Favored souls SLAs totally overpowered

[voxson5]

FvS is super, but so are other things.

That said, aggressive caster FvS hirelings are stupidly OP for HC. They won't replace a decent player but they will pretty much solo reaper mode for you.

To digress... I've only only complaint, and that's sunbolt (and lightning bolt) being a line AoE, whereas every other "bolt" & "beam" spell is single target only - They should all be the same line AoE IMO.

[Jerevth]

Why on earth, in the first month of hardcore, would you think, "I'll call down the nerf hammer on a party member class because my character doesn't shine as brightly in one quest."?
TOEE is a beast and it sounds like they contributed to the overall success, immensely.
I'd be grateful to have survived as a team, not bitter, resentful or offended(?).

Everyone else already stated how FvS balance works out so I figured I'd address the psychological concern.

[LurkingVeteran]

The OP seems to be confused about a number of things (Holy Smite is not an FvS SLA, it is a cleric one, FvS SLAs aren't actually much more OP than before). However, he is right that divines seem to do equal or better damage than arcanes for most of heroics, which is questionable given they get armor + heals for free.

• With the spell dice changes, divines also pretty much do the same damage as arcanes until Meteor at L17+. The only downside is that their first regular spell AoE is Holy Smite at L7-8 which quickly starts tapering off (until L24 Master of Alignment) due to base MCL 10, but it's absolutely the best spell in the game at that level (alignment damage on a will save that does as much damage as an SL8 spell on 75% of the game and, I think, Meteor damage on outsiders).
• AoV Sunbolt SLA has always been super strong (partial) AoE due to all the caster level bonuses they get, they can also get this at L3.
• Cleric can also do ridiculous AoE damage with Holy Smite SLA already at L4.
• Clerics get Word of Balance at 20 which is about Iceberg single target damage on most targets, but they fall behind Meteor in AoE (but so do non-fire/earth savants)
• FvS gets crazy max caster level increases for Firestorm/Flamestrike so can partially keep up with Meteor AoE in epics but are weak to fire immunes (hint: Tiefling).

TLDR; Balance might be fine for epics, but I see little reason to play arcane between L3-17 given that divine damage is similar (although SLA-dependent before L7-8) and they are much squishier (unless you have a lot of reaper points). If you play arcane it's for Meteor/Acid Well (sorry Air Savants) and Mass Hold. On the flip side, divines struggle more in epic content. I think they should smooth out the power curves a bit.

[Tarinia]

The OP seems to be confused about a number of things (Holy Smite is not an FvS SLA, it is a cleric one, FvS SLAs aren't actually much more OP than before). Regardless, AoV Sunbolt has always been super strong due to all the caster level bonuses they get. With the spell dice changes, divines also pretty much do the same damage as arcanes until Meteor at L17+. Cleric can also do ridiculous damage with Holy Smite SLA at L4, but they taper off at L10 until you can pick up the Master of feat at L24. The only downside is that their regular spells start off a bit weaker until they can pick up Holy Smite as a spell at L9-10. Balance might be fine for epics, but I see little reason to play arcane in heroic given how much squishier they are.

You are right, that the spell holy smite is overpowered in low heroics till lvl12 because the damage potential was greatly increased together with other divine spells.
Perhaps it is this problem alone that let certain classes that have this spell on the class list and even slas be much more efficient then wizards using fireball or similar aea spells.
For me seeing DDO not based on 5ed D&D but on 3.5ed, the massive change/increase in damage potential let divine classes now shine whereas other classes that are normally doing aea damge in D&D 3.5 ed are just underpowered.
Palemaster is a special case because his slas are doing much less damage then other newer increased spells and are non effective vs. 1/3 of DDO monsters like undead in group play. In solo play thats not so important, because you can damage them twice, but in group play its a pain, if you heal undead with your first shot and most others kill them or damage them.

I don´t ask for a general nerf but instead to balance these new increased damage spells and slas in heroics for hardcore vs. the older aea spells that should be iconic in the game (they even are in 5ed- fireball do much more damage then other spells there). Till then my next toon will be a cleric or fvs to use this easy way for hardcore instead of underpowered wizard classes.

Tarinia

[hit_fido]

The reason there is a high representation of fvs on hardcore is because they get 10 hp per level not because of their dps. It's as simple as that.

OP didn't state anything about the number of favored soul characters on hardcore relative to other builds; the statement was about the perceived success and speed of clearing mobs relative to other builds on the elite difficulty that most people run on hardcore, which is also my observation. It's almost as if SSG intended to improve certain spell casting when they increased damage output and it's a testament to the effectiveness of their change that people are reporting their observations of different/better rates of performance. It's possible SSG still tries to balance the game with more concern for elite than reaper based on their early statements but who knows.

Personally I'm not convinced that it's too far out of balance; favored souls vs other spell casting classes like alchemist, warlock and cleric all seem quite capable for fast aoe clearing during heroics so in context of that play style (aoe casting) it seems to be within the margin of reasonableness.

As far as popularity at least according to the player audit favored soul is roughly 8th/9th.

[GLITRKING]

The ink isn't dry yet for the last nerf. Now we need to nerf something else. Has it even been two weeks yet? You wait till people catch on what a cleric with sun domain can do.

DUUDE, quite please!!!!!!!!

[Zretch]

The OP seems to be confused about a number of things (Holy Smite is not an FvS SLA, it is a cleric one, FvS SLAs aren't actually much more OP than before). However, he is right that divines seem to do equal or better damage than arcanes for most of heroics, which is questionable given they get armor + heals for free.

• With the spell dice changes, divines also pretty much do the same damage as arcanes until Meteor at L17+. The only downside is that their first regular spell AoE is Holy Smite at L9-10 which quickly starts tapering off (until L24 Master of Alignment) due to base MCL 10, but it's absolutely the best spell in the game at that level (alignment damage on a will save that does as much damage as an SL8 spell on 75% of the game and, I think, Meteor damage on outsiders).
• AoV Sunbolt SLA has always been super strong (partial) AoE due to all the caster level bonuses they get, they can also get this at L3.
• Cleric can also do ridiculous AoE damage with Holy Smite SLA already at L4.
• Clerics get Word of Balance at 20 which is about Iceberg single target damage on most targets, but they fall behind Meteor in AoE (but so do non-fire/earth savants)
• FvS gets crazy max caster level increases for Firestorm/Flamestrike so can partially keep up with Meteor AoE in epics but are weak to fire immunes (hint: Tiefling).

TLDR; Balance might be fine for epics, but I see little reason to play arcane between L3-17 given that divine damage is similar (although SLA-dependent before L9) and they are much squishier (unless you have a lot of reaper points). If you play arcane it's for Meteor/Acid Well (sorry Air Savants) and Mass Hold. On the flip side, divines struggle more in epic content. I think they should smooth out the power curves a bit.

/shrug

I played a nuking FvS for a couple lives after the spell changes and found it to be very functional, but I still went back to Sorc builds. Holy Smite just wasn't consistent enough for me. Comet Fall and Flame Strike were my bread and butter and they did the job, but that delay between casting and effect was just....unsatisfying?

Regardless, the main reason to play a Sorc in heroic leveling is the casting speed. Playing Sorc is basically being given Quicken for no mana cost and no feat cost at level 1. Add that to the lower recharge times and heroic leveling just feels better, to me, at least. That being said, I solo a lot and tend not to play Sorc unless I can also pair it with warforged / bladeforged so I can self-heal. For nuking as a fleshy, Favored Soul is a very strong class.

[Logicman69]

I think the OP is seeing the power ramp from an odd place. In the early stages of the game, a PM underperforms vs a FVS or a sorc. All your general SLA's don't do anything to a good portion of mobs, and it can be a little frustrating. Especially when you see something like a FvS running around with light based spells just toasting everything.

That is, until a PM hits Level 12.. and then it all changes. Why? Necrotic Blast. That one spell is like an SLA of delayed Blast Fireball. The damage numbers are just insane, and it keeps getting better. Anything that is living just gets one-shotted. Any undead, you with have to cast it twice. But with a 6 second cooldown, that is nothing! Did I mention that its an SLA, so maximize, empower, quicken, heighten.. boost it all you want. Your only nemesis with be golems. Those suck.

Point is, if you are playing a pale master, you have to be a little patient. Its going to suck in the beginning, but by the end you will be running circles around those FvS's. In the meantime, if everyone else is one shotting mobs and zerging ahead.. great! Especially in hardcore. Buff them, haste them, give them blur and resists, and let THEM get in the line of fire. Kick back, watch, and collect your xp and loot. Its all the same no matter if you have the most kills or the least.

[LurkingVeteran]

I think the OP is seeing the power ramp from an odd place. In the early stages of the game, a PM underperforms vs a FVS or a sorc. All your general SLA's don't do anything to a good portion of mobs, and it can be a little frustrating. Especially when you see something like a FvS running around with light based spells just toasting everything.

That is, until a PM hits Level 12.. and then it all changes. Why? Necrotic Blast. That one spell is like an SLA of delayed Blast Fireball. The damage numbers are just insane, and it keeps getting better. Anything that is living just gets one-shotted. Any undead, you with have to cast it twice. But with a 6 second cooldown, that is nothing! Did I mention that its an SLA, so maximize, empower, quicken, heighten.. boost it all you want. Your only nemesis with be golems. Those suck.

Point is, if you are playing a pale master, you have to be a little patient. Its going to suck in the beginning, but by the end you will be running circles around those FvS's. In the meantime, if everyone else is one shotting mobs and zerging ahead.. great! Especially in hardcore. Buff them, haste them, give them blur and resists, and let THEM get in the line of fire. Kick back, watch, and collect your xp and loot. Its all the same no matter if you have the most kills or the least.

Necrotic blast is good, but it's not substantially better than Cleric/FvS SLAs.

Anyway, I agree with the previous poster that Sorc still feels more fun due to having lower casting time (and CDs), but divines still do comparable damage until Meteor/Acid Well. If that should factor into damage discussions or not can be discussed. I still think smoothing out the power curves a bit for all types (incl. all Savants) would be good. However, it's not a big problem.

[Chacka_DDO]

For me there is no question, ALL caster classes who have "nukes" should do similar damage with their nukes.
Before the recent changes to the clr/fvs/brd/dru spells, this was clearly not the case and all these classes did poor damage.
After this most needed change, they now do good damage, but it was to expect that some players start to complain that they now outshine their favored class.
In my opinion, the damage is within tolerance and acceptable...
Especially Spell Singer bards are now fun to play while I felt before rather helpless and more like a kind of buff bot when I played one!
FvS was already good before but they had the problem of having only one really good spell before while you have now many powerful spells available, which gives a lot more variety to this class.

Don't get me wrong if all classes are nerfed to the same low level of damage it would be also ok for me but it makes no sense if some classes do like 1/10 of the damage other classes do and exactly this was the case before the recent spell buffs.
Power balance is important for DDO so no class feels technically way too weak and it should more matter what kind of class/race you like to play.
You should not feel forced to play a certain race or class or feel "gimped".

What bothers me is as usual the maximum caster level on spells, the consequence of this (in my opinion) senseless mechanic is that spells have to be overpowered in heroic levels so that they are not way too weak in epic levels (because they stop scaling at level 20 or even earlier with only a few rare exceptions)
I know this is a deviation to pen and paper D&D but in my opinion, it would make MUCH more sense if the spell damage scales with the CHARACTER level!
So spells do less damage in heroic but more damage in epic levels (and hopefully more balances for epic and heroic and later legendary quest levels)

[rabidfox]

After thinking about this thread a bit, I think the bigger issue is that Archmage really needs a pass to update it (which has been a reoccurring theme for a while). PM is a survival tree with self-heals, damage, immunities, etc. and really shouldn't keep up with nuking/pure damage trees like AoV. Archmage should be the tree that's breaking out the big guns for damage for heroic leveling while tossing in some DCs for endgame. And Archmage really doesn't bring enough to the table to make it feel worth going into vs PM at low levels.

[Amorais]

I hate balance threads.

I prefer classes to be unbalanced or weird or completely different. I don't want vanilla balancing across classes as "if everyone is special, nobody is". 5th edition has this in spades and I find it boring as hell when all spellcasters HAVE to have a damaging cantrip instead of using their nous to contribute like you had to do in 1st edition.

Now in 5th instead of thinking up some good actions in a round for your 1st level wizard its like "oh, I'll cast Acid Splash" *yawn*

If FvS are overpowered - great. More chance of success for everyone. Why complain?

[Chilldude]

To the OP:

You've come down with a slight case of the grass is greener syndrome. It's nothing to worry about, it'll go away on its own over time, but it can be treated immediately by simply playing FVS.

I'm not saying FVS isn't great, it is, it's one of my favorite classes. However, the main reason I like it so much isn't because it has more offensive power than everything else, because it most certainly does not. The reason I like it is because it can be quite powerful offensively while also being able to heal the party.

Years ago I came up with probably the first light spell caster build in the game called The Bringer of Light. Very few people got to see the build because a handful of jerks in the forums started a war in the thread over my recommendation to drop Wisdom and go completely Charisma based. It was only a RECOMMENDATION and I warned that doing so would void your warranty, as well as make all the spellbook offensive spells essentially worthless. (Back then FVS casting stat was WIS.) People just wouldn't shut up about it and the thread got locked instead of just removing the trouble makers. I was so mad they locked the thread I stopped playing the game for quite some time and although I've been back several times over the years, that event left such a bad taste in my mouth that I rarely feel like doing anything supportive in the community.

You can't understand how cool the build was unless you understand how badly they screwed up the game for casters when epic levels first came about. Casters were far too powerful in heroics, they soared high above the rest in terms of damage output, so it would certainly make sense to clip their wings a bit. Turblind chopped their wings off. First the made mob saves stupendously high in EE, and then they gave all sorts of epic power to melee and ranged, but they gave epic casters only ONE epic ability, the dumbest, laziest, most OP ability in the entire game. A one button, centered on yourself, explosive AoE! Seriously guys? This was your solution to casters being OP in heroics? Make their sole epic ability a single press win button? How lazy, terrible, and shortsighted.

They should have done something with spell power, having it ramp up and down based on what the player does, having to strategically balance power and longevity to maintain their resource from shrine to shrine. Make casters a thinking man's class like they were in the days before SLAs. In the very old days people would turn on all their SLAs, run out of spell points halfway to the next shrine, and roll up a monk. By contrast, today anybody can roll up just about any caster, turn on every meta magic and just go around randomly spamming buttons all day long, but even SLA's weren't enough to save epic casters in the beginning.

What a lot of people don't understand is that most of the caster's power comes from caster level. Caster level is like the critical multiplier for physical damage. Doesn't really matter how much spell power you are putting into a spell if it's shooting nerf darts. Another thing I don't think most players understand is that while spell power doesn't technically have diminishing returns, your first 100 spell power doubles the damage of your spells, while going from 600 to 700 is an increase of roughly 10%. Don't believe me? See for yourself...

300 damage @600 spellpower = 300 + (300 x 6.00) = 2100
300 damage @700 spellpower = 300 + (300 x 7.00) = 2400

Each point of spell power is 1% increase over the base damage of a spell... in this case 300 base damage, so each point of spell power is an increase 1% of 300, or 3 points of damage. Your first 100 spell power doubles your damage from 300 to 600!!! What a difference! At end game, they hand out 30 spell power like it's an Earth shattering upgrade when in fact you would never even notice the difference.

Back to the early days of epic levels...


So casters in epic levels were only given 1 epic ability, a massive AoE centered on yourself that you couldn't use meta magic on, it had a very long cooldown, and a very low save. At first it seemed like casters were doing better than ever, except the only difficulty where power even mattered anymore was EE, hard and normal were a joke. In EE mobs saves are insanely high, so casters lost half their damage right off the top! Most mobs were going to save most of the time for most casters, that's not saying it was impossible though. There were gimmicks. Casters could go enchantment focused, put up danceballs, group up mobs, mass hold them and then pop 'em with an energy burst, but in practice it was stupid as it sounds. For the most part, casters were using old school spells whose max caster levels were reached long ago in heroic levels, to fight mobs with 10 times the hitpoints and saves through the roof. It cost more to do less damage, casters just couldn't keep up and they died off rather quickly. At the time I estimated that even with double my spell points I still wouldn't be able to keep up.

That's when The Bringer of Light was born. A CHA based FVS that used the exceptionally inexpensive SLAs in the Exalted Angel tree almost exclusively. (Back then Renew was in EA.) Being CHA based I had a ton of spell points, with the super cheap SLA's I could pew pew all day long to build up to a divine wrath (another thing that has changed). I only threw out heals or mass heals when absolutely necessary, otherwise I kept renews on people that got hurt and pew pew'd everything in sight. I used to single heal raids and still come out with most kills. With quickened heals and FVS wings I was all but unkillable, only real weakness was in being knocked down... something you can filigree today BTW.

My light spell FVS build wasn't overtly powerful in terms of raw damage, but what a powerful asset it was to any party it joined. Nobody would have looked at me and thought, "That FVS is too powerful, they need nerfing!!!", yet it was probably the most powerful caster of its time. Today you can get a lot more casters levels in a lot of spells, there is a lot more spell power to go around, more SLAs, more evocation DCs, and Energy Burst can use meta magic and uses evocation DC.

I'm sure this will elicit a dozen or so responses telling me how they never stopped casting and I just needed to learn to play, to which I have no other response than, "You're so cool! Can I be your friend?" My point though is casters are back, albeit certainly not better than ever. I doubt they'll ever be undisputed heavy weight champion of Stormreach again, but they can certainly hold their own and a well played caster probably makes an average physical damage doer look silly these days.

So OP, when you see that FVS sling a Sunbolt down a hallway and kill 3-4 mobs at once, there's a whole lot going on under the hood that you don't realize. They've done a lot behind the scenes in building and gearing their character, they've specifically lined up the shot by targeting the mob furthest back, and they got lucky that not only were the mobs lined up in the first place, but that all the mobs were hit. Rarely do you just run up and shoot the first mob in the face and have the bolt go flying back through half a dozen more mobs. Rarely do you get more than a couple kills with 1 bolt, even just getting 2 takes lining up the shot 95% of the time. Then you have to realize that Sunbolt is now on cool down, and there's not much for that FVS to do for awhile offensively. As the FVS goes up in levels, they'll get more and more spells, several of them being quite powerful in heroics, but anything the FVS can do in heroics pales in comparison to other casters. Just as soon as a FVS, or any caster, hits epic levels the tables are turned. Mobs have a ton more health, much higher saves, saves you'll have a hard time getting over until level 29, and you'll likely be doing half the damage you did in heroics as everything is saving. Only extremely well built and geared casters are going to be able to hit epics and keep rolling, most are going to have to step down to hard pretty much until cap.

In DDO things often look better on the other side of the fence, but you have to understand for almost everything there is a lot going on under the hood that you don't see.

[Bacon_Burger]

Played a fvs all weekend on hcl.

Always fun to run through lvl 12, then the class feels to ebb back as other classes gain power after lvl 10.

FVS is a decent class. we don't need every class to optimal, sure it could use a little upgrade here & there, but all in all, it's ok, at least not as gear dependent until lvl 15 & up.

[SpartanKiller13]

Another thing FVS have very crappy UMD - very difficult on Hardcore server to struggle to even cast Expeditious Retreat on yourself at low levels. Also Crappy Skill Points.

FvS has the option to be a Cha-caster instead of Wis, if UMD is a concern. Given HC you're not planning gearsets so you don't even have to worry about Wis vs Cha being more optimal lol.

[rabidfox]

FvS has the option to be a Cha-caster instead of Wis, if UMD is a concern. Given HC you're not planning gearsets so you don't even have to worry about Wis vs Cha being more optimal lol.

I went Cha/UMD on my FvS I took to 20. I really didn't need the UMD in the end and kinda wish I'd gone Wis for the higher spot; stealthed mobs were my bane when others could see them and I just took them at their word that was a mob out there.

[Tarinia]

To the OP:
So OP, when you see that FVS sling a Sunbolt down a hallway and kill 3-4 mobs at once, there's a whole lot going on under the hood that you don't realize. They've done a lot behind the scenes in building and gearing their character, they've specifically lined up the shot by targeting the mob furthest back, and they got lucky that not only were the mobs lined up in the first place, but that all the mobs were hit. Rarely do you just run up and shoot the first mob in the face and have the bolt go flying back through half a dozen more mobs. Rarely do you get more than a couple kills with 1 bolt, even just getting 2 takes lining up the

I wish you were right, but I was going with somebody who was not actively seeking spellpower on HC and never understand the maximizing of rules in DDO- but my Palemaster was maxed in all areas as best I could.
And he still was faster casting and killing one shotting most of the mobs as favoured soul with sun bolt-
by the way

DEVs:why are sun bolt and lightning bolt hitting lot of mobs and most other bolt spells (necrotic...) not?

[Chai]

So someone must play a character into end game three times to have a opinion? You cant get a good enough idea after the first one? Your way sounds very time consuming. I’ll just pay attention the first life ????

Let's just start with playing the class first. We can work from there.

Alot of these nerf requests historically are "someone else kills things faster than me so their class/build needs a nerf" with the exaggeration turned up to 11.

While this OP is pretty tame its obvious they haven't played the class all the way up. When those SLA hit a wall it will get blade barrier (non SLA), but a few levels later alot of mobs evade. By that time the OPs pale master will be crushing those rooms with death magic or at the very least CCing most of it.

[Chai]

I hate balance threads.

I prefer classes to be unbalanced or weird or completely different. I don't want vanilla balancing across classes as "if everyone is special, nobody is". 5th edition has this in spades and I find it boring as hell when all spellcasters HAVE to have a damaging cantrip instead of using their nous to contribute like you had to do in 1st edition.

Now in 5th instead of thinking up some good actions in a round for your 1st level wizard its like "oh, I'll cast Acid Splash" *yawn*

If FvS are overpowered - great. More chance of success for everyone. Why complain?

You mean my first level wizard can be an actual wizard instead of a garbage crossbow user?

If you get the 5E splat books there are plenty of cantrips to choose from. No need to take the same vanilla ones if you don't want.

[Tarinia]

Let's just start with playing the class first. We can work from there.

Alot of these nerf requests historically are "someone else kills things faster than me so their class/build needs a nerf" with the exaggeration turned up to 11.

While this OP is pretty tame its obvious they haven't played the class all the way up. When those SLA hit a wall it will get blade barrier (non SLA), but a few levels later alot of mobs evade. By that time the OPs pale master will be crushing those rooms with death magic or at the very least CCing most of it.

After getting to lvl 12 as Palemaster, I also feel the great boost of power to have a 1d6+5/Lvl area attack as sla (necrotic blast). Group of Elite mobs are one shotted. So my feeling was right:

The might of a spellcasting class in lower heroics depend on when the class gets his first spell attack with double d6 lvl damage and again when he gets his first area spell attack with double d6 lvl damage and how many mana the class has or these attacks are needing to cast.

holy smite (lvl 4 spell): Smites targets with holy power, evil targets take 9 to 14 (1d6+8) holy damage per caster level (up to a max of caster level 10) and are blinded...

a cleric can get this spell as sla in lvl 6 because the enhancement only need: Requires Cleric Level 4, 20 APs spent on tree) - so from lv6 on a cleric will feel like a demigod.

This spell does more damage per lvl then the lv12 sla necrotic blast from palemaster and even blinds enemies (of course depending on alignment but necrotic blast is also ineffective vs. undead). Light can also boosted more in spellpower then any other source of energy.