Blocking in pvp, blocking and healing in pvp.

olsborg · March 2023

So me and my friends who pvp together a couple times a week, we have been discussing this topic quite a bit lately. Blocking in pvp. Its too easy, its too easy to hold block for less cost then the guy using skills on you while you block it(with a shield or a froststaff). You can block and heal endlessly 1v1 if you just casually build for it, atleast on the nocp/no procc Ravenwatch campaign.
Its easy to make a trolltank who hold block and spam heals for a very long time, but its also a problem(or too easy) on builds with damage, just barswap to shield or froststaff on backbar, hold block for 3s and spam a few heals if you need to...its too easy to do this for way too little cost. And high hitting skills like Assassin Will who normally hits for 12-15k are reduced to 1-1.5k in dmg[snip].

IMO (and my friends opinions)

Are there others out there who think similarly, or differently? Please discuss your opinions.

[edited for profanity bypass]

OBJnoob · March 2023

Well. Been a little while since I played Ravenwatch-- but I did it for like 4 years straight before stopping recently. I would say it's actually not easy to build a permablock tank in Ravenwatch. CP makes it easier. I've only seen a few people do it against numbers and actually last long enough to be worth remembering.

BUT. I realize you're talking about 1v1s. The thing is... I don't know... I obviously have mixed feelings. I think it is mostly a tool for fighting outnumbered-- and harder to use under such conditions. If it is balanced in that regard then it is certainly OP in a 1v1. No argument there.

BUT. That's kinda true with a lot of things 1v1. 1v1ing requires a certain mutual understanding and fairness... That frankly isn't given by those who badly want to win. And that's why most dueling tournaments ban certain things. But if you're just 1v1ing some random enemy on his open world build and, until you got in his way, he was on his way to his favorite farming tower... I mean, he isn't really obligated to fight you fair. Nor perhaps could he, since his gear and skills are for something else.

Ultimately I think the normal cliche belongs here... If you encounter a blocking tank that won't die or run out of resources then just leave. And honestly... No offense... But if he barswaps and has the ability to kill you after weathering your storm for a couple minutes then his build might just be better than yours.

Blocking could be nerfed a bit perhaps. What I don't want to see is it be gutted to the point where you can no longer block-heal 3+ players for a second or two and try to escape. Because sadly these situations are more common and are ideally what strong defensive measures are for.

BUT. This can always be abused 1v1. And I don't really think there's anything that can be done about it. People have different ideas about fairness, fun, and winning. The more fair you try to be, the less you may win. So make sure being fair makes you happy.

fred4 · March 2023

Getting block cost down to the point where you become a troll takes a fair bit of investment. PvP can run down your stamina much faster than PvE. You can be charged block cost every quarter of a second. Jabs and Flurry counter blocking builds for that reason. People just don't run those skills much anymore.

Of course a good player will mix things up, blocking momentarily only to dodge roll or LoS the next second. If they're very good, they may anticipate your burst and selectively block only that.

I agree with OBJnoob. An open world build and a duelling build are two different things. Whether it's done with blocking or another way, (some) open world players are hard to kill because they account for the possibility of getting zerged. They have to be tanky. They may not be able to kill their peers, although I've seen extended duels where someone wins eventually (and not because of lag or boredom).

That may not be your cup of tea. Certainly extended open world duels aren't really mine. In that case, just leave.

Mankeyyyyy · April 2023

Block mitigation is definitely way too high in my opinion, at least for what it costs. Not every build has an unblockable CC ZoS

Turtle_Bot · April 2023

Block casting, especially for heals, is way too strong of a defensive tool, especially for PvP. Also, having interruptible cast times on heals that not only stun the caster if interrupted, but also hard lock (grey out) the skill for 3GCD is far too punishing on such an essential defensive tool (healing) for PvP. Healing needs to be shifted into a middle ground between these 2 extremes.

It's a number of factors that make it so strong.
- The ability to get out of execute/pressure range while essentially reducing the damage taken to 0
- Not being able to have that healing denied via a core game mechanic (interrupt)
- being immune to most CC while casting the heal as well
block casting is just far too strong compared to every other defensive option outside of HoT stacking and even that needs to go to ridiculous lengths to reach/surpass the survivability that block healing allows for (see ball groups HoT stacking).

As a sorc main who's class physically cannot block cast its heals due to its heals having cast times it is like night and day with how noticeable the difference in survivability is between block casting heals and not being able to/relying on shields.

I have gone back and forth on shields and heals countless times now. No matter what I try, no matter how strong the shields get, block casting healing (even mediocre heals such as blessings of protection) just significantly outperforms anything shields can do except survive surprise extreme burst, but even that gets mostly mitigated just by stacking more max health where most burst won't deal enough damage to 1 shot you anyway.

There's a few ways to go about fixing this imbalance.
1. Make casting a burst heal ability drop block (even if it only drops it for a split second while it's being cast)
2. Add a 1 second cast time to ALL burst heals, but make it so that they cannot be interrupted outside of being hit by a hard stun (this adds counter play for both the caster (CC immunity) and the attacker (use a stun)), also remove the fact that interrupting an ability with a cast time hard locks it (greys out) for 3GCD regardless of how long/short the cast time is (should be enough that the caster is stunned on-top of having the ability cancelled anyway, no need for that additional extended lock of the skill on top of this).

birdik · April 2023

Lol i made several themes like this years before and all what i heard was:" block is fine, l2p *

Udrath · April 2023

Stamina increase and magicka increase poisons help a lot, and other than that unblockable stuns like fear, javelin, fossilise, etc. Be nice if penetration increased damage against block mitigation to kind of offset that stat a bit.

edward_frigidhands · April 2023

Udrath wrote: »

Stamina increase and magicka increase poisons help a lot, and other than that unblockable stuns like fear, javelin, fossilise, etc. Be nice if penetration increased damage against block mitigation to kind of offset that stat a bit.

https://eso-sets.com/set/shell-splitter

StaticWave · April 2023

If you ever dueled players in a full damage build on a strong class like DK or NB, you'll see how hard it is to execute them because all it takes is 1 block + 1 burst heal that can crit for 17k to instantly bring them back to full HP. Is it blocking that's the issue, or is it the burst heal? I'd say by themselves, neither blocking or burst healing are a problem. It's blocking + burst healing that is the problem.

I religiously use SnB for every build on stamsorc and I still never have the same survivability as a NB, Templar, DK, Warden, or Necro because I don't have a decent burst heal of my own.

The people who seem to block forever have built around that and aren't really a threat to you. They're mostly troll-tanks and you can ignore them. It's the people in a high damage build with a decent burst heal that can hold block for 1-2 seconds to cast all their big heals that will give you trouble.

Balance block healing, and you'll see the issue disappear.