About Neglected Balancing for the Werewolf Class

Wuuffyy · October 2023

Simply put: are we ever going to address the poor playability and performance that werewolf has dealt with for years at this point?

We haven’t had a meaningful update to werewolf in at least 1-2 years and that update only stood to further complicate, and make inferior, any of the pros that werewolf *used to* offer.

We are now talking about class sets to both make each class play even more uniquely and more effective while werewolf (the big monster that has knife-claws) doesn’t do anything special besides being a health sponge with no damage and no survivability.

*feedback is welcome to encourage engagement

Panderbander · October 2023

It seems to be a hard sell to get anyone at ZOS to even contemplate improvements to werewolf, and every time they make a change or release something that might benefit werewolf they seem to break it specifically for or because of werewolf.

It's really disheartening. Legitimately the worst thing in the game and that's saying something when Necromancer exists in the state it's in.

autocookies · October 2023

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Erickson9610 · October 2023

Maybe we need another DLC that's related to werewolves to get a balance update to the Werewolf skill line. Consider how the Werewolf skill line was updated for the Wolfhunter DLC and the Greymoor Chapter, both of which prominently featured werewolves.

The only other time the Werewolf skill line seems to get any buffs is when something unrelated changes, such as the rework to Empower that made it only affect monsters — it was the update after that one that improved Werewolf's Howl of Despair to make it provide more than just Empower.

Werewolf is largely ignored unless werewolves somehow end up being a selling point for a DLC.

IncultaWolf · October 2023

I agree, I'd absolutely love to see werewolf get a rework like vampires got in the Greymoor chapter. An improved player model would be amazing, and if not that, maybe werewolf skins. I would be thrilled if we got minor resolve added to the savage strength passive, and the howl healed nearby ally werewolves as well, so it would encourage pack play. I also dislike the requirement on hircine's rage where you have to be at exactly 100% health to get the major berserk. Not really fair and balanced when it DEBUFFS you, and then compare it to nightblades concealed weapon spammable, easy to proc and no downsides. I can live with the self debuff, but at least let me get the major berserk if I happen to cast the expensive ability at 99% hp and waste resources.

I would also love if the hircine's rage morph scales off max stats/weapon damage, so that we're not forced to play 40k hp in pvp just to survive and not get nuked instantly, because remember, we have no heal over times, no minor resolve, no snare removal, and no free 30% mitigation from undeath.

Change the packleader morph minor courage buff to something unique, there are so many sources of minor courage in the game now compared to a few years ago, we need something unique to bring to a group, because right now, you're nerfing yourself and your group by bringing a werewolf in most situations.

Give us back our snare. The snare from the packleader direwolves was removed out of nowhere very recently, and with no explanation at all, no reason was given for the unnecessary nerf. Put it on pounce or carnage.

I would like for werewolves to be competitive again in pve and pvp, but right now it's considered a roleplay spec by the majority of the player base sadly. Nefas even rated it the worst skill line in the entire game. There are only a little less than a dozen good werewolf players left, myself included on PCNA and we all know each other.

Please change the food pack leader's bone broth to actually benefit us after we transform because right now all it does is reduce the ultimate cost by 5% but does nothing for you after you're already in form. Shapeshifter's chain was looked at and given werewolf ability cost reduction. I would actually use the bone broth on certain builds if it reduced the cost of our abilities.

And finally, give werewolves the ability to sneak. The animation is already in the game, we could sneak in Morrowind, why can't we here? This thread is very detailed and has a lot of feedback on the ability to sneak as a werewolf.

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/642532/werewolf-should-be-allowed-to-sneak

huskandhunger · October 2023

Wuuffyy wrote: »

Simply put: are we ever going to address the poor playability and performance that werewolf has dealt with for years at this point?

We haven’t had a meaningful update to werewolf in at least 1-2 years and that update only stood to further complicate, and make inferior, any of the pros that werewolf *used to* offer.

We are now talking about class sets to both make each class play even more uniquely and more effective while werewolf (the big monster that has knife-claws) doesn’t do anything special besides being a health sponge with no damage and no survivability.

*feedback is welcome to encourage engagement

I agree on this, maybe @ZOS_Kevin or @ZOS_GinaBruno could shed light on this about any updates or future developments.

As a long time werewolf player, we have specific pain points in both PVE and PVP where our skill line has lost some of its key strengths and power seemingly for no gain --for instance:

The loss of the 10,000 armor unique bonus we had enabled lots of variety in werewolf build strategies to help it better function across pve, pvp, and overland content. Imagination was the limit and medium armor was actually viable to use on werewolf. In short, we could play as we wanted. Now no longer, with the change to 5948 base armor of Major Resolve, the skill line offers nothing that each of the classes has already. Compare this with for instance the vampire undeath passive, which is a very potent 30% mitigation value. Werewolf has nothing unique to offer or bring to the table in being one.

Just this last patch we lost snare on Packleader direwolves, with no alternative balancing provided at all. Given most classes have a slow or snare, we are now falling behind in capabilities.

Werewolf for the longest time has not been able to sneak, or crouch. Other classes have a way of avoiding or sneaking up on opponents, but werewolves cannot hunt apparently or stalk their prey? A bit of imagination here could do wonders and maybe some kind of hunt capability could be added in and incorporated with pounce to allow more engaging gameplay.

And this gets at the heart of many of the werewolf abilities, and visuals---the werewolf community would like to see more updated visuals and design to fulfill on the fantasy of being a werewolf, something deadly and monstrous not.....a scrawny doggo who dies in 1 hit.

This brings me to my next pain point. Werewolf healing, has no actual effective heal over time. The per / 2 seconds healing on Claws of Life is not strong enough to keep a werewolf alive in difficult content in intense PVE situations, or in PVP it's further reduced by Battle Spirit passive as to give a meager trickle of health back around the range of 200hp to 459hp every 2 seconds in combat. This is horrendous. Lack of heal over time efficacy further pigeon holes werewolf into tankier and tankier set ups with limited armor options due to trying to compensate over poor design. Again, reworking the abilities would greatly aid enjoyment of the werewolf experience in ESO and player fun.

Werewolf Bugs -- currently we have an actual bug on live where many werewolf players myself included cannot even pass on lycanthropy to other players through the Hircine's Gift quest at werewolf shrines throughout Tamriel.

So we have many existing issues all at once that are contributing to a poor experience across the board and it would be wonderful if the ZOS team could look into some of these issues to address these concerns and potentially improve upon how werewolf plays in the game today.

Thanks!

-Husk

autocookies · October 2023

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Panderbander · October 2023

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/626619/major-berserk-and-minor-resolve-for-werewolves

This has been a long-running thread looking for an explanation and while it did get a zos response, the point was completely missed and has been made moot since with the change to concealed weapon giving Major Berserk ( https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/642080/could-we-get-an-explanation-for-this )

Panderbander wrote: »

...
Brutal Pounce not always swapping to Brutal Carnage after pouncing.

Brutal Carnage requiring a target in range to cast, yet it's a conal AOE that can be easily ranged and thus rarely hits in PVP

Claws of Life being our only pseudo-"heal over time" and the return on that being so small as to not be noticeable, even on multiple targets.

The obscene cost of werewolf abilities in relation to their damage done, which seems to have been balanced with the extra 30% stamina in mind though that gives very little extra damage or ability uses in practical use.

The damage of werewolf abilities being often lower than similar abilities of base classes despite this extra ability cost.

Werewolf having a unique 30% movement speed buff but without snare removal we actually move slower than base classes (all of which can access snare removal).

Both morphs of our heal being tied to max health while our damage is tied to weapon damage and max stamina/magicka, meaning we're forced to split stats more than anyone else (which leads to the common complaint about werewolves having 40k+ HP).

Pounce routinely leaping us at gods know what because when we land there certainly isn't anything there (anyone that's played long enough has seen this).

An inability to stealth (some hunters we are) or detect stealth (some enhanced senses we have).

No ability to synergize with other werewolves despite a timer minigame that clearly wants us to run with other werewolves.

THE [snip] TIMER MINIGAME.

Next to no weapon passives carrying over to werewolf form despite there being no indication that this is the case and causing a lack of interesting choices when building our character.

No proper heal over time meaning that while we have to stay aggressive to keep our timer up, we can't afford to do so because there is no passive healing.

Health recovery (which WAS our heal over time) has been completely gutted.

An inability to run both a monster set and a mythic while running two five-pieces because we can not split sets with a back bar.

Our fear occasionally only applying off balance on non-CC immune targets.

No ability to recover magicka, leading to an inordinate use of magicka recovery in our builds or heavy armor (for pvp at least)

No ultimate and no way to combo with our abilities (it's all pure pressure) despite seemingly every single werewolf themed set in the game offering ultimate generation/cost reduction. (I know about Savage Werewolf)

...and there's more.

I don't expect ZOS to ever fix werewolf (or even vampire tbh) to be a proper playstyle and not just some meme'd on RP ability, but perhaps someone might see this and actually take the time to look into improving things for us. Those of us that still play werewolves don't really have any other choice for playing this in another game; there just aren't any good variations of werewolves out there. All I want is for us to be at least on par with the middle of the field.

TL;DR: Werewolf has a lot of problems, more than just these buffs.

[Edited for Censor Bypass]

There is also another thread suggesting fixes for the 25% poison damage taken debuff that was last balanced back when we had 10k unique armor abs health recovery hadn't been nuked.

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/645317/werewolf-unique-armor-vulnerabilities-and-balance-concerns#Comment_7979178

@ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_Kevin @ZOS_BrianWheeler these threads are starting to pile up. It is actually driving people away from the game as @IncultaWolf pointed out. There are so few of us left now because this isn't being addressed.