Let's Talk: Enhancements!

[red_cardinal]

Two questions:

1. Will favored souls be able to take radiant servant pre?

I hope not. If radiant servant is racial prestige, then humans may take it.
I think that the rule will stay the same: racial + class prestige stack if different.

2. Will wizards be able to take both palemaster and archmage pres?
Thanks for your response in advance!

I hope not, it makes no sense.

[red_cardinal]

while many people remain convinced that all this is overpowered. i feel that eventually APs would be the more restricting factor when it comes to character building. so many overpowered builds, but they will probably have to sacrifice AP somewhere else which would be fair. at least thats what i think the devs intentions are.

Don't worry. Melf's SLA for sorcerers was OP in U9 release on Lammania and it was nerfed before it hit live.
I think same will happen here. This will be tested out, surely, since it's important update.

[red_cardinal]

I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong, but it sounds like if you have a Halfling Barbarian, you can drop the rogue levels and become a pure Barbarian and gain both FB III and Assassin III but with a heavy AP cost.

And you could assassinate an orthon with a Greatclub of the scrag.

That aside, feat prerequisites matter much too to get the both Prestiges in the line.

[red_cardinal]

I have to disagree. As long as all races have a great racial PrE, overpowered doesn't apply (it's a relative term).

I agree. Also, feats will surely be needed to get some prestiges. You might think that Dwarf ranger AA SD could happen, but you're wrong. I doubt you could fit it all in considering feats. Since this is still only in clouds, they will watch how some things fit. After all, this is now their main focus.

[Auran82]

heh.. If they just give ravager bbn critical rage..
Well no, it wont be possible.

You see crit rage, as the name imply only works while raged.

Monks have a hard time raging, being lawful and all.

I guess you could for 30 seconds tho, with the past life rage clicker =)

Perhaps they could enhance that so we can all play a uber barbarian dragonmonk that we all dreamed of.. heh.

Proper Barb rage cancels monk stances which would also be a hindrance.

They fixed that bug though, can't multi barb and monk anymore.

[quijenoth]

I think that the current list of racial unlock trees were:

Dwarf: Stalwart Defender
Warforged: Stalwart Defender
Halfling: Assassin
Half-Orc: Ravager
Elf: Arcane Archer
Drow: Tempest
Human: Pick one. (Slightly higher investment in Racial tree required to unlock.)
Half-Elf: Arcane Archer, Human, Elf (Yes, in our current plan they can unlock racial trees from the other races if desired. They might be able to go Half-Elf tree -> Human tree -> Any PrE through gargantuan AP expenditures.)

These are still subject to change. (Especially that Human part.)

While these changes look amazing one concern I do have is with warforged choice as so many have mentioned but only 1 person has picked up on...

A Self-Healing Warforged 20 Wizard Pale Master with Stalwart defender boosts would be ungodly powerful! likely looking at almost 800 hit points or more here and with masters touch plus any blue socketed epic heavy shield to 0% ASF a WF PM will require some serious beating to take down! let alone adding ring of the master artifice into the mix!

It appears you have ravager set ready for release as its commented on a few times but is there any others that you are considering releasing (soon) that would better fit a human? I get the idea you want humans to stay the ultimate flexable class but with the half-elf sharing both human and elf they are trumping humans every time you improve humans.

My suggestion would be to allow humans to choose any without increasing costs, let the players imaginations run wild here! Even if it does sound crazy having a human rogue radiant servant.
Allow Half-elf to choose AA and any pre connected to their dilitante. This would add some value to certain under-used dilitantes instead of all the rogue/barb dils you see atm. I quite like the sound of a half-elf paladin with Hunter of the Dead, and Radiant Servant from his Cleric Dil.

Other concerns:
People have mentioned sticking to eberron lore and if I recall half-orcs are essentially druids primarily, the fact you have chosen a barbarian prestige doesnt fit within eberron lore even though the race has alot of synergy with the class, same applys for halfling, perhaps ravager would fit them better?
Warforge "Juggernaut" and perhaps even Warforge "Reforged" definately need to be in place BEFORE you consider a racial Pre for them.

[sephiroth1084]

I think that the current list of racial unlock trees were:

Dwarf: Stalwart Defender / Warpriest
Warforged: Stalwart Defender / Ravager?
Halfling: Assassin / Acrobat or Virtuoso?
Half-Orc: Ravager / ?
Elf: Arcane Archer / Archmage
Drow: Tempest / Assassin
Human: Pick one. (Slightly higher investment in Racial tree required to unlock.)
Half-Elf: Arcane Archer, Human, Elf (Yes, in our current plan they can unlock racial trees from the other races if desired. They might be able to go Half-Elf tree -> Human tree -> Any PrE through gargantuan AP expenditures.)

Also, I think that, if not immediately, eventually we should get at least 2 options per race.

[Shade]

- Lamannia has already been trending towards earlier builds - ugliness and all; effectively it's becoming a test server, not a preview server. If everything goes as planned you get a chance to play & comment before it's too late to change.

Great news.

I think Lamannia should be available 24/7 as the official, and only test server. Even if there is no new patch yet ready, you should put it up with the live game version. It's useful to players to test things regardless.

[Vormaerin]

Why does everyone act like racial PrEs are going to suddenly make everyone superpowerful?

How many APs do you typically have laying around doing nothing useful? Every AP and feat that a warforged caster spends on Warforged Defender (for example) is one less AP spend on spell casting enhancements.

If, as Eladrin says, getting two PrEs to tier III will cost all your APs, consider what that means. If the Kensai and Stalwart lines are combined, then where is the Haste Boost, Toughness Enhancements, Fighter Tactics, etc going to come from? You've spent all your APs on those PrE trees..

Or the guy who wants to be a Dwarf Paladin.... how you are going to be in Stalwart Stance and DoS stance at the same time?

Personally, I find all this very exciting. More options are always good and a simpler UI for enhancements is long over due.

[Failedlegend]

Warforged: Stalwart Defender

I agree with the others SD does not jive with WF for now I'd say Kensai, Frenzy Barb but future ideas would be Occult Slayer or Juggernaut

Elf: Arcane Archer

I think I good addition for elf would be Eldritch Knight

[Emili]

Lmao...

Just remember this ... It is typical for the players to micro manage and approach things with a perspective yielding the "best of breed." Escentially comming up with a flavour of the day which rules them all.

[Bolo_Grubb]

I am hoping these changes are a good thing, but worried that they are too big of a change. Turning the game into a completely different game.

As it sounds right now I going to look for lesser hearts on sale because it sounds like I may need to do an LR on any and all my toons once these changes go into effect.

[Scraap]

Elite and Epic alike are built around the exceptionally high stats possible (not the average) ... you do know this?

Intimately, and that particular thought process is quite the opposite of piling stacking on stacking on stacking till the numbers no longer matter much till they are sky high.

Take

Are you speaking of things like rogue dex stacking with ranger dex plus class dex stats?

Under that particular proposal, it'd be 6 for a rogue 20, 6 for a ranger 20, or 3 from each if an x/y split (pick your poison where you'd mix) or 6 from an item. Meaning you could drop the item and put something else in it's place until you snagged something epic. Maybe not even then if you count racial in as well.

It also means that instead of the 30 or 40 resists you normally see running around ... some people will be out there running with 70 to 80... requiring an increase in Mob damages to meet the the exceptions...

Same rule of thumb there. Inherently walking around at 11 or 12 ish with the equivalent of a greater fire resistance item, or or using a gear slot for it. Different methodologies to hit benchmarks. not moving them (possibly lowering them in fact). Note this would also bring up the relative worth of the two defender PREs, as that would free up not one but 2 slots when in stance, leaving folks more to play with gear-wise.

[grodon9999]

I agree with the others SD does not jive with WF for now I'd say Kensai, Frenzy Barb but future ideas would be Occult Slayer or Juggernaut

The Feat and AP costs might not make the 800+ HP WF archmage/Stalwart a reality . . . but I gotta say I think WF having Kensai as the option is kinda cool and works for machines build for war.

[Emili]

If, as Eladrin says, getting two PrEs to tier III will cost all your APs, consider what that means. If the Kensai and Stalwart lines are combined, then where is the Haste Boost, Toughness Enhancements, Fighter Tactics, etc going to come from? You've spent all your APs on those PrE trees..

If he tells that you may take two PrE to full under the new system that also means they've cheapened them... As it stands at the moment most Kensei - imo - do not take tactics because it is built in the PrE and they have few AP left after taking the PrE.

Thus they take STR (which itself enhances tactic and DPS) and Haste Boost plus some racials... A very good example is my Human fighter had to Drop down to 10% healing amp to garner more levels in HV after the value of that went up... That's how tight some PrE's currently are...

[Razcar]

The Assassin poisons, for instance, will be selectable enhancements in the Assassin tree and will work fairly differently than they do now.

Thank you.

In general I hope that this Enhancement revision can even out many of the class imbalances we have now and make less played classes more popular. From your and Madfloyd's post so far I'm optimistic - you seem IMO to have focused on what's wrong with the current system, and your bullet points for what a system like this is supposed to do I fully agree with (especially allow DEEP character building). I hope that many new fun builds will come from this - character building has been a bit stale lately.

Something like Barbarian Critical Rage may be folded into the Ravager enhancement line as the Ravager Capstone.

PrE Capstones? Sweet.

[Emili]

Intimately, and that particular thought process is quite the opposite of piling stacking on stacking on stacking till the numbers no longer matter much till they are sky high.

Take

Under that particular proposal, it'd be 6 for a rogue 20, 6 for a ranger 20, or 3 from each if an x/y split (pick your poison where you'd mix) or 6 from an item. Meaning you could drop the item and put something else in it's place until you snagged something epic. Maybe not even then if you count racial in as well.

Same rule of thumb there. Inherently walking around at 11 or 12 ish with the equivalent of a greater fire resistance item, or or using a gear slot for it. Different methodologies to hit benchmarks. not moving them (possibly lowering them in fact). Note this would also bring up the relative worth of the two defender PREs, as that would free up not one but 2 slots when in stance, leaving folks more to play with gear-wise.

That is not how the Dev's design the game's quest... they do not hover on the lowball parks, nor even the average ballparks... and when you walk in an elite or epic quest they are built very close to the highest benchmarks attainable - you're expected to have things nearly max'd. A good example are today's base damage reflex damage DC's and trap save DC's ... unattainable without level appropriate equipment PLUS keeping the stats high enough... The suggestion above increases required saves on elite at level by +1,5 on the average.... the high point range being +3, therefore all epic and elite will bound to 1,5 to 2 higher. Care to do so with STR, CON and casting DCs? They design Elites and Epic benchmarks at close to the highest points you possibly may get.

What I am saying is I can't see them keeping the "benchmark" required the same while allowing a "higher" point attainable by a character.

[Scraap]

That is not how the Dev's design that game's quest... they do not hover on the lowball, nor even the average... when you walk in an elite or epic quest it is built around the highest benchmarks attainable - you're expected to have it nearly max'd.

And to my mind at least, that's precisely how we keep ending up with cookie cutter lookalikes every place you look. If the only augmentation they'll be doing is bigger numbers on the screen, they can keep it, and save themselves the effort, since there won't be a thing that would actually change in the end.

[dragons1ayer74]

...

Something like Barbarian Critical Rage may be folded into the Ravager enhancement line as the Ravager Capstone.

Folded in critical rage is great but not as a capstone, please really take a close look and be very careful with what you do with Critical Rage.

Out of my many barbarians I have 3 that still have critical rage only one of these is a pure 20 barbarian and he would be the least affected if critical rage is changed or removed. The other two characters are unique and both built around the critical rage 2 enhancement and both have exactly 14 levels barbarian and 6 levels of other classes.

I was one of the people that said right from the start that grand fathering this ability right from the start was not a good idea and that critical rage barbarian ultimately should have been a different prestige class.

Lastly I also don’t believe that any rework of a system needs to force players to reset the enhancements, it should heavily encourage it also.

...(think augmentation here, not nerfs)...

Anything taking something away that we can no longer have access to that we previously did is a nerf.

[grodon9999]

while many people remain convinced that all this is overpowered. i feel that eventually APs would be the more restricting factor when it comes to character building. so many overpowered builds, but they will probably have to sacrifice AP somewhere else which would be fair. at least thats what i think the devs intentions are.

Compared to how casters are any melee could have two full PREs with all the trimming and not be over-powered (okay, maybe kensai III and FB III might be a bit much).