The best alternative for damage shields: don't stand in the red.

Starlock wrote: »

I don't really care about the shield changes one way or another, but I'd rather have a cast time than an increased cost penalty (I hate that on streak). It also isn't in line with the goals the developers have for the cast time change. It doesn't help accomplish this:

ZOS_RobGarrett wrote: »

First I'd like to talk about our motivation with the change. We believe choices between damage output and survivability make combat more interesting. There are a number of areas within our system that could better adhere to this philosophy, but these self-cast damage shield abilities stood out as being particularly out of line. It was too easy to throw a bunch of effective health on yourself while making a minimal sacrifice in terms of DPS itemization and rotation. This applied to both PvE and PvP scenarios.

Of course it helps! And I understand exactly what Rob meant. "Damage vs survivability." This has been present in several other previous changes. But cast time is not the best way out. Cast time is outdated.

Over time they made so many changes with heavy attack, to be thrown out in the changes involving the shields.

PvE/PvP: "Burst damage vs use damage shield and heavy attack." They didnt go that way!

Enemy-of-Coldharbour wrote: »

The best alternative for damage shields: don't stand in the red.

My Soul Assault burst combo has a lot of red! You just can't see it.

So many healers that are coasting are gonna get called out hardcore if this change makes it to live.

Run the other way..

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

I feel like this would still be bad for some vet trial mechanics. Warrior’s Starfall is one that I’ve seen mentioned often, which requires shielding 6 times in 6s to survive in vet HM. If your healer is great and you are block casting then you can maybe get away with shielding every other tick, which is still 3 shields within your stacking penalty period. Would the 35% be stacking with each subsequent shield cast? Or every shield after the first one costs the same, and is 35% more than the base cost?

Stacking with each subsequent shield cast. No shield spam.

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

joaaocaampos wrote: »

Stacking with each subsequent shield cast. No shield spam.

Savage. I’d be drained of Magicka as fast as any mechanic in vHoF.

Yes I know. But you can use all necessary shields, right? Even if your Magicka reaches 0? You will lose damage (through sustain), but you will survive.

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

True, still better than a cast time.

Yeah!

Well, there is also the possibility of increasing the base cost. No stacking. But then the base cost would be increased by 70%.

• Conjured Ward/Hardened Ward cost: 5580 Magicka (from 3510 Magicka). Empowered Ward cost: 5160 Magicka (from 3240 Magicka).
• Annulment and morphs cost: 7290 Magicka (from 4590 Magicka).

You said about using shield 6 times in a row, right? So...

• 35%, stacking cost = 50.670 Magicka.
• 70%, no stacking = 33480 Magicka.

In the long run, this option is better.

New meta, 1 restro 1 destro? It's not really "new" since it was very popular at the beginning of this game when dps still <20k. I guess that's what ZOS want. Slow down dps by forcing people to slot skills for survivability.

If you want to reduce spamming shields by increasing their costs, or discourage shield stacking, you could increase the cost by the percentage of any existing shield you still have up, rather than a fixed amount.

If you have to spam shields 6 times in 6 seconds, and 90% of each shield gets eaten each second, each additional shield is only costing 10% more. But if you're just spamming shields to spam shields (or stack shields), then each new one might cost double if the first one hasn't been touched. A triple-stacked shield would cost three times as much. Etc.

Caveats:

• It shouldn't count shields placed on you by other players; only self-cast shields.
• It should take the lower percentage of your own shield and your pet's shield, if applicable. If you're using Conjured Ward to give your pet a shield while you stand further away, it shouldn't be doubling the cost each time you use it just because your own shield hasn't been touched, while your pet's is gone.

This would also push it more towards a pure reactionary ability, rather than something you're keeping up fulltime, since if you refresh a shield while the previous cast is still active, you just doubled the cost. This gives small windows of opportunity to take higher damage if you don't want to waste magicka. This helps add a bit more risk to the risk-reward equation without heavily penalizing common usage (other than shield stacking, which seems to be something people want to discourage anyway).