[Class Rep] Warden Feedback Thread

Skjaldbjorn · January 2020

And once again, you keep saying this "stepping on toes" thing. You act as though other classes don't share skills of similar or even identical types and styles. The Bound Armaments change was just a re-hash of Grim Focus. Is that "stepping on the toes" of Nightblades? Having Shalks as the central, identifying skill of Stamden means Magden is "stepping on their toes". We've been over this. I do understand your point, I just feel it's completely misguided. Arctic Blast is not in any way a defining Magden skill.

Remember that my initial view was to change Winter's Revenge. After seeing your perspective, I actually 100% agreed with you there. It's a defining skill for Magden, it's central to the identity of the class, it's a core skill that is used in a lot of content for Magden, and would also break the "rule" of no Stam DPS having a second ground-based AoE. That's why I abandoned your suggestion for the alternative of budding. It would break that standard.

ESO_Nightingale · January 2020

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

And once again, you keep saying this "stepping on toes" thing. You act as though other classes don't share skills of similar or even identical types and styles. The Bound Armaments change was just a re-hash of Grim Focus. Is that "stepping on the toes" of Nightblades? Having Shalks as the central, identifying skill of Stamden means Magden is "stepping on their toes". We've been over this. I do understand your point, I just feel it's completely misguided. Arctic Blast is not in any way a defining Magden skill.

When i sent in the suggestion for icicle flurry (what seems to now be bound armaments) i included a different proc condition. i think the actual proc itself is actually unique and i like it.

Skjaldbjorn · January 2020

ESO_Nightingale wrote: »

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

And once again, you keep saying this "stepping on toes" thing. You act as though other classes don't share skills of similar or even identical types and styles. The Bound Armaments change was just a re-hash of Grim Focus. Is that "stepping on the toes" of Nightblades? Having Shalks as the central, identifying skill of Stamden means Magden is "stepping on their toes". We've been over this. I do understand your point, I just feel it's completely misguided. Arctic Blast is not in any way a defining Magden skill.

When i sent in the suggestion for icicle flurry (what seems to now be bound armaments) i included a different proc condition. i think the actual proc itself is actually unique and i like it.

Having played both a Stamblade and Stam Sorc, it's the same, really. Same condition, the only change is you can cast it early which is horribly inefficient and really only ever done by mistake. Honestly, the fact you can cast it before max stacks means you can't refresh the buff until it's entirely expired or immediate double-casting which is an enormous PITA at times. But effectively, they're the same skill. It's not unique.

ESO_Nightingale · January 2020

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

ESO_Nightingale wrote: »

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

And once again, you keep saying this "stepping on toes" thing. You act as though other classes don't share skills of similar or even identical types and styles. The Bound Armaments change was just a re-hash of Grim Focus. Is that "stepping on the toes" of Nightblades? Having Shalks as the central, identifying skill of Stamden means Magden is "stepping on their toes". We've been over this. I do understand your point, I just feel it's completely misguided. Arctic Blast is not in any way a defining Magden skill.

When i sent in the suggestion for icicle flurry (what seems to now be bound armaments) i included a different proc condition. i think the actual proc itself is actually unique and i like it.

Having played both a Stamblade and Stam Sorc, it's the same, really. Same condition, the only change is you can cast it early which is horribly inefficient and really only ever done by mistake. Honestly, the fact you can cast it before max stacks means you can't refresh the buff until it's entirely expired or immediate double-casting which is an enormous PITA at times. But effectively, they're the same skill. It's not unique.

i see, has this been reported to a class rep?

Skjaldbjorn · January 2020

ESO_Nightingale wrote: »

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

ESO_Nightingale wrote: »

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

And once again, you keep saying this "stepping on toes" thing. You act as though other classes don't share skills of similar or even identical types and styles. The Bound Armaments change was just a re-hash of Grim Focus. Is that "stepping on the toes" of Nightblades? Having Shalks as the central, identifying skill of Stamden means Magden is "stepping on their toes". We've been over this. I do understand your point, I just feel it's completely misguided. Arctic Blast is not in any way a defining Magden skill.

When i sent in the suggestion for icicle flurry (what seems to now be bound armaments) i included a different proc condition. i think the actual proc itself is actually unique and i like it.

Having played both a Stamblade and Stam Sorc, it's the same, really. Same condition, the only change is you can cast it early which is horribly inefficient and really only ever done by mistake. Honestly, the fact you can cast it before max stacks means you can't refresh the buff until it's entirely expired or immediate double-casting which is an enormous PITA at times. But effectively, they're the same skill. It's not unique.

i see, has this been reported to a class rep?

Not sure I follow. The part that's annoying, or that the skills are nearly identical? Because I wouldn't even bother reporting that, honestly. There's far more important things to work on right now in ESO than skills being similar lol

ESO_Nightingale · January 2020

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

ESO_Nightingale wrote: »

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

ESO_Nightingale wrote: »

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

And once again, you keep saying this "stepping on toes" thing. You act as though other classes don't share skills of similar or even identical types and styles. The Bound Armaments change was just a re-hash of Grim Focus. Is that "stepping on the toes" of Nightblades? Having Shalks as the central, identifying skill of Stamden means Magden is "stepping on their toes". We've been over this. I do understand your point, I just feel it's completely misguided. Arctic Blast is not in any way a defining Magden skill.

When i sent in the suggestion for icicle flurry (what seems to now be bound armaments) i included a different proc condition. i think the actual proc itself is actually unique and i like it.

Having played both a Stamblade and Stam Sorc, it's the same, really. Same condition, the only change is you can cast it early which is horribly inefficient and really only ever done by mistake. Honestly, the fact you can cast it before max stacks means you can't refresh the buff until it's entirely expired or immediate double-casting which is an enormous PITA at times. But effectively, they're the same skill. It's not unique.

i see, has this been reported to a class rep?

Not sure I follow. The part that's annoying, or that the skills are nearly identical? Because I wouldn't even bother reporting that, honestly. There's far more important things to work on right now in ESO than skills being similar lol

the former.

Skjaldbjorn · January 2020

ESO_Nightingale wrote: »

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

ESO_Nightingale wrote: »

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

ESO_Nightingale wrote: »

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

And once again, you keep saying this "stepping on toes" thing. You act as though other classes don't share skills of similar or even identical types and styles. The Bound Armaments change was just a re-hash of Grim Focus. Is that "stepping on the toes" of Nightblades? Having Shalks as the central, identifying skill of Stamden means Magden is "stepping on their toes". We've been over this. I do understand your point, I just feel it's completely misguided. Arctic Blast is not in any way a defining Magden skill.

When i sent in the suggestion for icicle flurry (what seems to now be bound armaments) i included a different proc condition. i think the actual proc itself is actually unique and i like it.

Having played both a Stamblade and Stam Sorc, it's the same, really. Same condition, the only change is you can cast it early which is horribly inefficient and really only ever done by mistake. Honestly, the fact you can cast it before max stacks means you can't refresh the buff until it's entirely expired or immediate double-casting which is an enormous PITA at times. But effectively, they're the same skill. It's not unique.

i see, has this been reported to a class rep?

Not sure I follow. The part that's annoying, or that the skills are nearly identical? Because I wouldn't even bother reporting that, honestly. There's far more important things to work on right now in ESO than skills being similar lol

the former.

Ah, I mean, it's very useable. You just have to get a feel for how it works. It's really annoying when you want to bar swap but have to hang around for the last second to let it drop off, but it's really not worth putting more on the devs when there's so much more to fix, like Necro being so excessively strong compared to the rest of the field.

ESO_Nightingale · January 2020

okay I've finished my roadmap thing for the warden class, including the suggestions from the previous discussion: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1fWoOX0S4yrR_KFZcjBAvHvR2K6T__6LrIGiaERV8NQA/edit?usp=sharing

Previously it was just about magicka warden, but now i've tried to update it for both. I believe it's come out well.

Skjaldbjorn · January 2020

ESO_Nightingale wrote: »

okay I've finished my roadmap thing for the warden class, including the suggestions from the previous discussion: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1fWoOX0S4yrR_KFZcjBAvHvR2K6T__6LrIGiaERV8NQA/edit?usp=sharing

Previously it was just about magicka warden, but now i've tried to update it for both. I believe it's come out well.

As I said before, your Creeping Pollen change completely destroys the seemingly hard rule in ESO for ages that Stamina don't get ground-based class DoTs. It's always been weapon skills. The only AoE effects Stam gets from class skills are instant cast DD, or things like FoO or Ritual.

ESO_Nightingale · January 2020

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

ESO_Nightingale wrote: »

okay I've finished my roadmap thing for the warden class, including the suggestions from the previous discussion: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1fWoOX0S4yrR_KFZcjBAvHvR2K6T__6LrIGiaERV8NQA/edit?usp=sharing

Previously it was just about magicka warden, but now i've tried to update it for both. I believe it's come out well.

As I said before, your Creeping Pollen change completely destroys the seemingly hard rule in ESO for ages that Stamina don't get ground-based class DoTs. It's always been weapon skills. The only AoE effects Stam gets from class skills are instant cast DD, or things like FoO or Ritual.

Quite a fair point, didn't you suggest a change to leeching vines?
Edit: at the end of that previous discussion you seemed on board.

Skjaldbjorn · January 2020

ESO_Nightingale wrote: »

Quite a fair point, didn't you suggest a change to leeching vines?

No. I don't want to go back to early Warden where half of what we did was cast self-buffs.

Skjaldbjorn · January 2020

To expand on that, our bar space is already tight, and a self-buff is such an unintuitive thing to tack on, doesn't really resolve any core issues with the class, and just feels like a lazy, uninspired resolution to a class that needs a ton of work to get back in line.

Skjaldbjorn · January 2020

The problem I keep coming back to is PVP. Warden has eaten a metric ton of nerfs and balance changes that were largely rooted in PVP. If it were up to me, i'd scale Shalks and Birds to bring Warden in line, but the PVP community would go nuts. So I am attempting to find meaningful routes to scale Warden damage while touching those skills as little as humanly possible.

ESO_Nightingale · January 2020

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

The problem I keep coming back to is PVP. Warden has eaten a metric ton of nerfs and balance changes that were largely rooted in PVP. If it were up to me, i'd scale Shalks and Birds to bring Warden in line, but the PVP community would go nuts. So I am attempting to find meaningful routes to scale Warden damage while touching those skills as little as humanly possible.

I think that touching them as we talked about before would be fine. It would bring the power back into the class instead of just raw power buffs on passives and through slotted effects. people would complain, but the changes need to happen sooner or later. preferably sooner. but we need to help get the class into a more comfortable spot with more identity and power in it's skills.

Skjaldbjorn · January 2020

ESO_Nightingale wrote: »

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

The problem I keep coming back to is PVP. Warden has eaten a metric ton of nerfs and balance changes that were largely rooted in PVP. If it were up to me, i'd scale Shalks and Birds to bring Warden in line, but the PVP community would go nuts. So I am attempting to find meaningful routes to scale Warden damage while touching those skills as little as humanly possible.

I think that touching them as we talked about before would be fine. It would bring the power back into the class instead of just raw power buffs on passives and through slotted effects. people would complain, but the changes need to happen sooner or later. preferably sooner to help get the class into a more comfortable spot with more identity.

But again, I do firmly disagree with you on the bleed identity. Firmly. I don't think that fits Warden at all without a complete visual overhaul. If Zos is willing to go to that length, okay. But otherwise, it makes no sense and shouldn't have been the road they took to start with.

ESO_Nightingale · January 2020

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

ESO_Nightingale wrote: »

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

The problem I keep coming back to is PVP. Warden has eaten a metric ton of nerfs and balance changes that were largely rooted in PVP. If it were up to me, i'd scale Shalks and Birds to bring Warden in line, but the PVP community would go nuts. So I am attempting to find meaningful routes to scale Warden damage while touching those skills as little as humanly possible.

I think that touching them as we talked about before would be fine. It would bring the power back into the class instead of just raw power buffs on passives and through slotted effects. people would complain, but the changes need to happen sooner or later. preferably sooner to help get the class into a more comfortable spot with more identity.

But again, I do firmly disagree with you on the bleed identity. Firmly. I don't think that fits Warden at all without a complete visual overhaul. If Zos is willing to go to that length, okay. But otherwise, it makes no sense and shouldn't have been the road they took to start with.

To me, i think it makes sense. As the animals can rip people apart. Talons, claws and thousands of tiny mandibles can all puncture skin and cause bleeding. them reworking the animal animations slightly for stamina would be an improvement too, it would help to differentiate between both classes rather than just looking at the dude's weapon

Skjaldbjorn · January 2020

ESO_Nightingale wrote: »

To me, i think it makes sense. As the animals can rip people apart. Talons, claws and thousands of tiny mandibles can all puncture skin and cause bleeding.

Claws from the bear, sure. Bird, flimsy. That bird is a joke. Either convert it to a melee spammable with a talon-y look/feel, or make the bird something substantial that really imparts the dynamic. A big ass eagle or hawk, we can talk about it.

Bugs, no. Just...no. That's nonsense. Honestly i'd rather they just ditch that skill for Stam entirely. I didn't like that they made the stam morph at that stage. It was lazy. I asked for it ages ago, but waiting until they dumpstered dots to give it to us felt backhanded and pitiful. That was one of the bigger slaps in the face as a Warden main we've seen yet. Wardens have asked for a Stam morph of that since at least Summerset.

ESO_Nightingale · January 2020

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

ESO_Nightingale wrote: »

To me, i think it makes sense. As the animals can rip people apart. Talons, claws and thousands of tiny mandibles can all puncture skin and cause bleeding.

Either convert it to a melee spammable with a talon-y look/feel, or make the bird something substantial that really imparts the dynamic. A big ass eagle or hawk, we can talk about it.

This i can agree with. i hate that it's so focused on one specific area of the world. kills roleplaying and i also hate the racer.

Gaggin · January 2020

They should make the bird undodgeabl … for lore purposes...

What warden really need in pve is a good, solid heavy attack rotation.

thadjarvis · January 2020

Think poison makes more sense than bleed imo. To my knowledge bleed didn’t enter into warden till divide change. Poison has been there from getgo, and RP wise makes sense when throwing bugs at people.

@ESO_Nightingale
I think the primary issue @Skjaldbjorn brought up was missed in your tooltips: PvE stamden usage. I may have missed it but I didn’t see something that buffs group damage directly or indirectly. Unless a class is a very high outlier DPS, group damage buff is what matters.

I’m getting a little lost as to what the pain points are with so many changes and how they’d inter relate. What are the 2 to 4 pain point changes in the tool tips?

Skjaldbjorn · January 2020

thadjarvis wrote: »

Think poison makes more sense than bleed imo. To my knowledge bleed didn’t enter into warden till divide change. Poison has been there from getgo, and RP wise makes sense when throwing bugs at people.

Correct. Bleeds are brand new to Warden's kit, literally the last 1-2 patches, and didn't make sense thematically when they added them lol

Tolino · January 2020

-Arktic Blast:
Remove the Heal
Reduce the cost to 3780 Magicka (AOE-Standart)
Increase the Radius to 8m and duration to 8s
=>Magden currently has nothing that really sets him apart from Stamden! This ability would work well as a class identity Skill!

-Remove the delay and 7m requirement on all Morphs of Dive

-Cliff Racer and Deep Fissure => Frost dmg

-Fungal Growth and both morphs:
Reduce the cost to 3510 Magicka
Increase the Heal on Enchanted Growth by 10% (Same as Blessing Of Restoration)

-Accelerated Growth :
Instead of major mending, you get 15-20% cost reduction for all Green balance- ability under 40% life(Ultis included)
=> Automatic major mending is just far too strong in PvP!

Emerald Moss => Increase to 3% per Green balance- ability

-Sleet Storm and Northern Storm:
Major Protection only for the user (No AOE-Mayor Protection)
Permafrost keeps AOE-Mayor Protection
Reduce the duration of Permafrost to 8s
=> The AOE-Mayor Protection is to good in groups. This means that you can’t really buff Magden (for solo play) without making it even more OP in groups!

Skjaldbjorn · January 2020

Tolino wrote: »

-Arktic Blast:
Remove the Heal
Reduce the cost to 3780 Magicka (AOE-Standart)
Increase the Radius to 8m and duration to 8s
=>Magden currently has nothing that really sets him apart from Stamden! This ability would work well as a class identity Skill!

@Tolino
Winter's Revenge and Permafrost. We share every other skill. What sets Stamden apart from Magden? lol

ESO_Nightingale · January 2020

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

Tolino wrote: »

-Arktic Blast:
Remove the Heal
Reduce the cost to 3780 Magicka (AOE-Standart)
Increase the Radius to 8m and duration to 8s
=>Magden currently has nothing that really sets him apart from Stamden! This ability would work well as a class identity Skill!

@Tolino
Winter's Revenge and Permafrost. We share every other skill. What sets Stamden apart from Magden? lol

The many more non class skills

Skjaldbjorn · January 2020

ESO_Nightingale wrote: »

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

Tolino wrote: »

-Arktic Blast:
Remove the Heal
Reduce the cost to 3780 Magicka (AOE-Standart)
Increase the Radius to 8m and duration to 8s
=>Magden currently has nothing that really sets him apart from Stamden! This ability would work well as a class identity Skill!

@Tolino
Winter's Revenge and Permafrost. We share every other skill. What sets Stamden apart from Magden? lol

The many more non class skills

So Stamina Warden's "defining class identity" is having weapon skills. Like every other Stam in the game. I hope you realize how silly that sounds lol

Skjaldbjorn · January 2020

Alright, i'm going to throw some more perspective-based details in. Here's the deal. There are only so many skills. Warden has a LOT of support skills that would either never function as a PVE DPS skill (vine and gate as a great example) or they have DPS skills that are shared. Using both Liko and Stile's parsing setups for Stamden and Magden respectively, since they are unbiased and purely about generating the best numbers possible, here's the breakdown;

Stamden Bars (Liko)
Front:
Swarm
Dive
Trap
Soul Trap
Sub Assault
Bear

Back:
Barrage
Dive
Circle of Protection
PI
Netch
Bear

Total:
5 Class Skills
2 Fighter's Guild Skills
2 Weapon Skills
1 World Skill

Magden Bars (Stile)
Front:
Netch
Degeneration
Fissure
Birb
Fetcher
Bear

Back:
Spell Symmetry
Trap
Unstable Wall
Winter's Revenge
Scalding Rune
Bear

Total:
6 Class Skills
3 Mage's Guild Skills
1 Weapon Skill
1 Fighter's Guild Skill

Now you tell me, please, how Stamden's got this immense load of weapon skills. We're running the same class skills you are, aside from Winter's Revenge. You get Mage's Guild, we get Fighter's Guild, and you use about as many FG skills as we do. One of ours is just there for utility and the passive. Our options are so poor the top DPS setup slots Soul Trap of all things. This is kind of my point. Both sides need new skills. There's no arguing that. We both lack class identity. But if Magdens get rigidly spec-only skills, Stamden should, too. To me, Arctic Blast isn't even a defining Magden skill. It's a PVP tool.

EDIT: And hell, it might only be one weapon skill if the ridiculous off-balance change didn't force us into a Barrage/Master's rotation lol.

Skjaldbjorn · January 2020

@ESO_Nightingale Finally, as a last point, I will parallel to Necromancer. Necro is probably the closest class to Warden in every conceivable way. They are eerily similar from a design aspect, such as skills like Shalks/Blastbones, as well as a ranged spammable in the two skull variants. We're also the only two DLC classes, which seem to be built from a much different dynamic than any other ESO classes. Let's take a second and look at what their class skill split is.

Pestilent Colossus (Stam) // Glacial Colossus (Mag)
Venom Skull (Stam) // Ricochet Skull (Mag)
Blighted Blastbones (Stam) // Stalking Blastbones (Mag)
Skeletal Archer (Stam) // Skeletal Arcanist (Mag)
Detonating Siphon (Stam) // Mystic Siphon (Mag)
N/A (Stam) // Avid & Unnerving Boneyard (Mag)

So the defining, class-identity skill for Mag is Boneyard. That's it. That's the only meaningful DPS skill they have that is different from Stam, and Stam even uses it sometimes as a utility skill.

I hate to break this to you, but Winter's Revenge is Magden's class identity. It's not necessarily fair or how I would do it, but it's clearly by design, as Necromancer repeats it almost to the exact, minute detail.

Whether you realize it or not, my Arctic Blast benefits us both without hurting PVP at all. It's a good change, that makes the most functional sense for all involved to give us both a new skill to interact with on various levels.

Right now, Stamden has 4 class skills that are directly DPS skills. Bear, Shalks, Swarm, Birb. Mag has 5 by adding in WE. Necro has 5/6, respectively. I'm not trying to steal Magden's identity. I'm just trying to get us to that same plateau. Stamden deserves 5 class DPS skills.

ESO_Nightingale · January 2020

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

@ESO_Nightingale Finally, as a last point, I will parallel to Necromancer. Necro is probably the closest class to Warden in every conceivable way. They are eerily similar from a design aspect, such as skills like Shalks/Blastbones, as well as a ranged spammable in the two skull variants. We're also the only two DLC classes, which seem to be built from a much different dynamic than any other ESO classes. Let's take a second and look at what their class skill split is.

Pestilent Colossus (Stam) // Glacial Colossus (Mag)
Venom Skull (Stam) // Ricochet Skull (Mag)
Blighted Blastbones (Stam) // Stalking Blastbones (Mag)
Skeletal Archer (Stam) // Skeletal Arcanist (Mag)
Detonating Siphon (Stam) // Mystic Siphon (Mag)
N/A (Stam) // Avid & Unnerving Boneyard (Mag)

So the defining, class-identity skill for Mag is Boneyard. That's it. That's the only meaningful DPS skill they have that is different from Stam, and Stam even uses it sometimes as a utility skill.

I hate to break this to you, but Winter's Revenge is Magden's class identity. It's not necessarily fair or how I would do it, but it's clearly by design, as Necromancer repeats it almost to the exact, minute detail.

Whether you realize it or not, my Arctic Blast benefits us both without hurting PVP at all. It's a good change, that makes the most functional sense for all involved to give us both a new skill to interact with on various levels.

Right now, Stamden has 4 class skills that are directly DPS skills. Bear, Shalks, Swarm, Birb. Mag has 5 by adding in WE. Necro has 5/6, respectively. I'm not trying to steal Magden's identity. I'm just trying to get us to that same plateau. Stamden deserves 5 class DPS skills.

I'm trying to get you there without sacrificing magden's identity.

ESO_Nightingale · January 2020

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

ESO_Nightingale wrote: »

Skjaldbjorn wrote: »

Tolino wrote: »

-Arktic Blast:
Remove the Heal
Reduce the cost to 3780 Magicka (AOE-Standart)
Increase the Radius to 8m and duration to 8s
=>Magden currently has nothing that really sets him apart from Stamden! This ability would work well as a class identity Skill!

@Tolino
Winter's Revenge and Permafrost. We share every other skill. What sets Stamden apart from Magden? lol

The many more non class skills

So Stamina Warden's "defining class identity" is having weapon skills. Like every other Stam in the game. I hope you realize how silly that sounds lol

It doesn't sound silly to me. In fact it sounds normal.

ESO_Nightingale · January 2020

thadjarvis wrote: »

Think poison makes more sense than bleed imo. To my knowledge bleed didn’t enter into warden till divide change. Poison has been there from getgo, and RP wise makes sense when throwing bugs at people.

@ESO_Nightingale
I think the primary issue @Skjaldbjorn brought up was missed in your tooltips: PvE stamden usage. I may have missed it but I didn’t see something that buffs group damage directly or indirectly. Unless a class is a very high outlier DPS, group damage buff is what matters.

I’m getting a little lost as to what the pain points are with so many changes and how they’d inter relate. What are the 2 to 4 pain point changes in the tool tips?

Alright I'll work something out. Thanks for bringing that up.