U48.4 Preview 2: Balance Changes: Spells

[BrokenAgain]

Thanks niknight - yes I'm aware the level 21 feat was also changed to scale into epic levels.

I was just making a comparison for the old/new versions of the level 26 feat because it wasn't clear whether if the slight damage buff was intended to occur for both feats or just overall (assuming players take both).

In case the intention was to increase damage (besides adding scaling) for both feats, I wanted to point out that the new feat actually dips in damage at 26 (4d4, avg 10) when compared with the old feat (4d6, avg 14), although obviously it comes out slightly ahead at 30 (6d4, avg 15).

[niknight]

Thanks niknight - yes I'm aware the level 21 feat was also changed to scale into epic levels.

I was just making a comparison for the old/new versions of the level 26 feat because it wasn't clear whether if the slight damage buff was intended to occur for both feats or just overall (assuming players take both).

In case the intention was to increase damage (besides adding scaling) for both feats, I wanted to point out that the new feat actually dips in damage at 26 (4d4, avg 10) when compared with the old feat (4d6, avg 14), although obviously it comes out slightly ahead at 30 (6d4, avg 15).

The new feats still come out ahead at 26. On live, you get 7d6 at level 26. On Lama, you get 5d6 + 4d4 at level 26.

[BrokenAgain]

Thank you. Yes, that's my point exactly. Besides turning the epic dice from a static buff to a scaling buff, is the change suppose to:

A: be a buff overall with the assumption that both feats are taken

B: increase the damage of both feats independently.

In case it was scenario B, I'm saying that the damage for the Epic Arcane Eldritch Blast at level 26 is worse than the live version. In other words is dev’s goal to give more damage with new level 26 feat (separately from level 21 feat) for each level progression than live version?

[slarden]

Thank you. Yes, that's my point exactly. Besides turning the epic dice from a static buff to a scaling buff, is the change suppose to:

A: be a buff overall with the assumption that both feats are taken

B: increase the damage of both feats independently.

In case it was scenario B, I'm saying that the damage for the Epic Arcane Eldritch Blast at level 26 is worse than the live version. In other words is dev’s goal to give more damage with new level 26 feat (separately from level 21 feat) for each level progression than live version?

The old feats provided 7d6 base dice and now those 2 are effectively rolled into one feat and the level 26 feat adds 6d4 pact dice. So the net change is effectively adding 6d4 pact dice to warlock which does cover the loss of the enhancement spellpower and a little more. Warlocks have slightly better dps than they had yesterday, but they are still lagging behind in single-target dps significantly.

[dark270]

yup, looks like ill just TR/LR out and never play alchemist again! thanks devs!

[Toph_Prime]

If sunburst is getting a buff it seems reasonable to assume greater sunburst will get a buff too right?

[cru121]

Please boost spellsinger's reverberate (damage over time sla), and maybe also boost horn of thunder and/or greater shout a bit more.

Spellsingers have *no* single-target damage spells other than reverberate, and its damage is pitiful. Please change the damage to *at least* 1d6 +1 per caster level (currently 1d10 + 1 per *3* caster levels). Also, lower the cooldown on all similar dots.

Greater shout is a lvl 6 bard, lvl 8 sorc/wiz spell, but has the same damage dice as level 3 sorc/wiz spells.

Yeah... Bard's heroic nuking potential was actually already decent and is now even better, yet the changes still fail to address the main problem - anemic damage in epic and legendary content.

[janave]

Same old picking winners and losers.

`Hey how to differentiate between Wizard and Sorcerer? Lets make Wizard "the DC caster" and Sorcerer the damage nuker. ( mind that in the source game this is not why and how they are different)`. As if damage spells have no save...

Later...

New Meta with reaper: DC ceiling is slightly increased ( innate/trainable DCs are going to help climb up)

Apply Debuffs:
DC => 0%
Damage => Up to 90%? (save for half still applies because Sorcerers arent "DDO DC casters"...)


Before the auto immunity breaker content design took care of balancing the characters much better.

[SirValentine]

...having to focus on two spell lines... maybe even 3. Evocation (obviously), necromancy (Finger of death) and now transmutation.

Druids also have a bunch of Conjuration and Enchantment spells, and even one Abjuration. (I don't use the Abjuration, personally, but someone could.)

[janave]

+1, I legit laughed when I read that.

We honestly need some more support for a sustained damage caster, and alch and warlock look like they should be the premier options therein. I would love to see them get realized in that.

Warlock SE with stronger epic scaling for Stricken and Consume could fill in that role. Also agree with Slarden that a single target burst for Warlocks would be optimal, they are practically the only ranged option without a burst ( this wasnt much an issue before reaper, but these days, no burst = may as well pike).

SE capstone: Consume and Stricken scales with 150% ( from 125%) spell power.


Arcanotech Capstone: Arcane Empowerment:

- Remove Spellcraft => +2% spell crit with all spells.
- Empower and Maximize meta magic costs -5 spell points.
- While Empower Metamagic is on: +25 Spell power

Shocking Vulnerability: Why not standardize these? they are all over the place, d4 per hit for each is still 20 to 5 hits range, quite wide. Its also effectively a reaper, raid or epic ability by now. So front loading these would make sense for better gameplay. d4+1?

[LurkingVeteran]

...
[*]A variety of spells have had their damage dice fixed.

What does this mean? Which spells were changed? Some spells as they were implemented on Lama seemed reasonable balance wise (e.g. Ice Flowers, Flamestrike), but if you actually gave them the numbers in the patch notes I'm pretty sure they will be OP now. Ice Flowers doing Meteor damage on 2s CD and Flame Strike not being far behind seems like you are trading one OP class (Alchemist, Fire Sorc) for others (Ice Druid, AoV w/ +15 MCL, maybe Fire Cleric with the SLAs).

[nobodynobody1426]

The spell Sunburst has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+4 damage per caster level.

Isn't this kinda low for a level 8 spell? Firestorm has 1D6+8 and the theme seems to be 1D6+Spell Level for AoE spells, could we have this tuned upwards a bit seeing as there aren't any other high level radiant AoE's?

[LurkingVeteran]

Isn't this kinda low for a level 8 spell? Firestorm has 1D6+8 and the theme seems to be 1D6+Spell Level for AoE spells, could we have this tuned upwards a bit seeing as there aren't any other high level radiant AoE's?

Also makes no sense since SL4 Holy Smite is listed as D6+8. Not sure if it just applies to outsiders or something. Would be nice if somebody could check on Lam, because this doesn't seem to make much sense.

[nobodynobody1426]

Also makes no sense since SL4 Holy Smite is listed as D6+8. Not sure if it just applies to outsiders or something. Would be nice if somebody could check on Lam, because this doesn't seem to make much sense.

It does do that damage **but**, it's based on enemy alignment similar to how Word of Balance is, also they have a ML of 10 that requires an epic feat to raise to 20.

Damages targets with holy power. Deals 1d4+4 holy damage per 2 caster levels to Evil creatures (maximum damage 5d4+20 at caster level 10), leaving them blinded for 6 seconds (Will save negates), or deals 1d3+3 holy damage per caster level to Evil outsiders (maximum damage 10d3+30). This spell has no effect on Good targets, and Neutral targets take half damage, may save to further reduce damage, and are not blinded. This spell can only be cast by Good or Neutral casters; it has no effect when cast by an Evil caster.

Orders Wrath is the same

Lawful power smites your targets. Only Chaotic and Neutral (Not Lawful.) creatures are harmed by the spell. The spell deals 1d4+4 points of damage per 2 caster levels (Maximum damage 5d4+20.) to a Chaotic creature, or 1d3+3 per caster level (Maximum damage 10d3+30.) to a Chaotic Outsider, and causes it to be Dazed for 6 seconds. A successful Will save reduces damage to half and negates the Dazed. The spell deals only half damage to creatures who are neither Lawful nor Chaotic, and they are not Dazed. This spell can only be cast by Lawful or Neutral casters, it has no effect when cast by a Chaotic caster.

Word of Balance

You utter elder words of balance, judging those who stray too far from the path of neutrality. Targets with an alignment one step away from True Neutral, such as Chaotic Neutral, take 9-16 bane damage for every two caster levels up to level 20. Targets who are two steps away, such as Chaotic Evil, take that damage twice. True Neutral targets are immune to this spells.

D&D Dice: For every two caster levels, deals 1d8+8 bane damage to creatures one step away from True Neutral, or 2d8+16 bane damage to creatures two steps away from True Neutral.

The alignment spells are hit-or-miss, either they work great (with new damage die) or they fail miserably, primarily they are for killing undead or demons. Stuff like constructs, plants, elementals, animals and most magical beasts won't be effected much due to their neutral alignment. Sunburst now deals damage regardless of undead condition and is a level 8 druid/sorc/cleric spell similar to Firestorm, should get the same damage dice.

[valewalker]

I posted about this at length on the update check in thread, but cross-posting here, since you haven't made any meaningful changes to Alchemist since the first preview (and no, those DoTs do not count - they're largely useless for improving low-mid heroics, your stated goal):

As a character who primarily plays spellcasters (aside from you, Druid!), I've been reading both this and the original thread, and have a fair amount of feedback on the Alchemist bombardier changes, and yes, it's (mostly) critical, with some suggestions as alternatives.

Alchemists do _not_ need stacking DoTs of a single target variety when levelling. My levelling track is roughly:

1) Oh god, any spell, everything feels anemic, need more 'plosions (or if single target, power in one hit)
2) Ooh, Molotov Cocktail is nice
3) Ooooh, Cindersmoke, everything is blind and mostly dead
4) Level 12: Oooooooohh, Multivial, Fiery Obliteration, Elemental Combination. 12-19 is the most powerful part of an Alch life (then again at 29)
5) Level 20: Oh, I get a Multivial SLA too, Neato, I get to be a little more efficient, and stop worrying so much about running out of SP when Meta'ed. Oh wait, this stupid SLA works differently to the normal spell, and I can't throw it without targetting a mob. This is weird, but okay, it's cheap!
6) Level 29: I am the God Of Hellfire and I bring you.. tiny, tiny bottles. That don't work in the underwater Fey quest and I'm useless entirely in that entire quest.

I typically play R1 up to about GH at 15 (where it goes to R3-4), and typically in groups, with about 60 reaper points and about 1070 self-buffed fire spellpower at 30. (This is all for background info for other players interest).

Groups in no way, shape or form use single target unless there's no other choice, since the mobs simply do not last long enough for people to care (aside from in high reaper, but then a 'low-mid heroic single target DoT is not aimed at that') - and yes, I'm including lives where I'm not playing Alch, like a sorc life, or an EK wiz like, or PM wiz, etc, etc.

They definitely don't use DoT spells, unless there's no other choice in a rotation. Everything is optimised for AoE DPS where possible, and it's how the game is played (at least in my experience - I play on Thelanis). DoT spells take longer to apply and tick than actual damage spells take to destroy things (and frankly, longer than good players playing melee like an EK wizard take to explode/chop things in groups too). Dungeons are primarily packs of mobs (or people drag them into packs), aside from the boss, and even then, the boss will get destroyed pretty quickly, unless you're in a raid, and again, that's not happening at low-mid heroic.

I don't feel like adding this kind of spell in any way addresses our concerns of the original post, that being an over 55% DPS drop _and_ for some reason (stated as gearing, but that makes no sense - just add the same bonuses on new pieces of gear, stopping that belt becoming permanent as an option, just like every other bonus that appears on multiple pieces of gear), the RL belt changes.


As for the actual nerfs, I'll preface this by saying that Alchemist _does_ need a nerf.

The playstyle of the class, due to its low defences, and frankly, really awkward line of sight bottle mechanics is ideally 1) Run in, 2) ideally jump over a pack, dropping bottles, 3) get the heck out. Throwing stuff from range has problems with line of sight (especially you, heal bottle) unless the dungeon is an open layout, which leads to 1) throw lots of bottles from range) gameplay.

*As such, everything in an Alchemist bombardier life revolves around one big hit, because you'd better not be near mobs otherwise - my pyjamas can't take the hit, we're playing on the bleeding edge (and enjoying it), vs my EK Wiz that can stand in the pack, laugh, explode, laugh again and spin like a mad man*

It also revolves around Multivial for a) yep, its damage is too high, and b) (just as importantly), stripping elemental immunity much, much easier than a Sorc (at least, in heroics, even with Tiefling scorch considered).


Spell Cost Changes


When you're trying to optimise for one big hit, that means you're also generally running fully meta'ed, which leads to (until the late epic stage), Alchemists running out of SP fairly easily, unlike Sorcs, and like Wizards if they're trying to do the same - that's part of why the damage is so large and packs are one-hit, we're not running lean to do that and if we run out of SP due to inexperience, then we're entirely useless. That generally feels fairly balanced right now, so if any cost of spell change is limited to _late_ epics to raise it, that's again fine, aside from raids, because the various SP feats have really kicked into gear by then.

In raids, Alchemists are frankly a mess when it comes to sustained DPS, like most casters - we'll run dry quite easily, and having lost cost SLAs is fairly essential to keep some sort of sustained damage up. The raids can be long enough for this to be a real issue (like taking out pillars in LoB), and the spell cost changes are a bad idea here, and with the above, fine, just running un-meta'ed is probably the only option.

In general, I don't think that upping the cost of SLAs is particularly a good idea - they're cheap and let you have a nice low cost mode when playing. If anything, keep them low cost, but reduce the SLA version damage, if that's a concern. And doubling the cost of Multivial and upping the SLA to the same cost, is just silly - change the damage, not the cost - Alchemists already run out of mana, unless you're intending to change the playstyle, meaning:

a) Up their defences

or

b) Stop using LoS mechanics with the bottles, and have them act like normal spells, then we become a different sort of Wizard.

Personally, I like the current playstyle.



Multivial


Oh my. In addition to making them cost double, you're removing Master of Spellvials from Multivial, adding 50% on their cooldown, reduced the caster level by 10 and removing SL belts?

This is frankly, utterly nuts levels of nerfs in one patch - and this is exactly how warlocks went from being played to... not. Please reconsider this, and apply the nerfs over time, after seeing the effect by playing in game during a full life and not via modelling in spreadsheets.

Cooldown: Sure, seems rational, although makes spiking now _completely_ pointless. It was barely used (at least for me) anyway, but now just devolves to - just stay in pyrite stance, ignore spiking, because we can't fit enough spells into the spike period. If you intend spikes to be used, then I'd recommend upping the spike timer, even beyond the increase in Multivial's cooldowns - it just isn't used enough to warrant it, it's fiddly, and complicated for anyone new to learn.

Master of Spellvials, Caster Level: Stop playing with weird and confusing feat changes (MASTER OF SPELLVIALS. NO, NOT YOU MULTI...SPELLVIAL), and drop the damage a bit in the first patch, maybe 5 caster levels, along with the belt changes (if you go ahead with those), then a second patch after actually playing it, and getting feedback.


Issues with developer relations/implementations


You clearly either don't test new premium content enough (in-game) before releasing, or you're incentivising sales by releasing overpowered stuff. No matter what you say your internal priorities are, your actions show one or both of these to be true.

See a) Warlock, b) Inquisitive, c) Alchemist (and presumably not d) Shifter because of the player council).

While incentivising sales is not a bad thing - quite good for a business, and I applaud it, souring players a year later when they've already paid you is a very, very bad thing (since you haven't changed anything in a major way, or even communicated it), they're expecting roughly at least the class as currently exists in game to be how the class is intended to be. See a, b, c.

Apply nerfs/balance soon after release if you didn't intend it, don't go silent and ignore it, then pull this kind of behaviour blindly, announcing a metric cart-load of nerfs at once.

Let players know your intent as soon as possible, and not after you've sold enough for it not to matter - your long-term revenue matters, and the lack of communication, combined with the overpowered initial release, means you get this kind of feedback when you nerf all casters (and especially Alchemists in this case).

In this section, I'm not complaining about the nerfs - balancing passes are needed - the problem is your lack of correction of the assumption that this is the way the class is intended to be, for so long after you released it.

MrBashful
Thelanis

[Stravix]

*world's largest snip*

In raids, Alchemists are frankly a mess when it comes to sustained DPS, like most casters - we'll run dry quite easily, and having lost cost SLAs is fairly essential to keep some sort of sustained damage up. The raids can be long enough for this to be a real issue (like taking out pillars in LoB), and the spell cost changes are a bad idea here, and with the above, fine, just running un-meta'ed is probably the only option.

MrBashful
Thelanis

I think this highlights one of my largest problems with alch. They were advertised as a poison caster.

Poison implies DoT, and while very not meta, a DoT spellcaster is a niche that is relatively unfilled (sorry warlock) and would let casters actually be viable in the raiding scene, like throwers and VKF.

How that got translated into fire sorc with bottles and evasion is beyond me.

[o2t4f]

Is festival ice spell power also being removed? Don't think they come in sonic, force, and light versions.

[nobodynobody1426]

I think this highlights one of my largest problems with alch. They were advertised as a poison caster.

Poison implies DoT, and while very not meta, a DoT spellcaster is a niche that is relatively unfilled (sorry warlock) and would let casters actually be viable in the raiding scene, like throwers and VKF.

How that got translated into fire sorc with bottles and evasion is beyond me.

It's the immunity bypass of Bombardier combined with the multi-hit nature of Multivial, works the same way as Fire Apotheosis and Meteor Swarm. That makes them able to be a better fire sorc then fire sorc because unlike fire sorc Alchemists actually get crazy good defense options and built in healing. Running a fire build and a bunch of infernal hell lords come at you, doesn't matter just Multi-vial and win. Ancient fire elementals sent by Kossuth, doesn't matter multi-vial and win. Any ranged immunity-bypass + multi-hit AoE attack is going to render all content trivial unless the player actively nerfs themselves with R10 silliness.

Extra Credits did a really good series on this kind of stuff

Balancing for Skill - The Link from Optimal Power to Strategy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EitZRLt2G3w&t=2s

MS / MV spam has become a First Order Optimal strategy, same with Inquisitive dual shooter and a thrower builds. Basically anything that has an absurdly low skill to power ratio gets turned into this, especially if it has a design flaw that a veteran player can leverage to further exploit the power curve. EC does a bunch of cool videos around game design and it's really cool as players to learn about this stuff.

[grubenbrobrobroketv]

There are a number of bugged interactions with Alchemsit at the moment.

With the new inflict spells coming out i want to try them out with alchemist because that is my prefered caster class.
I still want to do great self healing with my spells so i want to do a 16/4 alchemist wizard split to get the undead ability to heal myself since i believe death salve doesnt work properlly either for self healing negative ability. Death salve working propelly is a must for the new raid as the horses can act as a secondary healer for your tank for them if they can be healed by negative damage.(I think the fix for this is just doubling the value it gives but dont quote me on that though)

i want to do a 4 split instead of a 3 split becuase in T4 arch mage there is an enhancement that allows you to strip negative immunity with negative spells but this doesnt work for lesser death aura or any of alchemists inflict spells.

Currently on lamannia inflict spells dont heal undead characters at all. Harm is the only spell that still works to heal undead but this spell wasnt adjusted with the inflict spell pass so that is not surprising. I feel that this is due to them wanting different dice for damage and healing but that healing dice portion must not be implemented yet.

The winter raid trinket doesnt apply quenching with druid or alchemsit spells.

[slarden]

Is festival ice spell power also being removed? Don't think they come in sonic, force, and light versions.

Unless they changed it - it doesn't stack with a standard spellpower item - I haven't checked in years though due the lower spellpower for the min level it adds - if it is now typed differently I will dig up my old mask and regret not making more.