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Why not bring back defile?

GorraShatan
GorraShatan
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It seems based on the PTS changes that there's a desire to nerf healing to deal with ball groups. Yay!

So why not buff defile as a way to address that? That wouldn't affect PVE and it has counterplay (purge) which itself has more counterplay (plaguebreak).

Maybe throw in a target cap for healing and shields with battlespirit and a modest buff to siege damage...
  • Celas_Dranacea
    Celas_Dranacea
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    It seems based on the PTS changes that there's a desire to nerf healing to deal with ball groups. Yay!

    So why not buff defile as a way to address that? That wouldn't affect PVE and it has counterplay (purge) which itself has more counterplay (plaguebreak).

    Maybe throw in a target cap for healing and shields with battlespirit and a modest buff to siege damage...

    1000% times this!
    A Bosmer Nightblade Werewolf
  • edward_frigidhands
    edward_frigidhands
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    A reversal of the nerfs to the different Major/Minor buffs maybe? Previously I think Major Defile impacted all healing by 30% instead of healing and shields by 12%. Buffs/Debuffs used to be more impactful.
    Edited by edward_frigidhands on January 20, 2026 8:13AM
  • El_Borracho
    El_Borracho
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    Yes please. Defile + Disease builds were a real thing once upon a time. Back when Thurkovun was a real set.
  • madmidwestmark
    madmidwestmark
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    Just limit HOTS in cyrodiil to 1 for each skill. Any new cast, refreshes and eliminates the previous instance.
  • YandereGirlfriend
    YandereGirlfriend
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    It seems based on the PTS changes that there's a desire to nerf healing to deal with ball groups. Yay!

    So why not buff defile as a way to address that? That wouldn't affect PVE and it has counterplay (purge) which itself has more counterplay (plaguebreak).

    Maybe throw in a target cap for healing and shields with battlespirit and a modest buff to siege damage...

    There already are target caps for all healing abilities.

    The best solution is to disallow morph stacking on players and to limit each morph to only a single instance per player.

    Has the benefit of also improving performance.
    Edited by YandereGirlfriend on January 20, 2026 7:24PM
  • GorraShatan
    GorraShatan
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    It seems based on the PTS changes that there's a desire to nerf healing to deal with ball groups. Yay!

    So why not buff defile as a way to address that? That wouldn't affect PVE and it has counterplay (purge) which itself has more counterplay (plaguebreak).

    Maybe throw in a target cap for healing and shields with battlespirit and a modest buff to siege damage...

    There already are target caps for all healing abilities.

    The best solution is to disallow morph stacking on players and to limit each morph to only a single instance per player.

    Has the benefit of also improving performance.

    Isn't the cap quite high for vigour and barrier?
  • MXVIIDREAM
    MXVIIDREAM
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    I think defile being buffed would have groups specing into this and slaughtering smaller groups solo and anything in their way kind of an indirect buff to groups
    I’d rather see only one instance of skill on each player one regen one bug or one barrier ect they don’t stack they just refresh does that make sense ?
  • YandereGirlfriend
    YandereGirlfriend
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    It seems based on the PTS changes that there's a desire to nerf healing to deal with ball groups. Yay!

    So why not buff defile as a way to address that? That wouldn't affect PVE and it has counterplay (purge) which itself has more counterplay (plaguebreak).

    Maybe throw in a target cap for healing and shields with battlespirit and a modest buff to siege damage...

    There already are target caps for all healing abilities.

    The best solution is to disallow morph stacking on players and to limit each morph to only a single instance per player.

    Has the benefit of also improving performance.

    Isn't the cap quite high for vigour and barrier?

    The generic cap for AOE heals is 6 targets.

    So Vigor hits 6 per cast (this is complicated though because how it chooses those targets is not straightforward).

    Radiating Regen, the other most notorious sticky HOT, only hits 3 per cast as per its description.

    Ultimates hit 12 because they are... ultimates. This is good and makes sense because ultimates should be powerful.

    For Barrier, if two people cast a Barrier then the new Barrier overwrites the old Barrier since shields of the same underlying ability cannot stack. That means that you cannot stack a Replenishing Barrier with a Rejuvenating Barrier or with a base morph Barrier, despite them being different morphs. They all simply count as Barrier and all overwrite each other.

    IMO, the healing target caps are fine and relatively well-balanced as they are. The only broken mechanic is simply that sticky HOTs like Vigor and Radiating Regen can stack infinitely if you have enough people casting them. Which is why I quite like the solution of only allowing one instance per player to be active.
  • MincMincMinc
    MincMincMinc
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    MXVIIDREAM wrote: »
    I think defile being buffed would have groups specing into this and slaughtering smaller groups solo and anything in their way kind of an indirect buff to groups
    I’d rather see only one instance of skill on each player one regen one bug or one barrier ect they don’t stack they just refresh does that make sense ?

    Bingo, we already saw this before in the game. Once you make it hard to heal for everyone, this doesnt target any particular group.

    Its a stacking issue, you have to change how things stack.
    • How many can stack at any given time?
    • How long is the duration, how many GCDs between that can allow more stacks to tick?
    • What is the tickrate, what are the chances things line up or are consistent?
    • How large is the AoE, what caps does it have?
    • Cost of the skill?
    • etc.
    I only use insightful
  • MXVIIDREAM
    MXVIIDREAM
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    MXVIIDREAM wrote: »
    I think defile being buffed would have groups specing into this and slaughtering smaller groups solo and anything in their way kind of an indirect buff to groups
    I’d rather see only one instance of skill on each player one regen one bug or one barrier ect they don’t stack they just refresh does that make sense ?

    Bingo, we already saw this before in the game. Once you make it hard to heal for everyone, this doesnt target any particular group.

    Its a stacking issue, you have to change how things stack.
    • How many can stack at any given time?
    • How long is the duration, how many GCDs between that can allow more stacks to tick?
    • What is the tickrate, what are the chances things line up or are consistent?
    • How large is the AoE, what caps does it have?
    • Cost of the skill?
    • etc.

    I still think only allowing 2 instances of each shield and heal skill is the way forward but I guess will see what happens

  • madmidwestmark
    madmidwestmark
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    Just only allow 1 instance of a heal over time in cyrodiil
  • CatoUnchained
    CatoUnchained
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    It seems based on the PTS changes that there's a desire to nerf healing to deal with ball groups. Yay!

    So why not buff defile as a way to address that? That wouldn't affect PVE and it has counterplay (purge) which itself has more counterplay (plaguebreak).

    Maybe throw in a target cap for healing and shields with battlespirit and a modest buff to siege damage...

    There already are target caps for all healing abilities.

    The best solution is to disallow morph stacking on players and to limit each morph to only a single instance per player.

    Has the benefit of also improving performance.

    Isn't the cap quite high for vigour and barrier?

    The generic cap for AOE heals is 6 targets.

    So Vigor hits 6 per cast (this is complicated though because how it chooses those targets is not straightforward).

    Radiating Regen, the other most notorious sticky HOT, only hits 3 per cast as per its description.

    Ultimates hit 12 because they are... ultimates. This is good and makes sense because ultimates should be powerful.

    For Barrier, if two people cast a Barrier then the new Barrier overwrites the old Barrier since shields of the same underlying ability cannot stack. That means that you cannot stack a Replenishing Barrier with a Rejuvenating Barrier or with a base morph Barrier, despite them being different morphs. They all simply count as Barrier and all overwrite each other.

    IMO, the healing target caps are fine and relatively well-balanced as they are. The only broken mechanic is simply that sticky HOTs like Vigor and Radiating Regen can stack infinitely if you have enough people casting them. Which is why I quite like the solution of only allowing one instance per player to be active.

    I think you've just proven that ZOS does, in fact, have the ability to limit skills to one instance only per player. Well done!

    If they can do it for barrier, they can do it for the other heals and shields.
  • CatoUnchained
    CatoUnchained
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    Just only allow 1 instance of a heal over time in cyrodiil

    ...and make it conditional on "when battle spirit is active". Don't want to screw things up for end game trial groups.

    Edited by CatoUnchained on January 27, 2026 1:09AM
  • Iriidius
    Iriidius
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    Vitality and mending give only 12% so defile as reversed version should also give only 12% as buffs and debuffs are standartized. If you think it is to weak because there are buffs for healing done and received but only debuff for healing received than the solution is to add a debuff for healing done. Might even add it on blastbones and some other sources of defile so players have to slot only once
    PC EU
  • Iriidius
    Iriidius
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    How is buffing defile to counter ballgroups an acceptable solution when it can be used by a zerg or duellist to debuff one lone player easily either. Even the solution of reducing healing for players with more than 8 hots gets rejection because a troll can give players 8 hots with low healing to push them above(even when nobody will do this probably) but there’s no requirement to get defile other than a opponent applying it to you.
    PC EU
  • xylena
    xylena
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    Single target sticky defiles ended up being a "haha screw you in particular" to solos that did nothing to groups. Stationary AoE like Meatbag siege is obviously good for the game, so maybe there should some skills that do that, like a Defile ult as threatening as Negate.
    PC/NA || Cyro/BGs || solo/smallscale || retired until Dagon brings a new dawn of PvP
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