U36: Artificer & Battle Engineer Changes

[CThruTheEgo]

I'll admit I didn't know this nor do I know this still. Hoping someone enlightens me. ????

Legendary dreadnaught core 2:

Action Hero: Passive Bonus: Reduces the cooldowns of your Action Boost abilities by 33%. (Note, innates cannot be twisted, thus listed cooldowns include this reduction.).

[Steelstar]

Sounds like it's already a given that you think of artificer as a multiclass type rather than being able to stand on its own. Shouldn't both options be viable?

Once it has three trees like most other classes, I agree. In the meantime, it makes sense to say that it's less-rounded than other classes are, and multiclassing helps round that out, depending on what you're trying to build.

[CThruTheEgo]

Sounds like it's already a given that you think of artificer as a multiclass type rather than being able to stand on its own. Shouldn't both options be viable?

Steel was talking about melee artis specifically. A ranged/caster hybrid already stands well on its own (see Dubbell O'Seven in my sig for an example). These changes will simply bring it up to speed with the other revamped classes.

[cdbd3rd]

I don't really understand why so many people clamor for all the trees in the game to be exactly the same, and all the classes to play the same. With the same options, the same playstyle, the same defensive options and the same kobold beatdown time.

Why not let the artificer remain defensively weak - no evasion or special dodging, and no special heavy armor tankiness - but give them other things to help them stay alive? Here are a few options.....

Good ideas, but don't fit within the context of this thread, being a one-tree topic. Especially a tree that is mostly complete with only a few tweaks as viable options now.

A little defensive/healing buff wouldn't be a bad thing as we continue to wait for a third tree.

[CThruTheEgo]

I don't really understand why so many people clamor for all the trees in the game to be exactly the same, and all the classes to play the same. With the same options, the same playstyle, the same defensive options and the same kobold beatdown time.

I agree, but unfortunately that ship sailed long ago. Artificer will be the 9th out of 14 classes to get revamped. They've all been the same. For example, the assassin is arguably a completely unique melee playstyle. During the rogue pass, there were many suggestions given by some very passionate assassin players to maintain and augment that playstyle. Instead, they simply got more of the same: melee power, crit multiplier, crit range, PRR, etc. And while assassin's still have a more unique playstyle than other melee builds, their playstyle is now closer to those builds than it was before the pass.

I've simply come to accept that this is what the class passes will be. It is what it is. I suspect they do this due to limitations of both time investment and coding mechanics currently available. It's a lot easier to simply copy/paste a crit multiplier, for example, than to create unique mechanics for multiple abilities for multiple classes. Personally, I'd rather they take the time and diversify as you are advocating, but it's simply not going to happen. If it was going to happen, it would have already.

[GumpsGang]

Now I'm going to have to make a Gnome Artie with a big hammer. I blame you, Steelstar. Just awesome.

[UurlockYgmeov]

Time to get my Artificer out of its mothballs....

well said!

[ThomasHunter]

Legendary dreadnaught core 2:

Thank you and very interesting. However - BOOOO. It's a core and I don't think my Arti does well there.

I'll appeal to Steelstar again. Please Steel! What about 3 tiers that get smaller cool down times?

???? Okay no more whining from me...

[Ryethiel]

Construct Essence *snip*

I agree.

It seems that trying to go the Construct Essence route is a rather heavy investment of taking up not just 2 Feats, but an Epic Feat as well and having to wait til 21 just to get a somewhat lackluster result. Otherwise, you can pick Warforged, get everything at level 1, and access to Repair Amp that you otherwise wouldn't.

Construct Essence in general is really feeling like a trap. If you make a fleshy, stay fleshy and just twist Cocoon.

[Zzevel]

The damage output is decent compared to other builds..

Someone at Mercedes Benz also said the 'Smart Car' looked decent before it went into production.. remember that...

They've bee out for what like 5? years now.. revamped and played with a few times.. if you keep promising the third tree, eventually we might believe you.

[Tlorrd]

Once it has three trees like most other classes, I agree. In the meantime, it makes sense to say that it's less-rounded than other classes are, and multiclassing helps round that out, depending on what you're trying to build.

Thank you. I can get on board with your honesty in this matter. Much appreciated.

[Mornyngstar]

I think I may try out a Dwarf Battle Engineer wielding a Dwarven axe. I would then use stun effects and attack, add in Con to damage along with Int to damage and see the mobs dropping.

[TDarkchylde]

This tree proposal is a step in the right direction, but not yet enough to make me roll another Arti or level the one I have left. Right now, self-healing is the only defense an Artificer has. That doesn't work in Reaper either for potion-tossing or Repair with Construct Essence or playing a (War/Blade)forged.

Artis absolutely need a defensive tree to have any viability in the current game. I hope that's where the third tree ends up. Until then, it's not worth running the class.

Also, no love at all for making Great Crossbows even remotely viable on Artis? I understand the need to balance repeaters, but some of us would like a decent Great Crossbow build that isn't a Mechanic. Making the nerfed added damage apply to all crossbows leaves a sour taste in my mouth.

[karatemack]

Hello!
In the not-too-distant future (u36), a revamp to Artificer Battle Engineer, as well as some Artificer class features, will be heading your way! Here's what to expect:


...cool stuff...

Great! Glad you answered many of the questions before they were asked.

I personally prefer to utilize the dog, so this update won't make me play my arti any more... however there are some nice flavor builds these changes open up.

Also, there is a lot of talk about arti defenses... I have always thought that doing damage from ranged IS the arti defense (along with a couple of potential CC spells). Not EVERY class needs or SHOULD have AC/PRR/MRR etc. Still think it would be cool if we could cause our pups to self-destruct dealing damage equal to their hit points to all mobs around. Sure... the dog dies but they get to go out with a bang. Or maybe make it an effect upon death for the dog.

Keep up the great work Steel!

[Eryhn]

Still think it would be cool if we could cause our pups to self-destruct dealing damage equal to their hit points to all mobs around. Sure... the dog dies but they get to go out with a bang. Or maybe make it an effect upon death for the dog.

inb4 an echo of the deathward bug transposed to the mechanical sphere has artis blowing up bladeforged and warforged in party with their dogs ... - which could be fun

[Silverleafeon]

First Look Thoughts:

QUOTE=Steelstar;5981182

Hello!
In the not-too-distant future (u36), a revamp to Artificer Battle Engineer, as well as some Artificer class features, will be heading your way! Here's what to expect:

Thanks

Base class:

• Rune Arm cooldown is improved by 30%. (This is the improvement that Thermal Venting currently gives, which has been removed from the BE tree.)
• Rune Arm Charge Decay while moving is reduced by 50%. (This is the improvement that Arcane Capacitors currently gives, which has been removed from the BE tree.)
• There is no longer a penalty to movement speed while charging a Rune Arm.
• Artificers now get Warhammer and Light Hammer proficiencies.
• Improved Critical: Bludgeoning has been added to the Arti class feat list.
• Artificer Admixture spells now fire straight down if the caster has themself hard-targeted. (This will essentially deploy it on you... assuming you're standing on solid ground.)
• Lightning Sphere now has a functional saving throw - for both monster AND player casters

Wow!
Very nice changes to the Rune Arm!

The biggest reason I would head towards the BE tree is to be able to move at normal speed while using a Rune.

I like adding Hammers as a feature weapon of Artificiers, its flavorful and interesting.
Bswords & Dwarven Waraxes are Exotic Weapon, so not granting Prof makes sense, nice to have the other Prof granted.

Mmmm...finally no auto daze by monsters and undazed by players, thank you!

Definitely buffing both trees with these changes.


Rune Arms:

• (Note: None of this really applies to Knives Eternal, Machinations of Madness, or Whirling Words. They were already doing most of this.)
• Rune Arm shots now scale with 100% Spell Power. Most were scaling at 50% or 80% previously.
• Rune Arm weapon imbues now scale with 200% Melee or Ranged power (whichever is higher)
• Homing on Rune Arms now works at about the same angles you can shoot a crossbow at and still hit your target (roughly 80 degrees). It was previously about 20 degrees for most Rune Arms, meaning you'd be shooting your crossbow and hitting your target, but your Rune Arm shots would just shoot wherever your camera was looking. Long story short, homing should be more reliable now.
• Cannonball Shot (used by Glass Cannon) now uses homing.
• Cannonball Shot now has a much smaller projectile, which fixes a lot of bad behavior, such as:
  
  • It should no longer create the projectile behind a creature you're fighting at melee range
  • It should no longer instantly explode on firing because you're playing a Gnome or Halfling and the projectile was taller than you were

Thank you for increasing Rune Arm spell power, along with Rune Arm Weapon Imbues.
Nice bug fixes there too.
Looking forward to playing a Gnome holding a light repeating xbow soon.



Tree Changes:

Core 2: Gets +1 Stable Charge Tier in addition to everything it already does. (This replaces Rune Arm Overcharge, which has been removed from the BE tree.)
Core 4: Gets +1 Stable Charge Tier in addition to everything it already does. (This replaces Rune Arm Overcharge, which has been removed from the BE tree.)
Core 5: Gains +15 PRR and MRR in addition to everything it already does.
Core 6: Gains +2 INT (for a total of +4), +1 Competence bonus to Crit Multiplier with Crossbows, Bastard Swords, Dwarven Axes, Light Hammers, Warhammers, and Morningstars in addition to everything it already does.

Hmm...very nice higher Stable Charges for BE, making it still the better choice for Rune Arm fans,
while allowing Arty Casters to enjoy Rune Arm Blasting cycles.

Defense bonuses are always nice.

Capstone looks very nice, and definitely incentive to stay pure.
Its interesting to note that according to DDO Wiki:

Gnomish Weapon Training: +2 to hit and damage with light hammers, light maces, light picks, shortswords, shortbows, light crossbows, and light repeating crossbows.
+1 Competence Bonus to Critical Threat Range with the same weapons.

Since these are different, a gnome gains both, making a Gnome holding a Light Repeating Xbow (which is used less) interesting.


Tier 1:
Weapon Training: Add third line: Light Hammers, Warhammers, Morningstars.
Field Engineer: No changes.
NEW: Field Scrapper: +1/2/3 to Sunder DCs.
Thaumaturgical Conduits: (Moved down from Tier 2)
Item Defense: No changes.

Nice, moving some features to basic abilities makes room for new and lower.
A bit of support to melee here, Sunder makes a lot of sense as does hammers.

Tier 2:
Weapon Training: Add third line: Light Hammers, Warhammers, Morningstars.
Wrack Construct: Made sure it matches Mechanic's version.
NEW: Caustic Strike: (Melee: +1/2/3 [w]) (Crossbow: +0.5/1/1.5[w]), adds 3d6 Acid damage and 10d6 Rust damage. This damage scales with Spell Power. Ranged variant requires a crossbow. 6 second cooldown.
Extra Action Boost: (Moved down from Tier 3)
Attack or Damage Boost: (Attack moved in here from T1, made multiselect with Damage.)

Hmm...new attack, nice.
Good to equalize Wrack Construct.

Tier 3:
Weapon Training: Add third line: Light Hammers, Warhammers, Morningstars.
Disable Construct: Made sure it matches Mechanic's version.
STR/DEX/INT: No changes.

Nice.
It will be interesting to see if we get a few Swashbuckling Arties using Light Hammers in game?

Tier 4:
Weapon Training: Add third line: Light Hammers, Warhammers, Morningstars.
Battle Mastery (Fusilade/Haste Boost): Fusilade now lasts for 18 seconds (was 6).
NEW: Shatter Defenses: (Melee: +1/2/3 [w]) (Crossbow: +0.5/1/1.5[w]), procs Improved Sunder. DC 14+INT Mod+Sunder bonuses. Ranged variant requires a crossbow. 10 second cooldown, shares a cooldown with Sunder.
NEW: Agility Engine: 3/6/10% Doublestrike and Doubleshot while wearing a Rune Arm.
STR/DEX/INT: No changes.

Well, the big moment, what will Endless Fusilade be?
Interesting, increasing the Duration is an unexpected by wonderful choice.
It brings it more into line with Manyshot as a room destroyer.

The new attack seems interesting.

Doubleshot is always welcome.


Tier 5:
NEW: Reconstructed Armaments: +1 Competence Bonus to Critical Threat Range with chosen line (Crossbows, Hand-and-a-half, or Hammers/Morningstar).
Weapon Attachment: No changes.
NEW: Thunder-Shock Weapon: (Melee: +3 [w]) (Crossbow: 1.5[w]), +3d6 Electric Damage which scales with Spell Power. Procs Trip, DC 14+INT Mod+Sunder Bonuses. Ranged variant requires a crossbow. 12 second cooldown, shares a cooldown with Trip.
NEW: Unlock Potential: +20 Melee and Ranged Power while wearing a Rune Arm.
Tactical Mobility: Move 10% faster while wielding Rune Arm.

There we go, Competence Bonus to Critical Threat Range (which would not stack with Gnomes) tucked safely into tier five.
Well done on bringing Crit Bonuses to Arties.

Another attack that is interesting.

Melee and Ranged power tucked inside the exclusive tier five, very welcome.

Faster movement is always nice for trapper classes to catch up with the pack.



----

FAQs!

What's the current status of this feature?
Built and ready to roll out with U36. That said, there's still time to make adjustments (though not enough time to wholly alter direction).


Sweet, bring it on, looks great to me!

Why Hammers and Morningstars?

• Artificers in P&P don't especially excel with one weapon type or another, but there are a fair few official images of them with these kinds of weapons.
• We wanted a bludgeoning option, as well as some simple/martial options
• All three of these weapons are somewhat underserved in DDO
• Synergy with the Onatar deity, who has similar themes
• Synergy with Gnomes and Dwarves, who make good Artificers in P&P and also get bonuses with these weapons.

Well thought out, and makes Arty distinctive.
Important as we add more and more classes.

There aren't a lot of good Hammers and Morningstars out there right now...

• Fair! But there will be more.

Nods happily.

Why is the Crossbow damage lower on the actives?

• Artificers tend to focus on Repeaters, who get extra returns from +[w] attacks. Cutting it by half, but multiplying it by three shots still comes out a bit ahead.

Makes sense.

Why isn't Weapon Attachment getting changes?

• It just got some upgrades during the Race Tree Pass.

Does Endless Fusillade still have that super-long windup animation?

• Yes! ...But we also tripled its duration without increasing its cost. Keeping the animation means we can make it a lot more powerful.

Acceptable, it felt way too short.
Just to think ahead.

Any changes to Arcanotechnician?

• Not at this time. They just got a pass a little over a year ago!

Full movement speed while Rune Arm is charging is a huge buff to Arcanotechnician.
I usually turned Rune Arms off while using that tree, eliminating Rune Arm Blast.

So? This pass is bigger than that one was!

• Arcanotechnician before that pass was a better tree than Battle Engineer is now (on Live) - It's a solid tree in its current state (with some good builds using it), and the base class changes above will help them.

Rune Arms DCs are really difficult to attain in Epics!

• Yep. At this point, they have the same DC as a 10th level Artificer spell, more or less. Which isn't the easiest to attain! That isn't best fixed in the Battle Engineer tree, though. Arcanotechnician has a leg up on attaining those DCs (as it should). We added a few things behind the scenes as part of this pass that will help us better improve Rune Arm DCs in the future, if needed. In any case, most Rune Arms will be doing more damage than before regardless of DCs.

Spell Focus: Rune Arm
Spell Focus: Breath Weapon
Spell Focus: Pixie Dust

You didn't mention the poor Iron Defenders here, they're still terrible!

• Yes, they are. In working on this pass, we did a lot of meetings, research, and discussion about Arti dog and Druid wolf pets - And came to the conclusion that a meaningful pass to improve them (not even including AI changes, just statistic and enhancement based) was going to take twice as long as the Arti pass above, at minimum. It's something we'd love to do someday, as they're a core part of these classes; it's just not in the cards for the moment.

I understand its going to be a lot of work, we prefer to get goodies piecemeal quicker than all at once much later.

Please consider making some Uber Uber Uber Collars (which players cannot use) that are overpowerful,
because Iron Dogs & Leather Wolves are so low on the damage scale.
If you want to test them out, use one to attack the lamania Kobold while a player attacks another.


Third Tree?

• I wish. Not yet, sorry.

Well done here.
Thanks.

[Fnordian]

Some nice changes and additions, especially Endless Fusilade and the fixes and improvements to the rune arm. And I'm hoping we won't have to wait too long for a pet pass too.

Is there any chance of a boost for Flame Turret to be useful at higher levels (including epic)?

[HastyPudding]

• Homing on Rune Arms now works at about the same angles you can shoot a crossbow at and still hit your target (roughly 80 degrees). It was previously about 20 degrees for most Rune Arms, meaning you'd be shooting your crossbow and hitting your target, but your Rune Arm shots would just shoot wherever your camera was looking. Long story short, homing should be more reliable now.

So rune arms like Coronach and Toven's Hammer will now be more accurate when you fire, instead of firing randomly or at the ground 2 feet in front of you?

[Ryethiel]

On the subject of defenses:

Perhaps Reinforce Construct could use a buff, in order to help with defenses? Gives us access to some temporary HP.

I know about Palliative Admixture, but 20 temporary hp on a 30 second cool down is rather awful.

[Livmo]

They do - did you not see the 'class' changes? Those are serious QOL bumps to all arties who use runearms. Eliminating the movement speed penalty was a primary reason I would always, always go into BE, and the new cooldown reduction is just icing.

Admittedly, they haven't said if the class thing is level gated or if its just L1 in the class, so you might still be entirely right in terms of needing more class levels than perhaps you might want. But as long as you have all of that by L6 I wouldn't see that as a huge problem.

I'm looking for free rune arm add-ons via Core advancement only, which I hope would encourage folks to take more arty levels. I strongly feel all rune arm stuff needs to come out of both trees and no AP should be spent on rune arm junk in them trees , other than advancing the Core to get rune arm buffs. Advance in the Core and get more buff out of the Rune Arm.

The stuff inside the tree should be more special. For example, why doesn't the other tree address Tactical Detonation or Bladebarrier as SLAs? Or acid? I feel railroaded into an electric build.


A great opportunity here to do something special with Battle Engineer. Then sustain the momentum and make Arcano more boom and then razzle dazzle us on the new 3rd tree at the end of the road.