So... how about Divine Might?

[Templarion]

Casting time is ok.

However, double or triple the duration and half the amount buffs per rest. Overall time stays about the same but no need to cast it all the time.

[Claymorep]

This may seem like an obvious suggestion, but how about:

Change AP cost to 1/1/2/2
Reduce casting time.
Change added Damage to a die roll and add Charisma modifier to damage (eg: DM1 - 1d4 + CHA mod, DM2 - 1d6 + Cha Mod, DM3 - 1d8 + CHA mod, DM4 1d10 + CHA mod).

I'm on the same idea: To use the pen and paper rules and add Your charisma bonus to your weapon damage at tier 1 and decrease the casting time. The cost should be 1/1/1/1 considering the cha investment added to the fact it's not a pre requirement (we have useless requirements like courage of good 2 and energy of the scion 2) and a similar bonus or a fixed one like (considering a dice to be rolled will surely be a bug):

DM 1 add your charisma bonus
DM 2 as DM1 +2 damage
DM 3 as DM1 +4 damage
DM 4 as DM1 +6 damge

[sephiroth1084]

Probably You missed the news...

Barbarian damage boost now adds a 10/15/20/25% to damage! So, with this change at door (and human/helf versatility for the same thing) a Pally should have something similar.
We are discussin about DM (but another kind of boost is welcome anyway) that compared to the investment required (extremely high cha, ap cost and activation time) is under the effectivness of BDS atm and will be superover under BDS on U 11...

I didn't miss the news. My point was that Damage Boost needed a boost, while Divine Might doesn't...not in the way being suggested (percentile bonus vs. static numeric).

I'm on the same idea: To use the pen and paper rules and add Your charisma bonus to your weapon damage at tier 1 and decrease the casting time. The cost should be 1/1/1/1 considering the cha investment added to the fact it's not a pre requirement (we have useless requirements like courage of good 2 and energy of the scion 2) and a similar bonus or a fixed one like (considering a dice to be rolled will surely be a bug):

DM 1 add your charisma bonus
DM 2 as DM1 +2 damage
DM 3 as DM1 +4 damage
DM 4 as DM1 +6 damge

Way too overpowered to give paladins an extra +20 damage on top of Divine Favor, Zeal, Exalted Smite, Divine Sacrifice and Weapons of Good!

Which reminds me...paladins already have a percentile-based damage bonus in Zeal, which is more versatile than the new Damage Boost (and likely ends up resulting in more damage overall as well due to its longer duration and multiplication of non-weapon damage and special proc effects).

Also note that it's entirely possible for a human paladin to pick up the new damage boost, and that paladins =/= barbarians and don't need to mimic their toys, just as they shouldn't be mimicking ours.

[noinfo]

I didn't miss the news. My point was that Damage Boost needed a boost, while Divine Might doesn't...not in the way being suggested (percentile bonus vs. static numeric).



Way too overpowered to give paladins an extra +20 damage on top of Divine Favor, Zeal, Exalted Smite, Divine Sacrifice and Weapons of Good!

Which reminds me...paladins already have a percentile-based damage bonus in Zeal, which is more versatile than the new Damage Boost (and likely ends up resulting in more damage overall as well due to its longer duration and multiplication of non-weapon damage and special proc effects).

Also note that it's entirely possible for a human paladin to pick up the new damage boost, and that paladins =/= barbarians and don't need to mimic their toys, just as they shouldn't be mimicking ours.

The issue regarding this is that Pallys are significantly lower dps then other dps classes with maybe exception of ranger. These other classes got a significant boost, neither rangers or pallys did. Even with Zeal pallys are not even close to the dps level of barbs and kensais. You do make a good point that the toys of barbs and kensais should not be the same as Pallys however it is obvious that Pallys (and rangers) do need some more.

[sephiroth1084]

The issue regarding this is that Pallys are significantly lower dps then other dps classes with maybe exception of ranger. These other classes got a significant boost, neither rangers or pallys did. Even with Zeal pallys are not even close to the dps level of barbs and kensais. You do make a good point that the toys of barbs and kensais should not be the same as Pallys however it is obvious that Pallys (and rangers) do need some more.

Which DPS classes got a DPS boost?

Fighters don't have Damage Boost.
I'd argue that rogues were gaining more from Haste Boost than from this new damage boost.
Monks don't have Damage Boost.


So...barbarians got a boost, and humans.

If this pushes barbarians too far ahead of the other classes, then that needs addressing, not their pulling further ahead of paladins.

Humans...that's another issue, mostly playing off the fact that paladins are more AP-starved than the other classes tend to be, although not by that much, so new, powerful enhancements aren't as available to them as to others. Again, this could be handled by addressing the actual issue--that paladins need their AP costs revised, lowered.

[mournbladereigns]

In u11, the damage boost enhancements got a HUGE upgrade by being turned from a straight +x to a percentage bonus, meaning that activating them during combat will actually boost dps instead of reduce it (details here, courtesy of Shade). This is a good thing, considering how much it will help melees compete dps wise in endgame content, which when compounded with increased elite difficulty should make things more interesting than DoT-DoT-DoT.

However, I have seen no reference to a Divine Might revamp. For those who don't know, DM does basically the same thing as Damage Boost used to do, capping at +8 instead of +5 and lasting longer (though it has a significantly longer activation time). Considering how expensive Divine Might is (10 ap on what is possibly the most AP starved class, and a base cha req of 20), especially compared to Damage Boost (which is already required for many common PrEs, making it less of a hassle to take), I would suggest giving Divine Might a similar bonus, but have it work slightly better/differently than Damage Boost. Since Damage boost caps at 25%, Divine Might could cap at 40%; however, I would much prefer a lower base damage cap (25-30%) and an additional bonus to bane/capstone/KotC/alignment damage that would make the enhancement line unique and powerful instead of a simple extended interpretation.

This last bit is mostly wishful thinking, but I would also like to see if these enhancements (both DM and DB) coukd be more balanced in relation to THF and TWF. As it is, TWF gets a much bigger boost, and I am still unsure whether the new DB applies to glancing blows.

I see Divine Might keeping the same AP Costs/Cha requirements in exchange for giving a +5%/10%/+15%/+20% damage boost with a fast casting time as a reasonable buff. Considering it lasts 3 times as long as other action boosts. This will be a significant boost to sustained DPS, without being OP. And make it still worthwhile to invest in DMIII/IV.

[Claymorep]

[QUOTE=sephiroth1084;3999419]I didn't miss the news. My point was that Damage Boost needed a boost, while Divine Might doesn't...not in the way being suggested (percentile bonus vs. static numeric).[QUOTE]


About this I'm with You, but giving a barb a so great advantage (I remember it is in his ap line to have his pre, so it's an advantage at the cost of anything), without giving other dps classes a similar or compensating thing is to unbalance the game vs a single class and adding the possibility of dr weapons to this class will end in a sole dps direction.
Don't know if by Devs human versatility was intended or simply (same description = same bonus) added, but anyway this will force all dps to be or horc barbarian or helf fighters (and their mix). This tread is about DM, but clearly involves all balancing of the game (also rangers have a similar problems).

[QUOTE=sephiroth1084;3999419]Divine Favor, Zeal, Exalted Smite, Divine Sacrifice and Weapons of Good!

Which reminds me...paladins already have a percentile-based damage bonus in Zeal, which is more versatile than the new Damage Boost (and likely ends up resulting in more damage overall as well due to its longer duration and multiplication of non-weapon damage and special proc effects). [QUOTE]

Have You ever played a pally or do You speak about what You know or remind?
Zeal is a 10% double strike bonus (as fighter capstone or as jorgundal collar intended by devs)
Divine favor is a +3/+3 to hit/to damage (not so overpowered...)
Exalted smite (17 ap cost line!!!) for 12 hits with a +2 to critic multiplier and a +2 to treat range so with a sos is a 13-20 critic range for x5 (what about barb critics? ironic). Let's hope the mob don't move or the lag will not land your smite on an empty portion of the screen...
Weapon of good (hitted by crystal bypassing dr...) after U11 will loose a lot more with artificers that can give dr bypassing enhancments to all the party (esos for barbs, 2x lit2 kopeshes for fighters and so on), only thing is that I'll save 25 mana of an artificier[QUOTE]

Actually a dps pally is near a barb or kensai dps (vs devils and demons) but a lot against other tipes of mobs at the cost of his versatility (selfhealing or selfsufficiency) and below 100-150 hp vs a fighter and 200-250 vs a barb.

After update 11 a pally have to say bye bye to his aura, lays and healing amplification to take Human versatility line and specialize totally in dps line to stay anyway behind an horc barb or a human/helf fighter (blitz and monster too) as they can use human versatility in combo with haste boosts.

If this is the choice left to a pally I don't think everyone else will play a class that have less hp then others, stat/feat/ap/slot starved and stressing one by continuous clicking...

I tried my pally on Lamma and I don't like it, so unless something will be done I think I'll use as bank or some raids when others are in timer.

Solutions (what we are discussing):
-lower pally action point costs or
-or increase divine might power so pallies are not required to take human versatility line.

[TDarkchylde]

Let's not forget in all this that Clerics get DM as well, and some are actually built to use it too - however in doing so, they end up even more spread thin stat-wise than Paladins do. (One of my TR Cleric build plans is forced to start with 12 WIS to fit in the CHA needed for DM3 - three levels of non-cleric in the build so no DM4.) So I'd support the idea of lowering the base CHA requirement by 2 for each tier.

I'd also be for dropping the cast time. Auto-Quickened like Divine Favor/Divine Power/Zeal would be nice, but at this point I'd settle for DM's activation being able to be sped up by Quicken.

As for bumping the damage to try to make it comparable to Damage Boost/HV... I've got nothing there. It certainly needs addressing with DB/HV going to a percentage base, I'm just too sleep-deprived for math tonight.

[sephiroth1084]

About this I'm with You, but giving a barb a so great advantage (I remember it is in his ap line to have his pre, so it's an advantage at the cost of anything), without giving other dps classes a similar or compensating thing is to unbalance the game vs a single class and adding the possibility of dr weapons to this class will end in a sole dps direction.

There are a few different things going on here.

First, if this pushes barbarians too far ahead of everyone else (does it? I haven't seen any numbers supporting this) then the bonuses need to be considered for revision, not balanced by giving everyone else the same thing for no real reason. For example, compare a barbarian 20 vs. a barbarian 18/fighter 2. How much better is Damage Boost IV on the first character than Haste Boost I on the second? Does this actually shift the balance of power much if at all?

Second, if this does cause a notable shift, simply giving paladins a boost won't do much for everyone else (ie Rangers and Monks, and monks are pretty pressed on AP as well), so simply changing Divine Might doesn't help the situation.

Third, the point about artificers' ability to grant weapon properties may eclipse the paladin's capstone ability...and it may not. Remember that those spells will be competing with other ones that add bonus damage, and that you still need to actually have an artificer in the party. All limiting factors.

Don't know if by Devs human versatility was intended or simply (same description = same bonus) added, but anyway this will force all dps to be or horc barbarian or helf fighters (and their mix). This tread is about DM, but clearly involves all balancing of the game (also rangers have a similar problems).

This may be a good point for the devs to reevaluate how HV should be functioning in respect to its bonuses vs. those that the classes gain. Maybe it should grant smaller bonuses, since it's giving more versatility for a lower cost? Also, if Divine Might gets changed as people are suggesting, will it stack with HV? Will the benefit of being a human paladin be simply that you can ignore HV or Divine Might, if that grants smaller benefits, or will it be a sort of penalty to human paladins? They become the only humans who gain no real benefit from the changes to HV?

Have You ever played a pally or do You speak about what You know or remind?

Yes, several, but that's irrelevant.

Zeal is a 10% double strike bonus (as fighter capstone or as jorgundal collar intended by devs)
Divine favor is a +3/+3 to hit/to damage (not so overpowered...)
Exalted smite (17 ap cost line!!!) for 12 hits with a +2 to critic multiplier and a +2 to treat range so with a sos is a 13-20 critic range for x5 (what about barb critics? ironic).

Thanks for listing all of those. That was helpful.

[quote]
Let's hope the mob don't move or the lag will not land your smite on an empty portion of the screen...
Weapon of good (hitted by crystal bypassing dr...) after U11 will loose a lot more with artificers that can give dr bypassing enhancments to all the party (esos for barbs, 2x lit2 kopeshes for fighters and so on), only thing is that I'll save 25 mana of an artificier[quote]
I don't have a problem with my smites missing, and a double strike bonus ends up being pretty close to a straight alacrity bonus (better than the buffed Damage Boost figures, at least for the lower tiers, if not the whole thing), and functions slightly better on most paladins since it can grant you double smites and sacrifices.

Also, you neglect to mention that the paladin capstone also grants +1d6 damage vs. evil opponents (nearly everything we fight at end game) and a further +2d6 vs. evil outsiders and undead--not as big a group, but still significant.

Actually a dps pally is near a barb or kensai dps (vs devils and demons) but a lot against other tipes of mobs at the cost of his versatility (selfhealing or selfsufficiency) and below 100-150 hp vs a fighter and 200-250 vs a barb.

These sorts of statements really require backing up. How exactly does the paladin DPS compare pre-DB changes? After? Vs. EO? Vs. non-EO? What does the build require that forces the paladin to sacrifice their self-sufficiency/healing? Do they actually need to? How much DPS would need to be given up to work those back in?

Honestly, as someone with a paladin AC tank with self-healing and pretty solid DPS, I find it hard to believe that a DPS-focused paladin would be hard pressed to fit in the other stuff when they don't have to worry about AC.

After update 11 a pally have to say bye bye to his aura, lays and healing amplification to take Human versatility line and specialize totally in dps line to stay anyway behind an horc barb or a human/helf fighter (blitz and monster too) as they can use human versatility in combo with haste boosts.

It's been a while since I've checked...can HV be activated while a class-based action boost is running? Can you put up both Haste Boost (fighter or rogue) and HV DB at the same time? My suspicion is that the answer is NO. If that's the case, why would a fighter ever bother with HV? If I'm wrong, then that's a separate issue.

Also, keep in mind that a human paladin could drop a few enhancements to fit in fewer than 4 tiers of HV, which is still a boon for them! They aren't locked out of using it and certainly aren't forced to sacrifice everything else they'd otherwise have going on just to pick it up.

[quote]
If this is the choice left to a pally I don't think everyone else will play a class that have less hp then others, stat/feat/ap/slot starved and stressing one by continuous clicking...[/quote[ I wasn't aware that people played paladins for mega-DPS in the first place...

I tried my pally on Lamma and I don't like it, so unless something will be done I think I'll use as bank or some raids when others are in timer.

And...what? Did you group with 5 barbarians who out-killed you or something? What didn't you like? Why? How does that have any bearing on this topic?

[Orange-Silk]

I see Divine Might keeping the same AP Costs/Cha requirements in exchange for giving a +5%/10%/+15%/+20% damage boost with a fast casting time as a reasonable buff. Considering it lasts 3 times as long as other action boosts. This will be a significant boost to sustained DPS, without being OP. And make it still worthwhile to invest in DMIII/IV.

DM III (before your proposed change, and is what most builds can afford anyways) is +6dmg
DM III (after your change) 15%

For it to be EQUAL you would need 40 base damage, that means effectively a nerf on lower lvls and a negligible change at higher lvls. (And TWF paladins would cry until they can get their excep STR and Epic vulkoor set)

I'm not sure percentage increases really help anything aside from Barbs or ESoS users, I for one won't be using dmg boost on my rogue at all, haste is just so much better.

DM does need a boost to make paladin DPS more competitive however (or just to compensate for forcing me to start with 16 CHA and eating a +2tome , I suggest damage boost to require base dex for barbs ) I just don't see emulating a clearly barb-tailored toy to be the way to do it.

[LiquidShadow]

DM III (before your proposed change, and is what most builds can afford anyways) is +6dmg
DM III (after your change) 15%

For it to be EQUAL you would need 40 base damage, that means effectively a nerf on lower lvls and a negligible change at higher lvls. (And TWF paladins would cry until they can get their excep STR and Epic vulkoor set)

I'm not sure percentage increases really help anything aside from Barbs or ESoS users, I for one won't be using dmg boost on my rogue at all, haste is just so much better.

DM does need a boost to make paladin DPS more competitive however (or just to compensate for forcing me to start with 16 CHA and eating a +2tome , I suggest damage boost to require base dex for barbs ) I just don't see emulating a clearly barb-tailored toy to be the way to do it.

how about making DM last 1 min per tier and cost 1p per tier and making it add cha mod to dmg?, thats 4 min on DM IV for 4AP total. u still have to hit things and thats where u have to put all ur resources on this class so u wont see any good 30+ cha builds anyway, especially twf.

[noinfo]

Which DPS classes got a DPS boost?

Fighters don't have Damage Boost.
I'd argue that rogues were gaining more from Haste Boost than from this new damage boost.
Monks don't have Damage Boost.


So...barbarians got a boost, and humans.

If this pushes barbarians too far ahead of the other classes, then that needs addressing, not their pulling further ahead of paladins.

Humans...that's another issue, mostly playing off the fact that paladins are more AP-starved than the other classes tend to be, although not by that much, so new, powerful enhancements aren't as available to them as to others. Again, this could be handled by addressing the actual issue--that paladins need their AP costs revised, lowered.

And Helves.

Pallys are all round starved feat and ap wise. And I agree that they do need the AP costs reduced, which I am certain I said in another post earlier.

However you can adjust all you like the dps of pallys is in the most part far too low outside of certain situations and playing with enhancement costs will not fix that.

As it stands this will boost Barbs significantly in burst DPS vs Kensai who used to be the master of it and raise them further above Pallys and Rangers.

[mournbladereigns]

DM III (before your proposed change, and is what most builds can afford anyways) is +6dmg
DM III (after your change) 15%

For it to be EQUAL you would need 40 base damage, that means effectively a nerf on lower lvls and a negligible change at higher lvls. (And TWF paladins would cry until they can get their excep STR and Epic vulkoor set)

I'm not sure percentage increases really help anything aside from Barbs or ESoS users, I for one won't be using dmg boost on my rogue at all, haste is just so much better.

DM does need a boost to make paladin DPS more competitive however (or just to compensate for forcing me to start with 16 CHA and eating a +2tome , I suggest damage boost to require base dex for barbs ) I just don't see emulating a clearly barb-tailored toy to be the way to do it.

Well, my thinking would be, as it adds to base damage, it would be a significant boosts on smites, since smites add 7+3xpal lvl to base dmg. and DMIII is available at 15 that's +52 per smite, and would be around +8 with just smite bonus, say
4.5 khopesh
5 weap
10 str
3 DF

say 22.5 base +52 smite, so +11 on smites, at lvl 15
and say 22.5 + 67, so +13 at 20.

So +5/+7 over base on smites, a bit under on regular strikes. STill a significant boost.
Which would be achieved with a % multiplier on base dmg, as opposed to flat bonus. Making their smites versus evil opponents smitier


So yeah still a bit low, so put it back to 10%/15%/20%/25% per tier, same ap cost/cha reqs, fast cast with 1 min time.

20% DMIII would put it at base dmg 30 as break even point for baseline increase. And would make major increase on smites. +15 base dmg at Lvl 15, +18 at cap, for +9/+12 versus standard DMIII


Then if this base dmg is bumped before crit multipliers, could def make a significant difference, against all evil enemies. (Which is good for all pals, just not KoTC)

So I think with bumping regular attacks plus smite bonus it would be a better increase for pals, against all evil enemies.

[Orange-Silk]

Well, my thinking would be, as it adds to base damage, it would be a significant boosts on smites, since smites add 7+3xpal lvl to base dmg. and DMIII is available at 15 that's +52 per smite, and would be around +8 with just smite bonus, say
4.5 khopesh
5 weap
10 str
3 DF

say 22.5 base +52 smite, so +11 on smites, at lvl 15
and say 22.5 + 67, so +13 at 20.

So +5/+7 over base on smites, a bit under on regular strikes. STill a significant boost.
Which would be achieved with a % multiplier on base dmg, as opposed to flat bonus. Making their smites versus evil opponents smitier


So yeah still a bit low, so put it back to 10%/15%/20%/25% per tier, same ap cost/cha reqs, fast cast with 1 min time.

20% DMIII would put it at base dmg 30 as break even point for baseline increase. And would make major increase on smites. +15 base dmg at Lvl 15, +18 at cap, for +9/+12 versus standard DMIII


Then if this base dmg is bumped before crit multipliers, could def make a significant difference, against all evil enemies. (Which is good for all pals, just not KoTC)

So I think with bumping regular attacks plus smite bonus it would be a better increase for pals, against all evil enemies.

My bad, I wasn't considering crits and smites, but still, DM should be something much more flavorful than a percentage increase, Light damage and an attack bonus maybe, maybe make it Charisma based (so you get rewarded for taking lots of cha, not forced to do it, monk-style. I mean, are monks forced to have 18wis to get touch of death?, no, but are they rewarded damage wise by the wis they take? yeah), maybe give it a CHA based DC extra damage proc. I'd love a cha DC check that isn't restricted to renders and hounds mind you.

In short, paladin needs a DPS boost, but not one that encourages max STR half-orc ESoS, one that implies versatility, rewards CHA investment and is the kind of things that stop me from re-rolling into a kensai. If only because a raid group composed by a couple healers, a couple Horc Barbs to hold aggro and the rest WF wizzies/sorcs looks almost like a dystopic future