U55 Preview 1: The Level Cap Increase

[Nickodeamous]

EDIT: I looked up the Whirlwind Attack feat. I've played this game so long I have to stop and remember the name of who the US president was when I started playing this game, and I've been deeply connected to this game since beta. The fact that I had to look up Whirlwind Attack feat is a testament to how much it blows. FOUR feats to gain a cleave at +4[W] damage. https://ddowiki.com/page/Whirlwind_Attack
.

WWA blows for everybody but my monk (my helicopter kick) who uses it all the time at end game and is literally the only AOE I have a handwrap build. lol This tier 4 belongs in GMOF period and should not be in Fury. Willing to trade

[Arkat]

Nothing here is set in stone! We solicit feedback from our fans so we can make sure we're doing the best we can to make everyone happy

Good.

Then I challenge you (or whomever worked on it originally) to work on the Shadowdancer Core 4 as well.

It's so bad that one could easily think it's just a placeholder power.

See comments about the core fours here:

[Shall]

The grandmaster of flowers core seems a bit odd in that the abilities it improves are still monk only, most of the other destinies trees grant players the relevant class features they enhance like smite evil, or turn undead, or leap of fate. It would be nice to at least make meditation and wholeness of body usable practical to use in combat instead of ending when you take any action. That would also make the embrace the void henshin enhancement a little more useful. Maybe the core could also further lower the cooldown of wholeness of spirit heal from the first row of the tree. And/Or maybe add to the epic strikes an additional crowd control, probably a daze, able to affect targets immune to the stun like undead and constructs.

[Artos_Fabril]

The grandmaster of flowers core seems a bit odd in that the abilities it improves are still monk only, most of the other destinies trees grant players the relevant class features they enhance like smite evil, or turn undead, or leap of fate.

That's a good point. Improvements to Wholeness of Body or Meditation belong in the heroic tree(s), not in the level 32 ED core.

[patang01]

Legendary Dreadnought: Unstoppable: When you activate an action boost, you have a 20% chance to gain the Unstoppable effect for 20 seconds. Unstoppable: You take 25% less damage from all sources, gain a +20 action boost bonus to Fortitude and balance saves, and are immune to knockdown.

Legendary feels weak. I rather it just be a clicky used with actions boosts. Skip the 20 percent chance to gain the effect. Just make it the effect.

It just feels like another proc effect among all other busy proc effects. By making it a clicky there's a solid reason to expect it to work, as suppose to a chance when you might actually need it. I'd never waste that stuff on trash mobs. Also make a stay your ground. You cannot get pushed back when using it. Half the time when you use a feature like this it is against something that will smack you around, wasting half the effect on just having to run back into the fight. As a 4th core it should feel a little bit more monumental.

[Jerevth]

T4's

Draconic Heritage II: Spell points are mighty cheap (And will this stack with equipment that already makes it available? Gearing provides reduced cost at lower levels already.) I never bothered with Eschew Materials with my casters; special components- diamond dust, khyber shards are cheap or plentiful anyway for all but the first-life character. By level 32... they're likely going to be ok, too. Recommend: 2% Chance of shock and awe in targets hit by attack or spell. (Draconic aspects should be available in Legendary, no?)

Grandmaster of Flowers: Bring peace... only 3% dodge bypass? The other benefits are nice and the dodge bypass seems to be an afterthought... bump this to 5% dodge bypass/ 25% Fort reduction or change this to +3 dodge/+3 dodge cap increase.

Legendary Dreadnought: I like this- action boosts are readily available by this point, the 20% chance is a nice mitigation to keep this from being declared nerf-worthy, as is the cool down on action boosts. Immunity to knockdown is already covered by a couple heroic enhancements, though, but it is thematic...

Fury of the Wild: I don't think cores should not be based around a single stat-base attack. Recommend this take a different combat source for the trigger. I like the attempt to avoid adding another hotbar item, though. Perhaps, add an optional single trigger drag-able icon for those who don't have strength-based attacks (Trip/imp trip, etc) so Dex/Int/Charisma/Wisdom/Con based melee'ists can partake?)

The rest I like, or am not as well versed in builds that use them, and I understand some folks may have some excellent counter arguments to the above. (Fury sounds like it should be strength based... but the Cores of the melee Epic Destinies should allow any melee build to get good use with effective hotbar icons, shouldn't they?)

[Lynnabel]

Quick Update:

We're poking around at some adjustments that we wanted some additional feedback on before next Lamannia. New stuff in orange!

Shadowdancer: Cut to the Soul: +3% dodge bypass, +3% fortification bypass, +3% damage versus the helpless. When you cast the spell Trap the Soul, it automatically applies 3 stacks of the Darkness debuff even if the enemy survives the spell. Darkness debuff: You are vulnerable to Sneak Attacks. -3 Spell Resistance, -3 PRR and -3 MRR per stack. Lasts 12 seconds, stacks drop 1 at a time. Max 3 stacks.


Grandmaster of Flowers: Master of Philosophy: Multiselector:

• Enlightening Philosophy: +3% dodge bypass, +10 Magical Resistance Rating cap. Your Stunning Blow and Stunning Fist feats are now considered Light builder attacks.
• Forbidden Philosophy: +3% dodge bypass, +10 Magical Resistance Rating cap. Your Stunning Blow and Stunning Fist feats are now considered Dark builder attacks.
• Aberrant Philosophy: +3% dodge bypass, +10 Magical Resistance Rating cap. Your Stunning Blow and Stunning Fist feats are now considered Void builder attacks.

Thoughts? Questions? Suggestions? :)

[Black_Ninja]

Grandmaster of Flowers: Master of Philosophy: Multiselector:

• Enlightening Philosophy: +3% dodge bypass, +10 Magical Resistance Rating cap. Your Stunning Blow and Stunning Fist feats are now considered Light builder attacks.
• Forbidden Philosophy: +3% dodge bypass, +10 Magical Resistance Rating cap. Your Stunning Blow and Stunning Fist feats are now considered Dark builder attacks.
• Aberrant Philosophy: +3% dodge bypass, +10 Magical Resistance Rating cap. Your Stunning Blow and Stunning Fist feats are now considered Void builder attacks.

Beautiful. I love this! Useful, gives character, and utilizes things that already work in monk. Love the ability to get void without henshin T5. And thank you for including stunning blow as well. If this is how we go forward, I'll be a happy camper.

[Seph1roth5]

I like adding stuff for spellcasters but still think the other effect numbers are a bit low. Instead of trying to do a bunch of things and with small numbers, why not do less things but better?

Dodge bypass is really hard to judge because most people have no idea how much dodge monsters have. Devs have mentioned more monsters will have dodge in Dread (or maybe just legendary stuff?) specifically, but still. On EE will they have 5 dodge, 50? It's really hard to tell if 3 is good, but my guess is no it's not.

So like I mentioned, what if it were instead a good #, like 10 dodge bypass (and ditch the helpless/fort bypass), and then for the magical side, have it do 1 stack of the debuff when you use an illusion spell, instead of 3 stacks when you cast a very esoteric spell that not everyone has access to. True not everyone has feywild (they should!) but I think illusion spells are much more common than trap the soul. Plus more thematic with shadows and whatnot.

[Artos_Fabril]

Quick Update:

We're poking around at some adjustments that we wanted some additional feedback on before next Lamannia. New stuff in orange!

Shadowdancer: Cut to the Soul: +3% dodge bypass, +3% fortification bypass, +3% damage versus the helpless. When you cast the spell Trap the Soul, it automatically applies 3 stacks of the Darkness debuff even if the enemy survives the spell. Darkness debuff: You are vulnerable to Sneak Attacks. -3 Spell Resistance, -3 PRR and -3 MRR per stack. Lasts 12 seconds, stacks drop 1 at a time. Max 3 stacks.


Grandmaster of Flowers: Master of Philosophy: Multiselector:

• Enlightening Philosophy: +3% dodge bypass, +10 Magical Resistance Rating cap. Your Stunning Blow and Stunning Fist feats are now considered Light builder attacks.
• Forbidden Philosophy: +3% dodge bypass, +10 Magical Resistance Rating cap. Your Stunning Blow and Stunning Fist feats are now considered Dark builder attacks.
• Aberrant Philosophy: +3% dodge bypass, +10 Magical Resistance Rating cap. Your Stunning Blow and Stunning Fist feats are now considered Void builder attacks.

Thoughts? Questions? Suggestions?

Shadowdancer still very bad, a bonus for a single spell, that requires you to fail your DC, and doesn't even lower the save the DC targets. (edit: misread stacking mechanic; still, not very good) Dodge bypass and helpless damage never apply at the same time, and most enemies have no dodge chance. 3% fort reduction is inconsequential, and 3% helpless damage increase is nice, but not significant.

GMoF Looks okay for monks, but it's terrible for anyone without the the Monk Finisher feat.

[cru121]

When you cast the spell Trap the Soul, it automatically applies 3 stacks of the Darkness debuff even if the enemy survives the spell. Darkness debuff: You are vulnerable to Sneak Attacks. -3 Spell Resistance, -3 PRR and -3 MRR per stack. Lasts 12 seconds, stacks drop 1 at a time. Max 3 stacks.

This could be maybe useful if it also applied to Necronomicannon's Trap the Soul proc. Though not sure if the legendary version even works.

[btolson]

Shadowdancer: Cut to the Soul: +3% dodge bypass, +3% fortification bypass, +3% damage versus the helpless. When you cast the spell Trap the Soul, it automatically applies 3 stacks of the Darkness debuff even if the enemy survives the spell. Darkness debuff: You are vulnerable to Sneak Attacks. -3 Spell Resistance, -3 PRR and -3 MRR per stack. Lasts 12 seconds, stacks drop 1 at a time. Max 3 stacks.

Why is this orange part so hyper-specific to a single spell (requiring 15+ levels of a particular class)? Why not be more inclusive to other types of casters that go so deep into this destiny? And multiclassses?

Monk builders are class-specific too, but at least are readily available to multiclass monks.


And broader concerns still remain that some core4s are obviously much stronger than others, which pigeonholes us towards the stronger ones. With a pre-req of 21+ points to take them, most of us will be limited to 1, maybe 2 core4s and the "right" choice will almost always be objectively obvious.

[Carpone]

Why not simplify Shadowdancer core 4 into applying 3 stacks whenever Nightmare Lance or Shadowstrike are successful? Use the stuff already in the tree that people that deep in the tree are gonna have. That way it doesn't favor casters, or require specific items with TTS procs.

[Arkat]

Quick Update:

We're poking around at some adjustments that we wanted some additional feedback on before next Lamannia. New stuff in orange!

Shadowdancer: Cut to the Soul: +3% dodge bypass, +3% fortification bypass, +3% damage versus the helpless. When you cast the spell Trap the Soul, it automatically applies 3 stacks of the Darkness debuff even if the enemy survives the spell. Darkness debuff: You are vulnerable to Sneak Attacks. -3 Spell Resistance, -3 PRR and -3 MRR per stack. Lasts 12 seconds, stacks drop 1 at a time. Max 3 stacks.




Thoughts? Questions? Suggestions?

The numbers in Red are still too low.

Core 4 of Celestial Avenger gives a -25% Fort bypass debuf.

As I said in the video I posted in my previous post, make those #s 5s instead of 3s and I'll be prepared to call it good.

[elvesunited]

Quick Update:

We're poking around at some adjustments that we wanted some additional feedback on before next Lamannia. New stuff in orange!

Shadowdancer: Cut to the Soul: +3% dodge bypass, +3% fortification bypass, +3% damage versus the helpless. When you cast the spell Trap the Soul, it automatically applies 3 stacks of the Darkness debuff even if the enemy survives the spell. Darkness debuff: You are vulnerable to Sneak Attacks. -3 Spell Resistance, -3 PRR and -3 MRR per stack. Lasts 12 seconds, stacks drop 1 at a time. Max 3 stacks.


Grandmaster of Flowers: Master of Philosophy: Multiselector:

• Enlightening Philosophy: +3% dodge bypass, +10 Magical Resistance Rating cap. Your Stunning Blow and Stunning Fist feats are now considered Light builder attacks.
• Forbidden Philosophy: +3% dodge bypass, +10 Magical Resistance Rating cap. Your Stunning Blow and Stunning Fist feats are now considered Dark builder attacks.
• Aberrant Philosophy: +3% dodge bypass, +10 Magical Resistance Rating cap. Your Stunning Blow and Stunning Fist feats are now considered Void builder attacks.

Thoughts? Questions? Suggestions?

Grandmaster is a lot better as it uses skills a monk would. ( I can't imagine a non-monk getting 21 points deep in this destiny ) Though could it work with other stun attacks? Like Dire Charge?

Shadowdancer doesn't seem to pass the cost/benefit analysis. Casting an 8th level spell multiple times to lower for a -3 SR MRR PRR debuff plus sneak attack vulnerability? ( that a spellcaster can't take advantage of ) Up to a max of 15 after casting 5 times? That's pretty much only useful as debuff support against bosses ( and that assumes it even works against bosses ) and even then you are probably better off hitting him with 5 cheaper to cast damaging spells than 5 level 8 debuff spells.

[Lynnabel]

Grandmaster is a lot better as it uses skills a monk would. ( I can't imagine a non-monk getting 21 points deep in this destiny ) Though could it work with other stun attacks? Like Dire Charge?

Shadowdancer doesn't seem to pass the cost/benefit analysis. Casting an 8th level spell multiple times to lower for a -3 SR MRR PRR debuff plus sneak attack vulnerability? ( that a spellcaster can't take advantage of ) Up to a max of 15 after casting 5 times? That's pretty much only useful as debuff support against bosses ( and that assumes it even works against bosses ) and even then you are probably better off hitting him with 5 cheaper to cast damaging spells than 5 level 8 debuff spells.

It stacks up to 3 times, but you get 3 stacks per cast. This debuff does not stack beyond 3.

[Assassination]

Good.

Then I challenge you (or whomever worked on it originally) to work on the Shadowdancer Core 4 as well.

It's so bad that one could easily think it's just a placeholder power.

A lot of assassins think the whole Shadowdancer Tree is just a placeholder. I guess it was designed as an 11 point splash for rogues. Don't worry too much about core 4, maybe go back and redo the whole tree.

All of the melee core 4's seem pretty meh to me.

Please consider making the weapon specialty feats into something a melee would consider taking. Enhancing the line of weapons that a melee is actually using would be a good starting point. I can't really think of
a circumstance where this current setup is of any value to anyone. Thx.

[ThomasHunter]

I don't really care about that new part for Shadowdancer (personally). What I think would be fun (better?) is to add Sneak Attack Dice that is then used for the spellcasting in the tree. It's difficult to come by sneak attack dice as a spellcaster that would make it useful for the tree. Adding it as a core (at least for the spellcasting part?) would be very helpful.

thanks!
Taleisin

[Caarb]

Quick Update:

Grandmaster of Flowers: Master of Philosophy: Multiselector:

• Enlightening Philosophy: +3% dodge bypass, +10 Magical Resistance Rating cap. Your Stunning Blow and Stunning Fist feats are now considered Light builder attacks.
• Forbidden Philosophy: +3% dodge bypass, +10 Magical Resistance Rating cap. Your Stunning Blow and Stunning Fist feats are now considered Dark builder attacks.
• Aberrant Philosophy: +3% dodge bypass, +10 Magical Resistance Rating cap. Your Stunning Blow and Stunning Fist feats are now considered Void builder attacks.

Thoughts? Questions? Suggestions?

Epic Destinies should not be constrained by heroic choices but stand alone. If the core also granted Choice of Philosophy (level 3 monk autogrant) this would be fine.

I think a cooler ability would be granting monk stances or improving monk stances one level ie

None -> Adept
Adept -> Master
Master -> Grandmaster
Grandmaster -> Legendary Grandmaster

[Aredharr]

It stacks up to 3 times, but you get 3 stacks per cast. This debuff does not stack beyond 3.

I love that this gives another angle/utility to the trap the soul spell (which I love in its new format) and fits nicely with the name of the core 4 "cut" the soul. I will definetly use it on bosses with my caster. Brilliant!

The idea to link a monk builder (and having the choice) to stunning blow/fist is super outside the box and I like that.
Where it becomes sour is that there is a huge disadvantage for QS monks vs HW monks due to the WIS stat modifier and way longer cooldown compared to stunning fist.

I wonder if you'd consider the core4 to change the stunning blow STR modifier to WIS... because that would be cool and would be worth taking the feat to go on par with HW monk stunning ability, albeit on a longer cooldown.

Cheers!