Werewolf DPS is higher without casting Roar. So, damage dealers may slot the morph that can taunt.

Erickson9610

One of the goals of introducing the Terrified debuff is to encourage Werewolf players to use all 5 of their skills, but it turns out that Werewolf damage dealers can score higher DPS by not interacting with Roar at all. Further, because Roar is still not worth casting, damage dealers who use Oakensoul may prefer to slot Deafening Roar for the passive Major Protection, which means they have the ability to taunt while dealing optimal DPS.

Here is a 99k parse I performed with Ferocious Roar in the rotation on the PTS:

Note that Ferocious Roar has no data in the info tab because the trial dummy is immune to being feared. The number of "missed" light attacks (22) corresponds to the number of times Ferocious Roar was cast in this parse.

And here is the 102k parse I performed with Deafening Roar slotted but never used (i.e., the old rotation):

For completeness sake, here's my 107k parse on Live:

The time it takes to cast Roar/Ferocious Roar in a parse makes it less worthwhile to actively use those skills in PvE. In other words, the bonus from Terrified isn't worth the sustain and DPS loss. In my parses on the PTS, I got 22269 DPS from Howl of Agony when casting Ferocious Roar every 10 seconds, but I get 25503 DPS from Howl of Agony when I don't cast Roar or its morphs at all. The maximum damage from Howl of Agony is greater when the enemy is Terrified, but the damage per second suffers because Roar itself doesn't deal any damage. The sustain is also much better when I don't need to cast Roar.

If Roar isn't worth casting, then it's just a wasted slot on our ability bar, as it was before. However, due to the changes to Deafening Roar, it's now worthwhile for a Werewolf damage dealer wearing Oakensoul to slot Deafening Roar for the added Major Protection. That is, Deafening Roar provides a buff that Oakensoul lacks, and any other buffs from Ferocious Roar are generally redundant or not worth using. Werewolf damage dealers may want to use Deafening Roar if they don't benefit from Terrified as much as they should, if they source Major Savagery and Prophecy from somewhere else, and if they don't need heavy attack speed or don't need to heavy attack at all. Maybe these Werewolf damage dealers don't want to put enemies on crowd control immunity, so they won't use their 5th skill.

The point is, Werewolves will use Deafening Roar for the passive benefits, because it's a DPS nerf to try to keep Terrified up. It's better to just take the maximum 31.82% uptime of 10% bonus damage (when before it was maximum 100% uptime of 25% bonus damage) instead of putting a strain on sustain, annoying your tanks, and lowering your DPS by trying to get an extra 10% bonus damage from Terrified. As a result, Terrified is only useful where heavy hitting abilities are needed, such as PvP — but the enemies there can purge Terrified anyway, so there's no point to using it at all.

Erickson9610

A few suggestions to alleviate these specific problems:

• For optimal DPS, a Werewolf damage dealer would pick the Werewolf Berserker morph for the damage over time on light attack. Since Pack Leader is already tanky and designed as a support (+10% unique mitigation, passive Minor Courage to grouped allies, +3 to the Call of the Pack passive for grouped Werewolves) then the taunt on heavy attack should be tied to the Pack Leader morph, rather than to Deafening Roar. This would eliminate the possibility of a Werewolf damage dealer being able to taunt, but they should still be able to pick the tankier morph of Roar if they need it.
• The damage boost of Terrified does not outweigh the DPS gain of omitting it from the rotation. I'd suggest buffing the bonus damage of Terrified if it's absolutely necessary to have Werewolf damage dealers fearing enemies every 10 seconds.
• The duration of Terrified is short. It would increase overall DPS if Terrified had a duration of 20 seconds, so more time can be spent casting Howl of Agony.
• Terrified is not sourced from anywhere outside of the Werewolf skill line, so a Werewolf who wants the bonus damage would either need to cast Roar themselves or have allied Werewolves cast Roar. Given how few players will play Werewolf, an alternative way to boost the DPS is to introduce more ways of inflicting Terrified, outside of the Werewolf skill line. Alternatively, make Terrified useful for non-Werewolf allies, so that groups will want a Werewolf in their group composition.
• Because Terrified is a negative effect, it can be purged. Instead of this, rework Terrified to be a group buff, rather than an enemy debuff, as this will serve a similar purpose. Alternatively, add a tracking effect to Terrified so that it has some utility outside of being a purgeable damage buff.
• If Werewolves need to use all of their skills, then give them a Grimoire they can swap troublesome skills like Roar out for. Such Werewolf Grimoire could undoubtedly be made to be more useful for a Werewolf damage dealer than Roar currently is.

@ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_Kevin @ZOS_BrianWheeler

Skoomah

The changes to werewolf next patch are not helpful. Every patch, we see set selection and skill selection narrow. Werewolf will no longer be fun to play. Tanky werewolf playstyles that can’t kill anything effectively is so boring.

Skoomah

It really bothers me that my beloved playstyle as a werewolf is getting gutted so badly next patch. I don’t want to play the light attack weaving pve werewolf in PvP, and I don’t want to be forced into having to use Blooddrinker and Oakensoul to still be below par with other classes. How else are we going to make up for damage loss? What other way is there to play werewolf without just being an annoying tank that can’t kill anything?

These changes don’t accomplish anything in PVE or PVP. This is change for the sake of change. Why are we wasting time on these kinds of changes to werewolf? We all hate the changes. No werewolf likes these changes.

Tommy_The_Gun

So it seems that if you pick Deafening roar morph, you are essentially left without Major Prophecy & Savagery meaning that you actually have to use Oakensoul. This is also bad since there will be close to no build diversity. And if don't pick this morph you are losing Major Breach and Minor Maim debuff loool. So it is like "pick your poison" I guess.

From a solo play perspective, Prophecy & Savagery is far too important to be swapped for Protection, so there is very little choice when it comes to skill morphs. Losing the "essential de-buffs" sucks, but it is still better than losing Prophecy & Savagery. I mean I shouldn't not be forced to using one specific mythic just to have access to basic buffs...

From a PvP perspective, I do wonder if Pack Leader 10% less damage taken + Major Protection will be good enough to make WW playable. Most likely not.

So to summarize:
- PvE tanks are unhappy cuz ZOS took Tormentor multi-taunt away and replaced it with heavy attack taunt on a morph that does not speed up heavy attacks. You won't be able to taunt stuff fast enough for the WW tank to actually work (too many things to taunt & no aoe taut) & you are left open without blocking for far too long.
- PvE DPS are unhappy cuz damage output (that was already quite low) went down & rotation intended for DPS (Terrified de-buff) is far to awkward & clunky to use so it is actually better to keep things simple & ignore it.
- PvP players are unhappy cuz Werewolf loses their primary burst damage. Current damage bonus relies on fear or just positioning & is more reliable as "position" can not be purged. Werewolf in general still lacks basic tools that are essential for PvP and every other class has access to it. Terrified does not work as Detection/nb's Piercing Mark and Werewolf still does not have CC immunity tool or negative effect removal tool.

Great update ZOS. I do understand that the wording on PTS & all the "dog jokes" were there for fun, but um... how to put it...
I just have the feeling that many Werewolf players now feel like you were making fun of them, ZOS.

Panderbander

Tommy_The_Gun wrote: »

Great update ZOS. I do understand that the wording on PTS & all the "dog jokes" were there for fun, but um... how to put it...
I just have the feeling that many Werewolf players now feel like you were making fun of them, ZOS.

Oh 100% it feels like that. It feels like that every patch we get adjusted without a word why, like when they took away the direwolf snare for no apparent reason other than... I dunno.

So basically this patch boils down to we got more of the now-nerfed hemorrhaging and a 25% reduction in damage in exchange for a debuff that actually does nothing.

Bravo. Task failed successfully.

huskandhunger

@ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_Kevin Hi Kevin, Hi Gina, the changes to the Roar morphs in particular are deeply unpopular among the werewolf community, can we get some kind of response at least that player feedback is making it through?

Wuuffyy

Erickson9610 wrote: »

A few suggestions to alleviate these specific problems:

• For optimal DPS, a Werewolf damage dealer would pick the Werewolf Berserker morph for the damage over time on light attack. Since Pack Leader is already tanky and designed as a support (+10% unique mitigation, passive Minor Courage to grouped allies, +3 to the Call of the Pack passive for grouped Werewolves) then the taunt on heavy attack should be tied to the Pack Leader morph, rather than to Deafening Roar. This would eliminate the possibility of a Werewolf damage dealer being able to taunt, but they should still be able to pick the tankier morph of Roar if they need it.
• The damage boost of Terrified does not outweigh the DPS gain of omitting it from the rotation. I'd suggest buffing the bonus damage of Terrified if it's absolutely necessary to have Werewolf damage dealers fearing enemies every 10 seconds.
• The duration of Terrified is short. It would increase overall DPS if Terrified had a duration of 20 seconds, so more time can be spent casting Howl of Agony.
• Terrified is not sourced from anywhere outside of the Werewolf skill line, so a Werewolf who wants the bonus damage would either need to cast Roar themselves or have allied Werewolves cast Roar. Given how few players will play Werewolf, an alternative way to boost the DPS is to introduce more ways of inflicting Terrified, outside of the Werewolf skill line. Alternatively, make Terrified useful for non-Werewolf allies, so that groups will want a Werewolf in their group composition.
• Because Terrified is a negative effect, it can be purged. Instead of this, rework Terrified to be a group buff, rather than an enemy debuff, as this will serve a similar purpose. Alternatively, add a tracking effect to Terrified so that it has some utility outside of being a purgeable damage buff.
• If Werewolves need to use all of their skills, then give them a Grimoire they can swap troublesome skills like Roar out for. Such Werewolf Grimoire could undoubtedly be made to be more useful for a Werewolf damage dealer than Roar currently is.

@ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_Kevin @ZOS_BrianWheeler

The most sensible argument. Anything else seems honestly unnecessarily convoluted by comparison.

C_Inside

Awesome! Another member of our "weak class that gets nerfed for no reason because the dev team doesn't play said class and has no idea what they're doing" club (it's a working title). You can take a seat right over there right between Necro and Templar. No not that one, that belongs to pve Nightblades.

Just like templar jabs and necro stalking blastbones these mind boggling changes will make it to live no matter how much feedback you give them. It's set in stone as soon as week 1 rolls around.

IncultaWolf

C_Inside wrote: »

Awesome! Another member of our "weak class that gets nerfed for no reason because the dev team doesn't play said class and has no idea what they're doing" club (it's a working title). You can take a seat right over there right between Necro and Templar. No not that one, that belongs to pve Nightblades.

Just like templar jabs and necro stalking blastbones these mind boggling changes will make it to live no matter how much feedback you give them. It's set in stone as soon as week 1 rolls around.

It's really sad too, I don't know if it's malicious or just complete incompetence at this point. You have very dedicated werewolf players like Erickson going on pts and testing these changes, while providing solid data and evidence that proves these changes do the opposite of the intended goals stated in the patch notes.

C_Inside

IncultaWolf wrote: »

C_Inside wrote: »

Awesome! Another member of our "weak class that gets nerfed for no reason because the dev team doesn't play said class and has no idea what they're doing" club (it's a working title). You can take a seat right over there right between Necro and Templar. No not that one, that belongs to pve Nightblades.

Just like templar jabs and necro stalking blastbones these mind boggling changes will make it to live no matter how much feedback you give them. It's set in stone as soon as week 1 rolls around.

It's really sad too, I don't know if it's malicious or just complete incompetence at this point. You have very dedicated werewolf players like Erickson going on pts and testing these changes, while providing solid data and evidence that proves these changes do the opposite of the intended goals stated in the patch notes.

I think it's just the combat team has a certain vision but are way too prideful to admit they messed up and walk back their decisions when the community rightfully points out how bad they are. I mean, have you seen how Rich Lambert has reacted in the past when people have rightfully pointed out how greedy the monetization is?

Tannus15

These changes are proof that ZoS play PvP.

someone kept getting killed by werewolves and decided to do something about it.

huskandhunger

Just general communication along the lines of 'hey y'all, we hear you, we see you, and understand these changes are not going over so well in light of the feedback provided. Here is how we are addressing these concerns,...' or in light of these concerns, x y, z, has been discussed or even if a doubling down e.g. hey we intend to move forward due to x y z, but some communication as opposed to none would be most appreciated. ^_^

huskandhunger

as well a given rationale around decision making of changes would likely go very far for establishing positive rapport with the community of players at large to gain insight behind what may appear as random changes....granted other things do come down the pipeline which understandably may not be ready to be revealed yet, but even a basic hang in there, etc or you'll see why in time could also be beneficial

Skullstachio

There is a semi easy solution to this problem and other class related problems: Vote With Your Wallet.

Why?: who has been paying attention to the helldivers 2 drama and how players won a massive battle against sony. (With the proverbial alliance war yet to conclude in the long run.

Case and point: the only way to get through to ZoS/Bethesda (I honestly think that ZoS barely get to hear out all proper player feedback relayed through their intermediaries without some goldmaking scheme being involved.), is to show them how passionate you are, as gamers, about the elder scrolls online.
Review accordingly, stop paying for a game that has been shafted time and time again by bad design choices, unnecessary shortcuts which have left a fairly massive chunk of the base game worse off for wear looking at you PvP/Cyrodiil), and a diluted vision from an ever changing combat team that just barely has any clue on what they are doing, prove it to them just how passionate you are about ESO.

And Kindly tell bethesda to shaft Deshaan, Eastmarch, Icereach. Nobody wants that kind of Tamrielic Politicking & pandering. (People saw how that went down with it infecting gaming, it never ends well.

Panderbander

Skullstachio wrote: »

There is a semi easy solution to this problem and other class related problems: Vote With Your Wallet.

Why?: who has been paying attention to the helldivers 2 drama and how players won a massive battle against sony. (With the proverbial alliance war yet to conclude in the long run.

Case and point: the only way to get through to ZoS/Bethesda (I honestly think that ZoS barely get to hear out all proper player feedback relayed through their intermediaries without some goldmaking scheme being involved.), is to show them how passionate you are, as gamers, about the elder scrolls online.
Review accordingly, stop paying for a game that has been shafted time and time again by bad design choices, unnecessary shortcuts which have left a fairly massive chunk of the base game worse off for wear looking at you PvP/Cyrodiil), and a diluted vision from an ever changing combat team that just barely has any clue on what they are doing, prove it to them just how passionate you are about ESO.

And Kindly tell bethesda to shaft Deshaan, Eastmarch, Icereach. Nobody wants that kind of Tamrielic Politicking & pandering. (People saw how that went down with it infecting gaming, it never ends well.

Already done this personally for months now. Honestly happier for having done it.

I still want this game to improve because I did enjoy it as much as I did, and would love to have that joy back, which is the only reason I'm still active here.

Remathilis

C_Inside wrote: »

Awesome! Another member of our "weak class that gets nerfed for no reason because the dev team doesn't play said class and has no idea what they're doing" club (it's a working title). You can take a seat right over there right between Necro and Templar. No not that one, that belongs to pve Nightblades.

Just like templar jabs and necro stalking blastbones these mind boggling changes will make it to live no matter how much feedback you give them. It's set in stone as soon as week 1 rolls around.

The werewolf also can't have the corner in the back. That's reserved for vampires when they finally pull the trigger on the Undeath passive.

sneakymitchell

I still see fearious roar as just quick heavy attack if low on stamina. Just 1 2 and back to rotation. Since a stun is used in minor scenarios in mechanics and such

Erickson9610

sneakymitchell wrote: »

I still see fearious roar as just quick heavy attack if low on stamina. Just 1 2 and back to rotation. Since a stun is used in minor scenarios in mechanics and such

I personally use Ferocious Roar on Live for this reason. You don't actually need to hit enemies with it to get the heavy attack speed buff, meaning you can step away from the group, cast Ferocious Roar, then Pounce back into the group and start heavy attacking without putting enemies on Crowd Control Immunity.

By contrast, the only way to apply Terrified is to actually hit the enemies with Ferocious Roar, which may put them on Crowd Control Immunity if they aren't already on it. Damage dealers shouldn't be required to put enemies on Crowd Control Immunity to get a damage buff.

autocookies

sneakymitchell wrote: »

I still see fearious roar as just quick heavy attack if low on stamina. Just 1 2 and back to rotation. Since a stun is used in minor scenarios in mechanics and such

I do this as well, and fill as much stam as possible while they are set off balance... at least until there is no choice but to refresh Brutal Pounce... and the 10 second Carnage timer...

Personally I never use Ferocious Roar both skills set the enemies off balance, and even if I wanted to have the faster heavy attacks.. I don't have the luxury of going without Major Breach. (nor is it worth it by the time you get the speed bonus its already nearly gone since the first heavy takes a lifetime to land also multiple enemies cause the heavy to always be slow anyways)

On that topic every build I have has some way of applying Major Breach since the groups I run with don't often apply it, and its usually my duty to ensure we have it covered. I press roar on cooldown on live and will continue to next patch as roar has always been a number 1 priority skill for the breach alone. I will be forced to use that morph next patch as losing breach is a bigger loss then losing the crit chance I feel. Also I want the major protection, being harder to kill is more dps then being a dead werewolf waiting on a revive.

Also going to add that I will continue to be forced to wear a set like briarheart due to the healing affect and the fact that its only an okay dps set at the same time... werewolf self healing for me is not in a good place. and since the damage is horrible as well there is no choice when it comes to sets you are forced to wear the best dps sets you can get...

In comparison I run an oakensoul build on my toons in the infinite archive. my dps is high enough to skip all the mechs and not die up to the end of the second arena (when not in werewolf form) I also have survivability and can survive the mechs (again out of wolf form).... Now in werewolf form I can't kill the enemy before the mechs kick in... and in addition to that I also don't have the survivability to survive the mechs? I build towards magic regen because having a heal is more important then having the stam. If heavy attacks gave both resources that would help me a ton otherwise as its usually magic not stam that I need most.



Why is my survivability greater out of wolf form? Revealing Flare for major protection, Resolving Vigor, a massive dot heal + minor resolve + the heal scales off damage rather then max health... also stam refilling off heavy attacks to be able to use my stam heal. Werewolf doesn't have this option they have 1 expensive magic burst heal and one skill that requires an enemy to heal for a tiny value.. and the heavy attacks always give stam.

Why is damage less? normal oakensoul builds you have 6 skill choices (5 skills you can choose + weapon passives + class passives + an ultimate you can use as desired). Werewolf has 5 skills.. 3 of which do damage you have a total of 3 dots if your a berserker werewolf. 2 of your skills do no damage, you no ultimate, and you have no weapon passives also your class passives rarely are helpful.

Our werewolf passives do not help us for damage ether most of them are just to increase the duration of our werewolf form. Only the Increases your Weapon and Spell Damage by 18% which likely is to counter the loss of the infused backbar berserker enchantment...

huskandhunger

autocookies wrote: »

sneakymitchell wrote: »

I still see fearious roar as just quick heavy attack if low on stamina. Just 1 2 and back to rotation. Since a stun is used in minor scenarios in mechanics and such

I do this as well, and fill as much stam as possible while they are set off balance... at least until there is no choice but to refresh Brutal Pounce... and the 10 second Carnage timer...

Personally I never use Ferocious Roar both skills set the enemies off balance, and even if I wanted to have the faster heavy attacks.. I don't have the luxury of going without Major Breach. (nor is it worth it by the time you get the speed bonus its already nearly gone since the first heavy takes a lifetime to land also multiple enemies cause the heavy to always be slow anyways)

On that topic every build I have has some way of applying Major Breach since the groups I run with don't often apply it, and its usually my duty to ensure we have it covered. I press roar on cooldown on live and will continue to next patch as roar has always been a number 1 priority skill for the breach alone. I will be forced to use that morph next patch as losing breach is a bigger loss then losing the crit chance I feel. Also I want the major protection, being harder to kill is more dps then being a dead werewolf waiting on a revive.

Also going to add that I will continue to be forced to wear a set like briarheart due to the healing affect and the fact that its only an okay dps set at the same time... werewolf self healing for me is not in a good place. and since the damage is horrible as well there is no choice when it comes to sets you are forced to wear the best dps sets you can get...

In comparison I run an oakensoul build on my toons in the infinite archive. my dps is high enough to skip all the mechs and not die up to the end of the second arena (when not in werewolf form) I also have survivability and can survive the mechs (again out of wolf form).... Now in werewolf form I can't kill the enemy before the mechs kick in... and in addition to that I also don't have the survivability to survive the mechs? I build towards magic regen because having a heal is more important then having the stam. If heavy attacks gave both resources that would help me a ton otherwise as its usually magic not stam that I need most.



Why is my survivability greater out of wolf form? Revealing Flare for major protection, Resolving Vigor, a massive dot heal + minor resolve + the heal scales off damage rather then max health... also stam refilling off heavy attacks to be able to use my stam heal. Werewolf doesn't have this option they have 1 expensive magic burst heal and one skill that requires an enemy to heal for a tiny value.. and the heavy attacks always give stam.

Why is damage less? normal oakensoul builds you have 6 skill choices (5 skills you can choose + weapon passives + class passives + an ultimate you can use as desired). Werewolf has 5 skills.. 3 of which do damage you have a total of 3 dots if your a berserker werewolf. 2 of your skills do no damage, you no ultimate, and you have no weapon passives also your class passives rarely are helpful.

Our werewolf passives do not help us for damage ether most of them are just to increase the duration of our werewolf form. Only the Increases your Weapon and Spell Damage by 18% which likely is to counter the loss of the infused backbar berserker enchantment...

I agree, werewolf really needs better healing over time capability and greater control to provide consistent damage on their own.

ViggyBoi

Simple fix, make terrified actually do something on its own instead of attaching an empty debuff to what's essentially a dead cast. This whole direction the devs went wasn't nessesarily the fix I would have gone with. The idea was neat but there really wasn't a lot of playtesting or focus on it. Understandable considering scribing was the focus of the patch but it still is a real bummer to have the werewolf problem acknowledged by name, only to not have any satisfying adjustments. Maybe next time.

sneakymitchell

autocookies wrote: »

sneakymitchell wrote: »

Our werewolf passives do not help us for damage ether most of them are just to increase the duration of our werewolf form. Only the Increases your Weapon and Spell Damage by 18% which likely is to counter the loss of the infused backbar berserker enchantment...

Don’t forget of 30% stamina. Yea I can see your point still. With Scribing people can have multiple debuffs and DoTs going. The werewolf suppose to be a hard hitting beast. But most times you just be doing a same rotation and the spamable is close to the other spamable skills in the game. Having some unquie feature like whip from dk more weapon and spell damage. Or sorcs crushing weapon reduces the armor more on target even if not best spamable little worse than howl but the armor debuff is still huge in supporting the groups dps.

Werewolf doesn’t have much support going and if they do it’s already in the other players kit. Or set.

StamPlar_1976

I see nothing has changed after being gone for 5 years. Classes still being nerfed into the ground for no reason. No respect to the players by giving them proper explanations or not taking feedback. Dang shame.