First Look: Shadar-Kai Adjustments

[kmoustakas]

I've been trying to make a Shadar-Kai tank for ever, specifically for the chain.

Everything so far sounds awesome.

Anyone else hoping for 'get over here'? I mean, the chain will be using your weapon so... it's a Kunai right?

[Faltout]

This looks great Steelstar. I too would make the Displacement have a sp pt cost or charges. Getting sp pts from gear isn't that difficult anymore.

Owing to a thread I started earlier this morning (https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...f-Acrobat-Race) I have a question... what dex based race would you use for a Thief Acrobat build? There doesn't seem to be any quarterstaff support in any racial tree, except perhaps Half orc because it supports 2HF but is the opposite of Dex based.

And here we have a dex based rogue-ish race and its primary uniqueness (chain attack) disallows quarterstaff because of the light melee wpn requirement. So where would you go for TA?

Since I'm playing a shadar-kai thief-acrobat right now, I'll second that concern. Not as much because I can't find another race for a thief-acrobat, but because now the shadar-kai race shoehorns the rogue into being an assassin. Besides, the theme for shadar-kai goes hand in hand with thief-acrobat.

Also, someone using a light melee weapon is usually single target and don't find themselves in situations with a lot of monsters around to use the chain attack. On the other hand, thief-acrobats try to be at the center of the action to make use of strikethrough and cleave trip attacks (which do not account for bonuses to trip btw, perhaps fix that?)

Finally, I have another comment. While Shadar-kai do not any extra feats (because they are human), they do get a bonus to DEX which humans do not get. So, all in all, shadar-kai are about equal to humans and do not need to have extra innate feats. Besides, with all the racial AP that you get from racial TRs, getting stuff from the racial tree is not such a big deal.

My proposed changes would be to increase the damage of the chain (to 1d8 per level?) and improve the trip chances of the forcefull chain (while also mentioning what those chances are in the description)

A final thing: Perhaps make it so we can cancel the chain by blocking instead of tumbling? Or activating some other attack? Tumbling takes time (to activate), changes your position and one would probably already complete the attack before managing to tumble to cancel it.

[FuzzyDuck81]

Really like the look of these & it'll likely make shadar-kai a very strong contender for 2wf builds since it'll give them some much-needed utility against multiple enemies - rather glad I didn't get around to TRing my shadar-kai knife fighter yet

[slarden]

Displacement? Nobody cares all that much about Displacement. Why? Because too often in end-game content, it seems like most of the mobs have true seeing anyway making displacement useless.

Now, if Steelstar were to offer 25% Etherealness, THAT would be MUCH better. Not all that many mobs have ghost touch.

Agree on displacement. I wasn't expecting people to think that was too strong. Most people have unlimited displacement clickies from greensteel so this racial benefit is mostly a quality of life issue so people don't need to store so many greensteel items in their inventory.

As you say the importance of displacement has declined over time as more enemies have true seeing and the reaper penalties.

25% ethereal is probably too strong at heroic levels but completely redundant with shadowdancer at epic levels. I prefer to see displacement remain as it is now. They can put a small sp cost to it perhaps, but not limited charges.

Isn't etherealness and concealment scaled down pretty harshly in reaper content? Like to 5% per skull? So around r4-r5 you end up with absolutely no benefit? Displacement would still provide some benefit at that difficulty.

Yes, it's reduced and the reduction scales with skull.

[Catabree]

Add more sneak attack dice, assassinate dc boost, some form of level drain on the t5 gloom.

[Graskitch]

yes, I would like to see more synergy in the shadar-kai racial tree for assassinate, and also applying bleed effects for thematic/lore reasons.


in update 48.3, "the Fear spell now has a capped duration of eight seconds when cast against players."

because of that change to capping fear effect duration on players, the sdk tier 1 "Bold: You overcome fear quickly - fear and shaken effects are removed from you after 12/6/3 seconds." lost a lot of its value. what is the point of investing 1 or 2 action points into Bold if fear is already removed after 6 seconds?

Can that please be changed to just 1 action point for 3 second fear removal or else just granting fear immunity?



probably not within the scope of your quick and dirty, but would be nice if shadar-kai could summon a shadow mastiff companion (with toolbar).

[kpak01]

I'm guessing this is all aimed at those uberultrasupercompletionists? I don't object that they have something decent to spend their gazillion free racial points on but it all seems pretty irrelevant to my first-life SDK Rogue.

[Nugaot]

I'm guessing this is all aimed at those uberultrasupercompletionists? I don't object that they have something decent to spend their gazillion free racial points on but it all seems pretty irrelevant to my first-life SDK Rogue.

Why the bitterness? If you read the OP you're getting the chain attack as a free feat at level 1.

[HuneyMunster]

Displacement? Nobody cares all that much about Displacement. Why? Because too often in end-game content, it seems like most of the mobs have true seeing anyway making displacement useless.

Now, if Steelstar were to offer 25% Etherealness, THAT would be MUCH better. Not all that many mobs have ghost touch.

I would prefer a racial bonus to Etherealness that stacks with Shadow form from Shadowdancer.

Like someone said, the penalty to Incorporeal and Concealment in high Reaper Skulls would still negate all the benefits of Shadow Form. I'm not sure if Steelstar can confirm how much of a penalty to these occurs in Reaper difficulty.

Would also like to see Assassinate bonus in Shadai-Kai due to them starting off as an Assassin and fits well for Kai theme. Possible place to include this is in Guile, though would not add it to halfling as it doesn't fit that race. Deep Gnome get bonuses to Illusions so don't see why Shadai-Kai can't get bonuses to Assassinate.

Could there be a reduction in the cooldown for Shadow Phase and Jaunt to 30 seconds base and add another option of an Ability score in the cores?

Winter's Favored also needs a look at as its weak for a T4 racial and as far as I know its not being effected by melee power. Though I would like to see Winter Favored strip cold immunity when using light weapons to make Raellia, the Frostblade more appealing. I doubt this could be implemented though.

[HuneyMunster]

I'm guessing this is all aimed at those uberultrasupercompletionists? I don't object that they have something decent to spend their gazillion free racial points on but it all seems pretty irrelevant to my first-life SDK Rogue.

You can apply the same logic to all races. If you want all the good Horc abilities you need a lot of AP. If Dragonborn and want breath and wings ability you need AP. Though, when they first changed the enhancements to trees they probably should have had racial action points independent to classes action points to make playing a race feels different than another outside of races bonus to ability score. Racial past lives has address this but, requires a lot of past lives to be effective.

[kpak01]

Why the bitterness? If you read the OP...

Do you have something to say about the changes, or are you just going to indulge in name-calling and personal attacks?

You can apply the same logic to all races.

You sure can.

[Nugaot]

Do you have something to say about the changes, or are you just going to indulge in name-calling and personal attacks?

I sure can. I think it’s great the SDK will be getting chain attack for free at level 1. It will be great for first life rogues with no past lives.

[Cetus]

Sooo...I can't swing my greataxe around like a chain?

disappointing =D

[Alrik_Fassbauer]

I haven't played my Shadar-kai long enough to be able to say anything on these changes.
But : I'd like to have other hair styles for the Iconic ! The current looks are too much like Punks to me ...

[Xgemina]

Since the new chain attack is using your weapon stats, does that mean your weapon will now take damage from oozes/slime/rust monsters when using the attack? One of the benefits of the current attack is no weapon damage against those monsters.

[hit_fido]

Sooo...I can't swing my greataxe around like a chain?

disappointing =D

I could have sworn the villain from Beastmaster was swinging a greataxe around on a chain at one point...

I thought the Shadar-kai concept was that the spiked chain was distinct from whatever weapon you were using. Forcing it to be a light melee weapon does seem to imply you've actually attached your little dagger to a chain and are swinging it instead - apparently you can chain attack while dual wielding.

So my character can dual wield daggers and still swing a spiked chain? I dunno man, why can't my character hold a greataxe in one hand for a moment and swing a chain too?

[Vish]

Never played a shadar Kai
Never plan to play one

But if I do, I’m happy the changes
They always seemed some red head goth step child

[MaeveTuohy]

Great to see this largely worthless tree getting some attention.

Any chance you will be updating the passive PL feat to give the bonus to dodge cap as well, as currently the +1-3 dodge has no value outside of low-mid heroics.

[Lauf]

hi,

my initial impression is that the first chain enhancement is crazy strong for where you've put it and its cost.
if I understand this correctly, it is a triple cleave, and has an increased damage, and has increased chance to crit.
for.... nothing?

I dare you to find anything remotely comparable anywhere.


even if it were only a triple cleave, with the other bonuses added only at higher levels, it would still be overpowered for how easy it is to get.

the fact you've eliminated the need to stand still, and tied the damage to the regular weapon damage, these should be enough to fix the chains and make them appealing and useful. I feel you've went overboard with this change.

it's a racial enhancement... a +1/+1 to damage is normal, a x3 cleave at +1[W] + crit + mult... you're too far gone.

[Zaalaos]

hi,

my initial impression is that the first chain enhancement is crazy strong for where you've put it and its cost.
if I understand this correctly, it is a triple cleave, and has an increased damage, and has increased chance to crit.
for.... nothing?

I dare you to find anything remotely comparable anywhere.


even if it were only a triple cleave, with the other bonuses added only at higher levels, it would still be overpowered for how easy it is to get.

the fact you've eliminated the need to stand still, and tied the damage to the regular weapon damage, these should be enough to fix the chains and make them appealing and useful. I feel you've went overboard with this change.

it's a racial enhancement... a +1/+1 to damage is normal, a x3 cleave at +1[W] + crit + mult... you're too far gone.

I think you're making mistake by trying to compare this to normal cleaves, and their attack speed. I'd wager animation is much longer than any of cleaves, even with haste boost and speed item. We'll have to wait and see how it plays out on Lam. Personaly I'm perfectly fine with shadar-kai having something unique and usable about their race for once.