First Look: U41 Eldritch Knight

[FuzzyDuck81]

It was our initial impression as well that Wizard was going to mercilessly outclass Sorcerer in Eldritch Knight. In playtesting, they end up playing somewhat differently but ultimately come out to about the same DPS depending on how you build. It's closer than one would think, even after accounting for things like Harper.

I'd guess the faster casting speed sorcerers get played a pretty big part in this, especially with quick draw to eliminate the gap between casting & fighting?

[elvesunited]

To be a little blunt: If you're in Tier 5 of this tree, and aren't casting one offensive spell at least once every 12 seconds you're probably not playing this tree effectively.

As the tree lacks offensive SLAs and/or temporary spell points, how is it possible to maintain sustainable DPS though rapid alternating between offensive spellcasting and melee attacks? The only effective spells ( in terms of spellpoint cost and cast speed ) I could think of would be low level touch range spells without metamagics ( not that they'd have many of those anyway as many feat choices would be spent on melee ) that would be doing less damage than the damage of the weapon. So you'd be taking breaks from your more effective melee attacks to cast low level spell attacks to maintain optimum damage on your melee.

[AlmGhandi]

I don't see you getting as lot of sympathy here, since even before these changes you'd need "some LR 20 hearts to change my eldritch knights to something else."

Did you have a specific point to make, or were you just saying that your lousy build before these changes was still a lousy build? They did improve things a bit, that's not something that you can deny.

I was actually saying that I am very happy with Eldritch Knight and am quite sure that these changes will make it less fun for me.
I did wizard with a bit of harper and sorcerer lives, pure and splashed... spent more time running around in Epic levels as an Eldritch Knight than anything else... I am going to miss the old ways.

[Katalissa]

...I am very happy with Eldritch Knight and am quite sure that these changes will make it less fun for me... spent more time running around in Epic levels as an Eldritch Knight than anything else... I am going to miss the old ways.

What specifically in this new tree is going to make it less fun or ruin your "old ways"? The only REALLY major change that gets rid of something for something new is the Knight's Transformation instead of Tensers - and you COULD always use Tensers as a spell... The rest is mainly better versions of the same, and a few extra tricks we didn't have before.

[Zites]

The real question is as Sev and Tor put it (if we never see it in gameplay that's something we want to fix.)

Will the elitist want EK in their mid reapers r5-7 party?

Will EK be welcome in r1-3 raids?

They are already saying no with out event testing it, so if we never see it in gameplay have you really fixed it?

[Saekee]

just to add to other points:
I don’t understand the lore behind stacking incorp, let alone why you keep giving out deflect arrows & quickdraw

I feel there should be sources of temporary hp

I want to see effects that make these warriors capable of opposing other spellcasters since they innately understand magic. So please add nullmagic guards, spell resistance, spell absorption and shattermantle, and perhaps other similar effects. Maybe also add ‘dispel resistance.’ The eldritch elemental type might include levels of same elemental absorption if a shield is equipped, for example.

They also ought to gain inherent resistances to enemy defensive spells, such as True Seeing. Granted, they can just cast the spell, but spells can be dispelled.

[Alcides]

Core 1: Eldritch Strike: Melee Cleave Attack. +1[w]. If this attack hits, your weapon also releases a blast of magical energy, dealing an additional 1 to 2 Force Damage per character level to all nearby foes.(Activation Cost: 0 SP Cooldown: 11 seconds)
You gain proficiency with Simple Weapons
Every Core Ability in the Eldritch Knight tree grants you +10 Max HP
Every Core Ability beyond Core 1 in the Eldritch Knight tree adds 1 to the Force Damage per character level to Eldritch Strike and Eldritch Tempest.
Every Core Ability beyond Core 1 reduces the cooldown of Eldritch Strike by 1 second.

Shield Striking: (unchanged) On Hit: +5%/+10%/+15% chance to proc an immediate Shield Bash attack with an equipped shield. Every six seconds while you have a shield equipped, you gain Temp HP equal to the 3 times enhancement bonus of your equipped shield plus your character level. This is doubled at epic level.

Knight's Transformation: Toggle: While this is turned on, all your spells and SLAs that are affected by Metamagics have their range reduced to touch range. You cannot enable the Enlarge Metamagic while this is active. You gain +30 Universal Spell Power and +3% Spell Critical Damage. The penalties of Tenser's Transformation are reduced by half.

Improved Knight's Transformation: If you have Knight's Transformation active, you also gain +1 Competence Bonus to Critical Multiplier with Melee Weapons. Tenser's transformation no longer has any penalties.

Eldritch Tempest: Activate: Perform a spinning melee attack, dealing weapon damage +5[W] to all nearby enemies and knocking them prone for 1 second. (Activation Cost: 50/40/30 Spell points. Cooldown: 24/18/12 seconds) If any foes are struck by Eldritch Tempest, your weapon also releases an explosion of magical force, dealing an additional 1d6 Force damage per character level to all nearby enemies. This additional force damage is affected by your spell power. (now 1AP per rank)

[Steelstar]

They are already saying no with out event testing it, so if we never see it in gameplay have you really fixed it?

More important is the feedback from people who have played it on Lamannia so far, which has been generally positive. To (once again) be mildly blunt, theorycrafting without playing provides far less useful feedback, as it's often based on assumptions and guesswork that aren't accurate.

Which makes sense; we've been playing with this tree for a month or two internally, and people are now seeing it for the first time and starting to grasp what's possible with it. We know what build types work and don't within this version of the tree already. I've built 13 different builds using this tree and have run them all through actual content. There'll (of course) be builds using it that we didn't expect in the end, which is great, but those don't tend to emerge until 2-3 weeks after a new tree hits Live and people start really working with it.

When we hear several people say "I haven't played it, but this ability/tree seems really weak" vs. a few say "I've played this on Lamannia and it feels fine", we're more likely to lean on the latter, because it's based on actual play.

Also, as we've said before - How often a build gets played has no bearing on how powerful (let alone how valid/good) a build is. There are plenty of decently powerful builds that aren't played that often. Like Beacon of Hope and Renegade Mastermaker, this tree has a non-typical playstyle. It won't be for everyone, but we're hoping that it'll be fun and able to hold up in content for those who want to play a hybrid melee/caster.

[Steelstar]

just to add to other points:
I don’t understand the lore behind stacking incorp, let alone why you keep giving out deflect arrows & quickdraw

The stacking incorporeality is essentially you using your arcane magic to deflect attacks.

Deflect Arrows was added to help reduce damage from ranged sources, as it is one of the things this build had the most trouble defending against in playtesting.

Quick Draw reduces the time between casting and returning to your weapon attack chain.

[HuneyMunster]

A lot of people are selling Sorc short in comparisons. Sorcs can break immunity, get more spell power potential, more caster levels, and shorter cooldowns. They won't do the same melee damage but they make up for it in casting power.

To break immunity you need Savant form for it to apply to all targets or T5 Savant for Awaken Elemental Weakness with a 20 second cooldown, slow casting time that is reduced to touch range. If your target moves when using Awaken Elemental Weakness it will go on cooldown for 20 and the target will still be immune to for main spell damage. Taking either of these loses either better T5 enhancements, Core 6 Eldritch Blade or martial class splashes.

If you splash more than 1 class you will lose either Hold Monster Mass or Wail. A wizard could take 2 to 3 levels of other classes with far less drawbacks. A Sorcerer would mostly probably require to be PDK and use a lesser +1 to still be able to break immunities. Taking 3 levels of Bard for Smooth Flourishes from Swashbuckler will lose your level 9 spells. Even Wizard would make a better 3 Bard splash by taking Two Steps Ahead for Int to damage and still retain 2 Mass Hold and Wail. For Sorcerer Favored Soul seems the obvious choice for Divine Presence.

I would think at a latter date Sorcerer might work better if or when a Universal tree is introduced for Charisma for damage. Maybe Tiefling could be the answer when Sharn is released as it seems the iconic will either be Bard or Sorcerer.

[Duhboy]

It was our initial impression as well that Wizard was going to mercilessly outclass Sorcerer in Eldritch Knight. In playtesting, they end up playing somewhat differently but ultimately come out to about the same DPS depending on how you build. It's closer than one would think, even after accounting for things like Harper.

Care to show us number figures?

Also Steelstar how come no Int/Cha to damage in the tree?

Noticed the 1st core "Every point spend in the Eldritch Knight tree grants you +0.5 Universal Spell Power." was removed. Will this be added back in or no?

I personally don't see this tree being very viable in reaper let alone in high end reaper.

A wizard EK doesn't gel well with hardly any epic destiny compared to a sorc.

Plus side atleast this tree isn't COMPLETE garbage anymore but still bad

[HuneyMunster]

More important is the feedback from people who have played it on Lamannia so far, which has been generally positive. To (once again) be mildly blunt, theorycrafting without playing provides far less useful feedback, as it's often based on assumptions and guesswork that aren't accurate.

Unfortunately character copy doesn't seem to be working to be able to test on my Sorcerer so I can only theorycraft at the moment. Will it be available for preview 2?

And off topic could we buy stacks of Thread of Fate at larger stacks than of 100 as it cost 5000 to get the cosmetics. This means it require purchasing 200 stacks of 100 to get all cosmetics on lamannia.

[liston33]

Any idea when character copy will be available? Testing first life characters does not show the true nature of the beast..lol

[Doomflayer]

The real question is as Sev and Tor put it (if we never see it in gameplay that's something we want to fix.)

Will the elitist want EK in their mid reapers r5-7 party?

Will EK be welcome in r1-3 raids?

They are already saying no with out event testing it, so if we never see it in gameplay have you really fixed it?

I have no problem getting in r1 -r3 raids or r5+ groups as a current EK player. My gear is exceptional and greater ruin adds good DPS. On top of that I can solo low reaper, so how does an improvement in EK hurt current EK player's again?

[Lynnabel]

Unfortunately character copy doesn't seem to be working to be able to test on my Sorcerer so I can only theorycraft at the moment. Will it be available for preview 2?

And off topic could we buy stacks of Thread of Fate at larger stacks than of 100 as it cost 5000 to get the cosmetics. This means it require purchasing 200 stacks of 100 to get all cosmetics on lamannia.

The cosmetics you are trying to buy are not hooked up on lamannia. The one that does have visuals is purchasable from the dojo main loot NPC to avoid the scenario you are describing.

[Mindos]

Quick Draw reduces the time between casting and returning to your weapon attack chain.

Does Quick Draw still do what we all think it does? Wasn't there an added 1 second delay put in place recently?

[Dragavon]

Quick Draw reduces the time between casting and returning to your weapon attack chain.

the recent change you guys made adding a 1s cooldown to everything has made quick draw useless.

[guzzlr]

To be a little blunt: If you're in Tier 5 of this tree, and aren't casting one offensive spell at least once every 12 seconds you're probably not playing this tree effectively.

Fair enough. I hope there are enough spell points to keep this going. Sounds like an impressive way to burn through them very fast. I am looking forward to trying it out!

[Silverleafeon]

Thank you for leaving my Pally 15 / Fighter 4 / Wizard 1 (and other players Fighter 14 / Pally 5 / Wizard 1, ect…) tank builds alone even though splashing 1 class level & 4 enhancement points to gain +10% AC is rather low hanging fruit (but tank builds still could use the love in keeping thus).

The Fighter 12 / Pally 5 / Wizard 3+ is definitely looking more attractive now.

[Xgya]

Fair enough. I hope there are enough spell points to keep this going. Sounds like an impressive way to burn through them very fast. I am looking forward to trying it out!

So, at level 12, my character has about 1600 mana.
I get to refresh my resources at least once every 10 minutes, often a lot more.
1 spell every 12 seconds, assuming you're in combat for the whole 10 minutes, would be 50 spells, which means I have 32 mana per spell to spend strictly to keep the buff up. That's slightly behind being able to cast a Quickened Chain Lightning (the highest level attack spell I should have access to at this level) every time I need to, but above a Quickened Cone of Cold. Mentioning Quickened spells because I'd be meleeing, and I ain't got no time to be standing still wiggling fingers.
Alternatively, this is a Quickened Web every time I reach melee, which makes a lot more sense since this is supposed to be a squishy burst melee, not a tanky frontline, so making sure the enemies can't properly counter makes a lot of sense. The other Quickened spell of choice is of course the eternally-useful Displacement (which I'd probably alternate between Web and this one to keep the buff up, really)

The above is assuming there aren't points at which I'm opening doors or chests, running, rezzing other party members or other non-combat-oriented stuff.
Of course, it also ignores the mana spent on buffs.