Why nerfing the Bear?

leepalmer95 · September 2018

swirve wrote: »

lagrue wrote: »

Apparently to circle jerk back and forth until we're all playing the game with wet ramen noodles as weapons. AKA it's all to appease the PVP crowd who complain about balance that will never, ever be possible to achieve.

The very notion of balance in any RPG style game is like a unicorn that *** diamonds under a rainbow. It doesn't, and realistically cannot exist.

Bingo... PvP crowd cryers are damaging the game for everyone!

LIterally nothing to do with pvp at all.

No one used the bear in pvp.

The dmg and sustain buffs for warden are all because of pve, currently in pvp stam warden are very strong and because of pve they completely buffed its dmg and sustain massively.

So why is our pvp getting more imbalanced because of pve?

leepalmer95 · September 2018

lagrue wrote: »

Kadoin wrote: »

swirve wrote: »

lagrue wrote: »

Apparently to circle jerk back and forth until we're all playing the game with wet ramen noodles as weapons. AKA it's all to appease the PVP crowd who complain about balance that will never, ever be possible to achieve.

The very notion of balance in any RPG style game is like a unicorn that *** diamonds under a rainbow. It doesn't, and realistically cannot exist.

Bingo... PvP crowd cryers are damaging the game for everyone!

I don't know of a single PvPer that plays warden and slots bear OR has ever complained about it. Wait...hold on...I slot bear in PvP, but rarely.

Likewise I don't know a single PVEr who ever said the game wasn't balanced or things needed to be nerfed, but I can find 100s of topics a day that are from PVP players complaining about 'x' being too OP... sooo yeah... just because the devs hit the wrong spot everytime, doesn't detract from the fact they do it to try an appease PVP playerbase.

Whether for the bear or anything else - the only reason they constantly mess with everything is because of the barrage of threads they face everyday from disgruntled PVP players.

Lmao pve'ers complain about balance all the time.

Literally all i've heard in pve is how OP nb's are and how they need nerfed in pve etc.. how magdens need buffs etc... How healers are useless etc...

The cast time on shields was because of pve.

The warden buffs was because of pve.

The change to nb bow proc was because of pve.

The beam change was because of pve because they want magplar to be able to weave light between it to buff dps.

Sylvermynx · September 2018

Well, I hope it's not a huge hit, because I tend to depend on the pets (both warden and sorc) which are run server side.... since my lag averages 2 seconds on a GOOD day.

*sigh* I really REALLY don't want to have to go back to WoW or RIFT. But damn - if you keep messing with the two classes that truly work for me here....

zaria · September 2018

lagrue wrote: »

Kadoin wrote: »

swirve wrote: »

lagrue wrote: »

Apparently to circle jerk back and forth until we're all playing the game with wet ramen noodles as weapons. AKA it's all to appease the PVP crowd who complain about balance that will never, ever be possible to achieve.

The very notion of balance in any RPG style game is like a unicorn that *** diamonds under a rainbow. It doesn't, and realistically cannot exist.

Bingo... PvP crowd cryers are damaging the game for everyone!

I don't know of a single PvPer that plays warden and slots bear OR has ever complained about it. Wait...hold on...I slot bear in PvP, but rarely.

Likewise I don't know a single PVEr who ever said the game wasn't balanced or things needed to be nerfed, but I can find 100s of topics a day that are from PVP players complaining about 'x' being too OP... sooo yeah... just because the devs hit the wrong spot everytime, doesn't detract from the fact they do it to try an appease PVP playerbase.

Whether for the bear or anything else - the only reason they constantly mess with everything is because of the barrage of threads they face everyday from disgruntled PVP players.

Lots of pve complains, trials beeing designed for magic users. Magwarden is weak is the most common ones.
Loads of pve complains about shield changes as it will hurt survival a lot.
No PvE players don't ask for nerfs as it will hurt the group, they ask for buffs.

Anhedonie · September 2018

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

We reduced the damage of bear so we could buff the base damage of Wardens; the overall DPS should be within 1-2% of what it was before due to the buff of Advanced Species. This means anyone who doesn't use the bear will see less of a DPS loss.

Please, reread this. Your statement contradicts itself.
Also, warden's DPS is already bad. Why keep it at the relatively same level?

Volckodav · September 2018

omegatay_ESO wrote: »

They nerf the classes, so they can justify the champion point increases. Can't have everyone running around one shoting bosses.

Since when and with witch spe bear OS bosses?

Volckodav · September 2018

BalticBlues wrote: »

While we are at it:
Wardens like the bear, but not at the cost of sacrificing another ultimate.

Suggestion:
1. Make the Bear a regular skill, as the Sorc pets.
2. Let Swarm become the Warden Ultimate.
... and give people a a Stamina and a Magica morph of the new Swarm Ultimate

Love this idea, so maybe I will begin to use Swarm

Volckodav · September 2018

Volckodav wrote: »

omegatay_ESO wrote: »

They nerf the classes, so they can justify the champion point increases. Can't have everyone running around one shoting bosses.

Since when and with witch spe bear OS bosses? ok to be honest I never have any magden with me in any pve content, and with I'm playing with my magden solo bear have lot of trouble doing what I want, running after bosses, miss, strange pathfinding, and take me 2 ulti, so no healing frest i.e or nice permafrost with reduce dammage and stun

Ravenayle · September 2018

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

We reduced the damage of bear so we could buff the base damage of Wardens; the overall DPS should be within 1-2% of what it was before due to the buff of Advanced Species. This means anyone who doesn't use the bear will see less of a DPS loss.

We already had horrible dps. I don't get this. So now we are penalized for using our bear? How sad!

max_only · September 2018

max_only wrote: »

Ir0nB34r wrote: »

Mephisto939 wrote: »

A 30% damage nerf??? Has anyone even complained that Guardian was outperforming? Well so much for the main selling feature of the Warden.

Nerfs dont only come from player feedback. Developers use game telemetry to gather data on how things are being used, and if a skill seems to be over performing compared to other skills, then they will make changes to bring them in line to their counterparts.

People too often think that 'whining' to developers result in sweeping nerfs, but this isn't exactly true. It only helps bring it to their attention. They run the data, and if the data reinforces the feedback, then nerfs are made.

Keep this in mind when you feel the developers are not listening to people saying something is OP. The data usually paints a better picture. Numbers do not lie, and humans can't help but embellish and be somewhat bias.

That doesn’t explain why they would nerf the Reason Why We Bought It.

I bought a foot long sub meal that comes with chips and a drink. They took 30% off my sandwich but increased my drink from a medium to a large. That’s nice, I purchased this meal deal for the Sub. I want a whole Sub. In fact you can keep your chips if you will double the toppings on my sub.... I might be a bit hungry actually

Quick update, I went and got some food lol

But really,

I won’t be buying animal skins if they continue to devalue this skill. It’s a double barred ultimate for Hircine’s sakes, it needs to be powerful

Bam_Bam · September 2018

sampol212 wrote: »

Seriously why? Wardens are already the weakest class in the game and now you are nerfing that poor ***?

Ummm, the weakest class in the game? You think so?

That's why about 50% of the Cyrodiil population seems to play Warden. Ridiculously powerful with infinite sustain and a bear to hug too.

Bam_Bam · September 2018

Coatmagic wrote: »

Bear got nerfed for simple reason: @ZoS STILL trying to balance PvP & PvE ~ same reason they do anything.

They need to seriously get over this because it will never happen and they will end up killing quite a good game in the process

People (including me) have been saying that for years now. It's still alive and kicking though!

TheInfernalRage · September 2018

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

We reduced the damage of bear so we could buff the base damage of Wardens; the overall DPS should be within 1-2% of what it was before due to the buff of Advanced Species. This means anyone who doesn't use the bear will see less of a DPS loss.

The logic here relies on the idea that the Warden is an already powerful class equal to a Nightblade. Unfortunately, they are not. I get that there is a balancing act here. You take damage away from the Bear and place it somewhere in the Warden's kit. So, the gain "should be 1-2% of what it was before". BUT, 1-2% gain is not enough for the Warden. I don't know if you guys are playing the Warden, but have you tried not nerfing the Bear and see if that places the Warden on par with a Nightblade?

There seems to be a movement here against whatever makes the class unique. You already took away the third bar of the Sorcerer and you also nerf the Bear of the Warden. I hope you guys are not implying that in order to "balance" the classes, you will strip away difference in favor of homogeneity, while maintaining a single-class (Nightblade) dominance in the damage dealing department.

maboleth · September 2018

^ I'm also totally against ironing the classes and making everyone look and feel the same. Totally wrong way of balancing.

As far as I'm concerned, EVERY class should have some distinctive, special and unique ability. Third bar for sorcs using overload ulti was one of those.

Androconium · September 2018

Bear has outlived its usefulness.

Good. Now I can find the banker again.

max_only · September 2018

TheInfernalRage wrote: »

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

We reduced the damage of bear so we could buff the base damage of Wardens; the overall DPS should be within 1-2% of what it was before due to the buff of Advanced Species. This means anyone who doesn't use the bear will see less of a DPS loss.

The logic here relies on the idea that the Warden is an already powerful class equal to a Nightblade. Unfortunately, they are not. I get that there is a balancing act here. You take damage away from the Bear and place it somewhere in the Warden's kit. So, the gain "should be 1-2% of what it was before". BUT, 1-2% gain is not enough for the Warden. I don't know if you guys are playing the Warden, but have you tried not nerfing the Bear and see if that places the Warden on par with a Nightblade?

There seems to be a movement here against whatever makes the class unique. You already took away the third bar of the Sorcerer and you also nerf the Bear of the Warden. I hope you guys are not implying that in order to "balance" the classes, you will strip away difference in favor of homogeneity, while maintaining a single-class (Nightblade) dominance in the damage dealing department.

I was about to agree but then I see you’re biased against Nightblades. Those of us who’ve played long enough know that Nightblades are on top now but it used to be 8 Sorcerers, 1 dk, 1 templar set up for a long time. Nightblades were only good for Dark Brotherhood/Thieves Guild quests, if that. MagDk had a short time to shine, Templar hasn’t shined in a long while, but they had it and Sorc domination lasted a good long while. It used to be the only class that had any kind of consistency in vMA to the point where advice for vMA newbs was to make a Sorc purely for running it to get weapons for the other classes.

Anyway Wardens don’t need to be number 1 across the board. We can be number 2 at some things but right now we are actually #2 aka shif

DanteYoda · September 2018

I don't think the bear nerfs were pve or pvp, i think this one is all dev bias tbh.

Ever since i've seen these nerfs i've really lost all will to play.. i pop in for an hour or so and then leave cause i know my characters are going to be useless next patch, why would i buy new content (murkmire) when my all my magicka characters are no good anymore..

This was an epically bad business decision imo..

SHADOW2KK · September 2018

swirve wrote: »

lagrue wrote: »

Apparently to circle jerk back and forth until we're all playing the game with wet ramen noodles as weapons. AKA it's all to appease the PVP crowd who complain about balance that will never, ever be possible to achieve.

The very notion of balance in any RPG style game is like a unicorn that *** diamonds under a rainbow. It doesn't, and realistically cannot exist.

Bingo... PvP crowd cryers are damaging the game for everyone!

You do realise there are whiners in both PvE and PvP camps ye?, I remember numerous examples of PvE peeps whining about Doshia and Molag Bal, and ofc the salt of playing in IC.

Not all PvPers whine and want nerfs, some of us just adapt and kill, it is the oh I died, it must be nerfed, sadly that mindset is active in PvE and PvP.

IZZEFlameLash · September 2018

Lol, now I know the reason why we see all the weird nerfs and buffs nobody really asked for. Summarized in Gina's post. Nerfs bear damage by 30%, claims that it was to buff the overall DPS. Lawl, what kind of philosophy is that?

stpolaris · September 2018

ZOS is flat out *** for this.

Glurin · September 2018

IZZEFlameLash wrote: »

Lol, now I know the reason why we see all the weird nerfs and buffs nobody really asked for. Summarized in Gina's post. Nerfs bear damage by 30%, claims that it was to buff the overall DPS. Lawl, what kind of philosophy is that?

A pretty straight forward one, actually. If wardens with bears do 50k DPS and wardens without bears do 40k, what happens when you buff base warden damage by say, 5k? Wardens with bears do 55k and the others do 45k, right? Wardens with bears might at this point be somewhat overpowered and you still have the issue of the bear being a significant increase in DPS compared to other available ultimates.

So, nerf the bear. Wardens get a baseline damage buff while the gap between bear and no bear gets filled in a bit.

Arciris · September 2018

Glurin wrote: »

IZZEFlameLash wrote: »

Lol, now I know the reason why we see all the weird nerfs and buffs nobody really asked for. Summarized in Gina's post. Nerfs bear damage by 30%, claims that it was to buff the overall DPS. Lawl, what kind of philosophy is that?

A pretty straight forward one, actually. If wardens with bears do 50k DPS and wardens without bears do 40k, what happens when you buff base warden damage by say, 5k? Wardens with bears do 55k and the others do 45k, right? Wardens with bears might at this point be somewhat overpowered and you still have the issue of the bear being a significant increase in DPS compared to other available ultimates.

So, nerf the bear. Wardens get a baseline damage buff while the gap between bear and no bear gets filled in a bit.

You are talking about Target Dummy parses, right?

I don't think the game should be balanced around those parses.

First, those are Single Target parses, while real combat situations require AOE most of the time (Bear is useless in that regard).
Second, when in comes to the Bear, it's Damage output is really different in a Dummy test or real combat situations (read many posts above about how the Bear's AI leads to severe DPS loss).

The logic behind the nerf is sound, but the context is wrong: it misses the bigger picture.

Edit: not to mention 30% is huge, Wardens could bear 10%, anything more and many people will loose interest in that class, since the main attractive is - guess what? - the Bear

IZZEFlameLash · September 2018

Glurin wrote: »

IZZEFlameLash wrote: »

Lol, now I know the reason why we see all the weird nerfs and buffs nobody really asked for. Summarized in Gina's post. Nerfs bear damage by 30%, claims that it was to buff the overall DPS. Lawl, what kind of philosophy is that?

A pretty straight forward one, actually. If wardens with bears do 50k DPS and wardens without bears do 40k, what happens when you buff base warden damage by say, 5k? Wardens with bears do 55k and the others do 45k, right? Wardens with bears might at this point be somewhat overpowered and you still have the issue of the bear being a significant increase in DPS compared to other available ultimates.

So, nerf the bear. Wardens get a baseline damage buff while the gap between bear and no bear gets filled in a bit.

If their goal was to increase overall DPS, they could have done so without nerfing the bear as the real trial setting differ from cheesed dummy parses. And the changes they made won't really make up for bear's damage loss. They did not say they wanted to close the gap between the bear and no bear Wardens. Btw, using pets despite all their flaws should be rewarded. Not punished.

Tryxus · September 2018

Glurin wrote: »

IZZEFlameLash wrote: »

Lol, now I know the reason why we see all the weird nerfs and buffs nobody really asked for. Summarized in Gina's post. Nerfs bear damage by 30%, claims that it was to buff the overall DPS. Lawl, what kind of philosophy is that?

A pretty straight forward one, actually. If wardens with bears do 50k DPS and wardens without bears do 40k, what happens when you buff base warden damage by say, 5k? Wardens with bears do 55k and the others do 45k, right? Wardens with bears might at this point be somewhat overpowered and you still have the issue of the bear being a significant increase in DPS compared to other available ultimates.

So, nerf the bear. Wardens get a baseline damage buff while the gap between bear and no bear gets filled in a bit.

That apparently was the idea and it does sound like a good plan but it has 1 fatal flaw...

Is there still a reason to run the Bear instead of the Destro Ulti?

max_only · September 2018

Glurin wrote: »

IZZEFlameLash wrote: »

Lol, now I know the reason why we see all the weird nerfs and buffs nobody really asked for. Summarized in Gina's post. Nerfs bear damage by 30%, claims that it was to buff the overall DPS. Lawl, what kind of philosophy is that?

A pretty straight forward one, actually. If wardens with bears do 50k DPS and wardens without bears do 40k, what happens when you buff base warden damage by say, 5k? Wardens with bears do 55k and the others do 45k, right? Wardens with bears might at this point be somewhat overpowered and you still have the issue of the bear being a significant increase in DPS compared to other available ultimates.

So, nerf the bear. Wardens get a baseline damage buff while the gap between bear and no bear gets filled in a bit.

Bears don’t do reliable damage outside of dummy tests. It’s not straightforward.

OneWarlord001 · September 2018

Least used unit in PVP. I hate getting the Warden bounty. Takes longer. I guess I will swap out the bear and go back to werewolf for Warden. One is buffed something else is nerfed. Hope they left my armour alone.

BrokenGameMechanics · September 2018

I thought ZOS was clear and upfront as to why the Bear was nerfed specifically with damage compensation bumps generally. The stated reason was "we hear you that the Warden players want to be less dependent on the Bear for DPS". In other words, ZOS rightly or wrongly has come to believe from feedback via the Warden class Reps, this forum and via other venues that in general Warden folk do not want to depend on the Bear. Here they are doing exactly what "we" have all been pleading them to do and here we are all booing at them. So they nerfed the Bear's damage but bumped damage via the passives etc.

Clearly they are in a no win situation and we all know it. Don't nerf the Bear, they suck; nerf the Bear they still suck.

I run the Bear in PVP and while extremially fustrating, it can be effective, really effective. Amazingly effective. You got to know how to maximize the Bear, it all too often was subject to the whims of the Bear "working" as well as the RNG gods, but damn when it all came together ... I know for a fact quite a few hardcore solo 1v1 PvP's were shocked with a WTF just happened. The Bear was underappreciated in PvP as well as PVE IMHO.

I'll miss the Bear big time. My play build and style is very much Bear centric. I'd prefer they had not changed it, but I do see where the Medium Armor and Animal passive damage bumps, Bird Of Prey static buff etc should allow for some different Warden setups now.

But don't get all mad at ZOS for doing what they think we've all been asking them to do.

If I'm off base on this, please, Warden Class Reps, please step in here and clarifiy what sort of feedback concerning Warden Bear has come via that channel to ZOS?

DanteYoda · September 2018

Glurin wrote: »

IZZEFlameLash wrote: »

Lol, now I know the reason why we see all the weird nerfs and buffs nobody really asked for. Summarized in Gina's post. Nerfs bear damage by 30%, claims that it was to buff the overall DPS. Lawl, what kind of philosophy is that?

A pretty straight forward one, actually. If wardens with bears do 50k DPS and wardens without bears do 40k, what happens when you buff base warden damage by say, 5k? Wardens with bears do 55k and the others do 45k, right? Wardens with bears might at this point be somewhat overpowered and you still have the issue of the bear being a significant increase in DPS compared to other available ultimates.

So, nerf the bear. Wardens get a baseline damage buff while the gap between bear and no bear gets filled in a bit.

But they don't buff it they remove 30% bear damage remove damage on Arctic and buff betty netch.. Wow yeah super buff..

Arciris wrote: »

Glurin wrote: »

IZZEFlameLash wrote: »

Lol, now I know the reason why we see all the weird nerfs and buffs nobody really asked for. Summarized in Gina's post. Nerfs bear damage by 30%, claims that it was to buff the overall DPS. Lawl, what kind of philosophy is that?

A pretty straight forward one, actually. If wardens with bears do 50k DPS and wardens without bears do 40k, what happens when you buff base warden damage by say, 5k? Wardens with bears do 55k and the others do 45k, right? Wardens with bears might at this point be somewhat overpowered and you still have the issue of the bear being a significant increase in DPS compared to other available ultimates.

So, nerf the bear. Wardens get a baseline damage buff while the gap between bear and no bear gets filled in a bit.

You are talking about Target Dummy parses, right?

I don't think the game should be balanced around those parses.

First, those are Single Target parses, while real combat situations require AOE most of the time (Bear is useless in that regard).
Second, when in comes to the Bear, it's Damage output is really different in a Dummy test or real combat situations (read many posts above about how the Bear's AI leads to severe DPS loss).

The logic behind the nerf is sound, but the context is wrong: it misses the bigger picture.

Edit: not to mention 30% is huge, Wardens could bear 10%, anything more and many people will loose interest in that class, since the main attractive is - guess what? - the Bear

Yeah dummy targets don't hit back.. Dead bear is no damage at all..

BrokenGameMechanics wrote: »

I thought ZOS was clear and upfront as to why the Bear was nerfed specifically with damage compensation bumps generally. The stated reason was "we hear you that the Warden players want to be less dependent on the Bear for DPS". In other words, ZOS rightly or wrongly has come to believe from feedback via the Warden class Reps, this forum and via other venues that in general Warden folk do not want to depend on the Bear. Here they are doing exactly what "we" have all been pleading them to do and here we are all booing at them. So they nerfed the Bear's damage but bumped damage via the passives etc.

Clearly they are in a no win situation and we all know it. Don't nerf the Bear, they suck; nerf the Bear they still suck.

I run the Bear in PVP and while extremially fustrating, it can be effective, really effective. Amazingly effective. You got to know how to maximize the Bear, it all too often was subject to the whims of the Bear "working" as well as the RNG gods, but damn when it all came together ... I know for a fact quite a few hardcore solo 1v1 PvP's were shocked with a WTF just happened. The Bear was underappreciated in PvP as well as PVE IMHO.

I'll miss the Bear big time. My play build and style is very much Bear centric. I'd prefer they had not changed it, but I do see where the Medium Armor and Animal passive damage bumps, Bird Of Prey static buff etc should allow for some different Warden setups now.

But don't get all mad at ZOS for doing what they think we've all been asking them to do.

If I'm off base on this, please, Warden Class Reps, please step in here and clarifiy what sort of feedback concerning Warden Bear has come via that channel to ZOS?

But we haven't been asking them.. hence the pve anger.. I never asked for a bear nerf or an Arctic blast nerf, i couldn't care less about some useless stun..now i wont even use the damn skill and will probably quit ESO altogether, losing customers to support broken pvp is bad business.

I don't even use the bird skill as its garbage, flies are garbage.. scortch and its morph are too slow and way to easy to miss with, ice skills are so tanking niche now when they should be primarily damage based...

The whole wobble warden design is a failure.. Warden needs to go back to how it was at morrowind release because what it is now is garbage..

Glurin · September 2018

IZZEFlameLash wrote: »

Glurin wrote: »

IZZEFlameLash wrote: »

Lol, now I know the reason why we see all the weird nerfs and buffs nobody really asked for. Summarized in Gina's post. Nerfs bear damage by 30%, claims that it was to buff the overall DPS. Lawl, what kind of philosophy is that?

A pretty straight forward one, actually. If wardens with bears do 50k DPS and wardens without bears do 40k, what happens when you buff base warden damage by say, 5k? Wardens with bears do 55k and the others do 45k, right? Wardens with bears might at this point be somewhat overpowered and you still have the issue of the bear being a significant increase in DPS compared to other available ultimates.

So, nerf the bear. Wardens get a baseline damage buff while the gap between bear and no bear gets filled in a bit.

If their goal was to increase overall DPS, they could have done so without nerfing the bear as the real trial setting differ from cheesed dummy parses. And the changes they made won't really make up for bear's damage loss. They did not say they wanted to close the gap between the bear and no bear Wardens. Btw, using pets despite all their flaws should be rewarded. Not punished.

Actually, yes, they did say that was their goal. In fact it was Gina who said it. In this very thread.

"We reduced the damage of bear so we could buff the base damage of Wardens; the overall DPS should be within 1-2% of what it was before due to the buff of Advanced Species. This means anyone who doesn't use the bear will see less of a DPS loss."

I'm not saying whether or not it will actually work the way they want it to. But the question was asked as to what the thinking was behind it, so I answered.

Glurin · September 2018

DanteYoda wrote: »

Glurin wrote: »

IZZEFlameLash wrote: »

Lol, now I know the reason why we see all the weird nerfs and buffs nobody really asked for. Summarized in Gina's post. Nerfs bear damage by 30%, claims that it was to buff the overall DPS. Lawl, what kind of philosophy is that?

A pretty straight forward one, actually. If wardens with bears do 50k DPS and wardens without bears do 40k, what happens when you buff base warden damage by say, 5k? Wardens with bears do 55k and the others do 45k, right? Wardens with bears might at this point be somewhat overpowered and you still have the issue of the bear being a significant increase in DPS compared to other available ultimates.

So, nerf the bear. Wardens get a baseline damage buff while the gap between bear and no bear gets filled in a bit.

But they don't buff it they remove 30% bear damage remove damage on Arctic and buff betty netch.. Wow yeah super buff..

They did more than buff the netch. They increased the damage bonus of Advanced Species. Reduced the cost of Cutting Dive and removed the minimum distance for the damage bonus on Screaming Cliff racer. Made Falcon's Swiftness's morphs give their bonuses just by being slotted rather than having to be activated, which reduces buff management. And they reduced the cost of Scorch. And that's just the damage related buffs.

The Arctic Blast change more or less falls in line with their desire for the Warden frost tree to be a pure tanking tree, which I don't like and neither do a lot of other people. But, that seems to be the direction they want to push frost Wardens into. Frankly at this point I'm chalking the Warden up as being a disappointment on that front and this has been the final straw that caused me to have changed my position on Necromancers. Before this, I was against a new class and instead believed we should limit it to a skill line, much like the Psijic line. Now I think we need a full Necromancer class with a frost tree of their own to answer the call for frost mages that so many people really desire.