Vampirism - strengths & weaknesses in equilibrium

Dracane · April 2020

I am fond of the idea to give vampire the drawback of getting reduced healing from non-vampire abilities.
This would keep stamina builds somewhat in check. Stamina will be extremely broken with Blood Frenzy if nothing changes.

MotownMurder · April 2020

What I don't understand about the way the vampire changes work is that the developers said that one of the ideas behind the update was to encourage vampire characters to feed, rather than to stay starving forever like they do now. But with the way the update currently looks, it seems like vampires would once again have an incentive to stay unfed forever, since the passives you gain by feeding are far less significant than the penalties.

Like, I hear this idea often that "It's a curse so it should suck!" but we surely want some people to play as a vampire, right? It seems weird to me to take all the cost and effort to design a whole new skill tree for vampires, just to have the mindset that "it's a curse so it should be so damaging that everyone has to cure it." The penalties should exist, but they should be manageable. This isn't manageable.

thankyourat · April 2020

Mayrael wrote: »

ShadowHvo wrote: »

Mayrael wrote: »

I think vampire abilit cost decrease shout be in strengths.

Apologies, you're absolutely right. That is an error on my part. I'll edit it right away.

Mayrael wrote: »

50% sprint cost reduction - use set like cowards gear and you are freaking unkillable. You can run forever with speed of light having major protection and vampire resistances and after 6s you vanish - new meta for disengage

Sorry but I think that 10% increased cost on all non vampire abilities is minimum.

Personally I find this particular argument rather weak, as that still is a synergy that requires a 5pc set-bonus to be equipped and maintained, thus you favor fleeing/survivability over other types of sets.

Truly that would be no different as to how existing builds are capable of creating synergy between their abilities and sets. Invulnerable Tanks for one comes to mind.

I agree that it is a very strong passive, but I believe that is precisely why it is at stage 4, and thus it indeed should have approbiate weaknesses. I just don't believe that increased cost in regular ability is the right one.

Yes of course 20% is to much as I said but 5% is to low and you can't ignore all the rest I have wrote. New passives are very powerful and give vampire bonuses of few 5pc sets, all you would have to do if the negative effect would be just 5% is to equip alteration mastery and here you go. You have all the new vampire toys without any new drawbacks just usual health regen and fire damage debuf.

Don't get me wrong I have few vampire characters but I wouldn't like to be forced to became vampire because its mandatory to stay competitive. It has to be choice with consequences and the new strengths are far more powerful than just 5% cost increase on non vampire skills.

What part of the new passives are so strong that it requires a cost increase to abilities? The fire damage Vulnerability alone would make me think twice about becoming a vampire even with the new passives. Losing every time you fight someone with fire damage is very punishing. The crouch passive is useless for everything except role playing, and the invisibility is more niche than it is strong. the strong passives that vampires have are undeath and the extra spell damage when leaving mist form. none of the other passives are practical in PvP at all. Any cost increase would make vampire undesirable for anyone trying to get the most out of their build.

Dracane · April 2020

Ratzkifal wrote: »

think of what that would mean for healers in trials. All of their healing is less effective because the DDs are vampires. That wouldn't work. Vampires wouldn't be allowed into trials anymore because nobody could heal them up. So it would have to be restricted to selfhealing received.

Healers tend to heavily overheal in pve. I always vastly overheal, since healing is damn easy to push in all content. It would hardly matter in trials.

Dracane · April 2020

thankyourat wrote: »

In PvE the regen is leaving and no one is going to be using mist form for the damage increase. sneak passives are completely useless in trials so there will be no benefit to being a vampire in PvE anymore. But the extra fire damage and cost increase will make going vampire have no benefits while still have having weaknesses. I’m not understanding the thought process behind adding a cost increase

You are absolutely right. So far I have only seen it from a pvp perspective. Vampire is indeed quite useless in pve, passive wise.

BUT you have blood frenzy and eviscerate, granting immense amounts of damage. Every DD will want to have blood frenzy. Over 2k weapon or spell damage from 1 skill? Only fools will not want to be a vampire. So actively, Vampire is much better in pve than it is right now. You will not have competitive dps as a non-vampire, I theorize.

Royaji · April 2020

Mayrael wrote: »

ShadowHvo wrote: »

Mayrael wrote: »

I think vampire abilit cost decrease shout be in strengths.

Apologies, you're absolutely right. That is an error on my part. I'll edit it right away.

Mayrael wrote: »

50% sprint cost reduction - use set like cowards gear and you are freaking unkillable. You can run forever with speed of light having major protection and vampire resistances and after 6s you vanish - new meta for disengage

Sorry but I think that 10% increased cost on all non vampire abilities is minimum.

Personally I find this particular argument rather weak, as that still is a synergy that requires a 5pc set-bonus to be equipped and maintained, thus you favor fleeing/survivability over other types of sets.

Truly that would be no different as to how existing builds are capable of creating synergy between their abilities and sets. Invulnerable Tanks for one comes to mind.

I agree that it is a very strong passive, but I believe that is precisely why it is at stage 4, and thus it indeed should have approbiate weaknesses. I just don't believe that increased cost in regular ability is the right one.

Yes of course 20% is to much as I said but 5% is to low and you can't ignore all the rest I have wrote. New passives are very powerful and give vampire bonuses of few 5pc sets, all you would have to do if the negative effect would be just 5% is to equip alteration mastery and here you go. You have all the new vampire toys without any new drawbacks just usual health regen and fire damage debuf.

I don't understand the weird obsession with 5pc in your post. Ashen Grip, Rattlecage and Senche's Bite also have 5pc bonuses. Does not mean that they are any good though.There are several hundreds of sets in the game. A couple dozens of them are considered good. Your average 5pc bonus is actually very likely to be awful.

And at the same time you are completely ignoring that equipping Alteration Mastery comes with the opportunity cost of equipping a different 5pc (sic!) set.

After you consider that those new and "very powerful" passives have no use in dungeons/trials (the only type of content where "everyone is a vampire for regen" holds true) I don't see why those passives justify a completely unreasonable cost increase. In PvP, where those passives actually can shine, extra flame damage is already good enough of a deterrent to prevent people from even considering vampire.

XomRhoK · April 2020

My point of view on vampire skill line and passives. I decided to not create another thread, this seems appropriate.
There is not very much to read, but, because of structure it takes up a lot of space, so i moved all text under Spoilers.
Stages of vampirism:

Vampirism Stage 1
Strengths:
- Access to all vampire active abilities

Weaknesses:
- Health recovery decreased by 30%
- Flame damage taken increased by 10%

Appearance:
Normal skin color, vampiric/red eyes

Clarification:
Stage mostly for role playing, give players, who want to play as disguised vampire, oppotunity to do so. Have access to all vampiric skills, but no other strengths, only weaknesses, this will encourage to use feeding mechanic before going in battle even those players who want to stay at low level of vampirism.

Vampirism Stage 2
Strengths:
- Access to all vampire active abilities
- Vampire abilities cost decreased by 10%
- Dark Stalker passive: decreased time to sneak 90-100%

Weaknesses:
- Health recovery decreased by 30%
- Flame damage taken increased by 10%

Appearance:
Pale skin color, vampiric/red eyes

Clarification:
More strengths, same weaknesses, again this will encourage to use feeding mechanic before going in battle even those players who want to stay at low level of vampirism. More vampiric appearance. With regards to Drak Stalker passive, i personaly don't like the fact that vampires run in sneak mode, i personally like the feeling of crouching, sneaking, i like the pace and animation, and i forced not to take Dark Stalker passive, because it take away this feeling from me. For those who like running in sneak mode there is Unnatural Movement passive now. And almost insant sneak mode can allowed some interesting gameplay to go sneak in the middle of the fight to buff your damage by sneak attack.

Vampirism Stage 3
Strengths:
- Access to all vampire active abilities
- Vampire abilities cost decreased by 20%
- Dark Stalker passive: decreased time to sneak 90-100%
- Undeath passive: reduced damage taken by up to 30% based on missing health

Weaknesses:
- Health recovery decreased by 60%
- Flame damage taken increased by 15%
- Regular abilites cost increased by 5% OR Healing received by non-vampire abilities decreased by 15%

Appearance:
Further progression for more vampiric look, as it is now on live servers

Clarification:
More strengths, more weaknesses.

Vampirism Stage 4
Strengths:
- Access to all vampire active abilities
- Vampire abilities cost decreased by 30-40%
- Dark Stalker passive: decreased time to sneak 90-100%
- Undeath passive: reduced damage taken by up to 30% based on missing health
- Unnatural Movement passive: Reduced cost of sprint by 50%, while continuously sprinting for more than 6 seconds player go into sneak mode and can continue to sprint in this mode

Weaknesses:
- Health recovery decreased by 90-100%
- Flame damage taken increased by 20%
- Regular abilites cost increased by 10% OR Healing received by non-vampire abilities decreased by 30%

Appearance:
Further progression for more vampiric look, as it is now on live servers

Clarification:
More strengths, more weaknesses. In my opinion, invisibility maybe a little too much for Unnatural Movement passive, going into sneak mode and continue to sprint there is a good alternative.

I completly removed Strike From The Shadows passive, because i think it does not give anything interesting, but only may become must have passive for players who like to one shot another players from sneak/inviz. Ability to go into sneak fast, and sprint in that mode already sufficiently represent insidious side of vampires, in my opinion.

Vampire skills:

Blood Scion
Description:
Transforms into lord of night, increasing you Max Health, Magicka and Stamina by 10000 by 20-30 seconds. While in this form you can see enemies through walls, your vampiric abillities have additional features, but you can't use weapon skills.

Clarification:
Appearance must be changed, but there are already threads about this: first, second.
Additional stats looks ok, but i don't like "instantly healing to full health" part from original description, firstly it takes away necessity to heal, more specific it takes away necessity to use Vampiric Drain ability, one of the few active damaging abilities from vampire kit. Secondly this heal overlaps with Battle Roar passive of Dragon Knights. In this regards i also not sure about "you heal for 33% damage you deal" part from original description.
20-30 second timer seems ok, but i think there must be opportunity to prolong this time, for example, by biting Mesmorized players, NPCs. More on that part in Mesmorize skill description.
In my opinion, Blood Scion must use his claws, so no weapon skills in this form, also vampiric powers must get some unique buffs when player in Blood Scion form.

Eviscerate
Description:
Slice the enemy open dealin X Magic Damage. Deals up to 50% more damage based on your missing health.
While in Blood Scion form ... (haven't come up with a good idea yet)
Clarification:
Seems ok as it is, except for too "soft" animation and sound for a strike. Good thematic melee spammable, but speaking of thematic this skill ask for Stamina morph.

Blood Frenzy
Desription:
Go into blood frenzy, increasing your Weapon and Spell damage by X. While toggled on, you cannot be healed by anyone other than yourself. Cost Health per second.
Don't want this skill in vampire kit, but haven't come up with a new one yet.

Clarification:
Not interesting toggle skill, in my opinion. Moreover it's a second toggle skill in skill line, plus one channeling ability, and with all that vampiric skill line starts to look not very dynamic. And again it can become must have skill for players who like to one shot another players from sneak/inviz or from afar, not very vampiric gameplay, in my opinion. I think this mechanic more suited for some passive skill. Haven't come up with a new skill yet.

Vampiric Drain
Desription:
Drain an enemie's life force, dealing X Magic Damage and healing you for 60% of your missing Health over 3 seconds.
While in Blood Scion form additionally restores Magicka and Stamina and can't be interrapted.

Clarification:
Good skill, with addition of Magicka and Stamina restoration in Blood Scion form can need another morph instead of Brain Drain. I prefer less sparky and more blood like animation that currently on live servers.

Mesmerize
Desription:
Seduce enemy, disorienting him (putting him to sleep) for 1.5-2 seconds. Single target. Melee range.
While in disoriented state player or NPC can be bitten ('X' button or 2nd press of Mesmorize skill button if target already disoriented, with fast animation of bite in neck, similar to Blood Healing perk in TES: Skyrim), bite do X damage, restore 20% of Health and gain 10-15 ultimate points. Player can't Break Free from Disoriented state, but desorient will break from any direct damage taken.
While in Blood Scion form this ability become ranged, and pull enemy to you(with Vampiric Grip from TES: Skyrim in mind, but more fast and suited for ESO, similar to Silver Leash and Fiery Grip skills). In this form bite instead of gaining 10-15 ultimate points will prolong Blood Scion form for 7-10 seconds.

Clarification:
First of all about Disoriented state, as i know it were in game before, but act alittle bit different and not used anymore, so ZOS can rework this state as i meantioned in skill description or create new state, Sleep, for example, with same properties. Disoriented state must be immune to Break Free, because player need little window to execute the bite and to all animations were executed properly, otherwise bite will looks bad and never hit the neck. Animation must be fast, maybe some collisions if another player will hit targeted player with direct damage and wake up him, but with fast animation i think it will look fine, or for the period of bite animation targeted player may go in Stun state, he will can Break Free, but again with fast animation it will look fine. After Disoriented state or bite targeted player must recieve standart Immovability buff, to prevent abuse, player under Immovability buff can not be Disoriented.
Duration of Disoriented state must be short, enough to execute bite from melee range, but not enough to set up dangerous combinations.
In my opinion, this combo of (pull +) stun + bite more interesting than just a mass stun, which similar to werewolf Roar ability.

Mist Form
Desription:
Dissolve into a dark mist, redusing your damage taken by X for as long as you maintain the channel. Entering this form removes and grants immunity to all disabling and immobilization effects, but you cannot be healed and your Magicka Recovery is disabled. Cost X Magicka per second.
While in Blood Scion form ... (haven't come up with a good idea yet)

Clarification:
Good skill. From one side i like that it can be toggled for 1 second, because it can be used as cool alternative to block in some cases, from other side i a little worried about abusing of this, maybe mist form must be 3x cost, but with first 3 seconds for free and same magicka per second rate starting from 4th second.

Other thoughts:

- In Blood Scion form Sprint may looks like hovering of Vampire Lord from TES: Skyrim
- In Blood Scion form Roll Dodge roll may looks like dodge in Vampyr game or Bats in Skyrim
- All vampire skills, besides resources, can cost some Health. So Blood Frenzy skill can be replaced by some passive, if ZOS really like to keep this mechanic.

@ZOS_RichLambert @ZOS_BrianWheeler @ZOS_Gilliam @ZOS_GinaBruno

Mayrael · April 2020

Royaji wrote: »

Mayrael wrote: »

ShadowHvo wrote: »

Mayrael wrote: »

I think vampire abilit cost decrease shout be in strengths.

Apologies, you're absolutely right. That is an error on my part. I'll edit it right away.

Mayrael wrote: »

50% sprint cost reduction - use set like cowards gear and you are freaking unkillable. You can run forever with speed of light having major protection and vampire resistances and after 6s you vanish - new meta for disengage

Sorry but I think that 10% increased cost on all non vampire abilities is minimum.

Personally I find this particular argument rather weak, as that still is a synergy that requires a 5pc set-bonus to be equipped and maintained, thus you favor fleeing/survivability over other types of sets.

Truly that would be no different as to how existing builds are capable of creating synergy between their abilities and sets. Invulnerable Tanks for one comes to mind.

I agree that it is a very strong passive, but I believe that is precisely why it is at stage 4, and thus it indeed should have approbiate weaknesses. I just don't believe that increased cost in regular ability is the right one.

Yes of course 20% is to much as I said but 5% is to low and you can't ignore all the rest I have wrote. New passives are very powerful and give vampire bonuses of few 5pc sets, all you would have to do if the negative effect would be just 5% is to equip alteration mastery and here you go. You have all the new vampire toys without any new drawbacks just usual health regen and fire damage debuf.

I don't understand the weird obsession with 5pc in your post. Ashen Grip, Rattlecage and Senche's Bite also have 5pc bonuses. Does not mean that they are any good though.There are several hundreds of sets in the game. A couple dozens of them are considered good. Your average 5pc bonus is actually very likely to be awful.

And at the same time you are completely ignoring that equipping Alteration Mastery comes with the opportunity cost of equipping a different 5pc (sic!) set.

After you consider that those new and "very powerful" passives have no use in dungeons/trials (the only type of content where "everyone is a vampire for regen" holds true) I don't see why those passives justify a completely unreasonable cost increase. In PvP, where those passives actually can shine, extra flame damage is already good enough of a deterrent to prevent people from even considering vampire.

300 spell/weapon damage is huge buff, especially when you have many ways of multiplying it. Another part currently undead scales from 50% hp, meaning it works only on really low hp, new one looks like it will be working from 100% hp, that's huge, at 50% you get 2x minor protection or half of major protectio, next thing 50% sprint cost reduction, can you imagine how powerful it is? Look at LA/MA passives, not even close to this. No snare in sneak is already very good passive and it is moved to stage one, which will make it very desirable for almost any ganker because drawbacks are minimal. And the cherry at the top. Invisibility. It's wet dream for sorcs and anyone who wants easy disengage. 6s is not that long, it's duration of one sorc shield.

So please explain me how all of those new powers should be balanced if even now people decide to play as vampire without those awesome passives?

I will tell you what I'm going to do and most of the players will do the same if the cost increase will be just 5%. I'll drop one of my offensive sets and slot alteration mastery, because thanks to 300spell damage I can do it without worrying about big damage loss. And now I get many new shiny toys without any cost beyond what we have now, I can fed up to be able to play PvE or drop my stage for PvP, but not becoming a vampire in this scenario is simply stupid. If you want to see everyone running as vampire than please be my guest lower the cost increase to those 5%, just don't cry when ZOS will come with nerf hammer destroying vampires completely.

Royaji · April 2020

Mayrael wrote: »

Royaji wrote: »

Mayrael wrote: »

ShadowHvo wrote: »

Mayrael wrote: »

I think vampire abilit cost decrease shout be in strengths.

Apologies, you're absolutely right. That is an error on my part. I'll edit it right away.

Mayrael wrote: »

50% sprint cost reduction - use set like cowards gear and you are freaking unkillable. You can run forever with speed of light having major protection and vampire resistances and after 6s you vanish - new meta for disengage

Sorry but I think that 10% increased cost on all non vampire abilities is minimum.

Personally I find this particular argument rather weak, as that still is a synergy that requires a 5pc set-bonus to be equipped and maintained, thus you favor fleeing/survivability over other types of sets.

Truly that would be no different as to how existing builds are capable of creating synergy between their abilities and sets. Invulnerable Tanks for one comes to mind.

I agree that it is a very strong passive, but I believe that is precisely why it is at stage 4, and thus it indeed should have approbiate weaknesses. I just don't believe that increased cost in regular ability is the right one.

Yes of course 20% is to much as I said but 5% is to low and you can't ignore all the rest I have wrote. New passives are very powerful and give vampire bonuses of few 5pc sets, all you would have to do if the negative effect would be just 5% is to equip alteration mastery and here you go. You have all the new vampire toys without any new drawbacks just usual health regen and fire damage debuf.

I don't understand the weird obsession with 5pc in your post. Ashen Grip, Rattlecage and Senche's Bite also have 5pc bonuses. Does not mean that they are any good though.There are several hundreds of sets in the game. A couple dozens of them are considered good. Your average 5pc bonus is actually very likely to be awful.

And at the same time you are completely ignoring that equipping Alteration Mastery comes with the opportunity cost of equipping a different 5pc (sic!) set.

After you consider that those new and "very powerful" passives have no use in dungeons/trials (the only type of content where "everyone is a vampire for regen" holds true) I don't see why those passives justify a completely unreasonable cost increase. In PvP, where those passives actually can shine, extra flame damage is already good enough of a deterrent to prevent people from even considering vampire.

300 spell/weapon damage is huge buff, especially when you have many ways of multiplying it. Another part currently undead scales from 50% hp, meaning it works only on really low hp, new one looks like it will be working from 100% hp, that's huge, at 50% you get 2x minor protection or half of major protectio, next thing 50% sprint cost reduction, can you imagine how powerful it is? Look at LA/MA passives, not even close to this. No snare in sneak is already very good passive and it is moved to stage one, which will make it very desirable for almost any ganker because drawbacks are minimal. And the cherry at the top. Invisibility. It's wet dream for sorcs and anyone who wants easy disengage. 6s is not that long, it's duration of one sorc shield.

So please explain me how all of those new powers should be balanced if even now people decide to play as vampire without those awesome passives?

I will tell you what I'm going to do and most of the players will do the same if the cost increase will be just 5%. I'll drop one of my offensive sets and slot alteration mastery, because thanks to 300spell damage I can do it without worrying about big damage loss. And now I get many new shiny toys without any cost beyond what we have now, I can fed up to be able to play PvE or drop my stage for PvP, but not becoming a vampire in this scenario is simply stupid. If you want to see everyone running as vampire than please be my guest lower the cost increase to those 5%, just don't cry when ZOS will come with nerf hammer destroying vampires completely.

Isn't that the whole point? Everyone is a vampire in Greymoor. Two patches later ZOS nukes all passive and active skills. It does not matter if cost increase will be 5, 20 or even 50%. They will still start with vampire being broken and then nerf it.

Welcome to horizontal progression.

Suligost · April 2020

10-15% is the lowest cost of non-vampiric skills I could imagine. Besides all people says about OP skills but I can imagine someone use blood craze-drop his health and I can just spam executioner from 2h (2 shots each 6-7k with my 30k health - good luck with that little 300 spell dmg) xDDD

ShadowHvo · April 2020

Suligost wrote: »

10-15% is the lowest cost of non-vampiric skills I could imagine. Besides all people says about OP skills but I can imagine someone use blood craze-drop his health and I can just spam executioner from 2h (2 shots each 6-7k with my 30k health - good luck with that little 300 spell dmg) xDDD

I still think that is far too high percentage-wise, and it still doesn't really fit very thematically to how vampires are in the Elder Scrolls setting.

People are very worried these new abilities are so strong in terms of DPS potential, yet doesn't really consider the immense health drain that Blood Frenzy also has.

Most DPS, or so I imagine, cannot afford to keep that ability up for long. The suggestion to reduced healing received from non-vampire abilities would only further assist to that.

thankyourat · April 2020

Dracane wrote: »

thankyourat wrote: »

In PvE the regen is leaving and no one is going to be using mist form for the damage increase. sneak passives are completely useless in trials so there will be no benefit to being a vampire in PvE anymore. But the extra fire damage and cost increase will make going vampire have no benefits while still have having weaknesses. I’m not understanding the thought process behind adding a cost increase

You are absolutely right. So far I have only seen it from a pvp perspective. Vampire is indeed quite useless in pve, passive wise.

BUT you have blood frenzy and eviscerate, granting immense amounts of damage. Every DD will want to have blood frenzy. Over 2k weapon or spell damage from 1 skill? Only fools will not want to be a vampire. So actively, Vampire is much better in pve than it is right now. You will not have competitive dps as a non-vampire, I theorize.

For PvE it depends on how often you have to heal yourself. If you have to stop doing damage to actively heal because healers can heal you that might turn into a net DPS loss. it’s also going to make you very squishy. So the risk reward is already factored into blood frenzy.

Where blood frenzy seems like it would be really good at is for Nightblades in PvP. Nightblades are going to be able to come out of stealth with a ton damage next patch. I feel vampire will be situational in majority of the other classes with a few classes Mag classes being forced into it because of the stun.

Mayrael wrote: »

Royaji wrote: »

Mayrael wrote: »

ShadowHvo wrote: »

Mayrael wrote: »

I think vampire abilit cost decrease shout be in strengths.

Apologies, you're absolutely right. That is an error on my part. I'll edit it right away.

Mayrael wrote: »

50% sprint cost reduction - use set like cowards gear and you are freaking unkillable. You can run forever with speed of light having major protection and vampire resistances and after 6s you vanish - new meta for disengage

Sorry but I think that 10% increased cost on all non vampire abilities is minimum.

Personally I find this particular argument rather weak, as that still is a synergy that requires a 5pc set-bonus to be equipped and maintained, thus you favor fleeing/survivability over other types of sets.

Truly that would be no different as to how existing builds are capable of creating synergy between their abilities and sets. Invulnerable Tanks for one comes to mind.

I agree that it is a very strong passive, but I believe that is precisely why it is at stage 4, and thus it indeed should have approbiate weaknesses. I just don't believe that increased cost in regular ability is the right one.

Yes of course 20% is to much as I said but 5% is to low and you can't ignore all the rest I have wrote. New passives are very powerful and give vampire bonuses of few 5pc sets, all you would have to do if the negative effect would be just 5% is to equip alteration mastery and here you go. You have all the new vampire toys without any new drawbacks just usual health regen and fire damage debuf.

I don't understand the weird obsession with 5pc in your post. Ashen Grip, Rattlecage and Senche's Bite also have 5pc bonuses. Does not mean that they are any good though.There are several hundreds of sets in the game. A couple dozens of them are considered good. Your average 5pc bonus is actually very likely to be awful.

And at the same time you are completely ignoring that equipping Alteration Mastery comes with the opportunity cost of equipping a different 5pc (sic!) set.

After you consider that those new and "very powerful" passives have no use in dungeons/trials (the only type of content where "everyone is a vampire for regen" holds true) I don't see why those passives justify a completely unreasonable cost increase. In PvP, where those passives actually can shine, extra flame damage is already good enough of a deterrent to prevent people from even considering vampire.

300 spell/weapon damage is huge buff, especially when you have many ways of multiplying it. Another part currently undead scales from 50% hp, meaning it works only on really low hp, new one looks like it will be working from 100% hp, that's huge, at 50% you get 2x minor protection or half of major protectio, next thing 50% sprint cost reduction, can you imagine how powerful it is? Look at LA/MA passives, not even close to this. No snare in sneak is already very good passive and it is moved to stage one, which will make it very desirable for almost any ganker because drawbacks are minimal. And the cherry at the top. Invisibility. It's wet dream for sorcs and anyone who wants easy disengage. 6s is not that long, it's duration of one sorc shield.

So please explain me how all of those new powers should be balanced if even now people decide to play as vampire without those awesome passives?

I will tell you what I'm going to do and most of the players will do the same if the cost increase will be just 5%. I'll drop one of my offensive sets and slot alteration mastery, because thanks to 300spell damage I can do it without worrying about big damage loss. And now I get many new shiny toys without any cost beyond what we have now, I can fed up to be able to play PvE or drop my stage for PvP, but not becoming a vampire in this scenario is simply stupid. If you want to see everyone running as vampire than please be my guest lower the cost increase to those 5%, just don't cry when ZOS will come with nerf hammer destroying vampires completely.

That 300 spell damage is only active after leaving mist form or stealth so it’s really situational. Nightblades already have a similar passives and it’s not really all that great. You are not going to be able to rely on that damage enough to drop a damage set that would be active 100% of the time like new moon. No one cares about sprint cost reduction because it’s not really that great. No one cares about turning invisible while sprinting because its too situational.

Undeath is op especially on tanks. it’s really the only great passive available to vamps. The others are situation and can be good in some fights but will be useless in others. Blood frenzy looks good for pvp and mist form is good for pvp. Those are the main reasons to be vamp. Blood frenzy already already has a downside to using it in the form of health drain. Mist form already has a downside because your mag regen and healing are stopped. The extra flame damage and lower health regen makes up for undeath.

I don’t feel as though a situational passive like 300 spell damage out of mist form for a small amount of time is balanced by a 20% cost increase to all of your non vamp abilities. A better way to balance that would be your next attack out of mist form will have a 20% cost increase instead of having to 20% cost increase be active at all times.

XomRhoK · April 2020

ShadowHvo wrote: »

Suligost wrote: »

10-15% is the lowest cost of non-vampiric skills I could imagine. Besides all people says about OP skills but I can imagine someone use blood craze-drop his health and I can just spam executioner from 2h (2 shots each 6-7k with my 30k health - good luck with that little 300 spell dmg) xDDD

I still think that is far too high percentage-wise, and it still doesn't really fit very thematically to how vampires are in the Elder Scrolls setting.

People are very worried these new abilities are so strong in terms of DPS potential, yet doesn't really consider the immense health drain that Blood Frenzy also has.

Most DPS, or so I imagine, cannot afford to keep that ability up for long. The suggestion to reduced healing received from non-vampire abilities would only further assist to that.

Part of my post from another thread about cost of Blood Frenzy:
"Seems it stage 4, because in video you can see costs of other abilities and only stage 4 and 1 give whole numbers after cost equation. But it 576/0,6=960*0,9=864 per second at stage 1 vampirism.
But Resolving Vigor, with 930 wpn damage buff, will heal more for 542 per second, so total cost of the Blood Frenzy decreased to 322 HP/s for stage 1 and to 34 HP/s for stage 4, if player use some HoT in his rotation. Seems like a must have skill for PvP and non DLC PvE at least."

ShadowHvo · April 2020

XomRhoK wrote: »

Part of my post from another thread about cost of Blood Frenzy:
"Seems it stage 4, because in video you can see costs of other abilities and only stage 4 and 1 give whole numbers after cost equation. But it 576/0,6=960*0,9=864 per second at stage 1 vampirism.
But Resolving Vigor, with 930 wpn damage buff, will heal more for 542 per second, so total cost of the Blood Frenzy decreased to 322 HP/s for stage 1 and to 34 HP/s for stage 4, if player use some HoT in his rotation. Seems like a must have skill for PvP and non DLC PvE at least."

But my suggestion would precisely alleviate that, as Vigor wouldn't be a very effective counter to the heal-cost of Blood Frenzy.

Naturally numbers can fluctuate, but I believe that the healing should be severe enough to be punishable.