Heavy attack nerfs (how do you manage)

luchtt · July 2022

Light attack nerfs were fairly meh, I don't agree or disagree with them, they're fine in my opinion, however as part of this change, heavy attacks also got a flat damage instead of scaling.
This achieves 2 things: Invalidates the great buffs to the heavy attack sets in week 1, and makes heavy attacks absolutely insanely bad.

To put it in perspective, every heavy attack build I tested (I used to theorycraft them quite a bit as they were fairly strong at lower dps due to the sets flat damage bonus) hits about 40-60% lower dps.
Along with the heavy nerfs to damage over time abilities, which are HA builds only other form of damage, pretty much everything a HA build had, is nerfed into the ground. There is not a single thing that didnt get nerfed for these builds.

94k lightning HA sorc: 50k (on a fairly significantly buffed dummy, no less)

90k lightning HA DK: 58k.

After this I stopped testing as I realized the HA flat dmg would make any attempt at using HA channel as your spammable a rather useless effort.

So yeah, I don't really care about HA or HA builds anymore as I've moved on from them as I got better at the game, but I know a vast majority of players in lower skill tiers are using them as primary forms of damage with significantly less optimization. If this patch goes through, with the heavy attack base damage staying at this flat level, you will absolutely see any heavy attack build do absolutely nothing. They were decent at best before the ascending tide nerfs, but now they're absolutely horrible.

[snip]

I wish any user of these types of builds great luck, [snip] If you think there is any sort of ''gap closing'' happening here, you are sorely mistaken. This goes for every build but HA builds especially.

[edited for bashing]

Draxund · July 2022

Indeed, I finally threw in the towel on HA builds this patch. I wasn't using them for group DPS or anything, but primarily for soloing (something Luchtt has been an inspiration for). Trying to push the limits on soloing dungeons was one of the few things that maintained my desire to play the game; it was a fun challenge that had me theorycrafting once again! But with the decimation to HAs and the overall reduction in damage, I'm not sure soloing dungeons is worth my time or subscription anymore.

Interestingly, PvP became my other main interest, which gave me a unique perspective on the dichotomy of HAs. In PvP, this patch was horrible for getting ganked/one-shotted by heavy attacks (and gankers). There are clearly other factors contributing to the current ganks/one-shots, but I can see where a developer may want to bring down HA. But on the other hand, they were incredibly fun and effective in my PvE experience when soloing.

To me, this is yet another reason in an ever-increasing list of reasons for why ZOS should seriously consider the separate balancing of gear and/or mechanics in PvE vs PvP. I doubt that they'll ever do this, but I feel like it's the only saving grace at this point. As of now, PvP has been rough in the current meta, and U35 looks to put a serious damper on extreme soloing. Those were really the only things keeping me subscribed or playing at all.

luchtt · July 2022

Draxund wrote: »

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To me, this is yet another reason in an ever-increasing list of reasons for why ZOS should seriously consider the separate balancing of gear and/or mechanics in PvE vs PvP. I doubt that they'll ever do this, but I feel like it's the only saving grace at this point. As of now, PvP has been rough in the current meta, and U35 looks to put a serious damper on extreme soloing. Those were really the only things keeping me subscribed or playing at all.

Absolutely. If they do this, even with all these patches currently being horrible, I think that it's possible the game could recover. It's one of the main problems plagueing balance. If they simply seperate it, they can be much more specific with changes and dont have to worry about basically the other game they are balancing with the same changes. Pve is so seperate from pvp that it's a miracle both are still somewhat working (I use somewhat very lightly here lol)

Rimskjegg · July 2022

I actually thought they'd address this until Friday's update. [snip]

I want my hours testing vMA on a beginner vMA Sorc build back.

[edited for bashing]

ssewallb14_ESO · July 2022

This is the best I can do in a playable build :

About a 20% damage loss over live. It kinda works and the rotation is actually easier than my live build. I feel like a proc bot that just heavy attacks to sustain 5 medium though.

If I make the rotation pointlessly hard and terrible in actual content I can squeeze out another 3k DPS.

On a 6 mil it's about a 25% DPS loss from live, though I got PTS lagged before I could thoroughly test.

ccfeeling · July 2022

HA lose 1 channeling attack and just provide low FLAT damage

I play HA build for years, not going to change .

Gonna take some time to parse and find out the acceptable sets and cp combo.

Nothing more I can do , that's how Dev closer the gap between end game and causal .

Nerf and buff cycle to protect their jobs .

Lughlongarm · July 2022

-HA shock staff is back to 3 ticks before the big blast.

HA easy effective build.

-DK Khajiit probably are probably the best picks for class/race for the 100% up time empower+crit damage.

-Maelstrom shock staff on the back with shock glyph for the off-balance debuff.

-Storm Master(jewelry + precise shock staff)

-Order's Wrath(body)

-Monster/Mythic whatever you like.

-Shadow Mundus

Rest you can build purely for defense.

Will work both for PVE(mostly solo) and PvP. HA damage is very respectable. Very easy and lazy build that can also be extremely tanky.

Hope ZOS will not regret making this change. Any time they make damage a fix number, they get unexpected outcomes mostly related to tank builds doing tons of damage.

Lalothen · July 2022

My guildmates & I are testing out vHRC HM & vAA HM this evening, doing a comparison of live vs. PTS clears. I'll be running my HA MagDK which is currently a 92k DPS build on Live, and a 68k DPS build on the PTS. I'm normally comfortably in the top 3 DPS (sometimes 1st, other times not; depends on the encounter) for boss encounters, but I'm expecting to struggle since HA builds have been hit comparatively harder than LA ones.

HEAVY ATTACK BUILD LOVERS, WE'VE HEARD YOUR CRIES... WE WANT BETTER FOR YOU

Someone please make this statement make sense in the context of the current PTS... because there are a lot of choice (expletive) words I'd use to describe the current state of HA builds on the PTS, and they're all antonyms of the word "better".

Everaen · July 2022

Wanting better for heavy attack lovers, and providing better for heavy attack lovers, are two separate things, obviously.

BlueRaven · July 2022

I have no idea what is going on really with these combat changes. They wanted to make things more accessible, but really they made the dps requirements more difficult.
And who seem to be the biggest victims in all this? The players on the lower end of the dps scale.

Honestly this upcoming patch I will be phoning it in until U36. I’ll just stick to overland dailies and a bit of housing. Because I am just lost at the moment. I have no idea how to recover my dps, and part of me just doesn’t want to.