Balance question regarding attributes and gear - can this solve a lot?

Cogo · July 2014

@ZOS_GinaBruno

This question is for Zenimax balance team and all players.

Regarding balancing, are the devs working on attributes? Several sites, players who do theorycrafting, and pretty much everyone who are "good players", says the same thing. That 49 health, is better then most. Is this true?

I have the same question regarding gear.

I do not expect balancing to be done quickly.
I am asking if Attributes and GEAR is part of balancing? Could this be a big part of the solution to many balancing problems? I do NOT suggesting "buffing" gear. I suggest the Zeni way of "tweaking". In this case, "tweaking down some gear, in some stats".

Question 1:
Is it true that the 3 attributes does not have remotely the same effects?
I am not asking about a little difference. But if Magika and stamina attributes are almost pointless to raise, compared to health? If so, is the balance team working on attributes as well?

Is gear part of the balance problem?
It seams that GEAR, not just armor skills and passives, is VERY unbalanced. Is it not GEAR that makes heavy armor not nearly as good as light armor when it comes to "normal" protection? (Not magic)

Note:I am asking about gear in general. RARE gear of many different stats/effects MUST be in game. But RARE and uncommon GOOD gear, should have some counter effect. RARE means RARE. Not something that drops once a week for every player. RARE is something most players do not get as a drop.
Example: A rare Robe with big AC, can not be enchanted, or similar. This provides for more choices and builds. And helps with balancing.

To choose to be good at one thing, but not another.

Question 2:
Is the balance team working on gear being balanced in stats?
For example, if light armor had much lower armor value and even with 7 pieces of light armor, you would never even come close to the armor cap.

Would this not be a BIG step in "balance" light armor, vs medium and heavy in AC protection? Light armor characters could still use X pieces of medium or heavy armor for normal protection. Today they do not have to.
By just lowering the AC value on ALL light armor, would not that, in one change, solve a major problem with balancing?

Light armor protection
Light armor as magic protection makes sense. But a robe player should almost get one-shotted if they get hit by a HARD or very powerful none magic damage, unless they use any defense ability, char skill or personal skill in moving, blocking, etc.

For example: If a dual wield character attacks a character in only light armor, does it not make sense for the light armor character to die very quickly? (Unless they do something). Note: This is a balance question, and not a PvP/PvE question.

Vuron · July 2014

1) The problem isn't that one stat is more valuable than another. The issues are caused by the low soft caps for magicka and stamina. The caps are very easy to reach without putting any attribute points in either category. So, since health has the highest cap and gets the higher return for point.... 49 health.

I haven't thought about the repercussions, but raising the soft caps could change the optimal build.

2) Gear, as it relates to armor rating or defense, is meaningless. Classes have passives and skills that raise their armor and spell resist well past the caps. The ONLY reason to where a certain type of armor is for the passives. There's no defensive difference in wearing light versus heavy if you have passives and skills that allow you to hit the armor cap.

Once again, the issue is caused by the low armor and spell resist caps. Raise the cap, change the mitigation %, and widen the armor value between heavy, medium, and light.

Cogo · July 2014

I understand, but even with the passives, there MUST be a value you can lower light armor too, so 7 pieces of armor, does not reach the current AC cap?

Once again, the issue is caused by the low armor and spell resist caps. Raise the cap, change the mitigation %, and widen the armor value between heavy, medium, and light.

This is exactly what I am asking for. I wonder if there simply is possible to do this by lowering Armor on light armor gear. How much, I dont know, but if its possible to reach the balance goal with that, why not lower the AC value only. If you have to lowert it to 1!!! Even (extreme)

traigusb14_ESO2 · July 2014

1 is no longer true.

In beta you used to get 15 points of Health per point spent, and 10 for STA and MAG (still true), but glyphs were even across the board, so you got more return for health (so all gyphs were 100 for example).

Since Launch gyphs have been fixed so, this is no longer true. Health glyphs of the same level now give more Health than STA and MAG ones do. So Health glyph would be 150, and the other two 100 )

So it no longer matters where you spend your points, you can even it out with glyphs and nothing is lost.

Cogo · July 2014

traigusb14_ESO2 wrote: »

1 is no longer true.

In beta you used to get 15 points of Health per point spent, and 10 for STA and MAG (still true), but glyphs were even across the board, so you got more return for health (so all gyphs were 100 for example).

Since Launch gyphs have been fixed so, this is no longer true. Health glyphs of the same level now give more Health than STA and MAG ones do. So Health glyph would be 150, and the other two 100 )

So it no longer matters where you spend your points, you can even it out with glyphs and nothing is lost.

If its true that attributes have no function. Then doesn't my question really needs attention? Should not attributes be part of the choices and effects you get?

NobleX35 · July 2014

I personally do 24/25 : magicka/health. I put all health on my gear (except for jewelry which is more magicka. On the heavy pieces (chest, helm, legs, and shield) I have infused which basically nets me the equivalent of 5 extra health attribute points for free, and on the light pieces (shoulders, gloves, waist, and boots) I use impenetrable. I personally feel that going full health on gear is better than full health in attributes because the ratio is the same 1:1.5:1 for armor glyphs and attributes, but with infused you get a higher return with health glyphs since they already provide a higher gain.

Cogo · July 2014

GothicPython wrote: »

I personally do 24/25 : magicka/health. I put all health on my gear (except for jewelry which is more magicka. On the heavy pieces (chest, helm, legs, and shield) I have infused which basically nets me the equivalent of 5 extra health attribute points for free, and on the light pieces (shoulders, gloves, waist, and boots) I use impenetrable. I personally feel that going full health on gear is better than full health in attributes because the ratio is the same 1:1.5:1 for armor glyphs and attributes, but with infused you get a higher return with health glyphs since they already provide a higher gain.

I have 14 in stamina, and I have noticed improvements in my stamina "drain".
I had to learn the hard way though, so I use stamina abilities like they where gold...to always have stamina enough to block when needed.

I cant say if that is because of my stats in stamina, or my gear/enchants and traits.

The way to build your char...thats it no way to find the "best", but what suits you...THATS not a problem

. I am asking if attributes and gear can be the problem for balancing. Not to make something better or worse.

Like previous poster said, whatever attributes you use.....doesnt matter. If thats the case, Zenimax really need to review that. And that doesnt mean raising everything. Could be! But we know from WAY to many MMO, that keep buffing never is the answer....you only end up with everything equal, buffed the hell, with bosses at millions of health.

So far, I think Zeni made a quite good job. I'm asking, if stats and gear is part of their balancing. Maybe they havnt come to that part yet? Or just speculating, didnt think that would be where a balance problem could be soved?

traigusb14_ESO2 · July 2014

Cogo wrote: »

traigusb14_ESO2 wrote: »

1 is no longer true.

In beta you used to get 15 points of Health per point spent, and 10 for STA and MAG (still true), but glyphs were even across the board, so you got more return for health (so all gyphs were 100 for example).

Since Launch gyphs have been fixed so, this is no longer true. Health glyphs of the same level now give more Health than STA and MAG ones do. So Health glyph would be 150, and the other two 100 )

So it no longer matters where you spend your points, you can even it out with glyphs and nothing is lost.

If its true that attributes have no function. Then doesn't my question really needs attention? Should not attributes be part of the choices and effects you get?

They have a function, they are the baseline for your character. Technically if you have no glyphs (say your armor is broken) your surviveability is much better with a spread. A person with 48 health and no real sta and magika will have a hard time killing anything to escape and repair.

Personally, I'd prefer the raw stats to do more than just give us 10 or 15 in the stat that actually seems to count.

For example 1000 magicka adds damage and healing to spells.

I'd like someone with 25 magicka raw stat to get more value than someone with 10.
So if you have 50 points in health, I'd like to see some bonus separate than just the same HP yo would get if you stacked glyphs.

Doesn't matter to me, more value in skills, more stat points for attrribs, more regen, more crit. something.