Soul Cleaver Feedback

merpins · September 2023

After some testing, it's not worth slotting. I don't think it's the fault of the set though, I think it's a fault of the skills in the skill line it's buffing. Swallow Soul for example feels okay to use, but its damage still doesn't really compare with other spammable options. The healing is okay, but the damage isn't really there. Then all other skills in that line don't really do enough to slot, even with these buffs. All in all, I think the skill line itself probably needs some re-evaluation, and a good number of buffs, otherwise it will continue to be something people don't use.

Vaqual · September 2023

Siphoning is already a good skill line. There isn't really a lot of testing required for this. As long as it isn't bugged, the math tells you all you need to know. Is siphoning and this set top dps? Probably not. But also: this is the healing line. This is a case for expectation management.

merpins · September 2023

Vaqual wrote: »

Siphoning is already a good skill line. There isn't really a lot of testing required for this. As long as it isn't bugged, the math tells you all you need to know. Is siphoning and this set top dps? Probably not. But also: this is the healing line. This is a case for expectation management.

So Nightblade doesn't have a dedicated healing or tanking skill line. Sure, the main nightblade healer skill is in that skill line. But Nightblade, just like all base game classes, were designed around theme, not around function like the newer classes are.

Soul Shred = A DPS skill with a self heal and a synergy that heals or a self heal with a bit of utility.
Strife = A DPS skill with a self heal like Templar's mag jabs or bloodthirst, Or a healer skill with some damage utility.
Malevolent Offering = a healing skill.
Cripple = A DPS skill.
Siphoning Strikes = a sustain skill.
Drain Power = An AOE DPS skill with a self heal + some self buffs.

This tells me the skill line is primarily a DPS skill line, but it's also... Not good. Yes it can be used for healing and it's pretty good at it. But it can't do DPS well, and that aspect needs to be re-evaluated and buffed or changed.

Vaqual · September 2023

I get these things and I didn't think we need to spell out trivial information, but do you genuinely think that skills that provide high passive healing, like swallow soul, should compete in terms of DPS with skills that do not? That ranged spammables should compete with melee ones? There are good reasons why this is the weakset single target non-execute spammable (by base damage) in the kit.

All DPS skills in this line have standardized values and are absolutely comparable to similar skills. In the end it comes down to the utility of the skills. Most of them are OK. Not OP, but OK. Sap essence is pretty lame, I concede that. But this is also double-dipping into the benefits of the new setbonus.

merpins · September 2023

Vaqual wrote: »

I get these things and I didn't think we need to spell out trivial information, but do you genuinely think that skills that provide high passive healing should compete in terms of dps with skills that do not?

Jabs. Bloodthirst. Crit Surge makes all skills self healing skills for Sorc. I don't think it's a problem, in fact precedent says it's not a problem. If it was buffed enough to be somewhat okay, and this set actually made it pretty good, then it'd be fine most likely. Right now it's just bad.
The skill used to be really good. It wasn't the best skill in the game, but you'd see Nightblades using mag setups with the skill and being somewhat competitive in PVE. This was pre Marrowind, before 2017. It was nerfed into the ground to the point that it doesn't even get slotted these days. I'm not saying it should be the best option. But It should be a good option or alternative to the normal nb setups.

Vaqual · September 2023

merpins wrote: »

Vaqual wrote: »

I get these things and I didn't think we need to spell out trivial information, but do you genuinely think that skills that provide high passive healing should compete in terms of dps with skills that do not?

Jabs. Bloodthirst. Crit Surge makes all skills self healing skills for Sorc. I don't think it's a problem, in fact precedent says it's not a problem. If it was buffed enough to be somewhat okay, and this set actually made it pretty good, then it'd be fine most likely. Right now it's just bad.
The skill used to be really good. It wasn't the best skill in the game, but you'd see Nightblades using mag setups with the skill and being somewhat competitive in PVE. This was pre Marrowind, before 2017. It was nerfed into the ground to the point that it doesn't even get slotted these days. I'm not saying it should be the best option. But It should be a good option or alternative to the normal nb setups.

Swallow soul returns its percentage several times. Even just using it every other gcd (just in case it isn't clear: using another skill in between) is enough to get 2 heal ticks.
But I do not really understand your argument. You list those skills. Should I evaluate them now and say whether they are good or bad based on damage and life steal %? Jabs is an AoE skill with additonal side effects and it was pretty overtuned before it was nerfed, but I am no templar main so I am not claiming that this is a good opinion. Flurry is an interruptable melee channel, the damage is pretty good though. Crit surge is an entirely different thing. How are these arguments applicable?

As I said above: The damage is standardized. You have to compare ranged single target spammables to ranged single target spammables. And then you will find, that those that deal more damage, do not provide the same amount of healing.

merpins · September 2023

Vaqual wrote: »

merpins wrote: »

Vaqual wrote: »

I get these things and I didn't think we need to spell out trivial information, but do you genuinely think that skills that provide high passive healing should compete in terms of dps with skills that do not?

Jabs. Bloodthirst. Crit Surge makes all skills self healing skills for Sorc. I don't think it's a problem, in fact precedent says it's not a problem. If it was buffed enough to be somewhat okay, and this set actually made it pretty good, then it'd be fine most likely. Right now it's just bad.
The skill used to be really good. It wasn't the best skill in the game, but you'd see Nightblades using mag setups with the skill and being somewhat competitive in PVE. This was pre Marrowind, before 2017. It was nerfed into the ground to the point that it doesn't even get slotted these days. I'm not saying it should be the best option. But It should be a good option or alternative to the normal nb setups.

Swallow soul returns its percentage several times. Even just using it every other gcd (just in case it isn't clear: using another skill in between) is enough to get 2 heal ticks.
But I do not really understand your argument. You list those skills. Should I evaluate them now and say whether they are good or bad based on damage and life steal %? Jabs is an AoE skill with additonal side effects and it was pretty overtuned before it was nerfed, but I am no templar main so I am not claiming that this is a good opinion. Flurry is an interruptable melee channel, the damage is pretty good though. Crit surge is an entirely different thing. How are these arguments applicable?

As I said above: The damage is standardized. You have to compare ranged single target spammables to ranged single target spammables. And then you will find, that those that deal more damage, do not provide the same amount of healing.

A good self healing skill can do good damage as well. As you mentioned, you do not play Templar: its healing is pretty comparable to Swallow Soul. Except it's an AOE damaging skill as well, and is the main spammable option for Templar, even after the nerf. Damage is too low now for the main spammable of the class, but it's still far and away better than Swallow Soul. Flurry is interruptible, sure, but the damage is pretty good and is very high. You wanna know what the weakness of swallow soul is? It has a sound effect queue, it's very slow, and its easily dodgeable. PVP, there is no reason for its damage to be so low. But I'm more talking PVE.

In PVE, ranged vs. melee doesn't matter. You don't want to be far from a boss anyway, else you'll not receive group buffs. Maybe it's slightly safer, but not much. If you want to do the best damage, you'll still need to use dual daggers, and then you need to be in melee anyway.

I don't understand your argument very much. You admit it has the lowest tooltip out of any spammable, and yet don't think it needs a buff? NB, the class that has one major playstyle and no real variants, doesn't need a skill buffed that could add more diversity to the class? Fine, lower the self heal and increase the damage. This doesn't need to be a big argument, the skill isn't seeing much if any use. Make it useful, and this set, which this thread is about, will be useable. Maybe. if they buff some of the other skills in the skill line too.

Vaqual · September 2023

merpins wrote: »

Vaqual wrote: »

merpins wrote: »

Vaqual wrote: »

I get these things and I didn't think we need to spell out trivial information, but do you genuinely think that skills that provide high passive healing should compete in terms of dps with skills that do not?

Jabs. Bloodthirst. Crit Surge makes all skills self healing skills for Sorc. I don't think it's a problem, in fact precedent says it's not a problem. If it was buffed enough to be somewhat okay, and this set actually made it pretty good, then it'd be fine most likely. Right now it's just bad.
The skill used to be really good. It wasn't the best skill in the game, but you'd see Nightblades using mag setups with the skill and being somewhat competitive in PVE. This was pre Marrowind, before 2017. It was nerfed into the ground to the point that it doesn't even get slotted these days. I'm not saying it should be the best option. But It should be a good option or alternative to the normal nb setups.

Swallow soul returns its percentage several times. Even just using it every other gcd (just in case it isn't clear: using another skill in between) is enough to get 2 heal ticks.
But I do not really understand your argument. You list those skills. Should I evaluate them now and say whether they are good or bad based on damage and life steal %? Jabs is an AoE skill with additonal side effects and it was pretty overtuned before it was nerfed, but I am no templar main so I am not claiming that this is a good opinion. Flurry is an interruptable melee channel, the damage is pretty good though. Crit surge is an entirely different thing. How are these arguments applicable?

As I said above: The damage is standardized. You have to compare ranged single target spammables to ranged single target spammables. And then you will find, that those that deal more damage, do not provide the same amount of healing.

A good self healing skill can do good damage as well. As you mentioned, you do not play Templar: its healing is pretty comparable to Swallow Soul. Except it's an AOE damaging skill as well, and is the main spammable option for Templar, even after the nerf. Damage is too low now for the main spammable of the class, but it's still far and away better than Swallow Soul. Flurry is interruptible, sure, but the damage is pretty good and is very high. You wanna know what the weakness of swallow soul is? It has a sound effect queue, it's very slow, and its easily dodgeable. PVP, there is no reason for its damage to be so low. But I'm more talking PVE.

In PVE, ranged vs. melee doesn't matter. You don't want to be far from a boss anyway, else you'll not receive group buffs. Maybe it's slightly safer, but not much. If you want to do the best damage, you'll still need to use dual daggers, and then you need to be in melee anyway.

I don't understand your argument very much. You admit it has the lowest tooltip out of any spammable, and yet don't think it needs a buff? NB, the class that has one major playstyle and no real variants, doesn't need a skill buffed that could add more diversity to the class? Fine, lower the self heal and increase the damage. This doesn't need to be a big argument, the skill isn't seeing much if any use. Make it useful, and this set, which this thread is about, will be useable. Maybe. if they buff some of the other skills in the skill line too.

I see what you want from this skill, but only because you need it to serve a singular purpose (dps) it doesn't mean that a one-dimensional balancing approach, focusing on dps, is a fair treatment for the skill. I am fine with leaving it at that. To end on topic: I still find the set interesting and I already have some good ideas in mind. Looking forward to farming it once it hits live. Thanks for the civil exchange.

YandereGirlfriend · September 2023

I think that it feels underwhelming because Siphon is very bland and completely un-buffed by the set and then, like you say, Sap Essence is simply an awful skill compared to Power Extraction. The morphs of Cripple are also very lackluster, IMO.

Which leaves Tether, Offering, and Strife as like the only good abilities in the line, as well as the Power Extraction morph.

merpins · September 2023

YandereGirlfriend wrote: »

I think that it feels underwhelming because Siphon is very bland and completely un-buffed by the set and then, like you say, Sap Essence is simply an awful skill compared to Power Extraction. The morphs of Cripple are also very lackluster, IMO.

Which leaves Tether, Offering, and Strife as like the only good abilities in the line, as well as the Power Extraction morph.

Pretty much. It's a great set on paper, but the skills in that skill line are so weak that even that doesn't do much. Even if the set just said "Siphoning skills deal 35% more damage. Reduce the cost of Siphoning skills by 15%." that would probably not even be enough to justify the set. The skills just need more damage to justify the skill line getting a dps set.

TX12001rwb17_ESO · September 2023

If the set was going to be based on ultimate stored, make it increase the power of all offensive class skills by 5% per 100 ultimate stored, at 500 ultimate that's a 25% boost to attack power but you cannot wear another set in it's place and cannot use your ultimate or you would lose it.

If that seems too strong then tie a small debuff to it like you take 2% more damage per 100 ultimate as well.