Sun Shield? More like Sun Burn.

Theist_VII

Joy_Division wrote: »

The problem with this skill is that it falls between two stools. Is it supposed to keep me alive? Is it supposed to damage the enemy? If it does both really well (as it did 10 years ago on a niche build), it's too OP. So by the definition of balance, it cant do either well. So we get the worst of all situations: wont prevent user from dying, wont kill the enemy, the opportunity cost for using it is too high.

The skill should do one of these functions really well and the other just a side benefit, depending on the morph that is chosen.

It’s really that simple, thank you.

The entire point of a combat ability system with morphing options, is choice. Choosing between different options, and altering the skill in a noticeable direction.

Right now it’s a choice of bad and worse, and I’m sure anyone can guess which morph is which.

Skulptro

Joy_Division wrote: »

The problem with this skill is that it falls between two stools. Is it supposed to keep me alive? Is it supposed to damage the enemy? If it does both really well (as it did 10 years ago on a niche build), it's too OP. So by the definition of balance, it cant do either well. So we get the worst of all situations: wont prevent user from dying, wont kill the enemy, the opportunity cost for using it is too high.

The skill should do one of these functions really well and the other just a side benefit, depending on the morph that is chosen.

Totally agree. Now the damage is meh as it is, so just boost shield strength for the skill to be viable.

KaironBlackbard

It's in the attack tree, therefore it's probably being balanced not by shield strength, but by damage.
Dragonknight's armor damages attackers, why can't sun shield do likewise?
It's a negligible shield, one-tapped by everything but overland and base-game content. Honestly the dlc power creep has turned base game group events into easier than a dlc delve boss. I think some of that needs to be rebalanced to give overland the challenge it was originally intended to have, by either scaling up old content, or reducing the new.
In scaling up old content, that not only includes scaling up old enemies and bosses, but old class skills too, and pretty much every base game skill.
Or, scale down dlc enemies and newer class skills that' haven't yet been nerfed from OP state, which would probably be easier, assuming there are less DLC enemies to scale than base game. Definitely less skills to scale.

I still think my variant would be better:
Base: attackers take fire damage (might be limited to melee range), shield explodes when it is destroyed damaging nearby enemies
Radiant: applies the shield to allies
Blazing: gain a fire aura while the shield persists, and the shield always detonates when it expires in proportion to its damage taken

Skulptro

either way, now this shield is 2 tapped, s it will not last long enough to do all this fancy effects. May be, If I will sacrifice even more into health and buffs, I will make it a 10k in PvP, right now I didn't even reach that number. It's achievable, not gonna lie, but it will require even more leaning into high health = even lesser damage output. But, yeah, it will be about 10k shield. Gone in 2GCD's. Spammabe + LA + Spammable + LA

But I really like your concept! It's great. The shield just has to be bigger, just to all this cool features to persist.

It's a pleasure to talk to you here, everyone! I'm pretty sure, we have enough good ideas throughout the forums to make one more MMO. But with Blackjack and...

KaironBlackbard

The detonation can't occur unless it's broken, except for blazing morph. If it deals 5k blast damage, and only has a 265 retaliation like dragonknight's scale armor, it'd be of more use to have as little shielding as possible so it gets destroyed more often, as is current that is one-tapped often.
Now, dragonknight's armor base gives resolve and retailiation, and morph adds damage shield which saves my back a ton.
If only sun shield was anywhere near as useful.

KaironBlackbard

Similar effect to Dragon Fire Scale's retaliation effect would also be fun.
Kind of like merging some of the effects of Hardened Armor and Dragon Fire Scale, merged, rebalanced, into sun shield 2.0, or whatever it would be.

• Take the Hardened Armor damage shield and retaliation, and Dragon Fire Scale's Retaliation, and that'd be sun shield, maybe even with a detonation on shield destruction.
• Radiant Morph like the new sun shield + Ward Ally.
• Blazing adds detonation if it doesn't exist, or upgrades base's into scaling off damage taken rather than only on destruction. AND either way also adds the flame aura with similar effect to blood mist's aura, but probably without healing from it.

KaironBlackbard

And if shield is still balanced as weak, then Radiant scaler as is now instead of the similarity to ward ally, unless it does both.

Theist_VII

@KaironBlackbard & @Skulptro great ideas!
Paladins should have a place in ESO!

Theist_VII

I feel like every time anyone brings this skill up, it’s forgotten momentarily later.

People are so complacent with having skills that do absolutely nothing.

Skulptro

As a High Superior Priest, I summon @ZOS_Kevin ! Hear our prayers, help us slay and banish evil daedric forces out of our realm. Help us to shield ourselves against their cruel fury!

For real, sir. 3% shield and a useless debuff for 6% cost increase is a bit of a NERF, not a buff even.

Synapsis123

This shield used to seem good, but honestly just pales in comparison to other shields. Maybe the current shield value is okay, but it needs to have some secondary effects.

Theist_VII

Synapsis123 wrote: »

This shield used to seem good, but honestly just pales in comparison to other shields. Maybe the current shield value is okay, but it needs to have some secondary effects.

Before Battle Spirit, Blazing Shield did enough damage to make people peel off of you, assuming you could sustain it properly back then. When the shield was normal, and damage was normal, you weren’t getting a quarter value like present. Having played then, I can tell you personally that it felt really good to use the skill, and gave the class that “house” vibe that the developers like to talk about.

After Battle Spirit, the skill was completely trashed, and as a result, a year later they buffed it a little too much and people were building unkillable tanks with it that could reflect and kill everyone around them, assuming they were dumb enough to attack in melee, keep in mind, this was a time when you could reflect all ranged damage back at your opponent on a Dragonknight, so it made sense for Templar to be able to reflect melee damage… Blazing Shield was just providing too much survivability as the offense morph.

Shortly after this over-buffing of the skill was acknowledged, Sun Shield was absolutely smashed by the nerf hammer.

Then out of nowhere Radiant Ward, and ONLY Radiant Ward got an increased % per-target buff a year or two ago, but it was not enough.

Now we’re looking at yet another pass at the skill, but this time they’re tacking on a debuff that is extremely common without doing anything significant enough to warrant using the skill.

All I want is to capture that feeling of using the skill before Battle Spirit, how is that too much to ask for? I’m not saying we need double the values of what we have, but a more thoughtful approach to how the skill and morphs work as a means to achieve that goal would be nice… instead of Minor Maim and a cost increase. lol

Skulptro

Actually, sone amount increase would be nice! Not to a ridiculous amount, but slightly. And more aggressive scaling for the first enemy hit. Like 50-70% with one enemy and then 10-15% for each additional enemy hit.

Yesterday night I tried shield-plar on live server in Cyro. Obviously, there were no "buffs" available there for Sun Shield there, but it was enough to have an idea. And it is in fact horrible. Stacking about 45k health gives you shields, that are nowhere near other shield classes. So I ran Soul Burst + Radiant Ward in tandem. Shields are expensive as hell, but do not make you that brawler you want to be. Instead they just are expenses to cripple your sustain. Much more profitable strategy could be to drop Radiant Ward and slot Radiant Aura(that one with minor regen buffs for me and my team) or even dropping all tge shields, because there are no modifiers for shield strength in templar's passives. Arcanist has some, for example. So the same exact Warding Burst(soul burst with shield) will have a higher tooltip. So I can switch to my arcanist and use the same build with much more effectiveness.

Pretty sure, minor maim and increased cost would change a thing. 3 % shield is gonna change nothing too.

KaironBlackbard

Theist_VII wrote: »

Synapsis123 wrote: »

This shield used to seem good, but honestly just pales in comparison to other shields. Maybe the current shield value is okay, but it needs to have some secondary effects.

Before Battle Spirit, Blazing Shield did enough damage to make people peel off of you, assuming you could sustain it properly back then. When the shield was normal, and damage was normal, you weren’t getting a quarter value like present. Having played then, I can tell you personally that it felt really good to use the skill, and gave the class that “house” vibe that the developers like to talk about.

After Battle Spirit, the skill was completely trashed, and as a result, a year later they buffed it a little too much and people were building unkillable tanks with it that could reflect and kill everyone around them, assuming they were dumb enough to attack in melee, keep in mind, this was a time when you could reflect all ranged damage back at your opponent on a Dragonknight, so it made sense for Templar to be able to reflect melee damage… Blazing Shield was just providing too much survivability as the offense morph.

Shortly after this over-buffing of the skill was acknowledged, Sun Shield was absolutely smashed by the nerf hammer.

Then out of nowhere Radiant Ward, and ONLY Radiant Ward got an increased % per-target buff a year or two ago, but it was not enough.

Now we’re looking at yet another pass at the skill, but this time they’re tacking on a debuff that is extremely common without doing anything significant enough to warrant using the skill.

All I want is to capture that feeling of using the skill before Battle Spirit, how is that too much to ask for? I’m not saying we need double the values of what we have, but a more thoughtful approach to how the skill and morphs work as a means to achieve that goal would be nice… instead of Minor Maim and a cost increase. lol

"This skill ignores battle spirit." - very simple change, makes it easily balanced between PvP and PvE, granting the same effectiveness in each instead of being completely trashed by battle spirit.

KaironBlackbard

Skulptro wrote: »

Actually, sone amount increase would be nice! Not to a ridiculous amount, but slightly. And more aggressive scaling for the first enemy hit. Like 50-70% with one enemy and then 10-15% for each additional enemy hit.

Yesterday night I tried shield-plar on live server in Cyro. Obviously, there were no "buffs" available there for Sun Shield there, but it was enough to have an idea. And it is in fact horrible. Stacking about 45k health gives you shields, that are nowhere near other shield classes. So I ran Soul Burst + Radiant Ward in tandem. Shields are expensive as hell, but do not make you that brawler you want to be. Instead they just are expenses to cripple your sustain. Much more profitable strategy could be to drop Radiant Ward and slot Radiant Aura(that one with minor regen buffs for me and my team) or even dropping all tge shields, because there are no modifiers for shield strength in templar's passives. Arcanist has some, for example. So the same exact Warding Burst(soul burst with shield) will have a higher tooltip. So I can switch to my arcanist and use the same build with much more effectiveness.

Pretty sure, minor maim and increased cost would change a thing. 3 % shield is gonna change nothing too.

The best shield is Brawler - cleave morph - two handed. It's balanced as a AoE damage with a side effect of giving you a 6k shield that increases per enemy hit. Why Sun Shield can't be more like that, I don't know.

Skulptro

KaironBlackbard wrote: »

The best shield is Brawler - cleave morph - two handed. It's balanced as a AoE damage with a side effect of giving you a 6k shield that increases per enemy hit. Why Sun Shield can't be more like that, I don't know.

I really don't know, how to do it right, but what I know for sure - it needs a rework. Damn, the whole class needs it. Both passives and active skills.

Billium813

In our ongoing 'crusade' to improve the Templar Tank experience...

Heard there were some Templar Tank updates in this PTS, so I came back to take a look. I've been fairly vocal over the years and have main'd Templar Tank for much of that time. While I personally feel that Templar Tank isn't as bad as everyone likes to claim, it certainly has its issues and they need to be addressed.

---

Focused Charge: This ability and its morphs will now also taunt the enemy hit for 15 seconds. Increased the duration of Major Protection granted from this ability and the Toppling Charge morph to 7 seconds, up from 4. Increased the cost of all versions of this ability to 3780, up from 3510.

Idk, I tried Focused Charge back when Major Protection was added and it just never felt right. There are moments when having a gap closer can be interesting for a Tank, but overall it felt rather unnecessary 90% of the time. I mean, I almost always am using my gap closer point blank just to get Major Protection... I'd rather slot Revealing Flare. Adding a taunt now really doesn't mean much IMO. Am I going to run Focused Charge over a better skill like Pierce Armor??? No. Am I going to run Focused Charge over a ranged taunt like Inner Beast? No.

Focused Charge is PvP aligned in my book and adding a taunt just doesn't feel right. Pass.

---

Sun Shield: This ability and its morphs now apply Minor Maim to enemies in the area for 10 seconds. Increased the damage shield scaling per enemy hit to 10%, up from 4%. Increased the base cost to 4590, up from 4320, now that the Shield applies an additional affix and is stronger.

I'm gonna say something rather controversial: I don't hate the current Radiant Ward. I have used it in combination with Vateshran Void Bash and had great success with it. I feel like the shield size is very good as is, if anything, requiring a skill element to get max power out of it. That being said, I understand that players want more from Radiant Ward... and certainly Blazing Shield needs resuscitation after being nerfed to death... but I think the issues are more systemic for Templar and Sun Shield is just an easy target cause it's only OK.

Personally, I don't dislike a defensive debuff like Minor Maim as the choice, but maybe change it to Minor Cowardice? There are very few sources of Minor Cowardice in the game and Minor Maim is rather commonly applied by other classes in your group. I'm not sure what bar space is being saved here for Templars... Seems OK at best, superfluous at worst.

I think players biggest issue with this new Sun Shield is that it doesn't fix a bigger issue overall with Templar: group buffs. While I don't think that HAS to be addressed on Sun Shield, I don't see a reason why Radiant Ward couldn't give other group members Minor Courage too. You could make it conditional too, like group members within 5m or something. You don't even need to increase the shield size IMO, just add these buffs/debuffs

My biggest issue though with this change is actually the increase in Magicka cost! Templar Tank already BURNS through Magicka! I know the increase is to cover the new debuff and shield size improvements, but I really feel like Templar Tank is fairly mana hungry. I'd like to see other improvements to balance out this additional cost...


---Conclusion---

Templar Tank has several issues and these changes don't really seem to address any of them IMO.

One major concern is group buffs and synergies as mentioned before. This change to Sun Shield doesn't really do anything to address that. Templar Tank is still fairly selfish, making it come in last when trying to build a group. You have to ask: "Why should a player pick Templar to tank?". It certainly isn't for the group buffs. Maybe make Spear Wall give allies within 5m Minor Protection too if you want to incentivize Templar Tanks.

Another major concern is mag sustain. I can appreciate this as a built-in weakness of the class, but it's getting a bit hard to ignore. Spell Symmetry being a MUST for Templar Tank just kind of speaks to how mag hungry the class is. Something minor like reducing the cost of Extended Ritual would go really far given the extra cost of recast spamming it just cause the first cast purge bugged, or because combat moved, or because you just got snared.

I'd like to see a rework to the ‎Restoring Light skill line. The Ultimate is practically useless for Tanks given you can't block, the whole line is mana hungry and polarized, and Sacred Ground is the only good Passive.

Theist_VII

Blazing Shield should be a skill that forces people out of your “house.”

For that to be possible, it needs to do heavy damage, and I mean heavy continuous damage to people within range of you, enough to make groups of players step away from you and attack from range or only enter melee in bursts.

Theist_VII

All this talk of standardization and balancing based on a spreadsheet, yet Sun Shield has less range than a light attack and does comparable damage.

Theist_VII

You want to talk about making Templar tank an actual option…

• Give 5m range Sun Shield an AoE Major Courage or Major Heroism, instantly Templar would become a viable option in organized play.

Want to make tanking not feel as though you’re pulling teeth while also balancing PvP?

• Reduce the tick frequency of Living Dark and have the skill once again scale off of Max Health.

Ready for the finishing touch?

• Instead of adding a taunt to both morphs of Charge, make one a pull that sets a target off-balance if they were casting while still granting the user Major Protection.

It’s that simple, I just fixed Templar tanks in not even a minute of thought, yet it’s been a decade and Zenimax continues to do nothing, actually?

Worse than nothing

STOP PRETENDING TO CARE ABOUT US!

Skulptro

I flagged patchnotes as scam. Auriel damn them.

KaironBlackbard

I just looked at my sun shield, at it's actually not half bad. On my healer.
I can't purchase it yet, but the tooltip says it gives a 7.5k damage shield and deals 3.5k area damage. That's about equal to most other damage shields. And a little weaker than most damage skills but about on par wish Brawler I think? I don't have that skills on that toon because healer, so can't compare.

Theist_VII

KaironBlackbard wrote: »

I just looked at my sun shield, at it's actually not half bad. On my healer.
I can't purchase it yet, but the tooltip says it gives a 7.5k damage shield and deals 3.5k area damage. That's about equal to most other damage shields. And a little weaker than most damage skills but about on par wish Brawler I think? I don't have that skills on that toon because healer, so can't compare.

The value of the ward is not what’s in question, although it desperately needs another source to scale it other than purely health.

Look at any of the other countless Scribing options that not only give you a shield, but your entire group a shield, while also providing a meaningful buff/debuff instead of Minor Maim.

You can literally prevent a killing a blow while applying Major Maim, DOUBLE the value in an AoE with greater range than Sun Shield, or make a ward that applies Minor Force, a necessary buff for damage that isn’t as commonly sourced since the nerf to Barbed Trap and that skill protects everyone.




Nobody uses Sun Shield, if you set a tracker for how many times you’ve been dealt damage by that skill and went into Cyrodiil, you would go years before seeing it show up on your recap.

KaironBlackbard

Theist_VII wrote: »

KaironBlackbard wrote: »

I just looked at my sun shield, at it's actually not half bad. On my healer.
I can't purchase it yet, but the tooltip says it gives a 7.5k damage shield and deals 3.5k area damage. That's about equal to most other damage shields. And a little weaker than most damage skills but about on par wish Brawler I think? I don't have that skills on that toon because healer, so can't compare.

Nobody uses Sun Shield, if you set a tracker for how many times you’ve been dealt damage by that skill and went into Cyrodiil, you would go years before seeing it show up on your recap.

Probably because it's an area ability with less range than most and less damage. Again, brawler. Doesn't it deal on average 5k-7k+? And it gives a 5k damage shield increased by 20% per enemy hit, yes? With a 7-8m range? Overall, more power, slightly less shield, but more power. People don't really care about damage shields in cyrodiil because they are halved, and thus the only thing they care about is the damage. 5k-7k with moderate range trumps 3.5k with almost half the range.

Skulptro

@KaironBlackbard
noone uses brawler skill either, except specific bomber builds with masters greatsword, and that is nish. Sometimes I see a noob with Brawler also. I grant them easy and fast end. At least, templar can deal with noobs now. Sometimes.

And yeah, Brawler is an offensive skill with some defence. But when a purely defensive skill doesn't give you what it should - that is trash. In PvE shield size is more or less good, Except the fact, that it costs a tonn of magica and is basically halfed, if there is not enough enemies around. Boss fight in PvE, no adds or trash around - you are screwed.

In PvP you will probably better spam Honor The Dead and Vigor, because they are much more effective in terms of numbers. Why should you spend 4k for a small shield, if you can just take some damage and use a burst heal with a huge cashback of magic? And also, you have to stack a tonn of HP to get a shield of some good size. And by good I mean at least 8-9k shield. And you'd better have Bastion CP and some Vitality buffs. And there are no class passives to boost your shield or resourse pool. And all this big health is useless in terms of damage production or healing. there is only one skill that also scales of health in templar's kit. And it is a small rune, that gives a small heal over time. Nothing like Polar Wind or RuneWard or Hardened Ward. Speaking of witch, Hardened Ward scales of max health or mag. So if a sork has a tonn of magica, he benefits in both shielding and damage. That is what it's in PvP for templar's shield. Useless expensive skill, that requires too much but offers too little.

universal_wrath

An idea for sun shield is to make it act like a "sun", when activated it deals slight damage and activatly burns/damage nearby targets with increasing size up to 8-10 meter (unlike DK spike armor that is passive damage), and when the armor expires it causes a super/smol nova which is an AOE damage based on damage recieved 50-100%, the damage shield is based on max HP while damage scale with max offensive resources, good balance, I believe.

Skulptro

I dueled a nightblade right now. He didn't even use invisibility. I have to chase him to deal any damage, stack my procs, mind the positioning, because he is allways outside of my circles, kyting me. And when he stacks enough ultimate, he presses 2-3 buttons, and Im gone. In one second or so. I won 1 duel of 5-6 may be. And that was really hard and long fight. And if I will go to Open World in my build - I'm screwed. If he goes in his current build - he is fine, running, kyting and deleting after 180 degree turn and 2-3 buttons. While I have to target my jabs, look for some circles on the ground, etc. other one can jst run around on his backbar. Swap bars and press 2 buttons to win.

This is about class balance and gameplay in general. And none of changes for Sun Shield, that were suggested here, can fix that. But all the suggestions are good indeed.

I think more and more frequently about dropping the game.

edited: And this NB had 36k HP. I had 31k. He can stack more health and still do crazy damage.

KaironBlackbard

Skulptro wrote: »

@KaironBlackbard
noone uses brawler skill either, except specific bomber builds with masters greatsword, and that is nish. Sometimes I see a noob with Brawler also. I grant them easy and fast end. At least, templar can deal with noobs now. Sometimes.

And yeah, Brawler is an offensive skill with some defence. But when a purely defensive skill doesn't give you what it should - that is trash. In PvE shield size is more or less good, Except the fact, that it costs a tonn of magica and is basically halfed, if there is not enough enemies around. Boss fight in PvE, no adds or trash around - you are screwed.

In PvP you will probably better spam Honor The Dead and Vigor, because they are much more effective in terms of numbers. Why should you spend 4k for a small shield, if you can just take some damage and use a burst heal with a huge cashback of magic? And also, you have to stack a tonn of HP to get a shield of some good size. And by good I mean at least 8-9k shield. And you'd better have Bastion CP and some Vitality buffs. And there are no class passives to boost your shield or resourse pool. And all this big health is useless in terms of damage production or healing. there is only one skill that also scales of health in templar's kit. And it is a small rune, that gives a small heal over time. Nothing like Polar Wind or RuneWard or Hardened Ward. Speaking of witch, Hardened Ward scales of max health or mag. So if a sork has a tonn of magica, he benefits in both shielding and damage. That is what it's in PvP for templar's shield. Useless expensive skill, that requires too much but offers too little.

Damage Shield and healing skills are useless in PvP. Normally. Because they are halved, or reduced more. Unless you stack a ton of HoTs and a spammable heal, you aren't outhealing anyones damage. I've had better luck on a block tank than a healer.
Although vampires kind of need them because they have no health recovery.

And even before the nerf to undeath, I never used vampires as tanks. The loss to health recovery killed that. I don't use my resources on skills in PvP, I use it all in blocking. My connection doesn't let me get a couple skills off, let alone a rotation, so all I can do is sit there and passively block everything and rotate between ice staff or shield to keep my block up when the other resource gets low. Primary set is Thews of the Harbinger, and boy can it deal damage to fools who use rapid attacks, like flurry, fatecarver, or Rapid Fire. Secondary set is a work in progress. Was using warrior poet, then shattered fate, then adamant lurker which was fun, now ayleid refuge. Warrior Poet gave the best damage, but I needed more penetration because it was dealing literally minimum damage to everyone, as if everyone had not just battle spirit, but over 35k armor and both protections. Then Shattered fate, it deals the same damage, making it as if everyone has not just 35k, but over 45k armor because my 16k pen couldn't bypass any point of armor. So I dropped it in dismay and went for a survival set, adamant lurker. Boy did that keep me alive. Now I'm on ayleid refuge, which has its merits. Toon's a Khajiit Nightblade running Inner Beast, Entropy morph that grants self buffs, Impale, Fear spell (max health, procs major resolve, applies minor maim), Lingering Flare (Major Protection), Veil of Blades (for max health) - Ice staff.
Pierce Armor, Shadowy Disguise (PvE), Concealed Weapon (minor expedition), Grim Focus (I forget the morph), Leeching Strikes, Spell Wall - shield.
I'm mostly on staff bar.
Entering PvP zones I normally trade disguise for defensive stance.

I think I should redact that into spoiler as it's not quite on topic. Yeah, gonna do that.

Titanic Cleave makes it more powerful than uppercut, especially when you hit multiple targets. It can become a zurg killer. Increases damage by over 4k per enemy hit. Hit 5 enemies it deals 20k+, + whatever the base damage is. Assuming 5k, that's 25k damage. Hit 10 people with it, that's 45k damage, everyone dies. Hit 25? No one's left standing, not even tanks.

Joy_Division

Skulptro wrote: »

I dueled a nightblade right now. He didn't even use invisibility. I have to chase him to deal any damage, stack my procs, mind the positioning, because he is allways outside of my circles, kyting me. And when he stacks enough ultimate, he presses 2-3 buttons, and Im gone. In one second or so. I won 1 duel of 5-6 may be. And that was really hard and long fight. And if I will go to Open World in my build - I'm screwed. If he goes in his current build - he is fine, running, kyting and deleting after 180 degree turn and 2-3 buttons. While I have to target my jabs, look for some circles on the ground, etc. other one can jst run around on his backbar. Swap bars and press 2 buttons to win.

This is about class balance and gameplay in general. And none of changes for Sun Shield, that were suggested here, can fix that. But all the suggestions are good indeed.

I think more and more frequently about dropping the game.

edited: And this NB had 36k HP. I had 31k. He can stack more health and still do crazy damage.

It's been this way for 10 years and it will be that way until the servers are shut down. The devs have never understood that in PvP, the ability to reset fights is infinitely better than the random buffs they throw on skills and that easy access to burst damage is way more valuable than a target dummy parse

The_Meathead

Theist_VII wrote: »

There’s no reason to why Sun Shield couldn’t lose it’s per-nearby-enemy scaling and have a stack build-up on blocked damage, or have Blazing Shield do something fun with additional flame damage to bash, or an increase to your overall damage with Sword & Shield equipped, or have the skill apply Burning in an AoE around you on activation, I mean seriously, it has Blazing and Shield in it’s name. Let’s get creative here.

I'd love for one of the Morphs to really bolster bash with flame damage, like you suggested.

That's a tremendously good idea, particularly since Templar is pretty far behind Sorc, Arcanist, or NB if you're into bash builds. Would give it a fun and unique niche.