Stalking Blastbones is Necro's BEST damage ability. Please reconsider the change.

Alaztor91

Hottytotz wrote: »

I already wrote my novel in another thread but the tldr of this thread seems to be keep blastbones at all costs and all of you are magically willing to forgive its massive issues now becasuse you dont want to lose it.

This is really bad. Blastbones is necros most damaging ability but that doesnt make it good or good to use. You could multiply graveyard damage by 2000% and it would all of a sudden be necros "best damage ability"...

I agree that blastbones shouldnt go away but it needs to change big time for necro to ever make progress to being a decent playing spec again... Otherwise it will be EC support slave until the end of this game.

tbh I don't think that ZOS even acknowledges all the issues that current live version of BB has, their reasoning for changing it is purely due to ''rotation issues/complexity''.

I have never seen ZOS respond to the other issues the skill has like the fact that it can get Crowd Controlled and basically waste a GCD or that if the target moves too fast or uses line of sight BB won't catch up to it. Afaik the only issue that ZOS sees with the skill is the fact that you pretty much have to use it every 3s to do decent damage.

I wouldn't really mind if for example they changed it to a strong 10s AoE sticky DoT(with a mechanic similar to Fulminating Rune), something that could match the damage of roughly 2 BB casts. They could make it so that it spawns 1 Corpse at the target location at the start and another one at the end. Then they could tweak other mediocre skills like Skeletal Mage or the Tethers.

OtarTheMad

MashmalloMan wrote: »

Hottytotz wrote: »

I already wrote my novel in another thread but the tldr of this thread seems to be keep blastbones at all costs and all of you are magically willing to forgive its massive issues now becasuse you dont want to lose it.

This is really bad. Blastbones is necros most damaging ability but that doesnt make it good or good to use. You could multiply graveyard damage by 2000% and it would all of a sudden be necros "best damage ability"...

I agree that blastbones shouldnt go away but it needs to change big time for necro to ever make progress to being a decent playing spec again... Otherwise it will be EC support slave until the end of this game.

Same page, why are so many of you asking them to revert it instead of focusing on their initial stated goal. Hold them accountable, Blighted Blastbones is not the original skill, make the cost scale dynamically and reintroduce the damage multiplier from Stalking Blastbones. With the nerf to Defile, this is 100% warranted and would not break any balance.

There, now it's fixed and we can begin focusing on how we can make the new ability more fun to use, because as it stands, it's not perfect, but it shouldn't be deleted from the game either. This provides a new way to play Necro, like it or hate it, some people want that.

Because most of us have seen this movie before, that’s why. It was the same crap when they nerfed Graverobber synergy. It was all “it had to go” “it needed to be changed, now they can focus on the rest” “this is just a step in them making necro good” “why are you complaining now ZOS will work on them.”

Everything being said now was said back then and ZOS did nothing. They didn’t continue to alter/change the class. It wasn’t a first step in some overhaul, it wasn’t anything but a nerf. Then came more and worse yet patches/updates where necro got nothing.

Necro has basically been punched in the face since 2019 and I, for one, am just tired of it and reading players saying that this will make ZOS work on the class… no… no it won’t lol.

MashmalloMan

OtarTheMad wrote: »

MashmalloMan wrote: »

Hottytotz wrote: »

I already wrote my novel in another thread but the tldr of this thread seems to be keep blastbones at all costs and all of you are magically willing to forgive its massive issues now becasuse you dont want to lose it.

This is really bad. Blastbones is necros most damaging ability but that doesnt make it good or good to use. You could multiply graveyard damage by 2000% and it would all of a sudden be necros "best damage ability"...

I agree that blastbones shouldnt go away but it needs to change big time for necro to ever make progress to being a decent playing spec again... Otherwise it will be EC support slave until the end of this game.

Same page, why are so many of you asking them to revert it instead of focusing on their initial stated goal. Hold them accountable, Blighted Blastbones is not the original skill, make the cost scale dynamically and reintroduce the damage multiplier from Stalking Blastbones. With the nerf to Defile, this is 100% warranted and would not break any balance.

There, now it's fixed and we can begin focusing on how we can make the new ability more fun to use, because as it stands, it's not perfect, but it shouldn't be deleted from the game either. This provides a new way to play Necro, like it or hate it, some people want that.

Because most of us have seen this movie before, that’s why. It was the same crap when they nerfed Graverobber synergy. It was all “it had to go” “it needed to be changed, now they can focus on the rest” “this is just a step in them making necro good” “why are you complaining now ZOS will work on them.”

Everything being said now was said back then and ZOS did nothing. They didn’t continue to alter/change the class. It wasn’t a first step in some overhaul, it wasn’t anything but a nerf. Then came more and worse yet patches/updates where necro got nothing.

Necro has basically been punched in the face since 2019 and I, for one, am just tired of it and reading players saying that this will make ZOS work on the class… no… no it won’t lol.

Fair enough, I feel you, they can be frustrating and Necro has been left in a bad state... but I don't think it's the right approach to revert it when they spent all this time working on something fundamentally different.

Ask yourself what is more likely?

1. They give Blighted Blastbones a bit more bang for its buck to actually match the complaints that it doesn't match live?
2. They completely remove a brand new skill from the toolkit despite feeling so strongly about giving Necro a new way to tackle their rotations?

I would say option 1. With ZOS you have to pick your battles and understand what will fall upon deaf ears and what they can change with the flip of a switch.

Use their own words against them. Blighted Blastbones does not retain the original playstyle, therefor they failed their goal and should rectify it.

OtarTheMad

MashmalloMan wrote: »

OtarTheMad wrote: »

MashmalloMan wrote: »

Hottytotz wrote: »

I already wrote my novel in another thread but the tldr of this thread seems to be keep blastbones at all costs and all of you are magically willing to forgive its massive issues now becasuse you dont want to lose it.

This is really bad. Blastbones is necros most damaging ability but that doesnt make it good or good to use. You could multiply graveyard damage by 2000% and it would all of a sudden be necros "best damage ability"...

I agree that blastbones shouldnt go away but it needs to change big time for necro to ever make progress to being a decent playing spec again... Otherwise it will be EC support slave until the end of this game.

Same page, why are so many of you asking them to revert it instead of focusing on their initial stated goal. Hold them accountable, Blighted Blastbones is not the original skill, make the cost scale dynamically and reintroduce the damage multiplier from Stalking Blastbones. With the nerf to Defile, this is 100% warranted and would not break any balance.

There, now it's fixed and we can begin focusing on how we can make the new ability more fun to use, because as it stands, it's not perfect, but it shouldn't be deleted from the game either. This provides a new way to play Necro, like it or hate it, some people want that.

Because most of us have seen this movie before, that’s why. It was the same crap when they nerfed Graverobber synergy. It was all “it had to go” “it needed to be changed, now they can focus on the rest” “this is just a step in them making necro good” “why are you complaining now ZOS will work on them.”

Everything being said now was said back then and ZOS did nothing. They didn’t continue to alter/change the class. It wasn’t a first step in some overhaul, it wasn’t anything but a nerf. Then came more and worse yet patches/updates where necro got nothing.

Necro has basically been punched in the face since 2019 and I, for one, am just tired of it and reading players saying that this will make ZOS work on the class… no… no it won’t lol.

Fair enough, I feel you, they can be frustrating and Necro has been left in a bad state... but I don't think it's the right approach to revert it when they spent all this time working on something fundamentally different.

Ask yourself what is more likely?

1. They give Blighted Blastbones a bit more bang for its buck to actually match the complaints that it doesn't match live?
2. They completely remove a brand new skill from the toolkit despite feeling so strongly about giving Necro a new way to tackle their rotations?

I would say option 1. With ZOS you have to pick your battles and understand what will fall upon deaf ears and what they can change with the flip of a switch.

Use their own words against them. Blighted Blastbones does not retain the original playstyle, therefor they failed their goal and should rectify it.

Most likely option 1. I suggested on one of the million Necro threads here that if ZOS was going to do this they have to give us something.

I suggested making a morph of Boneyard a targeted ground dot kind of like Imperfect Ring and a morph of Skeletal also put a dot on the target, on top of what it already does, on either the first hit or last.

We are stuck with this crap ability now. But it is also more likely that it’ll be option 3 which is keep the change but do nothing else. I just don’t have faith in them with Necro. Other classes? Sure, I actually like the sorc change and Arcanist nerf isn’t bad but necro? No. I’m more likely to get eaten by a dragon IRL than necro get a good overhaul.

Uvi_AUT

Urvoth wrote: »

How is pressing one skill every few seconds a "twitchy rotation"? Pressing skills to do a rotation is just part of the game's combat system and every class functions that way. You're definitely not in the majority when there are multiple threads and comments on here validating that people want to use blastbones.

Just watch a Necro-Parsevideo and compare it to any other Parse. Its insanely Twitchy.
Threads are only written by people who oppose something. People who like something dont start Threads. Its like 30 people at the most.

Being nauseous and angry because people want to keep their iconic class skill that's been the core of the necro dps setup since 2019 is just entitled and ignorant.

Youre completely right, but I dont care. I want this change to stay.

Lalothen

This change plays to the strength of my necro build: more DoT damage, and I'm no longer forced to slot effectively 2 spammables on my bar because Blast Bones - at 2.5s arming time - can't even weave properly with a lightning HA (2.1s channel time). I think the timer should be 30s instead of 20s though, because that will allow it to fit more seamlessly into "every other rotation".

I also think the other morph should be changed to a dynamic resource cost, and additionaly benefit from Stalking's current bonus of extra damage the longer it's "running to target". I don't believe that would unbalance it at all in either PvE or PvP.

That way everyone ought to be happy (but of course some people still wouldn't be, because well... we all know why that is).

Tessitura wrote: »

[Snip]

It's what happens when you try to balance one set of skills and gear around two distinct gameplay types with their own unique needs and balancing requirements. If the ESO devs would just bite the damned bullet and properly separate PvE & PvP gameplay then they'd be able to make it all work - but it's been one bandaid after another for years.

[Edited quote]

J18696

This change would have gone over so much better in the eyes of the community if they just made Stalking cost scale off Max resource and changed blighted since its pretty much the bad morph I dont think majority of people are against the idea of the new morph but having to sacrifice the superior version of the skill for this kinda a heavy blow

i11ionward

How about a skill that combines the effects of Blighted and Stalking Blastbones?

Cost and Damage Type Determined by Highest Max Resource.
Summon a skeleton from the ground after 2.5 seconds. The skeleton runs after the target and explodes when it gets close to them, dealing 3600 Disease Damage or Flame Damage to all enemies nearby. If skeleton chasing its target less than one second applying Major Defile to all damaged enemies for 4 seconds. If skeleton chasing its target more than one second, then every second the skeleton spends chasing its target increases the damage of the explosion by 10%, up to a maximum of 50% more damage. Creates a corpse on death.

gwenval

As someone who was just getting into necromancer and starting to play ECcro in vet trials, I am not too fond of these changes. I enjoy playing magicka characters and being left with a stamina morph seems to set my sustain off kilter despite the reduced cost (there appears to be a larger issue of catering toward stamina builds right now while leaving magicka playstyles in the dust, but that is a discussion for another thread).

Grave Lord's Sacrifice (the new morph) is very clunky on PTS so far. You can't seem to activate it until you attack a target, which feels very off given that this skill used to be my opener for the rotation. The animation/glow is unappealing and distracting as well. Others above are making the case better than me for the raw numbers for damage output, but I just wanted to say that from a gameplay feel perspective, it definitely feels like a downgrade.

ItsNotLiving

Necros complained for years about Blastbones being unreliable and buggy, all while saying the class needed an overhaul because of clunkiness of the skills. How was this change unexpected again?

smallwitchy

I wasn't too apposed to this. I think it's a wonderful idea to make necro more accessible, but this is NOT the way to do it. If they want to do anything meaningful, they should make blastbones more reliable, or do something similar to what they did to warden's scorch. This is just too strange of a change, not gonna lie, cause over time blastbones became the defining necromancer skill.

CameraBeardThePirate

ItsNotLiving wrote: »

Necros complained for years about Blastbones being unreliable and buggy, all while saying the class needed an overhaul because of clunkiness of the skills. How was this change unexpected again?

Blastbones hasn't been unreliable since they updated the leap distance to 28m. That was over 2 years ago.

Grim_Overlord

Grandsheba wrote: »

Blighted Blastbones

Target: Enemy
Range: 28m
Radius: 6m
Duration: 4 second
Cost: 2295

Skill description
Summon a decaying skeleton from the ground after 2.5 seconds. The skeleton runs after the target and explodes when it gets close to them, dealing 3600 Disease Damage to all enemies nearby and applying Major Defile to them for 4 seconds, reducing their healing received and Health Recovery by 16%.

Creates a corpse on death, causing a putrid area of decay in a 6-meter radius. Enemies within the area suffer from a potent Disease affliction, taking 1500 Disease damage over 4 seconds. Only 2 blighted corpes may persist at at time.

More of these kinds of effects I think really is the way to go. Let Necromancer lean into more of the decay theme both in terms of Mag and Stam getting to deal disease damage AND having smaller, potent dots that require consistant(note: not constant) reapplication over the course of a fight through our various class skills to help with the activeness of the class in combat and their damage potential.

I really like the idea of them leaning into caring about how many DOTs, statuses, and debuffs are on a target through these kinds of mechanics. For example, I think the ability quoted above is possibly a bit much given how AOE heavy the class is already, but having Blighted increase in damage by the number of negative effects on a target could help it out without giving it a DOT of its own while still synergizing with them. Giving Skulls a DOT, single target on one morph and AOE on the other, would aid this too as well as their mediocre damage compared to other spammables. Giving Archer and Arcanist some kind of small DOT as well would be fun too, such as Archer gaining a DOT on its final shot that deals increased bleed in execute or something.

Grim_Overlord

Something messed up with the quoting on the above post, so apologies for the repost:

More of these kinds of effects I think really is the way to go. Let Necromancer lean into more of the decay theme both in terms of Mag and Stam getting to deal disease damage AND having smaller, potent dots that require consistant(note: not constant) reapplication over the course of a fight through our various class skills to help with the activeness of the class in combat and their damage potential.

I really like the idea of them leaning into caring about how many DOTs, statuses, and debuffs are on a target through these kinds of mechanics. For example, I think the ability quoted above is possibly a bit much given how AOE heavy the class is already, but having Blighted increase in damage by the number of negative effects on a target could help it out without giving it a DOT of its own while still synergizing with them. Giving Skulls a DOT, single target on one morph and AOE on the other, would aid this too as well as their mediocre damage compared to other spammables. Giving Archer and Arcanist some kind of small DOT as well would be fun too, such as Archer gaining a DOT on its final shot that deals increased bleed in execute or something.

StarOfElyon

MashmalloMan wrote: »

Hottytotz wrote: »

I already wrote my novel in another thread but the tldr of this thread seems to be keep blastbones at all costs and all of you are magically willing to forgive its massive issues now becasuse you dont want to lose it.

This is really bad. Blastbones is necros most damaging ability but that doesnt make it good or good to use. You could multiply graveyard damage by 2000% and it would all of a sudden be necros "best damage ability"...

I agree that blastbones shouldnt go away but it needs to change big time for necro to ever make progress to being a decent playing spec again... Otherwise it will be EC support slave until the end of this game.

Same page, why are so many of you asking them to revert it instead of focusing on their initial stated goal. Hold them accountable, Blighted Blastbones is not the original skill, make the cost scale dynamically and reintroduce the damage multiplier from Stalking Blastbones. With the nerf to Defile, this is 100% warranted and would not break any balance.

There, now it's fixed and we can begin focusing on how we can make the new ability more fun to use, because as it stands, it's not perfect, but it shouldn't be deleted from the game either. This provides a new way to play Necro, like it or hate it, some people want that.

By using a bunch of dots that's not in your class? It's a way to play necro without playing a necro is all it is.

StarOfElyon

Uvi_AUT wrote: »

Urvoth wrote: »

How is pressing one skill every few seconds a "twitchy rotation"? Pressing skills to do a rotation is just part of the game's combat system and every class functions that way. You're definitely not in the majority when there are multiple threads and comments on here validating that people want to use blastbones.

Just watch a Necro-Parsevideo and compare it to any other Parse. Its insanely Twitchy.
Threads are only written by people who oppose something. People who like something dont start Threads. Its like 30 people at the most.

Being nauseous and angry because people want to keep their iconic class skill that's been the core of the necro dps setup since 2019 is just entitled and ignorant.

Youre completely right, but I dont care. I want this change to stay.

If you don't like the way necro plays, play a different class. It's that simple.

Remiem

Even if by some miracle ZOS decided to give Stalking's modifier back to Blighted and make its resource cost scale dynamically, it would still be a nerf for PvPers because Stalking's fire damage is more invaluable than Blighted's major defile.
ZOS need to replace Blighted, not Stalking with their totally fun and original dumpster fire of a new skill, period.

CameraBeardThePirate

Remiem wrote: »

Even if by some miracle ZOS decided to give Stalking's modifier back to Blighted and make its resource cost scale dynamically, it would still be a nerf for PvPers because Stalking's fire damage is more invaluable than Blighted's major defile.
ZOS need to replace Blighted, not Stalking with their totally fun and original dumpster fire of a new skill, period.

Ehhhh - sure fire is technically better because of the amount of Vamps + Burning, but Diseased is getting quite a potent buff, Defile is getting a massive buff now that it works on shields, and I'm like 70% positive Blighted Blastbones still has a hidden snare on it (although I haven't used the ability in ages so I'd need to test that last point).

If the Stalking modifier were added to Blighted, it wouldn't really be a nerf at all.

Remiem

Blastbones is AoE, even with a charged weapon you will get a diseased proc once in a bluemoon from it, same way Stalking rarely procs burning. The change to defile to affect wards is whatever, against classes not using them the debuff has been nerfed. I think the hamstrung snare has been fixed.

CameraBeardThePirate

Remiem wrote: »

Blastbones is AoE, even with a charged weapon you will get a diseased proc once in a bluemoon from it, same way Stalking rarely procs burning. The change to defile to affect wards is whatever, against classes not using them the debuff has been nerfed. I think the hamstrung snare has been fixed.

Not sure what you're on about here - Stalking procs burning plenty with a charged weapon.

Remiem

Not "plenty".
Anyway I'll take the almost guaranteed +13% damage dealt by the ability itself (and the same chance of rolling a burning proc) over the chance of rolling a 400 damage diseased proc and a couple seconds of minor defile.

couriersix

This is such an awful change. I main necro and it feels more punishing to me for taking the time to learn a rotation and how the skills work more than anything.

It's my favorite class because I can send skeletons to my enemies, not to myself what's even the point of it anymore

Uvi_AUT

StarOfElyon wrote: »

If you don't like the way necro plays, play a different class. It's that simple.

I did. But ZOS now fixed it so I dont have to anymore.

CameraBeardThePirate

Uvi_AUT wrote: »

StarOfElyon wrote: »

If you don't like the way necro plays, play a different class. It's that simple.

I did. But ZOS now fixed it so I dont have to anymore.

They objectively made the class worse. You literally cannot create corpses where they need to be on ranged builds with the new skill. That's not "fixing the class", that's making the biggest problem with the class (corpse gameplay) even worse.

EF321

At the very least cost of old morph should be decided by max resource or split like whip.

StarOfElyon

Uvi_AUT wrote: »

StarOfElyon wrote: »

If you don't like the way necro plays, play a different class. It's that simple.

I did. But ZOS now fixed it so I dont have to anymore.

That's like me saying I love Burger King but didn't like the food until they changed, and getting mad at people who liked the food the way it always tasted.

StarOfElyon

ItsNotLiving wrote: »

Necros complained for years about Blastbones being unreliable and buggy, all while saying the class needed an overhaul because of clunkiness of the skills. How was this change unexpected again?

Blastbones didn't need an overhaul. It just needed to be fixed. The other skills needed overhauls.

tsaescishoeshiner

If the goal is to make Blastbones part of an easier rotation, but the issue is that now Necros are lacking ranged corpses, here's a solution:

Make one morph of Blastbones a 10-second single-target curse that spawns 2 Blastbones at the target over the duration. Then it would be as easy to use as Haunting Curse, but still provide corpses at range, as well as burst.

TX12001rwb17_ESO

Well I guess this means the Necromancer is a Tank/Healer class.

Urvoth

Remiem wrote: »

Even if by some miracle ZOS decided to give Stalking's modifier back to Blighted and make its resource cost scale dynamically, it would still be a nerf for PvPers because Stalking's fire damage is more invaluable than Blighted's major defile.
ZOS need to replace Blighted, not Stalking with their totally fun and original dumpster fire of a new skill, period.

It's also easier for stam/hybrid builds to utilize a mag blastbones than it is for a magcro to incorporate a stam semi spammable into a viable build