Downtime Notice: Wednesday, April 6th, 9:00 AM - 1:00 PM Eastern (-4 GMT)

[Jerevth]

Having an effective caster destiny for damage was ruining my play, certainly. (Ironic statement)
Flighty proc chances based on fey whim of 7% just dead-ends this destiny for casters. There are few rapid fire spells that would trigger like a repeating xbow would.

Now, I'm not a programmer, but wouldn't 7% proc rate require more calculation than a 50% proc chance? Especially since the Devs recently had a pass that removed a numerous amount of proc-rate checks...
With a 7% chance - the RNG has to roll 1-100 and check for whether it is or isn't a proc. 1-7 is does, 8-100 it does not happen.
A proc rate of 50% is just a 1d2; it either happens or it doesn't. No number range, no major resource drain if a lot of people are running with the same destiny.

Flipping a coin ( 1d2) makes more sense for a fey oriented destiny.

Sure caster was pretty powerful, but now most people have dropped shiradi entirely or spent a few points selectively in it. It's not competitive anymore which means much of the work of the Dev who authored it is wasted.
Then, you'll drop another nerf on another caster destiny because it's too effective. And after all caster types are either locked in one destiny or people ignore them and jump to effective combat system, you'll start undercutting that one. It was ranged, now it's DPS casters, next it will be DC casters and finally melee will be on the chopping block.

I don't like the change. I don't like that it was rammed through without any warning and now we are stuck waiting to see what the "retune" of the destiny will be (because updates can be a month or more in the future).
Devs, this is why I manually renew my VIP instead of leaving it automatic; It's only thirty bucks you lost this go'round but it leaves a bad flavor when you do these heavy handed tactics- you KNOW they won't be popular, but do you have to up the ante and not only rush them through, but do so without any conversation with the client base? You could have opened the discussion, gotten feedback and made adjustments, then TESTED them.
But instead... this.

[Bathhsheba]

Thanks guys for completely nerfing my 10 sorc / 6 wiz / 4 soul build. Previously it was 50% playable, it is now 0% playable. With this update I'm done playing DDO and passing money to you! It's been a great 12 years .... thank you all! goodbye, it no longer makes sense to play

[NabeGewell]

Well no, my preference would be for SSG to more than double the hp of all endgame monsters, give all champions deathward and introduce new reapers that cant be cheesed. Call it r11 or something...

I miss r10s... r6 wearing an r10 mask is not the same...

Easy fix - just remove reaper points. You can even do it manually! lol

Instead how about we roll back to when cap was L20 and game had a population.

[Gnominal_Aphasia]

A bipolar DDO fan's take on Shiradi Champion!

Now the dust has settled a little, and I have read many of the comments, I have a proposal: make our lives simpler, Devs! Both ours and yours... win-win?

And before I dive into Shiradi, I want to briefly highlight 3 other areas:

(1) make Draconic Incarnation BLUE be applicable to both electric and sonic [you know why]

(2) where are the promised methods [heroic?] to temporarily remove a monsters immunity to a certain element?

(3) Please stop releasing new content for a while and fix all the old bugs already... I don't understand why you do not prioritise this [TBF, SSG are correcting problems and solving bugs, but a lot of these old bugs should have disappeared years ago]

SHIRADI CHAMPION
This ED was always messy [in my eyes] in so many ways; random events, niche builds, poorly structured and the Devs didn't like it either. So if caster fans can accept that in the "new" 2021 SC ED format, that a [Stay Good for example] 30% chance at a potentially large amount of reliable damage at 100% spell power [I know that many believed this was 200%] was probably too much, then we could also accept a more "balanced" and elegant change from SSG. Unfortunately this didn't happen; no offense to any particular person at SSG, but 30% / 100% nerfed to 5% / 50% [once again, without any consultation with the player base that pays your wages] has demonstrated how not to approach balancing the game.

I have been choosing my words carefully...

I have nothing against niche builds, au contraire! And DDO's build flexibility is a large factor why I love this game... cause it ain't the RP-ing, the server lags and the endless past life grinding!

Now that's out the way, here's what I deem to be a potential GET OUT OF JAIL FREE CARD for SSG...

Make Shiradi Champion... ****, great again? Hahahaha. Make SC simple, easy to use, and [drum roll...] well-thought out!

(a) remove, as much as possible, the notion of randomness from the ED;
(b) make it useful for both ranged and casters;
(c) make the abilities more powerful as you progress up the tiers, and lastly, but most [again, in my eyes] importantly,
(d) get it right this time, so that this ED isn't still the subject of scorn in a years' time.

This is what I would do:
- keep the same "random proc" abilities but modify them (Mantle, Stay/Still, Double Rainbow)
- EITHER add a tier 4 or 5 ability to strip targetted monsters of their immunity/resistance to Cold damage, OR change Cold to Untyped [for example]; I think the temporary stripping of immunity would be the more elegant solution
- Mantle: Ranged 100% chance to do X amount of damage of a random type at 200% ranged power; Caster 100% chance to do Y amount of damage... at 100% spell power
- Ranged: add more doubleshot at tier 5, much more... add this to Feywild Attunement but as a flat +20%, not in function of the number of Wilderness Feats
- Tier 2 ability Stay Good/Frosty becomes new multiselector Stay/Still Good/Frosty... players choose extra damage or [helpless] cc at the start, and the cc is 100% chance with a reasonable CD
- Tier 5 ability Still Good/Frosty becomes new multiselector [Stay/Still] PART 2 which makes the tier 2 version more powerful
- Double Rainbow: 100% chance at causing an effect [I personally would change the effects, but hey] with a CD

Everyone has a different take on what could be done, what should be done, what will be done, but simplifiying approaches and listening to players' feedback is the sensible one

EDIT... I think I would scale caster damage to 200% and reduce the extra nominal damage... and thinking about it, probably scale ranged damage at 400% too. The subject of another debate!

EDIT2... for the choice of [helpless] cc from Stay/Still multiselector, something like:
Ranged: tier 2 = 3 seconds cc, CD 6 secs; tier 5 = 6 seconds cc, CD 5 secs
Caster: tier 2 = 3 seconds cc, CD 15 secs; tier 5 = 6 secs, CD 12 secs (obviously can be applied to a AoE spell)

[mauriciodg]

Decided to log in today and see how bad my shiradi was. Dead toon, RIP. Thank you very much devs.

[Seph1roth5]

Having said that, I didn't mind. I was happy with my SHIRADI.

Are you sure shiradi was working with your warlock? My aura warlock didn't seem to be proccing the mantle at all with his auras or es blasts.

[Govynda]

This has been fixed internally and will be in an upcoming patch. Thank you!

thank you thank you lynnabel, much appreciated

[Govynda]

Are you sure shiradi was working with your warlock? My aura warlock didn't seem to be proccing the mantle at all with his auras or es blasts.

oh yes 100%. i saw it 1000s of times and did many tests. Undoubtedly it was working.

[Govynda]

One Question:

Shiradi T2 Stay Frosty has also been proccing a "slow effect" and T2 Stay Good has been proccing a "blindness".

Now that you are moving away from the cold damage option to a sonic/force/light/poison. Will these spell power types be proccing blindness ? or slow? or? And will the % chance still be 15% for ranged and 30% for casters ?

[Govynda]

So: let's break down the factors in mantle-based proc damage from Shiradi (current), Draconic, and EA, assuming we're level 30. The four main factors here are Damage Dice, Scaling %, Proc Rate (which is the chance for the effect to apply when the effect is not on cooldown), and Cooldown.


Draconic:
30d6+180 dice, 100% Spell Power scaling, 100% proc rate, 5 second cooldown.


Shiradi:
3d100+100 and another 3d100+100 dice, 100% Spell Power scaling, 30% proc rate, 0.1 second cooldown. (Note: Stay Good/Frosty currently say they scale at 200%, but don't. They're at 100% right now.)

Dear Steelstar, Thank you for your wonderful game and all the work you've done. The text I've excerpted above is unfortunate, and may explain how SSG has come to this conclusion re: shiradi nerf. Kindly hear me out with an open mind and generous spirit

Draconic mantle does not proc once every 5 secs, it procs 4x in 2 second increments. Generally its proccing once every 2 secs. This alone changes everything about the dps calculation. Forgive me. I know that you're aware of this, but since it wasn't pointed out in your post, I'm mentioning it for clarity.

Another critical aspect that wasn't stated above is that Draconic focuses all damage on one spell power type and therefore allows the caster to achieve far more spell power, spell crit chance, and spell crit damage. This is incomparable to shiradi with its broad range of spell power types. Obviously there's no way to get a commensurate spell power, spell crit chance, and spell crit damage with every spell power type as when the caster can focus on 1 or 2.

Draconic has obvious synergy with druid/sorc/alchemist because of the common spell-power-types and therefore the mantle proc is often not met by any immunity or resistance due to the innate abilities of these 3 classes. Prism regularly heals enemies and IS met by immunity and resistance.

Draconic has a double length Wellspring of Power, which over the course of a quest or raid averages an increase of +30 spell power and +3.3 crit damage above someone using Wellspring outside draconic.

Within the Draconic Destiny Tree is 70 spell power of the mantle's proc type. Shiradi (if "feywild attunement" is fixed) adds 30 universal and 30 force. Since shiradi relies upon multiple spell power types, again shiradi is diminished. This will be partially mitigated for those focused on force spell power after your proposed changes, but not for others.

Draconic has the amazing breath weapon which does a massive 2d6+20 damage / caster level, has increased DC, paralyses, and again is focused on the one top spell power with top crit profile. Shiradi has fey lights .... omg.

Draconic has double damage Ruin and Greater Ruin focused on force and the single top spell power, which when used by sorc/druid/alch cannot be resisted and overcomes immunity. I tell you frankly, we are abusing this power for comical effect. It's too easy such that it is reducing my fun.

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I love your DDO game. Love it!! Even if you appreciate nothing of what I've written in this post, let your take-away be that imo you have created the single best fantasy role playing game in history. DDO is a wonder!

In 16 years of playing approximately 40 hours per week and spending many many thousands of dollars, I have never posted on the forums until this shiradi nerf. These changes are so out of touch with actual game play that for the first time I have changed my forum policy. Please understand that I am actually familiar with the game as it is really being played. I have all past lives and capped reaper trees and play for many hours everyday. Even my alt has reaper wings. DRACONIC IS THE HIGHEST DPS TREE by a significant margin, and has been pre shiradi nerf. I spend my time playing r10s and raids with the endgame Orien community everyday. All the dps casters that I'm aware of are in Draconic. No one is in Shiradi or EA. (Only one ice sorc was in shiradi, but she changed as soon as the nerf came).

As you suggest, it is unreasonable to assume that a spell caster can cast more than 1 spell per second consistently in game play. Therefore, even in AOE situations utilizing the proposed shiradi 2 x 7% chance, the 100% proc/2secs of draconic with highest spell power, highest crit profile, and stripped immunity/resistance is superior, and what to speak of Draconic's single target dps which is outrageous .... really just consider the effect of a double damage breath weapon, double damage ruin/greater ruin, high damage proc every 2sec, doubled wellspring, and top 70 spell power in tree, with no resistance or immunity when they are all conjoining together.

Anyway, I'm letting you know plainly, in actual game play, Draconic was far superior caster dps pre-nerf, and what to speak of now. I have been present for many conversations with my friends laughing about how ridiculous is the Draconic dps, and encouraging each other to not mention anything or post any builds so that Draconic isn't nerfed. I hope you find my reasons listed above compelling and do the needful. Whatever you do, DDO remains my favorite game of all time. Congratulations! Nonetheless I will offer you a balance suggestion:

Nerf Alchemist dps 5-10%
Nerf Draconic dps 5-10%
Leave Shiradi as it was (or at least somewhat closer than your current proposal) but with the revised spell power types (force, light, sonic, poison) which is a great idea. This will create balance.