of blastbones or fissure. But they make for example 20% of everything that hits me, some other aoes total another 10-20%.
for every blastbones u are hit by a light attack, dots tick, something like dizzy.
with fissure comes a la, dots, pulse or clench.
for leap comes whip la dots flames of obliv, dawnbreaker is half single target

idea is aoes are around a third of everything hitting u. And they're blockable and telegraphed.

while evasion is good, it's not generally op. If u low defenses then it helps u survive a burst, but others like brawlers can use something better instead. Depends on how much room u have for something like this and how well u survive generally. I tried evasion and didn't get enough value out of it to be worth building around it.
i barely see anyone with evasion in bgs, and those that do are nbs mostly and that's because comfortable access to it.

React wrote: »

I don't know which server you're on [...] The general consensus is that damage isn't "weirdly high" either - most classes struggle to kill anyone on their own

u don't even have to search for me, it's on forum signature, but i guess u write from phone.
without changing anything on my defense after patch, i was getting more damage from same things as before, nothing being changed about what i use or damaging sources. Also i noticed players that die difficultly died easier. I have a video where last patch i survive 3 high damage players with kiting, and this patch i struggle with only two of same tier.

about 1v1, it's normal that nobody can kill on their own a decent enemy. Healing is higher than damage, and kiting is broken. Anyone that doesn't want to die 1v1, won't.

React wrote: »

Undeath, max HP, and evasion are all still very problematic in no-CP.

in battlegrounds didn't find those as "very" problematic but rather slightly. Healing and sustain are more of an issue
.

DrSlaughtr

React wrote: »

DrSlaughtr wrote: »

I'm going to point this out for the 50th time.

If you nerf Undeath, you are not nerfing DKs or any build that already has an investment into mitigation. You know, the people you're mad about.

I'm not "mad" about any class specifically. Every player in cyrodiil is a vampire, and 90% of them are using it exclusively for the undeath passive. Nobody should gain that level of mitigation passively with such inequivalent drawbacks.

DrSlaughtr wrote: »

So if you want to kill all damage nightblades easier, I guess gut Undeath by you aren't killing the tank meta runners any easier.

This is flat out untrue. I understand that your pvp experience is pretty much exclusively limited to playing a vampire nightblade ganker, but if you'd spend some time on the "tankier" classes you keep referring to as a non-vamp, you would immediately become aware of how drastic the difference in survivability is when undeath isn't present, even with high mitigation to begin with.

I've recently spent time playing as a non-vamp with several friends when we were preparing for a group v group tournament. The difference in mitigation, especially at low health, is astronomical without undeath.

DrSlaughtr wrote: »

Because those classes have been good sustain so there is very little drawback. Also most players think you're getting 30% mitigation so they invest in it no better what.

Nightblade has some of the best sustain in the game - I would know, since I main the class. It benefits from undeath just as much as any other class.

You really do love telling me what I do or don't do.

I have every class and I play them each at least once an update. I do this for a few reasons, one of which so I can see what people are doing and know how to fight them. I also take them into BGs more often.

I know exactly what Undeath feels like on my DK vs NB. I know what it feels like to be in combat and have it drop on my DK and have the same thing happen on my NB. It's a drastically different experience between the two classes and mitigation.

I can't believe we're arguing about this but hey, that's par the course for you. If you already have 33k armor and mitigation passives you will not get the same benefit from Undeath as a sorc with 15k buffed armor. This is a simple chain of logic. If it helps those builds more, then nerfing it across the board hurts those builds the most. A DK with max armor and healing will not suffer greatly at all. Make it effective on lower armor builds and less effective if not useless on high armor builds. Problem solved.

And no, nightblades don't have "one of the best sustain in the game." Based on what? Based on your experience dancing around towers doing light attacks until the stars align on your rallying cry, ultimate and bow?

We have one resource return skill that requires a full 20 seconds to give max value, plus constant light attacks, which might be great for you as you kite around towers waiting to build ultimate and proc bow, but for those of us who play the class identity which is cloak, we do not see the same return on investment.

Even then you have to pick between stamina or mag version and honestly it should have another effect thrown on it to make it on par with what other classes get.

I'm not saying it's terrible skill but you have this habit of over selling nightblade because the way you play aligns perfectly with what works best in cyrodiil right now. That's happenstance.

Then of course I have to run gd ridiculously expensive smoked bear to keep in a fight while others can just run tri food because they get passives with free resource return. Yes I'm aware I can run jewels but it is noticably less a return.

My DK, warden and sorc all have better sustain for me. So I guess if you consider #4 "one of the best" then okay.

The only way to get a high level of recovery on a cloak blade right now is to sacrifice your backbar for something like Wretched or Darloc, which means eliminating a lot of damage.

P.S. I rather enjoy fighting the nightblades who copied and pasted your build. Keep up the good work.

ZOS_Suserial

Greetings,

We understand that people will not always agree and have their own opinions they want to express, but we also want the forums to be a constructive platform for ESO and its community. It’s all right to disagree or even debate with each other, but baiting, mocking, antagonizing, trolling, etc. Is never acceptable in the The Elder Scrolls Online community. This is a friendly reminder to remain on topic and civil when posting.

Thank you

Oakenaxe

Kudos to you for putting this together, those are good suggestions to consider.

React

DrSlaughtr wrote: »

You really do love telling me what I do or don't do.

I have every class and I play them each at least once an update. I do this for a few reasons, one of which so I can see what people are doing and know how to fight them. I also take them into BGs more often.

I know exactly what Undeath feels like on my DK vs NB. I know what it feels like to be in combat and have it drop on my DK and have the same thing happen on my NB. It's a drastically different experience between the two classes and mitigation.

If you play those classes and you understand the drastic difference in mitigation, you should understand why undeath is overperforming and needs to be adjusted. It doesn't matter if you feel like it benefits your class more than others, or if you think your class needs it. The passive is objectively too strong, and needs to be adjusted.

DrSlaughtr wrote: »

A DK with max armor and healing will not suffer greatly at all. Make it effective on lower armor builds and less effective if not useless on high armor builds. Problem solved.

A DK with max armor and healing absolutely will feel this nerf, signicantly. The ability to kill a target like this will become significantly more realistic aswell, especially in cases where you have an execute to hit them with and the execute actually deals increased damage when they hit execute range

Per zenimax's own statement, they are not capable of making in-depth changes to the combat system at this point in time, due to the jumbled code they are in the process of reworking. It is unrealistic to ask for a dynamic scaling system on one passive based on armor values, but it is realistic to ask that the overperforming passive simply have it's values adjusted.

DrSlaughtr wrote: »

And no, nightblades don't have "one of the best sustain in the game." Based on what? Based on your experience dancing around towers doing light attacks until the stars align on your rallying cry, ultimate and bow?

We have one resource return skill that requires a full 20 seconds to give max value, plus constant light attacks, which might be great for you as you kite around towers waiting to build ultimate and proc bow, but for those of us who play the class identity which is cloak, we do not see the same return on investment.

Siphoning attacks is one of the best sustain skills in the game - both a signifcant resource return for weaving (which you should be doing all the time), and a chunk of resource return at the end, as well as a significant heal over time. It may be inapplicable to a playstyle where you remain in stealth for 90% of your gameplay without weaving or hitting any players, but that is a niche scenario.

Additionally, nightblade gets an unnamed 15% magicka and stamina buff as a passive, and gets 1k mag and stam returned on kills. If you slot refreshing path, you also gain access to both minor endurance and intellect.

DrSlaughtr wrote: »

I'm not saying it's terrible skill but you have this habit of over selling nightblade because the way you play aligns perfectly with what works best in cyrodiil right now. That's happenstance.

Then of course I have to run gd ridiculously expensive smoked bear to keep in a fight while others can just run tri food because they get passives with free resource return. Yes I'm aware I can run jewels but it is noticably less a return.

I'm not overselling nightblade. It is quite literally the strongest class in the game right now, for a myriad of reasons. All of the skills in the toolkit are loaded with secondary effects, many of which no other class has access to. In a meta where barspace is at a premium, having these dense skills is extremely valuable. Nerfing undeath doesn't affect nightblade more than any other class.

DrSlaughtr wrote: »

The only way to get a high level of recovery on a cloak blade right now is to sacrifice your backbar for something like Wretched or Darloc, which means eliminating a lot of damage.

This is untrue. My nightblade setup, which uses no additional sustain anywhere on the build outside of bear haunch and tri pots, gets 2100 mag regen and 1800-1900 stam regen fully buffed without a continuous. Those numbers are not reachable on any other class using the same gear. Nightblade is uniquely the only class that can have top of the line damage with 0 investment into sustain outside of haunch, while still having excellent sustain.

ZOS_Suserial wrote: »

Greetings,

We understand that people will not always agree and have their own opinions they want to express, but we also want the forums to be a constructive platform for ESO and its community. It’s all right to disagree or even debate with each other, but baiting, mocking, antagonizing, trolling, etc. Is never acceptable in the The Elder Scrolls Online community. This is a friendly reminder to remain on topic and civil when posting.

Thank you

Thanks for the warning!

Oakenaxe wrote: »

Kudos to you for putting this together, those are good suggestions to consider.

Thanks for reading!

Urzigurumash

DrSlaughtr wrote: »

Make it effective on lower armor builds and less effective if not useless on high armor builds. Problem solved.

Undeath kicking in only at lower HP would accomplish this, since tankier specs must take more damage to arrive at low HP than squishy specs. As I said above, it would help to return Undeath to being an exclusive means of mitigation, rather than an additional means.

If we want to nerf DKs more than NBs, I'll say it again, Undeath contributes to the overpowered state of DK, fka MagDK, because of the Flame Damage Penalty. Over 5k hours on DK and I dislike being the meta 2 attack class, liked it better when it was PetSorc or JabsPlar.

Suna_Ye_Sunnabe

If any of this happens, it had better be through the battle spirit. I am sick to death of nerfs for one side negatively impacting the other side.

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO

In general these are good suggestions, the ground hot limitations is something which I don't think zos can implement due to the way the game is designed but equally it's the least important because you can just negate the ground hots. Theres also the problem of the game needing to calculate the 'most powerful' hot to apply and then overwriting or applying to someone who doesn't have it already etc.

I also personally think the high hp issue is actually better fixed by splitting damage and healing between spell/weapon DMG and stamina/magicka. So that damage is only affected by max s/w damage and healing is only affected by max mag/stam. The reason people stack health (especially in groups), aside from the fact it gives you more reaction time and resistance to burst, is that losing max stam and magicka doesnt really impact your effectiveness when it comes to healing or damage. A cap would be fine but then why not just go back to softcaps in general for all stats (which was a far better system imo). Also health is far easier to stack due to the uneven scaling it has.

The snow treaders change honestly would likely just make groups use other mythics, 4s isn't really worth it when it's the same as other skills which give some more benefit to casting. Think this one needs a bit more thought.