No class should be balanced around one AA
- Thread starter Boehm
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donfolstar3
Dalayan Master
Yes. Mind Wrack is a great spell that receiving an upgrade would help necros from running out of steam, improve desirability, and also fix the age old question of why-do-sks-take-this-very-necro-tap-line-further-than-necros? Wrack and Zevfeer's rolled into one dual upgrade would be a lot more desirable than the runic that poops on two relics.
^That, improving dots across the board, and removing FC and giving an AA that is useful without becoming centric to the class (like Fever Pitch) would be some good major fixes. Making Leechstorm suck less, Lich durations, and relicpet<frogdps? would be good minor fixes.
Temellin
*Gnomalicious*
Just chiming in to say that the idea of removing festering curse and providing a boost to DoT damage is wonderful; it would go a long way in making necromancers more useful in shorter duration fights. I liked the 'super-mode' or pet based 'super-mode' ideas but those seem to fall into the problem of one AA providing a nice DPS boost and wanting to be used on every fight. If you want a DPS boost AA, keep festering curse, for long fights it provides a huge benefit; if you want to advocate the removal of festering curse with the DPS loss being replaced by boosting DoT damage across the necromancer's spell set then shouldn't you instead focus on utility AAs? I think that the healing ideas / 'raise the dead' pet-AI player revival ideas are very novel and could be pretty cool.
Perhaps, if festering curse is being removed and the DPS loss is being made up for by boosting DoTs, the AA could be changed to a necromancer pet buff; Some sort of 'Blood Ritual' that harms you upon initial casting but places a buff on your pet makes them ~BETTER~ if it is a constantly up ability maybe a decent boost to HP/AC/Resistances or if it is shorter duration perhaps a heal (It could be a life flow to flavorize the 'Blood Ritual' aspect of the AA), large defensive boost, with an improved lifetap proc? The idea being that it is not something absolutely necessary for a fight, but that it can help you keep one of your pet going if the going gets tough allowing you to maintain one of the, albeit minor compared to your DoTs, facets of your DPS.
Perhaps, if festering curse is being removed and the DPS loss is being made up for by boosting DoTs, the AA could be changed to a necromancer pet buff; Some sort of 'Blood Ritual' that harms you upon initial casting but places a buff on your pet makes them ~BETTER~ if it is a constantly up ability maybe a decent boost to HP/AC/Resistances or if it is shorter duration perhaps a heal (It could be a life flow to flavorize the 'Blood Ritual' aspect of the AA), large defensive boost, with an improved lifetap proc? The idea being that it is not something absolutely necessary for a fight, but that it can help you keep one of your pet going if the going gets tough allowing you to maintain one of the, albeit minor compared to your DoTs, facets of your DPS.
marshak
Dalayan Beginner
that's a neat idea
Brimztone
Dalayan Elder
Just curious, but:
If Festering Curse was removed and DoT damage increased across the board to bring Necros more in line, why would a DPS Cooldown be a bad thing? I think it would be great and I think more classes need short cooldown DPS Cooldowns that you can use every attempt.
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Nodnal
Dalayan Elder
As long as you can use it every attempt (raid bosses obviously) then it would be fine.
Brimztone
Dalayan Elder
That is what I meant by fight. Should have put attempt there yeah.
Temellin
*Gnomalicious*
Yeah, I was basically saying that I would want to avoid implementing a new DPS cool down thing that would essentially be Festering 2.0; If it is a small dps thing with a short cool down that could be fine but a good DPS boost with a long cool down could easily fall into the same problem that Festering has now. If Festering is taken out and the DPS loss is compensated for by a DoT boost then a utility AA would seem, from my perspective, more useful/neat than a DPS one.
donfolstar3
Dalayan Master
Since it seems like every necro and their mom seems to agree that FC needs to go and dots be boosted to compensate I'd like to repeat an idea from earlier in this thread that got little response (not even a stfu):
Fever Pitch
5 cast time
1 min CD
unresistable
Consumer all dots [exclude splurt] on the target doing all remaining damage instantly. Can crit.
Rorne suggested a very similar idea that would do AoE damage based off a % or something, either would be good for patching holes in the necro arsenal. It would have applications in solo, group, and raid settings- especially in fast burn groups and during the last 20% or so on bosses when necro efficiency plummets right into the crapper.
...
Oh, I also had this amazing totally new original idea to change Leechstorm into an AA called Lichstorm that is basically just a more powerful version of Mind Wrack to turn a ~useless AA into something useful. Just thought of it, out of the blue.
Fever Pitch
5 cast time
1 min CD
unresistable
Consumer all dots [exclude splurt] on the target doing all remaining damage instantly. Can crit.
Rorne suggested a very similar idea that would do AoE damage based off a % or something, either would be good for patching holes in the necro arsenal. It would have applications in solo, group, and raid settings- especially in fast burn groups and during the last 20% or so on bosses when necro efficiency plummets right into the crapper.
...
Oh, I also had this amazing totally new original idea to change Leechstorm into an AA called Lichstorm that is basically just a more powerful version of Mind Wrack to turn a ~useless AA into something useful. Just thought of it, out of the blue.
This would be hard to pull off; if it specifically happens when the DoT wears off, we'd have to do some complicated code gymnastics to reapply the DoT without interrupting any spell you may be casting at the time. Plus I just worry that it would be easy to miss or throw off your casting cycle when it does happen.
Although to go along with the "sustainable slow DPS" concept maybe something like this:
Strands of Life -> Something: whenever one of your DoT ticks crits, you receive 25%/50%/75%/100% of the spell's adjusted mana cost divided by the maximum number of ticks for the DoT. So if you had rank 4 and lucked out and had a DoT crit on every tick, you'd be refunded all the mana you spent on it. But on average your mana would last crit-chance% longer.
donfolstar3
Dalayan Master
While I love this idea and want to marry it and renew our vows ever sunday and make a million babies it is disconcerting that this is a gigantic bandaid for tomed players only over a core problem of efficiency/sustained damage. Though, I don't mind getting two ideas from it:
1. Make returned mana on dot crits an INNATE bonus of certain dots (Pyro on up? minus Sivyana- suck it Shaman you already have infinite mana). This would be similar in function to, but distinct from, Arcane Echo. As you point out the concept fits the sustained dps model but in this case would be a class fix instead of just an endgame fix. [edit: More of a class fix at any rate, obviously it would still be endgamish, but benefit tens of necros instead of about ten necros]
2. Attach the existing benefits of Strands of Life to something other than kill shots. As Drezin (and others have also I am sure) pointed out in the smoothing thread:
Either when a dot runs its duration (which is an eww ick shit idea for many groups but still beats praying for a killshot) or reduce the effect and make it a rider on any taps which would:
-get more mileage out of tap line which drops from half a health bar amazing at 60 to pretty bleh
-make duration dots total winners instead of "shit, I wish I got anything that wasn't this dot" moments in Erimal [hey, we have a shared experience with Druids!]
-wait for it....
-make Leechstorm fucking amazing
P.S.
Oh wait, that bit about Erimal doesn't make any damn sense since most Necros will have their relics long before getting to this tome... well I like the Druid zing so it is staying!
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Boehm
Dalayan Elder
My thoughts:
1. Insidious Elements - Being old and generally wanting kids to stay off my lawn, I was predisposed to hate this, but I like it. It gives utility to a tome that in its new form was bad as the spread mechanic never worked properly for scitterpox, and this carried over to include HB. Also, the cast time on scitterpox precludes it from most group uses.
Its utility is also dependent on me which I like. The only thing I could ask is there any way that scitterpox could have it's cast dropped by half a second to a second to somewhere between 5.5 and base 6. There are some raids where it really can't be used because you can't stand still that long.
Also, HB doesn't cut the spell bar. It does bad damage for too much mana, except under the circumstance where the necro is carrying the group. Because then the damage can be realized over the minute of timed damage, instead of simply lost. Can the recast be cut to like 5 seconds so it can concieveably be put up if a use arises? However unlikely that use may be.
2. Strands of Life - Is very good tome still and I would like to keep it the way it is. It does something very important for us, which is it provides a group buff for a class which is pretty meh in xp groups.
Yes, we get mez , rez and can pull to compensate for doing half the damage for about twice the adjusted mana cost of everyone else, but really no one really cares about those. Even classes that can also rez with a reagent seldom carry that article. if it was important they all would. And no one really wants us pulling.
Healers like getting an extra piece of mana a couple times every 5 minutes and, frankly, that might be enough to get in a group over another rogue or ranger.
It just means you have to time a lifetap or spam infernus for the luck shot, which is ok.
3. On extra mana regen - On this, I suggested a timed, burst lich scalable with hp since that should cover lower level necros as well. If this is not acceptable, then could leeching servant be changed to allow 10/20/30/40% increase to the effect of the worn lich? Zurkka suggested this
4. @ poster above, I don't really get the obsession with leechstorm. We would be better off asking for whisperwind for class flavor, since aoe fear will never work that way here. if it worked indoors it would help with pulling, which we occasionally do. or just getting away which is part of our raid utility.
1. Insidious Elements - Being old and generally wanting kids to stay off my lawn, I was predisposed to hate this, but I like it. It gives utility to a tome that in its new form was bad as the spread mechanic never worked properly for scitterpox, and this carried over to include HB. Also, the cast time on scitterpox precludes it from most group uses.
Its utility is also dependent on me which I like. The only thing I could ask is there any way that scitterpox could have it's cast dropped by half a second to a second to somewhere between 5.5 and base 6. There are some raids where it really can't be used because you can't stand still that long.
Also, HB doesn't cut the spell bar. It does bad damage for too much mana, except under the circumstance where the necro is carrying the group. Because then the damage can be realized over the minute of timed damage, instead of simply lost. Can the recast be cut to like 5 seconds so it can concieveably be put up if a use arises? However unlikely that use may be.
2. Strands of Life - Is very good tome still and I would like to keep it the way it is. It does something very important for us, which is it provides a group buff for a class which is pretty meh in xp groups.
Yes, we get mez , rez and can pull to compensate for doing half the damage for about twice the adjusted mana cost of everyone else, but really no one really cares about those. Even classes that can also rez with a reagent seldom carry that article. if it was important they all would. And no one really wants us pulling.
Healers like getting an extra piece of mana a couple times every 5 minutes and, frankly, that might be enough to get in a group over another rogue or ranger.
It just means you have to time a lifetap or spam infernus for the luck shot, which is ok.
3. On extra mana regen - On this, I suggested a timed, burst lich scalable with hp since that should cover lower level necros as well. If this is not acceptable, then could leeching servant be changed to allow 10/20/30/40% increase to the effect of the worn lich? Zurkka suggested this
4. @ poster above, I don't really get the obsession with leechstorm. We would be better off asking for whisperwind for class flavor, since aoe fear will never work that way here. if it worked indoors it would help with pulling, which we occasionally do. or just getting away which is part of our raid utility.
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donfolstar3
Dalayan Master
So... changing Strands of Life to something more reliable/steady would be bad because it better fulfills your entire rationale for liking Strands of Life? With the recent smoothing changes you would think that moving towards a more reliable and predictable Strands would be right in step with the overall plan.
As for my Leechstorm obsession it is mostly just my own little joke. The beauty of a Strands-on-taps change is that Leechstorm would no longer need to be changed at all because it would go from being an awful AA that has repeatedly been the subject of player scorn and requests for change (which is the source of my obsession I guess) into a pretty amazing AA assuming each target tapped triggered the suggested new Strands effect. Also, strands-on-taps does all that other stuff I mentioned and makes decent enough sense.
Strands of Life. Life tap. Get it?
Zaela's idea to tie a mana return mechanic into crits is amazing. Fucking amazing. It scales and perfectly fits/fixes the class model of sustained dps. Whether it is a tome (bye Leeching) or a baked in mechanic (Soul Burst? Spirit Drain? Life Rupture?) it would be a change that makes this whole thread worth it a dozen times over. How is anyone not talking about it?
Silosobi
Dalayan Pious Diety
Changing strands just doesnt make sense to me when you have another much worse class tome.
I like the mana for crits idea, but those numbers seem too high. That isnt to say necros shouldnt be helped (i havnt seen enough new parses to say either way), but a ~30% boost to sustainability from 4 class tomes seems like quite a lot. Maybe make the tome 10% per rank for a total of 12% bonus, and then add in the super lich AA thing to give necros a sustainability boost before they have to grind out a bunch of tomes.
I like the mana for crits idea, but those numbers seem too high. That isnt to say necros shouldnt be helped (i havnt seen enough new parses to say either way), but a ~30% boost to sustainability from 4 class tomes seems like quite a lot. Maybe make the tome 10% per rank for a total of 12% bonus, and then add in the super lich AA thing to give necros a sustainability boost before they have to grind out a bunch of tomes.
donfolstar3
Dalayan Master
...hooray?
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