Dragonknight Ability Updates for PTS Week 4

BattleAxe · February 4

MXVIIDREAM wrote: »

BardokRedSnow wrote: »

Just saw the newest pts update for molten whip and its 2 percent damage done to players per stack. That I think definitely addresses all issues. Very happy about that change, cant lie Im surprised zos is reading the forums seemingly a lot more than before.

Ggs.

Agreed great changes on mostly all front to be fair to them it’s a shame the landslide timers haven’t changed but they clearly see something we don’t a lot of people think it’s too long to build especially for pve but I guess time will tell, is nice that it lines up nicely with potions though so maybe that’s the saving grace, shame not to see crit healing added to the new crit damage passive but either way grateful for the changes they have made so far, much happier with whip

I think what needs to be checked and confirmed is will avalanche stacks fall off during boss immunity phases if say you have a dot running on a boss even if it isn’t dropping bosses health. Also if bosses with immune phases have adds to deal with also allows a dk to keep stacks even during immune phases. What I’m seeing based on how it reads is so long as a dk is actively engaging in combat you’ll build and keep stack’s. What I mean to say no one has said or showed for sure that stacks do in fact fall off during boss immune phases.

Avalanche: This passive causes you to slowly build stacks of Avalanche when dealing damage, up to once every 10|5 seconds. Avalanche grants 1% damage done per stack and maxes out at 10 stacks. Failing to deal damage for 2 seconds causes you to lose a stack.

At a glance this reads as, so long as a skill deals dmg you keep stacks. Meaning in theory if ur damaging a boss whether they are immune to it or not you shouldn’t lose stacks. Alternatively this also means if the immune boss has adds you can maintain stacks by engaging the adds in combat instead of being idle waiting out boss immunity. A dk will be an active damage dealer throughout combat. Also using the one morph of earth spike mantle increase how many stacks you can build in 10 seconds

Shatterspike Mantle (originally Volatile Armor): This morph’s damage over time effect now scales with your offensive stats, rather than your Armor. Additionally, when dealing damage with the effect, you add one additional stack of Avalanche, up to once every 10 seconds.

Using the above skill you go from reaching max stacks in 50 seconds to reaching max in about 35 seconds

Nithkaz · February 4

For some reason me and some people I talked to have less dps now, when It is suppose to be more dps with the changes you have made, we were hitting 180k+ dps in week three, and now in week four it is about 10k less, I'm not sure what's wrong but it feels odd, like something dosen't work as intended

Callosum · February 4

Nithkaz wrote: »

For some reason me and some people I talked to have less dps now, when It is suppose to be more dps with the changes you have made, we were hitting 180k+ dps in week three, and now in week four it is about 10k less, I'm not sure what's wrong but it feels odd, like something dosen't work as intended

170-180k dps on pure class DK?

Did you test DK subclassed into NB or Arc?

ZhuJiuyin · February 4

Nithkaz wrote: »

For some reason me and some people I talked to have less dps now, when It is suppose to be more dps with the changes you have made, we were hitting 180k+ dps in week three, and now in week four it is about 10k less, I'm not sure what's wrong but it feels odd, like something dosen't work as intended

The Whip provides 15% increased monster damage, but Engulfing Dragonfire damage is reduced by 30% (from a maximum of 80% to 50%), so pure-DKs lose some damage.

However, the Whip's 15% increased monster damage benefits subclasses, so the DPS increase mentioned mainly applies to subclasses.

*Correcting a calculation error

Callosum · February 4

ZhuJiuyin wrote: »

Nithkaz wrote: »

For some reason me and some people I talked to have less dps now, when It is suppose to be more dps with the changes you have made, we were hitting 180k+ dps in week three, and now in week four it is about 10k less, I'm not sure what's wrong but it feels odd, like something dosen't work as intended

The Whip provides 15% increased monster damage, but Engulfing Dragonfire damage is reduced by 30% (from a maximum of 80% to 50%), so pure-DKs lose 15% damage.

With all due respect, you can’t really calculate it like that. And moreover, engulfing dragonfire isn’t even used in those builds

ZhuJiuyin · February 4

Callosum wrote: »

ZhuJiuyin wrote: »

Nithkaz wrote: »

For some reason me and some people I talked to have less dps now, when It is suppose to be more dps with the changes you have made, we were hitting 180k+ dps in week three, and now in week four it is about 10k less, I'm not sure what's wrong but it feels odd, like something dosen't work as intended

The Whip provides 15% increased monster damage, but Engulfing Dragonfire damage is reduced by 30% (from a maximum of 80% to 50%), so pure-DKs lose 15% damage.

With all due respect, you can’t really calculate it like that. And moreover, engulfing dragonfire isn’t even used in those builds

Yes, I made a calculation error, but the pure DK dps are still lost, and we don't know if he used a subclass.

The whip increases monster damage by 15%. Dragonfire accounts for about 50%-60% of total damage, but now it has lost 30% of that damage. This means that even with the whip's buff, Dragonfire still loses 15%-18% of its damage. And the total DPS remains unchanged or decreases by about 3%.

YandereGirlfriend · February 4

Indeed.

The "base class as Dragonknight" stipulation makes no sense because all it does is buff subclassing players who now simply swap over to base Dragonknight from whatever they were before.

It's just some additional busywork before otherwise embracing the status quo and it does not achieve the ostensible goal of incentivizing players to select more than one Dragonknight line.

It also giga-punishes classes that are coming late in the refresh cycle (even more than they already are being punished simply by being late) because none of their abilities are locked behind anything, meaning that they will never be chosen as base classes because no existing mechanics incentivize it.

Like the PvP healing situation, this Whip situation feels very much like a short-term kludge that will hopefully be improved upon in upcoming patches.

MXVIIDREAM · February 4

Now if you use take flight… these changes are good and if you use them on a pure dk you also benefit from the landslide passive so again it’s rewarding pure builds which is a good way to go

BardokRedSnow · February 4

As I stated here:

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/8427717/#Comment_8427717

Amongst others, my vote on the base class requirement for certain buffs is that it's actually a good idea and I believe that Zos you should keep this and make it a staple for each class. Part of balancing subclassing is making mastery of a class, or specializing rather, actually important and meaningful. Making someone have to main said class is pretty much common sense in my opinion.

My humble vote is that you zos stick to your guns on this one. Otherwise there's very little reason to make more characters with different classes practically. I already main one character only, subclassing as is without the base class requirement makes it even less enticing to make more characters for me outside of RP which I haven't done in a good while.

Thats just my personal perspective. Aside from that less need to make more characters means less money for y'all and a shorter game lifespan. If class mastery and class identity is the goal, there should be something other than a slight damage buff from Landslide or number of dragon knight skills slotted that literally any class can take advantage of.

This is the main reason why subclassing is unbalanced in the first place, any character can fully utilize any skill line.

So on this, I think that you Zos should absolutely stick to your guns here, its an important step to bringing subclassing power more in line with pure classing, and people will probably see this once more classes have the same stipulation.

Radiate77 · February 4

^And I am in complete opposition to this.

The stated goal of these reworks was to spread out the power of each skill line, and by doing so, you solve the balance issues we are currently facing.

There is no need to add artificial restrictions upon using different skills and passives based on what Class you play. This is nothing short of a walk-back of Subclassing and for those of us who came back to the game to use the system, this is disrespectful.

Those pushing against Subclassing do not feel that this restriction is enough, and continue to push for further exclusivity, while people like me, who found a whole new breath of life with ESO’s implication of Subclassing… are completely blown away by this decision to soft-lock us out of iconic skills.

The original note for this change indicated that this stat boost was temporary, but how long is it expected that we’ll hang around while we lose access to more and more skills?

Wup_sa · February 5

Radiate77 wrote: »

^And I am in complete opposition to this.

The stated goal of these reworks was to spread out the power of each skill line, and by doing so, you solve the balance issues we are currently facing.

There is no need to add artificial restrictions upon using different skills and passives based on what Class you play. This is nothing short of a walk-back of Subclassing and for those of us who came back to the game to use the system, this is disrespectful.

Those pushing against Subclassing do not feel that this restriction is enough, and continue to push for further exclusivity, while people like me, who found a whole new breath of life with ESO’s implication of Subclassing… are completely blown away by this decision to soft-lock us out of iconic skills.

The original note for this change indicated that this stat boost was temporary, but how long is it expected that we’ll hang around while we lose access to more and more skills?

It is honestly great that they do it. Subclassing should have never been in the game, let alone be mandatory. You can still subclass to use whatever skills you like, but you should have never been strong with them.

Drackolus · February 5

Wup_sa wrote: »

It is honestly great that they do it. Subclassing should have never been in the game, let alone be mandatory. You can still subclass to use whatever skills you like, but you should have never been strong with them.

Why? Aren't options and variety good things? I agree that subclassing shouldn't be much stronger than pure classing, but what are the negatives of them being roughly equal?

Drackolus · February 5

BardokRedSnow wrote: »

... Part of balancing subclassing is making mastery of a class, or specializing rather, actually important and meaningful. Making someone have to main said class is pretty much common sense in my opinion.

Can you explain how mastering the abcombination of three skill lines conflicts with having a greater variety of options? The releases of new classes didn't reduce the reward of mastering a chosen class until arguably Arcanist because the beam has too high of a reward with no real skill required. Subclassing didn't make it any easier, it just made the numbers for doing the same actions higher due to individual skill line specialization.

My humble vote is that you zos stick to your guns on this one. Otherwise there's very little reason to make more characters with different classes practically. I already main one character only, subclassing as is without the base class requirement makes it even less enticing to make more characters for me outside of RP which I haven't done in a good while.

I'm not entirely sure what your point here is. It seems like you're saying that you're not being extrinsically motivated to make new characters, when you already have little intrinsic motivation. What's the loss here?

This is the main reason why subclassing is unbalanced in the first place, any character can fully utilize any skill line.

That's clearly untrue. Subclassing both Arcanist and Necromancer reduces your ability to utilize the class mechanics, and reduces the amount of crux or corpses you have available, the benefits of doing so, and ways to use them. The trouble comes with the fact that group content will always heavily reward specialization, and the large sacrifices in potential durability and support don't mean anything, so sacrificing those for even small damage increase is worth it. That's why one of, if not the, biggest goals is to make every line offer something substantial for every role. One of my biggest comlaints with this version of the refresh is that it significantly reduces overall support ability in the whole class, and has a much higher focus on damage in all three lines. Pre-refresh Earthen Heart alone was better for tanks than all three of these combined, and there's still nothing worthwhile here for healers.

Nithkaz · February 5

Callosum wrote: »

Nithkaz wrote: »

For some reason me and some people I talked to have less dps now, when It is suppose to be more dps with the changes you have made, we were hitting 180k+ dps in week three, and now in week four it is about 10k less, I'm not sure what's wrong but it feels odd, like something dosen't work as intended

170-180k dps on pure class DK?

Did you test DK subclassed into NB or Arc?

Dk / NB

Nithkaz · February 5

Callosum wrote: »

Nithkaz wrote: »

For some reason me and some people I talked to have less dps now, when It is suppose to be more dps with the changes you have made, we were hitting 180k+ dps in week three, and now in week four it is about 10k less, I'm not sure what's wrong but it feels odd, like something dosen't work as intended

170-180k dps on pure class DK?

Did you test DK subclassed into NB or Arc?

Dk / NB

ZhuJiuyin wrote: »

Nithkaz wrote: »

For some reason me and some people I talked to have less dps now, when It is suppose to be more dps with the changes you have made, we were hitting 180k+ dps in week three, and now in week four it is about 10k less, I'm not sure what's wrong but it feels odd, like something dosen't work as intended

The Whip provides 15% increased monster damage, but Engulfing Dragonfire damage is reduced by 30% (from a maximum of 80% to 50%), so pure-DKs lose some damage.

However, the Whip's 15% increased monster damage benefits subclasses, so the DPS increase mentioned mainly applies to subclasses.

*Correcting a calculation error

I'm not using engulfing dragonfire, no changes made affect negatively the build I'm using, that's why something feels odd, and it's not just me

Wup_sa · February 5

Drackolus wrote: »

Wup_sa wrote: »

It is honestly great that they do it. Subclassing should have never been in the game, let alone be mandatory. You can still subclass to use whatever skills you like, but you should have never been strong with them.

Why? Aren't options and variety good things? I agree that subclassing shouldn't be much stronger than pure classing, but what are the negatives of them being roughly equal?

No, honestly "variety" isn't good. Every update, subclassing, hybridization, etc that has been forced on us because of "variety" has made the game lose more and more players and in reality narrowed down variety even more.

Drackolus · February 5

Wup_sa wrote: »

No, honestly "variety" isn't good. Every update, subclassing, hybridization, etc that has been forced on us because of "variety" has made the game lose more and more players and in reality narrowed down variety even more.

It's true that player count went down after subclassing, but definitively saying that it was because of the core concept of the feature instead of the fact that it was implemented without doing the necessary rebalancing beforehand is unsubstantiated. The Fatecarver plague was already rampant, it just let more players access it without having to level another character.
It is somewhat hard for me to sympathize. Subclassing is what really hooked me, after not having played much since beta.

Callosum · February 5

Wup_sa wrote: »

The Fatecarver plague was already rampant, it just let more players access it without having to level another character.

Indeed, but subclassing also highlighted the problem even more clearly. If something is already game-breaking, subclassing naturally amplifies the issue because it gives everyone access to it. I’m not against subclassing, but I’d like to see it implemented with constraints that allow classes to have specific, interesting strengths without completely breaking overall balance. Of course, in an ideal world (especially for those who enjoy subclassing), every skill line would be equally strong, allowing a wide variety of builds to thrive so you could be effective with many different combinations in PvE and encounter a broad range of builds in PvP. Realistically, though, I don’t think that kind of perfect balance will ever be achieved.

That’s why I think constraints can paradoxically enable more variety, not less. Don’t get me wrong, I do think subclassing can be a great addition to the game. But to secure the effectiveness of different builds and playstyles, I don’t think locking certain specific bonuses behind a base-class requirement is a bad direction at all. It allows for extra-strong, interesting skills to exist without breaking the game, because you can’t simply combine the best tools from every class.

MXVIIDREAM · February 5

Seems like this has gone massively off topic unfortunately

Shame because there was some really good points made now we are on a subclassing tangent

MXVIIDREAM · February 5

Drackolus wrote: »

Wup_sa wrote: »

No, honestly "variety" isn't good. Every update, subclassing, hybridization, etc that has been forced on us because of "variety" has made the game lose more and more players and in reality narrowed down variety even more.

It's true that player count went down after subclassing, but definitively saying that it was because of the core concept of the feature instead of the fact that it was implemented without doing the necessary rebalancing beforehand is unsubstantiated. The Fatecarver plague was already rampant, it just let more players access it without having to level another character.
It is somewhat hard for me to sympathize. Subclassing is what really hooked me, after not having played much since beta.

Levelling a character takes hours now it’s not hard at all, I think the reason subclassing allowed you to walk in a feel up to date was because of how much significantly easier it makes the game at a lower skill level, mechanics , nah let’s just stand and burn

Drackolus · February 5

Callosum wrote: »

Realistically, though, I don’t think that kind of perfect balance will ever be achieved.

I think that's the point I ultimately disagree with. While people say that ESO has too many skills and is too complex to balance with more options, I don't think that's the case. The constraint of only having a set number of skills is pretty big, but apart from that, it's not even high in terms of MMOs. I played Ascension for a bit, which is an older version of WoW where you can access -any- skill from -any- class, with the only constraint being that you only have so many points to spend. Not only that, there were other options that can fundamentally change your whole character build, on top of that. The amount of options blows ESO out of the water, and it manages to balance itself just fine, with a fraction of the budget. I think the problem is that the current development paradigm - the same one since launch - is poorly suited towards balance changes. A lot of balance is just in small numbers changes, and limiting yourself to three to four patches that are full of other large scale changes just makes that impossible. If they can use incremental patches every other week or so with nothing but bugfixes and small balance changes, they can cover much more ground much faster.

BardokRedSnow · February 5

Drackolus wrote: »

BardokRedSnow wrote: »

... Part of balancing subclassing is making mastery of a class, or specializing rather, actually important and meaningful. Making someone have to main said class is pretty much common sense in my opinion.

Can you explain how mastering the abcombination of three skill lines conflicts with having a greater variety of options? The releases of new classes didn't reduce the reward of mastering a chosen class until arguably Arcanist because the beam has too high of a reward with no real skill required. Subclassing didn't make it any easier, it just made the numbers for doing the same actions higher due to individual skill line specialization.

My humble vote is that you zos stick to your guns on this one. Otherwise there's very little reason to make more characters with different classes practically. I already main one character only, subclassing as is without the base class requirement makes it even less enticing to make more characters for me outside of RP which I haven't done in a good while.

I'm not entirely sure what your point here is. It seems like you're saying that you're not being extrinsically motivated to make new characters, when you already have little intrinsic motivation. What's the loss here?

This is the main reason why subclassing is unbalanced in the first place, any character can fully utilize any skill line.

That's clearly untrue. Subclassing both Arcanist and Necromancer reduces your ability to utilize the class mechanics, and reduces the amount of crux or corpses you have available, the benefits of doing so, and ways to use them. The trouble comes with the fact that group content will always heavily reward specialization, and the large sacrifices in potential durability and support don't mean anything, so sacrificing those for even small damage increase is worth it. That's why one of, if not the, biggest goals is to make every line offer something substantial for every role. One of my biggest comlaints with this version of the refresh is that it significantly reduces overall support ability in the whole class, and has a much higher focus on damage in all three lines. Pre-refresh Earthen Heart alone was better for tanks than all three of these combined, and there's still nothing worthwhile here for healers.

1 Subclassing has made pretty much everything easier because of the way skill lines are designed, meaning you can stack for healing, dps or tanking with zero cost. Pure classing in that case was immediately made weaker, this is why sweats use three damage lines like storm call, animal companion (shalks) and aedric spear, then use protective jewelry to make up for lack of damage reduction from a defensive skill line. Increasing the numbers as you put it is literally the point.

subclassing was introduced after arcanist was released so not sure what point you're making there, there's countless threads and videos about how subclassing has homogenized the game because everyone's using the same skills and skill lines. Almost everyone for instance in cyrodiil has animal companion for sustain and cleanse via betty netch, the 20 percent addition to sustain from the passive, and shalks burst.

2. If Im not motivated prior to subclassing to main another character for the classes, when I had to do so in order to enjoy other classes, why would I bother to now when I can substitute the other skill lines on a whim to try them out at no cost. I dont make a lot of characters or play the others i have much because I mainly like playing DK, and dont feel the need.

Subclassing pretty much erased any sort of pressure to make a character for me entirely because of its lack of cost in doing so. Why would anyone bother making more characters aside from rp, or not wanting to switch between pve and pvp gear when they can easily change out all 3 skill lines, use them to full potential and have them all leveled in an hour or less each.

Classes and having to level multiple characters adds what us single player fans call replayability. With this base class requirement, some of that returns. Most fans are not like me seemingly and live for more than just DK lol, but its still pretty obvious that people wont make multiple characters nearly as much if they don't have to.

Too much convenience is not good for an MMO, that's why grind is necessary.

3. Exactly, there's not enough cost and whatever you lost from not using all three skill lines of any class is easily supplemented by the damage increase you gain from subclassing others. Tankiness is easily gained by other means since you no longer have to put in as much for damage via jewelry or your mundus or even a damage set. This is why making a base class requirement is necessary.

People want things to be balanced but dont wanna lose power or be inconvenienced, and unfortunately that isn't possible. The problem with subclassing isn't just flat numerical value, its also the function of different skills and their buffs and how they interact with skills from other classes. That's what needs to be limited, and shuffling the skills around alone isn't enough.

ThePainGuy · February 5

@ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_Kevin @ZOS_Amy

Hello again. Wanted to follow up a previous post I made last week. I wanted to first apologize and admit i was wrong and pleasantly surprised. Saw the changes made to DK this week on PTS. You added some flavor back to the molten whip skill for PVP players. Much appreciated. It is evident that you are reading and listening to feedback and trying to implement changes as best you can to make the DK rework enjoyable to the masses. I will reiterate what I said last week that you have been doing a great job communicating with the player base throughout this PTS and I am hopeful this is the beginning of more great changes to come.

SneaK · February 5

We need less crit reliant builds not more.

Talons should be half the cost if you’re not changing it, at least it would be somewhat unique as a super cheap control ability.

Take Flight needs range.

Drackolus · February 5

BardokRedSnow wrote: »

1 Subclassing has made pretty much everything easier because of the way skill lines are designed, meaning you can stack for healing, dps or tanking with zero cost. Pure classing in that case was immediately made weaker, this is why sweats use three damage lines like storm call, animal companion (shalks) and aedric spear, then use protective jewelry to make up for lack of damage reduction from a defensive skill line. Increasing the numbers as you put it is literally the point.

subclassing was introduced after arcanist was released so not sure what point you're making there, there's countless threads and videos about how subclassing has homogenized the game because everyone's using the same skills and skill lines. Almost everyone for instance in cyrodiil has animal companion for sustain and cleanse via betty netch, the 20 percent addition to sustain from the passive, and shalks burst.

So, we agree that the problem stems from being able to select three more specialized lines. Solutions should, then, target that problem, no?

2. If Im not motivated prior to subclassing to main another character for the classes, when I had to do so in order to enjoy other classes, why would I bother to now when I can substitute the other skill lines on a whim to try them out at no cost. I dont make a lot of characters or play the others i have much because I mainly like playing DK, and dont feel the need.

Subclassing pretty much erased any sort of pressure to make a character for me entirely because of its lack of cost in doing so. Why would anyone bother making more characters aside from rp, or not wanting to switch between pve and pvp gear when they can easily change out all 3 skill lines, use them to full potential and have them all leveled in an hour or less each.

Classes and having to level multiple characters adds what us single player fans call replayability. With this base class requirement, some of that returns. Most fans are not like me seemingly and live for more than just DK lol, but its still pretty obvious that people wont make multiple characters nearly as much if they don't have to.

Too much convenience is not good for an MMO, that's why grind is necessary.

I agree that having access to individual skill lines could make levelling that class for that skill line pointless, but if you want more than one line from a class, you have to be that class. If you want your character to be based on plants AND animals, you have to be a Warden. Of course, if everything in a class for your chosen role is in one line anyway, it doesn't matter, because you're not using the other lines as a pure class because they don't really give you anything - again, a problem steming from role-specialized lines. Even being a Warden inhibits your ability to fit that theme, because plants are -only- healing, and animals are almost all damage, except for the aoe breaches and the free cleanses for tanks. This part of the problem existed before Subclassing.

3. Exactly, there's not enough cost and whatever you lost from not using all three skill lines of any class is easily supplemented by the damage increase you gain from subclassing others. Tankiness is easily gained by other means since you no longer have to put in as much for damage via jewelry or your mundus or even a damage set. This is why making a base class requirement is necessary.

The problem with that solution is that it doesn't address the core problem. It's an awkard restriction, not a fix. These versions don't even impact healers and tanks - which I guess is fine, because this version is just three specialized dps lines. The tiny bits of utility added aren't even competitive with weapon skills and scribing. In essence, what they did is a new set of Herald of the Tome/Assassination/Aedric spear, but these ones don't work unless you stick to the predefined cookie-cutter combinations. Don't use too many weapon skills, or guild skills, and heaven forbid trying to get experimental with subclassing.
This refresh is an example of the solution you propose, and the only thing it did was save you the time of going to the subclassing npc. And punishing you for being a tank in the traditional tank class.

People want things to be balanced but dont wanna lose power or be inconvenienced, and unfortunately that isn't possible. The problem with subclassing isn't just flat numerical value, its also the function of different skills and their buffs and how they interact with skills from other classes. That's what needs to be limited, and shuffling the skills around alone isn't enough.

The only arguments that I've heard against reducing power is the concern for trial groups who made extra progress after the power boost from subclassing suddenly not being able to complete the same content.

SneaK · February 5

Also feels like we’re trying to balance against other base classes, in no way shape or form does it seem the kits for DK in U49 are going to be optimal without subclassing.

BardokRedSnow · February 5

Drackolus wrote: »

BardokRedSnow wrote: »

1 Subclassing has made pretty much everything easier because of the way skill lines are designed, meaning you can stack for healing, dps or tanking with zero cost. Pure classing in that case was immediately made weaker, this is why sweats use three damage lines like storm call, animal companion (shalks) and aedric spear, then use protective jewelry to make up for lack of damage reduction from a defensive skill line. Increasing the numbers as you put it is literally the point.

subclassing was introduced after arcanist was released so not sure what point you're making there, there's countless threads and videos about how subclassing has homogenized the game because everyone's using the same skills and skill lines. Almost everyone for instance in cyrodiil has animal companion for sustain and cleanse via betty netch, the 20 percent addition to sustain from the passive, and shalks burst.

So, we agree that the problem stems from being able to select three more specialized lines. Solutions should, then, target that problem, no?

Sure. Why not both?

BardokRedSnow · February 5

SneaK wrote: »

Also feels like we’re trying to balance against other base classes, in no way shape or form does it seem the kits for DK in U49 are going to be optimal without subclassing.

Exactly, I was thinking from the start that until warden is addressed, DK will still be subclassing into it for cleanse and sustain. Worrying about the inbetween stage of the refresh is gonna hinder the whole thing, we can rebalance the classes once they're all done.

Drackolus · February 6

BardokRedSnow wrote: »

Sure. Why not both?

I'm not opposed to giving classes something substantial and unique for being that class. I do think it's better for a DK with Ardent Flame/Winter's Embrace/Stormcalling to be noticably different than a Sorcerer or Warden with the same skill lines. Where I don't agree is that it should be subtractive, rather than additive. Making skill lines not work when picked up becomes a needless trap.
I do also think that the same DK using Earthen Heart instead should be different too, and not by what role they choose to fill. Class sets and class mastery scripts aren't really sufficient. As others have suggested, having a unique passive, set of passives, or even a whole skill line, could fit this role. It shouldn't be required to make the skill lines work at all, though. I'd be wary of using actives for this just because they's have to be impactful enough that every member of that class wants to use them, but I worry that would change from a unique feature and become a skill bar slot tax. Maybe if it was something like a pool of skills, of which you only get to pick one could at least make it feel more of an opportunity than a restriction. Could sort of be seen as a second ultimate, in a way.
This is one of those things where it's hard to test, just because it's intensive to make and might need to be swapped entirely if it doesn't work out, as opposed to something that is almost guaranteed to have positive results, like (actually successfuly) changing skill lines to be thematically and mechanically specialized, rather than role specialized.
I can see why they'd want to save Arcanist for last, since it already has the most "modern" visuals, and because it's such an egregious offender that it could require some pretty substantial changes. Some skill lines will need to be thematically reimagined. "Curative Runeforms" and "Restoring Light" should be renamed entirely, because those names are very role-focused.

s3dulo · February 6

SneaK wrote: »

Also feels like we’re trying to balance against other base classes, in no way shape or form does it seem the kits for DK in U49 are going to be optimal without subclassing.

I think you're right. I don't think ZOS's goal was ever to get pure DK competitive.. I think they just wanted to do the best they could in a couple of weeks. I had hoped we'd see a big increase in pure DK running around in because it was just so good but I doubt that will happen now. I think a lot more builds will be running one DK line but we will soon find it's just better subclassed.

I maintain there should be an escalating bonus for each DK skill line being run. I also think they should have leaned toward a little too OP and then dialed it back if it proved too much. DK had it's moment, it's in a better place, but subclassing is still king.

Hopefully I'm wrong about that.