Player Character Balance

[Vamm]

+1 to everything you said, with these being my top 3...

I do support beefing up Armor for us though, to make melee more viable.

Those EE mobs "should" be killing any Wizard they can get their mits on.

But... they should NOT be cutting down armored guys like they do now!

[Rautis]

I don't think player character abilities should be changed alot. Some epic abilities are way stronger than others, however. Balancing should come from clever changes to monsters. With changes like this both monster damage and hp could be lowered and game could still offer challenge. I will cover some areas of gameplay that I think have made the metagame what it is today.



Monsters not using things that bypass parts of layered defenses.

Displaced shadow fading monks with maxed dodge and some PRR are so popular because every one of those abilities works most of the time on physical damage. Each of these should have their uses but they should not work always.

• Why are there no monster archers with force arrow imbue? Players can get it at level 2 at earliest yet the most epic of archer monsters dont have it. It should be common ability on archer monsters. This ability bypasses incorporeal. Some melee monsters could come with ghost touch if it makes any sense lore wise.
• True seeing can be cast at level 9 but you rarely encounter it on monsters. If the organization you're fighting against has clerics or mages there should be a good chance of monsters having true seeing. This would also affect invis runs though. Not sure if it is a bad thing.
• It's ok that PRR always works. Problem is that you can get enough PRR from enhancements, items and feats that you get past optimal investment point making extra PRR from armor rather meaningless. There could be adjustments to PRR mechanic to make armor count more. One option is to adjust the 0.65 in PRR formula up or down depending on armor worn. So for different armors same PRR yields different results.
• There are also some abilities that bypass a portion of dodge rating. Certain monster types could use these.

Epic ward.

This ability simply ruins some playstyles that are viable in heroics. Rogue with crippling strike. Ravager with Mutilate and Cruel cut. Cloudkill using archmage. Bard with Suggestion. Even some Epic Destiny abilities suck when rats, wolves, bears, spiders and other epic monsters are immune or highly resistant to abilities you might have even specialized in.

• Give dispells to hit/AC treatment.
• Replace epic ward with buffs or make it dispellable. Make different 'epic wards' suitable for different monster types. Normal animals or vermin should not gain any kind of ward while strong casters could have very strong magical protections. Melees could come with package that improves their performance(true seeing, haste, blur, freedom of movement, death ward, immunity to mind spells, abilities from old epic ward etc). All these should be dispellable.
• Most casters and potential UMD using monsters should come with night shield or shield. It is level 1 spell afterall
• Giving dispell ability to some classes could also buff them if dispell is useful. Paladin Holy Sword could become more like Holy Avenger as self only weapon buff with dispell attempt on crit or so besides other benefits. Barbarian Occult Slayer could also gain dispell attempt ability at tier 5 or so.
• This could be a good time to give abjuration spell focuses an increase in dispell chance. Maybe also for abjuration archmages. Wider variety of build choices would be nice. Currently no one even thinks about focusing in abjuration.

Cost of getting a mob dispelled would play a big role in caster balance and should be adjusted carefully. Buffs on monsters can hurt both melees/ranged and casters depending on buff choices. Some monsters could even get buffs specially designed for them. For example now very few enemies use fire shield style abilities.(Melee nerfs are not needed at the moment. Yet it would be a buff for those melee builds that can dispell when compared to ones that can't.) Also Spell mantle/globe of invulnerability is rare these days.



Kiting.

This is last because I'm not sure if much/any changes are needed. This is atleast partially just a symptom of way things are now, like Fhauvial said. Most monsters lack reasonable countermeasures against kiting players. This makes kiting much less risky than using melee. Kiting should still be viable but atleast require more tactical choices. It should be dangerous to kite entire encounters.

• Have AI recognize kiting behavior(damage dealt vs. hit attempts taken. Monster attempting to attack in melee for time period but unable to do so or something like that. Probably not easy to come up with criteria that won't also consider CC casters or others as kiters. It might not be that bad even then though.)
• Archer mobs could target kiter so atleast some damage is caused. Archers could also use special attacks like leg shot or some ability that stacks per hit basis so the slowdown isnt as instant and there's time to react. This should help melee monsters to land more hits on kiters.
• Melees could use more tactical attacks on kiters, or switch to side abilities like shadow dagger, binding shadows or other debuffs suitable for particular monster that could help them catch you.
• Also casters could spare their Power Words for when kiting is detected

AI changes are probably not easy at all to implement. It could also be easy to overdo this. Most archers could just gain ability on their attacks that stacks slow effect on players. Nothing huge probably. Just 1% per hit could be enough.




These are some ideas that I got that might make any sense. If you like any of them please comment them. It took a while to come up with all of these. Some of these might have results I didn't think about. Most importantly these are ways to make monster hit points and damage more reasonable while still keeping challenge and hopefully balancing different playstyles in process.

[Alfhild]

Monsters not using things that bypass parts of layered defenses.

Displaced shadow fading monks with maxed dodge and some PRR are so popular because every one of those abilities works most of the time on physical damage. Each of these should have their uses but they should not work always.

• Why are there no monster archers with force arrow imbue? Players can get it at level 2 at earliest yet the most epic of archer monsters dont have it. It should be common ability on archer monsters. This ability bypasses incorporeal. Some melee monsters could come with ghost touch if it makes any sense lore wise.
• True seeing can be cast at level 9 but you rarely encounter it on monsters. If the organization you're fighting against has clerics or mages there should be a good chance of monsters having true seeing. This would also affect invis runs though. Not sure if it is a bad thing.
• .

Cutting off your nose to spite someone else's face is not a winning strategy in my opinion.

[knockcocker]

Other than the precision on shiradi, would you care to elaborate what I am getting wrong in the rest of points? This is partly because I am a bit offended (not raging, but no one likes to be told he got "everything wrong" ) and partly because if I am misunderstanding a game mechanic, I would very much want to know.

I've read a few of your posts here and on the 'toaster' thread. I don't think you can be
informed as to what you are getting wrong as you seem to refuse to accept what anyone
tells you.

Shiradi casters are not 'top DPS' (unless you can reliably get Joy or even 'Mad Queen') - not by a stretch. It's
viable because it's efficient and has more manageable DC requirements meaning you can build for other things
(i.e. some defense in the form of HP and saves).

WF self healing is not 'free' or 'OP' despite you wanting it to be so. IIRC WF Melee were popular maybe once
in this game when healing curses were in vogue (didn't affect repair/reconstruct). WF (and even BF) without
their own self healing to top up would not have adequate healing amp. to just walk into all raid groups. WF
(and by extension BF) were already heavily nerf'ed when MotU was released. Besides, if you want self healing
- build for it. There are so many options now compared to how it used to be.


As several illuminated people keep posting in this thread:-
EE favours:
Hit avoidance
Evasion
High Saves
High ranged damage
Effective CC
High burst DPS (ranged/melee/spell)
Efficient use of SP

It should be no surprise that clever builds which combine the above requirements feel 'OP'
to others which don't. I'm quite happy with this situation as it means clever, skillful players
(of which I am not one) get to make a difference. Essentially, it's the content that's the
driver for this. Nerf'ing abilities without changing the content will just drive a huge wedge
betwen the devs. and a substantial proportion of the playerbase.

Any re-balancing should be about giving more options not cutting down those tall poppies
so that everyone's the same. There's already been some good examples of how to do
this in this thread.

[SirValentine]

• This could be a good time to give abjuration spell focuses an increase in dispell chance. Maybe also for abjuration archmages. Wider variety of build choices would be nice. Currently no one even thinks about focusing in abjuration.

Any wonder? Heighten has been bugged for Dismissal/Banishment for years, and instead of fixing it, in U21 they finally declared the bug as WAI. Of course, the spells are close to useless in Epic anyway, due to the same issue that causes so many other issues: artificially high super-bloated monster CR/hit-dice.

[Delacroix21]

The problem of balance is only relevant in the context of epic elite, which is directly caused by the following features of epic elite (and the issue is worsening since update 15):

1. inflated monster hp (especially for orange and red named)

2. inflaged monster saves (literally untouchable)

3. inflated monster damages (renders non-ranged combat styles nonviable)

4. infated monster dc (causes players to overly focus on building up saves at the expense of all other varieties; if you dont build saves, you die instantly from cometfall/evo spells/soundburst etc.)

5. especially from update 19, the number of trashes also increase dramatically. This is very annoying combined with the above 4 points.

All of the above render almost all classes combinations powerless except only quite few ones like shiradi arcanes and furyshot monchers. This worsening situation is killing the versatility of builds (which is IMHO what most people like about this game) and the health of the game.


IMHO, the following need to be done as a matter of urgency:

1. EE monster's hp/saves/damages and spell dcs all need to be tuned down to ensure viability for a variety of other builds (not just Shiradi arcanes and furyshot monchers).


2. Shiradi casters can hit from long distance, remain totally unaffected by monster saves, and do more damage than any other casters! Also worth noting is that current mechanism allows shiradi arcanes to multi class like 4 fvs and 2 monk/2 pal etc, and that allowed shiradi arcanes to enjoy top-notch dps, best sustainability and best saves. This is too much of a privilege inaccessible to all other builds. (well, except the furyshot shot build as noted below).

My suggestion would be while making adjustment to Epic elites, it would be necessary to make all procs by shiradi magnified by say, 40% (or another ratio deemed appropriate by the dev team) of spell powers.

I believe with this change in place, shiradi arcanes will remain as a top-notch build (retain solid dps and can maintain top notch defence/sustainability), but will not be so overwhelmingly better than other casters as the current situation stands.


3. Furyshot moncher

Again current mechanism allows furyshot moncher to multi class 6 monk and 2 pal, and that allowed moncher to enjoy THE BEST dps (burst dps so far ahead of any other builds), and THE BEST DEFENSE (top notch saves, fly, dodge, high hp, stay ranged...). This is too much of a privilege inaccessible to all other builds.

I would suggest that adrenaline can only work on the first damage from manyshot/ten thousand star (if techically possible)

If the above is not possible, then maybe make adrenline not regenerating from ranged attacks.

At the very least, maybe change ten thousand star to not work on bows. (Not OP, people just don't like monks)


Even if dev changes so that adrenaline can only work on the first damage from manyshot/ten thousand star, furyshot moncher will remain as a top-notch build (retain top-notch dps but not overwhelming dps) and can maintain best defence), but will not be so vastly superior to all other builds as the current situation stands.

Most balanced ideas I have seen proposed.

[BigErkyKid]

I've read a few of your posts here and on the 'toaster' thread. I don't think you can be
informed as to what you are getting wrong as you seem to refuse to accept what anyone
tells you.

Shiradi casters are not 'top DPS' (unless you can reliably get Joy or even 'Mad Queen') - not by a stretch. It's
viable because it's efficient and has more manageable DC requirements meaning you can build for other things
(i.e. some defense in the form of HP and saves).

WF self healing is not 'free' or 'OP' despite you wanting it to be so. IIRC WF Melee were popular maybe once
in this game when healing curses were in vogue (didn't affect repair/reconstruct). WF (and even BF) without
their own self healing to top up would not have adequate healing amp. to just walk into all raid groups. WF
(and by extension BF) were already heavily nerf'ed when MotU was released. Besides, if you want self healing
- build for it. There are so many options now compared to how it used to be.


As several illuminated people keep posting in this thread:-
EE favours:
Hit avoidance
Evasion
High Saves
High ranged damage
Effective CC
High burst DPS (ranged/melee/spell)
Efficient use of SP

It should be no surprise that clever builds which combine the above requirements feel 'OP'
to others which don't. I'm quite happy with this situation as it means clever, skillful players
(of which I am not one) get to make a difference. Essentially, it's the content that's the
driver for this. Nerf'ing abilities without changing the content will just drive a huge wedge
betwen the devs. and a substantial proportion of the playerbase.

Any re-balancing should be about giving more options not cutting down those tall poppies
so that everyone's the same. There's already been some good examples of how to do
this in this thread.

First of all, and to get it out of the way, I am more than willing to accept criticism. Prove, I specifically asked for it.

In any case, shiradi is as high sustainable DPS as you can hope to be on a caster. Unless there is something I am not getting (and non of my guildies is understanding either). To me, this is not WAI since Shiradi procs become the main focus instead of whatever spell you are casting. But the greatness of this is that devs are reading this and can judge whether it is WAI or not.

Leaving aside the WF/BF debate, I gave some detailed comments on build / quests issues and I'd rather focus on that. (And not necessarily on whether you can get a Shiradi sorc to be the top dps in a party).

Let me say in advance that I do not think that the current state of the game, a primarily concern is that it focuses too much on kitting. This has been brought up too in the monster stats dev thread.


1. Ranged vs melee.
Problem: Ranged characters have the best defense through kiting and they hit very hard.
Solution: Nerf kiting.

2. Self healing.
Problem: Healers mostly redundant outside of raids, favors soloism, introduces imbalances between those who can heal very well and those who can't.
Solution: Re think self healing.

3. Shiradi and using ED out of one's natural sphere.
Problem: Shiradi provides the SUFFICIENT DPS in the game at very low sp cost and ranged.
Solution: Shiradi procs not affected by spell power.
Important: if you nerf shiradi, give nukers some chance in epic content. They cannot hit the mobs effectively now, they blow their blue bars killing trash.

4. Multiclassing
Problem: Front loaded key enhancements and feats favor deep multiclassing to be achieve very powerful and "unnatural" builds.
Solution: backload the cool enhancements and feats.
Careful to leave some for earlier on to allow for some flavor multiclass builds.

5. Evasion vs other forms of damage avoidance.
Problem: Evasion is prince in damage avoidance, only topped by kiting.
Solution: Give PRR and AC more relevance. Give melees a fortitude spell damage soaking ability (elemental absorption).

6. Epic mobs and the "tactical approach".
Problem: Epic mobs negate sophisticated gameplay. They save against tactical feats and spells and the most effective way to play them is to have top DPS.
Solution: More mobs and weaker. Allow for specialist builds to perform reasonably well.

7. Healers and group efforts.
Problem: the game is moving more to BYO everything.
Solution: Require specialists and give healers slas.

[Rautis]

Cutting off your nose to spite someone else's face is not a winning strategy in my opinion.

It depends on how much damage in general the monsters are doing after changes. Monster damage should be reduced, IMO. Part of the reason why it can't be done is because of 25% incorporeal with 25% dodge and 50% displacement means you have 28.125% chance to get hit before AC is even checked. With worst possible AC with 5% miss chance that's 73.28% chance to avoid incoming hits. And only part of this that takes real investment is the dodge.

I am not claiming all monsters should bypass incorporeality or displacement. I'm claiming they should be bypassed when it makes sense.(Which is more often than they are bypassed now.) This can make different builds shine in different encounters that cause physical damage.

And like in last post I'll repeat twice that Monster physical damage in epics is currently too high and should be reduced.

[Alfhild]

1. Ranged vs melee.
Problem: Ranged characters have the best defense through kiting and they hit very hard.
Solution: Nerf kiting.

Nerfing kiting has the potential to nerf more than the target, in this case high damage ranged builds.
I see it as a shotgun approach with collateral damage than sniping the intended target.
Everyone can kite and may need to. Not everyone kites while producing OP DPS.
Target the DPS of what you perceive to be OP, not a strategy that everyone employs at one point or another.

[Gargalarg]

Anything that works as intended I consider somewhat balenced.

That being said:
fix all exploits that could make a character more powerful then what is intended
fix bards; when encountering constructs or undead bards are useless therefore not needed. Making that class unbalanced
fix the new stunning on random gen items. 'Dazing V' means nothing and would take power away from any toon that uses stunning blow/fist
fix minor stuff:

ex: acrobat in the dark monk tree doesnt apply the 1/2/3% dodge when you take it making that enhancement less useful.

Generally i think nerfing will not solve any problems and probably create even more problems.

Fix the things that dont work correctly.

After that look and see what is underpowered and balance that to match what is more powerful because that would make all builds be MORE EFFECTIVE though as in all content especially on the highest difficulty there will always be challenge more so in higher lvl EEs.

I am currently playing a monkcher one of the most powerful builds and a still struggle with much EEs, many of which are out of the question to do by myself, thats how it should be for most builds as well.

[Zzevel]

(Breaking down this response to kill the wall of text) IMO this is EXACTLY the response everyone needs to take to heart. It's a CHOICE. Nobody ever said one way or another is right or wrong. The question shouldn't be Whats overpowered.. but WHATS UNDER POWERED. What can be added to a Paladin or Bard or Rogue to bring it to an effective level? Most people who complain about one build or another do not actually play the build, they just know they are lacking.. the question should be.. WHY ARE YOU LACKING?

People play these min/max builds because in the current state of the game, they simply WORK where others fall short.

So you do not want to make your character more powerful by taking 1 class split or 2 that is available to you and therefore if someone is doing it it is overpowered? When an option is available to everyone, that is not overpowered. Another thing is whether it becomes gamebreaking. 2 monk breaks the game? why? Nonsense. Multiclassing should always be rewarding. why should a fighter 20 be as powerful as a 16/2/2 or 12/2/2? You even go further as to say it should be more powerful? Why? Multiclassing options are there, always have been, take more planning, and open so many possibilities. Sure, you don't want to multiclass, don't, and wait for someone to join the group to do some specific task you could have performed with some extra planning investment. Capstones are already good enough, they are a freebie that actually is debatable. "Give us an incentive to stay pure". Still, why? If there is an item that goes in slot A and makes you way more effective, you can use it or not, that is your option, at the cost of using the slot, why should any other item have a similar level of power to your build. Some will be sinergetic and some won't. That's ok and fun.

Well you could argue the same with PLs. Give us an incentive to stay single live!! Single Life toons should be as effective as completionists (free that feat already, come on!), "give as a reward for not having TRd". Seems like a twisted logic but it is not. The option is there and is available to you. You cannot choose to not take the available tools/options that the game provides to be more powerful/effective/efficient and then ask for your build to be as effective as the one that optimized all.

3. Shiradi and using ED out of one's natural sphere.
Problem: Shiradi provides the SUFFICIENT DPS in the game at very low sp cost and ranged.
Solution: Shiradi procs not affected by spell power.
Important: if you nerf shiradi, give nukers some chance in epic content. They cannot hit the mobs effectively now, they blow their blue bars killing trash.

They did give nukers a chance .....by introducing shiradi, it works on many more spells than MM, and you would know that if you have ever actually played the destiny..

[UurlockYgmeov]

How about just concentrating on finishing the stuff never finished? Would give players something to do other than minmax building (ok for a second).

examples:

The Guild System
Cannith Crafting


Then we can talk about balance - maybe.

OH and adjust policy about cheats. Tell us they exist and the consequences of using them. When a new one is discovered, stop pretending the players are dumb, and that you are ostriches. Address issue head on with communication.

Worry more about server population and communication.

[Alfhild]

It depends on how much damage in general the monsters are doing after changes. Monster damage should be reduced, IMO. Part of the reason why it can't be done is because of 25% incorporeal with 25% dodge and 50% displacement means you have 28.125% chance to get hit before AC is even checked. With worst possible AC with 5% miss chance that's 73.28% chance to avoid incoming hits. And only part of this that takes real investment is the dodge.

I am not claiming all monsters should bypass incorporeality or displacement. I'm claiming they should be bypassed when it makes sense.(Which is more often than they are bypassed now.) This can make different builds shine in different encounters that cause physical damage.

And like in last post I'll repeat twice that Monster physical damage in epics is currently too high and should be reduced.

Increasing the number of mobs with Ghost Touch reduces the value of Incorp.
Reducing the value of incorp hurts Waith Necro's the most, virtually EVERY monk including non-monkcher monks, and nerfs everyone wearing an incorp item, which, at the level of play we are discussing, should be everyone.
Reducing the value of Displacement nerfs every shadowmarked elf, every arcane caster, everyone who has farmed Shroud clickies and everyone with workable UMD, which at the level of play we are discussing, is almost everyone.
A lot of people, yourself included, are saying EE mobs need a nerf.
Your suggestion is to nerf virtually every player, buff some mobs in one way, and nerf them all in others.
Were I a dev looking to pitch management a make-work project to ensure short-term job security, your idea is great.
I am not trying to be rude but just asking that you think out ALL the implications of your suggestion.

[fmalfeas]

Nerfing kiting has the potential to nerf more than the target, in this case high damage ranged builds.
I see it as a shotgun approach with collateral damage than sniping the intended target.
Everyone can kite and may need to. Not everyone kites while producing OP DPS.
Target the DPS of what you perceive to be OP, not a strategy that everyone employs at one point or another.

Agreed. Flashback, if you will, to Everquest, years and years ago. For a long time, 99% of the time, if you were losing a fight, you could run away. You'd quite possibly die anyway, as the mob chased you and beat you down, but you had a chance to survive if you ran in time, and were fast enough. Then, the devs decided that Necromancers, Druids, Rangers, and Wizards were being naughty by kiting mobs, So they made many, many, many mobs able to summon you back to them. No more kiting! Also, no more retreating. No more real tactics of any kind. All there was was tank & spank. And anyone not the tank had to make certain that they never, ever, ever got aggro, because if they did, they'd be summoned and insta-killed.

I do not want to see that implemented in DDO. It is not the answer. It's a cheap copout that makes the game less fun.

Adjust mob stats so that you don't 'need' to be one of the uberbuilds to be 'viable'. See how the playerbase reacts. Odds are, a lot of those uberbuilds will change. Why? Because other than the fact that they win, they're pretty boring. They're one or two trick ponies, without any real ability to adapt or grow. Part of the reason I won't make one, because I know that I'd be bored to death in no time. And part of why I have lots of alts, and all of them are prone to reincarnation. Need some difference now and then.

Even my druid not only has multiple gearsets for his level range, but as he stands right now, he /carries/ the gear to viably change up on the fly. It makes him more fun, more versatile.

[BigErkyKid]

Nerfing kiting has the potential to nerf more than the target, in this case high damage ranged builds.
I see it as a shotgun approach with collateral damage than sniping the intended target.
Everyone can kite and may need to. Not everyone kites while producing OP DPS.
Target the DPS of what you perceive to be OP, not a strategy that everyone employs at one point or another.

There are ways of doing it "right". I also kite with my melees, I consider it a smart strategy to avoid getting hit by many enemies at the same time.

The problem is when someone can backpedal and backjump-shoot at a speed such that NO enemy is capable of reaching him/her in melee. My suggestion, specifically:

1. Increasing nerf curve. A possible way to nerf kitting is by introducing a increasing curve nerf. That is, nerf more those that are high up and less the ones that are currently alright. Probably the last thing a tank needs now is reduced speed.

2. Remove attack/cast -jump exploit. It should still slow you down.

Special mention: Careful with melee mobs not using ranged or being very weak at ranged attacks.

The objective of both changes being that a ranged should not be able to keep dealing damage while running away at a speed that makes him untouchable by melees. That is, you could run away from the mobs, throw a couple of arrows or spells and repeat. But NOT back-jump cast, back-jump shoot continuously. I believe people would do it far less often if the latter was removed.

[Delacroix21]

Here is a simple group of changes to make to provide balance=

1. Monsters in EE (and in level 28 challenges) need reduced to-hit, damage, saves, SR, Spell Pen, and HP. (must be done FIRST)

2. Adrenaline still works with bows but does not regain charges with ranged (burst from manyshot, but forced to use meele to get it up)

3. Shiradi procs use 50% of caster spell power (less damage, but the build is still viable)

4. Masters Blitz stacks to 10, but does half the damage increase it does now.


Those are the only "balance" issues we face right now. Pure classes not being as strong as some multiclass combinations or weak EDs and PrEs are a separate topic.

[Fhauvial]

Increasing the number of mobs with Ghost Touch reduces the value of Incorp.

It also kills the Shadowdancer destiny for Rogues. Shadow Form is Tier 6, no less.

[Alfhild]

2. Remove attack/cast -jump exploit. It should still slow you down.

Without addressing whether jump-casting is exploiting, what you are advocating is an adjustment which affects EVERY level of caster play including heroic where Bladebarrier/Firewall dropping casters employ this technique ritually and have been doing it for years.

[Delacroix21]

Here is a simple group of changes to make to provide balance=

1. Monsters in EE (and in level 28 challenges) need reduced to-hit (will buff AC tanks), damage, saves, SR, Spell Pen, and HP. (must be done FIRST)

2. Adrenaline still works with bows but does not regain charges with ranged (burst from manyshot, but forced to use meele to get it up)

3. Shiradi procs use 50% of caster spell power (less damage, but the build is still viable)

4. Masters Blitz stacks to 10, but does half the damage increase it does now.


Those are the only "balance" issues we face right now. Pure classes not being as strong as some multiclass combinations or weak EDs and PrEs are a separate topic.

Requoted for truth. People are going way overboard with complaints and cries for nerfs. Incorporiality is fine, kiting is fine (go play WoW or something), self healing is fine,a dn evasion is fine. Self healing is required (along with kiting) as clerics couldnt even hit their heal buttons fast enough to save you if you are meeleing in EE. Evasion is less an issue if we tone down monster spells and give passive (not blocking elemental absrob to shields). If monsters are surviveable toe to toe (with a healer) kiting will be discouraged as its annoying (like divines blade barrier kiting on heroic normal or hard).

[BigErkyKid]

Without addressing whether jump-casting is exploiting, what you are advocating is an adjustment which affects EVERY level of caster play including heroic where Bladebarrier/Firewall dropping casters employ this technique ritually and have been doing it for years.

I don't agree. Once thing is to drop a barrier and to run back and forth through it and the other is to pew pew while you back jump.

Kitting through FW and BB becomes less and less effective as you move to higher levels. I would say it is almost never used in epics. At least that I have seen.