Nerf Bat Swarm

WraithAzraiel · August 2014

I'll keep saying it. Vampire was never the problem, it's the light armor wearing sorcs and DK's with their destro staves and ridiculous damage reduction as well as severely over inflated DPS output which translated directly to the amount of healing devouring swarm gives back. Plus their other near godlike abilities that make them take NO damage and heal them INSTANTLY.

Rocks and sticks for PvP, everyone running around naked with no class guild or weapon skill, just rocks and sticks.

Desdemonte · August 2014

lol L2P people. How can you not know your in a batswarm? You can *hear* it! I've had swarm dropped on me and I've *walked* out of them because of the *** poor damage they do. I hear the bats and I hardly even respond any more, depending if I'm the focus or not- if yes, dodge roll out. If no, move along.

Jeezus. So much whine.

Kypho · August 2014

Swarm abusers will always defend it, others always want to nerf it. 500+ damage every tick is so fine. And i have seen 5 ppl trying to fear the vamp and didnt worked lol... poor ones...

Kypho · August 2014

Homm wrote: »

Honfold wrote: »

Guys, it doesn't take a whole skill bar to counter a vamp sorc. Just put silver shards on your bar. If you see bats or mist, just spam them.

No way, you can't force lazy asses like OP or all the ranters here to have to counter other player skills! They will shout NERF NERF NERF till their build and tactics are the only viable and reasonable ones, and then they will open a thread "Why all noobs are using the same skills!!!!"

there is a point. silver shard is a nice staminaeater just against vamps. all have 1 slot free for it doesnt? you can use potions to keep stamina up for the vamp killing ability, even if it wont work. just for 10th time... such a big damage what it does...

there was when the silver had 100% proc and killd vamps really... like the swarm does with 6 ppl... but vamps QQ for nerf.... but that was just L2P issue... dont be lolvamp... still QQ for NERF NERF NERF...

Soo..... vamps got killd and they raged and NERF NERF NERF for nothing. it was fine like swarm.

griszax · August 2014

Kypho wrote: »

Swarm abusers will always defend it, others always want to nerf it. 500+ damage every tick is so fine. And i have seen 5 ppl trying to fear the vamp and didnt worked lol... poor ones...

With impen traits on Your gear ( If You don't have then it's clear You can't be threated seriously) there is just no way of 500 ticks from batswarm. 5 people dying to 1 vampire doesn't mean the ult is op ... it just shows those 5 ppl just play badly and they would die to 1 banner / magma armor or any other aoe ultimate.

Thechemicals · August 2014

Homm wrote: »

Thechemicals wrote: »

xsorusb14_ESO wrote: »

You think Bats is annoying..Wait until you fight Corrosive Armor next patch if they don't nerf it again on PTS

Notice i said again...bloody thing was doing 600ish a tic, but now its down to 400ish.

and now....its doing 1000-1500 dmg

Seen over 2k few times. Seems legit.

If devs could say what they were really thinking in a patch note it would be something like....

"Not to be outdone in this latest patch by Templars Blazing shield buff- we decided to rework DKs magma armor Explosion to make Templars blazing shield look like a tiny sparkle stick".

Maulkin · August 2014

Thechemicals wrote: »

Homm wrote: »

Thechemicals wrote: »

xsorusb14_ESO wrote: »

You think Bats is annoying..Wait until you fight Corrosive Armor next patch if they don't nerf it again on PTS

Notice i said again...bloody thing was doing 600ish a tic, but now its down to 400ish.

and now....its doing 1000-1500 dmg

Seen over 2k few times. Seems legit.

If devs could say what they were really thinking in a patch note it would be something like....

"Not to be outdone in this latest patch by Templars Blazing shield buff- we decided to rework DKs magma armor Explosion to make Templars blazing shield look like a tiny sparkle stick".

You really don't know what you're talking about do you? It's like you're playing a different game to the rest of us...

Is it a good game at least? Do you enjoy it?

Durham · August 2014

Hlaren_shortsheath wrote: »

theres a couple things that should be immediate reaction and noted here.

1) bat swarm only hits you for 100 or so damage per second so truthfully you can escape by just getting out of the way because its not immediate death. if you just stand there and let the bats hit you then, yes in a about 20 seconds youll die. so basicly just get out of the swarm path. not hard to do.

2) if you insist on standing in the batswarm and cant or wont move, then just "block" yes it will take you health away but you will not die if you use block.

Whats does much more then 100 lol... Mine is ticking well over 200 maybe 300 a sec

Samadhi · August 2014

mike.gaziotisb16_ESO wrote: »

...

You're right, it's a joke. Taking +33% dmg from fire even when you're hard-capped on fire res is completely useless. I mean what's the point of fire intolerance if there's no fire damage in Cyrodiil, right?

...

Your information is incorrect, at least in terms of player damage.
A single v10 Fire Resist ring brings the Fire Weakness down to almost non-existance.
Adding a v8 Fire Resist ring on top of that equates to taking slightly less Fire damage than a human with no Fire Resistance on.

Tested with my girlfriend and a Dragonknight alt with an Inferno Staff:

Vampire results with and without fire resistance:

Vampire with No Fire Resistance
Chain: 171
Searing Strike 222; burns for 69 per tick
Destructive Touch: 239
Inferno Staff Heavy Attack: 450

Vampire with 1 Legendary V10 Fire Resist Ring
Chain: 116
Searing Strike: 182; burns tick for 47
Destructive Touch: 162
Inferno Staff Heavy Attack: 307

Vampire with 1 Legendary v10 Fire Resist and 1 Legendary v8 Fire Resist
Chain: 111
Searing Strike: 130; burns tick for 45
Destructive Touch: 155
Inferno Staff Heavy Attack: 293

Human results with no fire resistance:

Human with no Fire Resistance
Chain: 114
Searing Strike: 148; burns tick for 46
Destructive Touch: 159
Inferno Staff Heavy Attack: 300

Human with fire resistance results (just for consistency sake and if anyone has interest):

Human with 1 Legendary v10 Fire Resist Ring
Chain: 78
Searing Strike: 121; burns for 31
Destructive Touch: 109
Inferno Staff Heavy Attack: 204

Human with 1 Legendary v10 Fire Resist ring and 1 Legendary v8 Fire Resist ring
Chain: 74
Searing Strike: 87; burns tick for 30
Destructive Touch: 104
Inferno Staff Heavy Attack: 195

All damages were done to the same character; Vampire Fire damage was tested first, then vampire was cured of vampirism, relogged, and came back to test again.

It's worth noting that a vampire with no fire resistance at all takes exactly 50% more fire damage than a human with no fire resistance at all.

It's worth noting that a vampire with a Legendary v10 Fire Resistance enchantment only takes about 2% more damage than a Human with no fire resistance of any kind.

It's also worth noting that a vampire with two fire resistance rings takes less fire damage than a human with no fire resistance of any kind.
This overall change is very minor though, and is arguably not worth equipping more than one ring for. This is probably due to the fire resistance stat capping.

I didn't bother testing with sieges since I never get hit by them anyway; if there are any vampires that like to zerg around and get shot with sieges, I welcome them to test by getting cured in the same manner and coming back with the results.
It's possible that sieges ignore resistances, but I have no data and won't speculate. Siege damage does not matter to me personally; I prefer to actually fight other players instead of fighting the walls and doors of a building.

Overall though, the Fire weakness is pretty trivial, given that it is almost completely negated by a single Jewelry enchantment.

griszax · August 2014

I have no idea how are You getting these numbers. What armor You use full light ? Did the player attacking You with fire had spell penetration ? What level he/she was ?
I tested it with 1450 fire ress vs 2500 fire ress vs 0 fire ress and the reduction wasn't that big while the damage from fire balista was still 50 % more than any non vampire player.

I just checked and without vamp I'm getting 400 fire balista ticks vs +/- 611 with 2500 fire res vs +/- 680 with 1450 fire resist. No idea if fire damage from balistas is calculated other way than from players but clearly even with fire ress I'm getting 50 % more damage just from fire balistas.

Halrloprillalar · August 2014

It's safe to say that if you nerf bat swarm, there will be no reason to stay a vamp.

Homm · August 2014

Halrloprillalar wrote: »

It's safe to say that if you nerf bat swarm, there will be no reason to stay a vamp.

Yup. Or play sorc, unless you like being the support class on pvp..

Halrloprillalar · August 2014

Homm wrote: »

Halrloprillalar wrote: »

It's safe to say that if you nerf bat swarm, there will be no reason to stay a vamp.

Yup. Or play sorc, unless you like being the support class on pvp..

yea basically.

I don't have fun spamming healing springs or purge or w/e

Samadhi · August 2014

griszax wrote: »

I have no idea how are You getting these numbers. What armor You use full light ? Did the player attacking You with fire had spell penetration ? What level he/she was ?
I tested it with 1450 fire ress vs 2500 fire ress vs 0 fire ress and the reduction wasn't that big while the damage from fire balista was still 50 % more than any non vampire player.

I just checked and without vamp I'm getting 400 fire balista ticks vs +/- 611 with 2500 fire res vs +/- 680 with 1450 fire resist. No idea if fire damage from balistas is calculated other way than from players but clearly even with fire ress I'm getting 50 % more damage just from fire balistas.

Not wearing any gear at all, except for the rings when they were equipped.

Dragonknight was a level 10 alt in a mix of heavy/medium armour with no spell penetration stat on weapon.
Only armour penetration was the 300 points from Cyrodiil buff.

I did the best I could to run the test without outside stats or factors impacting the Fire damage.

I'll look into testing again with a Sharpened weapon when my girlfriend gets back from work. No one I know has an alt in another alliance with high enough Light Armour for the passive though.
I'd be interested to know if Spell penetration goes through Fire resistance as well; if it does, I could see cause for vampires to complain about the Light Armour passives.

That's interesting with regards to the fire ballista damage though; I have no idea why siege weapons would have a discrepancy from other sources of fire damage.
Since you're getting over 600 damage with fire resistances on though, it may suggest a bug of some sort.
It would make sense if you were getting 600 damage with no resistances on at all as that is 50% increase from 400. Your data is suggesting fire siege as giving a damage increase of over 70% against vampires. How much do you take as a vampire with no fire resistance at all?

Enkil · August 2014

Honfold wrote: »

Guys, it doesn't take a whole skill bar to counter a vamp sorc. Just put silver shards on your bar. If you see bats or mist, just spam them.

Cloud form cannot be targeted, yet can move around and use other abilities while doing aoe damage. Silver shard won't help you at all...

Homm wrote: »

No way, you can't force lazy asses like OP or all the ranters here to have to counter other player skills! They will shout NERF NERF NERF till their build and tactics are the only viable and reasonable ones, and then they will open a thread "Why all noobs are using the same skills!!!!"

Well the problem is this use of "Nerf".... People read that and fixate on that one word then sometimes have a fit about nerfs in general. What sensible people are asking for is balance. I play a vampire too so I don't want it nerfed, but won't use the cloud ultimate because it's broken and too powerful. Needs to be balanced. It's obvious..

Halrloprillalar · August 2014

Enkil wrote: »

Honfold wrote: »

Guys, it doesn't take a whole skill bar to counter a vamp sorc. Just put silver shards on your bar. If you see bats or mist, just spam them.

Cloud form cannot be targeted, yet can move around and use other abilities while doing aoe damage. Silver shard won't help you at all...

Homm wrote: »

No way, you can't force lazy asses like OP or all the ranters here to have to counter other player skills! They will shout NERF NERF NERF till their build and tactics are the only viable and reasonable ones, and then they will open a thread "Why all noobs are using the same skills!!!!"

Well the problem is this use of "Nerf".... People read that and fixate on that one word then sometimes have a fit about nerfs in general. What sensible people are asking for is balance. I play a vampire too so I don't want it nerfed, but won't use the cloud ultimate because it's broken and too powerful. Needs to be balanced. It's obvious..

It's far more *** balanced than corrosive or soul tether, so honestly, I have no *** qualms about using it

Tintinabula · August 2014

since this thread has started I have noticed a lot more ppl learning how to handle this and using those methods.

Rylana · August 2014

Ninja dump an oil on a vampire emperor

Hilarity ensues.

Ghenra · August 2014

At this moment, Cyrodiil is the worst spaming AoE fest ever, a part of this, all the people are using bat swarm all the time, inded emperors use it to kill more than 30 players at time.

GG Zeni this game is better every day (irony).

Maulkin · August 2014

Samadhi wrote: »

mike.gaziotisb16_ESO wrote: »

...

You're right, it's a joke. Taking +33% dmg from fire even when you're hard-capped on fire res is completely useless. I mean what's the point of fire intolerance if there's no fire damage in Cyrodiil, right?

...

Your information is incorrect, at least in terms of player damage.
A single v10 Fire Resist ring brings the Fire Weakness down to almost non-existance.
Adding a v8 Fire Resist ring on top of that equates to taking slightly less Fire damage than a human with no Fire Resistance on.

Tested with my girlfriend and a Dragonknight alt with an Inferno Staff:

Vampire results with and without fire resistance:
Vampire with No Fire Resistance
Chain: 171
Searing Strike 222; burns for 69 per tick
Destructive Touch: 239
Inferno Staff Heavy Attack: 450

Vampire with 1 Legendary V10 Fire Resist Ring
Chain: 116
Searing Strike: 182; burns tick for 47
Destructive Touch: 162
Inferno Staff Heavy Attack: 307

Vampire with 1 Legendary v10 Fire Resist and 1 Legendary v8 Fire Resist
Chain: 111
Searing Strike: 130; burns tick for 45
Destructive Touch: 155
Inferno Staff Heavy Attack: 293

Human results with no fire resistance:
Human with no Fire Resistance
Chain: 114
Searing Strike: 148; burns tick for 46
Destructive Touch: 159
Inferno Staff Heavy Attack: 300

Human with fire resistance results (just for consistency sake and if anyone has interest):
Human with 1 Legendary v10 Fire Resist Ring
Chain: 78
Searing Strike: 121; burns for 31
Destructive Touch: 109
Inferno Staff Heavy Attack: 204

Human with 1 Legendary v10 Fire Resist ring and 1 Legendary v8 Fire Resist ring
Chain: 74
Searing Strike: 87; burns tick for 30
Destructive Touch: 104
Inferno Staff Heavy Attack: 195

All damages were done to the same character; Vampire Fire damage was tested first, then vampire was cured of vampirism, relogged, and came back to test again.

It's worth noting that a vampire with no fire resistance at all takes exactly 50% more fire damage than a human with no fire resistance at all.

It's worth noting that a vampire with a Legendary v10 Fire Resistance enchantment only takes about 2% more damage than a Human with no fire resistance of any kind.

It's also worth noting that a vampire with two fire resistance rings takes less fire damage than a human with no fire resistance of any kind.
This overall change is very minor though, and is arguably not worth equipping more than one ring for. This is probably due to the fire resistance stat capping.

I didn't bother testing with sieges since I never get hit by them anyway; if there are any vampires that like to zerg around and get shot with sieges, I welcome them to test by getting cured in the same manner and coming back with the results.
It's possible that sieges ignore resistances, but I have no data and won't speculate. Siege damage does not matter to me personally; I prefer to actually fight other players instead of fighting the walls and doors of a building.

Overall though, the Fire weakness is pretty trivial, given that it is almost completely negated by a single Jewelry enchantment.

Mate, I have huge appreciation for anyone doing theory crafting and testing. Two big thumbs up from me.

First off, my statement was made for people with soft-capped spell res in mind. Heavy Armor and Light Armor approach the spell res soft-cap on their own without help from rings. Medium suffers. Also remember spell res goes up with each char level, so everyone has some spell res. The higher the level of the char the more spell res so a test on lvl 10 is not as conclusive as one on vr12, though it's still decent test.

My statement is indeed incorrect if you compare a Vamp with rings as opposed to a player with medium (or no) armor. But it's actually correct when you compare the vamp to standard light and heavy armor wearers. I'll prove the point

First off, let's clarify that Fire resistance stacks on top of Spell Resistance but obviously is subject to the spell res hard cap. So if you put 2 Fire Resistance rings you're hard-capped on spell resistance for fire spells only. Also note the hard cap is 54% and Soft-Cap 33%.

Chains (No Spell Resistance)

Vamp: 171
Human 114
Vamp takes exactly 50% more

Chains (Hard-Capped Fire Resistance via 2 rings)

Vamp: 111 (111*1.54 = 171)
Human 74 (74*1.54 = 114)
Damage is 54% less than no resistance. Vamp takes exactly 50% more, still.

Chains (Soft-Capped Spell Res 33% via Light Armour)

Vamp: 128 (128*1.33 = 171)
Human 85 (128*1.33 = 114)
Damage is 33% less. Vamp still takes 50% more.

So a soft-capped human wearing light/heavy armor takes 85 while the hard-capped vamp with rings takes 111.

85 * 1.3 = 111 as it happens. So the vamp takes 33% more

There's fault on my part making a sweeping generalisation that does not affect all the players. It does however affect the majority at the moment so it's not very far off the mark. It was based on my observation of my own char who wears full light. As a vamp he took 33% more dmg despite the rings than when he was cured and not wearing fire res rings.

Samadhi · August 2014

@mike.gaziotisb16_ESO

Thank you for posting your results, I had no reasonable way to test Spell Resistance vs. Spell Penetration, so this directs a bit of light on this issue by showing the interplay between Spell Resistance and Fire Resistance.
The vampire was V10 with the base spell resistance for level; however, the level 10 Dragonknight had no spell penetration to bypass it with.
I appreciate the insight and acknowledge where the discrepancy in where our values come into play. It's worth knowing that Fire resistance still qualifies as an element-specific Spell Resistance. It also explains the rings having pronounced effect on incoming damages in my medium armour build.

It's pretty brutal that Light Armour has a Spell Penetration passive that ignores vampire's only source of defense though; it's even more troubling to consider in broader perspective that Light Armour passive would also impact the racial bonuses of Nord and Dunmer.
I suppose this also reasserts some of the ways in which Light Armour is the most appealing armour; at least in terms of skills that aren't mitigated by armour and armour reduction effects instead.

I appreciate you taking the time to fill in some of the holes in terms of the data I was able to manage to produce.

Raash · August 2014

Would be easier to just take vampire away completely. ESo vampires dont hold a candle to anything near the old school concept of them. Its Twillight-the kids edition that has been vomited into this game.
Keep and buff the lolwolves instead and delete vampires and all will be well again.

Thechemicals · August 2014

I enjoy killing vampires...id like to be able to target them when they are in mist and swarm mode so i can kill them faster.

Soulac · August 2014

Well my Vampire Ulti hits with 560 Crit, but I think I can do a bit more.
It's rly easy to conter a Vampire :
Clouding Swarm - Charge or another range stun if he casting the skill, fear from NB, Volcanic Rune, Dodge, Pulsar and other AoE

Devouring Swarm - Heal reduction, Stuns, St Dps, split out.

The only problems are sorcs.. Teleport, Ultimate up.

Thechemicals · August 2014

vampires...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lbB_HVcXpPk

griszax · August 2014

Soulac wrote: »

Well my Vampire Ulti hits with 560 Crit, but I think I can do a bit more.
It's rly easy to conter a Vampire :
Clouding Swarm - Charge or another range stun if he casting the skill, fear from NB, Volcanic Rune, Dodge, Pulsar and other AoE

Devouring Swarm - Heal reduction, Stuns, St Dps, split out.

The only problems are sorcs.. Teleport, Ultimate up.

You need a group of people to get ultimate up thro teleport. If a group can't survive vampire then they deserve to die imho.

NorthernFury · August 2014

Blade don't play no batswarm BS.

Luvsfuzzybunnies · August 2014

Halrloprillalar wrote: »

Homm wrote: »

Halrloprillalar wrote: »

It's safe to say that if you nerf bat swarm, there will be no reason to stay a vamp.

Yup. Or play sorc, unless you like being the support class on pvp..

yea basically.

I don't have fun spamming healing springs or purge or w/e

So just to be clear. You're saying vampirism is the only reason why sorcs are good at all?

Halrloprillalar · August 2014

Luvsfuzzybunnies wrote: »

Halrloprillalar wrote: »

Homm wrote: »

Halrloprillalar wrote: »

It's safe to say that if you nerf bat swarm, there will be no reason to stay a vamp.

Yup. Or play sorc, unless you like being the support class on pvp..

yea basically.

I don't have fun spamming healing springs or purge or w/e

So just to be clear. You're saying vampirism is the only reason why sorcs are good at all?

Offensively sorcs can do one of 2 things:

gank

or troll raids with streak/bats/negates

Luvsfuzzybunnies · August 2014

Halrloprillalar wrote: »

Luvsfuzzybunnies wrote: »

Halrloprillalar wrote: »

Homm wrote: »

Halrloprillalar wrote: »

It's safe to say that if you nerf bat swarm, there will be no reason to stay a vamp.

Yup. Or play sorc, unless you like being the support class on pvp..

yea basically.

I don't have fun spamming healing springs or purge or w/e

So just to be clear. You're saying vampirism is the only reason why sorcs are good at all?

Offensively sorcs can do one of 2 things:

gank

or troll raids with streak/bats/negates

Hmm I don't know what you want to do in pvp. If you wanna zerg ball then they do that very effectively. They lend very good group mechanics with negate magic not just to.troll raids. They are probably tied effectively with nb for ganking. They still have the best escape mechanism. Sounds like you only enjoy playing it if it's mash 2 buttons win game. I hear teken 3 calling your name.