Next Step After This Amazing Update

DestroyerPewnack · June 9

Now that pure classes have been buffed, (and with that, we got some much needed variety back,) I think it's time to look into something similar to class mastery, but for attribute/resource focusing.
For example, a global buff that only gets applied if 4 out of your 5 abilities pull from the same resource (either magicka or stamina) and if you have a matching weapon type, (staves for magicka, everything else for stamina.) This buff could take the form of a slight boost to weapon/spell damage, and a huge boost to the chosen resource's recovery, to help with sustain.
The beauty of U50 is that, without ZOS having to admit that subclassing was a mistake, it brought back variety by buffing pure classes. In one fell swoop, fun gets added back to the game, and ZOS's ego remains intact.
Resource mastery would achieve the same result, with magicka and stamina specs making a comeback, and ZOS will never feel the need to admit that hybridization was a big mistake.

Jsmalls · June 9

As much as no one wants to hear it. The next step needs to be a Nerf. But I suppose that should probably come after the last class rework

Everyone is giga juiced now. Dying requires the focus of 2-4+ players. Sustain is through the roof. Movement speed is insane.

Werewolves can burst heal for 40k, DKs, Templars and Wardens can all do the same. DKs have 10k+ spammables. Magicka Sorcerers have 25k shields, Stam Sorcs have 10k hps. Etc etc

Cyrodiil is on X-games mode right now.

I don't know maybe it'll all balance out at the end of class reworks but Cyrodiil is a mad house right now. Pure classes do seem competitive again though so that's a plus.

AcadianPaladin · June 9

Neither subclassing nor hybridization were mistakes. I enjoy them both very much and the two features have given me tons of variety and flexibility. Returning to everyone being a pure magic/stam pure class does not add variety. I don't care/mind if those options are on par with hybridization and/or subclassing options but not at the expense of penalizing those of us who enjoy both hybridization and subclassing.

tsaescishoeshiner · June 9

I think this is already worked into the armor system and its cost reductions. I think that enhancing the feel and power of weapon spammables would help make mag vs stam feel more distinct.

CatalinaWineMixer2 · June 10

Pure Class - The characters that paid for your game. The broken cherry picking system known as Subclass brought this about. Remove it. In no way whatsoever should Pure Classes have been put on the back burner or made to be inferior and they WERE. This will never be forgotten. You want 'set and forget', we already had that before buff and skill shopping with Subclass. You want 'Herald of the Flame" create a Class and institute RULES for it with passives you can't cherry pick. It needs to go away. People need variety, not build of the month. Wait more years for the refresh isn't the answer. It never should have been this way for over a year. We need combat rules published and instituted by Zos. No one will ever agree. It has to be you @Zos

Luneca · June 10

AcadianPaladin wrote: »

Neither subclassing nor hybridization were mistakes. I enjoy them both very much and the two features have given me tons of variety and flexibility. Returning to everyone being a pure magic/stam pure class does not add variety. I don't care/mind if those options are on par with hybridization and/or subclassing options but not at the expense of penalizing those of us who enjoy both hybridization and subclassing.

Even in the time of the "pure" stam / mag, I still ran a hybrid build and still completed vMA and other arenas with no issue. I used one in PvP and had great success, though curse eater and Rally was really powerful back then when each tick of Rally counted as a direct heal (no longer the case because Rally no longer is an HoT).

Initially I started running hybrids in PvP in 2015-2016 because I got annoyed at how dumb negate was on my mag builds. I said "I'm slotting stam skills" and my brother laughed until he saw it was possible to use it and still achieve great success.

The Genie won't be put back into the bottle for a number of reasons. Unifying weapon and spell damage was a good change that probably also alleviated issues on the backend. Not to mention improving balance and allowing us to use ALL the sets in the game instead of a select few IF we want to.

Nothing stops any of these players from not engaging with what they don't like. It makes zero sense for everyone to have to suffer or go back because some people don't like change. If they don't like it, the have the power to not participate in the changes, though I'm pretty sure there's absolutely no one that is seriously running 100% stam or mag skills and there never was anyway.

MasterSpatula · June 10

There is absolutely no defense or excuse for what hybridization did to light armor, to staves, and to magica builds in general. As soon as the team saw that even those few players who were running stacked mag in high-end content were doing it in medium armor with two daggers, it should have been a five-alarm "no-one-sleeps-until-we-fix-this-disaster" priority. They didn't. They haven't.

They know what they did, and they seem fine with it. Don't count on them ever acknowledging it as a mistake.

Gabriel_H · June 10

DestroyerPewnack wrote: »

Now that pure classes have been buffed, (and with that, we got some much needed variety back,) I think it's time to look into something similar to class mastery, but for attribute/resource focusing.
For example, a global buff that only gets applied if 4 out of your 5 abilities pull from the same resource (either magicka or stamina) and if you have a matching weapon type, (staves for magicka, everything else for stamina.) This buff could take the form of a slight boost to weapon/spell damage, and a huge boost to the chosen resource's recovery, to help with sustain.
The beauty of U50 is that, without ZOS having to admit that subclassing was a mistake, it brought back variety by buffing pure classes. In one fell swoop, fun gets added back to the game, and ZOS's ego remains intact.
Resource mastery would achieve the same result, with magicka and stamina specs making a comeback, and ZOS will never feel the need to admit that hybridization was a big mistake.

ZOS would have to redo every skill, altering its resource and damage type. My Tank as an Example:

Bar 1 - My main taunt, plus skills that do not have long active times
Slot 1: Stamina
Slot 2: Stamina
Slot 3: Magicka (C)
Slot 4: Stamina
Slot 5: Does not consume a resource (C)

Bar 2 - My ranged taunt, plus skills that do have long active times
Slot 1: Magicka
Slot 2: Magicka (C)
Slot 3: Stamina (C)
Slot 4: Stamina (C)
Slot 5: Magicka (C)

Or how about my DD:

Bar 1 - My primary ground AoE and main spammable, plus skills that do not have long active times
Slot 1: Stamina (C)
Slot 2: Stamina (C)
Slot 3: Stamina (C)
Slot 4: Magicka (C)
Slot 5: Does not consume a resource (C)

Bar 2 - My secondary ground AoE, plus skills that do have long active times
Slot 1: Stamina
Slot 2: Magicka (C)
Slot 3: Magicka (C)
Slot 4: Magicka
Slot 5: Stamina (C)

(C) - Denotes class skill

There are also skills that consume Health as a resource.

My setup is not unique in terms of long active times on one bar, short active & spammable on the other.

Usureki · June 10

As for resources I think it's a much greater problem, that while you have 64 points to spend in three buckets, in reality you have to make just 1 decision: select one and dump all your points in it. If you are super creative, you may do 50-50% or 33-64% with two attributes, but most of the time its just one go all the way.

The way spell and weapon damage scales and how healing is related to both (bruh) we enable hybrid gameplay, but at the cost of losing meaning between weapon and spell power, which is very lame from both lore and character building standpoints. I'm a very talented and highly educated wizard, so I can bash my mace with the same power as Shrek can cast fireballs. Like.. what the hell

I'd love to see actual attributes like we had in Oblivion and see our stats be calculated based on those attributes instead.

Deserrick · June 10

Jsmalls wrote: »

As much as no one wants to hear it. The next step needs to be a Nerf. But I suppose that should probably come after the last class rework

Everyone is giga juiced now. Dying requires the focus of 2-4+ players. Sustain is through the roof. Movement speed is insane.

Werewolves can burst heal for 40k, DKs, Templars and Wardens can all do the same. DKs have 10k+ spammables. Magicka Sorcerers have 25k shields, Stam Sorcs have 10k hps. Etc etc

Cyrodiil is on X-games mode right now.

I don't know maybe it'll all balance out at the end of class reworks but Cyrodiil is a mad house right now. Pure classes do seem competitive again though so that's a plus.

Yes, more nerfs would be great for balance/variety. The change to multiplier stacking was a good way of bringing certain combinations in line with others, and they could go even farther with that. Soft caps would also help alleviate stacking issues.

DestroyerPewnack · June 10

Luneca wrote: »

Nothing stops any of these players from not engaging with what they don't like. It makes zero sense for everyone to have to suffer or go back because some people don't like change. If they don't like it, the have the power to not participate in the changes, though I'm pretty sure there's absolutely no one that is seriously running 100% stam or mag skills and there never was anyway.

Some players want to carry their own weight when engaging with endgame content, and not drag their group down. Maybe you don't care about your group, or you don't engage with endgame content, but for us, we will always want to play the strongest builds.

With subclassing, the strongest builds used the exact same gear, with almost exactly the same skills. So, yes. Something was stopping us from playing the way we wanted, and we were forced to engage with these systems.

With U50, some class-exclusive sets have been buffed, and you get rewarded for playing a pure class. And most classes perform very well. Meaning, you have more choices, and neither you nor your group will get punished for that choice.

As for your claim that there never was anyone running 100% stam or mag skills; you are simply wrong. Plenty of people did that, before hybridization was introduced. In fact, there would have been no point in mixing up skills, because as a stam character, for example, your mag abilities didn't scale with your weapon damage/max stam, so they would have been super weak. The only time you'd use an ability that didn't match your attributes would have been for utility's sake, like magicka-based characters running barbed trap to gain access to the buff it gives, and the passives from the fighters guild skill line.