The State of Zeal

[ZeroTakenaka]

Ever since the change of Zeal to a doublestrike bonus, I notice I don't use it as much.

What is everyone's thoughts on the Zeal to doublestrike thing?

[Iambeastx]

CBA to use it most the time now, on my monks instead now and feat exchanged one to dark side

[BellCurve]

Totally pointless imo. It costs 25sp for just over 2 minutes of a 10% chance to doublestrike WHEN I hit with the first (which now hits less frequently) strike. Too high a cost for a very low chance of return. You will do more damage by keeping swinging than you will by briefly stopping to cast this spell and hoping it pays off when you start swinging again over the two minutes.

There are many other spells with immediate and more consistent results - why play the chance lottery for the same cost as the prize?

[Gercho]

Totally pointless imo. It costs 25sp for just over 2 minutes of a 10% chance to doublestrike WHEN I hit with the first (which now hits less frequently) strike. Too high a cost for a very low chance of return. You will do more damage by keeping swinging than you will by briefly stopping to cast this spell and hoping it pays off when you start swinging again over the two minutes.

There are many other spells with immediate and more consistent results - why play the chance lottery for the same cost as the prize?

This makes no sense, 10% double strike chance is the same than 5% attack speed boost for twf, and its a 10% speed boost for thf paladins, obviously zeal is worst than before for twf, but still really worthy on any paladin, not that you have much else to do with your spell points really.
Btw, its not clear that an attack generated by double strike doesnt has a possibility to get an off hand attack aswell, in that case for twf zeal would be the equivalent of 9% attack speed boost.

[Comfortably]

I too find that 25 spell points for a 10% increase to DPS totally worthless. Please just finish us off and remove it from the game already.

[BellCurve]

Allow me to clarify -

I need to hit first to run the 10% chance of generating another main hand attack. I am not guaranteed to hit on either.

I am totally confused how you can equate a 'chance to generate another attack' with a 'speed increase'. The chance to generate the attack is low, it is not guaranteed and it is bound by further factors such as your capacity to miss even if this attack is generated.

What is my attack speed increase if I miss over the spell duration or only hit once or twice? That you can attribute a speed to this and even go so far as to give that speed a fixed value seems a stretch.

The prior form of a 10% increase in speed (a fixed speed increase over a fixed period) is hugely more powerful than the current 1/10 chance to make another main hand attack (a chance based action that has further diminishment on returns in the form of misses).

I'm not trying to be smart or condescending I just fail to see the parallels you draw - if you can enlighten me I will have learned something and be glad of it.

[Gercho]

Allow me to clarify -

I need to hit first to run the 10% chance of generating another main hand attack. I am not guaranteed to hit on either.

I am totally confused how you can equate a 'chance to generate another attack' with a 'speed increase'. The chance to generate the attack is low, it is not guaranteed and it is bound by further factors such as your capacity to miss even if this attack is generated.

What is my attack speed increase if I miss over the spell duration or only hit once or twice? That you can attribute a speed to this and even go so far as to give that speed a fixed value seems a stretch.

The prior form of a 10% increase in speed (a fixed speed increase over a fixed period) is hugely more powerful than the current 1/10 chance to make another main hand attack (a chance based action that has further diminishment on returns in the form of misses).

I'm not trying to be smart or condescending I just fail to see the parallels you draw - if you can enlighten me I will have learned something and be glad of it.

Lets suppose you are THF to simplify things and that you never miss, i m not saying that every time you cast zeal, you will generate exactly 10% extra attacks, sometimes you will be lucky and generate more, other times you will be unlucky and generate less. In the long run, on average you will generate 10% more attacks while you have zeal.

Ok, you will miss sometimes, first of all, i m not sure that if you miss you dont have a 10% of generating an extra attack anyway, but even if thats the case, you should miss only 5% of the time in most situations (maybe epic could be different), so if you miss 5% of the time and missing hits dont have a chance of producing a second hit, then zeal instead of being equivalent to 10% attack bonus, its 9.75%, thats if you dont take into account divine sacrifices and smites, that will have a 10% chance of generating another divine sacrifice hit or smite hit, so they are aproximately 10% better than before for a thf paladin.
For twf its similar just that only your main attacks have a chance to generate a second strike, as your main attacks are more than 50% of your total attacks (about 55%) zeal is equivalent in the long run to a 5.5% attack speed.


Now, if you miss a lot, AND zeal doesnt works on missed shots, then zeal could be worst than that, but as i said, any paladin that is high lvl enough to cast zeal, should be hitting with 2 or more all the time, except maybe on epics.

[Ormindo]

It is good for THFs.

Though, it seems they nerfed it twice without saying it. When the update went live, I tried it out - Zeal was still awesome, two swings, two swings, one swing, one swing, one swing, two swings...

Now, I rarely see it trigger (I'm THF).

[ZeroTakenaka]

Totally pointless imo. It costs 25sp for just over 2 minutes of a 10% chance to doublestrike WHEN I hit with the first (which now hits less frequently) strike. Too high a cost for a very low chance of return. You will do more damage by keeping swinging than you will by briefly stopping to cast this spell and hoping it pays off when you start swinging again over the two minutes.

There are many other spells with immediate and more consistent results - why play the chance lottery for the same cost as the prize?

Agreed. My problem with doublestrike Zeal is that it doesn't seem to give a bonus. I'd feel better if I could see the doublestrike actually happening

[Eladrin]

Allow me to clarify -

I need to hit first to run the 10% chance of generating another main hand attack.
That is incorrect. Your primary attack can miss and still generate a doublestrike attack.

[Gercho]

That is incorrect. Your primary attack can miss and still generate a doublestrike attack.

Thanks Eladrin, thats what i thought... so zeal is 10% plus smite and sacrifices benefits for thf, and about 5.5% for twf

[MateCarefor]

Thanks Eladrin, thats what i thought... so zeal is 10% plus smite and sacrifices benefits for thf, and about 5.5% for twf

I must be stupid at math here, as I am not getting your percentages.
If zeal previously added attack speed,
and double strike is the 'potential' to add additional swings,
How are you saying there is an equivalency of value?

[Gercho]

i explained it a couple posts above, 10% attack speed is 10% more attacks all the time, 10% double strike (for thf) is 10% extra attacks on average, so its equivalent, not the same... in the long run, you will get with both the same amount of attacks.

[Chai]

This makes no sense, 10% double strike chance is the same than 5% attack speed boost for twf, and its a 10% speed boost for thf paladins, obviously zeal is worst than before for twf, but still really worthy on any paladin, not that you have much else to do with your spell points really.
Btw, its not clear that an attack generated by double strike doesnt has a possibility to get an off hand attack aswell, in that case for twf zeal would be the equivalent of 9% attack speed boost.


Not only that, but theres a chance for a triple smite.

[Zenako]

Lets use numbers instead of percentages to give a perspective.

Old ZEAL, 10% increase in attack speed.

(I am using some simplified numbers here for example purposes)

Old Paladin takes 100 swings in a minute.
With zeal he takes 110 swings in that minute.
Has the chance to create "N" special attacks like smites, etc amoung those 100 or 110 swings for bonus damage and effects.


New Zeal, 10% double strike.
New Paladin takes 100 swings in a minute
With Zeal going he takes 100 swings a minute and nomimally (10%) gets 10 double strikes. For a total of 110 attacks.
The key difference is that those double strikes can now also (if you are lucky) happen on your "N" special attacks so you actually get (N + 1/10N) special attacks every minute.

Over the span of a minute, your total damage done should be greater.

The reason it seems lower is the visceral effect of the visual and attack speeds and how closely tied many players were / are to that emotional effect. It just feels cool to rush about like a mad banshee swinging at everything.

The underlying numbers support the change. The feel is what is getting most people.

Zeal is still very worthwhile, you just don't get the same visual feedback and that is what tweaks people about it.

If TWF swung as if slowed and moved as slow as someone who has been Hamstrung, but actually did 3X damage on every hit, players would still not like the gameplay effect even if the DPS shot up.

[Do'Urden]

Lets use numbers instead of percentages to give a perspective.

Old ZEAL, 10% increase in attack speed.

(I am using some simplified numbers here for example purposes)

Old Paladin takes 100 swings in a minute.
With zeal he takes 110 swings in that minute.
Has the chance to create "N" special attacks like smites, etc amoung those 100 or 110 swings for bonus damage and effects.


New Zeal, 10% double strike.
New Paladin takes 100 swings in a minute
With Zeal going he takes 100 swings a minute and nomimally (10%) gets 10 double strikes. For a total of 110 attacks.
The key difference is that those double strikes can now also (if you are lucky) happen on your "N" special attacks so you actually get (N + 1/10N) special attacks every minute.

Over the span of a minute, your total damage done should be greater.

The reason it seems lower is the visceral effect of the visual and attack speeds and how closely tied many players were / are to that emotional effect. It just feels cool to rush about like a mad banshee swinging at everything.

The underlying numbers support the change. The feel is what is getting most people.

Zeal is still very worthwhile, you just don't get the same visual feedback and that is what tweaks people about it.

If TWF swung as if slowed and moved as slow as someone who has been Hamstrung, but actually did 3X damage on every hit, players would still not like the gameplay effect even if the DPS shot up.

+1

This is a very reasonable post and sums up my feelings regarding the change to Zeal (and the other attack speed nerfs). The overall DPS is comparable, but I find myself constantly annoyed by the visual feedback.

I'm also trying to stand still more often to gain glancing blows on THF (non-trivial especially for 20 KotC WoG Paladins :() and I feel like I miss moving targets more often due to slower swing speed. Something also feels off to me in the collision detection department as well.

Summed up...the changes have been...aggravating. I'm using non-inflammatory language on purpose despite the fact that I have stronger feelings on the subject ;)

[Goldeneye]

Zeal is still amazing!
Do you have any idea of how much effort goes into increasing your DPS by just a little bit?

Look at something like a +4 tome vs +2 tome.
+2 = 150k on the AH
+4 = 60+ runs of Tower of Despair to get the one you want.

However, it's a +1 to damage.

Considering paladins could potentially doubletrike on a smite... Zeal is amazing!... despite the mini-nerf

[ZeroTakenaka]

Okay. So we agree that the main problem is it doesn't feel like you're doing anything.

The issue is: What do we do so it still feels like you're actually doing something when casting Zeal?

Edit: This can apply to anything that has a chance at doublestrike like the tempest tier 3 or fighter capstone.

[MateCarefor]

Lets use numbers instead of percentages to give a perspective.

Old ZEAL, 10% increase in attack speed.

(I am using some simplified numbers here for example purposes)

Old Paladin takes 100 swings in a minute.
With zeal he takes 110 swings in that minute.
Has the chance to create "N" special attacks like smites, etc amoung those 100 or 110 swings for bonus damage and effects.


New Zeal, 10% double strike.
New Paladin takes 100 swings in a minute
With Zeal going he takes 100 swings a minute and nomimally (10%) gets 10 double strikes. For a total of 110 attacks.
The key difference is that those double strikes can now also (if you are lucky) happen on your "N" special attacks so you actually get (N + 1/10N) special attacks every minute.

Over the span of a minute, your total damage done should be greater.

The reason it seems lower is the visceral effect of the visual and attack speeds and how closely tied many players were / are to that emotional effect. It just feels cool to rush about like a mad banshee swinging at everything.

The underlying numbers support the change. The feel is what is getting most people.

Zeal is still very worthwhile, you just don't get the same visual feedback and that is what tweaks people about it.

If TWF swung as if slowed and moved as slow as someone who has been Hamstrung, but actually did 3X damage on every hit, players would still not like the gameplay effect even if the DPS shot up.

thankee and such (especially the 'should be greater' part).
+1 for visceral effect :D

[Junts]

Zeal still provides you with pretty much exactly the same amount of bonus attacks that it did before. If you aren't using it, you are pretty much math's definition of a fool.

In fact, if you are a s/b or thf user, zeal is now marginally better, since 10% of your smites will be double-smites now, when 0% were before.

[AylinIsAwesome]

Okay. So we agree that the main problem is it doesn't feel like you're doing anything.

The issue is: What do we do so it still feels like you're actually doing something when casting Zeal?

Edit: This can apply to anything that has a chance at doublestrike like the tempest tier 3 or fighter capstone.

Whenever we get a Doublestrike, have huge bold letters appear above our heads saying, "DOUBLESTRIKE", like an 80s arcade game.

[ZeroTakenaka]

Whenever we get a Doublestrike, have huge bold letters appear above our heads saying, "DOUBLESTRIKE", like an 80s arcade game.

+1 for chuckle.

[MalakRevan]

In all honesty I have pretty much quit using Zeal. I don't seem to doublestrike anymore with it up than with it off. I have better things to do with my SP than waste it on something that doesn't seem to be working right.

[Junts]

In all honesty I have pretty much quit using Zeal. I don't seem to doublestrike anymore with it up than with it off. I have better things to do with my SP than waste it on something that doesn't seem to be working right.


You don't double strike at all with it off, so ..

[CrimsonEagle]

I think that part of the problem is that I am a speed freak. The faster the better. I love to feel like I am moving so fast that I am almost out of control. It is fun for me. It is a rush. Now you would think that that 10% loss in speed would not be noticed all that much, but it is....it is.

The math seems to point out that the new changes may actually increase the damage done. The thing is, I dont care. I want faster and faster and faster. I feel a need for speed. Perhaps the change does give a little more damage. Well, I'll tell you what, I'll let that little bit of damage go. Give me the speed....it is FUN, and THAT is what this game is supposed to be about.

Speedfreak.

[dasein18]

I think that part of the problem is that I am a speed freak. The faster the better. I love to feel like I am moving so fast that I am almost out of control. It is fun for me. It is a rush. Now you would think that that 10% loss in speed would not be noticed all that much, but it is....it is.

The math seems to point out that the new changes may actually increase the damage done. The thing is, I dont care. I want faster and faster and faster. I feel a need for speed. Perhaps the change does give a little more damage. Well, I'll tell you what, I'll let that little bit of damage go. Give me the speed....it is FUN, and THAT is what this game is supposed to be about.

Speedfreak.

Drink more caffeine, move your head back and forth while playing and it should help.

[Junts]

I think that part of the problem is that I am a speed freak. The faster the better. I love to feel like I am moving so fast that I am almost out of control. It is fun for me. It is a rush. Now you would think that that 10% loss in speed would not be noticed all that much, but it is....it is.

The math seems to point out that the new changes may actually increase the damage done. The thing is, I dont care. I want faster and faster and faster. I feel a need for speed. Perhaps the change does give a little more damage. Well, I'll tell you what, I'll let that little bit of damage go. Give me the speed....it is FUN, and THAT is what this game is supposed to be about.

Speedfreak.


I understand, but those aren't your options.

You can be slow and bad, or slow and better. Pick.

[Crann]

I have better things to do with my SP than waste it on something that doesn't seem to be working right.

Like?

Newer Pally player here....and it doesn't seem to me that anything is more worthy of my SP.

[Gercho]

Like?

Newer Pally player here....and it doesn't seem to me that anything is more worthy of my SP.

maybe he thinks that divine favor stacks with itself :P, i only cast zeal divine favor and the occasional holy sword and resist energy with my paladin...

[Zenako]

Like?

Newer Pally player here....and it doesn't seem to me that anything is more worthy of my SP.

Correct. Not using Zeal, would almost be like telling the Arcane to not bother casting Haste since it doesn't give doublestrikes...:eek:

For me it is Zeal, Divine Might (high CHA paly), mix in the smites. Have enough turns to keep the DM up almost constantly in most quests.

[Varis]

10% chance to double strike or not, It'd taking me longer to kill stuff with only 80% offhand proc, the stun won't work on devils anymore and my burst damage via double smite is gone.

While you can argue that we have "less" lag in shroud then we did before, we now get NEW kinds of lag at different places.
Best of all, I get lag soloing now which is quite the feature since I have nobody that backs me up.


Quite upsetting because I just got done with shroud items before the change and had so much fun leveling the pally up.
I'm shelfing my pally but I get it...


screw with classes, have them buy lesser reincarnation stones to fix their characters, make them reroll into something different, hopefully buying a few xp pots for the next run...


and please dont give me the lag excuse... there is NO reason to use the "lag fix" as a front to nerf melee. You could have done your offhand strikes to 100% with greater 2wf and from there add the special increases via zeal, tempest, etc through double strikes.


/end rant

[Junts]

10% chance to double strike or not, It'd taking me longer to kill stuff with only 80% offhand proc, the stun won't work on devils anymore and my burst damage via double smite is gone.

While you can argue that we have "less" lag in shroud then we did before, we now get NEW kinds of lag at different places.
Best of all, I get lag soloing now which is quite the feature since I have nobody that backs me up.


Quite upsetting because I just got done with shroud items before the change and had so much fun leveling the pally up.
I'm shelfing my pally but I get it...


screw with classes, have them buy lesser reincarnation stones to fix their characters, make them reroll into something different, hopefully buying a few xp pots for the next run...


Actually, you still have a fairly high chance to double smite, and in fact you even have a rare chance to triple smite.

You, sir, are being a jackass.

My paladin is pulling way more aggro from way more classes than she pulled when i stopped playing for a while in february. Other classes were far, far more nerfed than we were.

Get over it.

[Gercho]

Actually, you still have a fairly high chance to double smite, and in fact you even have a rare chance to triple smite.

You, sir, are being a jackass.

My paladin is pulling way more aggro from way more classes than she pulled when i stopped playing for a while in february. Other classes were far, far more nerfed than we were.

Get over it.

/signed
Most hit class was THF pure barb, but people usually cares only about what they lose and not the general balance...

Junts, from something you posted before in this thread, you think/know if a double strike attack can generate an offhand attack?

[SteeleTrueheart]

you think/know if a double strike attack can generate an offhand attack?

No it will not.

[Junts]

/signed
Most hit class was THF pure barb, but people usually cares only about what they lose and not the general balance...

Junts, from something you posted before in this thread, you think/know if a double strike attack can generate an offhand attack?

It doesn't appear so, no.

Yes, paladins lost out some on losing zeal's benefit to the offhand and on the general offhand nerf. But for perspective, rangers also had 10% per hand, and had 25% more offhand attacks -than everyone else-, and pure barbarians had a 10% capstone for no reason that they've now completely lost. Sidesteppers lost the ability to get their glancing damage, making sidesteping and standing still equal. We lost what everyone else lost, but every other class but fighter lost something additional as well.

[Calebro]

Zeal still provides you with pretty much exactly the same amount of bonus attacks that it did before. If you aren't using it, you are pretty much math's definition of a fool.

In fact, if you are a s/b or thf user, zeal is now marginally better, since 10% of your smites will be double-smites now, when 0% were before.

^this^

Can you say TRIPLE CRIT SMITE for me?
See how it feels. Just let it roll off the tongue and see if you like it.
Sounds nice, right?
Now imagine yelling it into the mic so eleven other people know you did it, therebye annoying all of them but satisfying yourself. Imagine that, and see how it feels.
Pretty amazing, right?

If anything, Zeal is BETTER than it was before.

[Junts]

^this^

Can you say TRIPLE CRIT SMITE for me?
See how it feels. Just let it roll off the tongue and see if you like it.
Sounds nice, right?
Now imagine yelling it into the mic so eleven other people know you did it, therebye annoying all of them but satisfying yourself. Imagine that, and see how it feels.
Pretty amazing, right?

If anything, Zeal is BETTER than it was before.


Its not mathematically better, but it lost less than every other 10% speed boost lost when converting to double-strike, and the other class mechanics didn't also change in detrimental ways the way that barbarians, thf in general, and rangers did.

[PopeJual]

Zeal still provides you with pretty much exactly the same amount of bonus attacks that it did before. If you aren't using it, you are pretty much math's definition of a fool.

In fact, if you are a s/b or thf user, zeal is now marginally better, since 10% of your smites will be double-smites now, when 0% were before.

Additionally, Zeal now makes your Paladin smell like the Old Spice guy.

There was some discussion over whether this was a bug or was part of the intended design, but the development team decided to leave it in since we players can't smell the in-game characters anyway.

[Calebro]

Its not mathematically better, but it lost less than every other 10% speed boost lost when converting to double-strike, and the other class mechanics didn't also change in detrimental ways the way that barbarians, thf in general, and rangers did.

Well of course it isn't mathematically better. But many people have stated that it isn't even worth casting anymore. When you compare a Pally's loss to other classes losses, and the fact that Zeal now creates the possibility for triple crit smites, it now makes even MORE sense to cast it.
That's what I meant about it being better.

With the overall loss of DPS for TWF'ers, Paladins and Rangers were hit the least. And Zeal is a BIG part of why Paladins took less of a hit than others.
If people think it isn't worth casting, people are wrong.

[Reos]

Additionally, Zeal now makes your Paladin smell like the Old Spice guy.

There was some discussion over whether this was a bug or was part of the intended design, but the development team decided to leave it in since we players can't smell the in-game characters anyway.

TY for the lols, good sir!