Heavy Attack builds are currently rather badly designed.

luchtt

This title will be quite provocative as, currently, HA builds are quite popular especially for lower skill, less abled and newer players.
I want to assure you, I do not mean harm in general to HA builds. I was once a HA build onetrick for a long time and tried to push them to their limit before they got popular with the u35 buffs.

I wish to point out the problems currently plagueing this playstyle, parts that most players (both people for and against HA builds) do not see.

First: what makes HA builds tick:
1. Sergeant's Mail.
this is the heart of HA builds currently. It was the worst HA set before u35 but they giga buffed it and now it seems to be performing better than anything by a vast margin. It also introduces the neccesity to heavy attack constantly due to its very low duration uptime (5s). This makes it so that 1bar builds get an insane bonus. for basically being able to drop a cinder block on m1 and queue up skills inbetween. The 2bar variants of these HA builds only outparse the 1bar variants by a few % (like 10k dps in the best case, more often less than 5k) and requires a lot more thinking for pretty much no reward.

2. Empower.
This is another large component of the buffs, but its less powerful than sergeant, still neccesary though. It's very simple ridiculous % buff that only a few classes have easy access to, the rest having to resort to mages guild passives, introducing weird clutter into the build. Skinny cheeks' recent suggestion:

''Nerf empower 80% -> 60%''
''Dealing damage with a light attack increases your damage against monsters by 2% for 10 seconds. This can stack up to 5 times.''

3. Lightning heavy attack and heavy attack duration.
This is a bit of a 2 sided blade, on the 1 side lightning heavy takes long, meaning it makes your rotation a lot slower. However on the other side, it makes skill casts simply not line up. Especially short lasting dots/skills due to its very unusual length.

The other issue with the heavy attack itself is that the only weapon that HA builds actually work on are lightning HA builds. This is because they double dip into the bonuses, getting more damage for free due to the higher ticks. If HA builds are such an accessibility option why do they pigeonhole you into using only 1 weapon? very play how you want lol. The other HA weapons should be altered to deal more damage imo. but i wont go into more changes on that since its too much of a headache (I feel sympathy for the devs when thinking about possible ways to change this ngl lol)

Now, my suggestion/direction to fix these issue:

(lower effort fixes)
First, HA sets should be altered to fit within the DPS set norm, meaning their stat lines should be fixed quite a bit.
pretty much all HA sets currently are a very odd family, having really weird stat lines (max magicka x2, or stamina x2, stamina recovery, max health, health recovery, healing taken %, being heavy etc) Fixing these stat lines to make more sense with their 5pc effects would let them fit more into the ''dps build'' norm, and allow us to make the second part of this change work:

Change all current HA set 5 piece bonuses.
Nerf the higher end flat HA damage by a decent bit. (for example, sergeant mail 2580 -> 1500-2000, however infallible aether should be buffed a bit I feel)

Introduce the same flat light attack damage bonus for all of these sets (This is to encourage weaving as a skill progression for these builds, as it currently stands, weaving between HA's on the top builds is literally a dps deficit despite the much higher skill it requires)

Change some of the proc conditions these sets require:
Sergeant mail should be significantly extended considering HA channels take much longer.
Storm master should not proc based on a fully charged HA crit, especially considering how little crit chance HA builds get.
Infiltrator/Unweaver could probably just be flat boosts as they're in a weird ''opposite skill cost'' niche that is just weird to work with.

Long lasting Empower should also be granted to the other 4 classes other than templar (solar barrage) and DK (molten armaments) Note that this should not replace any existing buff, that would be cringe zos.

Lightning heavy attack channel should also be reduced to 2 seconds total to better fit in weaving skills between heavy attacks.

Lightning heavy attack Tri Focus passive should also be reduced to deal less cleave damage, possibly nerfing it to 80-60% instead of 100% as it's simply too powerful.
Also there is a bug where in pvp the full damage you deal against monsters will be dealt against players near the monster instead of being reduced by the ''against monsters only'' rule. Should quickly point out that this is being abused mainly in imperial city, you can recieve up to 40k ticks per second as an enemy if you stand near a high health enemy being heavy attacked.

What does this accomplish:
First, we need to get out of the way the fact that even 2 bar HA builds get almost 70% of their damage PURELY from heavy attacks. This promotes an extremely lazy playstyle with no real path to improving skill when mastering the build. Assuming you have the proper gear you will effectively already be at the peak of this build's effectiveness.

Introducing proper flat stat lines (crit, weapon and spell damage), increasing the light attack flat bonuses, and nerfing the total HA damage you gain from these sets would promote 2 bar HA builds much more, since using skills would no longer be a question of ''why cast a skill when you can do 100k dps with a HA channel anyway?'' and instead transform the HA channel into a more accessible slower spammable, emulating normal build gameplay except just with a slower easier spammable.

This would, however, nerf the 1 bar variant where you mainly just hold M1 to deal damage. This is intentional. While I don't have a problem with HA builds being good, currently you can get up to 92k dps purely from holding m1 and ulting when you have ult. Well over 90% of the playerbase struggles to get over 90k dps trying their absolute best. You can call that a skill issue but the fact that a build exists that just lets you do 90k+ dps both single target and AOE (tri focus does 100% aoe dmg) is insulting to any player who has grinded to get to the skill level they're at.
This sounds quite rude to anyone using that variant, but my changes would still not really super nerf this type of gameplay and its not intending to sledgehammer it. I still think it's a good accessibility option and it should exist. Though, it shouldn't top out so high, instead I'd nerf the pure holding M1 variant to about 60-80k dps range instead of 80-90k.
The top parses for people who try to still use the 1bar variant but also weave skills, possibly light attacks with my changes, should remain roughly at the same level, just requiring more skill.

The 2 bar variant would gain a lot more dps but also require more skill. Which I would argue is.. good design.

Now, for the more insane changes, which I would prefer but are much more difficult to implement:

This will build off of the first suggestion, however with one rather big twist:

Introduce either a cap or rapidly diminishing returns on HA damage.

Buff all HA 5 piece bonuses by a decent margin (from where they currently stand, except sergeant as it is just too powerful already, it can stay at 2580)

This sounds simple but introduces a very big thing HA builds lack: build diversity.

Currently, HA build users are pretty much throwing themselves off a cliff if they opt to use only 1 HA 5 piece instead of 2. It's estimated that storm master alone adds over 10k dps (to a 100k parse) making pretty much any other option a useless damage reduction.
If you reduce the raw power you can inject into HA alone, while not completely compromising the damage of such a build, different 5 pieces can be used to build on top of a heavy attack set.

My total aim for these changes, and for HA builds as a whole is to incorporate them more into the general playstyle of the game. They are very out of place, looked down upon etc right now.

I would aim for the absolute highest end of HA builds to hit 120k dps if you incorporate clean light and heavy attack weaving, rotation usage etc, just like a normal build would.
But I also wish to nerf the ridiculously overtuned low effortness of the current high parsing builds.
(quickly though, the 120k dps would be assuming the empower buff from skinny cheeks is introduced aswell, so normal buiilds would hit even higher, HA builds would still ultimately parse lower even at the highest end)

The skill expression of HA builds is currently very low and I just want to change that.
If the combat team reads this, I highly suggest not making any rash decisions trying to implement these or similar HA changes, because of 1 thing:
This is not intended to be provocative or insulting but the combat team does not understand how HA damage/builds work from what I can tell over the last few years. Ascending tide was supposed to buff HA builds but almost destroyed their damage. Update 35 introduced only a few relevant changes that overtuned only 1 set and introduced empower, while reverting the nerfs you did in ascending tide.

Test it extensively: here's some tips.
Heavy attack scales really badly with weapon and spell damage. 1 flat HA bonus damage equals to like 5 weapon/spell damage (estimation, but it is still very apparent)
Consult me because i know pretty much most things there are to know about HA builds. (hope this doesnt come off as braggy etc but it's just very clear the devs are at the very least not very understanding of how HA builds actually function)
Don't rely on oakensoul. It is a weak mythic only made to seem powerful by empower and HA sets.
Do not design HA builds with the intent to make them accessibility only. They should indeed offer a higher skill floor and damage floor (starting out higher) but they should not be almost flat like how it is currently. Introducing skill expression is key to incorporating HA builds into eso's combat system without angering anyone.

lastly
feel free to comment any suggestions ideas or disagreements with these ideas. I am by no means perfect and some ideas (especially what to do with empower) is still a bit iffy to me, not sure if it should be done like that.

Remathilis

I have an idea. Let's make more sets like Relequin an Kinras that requires precision LA weaving to keep up stacks and rely on low lag/latency internet and high actions per minute to gatekeep in vet content to only the sweatiest players willing to sit on a parsing dummy for hours on end to achieve respectable DPS numbers. That way, players will either git gud or drop the game. That should help the growth of the game community.

Or maybe other players shouldn't worry so much about players who want to HA though vet dungeons and Craiglorn HMs. Empower is already nerfed in PvP so I know it's not the Battleground players wanting HA nerfing, so it's gotta be the PvE community that sneers at the only viable alternative to zookeeping for sorcerer as "lesser"

Leave HA alone. They aren't outperforming LA weaving.

SeaUnicorn

however infallible aether should be buffed a bit I feel)
IA should have Major Vuln instead of Minor as its proc. There are sets offering Major Vuln already: Turning Tide and Archdruid Dreyvic, whereas Minor Vuln was added to so many abilities, that IA became very outdated. Major Vuln on IA will make heavy attack enjoyers be desired in Mid Tier groups rather being looked down on.

SeaUnicorn

Remathilis wrote: »

Leave HA alone. They aren't outperforming LA weaving.

I think OP wants them to perform on par with LA builds when mastered, rather than underperforming no matter how well you do it.

Remathilis

SeaUnicorn wrote: »

Remathilis wrote: »

Leave HA alone. They aren't outperforming LA weaving.

I think OP wants them to perform on par with LA builds when mastered, rather than underperforming no matter how well you do it.

That's not what I pulled from it. If that was the OPs intent, they missed the mark.

luchtt

Remathilis wrote: »

SeaUnicorn wrote: »

Remathilis wrote: »

Leave HA alone. They aren't outperforming LA weaving.

I think OP wants them to perform on par with LA builds when mastered, rather than underperforming no matter how well you do it.

That's not what I pulled from it. If that was the OPs intent, they missed the mark.

I definetely did not emphasize the results of these changes enough, so I will outline them here:

The top end dps HA builds should be able to reach will be much higher and more situationally flexible due to the addition of a secondary 5pc without cutting down on the HA damage much. This means you can maintain a HA rotation while doing much more damage than you would previously as long as you put more effort into a rotation and/or light attack weaving.

However, most people that use HA builds right now are using oakensoul 1bar HA builds.
The lower end of these, I emphasize this point: the purely M1 holding HA build variant will be negatively impacted.

With the introduction of better 2-4 piece stat lines your actual skill damage will drastically increase.
Many players don't realize this but a lot of your damage actually also comes from those 2-4 piece lines.
It's the reason why storm master is the best secondary set after sergeant. It has almost the lowest HA bonus damage but it's 2 crit stat lines make up for this difference. Noble duelist has almost 400 higher flat damage (and as I explained earlier, weapon and spell damage scales a lot slower with HA than flat stats) so just those 2 crit lines are making up a signfiicant difference.


The total nerf to damage with 80% -> 60% empower, and lower total HA damage does eventually mean you will do less damage if you choose to spec purely HA holding.

My ultimate goal is basically:
Increase skill expression while also trimming the low effortness of the build slightly.
A higher top end damage means HA builds are respected more, especially if they are not seen as a goofy side build by endgame as much, meaning HA build users can more easily get into dungeon/trial groups without being stigmatized and treated differently.
And lastly, the main point:

I wish for HA builds to be a possible stepping stone by incorporating light attack weaving as a viable option. This may sound elitist, but hear me out.

Currently, HA builds literally punish the use of light attacks due to no LA bonus existing on sergeant. It used to not be this way, before ascending tide, the meta sets for HA builds were the undaunted sets, noble duelist and infallible aether. If you used a combination of undaunted/noble duelist sets you would get an immense bonus to light attacks. This lead me to learning how to light attack weave without putting too much pressure onto me as a relatively new player to completely rely on them, since my baseline damage was still heavy attacks and it was high enough as to where I wasn't shooting myself in the foot with my bad weaving.

My damage ended up being about 20% light attacks and 30-40% heavy attacks.

However, back then, HA builds damage were well over 20% lower than even the highest point right now.
I intend for the current oakensoul 1bar builds to still be viable for almost all content (which is pretty much where it currently stands), while increasing the flexibility in sets that these builds can use and simaltaneously promoting imrpoving one's skill and mastery of the build with the possibility of moving on to the higher end of gameplay without having to almost re-learn the game completely.

I will emphasize once again: I want to buff HA builds in a general sense, but increase the possibility of mastery at the very high end of them.

If you have more questions i'm fine to answer them. I tried my hardest to emphasize on the point that these are not nerfs to HA builds as a whole but rather buffs, and this notion was clearly not put out well enough by me.

Soarora

Remathilis wrote: »

I have an idea. Let's make more sets like Relequin an Kinras that requires precision LA weaving to keep up stacks and rely on low lag/latency internet and high actions per minute to gatekeep in vet content to only the sweatiest players willing to sit on a parsing dummy for hours on end to achieve respectable DPS numbers. That way, players will either git gud or drop the game. That should help the growth of the game community.

Or maybe other players shouldn't worry so much about players who want to HA though vet dungeons and Craiglorn HMs. Empower is already nerfed in PvP so I know it's not the Battleground players wanting HA nerfing, so it's gotta be the PvE community that sneers at the only viable alternative to zookeeping for sorcerer as "lesser"

Leave HA alone. They aren't outperforming LA weaving.

Funny note. You can actually do Relequen and Kinras using lightning HAs. Each tick counts as an LA. Back when I was a new dps part 2 I used lightning HA opener to start out the fight with stacks of Kinras. I don’t recommend doing it but it does work.

bachpain

How about just keep it as it is? A reliable source of DPS for those who want to play that style. For an oakensoul, sergeants, storm masters build yes most of the DPS is coming from heavy attacks. But you won't get the most out of it without keeping other dots and off balance up as well.

In a traditional LA builds how much of the DPS comes from proc sets where the gear literally imparts DPS for you? Sure you have to LA waeve to get it to proc with Reliquin.... but it isn't your DPS anyway it is the gear. Pillar of Nirn just do damage and it will make everything bleed. Is that really so much different than folks who want to run a HA build getting most of their DPS from the HAs?

At the end of the day what a DPS brings into an encounter as far as gear and playstyle doesn't impact me in the slightest as long as they can do enough DPS and follow mechanics. Why should I care if they are heavy attacking or light attack weaving? Why should I care if they are running two bars or one if we can clear the content we are running?

PeacefulAnarchy

bachpain wrote: »

How about just keep it as it is? A reliable source of DPS for those who want to play that style. For an oakensoul, sergeants, storm masters build yes most of the DPS is coming from heavy attacks. But you won't get the most out of it without keeping other dots and off balance up as well.

I play only heavy attack when I dps, I want to be able to grow while still doing that playstyle. The current setup does not allow that. I don't agree with all of lucht's suggestions, and I'm especially weary that ZOS will apply the nerfs without the corresponding buffs that bring it back up, but if you actually read everything they wrote it's clear they aren't trying to nerf that playstyle but to broaden it and buff it.

The main issues with trying to grow a heavy attack build right now:
Empower was originally a LA buffing skill and the skills that grant it have super short uptimes except for the DK one which wasn't an empower skill before. If Empower is meant to only buff HA then give us skill sourced ways to keep it up reasonably within a HA rotation. Currently this also means oakensoul is by far the best way to get empower, forcing HA users into one bar no monster set builds.

HA timing is weird. 2.6/2.7 HA lightning channels make lining up skills a pain in the neck. Make the length a standard 2 seconds and adjust the damage to be the same dps and that would make it much easier to use skills with it.

Set variety: There are 6 sets that work with HA builds right now, one of them sergeants is a must, one storm master is almost a must because it parses higher but you can situationally use one of the others without losing too much. Make the base HAs more powerful, make the buffs provided by these sets correspondingly weaker and you can end up in the same place as now, but with an opportunity to use other sets instead. Though I guess this is an issue currently for non-HA builds as well that certain sets are just the best and everyone uses those. But the gap between the HA sets and anything else in a HA build is much bigger than a LA build that uses something other than nirn or depths or relequen.

Class variety: Not only is sorc the best one bar HA build, it's also the easiest to play. My main was a nightblade, I want to play nightblade, but no matter my skill selection I can not get her damage on a HA build to a comparable place as my pet sorc.

Some people think HA playstyle is just hold down left click, but it isn't. The real accessibility of the HA playstyle is 1) the extra time between your skill casts to think about what to cast, and 2) the ability to cast the skill mostly any time during the channel and have it go off at the end. Hold down left click should still be a viable playstyle, but I'd really like a way to do a rotation with a heavy attack build and push it much closer to LA builds in damage.

Think of the suggestion along these lines:
LA builds:
low end 10kdps
mid low end 40k dps
mid 80k dps
mid high 100k dps
top end 125k+ dps

HA builds:
low end: 10k dps
mid low end: 70k dps
mid 80k
mid high 90k dps
top end: 100k dps

the suggestion would be to make HA builds more like
low end 20k dps
mid low end: 50k dps
mid 75k
mid high 100k dps
top end: 120k dps

Lower the mid low end of right gear but bad skill choice, keep the mid about the same but raise the ceiling for those who want to tweak things within the HA playstyle. The HA playstyle itself lends itself to an easier path to improvement, so progression along the HA spectrum is still more accessible than it currently is on the LA spectrum.

Stx

I’m okay with the current level of dps heavy attack builds can generate. They have a lower ceiling and a higher floor than light attack builds which is perfectly balanced.

There is one thing that irritates me though. Why has it been a thing since the dawn of time that lightning staff and restoration staff are the only two weapons that can have decent damage with heavy attacks? Due to the way the channeled ticks interact with set bonuses, these weapons do so much more heavy attack dps than others it’s crazy.

I would like to see other heavy attack builds with two handsets, flame staves etc be possible.

PeacefulAnarchy

Stx wrote: »

There is one thing that irritates me though. Why has it been a thing since the dawn of time that lightning staff and restoration staff are the only two weapons that can have decent damage with heavy attacks? Due to the way the channeled ticks interact with set bonuses, these weapons do so much more heavy attack dps than others it’s crazy.

My guess is: because pvp. In order for the full damage to match, non-channeled weapons would have too much burst. Of course this stopped being applicable a long time ago, even before the current empower changes due to power creep and various other changes, but I suspect that was the original reason.

RaptorRodeoGod

These changes would hurt people who can't maintain higher APM and solo builds that rely on the max health from Sergeant's.

I agree that empower should be a default buff added to the remaining classes, and I agree Sergeant's should have a buff duration to promote 2 bar play, but I disagree with the rest of the suggestion's.

You'd be actively nerfing people that don't even perform at the top. They should be left alone. Update 35 hurt everyone enough.

Suna_Ye_Sunnabe

Heavy attack builds are great right now. There's no need to fix what isn't broken.

bachpain

RaptorRodeoGod wrote: »

These changes would hurt people who can't maintain higher APM and solo builds that rely on the max health from Sergeant's.

I agree that empower should be a default buff added to the remaining classes, and I agree Sergeant's should have a buff duration to promote 2 bar play, but I disagree with the rest of the suggestion's.

You'd be actively nerfing people that don't even perform at the top. They should be left alone. Update 35 hurt everyone enough.

Why would you need a buff to promote 2 bar play. The ability to have 5 more skills and another ultimate is incentive enough for those of us who WANT to play that way. People who WANT to play HA builds don't want 2 bars anyway. It is in a great place for everyone except the elitists who think people need to be doing pushups on their gamepads for whatever reason. I personally think it is amazing that there are accessible builds that can get people contributing in content, AND more focused on learning mechanics rather than staring at ability bars. Then as it gets too easy and less fun they can progress to 2 bars and more actions if so desired and do more.

FrancisCrawford

Remathilis wrote: »

I have an idea. Let's make more sets like Relequin an Kinras that requires precision LA weaving to keep up stacks and rely on low lag/latency internet and high actions per minute to gatekeep in vet content to only the sweatiest players willing to sit on a parsing dummy for hours on end to achieve respectable DPS numbers. That way, players will either git gud or drop the game. That should help the growth of the game community.

Or maybe other players shouldn't worry so much about players who want to HA though vet dungeons and Craiglorn HMs. Empower is already nerfed in PvP so I know it's not the Battleground players wanting HA nerfing, so it's gotta be the PvE community that sneers at the only viable alternative to zookeeping for sorcerer as "lesser"

Leave HA alone. They aren't outperforming LA weaving.

Wait. I thought HA attack builds also have sorc pets.

What do they use instead?

Meiox

Do not touch my beloved 'Lightning heavy attack Tri Focus passive' !! ;-)

robpr

bachpain wrote: »

Why would you need a buff to promote 2 bar play. The ability to have 5 more skills and another ultimate is incentive enough for those of us who WANT to play that way. People who WANT to play HA builds don't want 2 bars anyway. It is in a great place for everyone except the elitists who think people need to be doing pushups on their gamepads for whatever reason. I personally think it is amazing that there are accessible builds that can get people contributing in content, AND more focused on learning mechanics rather than staring at ability bars. Then as it gets too easy and less fun they can progress to 2 bars and more actions if so desired and do more.

What if people like the channel of Lightning Staff visuals but also want to use 2 bars?

Meiox

robpr wrote: »

bachpain wrote: »

Why would you need a buff to promote 2 bar play. The ability to have 5 more skills and another ultimate is incentive enough for those of us who WANT to play that way. People who WANT to play HA builds don't want 2 bars anyway. It is in a great place for everyone except the elitists who think people need to be doing pushups on their gamepads for whatever reason. I personally think it is amazing that there are accessible builds that can get people contributing in content, AND more focused on learning mechanics rather than staring at ability bars. Then as it gets too easy and less fun they can progress to 2 bars and more actions if so desired and do more.

What if people like the channel of Lightning Staff visuals but also want to use 2 bars?

The same when people want pets but also 10 usable skills, what you choose has consequences, you can't have all ;-)

bachpain

I put together a HA build for my 7yo son and he was doing 25k to 30k DPS in content on a DK without Sergeants, storm masters or oakensoul because he didn't have a sub or scrying. He doesn't play enough to justify the expense. On the free weekend we got him oakensoul for the 100% empower uptime and he has scratched together a 5 piece storm master but he still doesn't have the Sergeants lightning staff for 5 pieces. He does about 40 to 45 k in content and can do vet DSA with us at CP270ish.

robpr wrote: »

bachpain wrote: »

Why would you need a buff to promote 2 bar play. The ability to have 5 more skills and another ultimate is incentive enough for those of us who WANT to play that way. People who WANT to play HA builds don't want 2 bars anyway. It is in a great place for everyone except the elitists who think people need to be doing pushups on their gamepads for whatever reason. I personally think it is amazing that there are accessible builds that can get people contributing in content, AND more focused on learning mechanics rather than staring at ability bars. Then as it gets too easy and less fun they can progress to 2 bars and more actions if so desired and do more.

What if people like the channel of Lightning Staff visuals but also want to use 2 bars?

Nothing is stopping anyone from doing that. You can make a HA build without Oakensoul and use 2 bars by getting your empower from other sources. But as with everything in every universe there are tradeoffs. You can't turn daggers into a lightning staff and vice versa. Just because what works (i.e. has been explored and published) is oakensoul and lightning staff doesn't mean it is the only way. I saw a guy get a 100K + DPS parse from a sword and shield build.....

Necrotech_Master

PeacefulAnarchy wrote: »

bachpain wrote: »

How about just keep it as it is? A reliable source of DPS for those who want to play that style. For an oakensoul, sergeants, storm masters build yes most of the DPS is coming from heavy attacks. But you won't get the most out of it without keeping other dots and off balance up as well.

I play only heavy attack when I dps, I want to be able to grow while still doing that playstyle. The current setup does not allow that. I don't agree with all of lucht's suggestions, and I'm especially weary that ZOS will apply the nerfs without the corresponding buffs that bring it back up, but if you actually read everything they wrote it's clear they aren't trying to nerf that playstyle but to broaden it and buff it.

The main issues with trying to grow a heavy attack build right now:
Empower was originally a LA buffing skill and the skills that grant it have super short uptimes except for the DK one which wasn't an empower skill before. If Empower is meant to only buff HA then give us skill sourced ways to keep it up reasonably within a HA rotation. Currently this also means oakensoul is by far the best way to get empower, forcing HA users into one bar no monster set builds.

HA timing is weird. 2.6/2.7 HA lightning channels make lining up skills a pain in the neck. Make the length a standard 2 seconds and adjust the damage to be the same dps and that would make it much easier to use skills with it.

Set variety: There are 6 sets that work with HA builds right now, one of them sergeants is a must, one storm master is almost a must because it parses higher but you can situationally use one of the others without losing too much. Make the base HAs more powerful, make the buffs provided by these sets correspondingly weaker and you can end up in the same place as now, but with an opportunity to use other sets instead. Though I guess this is an issue currently for non-HA builds as well that certain sets are just the best and everyone uses those. But the gap between the HA sets and anything else in a HA build is much bigger than a LA build that uses something other than nirn or depths or relequen.

Class variety: Not only is sorc the best one bar HA build, it's also the easiest to play. My main was a nightblade, I want to play nightblade, but no matter my skill selection I can not get her damage on a HA build to a comparable place as my pet sorc.

Some people think HA playstyle is just hold down left click, but it isn't. The real accessibility of the HA playstyle is 1) the extra time between your skill casts to think about what to cast, and 2) the ability to cast the skill mostly any time during the channel and have it go off at the end. Hold down left click should still be a viable playstyle, but I'd really like a way to do a rotation with a heavy attack build and push it much closer to LA builds in damage.

Think of the suggestion along these lines:
LA builds:
low end 10kdps
mid low end 40k dps
mid 80k dps
mid high 100k dps
top end 125k+ dps

HA builds:
low end: 10k dps
mid low end: 70k dps
mid 80k
mid high 90k dps
top end: 100k dps

the suggestion would be to make HA builds more like
low end 20k dps
mid low end: 50k dps
mid 75k
mid high 100k dps
top end: 120k dps

Lower the mid low end of right gear but bad skill choice, keep the mid about the same but raise the ceiling for those who want to tweak things within the HA playstyle. The HA playstyle itself lends itself to an easier path to improvement, so progression along the HA spectrum is still more accessible than it currently is on the LA spectrum.

pretty sure they did standardize most or all heavy attacks to 1.8 seconds (it was never mentioned in the u35 patch notes, but lightning staves lost 1 tick of dmg to account for the shorter channel time)

Snamyap

Well, I don't have a solution but the current situation leaves very little room for build diversity and that's kindda boring. Bringing a bit more balance between the HA sets would be nice.
I'd also love to see the fire staff have a channeled HA as well but I guess there's a plethora of reasons I haven't thought of for not doing that.

SkaiFaith

OP said: "First, we need to get out of the way the fact that even 2 bar HA builds get almost 70% of their damage PURELY from heavy attacks. This promotes an extremely lazy playstyle with no real path to improving skill when mastering the build. Assuming you have the proper gear you will effectively already be at the peak of this build's effectiveness."

Let me fix that for you: "Assuming you have chronical carpal tunnel you will effectively already be at the peak of this build's effectiveness"

Just kidding, but seriously - why disabled players should pay the ripercussion of elite players over utilizing an accessibility feature that doesn't make disabled players OP or even at the same level in some cases.
We can't just assume that disabled players are capable and willing of achieving what skilled and elite players in the 1% can achieve just for fun.

Nerfing "the fun" of good players would result in nerfing disabled players that REALLY NEED this features.

With this put out of the way... I am not disagreeing with everything OP said. Most suggestions were fine (apart from cleave damage reduced to 60% and wanting to nerf 1 bar builds, which sounds insane and unfair to me).
I just wanted to make clear that the current state of HA builds is not broken, not even by far FOR DISABLED PLAYERS which are the target players. They already got to pay the first nerf caused by PvPers, and now even by skilled PvEers that are bad utilizing a legitimate good feature that is not made for them? No thanks.

I didn't mean to seem salty, forgive me but these things hurts my nerves (pun intended).
Hope devs listen and IF they have to nerf they keep in mind some of OP suggestions, like not nerfing under 60% the Empower buff.

vsrs_au

luchtt wrote: »

This title will be quite provocative as, currently, HA builds are quite popular especially for lower skill, less abled and newer players.

Well, that prejudiced comment got your post off to a fairly bad start. I prefer HA to LA, but not for any of those reasons.

Fugus

To me, the whole heavy attack setup they have in the game right now doesn't make any sense and is logically the exact opposite that should happen.

When you are throwing your all into something, you don't leave with more energy than what you started with.

The way it should work logically is that the attack takes maybe 1.5 times longer than a normal attack but hits 3 times harder or so or maybe adds some debuff to them and use your resources instead of adding to them. To be used for burst when needed or a resource dump if you have more to spare.

If the resource management in the game is lacking it needs to be adjusted with either the cost of the moves or the regeneration on the gear/character.

Won't lie, I abuse it to no end to get near limitless magicka/stamina but having that option just doesn't seem right given what the mechanical is supposed to mimic.

Stx

You’re right, it doesn’t make sense. But they tried to make it make more sense a couple years ago. They made heavy attacks deal more damage, and light attacks deal even less damage than they do now but they restored resources slowly.

The changes were very poorly received and they backed off of them.

I think the system they have now is fine, but I would like other weapons than lightning staves to be viable for heavy attack builds.

Fugus

To me, the proper way to address it would be to have the light attacks do about what they do now but with normal stamina regeneration during it while the heavy attacks take a little bit longer to wind up but deal more damage at the expense of Magicka/Stamina.

With the regeneration addressed through either the resource cost of skills reduced or the amount of regeneration increased. If the resources are regenerating too slowly with the current setup, then increase the regeneration, don't do a counter intuitive design choice that makes no sense.

Hyperdeathstalker

Another heavy attack hater, there is a lack of build diversity on heavy attack and light attack buildS at the very top, so i dont get the arguement there.

I dont understand the heavy attack stigma, its one of the few things making this game more accessible which is keeping the game alive and you wana make it complicated and cause a load of upset?

Like people said why mess with something that doesnt need any adjustments?

You got 135k parses with light attack builds and you calling nerf on heavy attack builds parsing 40k less?

I would like to see more variety on both types of builds with more sets

current problems facing the playstyle ? Upsetting elitists is the only thing i see

Hyperdeathstalker

Also heavy attack builds work on all weapons , yes lightning is the most powerful but , you can touch 90k with all weapons apart from sword and shield. Hell even resto you can get 94k dps

Stx

Hyperdeathstalker wrote: »

Also heavy attack builds work on all weapons , yes lightning is the most powerful but , you can touch 90k with all weapons apart from sword and shield. Hell even resto you can get 94k dps

Resto and lightning are the only heavy attacks that channel and have periodic ticks of damage so they double dip from prominent sets like sergeants and noble duelist.

I’m not going to say you’re wrong because I haven’t tested it, but just basing off of tooltips I don’t see how any weapon could come even close to those two in heavy attack dps.

Hyperdeathstalker

Stx wrote: »

Hyperdeathstalker wrote: »

Also heavy attack builds work on all weapons , yes lightning is the most powerful but , you can touch 90k with all weapons apart from sword and shield. Hell even resto you can get 94k dps

Resto and lightning are the only heavy attacks that channel and have periodic ticks of damage so they double dip from prominent sets like sergeants and noble duelist.

I’m not going to say you’re wrong because I haven’t tested it, but just basing off of tooltips I don’t see how any weapon could come even close to those two in heavy attack dps.

Yeah id say its goes lightning, resto 95k + , flame and dual wield , 2h around 93k and bow frost 90k and under , havent test frost fully though

So there is variety and not as one track as people make out.

I say its only around a 5 - 10 k dps loss not using lightning staff maybe less

wsmith97ub17_ESO

I agree with this topic and posters. If you want dps, then work for it. A 1000% damage reduction to HA seems right, along with movement penalties, lock them down for the duration and a couple seconds after.