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Gameplay Updates and Q&A with Eric Wrobel

  • Strider_Roshin
    Strider_Roshin
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    Can you remove the dodge roll cooldown, when dodge rolling for the purpose of getting out of roots? Also on console, dodge rolling, and bashing stops stam regen just like blocking does. Any plans to fix this?
  • MissBizz
    MissBizz
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    Soris wrote: »
    MissBizz wrote: »
    @Wrobel : Can you please explain why you chose the take away the third heal from BoL as the preferred skill change rather than any of the below options?

    -Add LoS
    -Reduce the full heal to 50% (so it's 3 small heals)
    -Reduce all 3 heals a bit

    -Give it bolt escape/roll dodge treatment
    -Increase cost
    -Reduce range
    -Anything that would have tamed down the skill but kept the 3rd heal.

    Not these! They are even bigger nerfs than what we have now. With this way you are gimping even more who is not a light armored full dedicated healer.
    This should NOT happen.

    That's fine. I don't necessarily believe myself these are better options but I'm wondering how they came about the decision.
    Lone Wolf HelpFor the solo players who know, sometimes you just need a hand.PC | NA | AD-DC-EP | Discord
  • bowmanz607
    bowmanz607
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    Are there any plans in the works for a training dummy of some sort to test gear and stuff on?
  • Strider_Roshin
    Strider_Roshin
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    bowmanz607 wrote: »
    Are there any plans in the works for a training dummy of some sort to test gear and stuff on?

    They hinted that they'll give us one with housing. I hope we can adjust it's resistances.
  • Bars
    Bars
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    @ bowmanz607 yep thats why they are nerffing Templars
  • Beaveri
    Beaveri
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    Any plans to do any adjustments for stamina sorcs (e.g any new stamina based sorcerer skills)?
    Edited by Beaveri on February 12, 2016 7:43PM
    PC EU - PVP

    Queen Visenya | Magicka DK
    Queen Valkyrie | Stamina DK
    Queen Nymeria | Magicka Sorcerer
    Queen Astrape | Stamina Sorcerer
    Queen Umbra | Magicka/Stamina Nightblade
    Queen Skadi | Magicka Warden
    Queen Greenseer | Stamina Warden
    Queen Marzanna | Magicka Necromancer
    Queen Kalma | Stamina Necromancer
    Queen Durga | Magicka Templar
    Queen Melisandre | Stamina Templar
    Queen Rhaenys | Stamina Templar
  • ThatNeonZebraAgain
    ThatNeonZebraAgain
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    Gore-of-the-Forest Argonian Nightblade
    Wode Earthrender Breton Dragonknight
    Ceol the Last Baron Redguard Dragonknight
    Wayra High Elf Sorceress
    Erebain Salothran Dark Elf Templar
    Rituals-of-the-Forest Argonian Warden
  • Fellhand_ESO
    Fellhand_ESO
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    What are your plans for making hybrid builds viable again? Builds could be much more unique if players had a choice of spreading out their attribute points rather than just dumping everything into a single stat.
  • cschwingeb14_ESO
    cschwingeb14_ESO
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    BoL: On live this morph currently increases healing over the base amount by 100%. This was a much needed change. Now we just need a good smart target emergency heal on resto staff to get class parity on healing. Templar needs better DPS options though, that come at the cost of healing ability.

    Please don't let Fasallas Guile go live the way it is. It will singlehandedly destroy PvP as soon as people get enough Rewards to build a set. Make it pop AE Defile around the attacker that hits you, and have a 10s cooldown

    Stam sorcs need a class-flavored melee range stam morph attack. Seriously.

    There need to be more counters to reflect. You took away one (1h/s reflect with double reflect change), and didn't add something back. You can't think that reflect is not powerfull enough. It's still incredibly powerfull.

    Make ranged Det insta cast, but make the single target damage even worse. This works as a zerg buster and as a anti reflect measure.

    Increase the damage on the mage guild Rune (volcanic/etc) and make the radius of the trap larger and make the AE explosion significantly bigger than the trap. This also works as a zerg buster and anti reflect measure
  • Ghost-Shot
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    @ZOS_GinaBruno @Wrobel @ZOS_RichLambert

    I have a few issues regarding Dragon Knights I would like to see Eric Wrobel address.

    Dragon Blood - We have seen some good buffs to dragon knights with this patch but they are still lacking. For example, dragons blood is still a useless ability in pvp, literally a waste of skill points. I have heard the reasoning that Wrobel wants it to be effective for people with high hp but thats how it worked before, now its not even good with high hp and bottlenecks DK's into using resto staves to have halfway decent heals. Burning embers works well for heals in a 1v1 setting but in regular open world play not so much in my opinion. Please consider removing the battle spirit heal debuff from dragons blood, its a signature class ability that has been made useless.

    Standard of Might - I feel that the cost of both morphs of standard need to be reduced to 200 (same goes for Nova but I'm not talking DK's here). The ability is very easily countered by negating or simply walking out so the cost needs to be reduced. Also I think the heal debuff should go back to 50%, as an ultimate, it should be more powerful than something we can get off any regular ability. As it stands right now, I see very little reason to chose banner over meteor or bats.

    Obsidian Shield - Igneous Shield is a phenomenal ability, we get some stamina, some ult and a healing buff when cast. The problem is no one uses the other morph anymore ( yes i know that frag shield was stupidly over powered at one point). I would like to see frag shield made competitive again and propose adding a small cool down to it to avoid it being as strong as it once was, or perhaps make the damage scale based on the size of the shield to make it similar to blazing shield. I was talking with a friend who has never played a DK awhile back and they honestly thought that the Frag Shield morph had been removed, thats sad.

    Inferno - This ability is still just bad, its a tier 5 class ability, this should be powerful.

    Ability Costs - Why are the costs of DK abilities so high? I'm not a night blade expert so this may not be entirely accurate but from what I'm told Sap costs NB's ~1900 magicka while talons and inhale cost 3000 magicka. Even with the damage buffs and flame damage on talons, impulse will likely still be more efficient for AoE dps in group play, can we get some cost reductions to make our class abilities more competitive?

    Passives - Some of the DK passives are very good, I'm not saying they aren't, but we also have some really useless passives. Can you please update passives like health regeneration to something more widely useful such as weapon/spell damage or magicka/stamina regeneration, maybe a stamina return while blocking (think original Black Rose set here) nothing crazy over powered but something that makes our damage and sustain competitive with other classes or actually makes our tanky class feel tanky.

    I don't want to sound like I'm not happy about the DK buffs that we have already but I feel like we still need more, as it stands right now from the perspective of group play, every slot in group that is held by a magicka DK is a spot that could be better filled by a Sorc or magicka Night Blade and as someone who has played the magicka DK since launch, that makes me very sad.


    Edited by Ghost-Shot on February 11, 2016 7:47PM
  • Joy_Division
    Joy_Division
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    actosh wrote: »
    @Wrobel

    Are there any plans to make both morphs desireable, when it comes to choose one?

    Most morphs in the game are a no brainer. example crystal frags

    What's sad is that the Crystal Blast morph was adjusted for this upcoming patch,
    Make Rush of Agony "Monsters only." People should not be consecutively crowd controlled in a PvP setting. Period.
  • CP5
    CP5
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    BoL: On live this morph currently increases healing over the base amount by 100%. This was a much needed change. Now we just need a good smart target emergency heal on resto staff to get class parity on healing. Templar needs better DPS options though, that come at the cost of healing ability.

    Please don't let Fasallas Guile go live the way it is. It will singlehandedly destroy PvP as soon as people get enough Rewards to build a set. Make it pop AE Defile around the attacker that hits you, and have a 10s cooldown

    Stam sorcs need a class-flavored melee range stam morph attack. Seriously.

    There need to be more counters to reflect. You took away one (1h/s reflect with double reflect change), and didn't add something back. You can't think that reflect is not powerfull enough. It's still incredibly powerfull.

    Make ranged Det insta cast, but make the single target damage even worse. This works as a zerg buster and as a anti reflect measure.

    Increase the damage on the mage guild Rune (volcanic/etc) and make the radius of the trap larger and make the AE explosion significantly bigger than the trap. This also works as a zerg buster and anti reflect measure

    I would love to put volcanic rune back on my bar. It was always so fun to hit people with but the only threat it carried was the cc.
  • Takllin
    Takllin
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    @Wrobel @ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_RichLambert @ZOS_JessicaFolsom

    When are you going to make Sharpened and Mauls/Maces penetration work properly?

    What is the status of your plans for Stamina Sorcerers?

    What are your plans with Heavy Armor?
    Edited by Takllin on February 11, 2016 8:12PM
    Jadokis - AD Redguard DK v16 AR 18
    Jàsènn - AD Orc Templar 47 AR 10
    Jessèn - AD Dunmer DK v16 AR 9 - Former Empress of Blackwater Blade

    Tekllin - AD Altmer Sorcerer v16 AR 18 (Ret.)
    Tekklin - AD Bosmer Nightblade v16 AR 12 (Ret.)
    Jasenn - DC Imperial Templar v16 AR 18 (Ret.)
    Jasènn - DC Orc Sorcerer v16 AR 15 (Ret.)
  • Neoauspex
    Neoauspex
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    BoL: On live this morph currently increases healing over the base amount by 100%. This was a much needed change. Now we just need a good smart target emergency heal on resto staff to get class parity on healing. Templar needs better DPS options though, that come at the cost of healing ability.

    Templar needs better DPS options though, that come at the cost of healing ability an identity, if there is to be class parity on healing.
  • hrothbern
    hrothbern
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    ShadowHvo wrote: »
    Hello everyone!


    [*] Leeching Strikes: Also in the next incremental patch, we plan on increasing the amount of health restored from this ability, based on your feedback.


    THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!

    @ShadowHvo ,
    And.... will it be 5% of Health ? ;)

    I am a NB Siphoning Tank and would rather have Leeching Strikes changed into a Tank Morph with more regain than SA and some DPS penalty.

    Also because I think that even if LS has 5% Health regain, it wil not be attractive in practice.
    The only kind of build that I can imagine where it is perhaps usefull is with ranged attacks.... Stamina bow ?

    So... I am curious about in what kind of build you use it.
    Edited by hrothbern on February 11, 2016 8:09PM
    "I still do not understand why I followed the advice of Captain Rana to bring the villagers of Bleakrock into safety. We should have fought for our village and not have backed down, with our tail between our legs. Now my home village is in shambles, the houses burning, the invaders feasting.I swear every day to Shor that after Molag Bal has been defeated, I will hunt down the invaders and restore peace in Bleakrock and drink my mead with my friends at the market place".PC-EU
  • Strider_Roshin
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    Any chance we can get a new trait that gives armor penetration as well as physical resistance? Pretty much a stamina version of Nirnhoned.
  • Takllin
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    Any chance we can get a new trait that gives armor penetration as well as physical resistance? Pretty much a stamina version of Nirnhoned.

    Yeah ever since they fixed Sharpened it has been terrible and we could sorely use something akin to Nirnhoned for Stamina builds.
    Jadokis - AD Redguard DK v16 AR 18
    Jàsènn - AD Orc Templar 47 AR 10
    Jessèn - AD Dunmer DK v16 AR 9 - Former Empress of Blackwater Blade

    Tekllin - AD Altmer Sorcerer v16 AR 18 (Ret.)
    Tekklin - AD Bosmer Nightblade v16 AR 12 (Ret.)
    Jasenn - DC Imperial Templar v16 AR 18 (Ret.)
    Jasènn - DC Orc Sorcerer v16 AR 15 (Ret.)
  • altemriel
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    when is the Khajiit Carnage passive going to be fixed?

  • Takllin
    Takllin
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    altemriel wrote: »
    when is the Khajiit Carnage passive going to be fixed?

    AFAIK it is fixed on the PTS.
    Jadokis - AD Redguard DK v16 AR 18
    Jàsènn - AD Orc Templar 47 AR 10
    Jessèn - AD Dunmer DK v16 AR 9 - Former Empress of Blackwater Blade

    Tekllin - AD Altmer Sorcerer v16 AR 18 (Ret.)
    Tekklin - AD Bosmer Nightblade v16 AR 12 (Ret.)
    Jasenn - DC Imperial Templar v16 AR 18 (Ret.)
    Jasènn - DC Orc Sorcerer v16 AR 15 (Ret.)
  • Wollust
    Wollust
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    AoE caps or riot?
    Susano'o

    Zerg Squad
  • Jhunn
    Jhunn
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    Wollust wrote: »
    AoE caps or riot?
    Inb4 post removed
    Gave up.
  • Cinnamon_Spider
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    [*] Meteor: This was the only Ultimate that you were previously able to reflect, so this change was simply bringing it in line with all other Ultimates. We also plan on making a slight reduction to the snare on the Ice Comet morph.
    So, when will this change be applied to Overload? I need it entirely for PVE, of course ;)

    Cinn #SorcLivesMatter
    Exquisite Bedlam - Sorcerer AD rank 34
    Cinnamonspiderdreams - Sorcerer EP rank 24
    Synaris Astarte - Templar DC rank 24
    Cinnamon Spider - Nightblade AD

    Youtube - Cinnamon_Spider
  • Didgerion
    Didgerion
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    Wollust wrote: »
    AoE caps or riot?

    We might not need to get rid of AoE caps...lets see how new zerg busting utilities work out.....most probably the ball groups will loose popularity in the next DLC and you won't really need an AOE ability that hits more than 6 players.

  • Jhunn
    Jhunn
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    Didgerion wrote: »
    Wollust wrote: »
    AoE caps or riot?

    We might not need to get rid of AoE caps...lets see how new zerg busting utilities work out.....most probably the ball groups will loose popularity in the next DLC and you won't really need an AOE ability that hits more than 6 players.
    Mhmm.... I admire your optimism.
    Gave up.
  • AOECAPS
    AOECAPS
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    Since Templars will soon be deleted from the game when will I be able to change my class type?
  • Didgerion
    Didgerion
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    [*] Meteor: This was the only Ultimate that you were previously able to reflect, so this change was simply bringing it in line with all other Ultimates. We also plan on making a slight reduction to the snare on the Ice Comet morph.
    So, when will this change be applied to Overload? I need it entirely for PVE, of course ;)

    The overload ultimate is not reflect able...you press R and you go into your overload state - that one is not reflectable...now you have two options from there on either you do heavy attacks - non reflectable or light attacks - reflectable.

    So saying that overload is reflectable is not entirely true.

    If the overload reflect would be like the meteor's one then I would press R for overload and the other player would get into overload state instead of me....would you agree to give someone your entire overload state? I doubt it...
    Edited by Didgerion on February 11, 2016 11:50PM
  • Zaldan
    Zaldan
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    Hello everyone!

    On this Friday’s ESO Live Twitch show, we’ll be joined by Lead Combat Designer Eric Wrobel to discuss some of the ability and balance changes going into the Thieves Guild base game patch. This will include what’s been done so far, some upcoming changes we plan to make, and answering some of your questions live. First, we’d like to address a few popular topics we’ve seen over the past week from the PTS forums:
    • Breath of Life: We understand that many of you are frustrated with this change, but we found the ability was a little too powerful as a single ability (both as a single target and AoE healing ability). We’ve been watching a lot of livestreams, and Templars appear to still be very useful using this ability in conjunction with others. This includes using Focused Healing which now grants you the Major Mending buff, or Healing Ritual which has a decreased cast time. We don’t currently have any plans to change Breath of Life beyond what’s already been done.
    • Magelight: We plan on making a few changes to this ability based on some feedback we’ve seen including reducing the radius of the reveal, and increasing the cost of the ability. Ultimately, we want it to be a little more difficult to find stealthed enemies unless you specifically use the Radiant Magelight morph, and want it to be more expensive to get the Major Empower buff from toggling Magelight.
    • Meteor: This was the only Ultimate that you were previously able to reflect, so this change was simply bringing it in line with all other Ultimates. We also plan on making a slight reduction to the snare on the Ice Comet morph.
    • Siphoning Attacks: We plan on increasing the resources provided by this ability in the next incremental patch.
    • Leeching Strikes: Also in the next incremental patch, we plan on increasing the amount of health restored from this ability, based on your feedback.
    • Alliance War Skill Line: Rich Lambert posted a very detailed response in this thread that we encourage you to check out, but in short, we based our changes on what we found to be the average amount of AP gained based on our data. That said, what’s currently on the PTS is lower than intended, and will be fixed in the next incremental patch.
    • Templars: We’ve been reading your feedback across the forums. We understand your frustration, and do appreciate you taking the time to let us know about your pain points. We have some additional changes going in for you in the next patch including increasing the duration of the damage reduction from Empowering Sweep, increasing the bonus to the initial hit from Crescent Sweep, and adjusting the buffs from Rune Focus to stay on you for 8 seconds after leaving the rune.

    With all that said, please post any combat or itemization-related questions for Eric in this thread, and we’ll do our best to answer as many as we can on Friday’s show. Remember to check today’s PTS patch notes first as we included a few fixes in this most recent update.

    Thanks, everyone, and we look forward to talking with you later this week!

    Basically their design, their game, dont like it tough

    :(
    Dovie'andi se tovya sagain.
    Niidro tiid wah fusvok dirkah.

    aka.@Cuthceol
  • Didgerion
    Didgerion
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    AOECAPS wrote: »
    Since Templars will soon be deleted from the game when will I be able to change my class type?

    All classes will be deleted from the game....that's why they are coming just with a race change feature and not a class one.
    Edited by Didgerion on February 11, 2016 11:48PM
  • Didgerion
    Didgerion
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    Zaldan wrote: »
    Hello everyone!

    On this Friday’s ESO Live Twitch show, we’ll be joined by Lead Combat Designer Eric Wrobel to discuss some of the ability and balance changes going into the Thieves Guild base game patch. This will include what’s been done so far, some upcoming changes we plan to make, and answering some of your questions live. First, we’d like to address a few popular topics we’ve seen over the past week from the PTS forums:
    • Breath of Life: We understand that many of you are frustrated with this change, but we found the ability was a little too powerful as a single ability (both as a single target and AoE healing ability). We’ve been watching a lot of livestreams, and Templars appear to still be very useful using this ability in conjunction with others. This includes using Focused Healing which now grants you the Major Mending buff, or Healing Ritual which has a decreased cast time. We don’t currently have any plans to change Breath of Life beyond what’s already been done.
    • Magelight: We plan on making a few changes to this ability based on some feedback we’ve seen including reducing the radius of the reveal, and increasing the cost of the ability. Ultimately, we want it to be a little more difficult to find stealthed enemies unless you specifically use the Radiant Magelight morph, and want it to be more expensive to get the Major Empower buff from toggling Magelight.
    • Meteor: This was the only Ultimate that you were previously able to reflect, so this change was simply bringing it in line with all other Ultimates. We also plan on making a slight reduction to the snare on the Ice Comet morph.
    • Siphoning Attacks: We plan on increasing the resources provided by this ability in the next incremental patch.
    • Leeching Strikes: Also in the next incremental patch, we plan on increasing the amount of health restored from this ability, based on your feedback.
    • Alliance War Skill Line: Rich Lambert posted a very detailed response in this thread that we encourage you to check out, but in short, we based our changes on what we found to be the average amount of AP gained based on our data. That said, what’s currently on the PTS is lower than intended, and will be fixed in the next incremental patch.
    • Templars: We’ve been reading your feedback across the forums. We understand your frustration, and do appreciate you taking the time to let us know about your pain points. We have some additional changes going in for you in the next patch including increasing the duration of the damage reduction from Empowering Sweep, increasing the bonus to the initial hit from Crescent Sweep, and adjusting the buffs from Rune Focus to stay on you for 8 seconds after leaving the rune.

    With all that said, please post any combat or itemization-related questions for Eric in this thread, and we’ll do our best to answer as many as we can on Friday’s show. Remember to check today’s PTS patch notes first as we included a few fixes in this most recent update.

    Thanks, everyone, and we look forward to talking with you later this week!

    Basically their design, their game, dont like it tough

    :(

    They are trying to balance things out but it is a hard task to do. There are so many inter-relations:

    DK*Sorc*NB*Templar*Stamina*Magica*Health*Light*Medium*Heavy*DPS*HPS*PVP*PVE*{other constants}

    You get an insane number of inter-relations even if all above constants are equal to 10 then you have 1 000 000 000 000 000 inter-relations.

    That's why adding classes to the game was a mistake. It would be 10000 times easier to balance things without classes (assuming that the constant for the class relationship is 10).

    And the sad part is that there are no CLASSES in TES lore.

    So here is my question again:
    Are there any plans to remove classes from ESO?
  • Nahz
    Nahz
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    Below, I've quoted posts I've made on the forums in regards to the sorcerer pets. The actual quotes are in spoiler boxes, and there are tl;dr bullet points under those boxes which summarize the points made. For more complete reasoning behind my suggestions, please see the posts in the spoiler boxes.

    There's also a section at the bottom of this post which lists some miscellaneous changes/additions that I'd like to discuss.

    Although frustrated by some of the issues and changes associated with the pets, please keep in mind that I'm very excited to see them getting some attention.

    Nahz wrote: »
    Over the weekend, I submitted bug reports regarding the stealth mechanic of the sorcerer's summoned pets while in PVP. Right now, the pets are not going into stealth; meaning that enemy players are able to see them even when the sorcerer is invisible. I relogged just in case there was a bug causing the pets to stay in combat, which then prevented them from going into stealth; but that did not fix the issue.

    When can we expect to see this bug fixed? This bug cannot wait for the next major update. It's hard enough to play the way I want (using a pet-based build) due to the fact that pets have poor AOE utility, and had their already low damage reduced further by the 50% damage reduction in Cyrodiil. I am not able to be effective in groups while using pets, so I've had to stick to only using them when running solo. This bug makes the pets a huge liability. I either have to give away my position, or cast them before engaging an enemy.

    These challenges, coupled with the problem of pets not benefitting from champion points, need attention.

    On that note, when can we expect pets to benefit from CP? With the CP system, enemy players will continue to gain resistance to the primary attacks from my pets (the twilight's lighting bolt, and the scamp's explosion), yet my pets cannot grow to challenge those stat increases. This issue also affects PVE, as my group members will continue to increase their damage as they build CP, but my pets will only benefit from the tiny amount of magicka I gain from 1/3rd of the CP I've acquired. If pets cannot benefit from the CP system due to technical limitations, when can we expect to see them buffed?
    • Are there plans to allow the sorcerer pets to benefit from the champion point system? If not, are there plans to increase their damage and resistances to make them on par with enemy players and monsters?
    Nahz wrote: »
    I cannot tell you how excited I was when I saw additions to the pets mentioned in the notes (from my previous forum posts, and my signature, you may be able to tell that I really enjoy pet builds). Being given a more active role in controlling the pets sounds like it will be very fun. The changes to the winged twilight pet are welcomed additions, and I'm honestly having trouble deciding which morph I want considering they both seem great.

    However, the changes to the volatile familiar are going to be extremely detrimental for my PVP build. When using my pet build in PVP, I depend on combining the damage from the scamp's explosion with some of my other abilities to burst down opponents. This burst is not quick. It takes me at least 8 (and usually more) seconds to set up, and competent players are able to recognize and counter it.

    The pulse ability of the scamp will not provide the necessary damage to make my build, which is already struggling, competitive. Considering the pets need a tremendous amount of TLC, it doesn't seem unreasonable for the scamp to have the death explosion, in addition to the pulse ability. This would allow it to be useful in both PVE and PVP, as the pulse will help it deal consistent damage to groups of stationary enemies (either monsters in dungeons or enemy players stacked on keep flags) and the explosion would allow for a quick burst of damage against more mobile targets.

    Below are a few suggestions that I think will improve the pets, particularly the volatile familiar:

    - In addition to giving the volatile familiar back the explosion effect, decrease the amount of time the assigned skill button must be held in order to dismiss the pets from 4 seconds to 2 seconds. This would allow players to make better use of the explosion without being vulnerable for a whole 4 seconds, but would still prevent the pet from accidently being dismissed. This just seems worthwhile all around considering 4 seconds is a long time to wait, especially in a fast-paced PVP scenario. When pets were going into stealth properly after 1.5 went live, I would dismiss my pets in order to help myself hide. Even though they were invisible, the fact that they were always slightly behind me meant that I had a larger detection radius.

    - The stun from the volatile familiar's pulse should be applied at the first pulse, not the last one. Applying the stun on the first pulse would help ensure that enemies remain in range for the second pulse which does not occur until a whole 2 seconds later. Enemy players would still be able to break free and move away from the scamp, assuming they were not already moving out of range due to CC immunity.

    - On that note, decrease the time between pulses to 1 second from 2 seconds. There are DOT abilities which tick faster and for more damage than this ability. This would make the pulse ability more useful against enemy players which will be constantly moving around. Faster ticks means the pulse would have more chances to actually hit them.

    - An alternative to applying the stun to the first pulse would be applying a snare effect to the first pulse to help keep enemies in range of the subsequent pulses. A better option would be to have each pulse (except maybe the final because it applies a stun) apply a snare. That would allow the volatile familiar to have an added debuff utility.

    - Before 1.6, I found the damage from the explosion to be adequate (there were, and still are, plenty of other abilities which hit much harder; but we made it work). With the 50% damage decrease introduced with the Imperial City update, I found the explosion damage to be lackluster. I wouldn't mind it being buffed, but I think a better option would be to scale the damage off of the familiar's missing health. Base damage for the explosion would still be 20% of your max magicka, but that damage would increase as the familiar's health dropped. However, if the explosion was triggered by the death of the familiar (not the dismissal), it would only cause the base 20% damage.

    This would introduce a new degree of strategy to the playstyle, as you would have to attempt to monitor your familiar's health (more on that below) and detonate the scamp at appropriate times. If you got too greedy, and kept pushing the familiar's health for that extra bit of damage, you would run the risk of losing all that extra effort. This would also mean that a horde of sorcerers couldn't just send their familiars into a blob of steel tornados and watch the fireworks.

    - With regards to monitoring the pets' health, we could really use health bars for all of our pets added to the UI. Other players in this thread have mentioned this, and agree that it would be a great addition. In could be expanded upon so that it indicates the strength of the shield on your pets, and the twilight tormentor would even have a glowing health bar when under the effect of its empower ability.

    EDIT:
    btw, brace for a wall of text
    • To dismiss a pet, the assigned skill key should need to be held for 2 seconds, as opposed to 4 seconds. This would allow players to quickly dismiss pets without doing so accidently.
    • The volatile familiar needs it's death explosion effect to be worthwhile in PVP. It should have both the pulsing ability, and the death explosion to make it useful in PVE and PVP content.
    • The first pulse needs to either stun enemies, or apply a strong snare to help keep enemies in range of subsequent pulses.
    • Pulses should occur every second as opposed to every 2 seconds. Enemy players will not be standing still, so more frequent pulses would help ensure at least one connected.
    • The base damage for the explosion should remain 20% of the player's max magicka, but also increase based on the amount of health the familiar has left before detonation.
    Nahz wrote: »
    Sorcerer
    • Daedric Summoning
      • Summon Unstable Familiar: The pets summoned from this ability and its morphs can no longer be dismissed by holding down the button. The pet can now be dismissed by removing the buff from your Active Effects window.
      • Summon Winged Twilight: The pets summoned from this ability and its morphs can no longer be dismissed by holding down the button. The pet can now be dismissed by removing the buff from your Active Effects window.

    What just happened here...

    I thought reducing the amount of time for which the skill button must be held from 4 seconds to 2 seconds seemed like an appropriate method of dismissing pets. Can we just have the 4 second button-hold back if this is going to be the alternative?

    If I'm trying to quickly go into stealth to evade enemy players, I don't have time to leave myself completely defenseless by going into a menu, scrolling through a list of active effects, and picking out the two that need to be deactivated. Not that leaving myself defenseless for 8 seconds is any better, but at least I would still be able to move around.

    @Wrobel, does this mean that we're definitely not getting the volatile familiar's death explosion (i.e., the feature which made the unstable familiar skill even remotely worthwhile for pvp) back; and that ZOS is not open to discussion about that feature?
    [/quote]

    What just happened here...

    I thought reducing the amount of time for which the skill button must be held from 4 seconds to 2 seconds seemed like an appropriate method of dismissing pets. Can we just have the 4 second button-hold back if this is going to be the alternative?

    If I'm trying to quickly go into stealth to evade enemy players, I don't have time to leave myself completely defenseless by going into a menu, scrolling through a list of active effects, and picking out the two that need to be deactivated. Not that leaving myself defenseless for 8 seconds is any better, but at least I would still be able to move around.

    @Wrobel, does this mean that we're definitely not getting the volatile familiar's death explosion (i.e., the feature which made the unstable familiar skill even remotely worthwhile for pvp) back; and that ZOS is not open to discussion about that feature?
    • This new method of dismissing pets should be replaced. It would be more helpful to have the 4 second button hold method than it would be to go into a menu and scroll through active effects. We may need to be dismissing pets while engaged in combat, which means mobility is necessary.

    Below are some miscellaneous suggestions which do not pertain to a particular pet, but pet builds as a whole:
    • Increase the range of explosion from Daedric Prey, as well as the damage the explosion causes to enemies that are caught in the blast. This would give pet users more AOE utility.
    • Adding health bars for all of the pets to the UI would be extremely helpful, especially if the scaling damage for the volatile familiar death explosion was implemented.
    • Please add the necropotence set to the Rewards of the Worthy mail with randomized traits and scaling levels. This would allow us to get vr16 versions of that set, and more ideal traits. This set, which is a staple for many pet builds, is still stuck at vr12; but we have few alternatives.
    Nahz - VR16 Sorcerer
    Paragon of Togglemancer Excellence
    Daggerfall Covenant | Trueflame NA PC

    #SeeYouInCU
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