Spell Casting Subtlety AA

Glamrin

Glamrin

Staff Emeritus
This aa currently makes NPC's notice magical activities 5, 10 and 20 percent less. One of the issues is that it is given to SK's as well as to casters.

I realise that it isnt possible to remove it for SK's or to change it without changing it for every class who can learn it.

However, I do have a suggestion for a change that might make it work for all classes!
Would it be possible to change this aa to be a percentage modifier to the characters Agression?
That way this aa would decrease agro generation for classes with minus agression modifiers (ie casters) and increase it for those with positive agression modifiers: ie sk's (and bards who chose to gear that way). As an added bonus it would make it scale with gear.
 
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It took me.. quite a while to figure out what you were saying. Im still not sure if I have it right.

Basically, a percentage of worn modifiers. IE, worn modifiers of +10 agression with the AA maxed would now have +12, and vice versa. So instead of being a constant percentage reduction, the percentage change (up or down) is based on gear.

Good idea, if its doable.
 
yes, and if you have -10 agression it would be -10 x 1.2 = -12 agression! :) ie the beauty of it ! percentages might have to be tweaked to give equal effect but yeah.
 
Glamrin said:
This aa currently makes NPC's notice magical activities 5, 10 and 20 percent less. One of the issues is that it is given to SK's as well as to casters.

I realise that it isnt possible to remove it for SK's or to change it without changing it for every class who can learn it.

However, I do have a suggestion for a change that might make it work for all classes!
Would it be possible to change this aa to be a percentage modifier to the characters Agression?
That way this aa would decrease agro generation for classes with minus agression modifiers (ie casters) and increase it for those with positive agression modifiers: ie sk's (and bards who chose to gear that way). As an added bonus it would make it scale with gear.
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I *LOVE* this idea. As a bard who has chosen not to purchase this AA because sometimes I do want aggro (as I am often a group MT or offtank, and in some raid situations where I end up tanking) and I don't want to diminish that versatility. If this could be changed I would stop tome'ing and buy it ASAP.

Both bards and sk's already have tools they can use if they want to dump aggro (Jolt and FD, respectively).

Yay for modular AAs!
 
Since it's already 20% less aggro, would it be possible to boost the percentages to say 10, 25, 50%?


This way it would provide at most 1, 2.5 and 5 aggression (with max +10% worn aggression). Unless that's overpowered for +aggression, I don't see any problem with it since it's already -20% when maxed regularly.
 
Code wise it's doable, though we'd have to mess with percentages to make it not suck for int casters frankly. We'll run it through some tests and admin decisions, and get back to you guys.
 
The only issue I see with it is the AA becomes gear dependant. Players that do not have the gear but already bought the AA lose the benefit from it. Any way to make it work both ways without involving gear?
 
Emiljon said:
Since it's already 20% less aggro, would it be possible to boost the percentages to say 10, 25, 50%?


This way it would provide at most 1, 2.5 and 5 aggression (with max +10% worn aggression). Unless that's overpowered for +aggression, I don't see any problem with it since it's already -20% when maxed regularly.
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This gets at what Tyrsell said about numbers, but it could easily go up to 200% to provide equal effect for what it does now (aggression is capped at 10%, 10% x (1 + 200%) = 30%, which is the same as maxed -aggression casters have with the current AA.

My concern would be balancing this on the + side against those classes which do not get this AA (specficially Warriors).

As for making it not dependent on gear, that ruins the scalability of the AA. Scalability is a good thing, and might be compensated for by some itemization tweaks at the low end.
 
GuiardoTuneweaver said:
This gets at what Tyrsell said about numbers, but it could easily go up to 200% to provide equal effect for what it does now (aggression is capped at 10%, 10% x (1 + 200%) = 30%, which is the same as maxed -aggression casters have with the current AA.

My concern would be balancing this on the + side against those classes which do not get this AA (specficially Warriors).
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Exactly what I was thinking.

Though the fact that SKs get this AA might be beneficial in restoring them as the #1 single target aggro holders (I don't know if they are or aren't now, but people speculate that they aren't). Paladins would still be AoE tanks, warriors would still be #1 mitigation, and then this would seal the deal on SKs being #1 in single target aggro.
 
Emiljon said:
Exactly what I was thinking.

Though the fact that SKs get this AA might be beneficial in restoring them as the #1 single target aggro holders (I don't know if they are or aren't now, but people speculate that they aren't). Paladins would still be AoE tanks, warriors would still be #1 mitigation, and then this would seal the deal on SKs being #1 in single target aggro.
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agreed, but imo they could still use a better terror because its hard to max +aggr in the low tiers, hell minlas also doesnt have it capped: +7 and hes a top tier knight
 
I'm hereby disregarding anything, anyone says, if they claim SK's don't aren't currently the best single target aggro in the game. Because clearly you are disregarding what I'm saying, and certainly aren't testing anything.


Back on topic. Such a change would require substantial itemization changes, at all tiers. The gains, if any, will certainly have to be measured against adding a great deal of +/- aggression on items all over the place.
 
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I'd prefer if we can keep this thread to the aa in question since changing it would be a good thing regardless of any agro changes. Atm it's not only an unused aa for sk's and bards but more importantly its one of those "irrevokable paths" aa's where if someone accidentally (or for some unknown reason) were to learn it, it would completely ruin his or her character. A sk with -20% agro would be pretty screwed. a bard with -20% agro would be fine in raids but might have more trouble on his own or grouping and would probably regret learning it at more than one time. (and at other times would wish he had that aa). For the bard the aa would become very useful since he could switch gear for raids/groups/solo to make it great. For the sk, it would remove a risk of making character worthless by one missclick and if the total would give him more agro, then that would be agro that scales with tier... which would also be pretty neat. And ofcourse... modular aa's that fix original eq misstakes are really really awesome.
 
Just to clarify, this AA is currently amazing for bards. Any bard who tells you otherwise is a poopyhead.

However, it is pretty lackluster for shadowknights. Is this a reason to revamp the AA for all other classes? Maybe, but like Zak has stated, this would require a lot of work on backgearing and gear in general for bards and intelligence casters. Almost every class gets an AA that is fairly worthless (singing mastery for bards comes to mind, maybe even a few more). I am not sure if an overhaul is the way to go just for one class unless it can be balanced like it is for all of the current classes that can make use of it.

It would also be the only AA that scales specifically with gear, unless I am not thinking of something. Though I really like the idea behind it, I do not think that the original effects can be replicated easily.
 
a bard can be played in many quite different ways. many would disagree... After a quick look, there seem to be more top tier bards who dont have it than who have gotten it. When farming with your bard and druid or bard and cleric its quite nice to have as much agro as possible, especially on the multiple pulls. When grouping and you end up tanking, which does happen now and then, its also nice to have agro... -20% agro on your pbae songs is quite a lot. on raids when an extra tank is needed bards often end up filling that spot, especially if its about kiting multiple adds for example and in those scenarios you will also be wanting that agro.

But yes, I realise that it would be a lot of work. I do think it would be worth it though... and not even only for sk's and bards. What with new gear and tomes, agro generation on top tier casters go up, and this will continue to happen as long as the game keeps being developed. Changing the aa to lower agro more for higher tier casters than for lower tiers will keep things more balanced in the long run.
 
The times bards tank is very situational, and even in the times you describe, the AA won't affect it often. When farming (duoing) I have never had any issues holding aggro on 6+ mobs even on the low end. Healing aggro is very low on SoD, so that has never been an issue. On raids, we can offtank a single target with our nukes just fine, and again, I have had no issues holding aggro on a mob I offtanked on a raid unless a SK or paladin is intentionally fighting with me. As far as grouping goes...if a bard is tanking over other classes (monk, ranger, paladin, shadowknight, paladin and warrior), I would assume that the bard is over geared compared to the other classes, and would not have a hard time tanking multiple mobs. Even when our tank went down in FR, Felyn has tanked 3-4 mobs at a time while being healed. As long as you know what you are doing, you can hold aggro just fine. (I have the AA, the negative aggro tome, -3% aggro from items and a mace that procs -100 aggro and still don't have issues getting aggro from anyone but our knights who are working hard for aggro).

The point I am trying to make is that the AA is very useful for bards. The bards who don't take advantage of it choose to do so for their own reasons. The AA is completely worthless (no good reason to get it at all) for SK. So again, the revamp would be for one specific class who cannot use it at all, while the current AA is either great (for bards) or just down right necessary (intelligence casters).

All I am saying is that I do not think that an overhaul for one class, when it affects many, is necessary.
 
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Could the AA just be changed to create the exception for SK's? So if an SK bought the AA it would give them +Agro instead of -Agro? To me this seems like the best fix and also the easiest. Change the AA description to say "If your an SK, it does this instead" just like melee mastery(?) has a different effect for beastlords.

It's a nice idea to let bards switch back and forth but there doesnt seem to be a consensus from bards on this matter.
 
good thread good ideas maybe we should put it on a list of vary long aa's that would be nice to be moded ;) j/k keep up the good work
 
if these types of changes can be made, can "combat ferocity" be made to positively influence int caster dodge? or make an attacker x% imprecise? I don't know many casters who melee.
 
Boehm said:
if these types of changes can be made, can "combat ferocity" be made to positively influence int caster dodge? or make an attacker x% imprecise? I don't know many casters who melee.
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Priests have pretty solid melee, esp with this AA. Also you have to consider pet classes that share this AA with their pets....
 
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