Update 29 Feats: Other Feats

[Avocado]

[URL="https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/467837-Update-29-Feats-Overview"][B]

New ML24 General Feats: (Each of these also grants +140 Maximum Spell Points)

• Improved Augment Summoning
  
  • Requires Augment Summoning
  • Your summoned creatures have +8 to all ability scores, +10% Dodge, and +100 Maximum Hitpoints
  
  
• Burst of Glacial Wrath
  
  • Cone spell, deals 30d6 Cold Damage and freezes the creature. Fortitude save (20 + Highest of your INT/WIS/CHA modifiers) negates the freeze.
  
  
• Intensify Spell
  
  • METAMAGIC: +75 Spell Power, spells cost +25SP. Works on any spell affected by Empower.
  
  
• Embolden Spell
  
  • METAMAGIC: +2 DCs to all spells with DCs. +10SP. Affects spells
  
  
• Master of Air
  
  • Your Shocking Grasp, Electric Loop, and Lightning Bolt spells no longer have a maximum caster level.
  
  
• Master of Earth
  
  • Your Acid Spray, Acid Arrow, and Acid Blast spells no longer have a maximum caster level.
  
  
• Master of Water
  
  • Your Cold Ray, Snowball Swarm, and Niac's Biting Cold spells no longer have a maximum caster level.
  
  
• Master of Fire
  
  • Your Burning Hands, Scorch, and Fireball spells no longer have a maximum caster level.
  
  
• Master of the Dead
  
  • Your Chill Touch, Necrotic Ray, and Negative Energy Burst spells no longer have a maximum caster level.
  
  
• Master of Light
  
  • Your Sun Bolt, Searing Light, and Sunburst spells no longer have a maximum caster level.
  
  
• Master of Artifice
  
  • Your Static Shock, Lightning Sphere, Blast Rod, and Lightning Motes spells no longer have a maximum caster level.
  
  
• Master of the Wilds
  
  • Your Produce Flame, Creeping Cold, Call Lightning, and Word of Balance spells no longer have a maximum caster level.
  
  
• Master of Music
  
  • Your Shout, Greater Shout, Sonic Blast, and Reveberate spells no longer have a maximum caster level.
  
  
• Master of Knowledge
  
  • Your Arcane Bolt and Arcane Blast spells now grant you one stack of Mental Honing (+3 Universal Spell Power, +2% Spell Crit Damage) when cast. This effect can stack up to 30 times. One stack is removed every 6 seconds.

New ML30 General Feat:

[LIST][*]Greater Ruin

• Requires Ruin.
• Deals 1000 untyped damage to a single enemy (no saving throw). Costs 150 SP

Just going to go down the list starting with improved summoning:

Until summons (not including hirelings) are balanced and competitive, this feat will not be taken. Pets need to do more damage, have higher saves and more prr/mrr. Perhaps change the feat to add some dps. I know the warlock tree has some melee power boosts but my druid/arti isnt a warlock.

Is Glacial Wrath affected by spell power or meta magics? Duration of freeze? Sp cost? I cant judge until those are known.

Intensify: This will only be taken by people who use SLAs. Too expensive for regular spells. It is going to buff warlock's EB, keep that into consideration.

Embolden: Looks good to me.

Master spell feats all look decent. It will probably make me actually take SLAs in Sorcerer trees. Only spell I have problem with is Sunburst. Sunburst does very little damage and adding a couple extra caster levels wont be worth it. I use sunburst to blind, not to do damage. Not sure what other spell you would use. Perhaps blade barrier?

Greater ruin: meh, whatever. It's just double ruin. Popular for cleric, fvs and shiradi casters. More bragging about 45k crits.

Its a start for a caster pass. However, I would like to see casters get a free meta-magic feat or something in epic levels. It would help balance casters. You did add spell power to each epic level, but it isnt exclusive to buffing casters. Anyone who uses cocoon or consecrate will also benefit. Melee and ranged power are exclusive to melee and ranged builds and do not benefit pure casters.

[Jiirix]

Ok, 3 Cleric past lives give +3 DC to Conjuration (I don't have them, but that's beside the point), but other than Cometfall there's no compelling reason for a cleric to focus on boosting Conjuration DCs. So the +3 is really just window dressing in the current environment of "go huge or go home" DC casting. It won't accomplish anything for the Cleric whose past lives earned the bonus. It's far more useful for a Warlock, for example.

I can't recall the last time Cometfall actually knocked anything over for me in level appropriate epic content. And I don't run EE except when grouped because I can't. Not absolutely can't, when I'm at 28th I can solo about 4 level 20 or 21 EEs. Slowly and painfully. So effectively can't. Cometfall is a spell I will chain with Fire Storm when I've got a pile of mobs stacked up and I have mana to spare before the next shrine (or it's close and I can afford to waste it on high cost, low effect spells). It's also a way to watch a blue hexagon appear over the head of every single mob as they make their saves vs. the knockdown.

Regarding Blade Barrier, gee it's not a bad thing for a Cleric or a Favored Soul to have an effective AOE, is it? You know, bring back that "wow" factor you felt when you hit 11th level and could first cast Blade Barrier? I mean, there's plenty of other examples out there for other classes: Earthquake, Evard's Grasping Tentacles, Ice Storm, Sleet Storm, Wall of Fire, Cloudkill, Death Aura, etc. All of those are persistent AOE spells you can use while kiting, except for Death Aura which moves with the caster.

Right now Blade Barrier caps at level 15 and thus starts providing diminishing benefits from 16th through 28th level content. And it has a DC save for half damage which the vast majority of Clerics or FvS will not have pushed high enough, if at all, to matter. Plus it is a Reflex save and so is doubly ineffective against foes with evasion. That makes it very costly for very little damage in epic content. Unlocking the level would only give it another 9d6 at the proposed 24th level where you could select the feat, plus 1d6 per level until cap. Still save for half damage, evade for none. And at level 24 the monsters have gained a whole lot more than 9d6 hit points (even scaling with Force spell power, which isn't a top spell power type for Clerics or FvS), so I'm not seeing any real problem with unlocking this spell.

I didn't say Blade Barrier can't be an option just that one has to be careful with this spells because it has a different game mechanic and different synergies. I don't see any problem with uncapping Comet Fall or Firestorm because these have a similar mechanic like the other spells (Fireball, Lightning Bolt, Sunburst or Negative Energy Burst) Blade Barrier IS different from those and you would have to think about Acid Rain, Wall of Fire and Ice Storm too.

[Lanhelin]

[*]Arcane Insight

• Activate to gain + 6 to all spell DCs and +6 to Spell Penetration for 30 seconds. 3 minute cooldown.

I have a question: Will an Otto's Sphere of Dancing, that lasts longer than 30 seconds, or one of the Symbols that last 5 Minutes, when cast while the effect of Arcane Insight is active, keep the +6 DC for their whole duration or lose it after 30 seconds?

[Tlorrd]

I didn't say Blade Barrier can't be an option just that one has to be careful with this spells because it has a different game mechanic and different synergies. I don't see any problem with uncapping Comet Fall or Firestorm because these have a similar mechanic like the other spells (Fireball, Lightning Bolt, Sunburst or Negative Energy Burst) Blade Barrier IS different from those and you would have to think about Acid Rain, Wall of Fire and Ice Storm too.

I agree they are more of an AOE DOT, but they are also not SLAs so to add a ton of metamagics would be extremely spell point costly and thus most people cannot just metamagic the wazoo out of them. And so uncapping those levels will bring them up on dps while not being overly powerful like a SLA.

Think of how many mobs are in TOEE, you can't keep casting these spells fully metamagiced, you'd burn through spell points to fast.

[Trillea]

I have a question: Will an Otto's Sphere of Dancing, that lasts longer than 30 seconds, or one of the Symbols that last 5 Minutes, when cast while the effect of Arcane Insight is active, keep the +6 DC for their whole duration or lose it after 30 seconds?

With the current mechanics ingame, the DC of a duration spell is set at cast and does not change even if the caster's DC changes in the meantime.

[PsychoBlonde]

Master of the Wilds is kind of craptastic compared to the other ones, because the max caster level on those spells is already high enough that you won't really gain much from removing it.

To be honest, I'm extremely dubious about having feats that are tied into enhancements (SLA'S) that way. I'd really rather have it be something like "max caster level on your level 3- X type spells is removed". This will have the advantage of being universal instead of only really benefiting the class that gets those SLA's.

[btolson]

Master of the Wilds is kind of craptastic compared to the other ones, because the max caster level on those spells is already high enough that you won't really gain much from removing it.

To be honest, I'm extremely dubious about having feats that are tied into enhancements (SLA'S) that way. I'd really rather have it be something like "max caster level on your level 3- X type spells is removed". This will have the advantage of being universal instead of only really benefiting the class that gets those SLA's.

Maybe as a kicker for both Master of the Wilds and Master of Light, they can also raise your overall Druid/Cleric/FvS Max Caster Level by... +4? (Bearing in mind that an awful lot of cleric/druid spells only gain dice per 2 levels.) This wouldn't have any additional impact on any of the SLAs that have had their caps removed, but would improve other spells to make up for the fact that those SLAs have less to gain than the options for other classes.

[HuneyMunster]

For Favored Soul

Master of Vengeance

• Your Blade Barrier, Divine Punishment and Firestorm spells no longer have a maximum caster level.

Covers all 3 spell damage types from Angel of Vengeance tree.

[IronClan]

Steel past Epic feats with DC's do not (last I tested) allow increasing via focus feats and gear so the question is will this take Evoc focus, gear Sorc past lives and evoc destiny DC bonuses (like the magister arcane augmentation?):

• Cone spell, deals 30d6 Cold Damage and freezes the creature. Fortitude save (20 + Highest of your INT/WIS/CHA modifiers) negates the freeze.

50-ish DC is not high enough by 25 for Elite level 25+ content, and it's not high enough by 45 (ish) for Devils* and presumably level 31 legendary content.

This same applies to spells like: Mass Frog, Forced Escape, Hellball, and also the Destiny spells Tsunami, Soundburst SLA, Draconic burst, and etc. Basically every Epic feat spell and every Destiny SLA currently that I've tested.

Also many of these spell where they have spell resistance checks seem to use your total character level for spell penn check and do not gain benefit from gear past lives or feats which means they are total wastes to cast against anything with spell resistance (at all because 28 Spell penn check might as well be zero).

* Just throwing that out there, I'm not convinced anyone knows the real DC needed to land stuff on oranges and higher fort mobs in the new content, my 92 stunning shield doesn't even make most stuff roll a save (last I tried which was pre-nerf update 28.1)... though I have for sure seen Frozen Fury land in DoJ so there must be some threshold at which the mobs actually roll a save and can fail it.

[Tlorrd]

Steel past Epic feats with DC's do not (last I tested) allow increasing via focus feats and gear so the question is will this take Evoc focus, gear Sorc past lives and evoc destiny DC bonuses (like the magister arcane augmentation?):

• Cone spell, deals 30d6 Cold Damage and freezes the creature. Fortitude save (20 + Highest of your INT/WIS/CHA modifiers) negates the freeze.

50-ish DC is not high enough by 25 for Elite level 25+ content, and it's not high enough by 45 (ish) for Devils* and presumably level 31 legendary content.

This same applies to spells like: Mass Frog, Forced Escape, Hellball, and also the Destiny spells Tsunami, Soundburst SLA, Draconic burst, and etc. Basically every Epic feat spell and every Destiny SLA currently that I've tested.

Also many of these spell where they have spell resistance checks seem to use your total character level for spell penn check and do not gain benefit from gear past lives or feats which means they are total wastes to cast against anything with spell resistance (at all because 28 Spell penn check might as well be zero).

* Just throwing that out there, I'm not convinced anyone knows the real DC needed to land stuff on oranges and higher fort mobs in the new content, my 92 stunning shield doesn't even make most stuff roll a save (last I tried which was pre-nerf update 28.1)... though I have for sure seen Frozen Fury land in DoJ so there must be some threshold at which the mobs actually roll a save and can fail it.

Totally agree ... things mentioned above need updated DCs to actually be usable in higher level EEs. They are great spells/SLAs but need an update to become feasible both on DC and Spell Penetration.

[Silverleafeon]

For Favored Soul

Master of Vengeance

• Your Blade Barrier, Divine Punishment and Firestorm spells no longer have a maximum caster level.

Covers all 3 spell damage types from Angel of Vengeance tree.

I like, might not fly, but I would certainly take it if it did.


Divine Spells that don't (unless they are not working as intended) have max caster levels:

Sunbeam (druid, divine disciple)
Nimbus of Light (cleric, favored soul)
Firestorm (cleric, favored soul)
Others?

Divine Spells that don't benefit from increasing caster levels:

Soundburst (cleric, favored soul)
Others?

[Morroiel]

Steel past Epic feats with DC's do not (last I tested) allow increasing via focus feats and gear so the question is will this take Evoc focus, gear Sorc past lives and evoc destiny DC bonuses (like the magister arcane augmentation?):

• Cone spell, deals 30d6 Cold Damage and freezes the creature. Fortitude save (20 + Highest of your INT/WIS/CHA modifiers) negates the freeze.

50-ish DC is not high enough by 25 for Elite level 25+ content, and it's not high enough by 45 (ish) for Devils* and presumably level 31 legendary content.

This same applies to spells like: Mass Frog, Forced Escape, Hellball, and also the Destiny spells Tsunami, Soundburst SLA, Draconic burst, and etc. Basically every Epic feat spell and every Destiny SLA currently that I've tested.

Also many of these spell where they have spell resistance checks seem to use your total character level for spell penn check and do not gain benefit from gear past lives or feats which means they are total wastes to cast against anything with spell resistance (at all because 28 Spell penn check might as well be zero).

* Just throwing that out there, I'm not convinced anyone knows the real DC needed to land stuff on oranges and higher fort mobs in the new content, my 92 stunning shield doesn't even make most stuff roll a save (last I tried which was pre-nerf update 28.1)... though I have for sure seen Frozen Fury land in DoJ so there must be some threshold at which the mobs actually roll a save and can fail it.

I agree - there seems to be a disconnect between epic slas and the monster saves in EE content.
Typical spell DC formula follows: DC 10 + level + stat mod + school bonuses

In order for this DC to be in the same ball park as heroic ones, 20 would have to equal 10 + spell level + school bonuses or in other words school bonuses would have to equal 1....

I can only imagine 2 scenarios: either that formula is a placeholder, or they intend to include school bonuses. Otherwise they might as well remove the freezing effect altogether.

I would like to see them go back into all the slas added after MOTU and double check that their DCs are being shown, calculated correctly, and if not adding the school bonuses - then changed to add them.

Note this problem isn't just exclusive to epics - the new warlock slas (create thrall, hurl through hell, and devour the soul) all have bugged DCs.

[Morroiel]

This is EXTREMELY weak for an epic metamagic.

75 sp for an increase of 25 sp and it takes an epic feat slot....

This will only be useful for shiradi and warlock casters..

I don't know what I expected but considering intensify spell is the most powerful metamagic feat in pnp.. I expected something...well epic.

Comparison:

Maximize Spell: Increases the Spell Power by 150. Spells will cost 25 more spell points while this feat is active.

You get 75 more spell power for maximize (a heroic feat you can take at first level) for the same amount of spell point increase.

I'm confused on the logic behind this? Aren't epic feats supposed to be more powerful?

[Silverleafeon]

This is EXTREMELY weak for an epic metamagic.

75 sp for an increase of 25 sp and it takes an epic feat slot....

This will only be useful for shiradi and warlock casters..

I don't know what I expected but considering intensify spell is the most powerful metamagic feat in pnp.. I expected something...well epic.

Comparison:

Maximize Spell: Increases the Spell Power by 150. Spells will cost 25 more spell points while this feat is active.

You get 75 more spell power for maximize (a heroic feat you can take at first level) for the same amount of spell point increase.

I'm confused on the logic behind this? Aren't epic feats supposed to be more powerful?

Its a typo, Steel said somewhere in this thread.
Its 75 usp for 15 sp (duplicating empower metamagic)

[slarden]

• Master of Air
  
  • Your Shocking Grasp, Electric Loop, and Lightning Bolt spells no longer have a maximum caster level.
  
  
• Master of Earth
  
  • Your Acid Spray, Acid Arrow, and Acid Blast spells no longer have a maximum caster level.
  
  
• Master of Water
  
  • Your Cold Ray, Snowball Swarm, and Niac's Biting Cold spells no longer have a maximum caster level.
  
  
• Master of Fire
  
  • Your Burning Hands, Scorch, and Fireball spells no longer have a maximum caster level.

For 3 of 4 elements you include a level 1, 2 and 3 spell that also happens to line up with the sorc SLAs. For water, you are including niac's biting cold rather than frost lance. I assume this is because it's problematic to implement an increase in caster level for frost lance due to the way it's worded and probably coded.

My issue with Niac's Biting Cold is that when grouped with a druid, a creeping cold or greater creeping cold will shut down niac's biting cold unless this was fixed recently. Can you can please make this spell more party friendly by not having niac's biting cold stopped by a creeping cold or greater creeping cold (and don't forget about creeping cold SLA).

[slarden]

That's a fair point.

Given that these are primarily themed around SLAs and low-cost commonly-cast damage spells, what would you say a Favored Soul specific option should look like? And a further Divine option in general?

Simple solution would be to add Sun Bolt and Sunburst to favored soul spellbook within the Angel of Vengeance tree. Not sure if the bonus casters level a favored soul gets creates a balance problem with cleric.

As a side note I assume you are aware that cleric sunburst kills undead and blinds non-undead automatically - there doesn't appear to be any save chance for enemies. This should be fixed.

You will need to be careful when adding slas to the favored soul tree as favored souls get 5 caster level bonuses. In addition, just reward is the best sp regeneration ability in the game and if combined with low cost force/light SLAs that do significant damage - it could easily become over-powered. Blade barrier gives just reward, scourge and other abilities multiple proc chances so even an unmeta'd blade barrier with the current cap is useful in epic content.

I do think favored souls need a boost, but due to all the goodness in their tree the interactions need to be looked at as well.

[Silverleafeon]

Divine spells to unlock caster level:

Great List
Sorted by Schools:

Evocation:

Searing Light ~ favored soul bread and butter
Sunbolt ~ awesome spell
Holy Smite ~ highly useful, but low on damage in end game
Flame Strike ~ a bit sluggish and expensive would be great to expand
Divine Punishment ~ low on damage in end game, very needed when added years ago
Sunburst ~ great anti shadow/undead spell
Word of Balance ~ much stronger than all the other alignment spells; thankfully one could take up to 3 master spells groups
Blade Barrier ~ great spell that is getting left behind due to monster hp vs spell power ratios
Order's Wrath ~ great crowd control spell vs chaotic but weak damage wise at end game
Chaos Hammer ~ kind of blah only a slow effect and weak damage
Unholy Blight ~ gotta be neutral to cast this one, also weaker choice since sicken << blindded or stunned


Conjuration:

Deific Vengeance ~ never used due to very weak damage and off school, however unlocking no max caster levels would do wonders for it
Cometfall ~ considered by some better in epics than blade barrier, hampered by off school DC woes



Might add (but seems not popular choice)

Abjuration:

Glyph of Warding ~ off school, very impressive in heroic normal
Greater Glyph of Warding ~ lacks damage in epics due to no SLA version, off school, would be helped by removing max caster levels


Necromancy:

Inflict Spells ~ off school, lacks damage in epics




Also of interest yet have no max caster levels:
{unless bug caps them at 20?}

Evocation:

Firestorm ~ nice, somewhat bugged in targeting, seems to do less damage than it ought to, maybe my imagination
Sunbeam ~ wonderful bread and butter Druid/Divine Disciple spell w/o metamagics
Nimbus of Light ~ included in favored soul spell cycles often despite low damage; slightly better in divine disciple due to SLA metas



Spells not really affect by max caster level situation:


Implosion ~ thank you for fixing this
Energy Drain ~ not bad but Epic Monsters recover very fast, so its no longer a stable spell unless you are necro focused
Soundburst ~ love the Exalted Angel SLA (please discuss increasing ED levels to 10 someday)

[Panzerdart]

These Artificer feats are absolutely not meant to address any of their issues. Or to substitute for an "Arti Pass". They are simply new options. Which I made because I like Artificers and had a few spare hours on a weekend. Take 'em if you like them, ignore them if you don't.

I can tell your love for Artificers is undying, Steel, I feel ya there. Much appreciated on the display of love with these new Feats.

How much can I bribe you to do an "Arti Pass" on your free time? Trust me, I'd pay handsomely.

Bacon, Cookies, Coffee, Tasty Hams, Broccoli, Chimichangas, Doritos, Cheeseburgers, Doughnuts, Taquitos, Fish Sticks, Twix, Kit-Kat, Egg Rolls, Gyros, Curly Fries, Spaghetti, Hot Dogs, Pizza, Cinnamon Buns, Eggplant Parmesan, Ice Cream, Nachos, Chicken Wings, you name it.

[Silverleafeon]

I can tell your love for Artificers is undying, Steel, I feel ya there. Much appreciated on the display of love with these new Feats.

How much can I bribe you to do an "Arti Pass" on your free time? Trust me, I'd pay handsomely.

Bacon, Cookies, Coffee, Tasty Hams, Broccoli, Chimichangas, Doritos, Cheeseburgers, Doughnuts, you name it.

I doubt we will ever see one, but if Sev wants to consider a kick-start approach to an expansion, I would toss in $20 to the ones that smacks of class/ED/enhancement/race/end game raiding

[sjbb87]

The average Melee/Ranged is a lot better off in terms of Epic feat choices right now than the average Caster. Making up for some of that gap is the main reason there are new mid-Epic feats in this update at all.

Here is the list of current epic feats
DPS
Blinding Speed
Overwhelming Critical
Combat Archery(ranged)

Tank
Bulwark of Defense
Epic Damage Reduction
Epic Fortitude
Epic Reflexes
Epic Will
Epic Toughness


skill
Epic Reputation
Epic Skills
Great Ability
Watchful Eye

caster
Ruin
Epic Mental Toughness
Epic Spell Focus
Epic Spell Penetration

Classes

Bard
Inspire Excellence

Monk
Vorpal Strikes
Improved Martial Arts


Rogue
Improved Sneak Attack

Warlock
Epic Eldritch Blast


Now the update 29

Caster
Wellspring of Power
Arcane Insight
Burst of Glacial Wrath
Intensify Spell
Embolden Spell
Master of Air
Master of Earth
Master of Water
Master of Fire
Master of the Dead
Master of Light
Master of Artifice
Master of the Wilds
Master of Music
Master of Knowledge
Greater Ruin

Summoner
Improved Augment Summoning

Artificers
Construct Exemplar


In short...

DPS =3 feats (1 useless and others just for ranged)
Tank =6 feats
Skill =4 feats
Caster update 29 = 10 feats plus one extra for each school
Bard =1 Feat
Monk=2 feats
Rogue=1 feat
Warlock=1 feat


So...
Missing many classes feats ....
Feats for DPS are few ...
And with the update 29 normal feats for dps there is almost only one.
Then await a response if will get away with it ....
Enough legendary feats being a joke for dps ...