Update 56 Preview 1: Stormsinger Archetype

[Zeklijan]

+1

And only Tifling mechanic is a poor choice, all casters should have they our mechanic to rip out immunities or Sorc/Alch/Druid will still stand on top tier casters far way

Completely agreed, every nuker should have the ability to remove at least the primary element they focus on.

Playing a dedicated nuker that can't remove a monster/boss it's immunity means that most of the time you are either doing insignificant or no damage in these situations. It doesn't feel good.

[EinarMal]

It's weird the criticals do not include sonic. I can see choosing the base class as a Dragonborn for the extra lightning spells in the spell book. Still better off going with Spellsinger/Falconry if you want to do spell DPS if they leave out sonic at least to me at first glance.

Mixing in a third element of cold kind of kills it, hard enough to gear two elements.

This is what I currently use when I play a Dragonborn Bard, with sonic/electric. Might be nice to add chain lightning into rotation, but pretty minor in grand scheme of things.

Feats (7):

1) Maximize

3) Quicken

6) Empower

9) Heighten

12) Completionist

15) Arcane Initaite

18) SF Enchantment

21) Inspire Excellence

22) Spellpower Sonic

24) Master of Music

25) Spell Power Lightning

27) BogW

28) Crush Weakness

30) Embolden

30) Scion of Feywild

31) Spellpower Positive

Enhancements
Spellsinger 41
Falconry 25
Racial 20
Feydark 11

Epic Destiny
Fatesinger 35
Draconic 25
Shadowdancer 13

[QuantumFX]

There's a bug i the TR process as well. My main is a 30 Warlock Tiefling Scoundrel. I did a +20 Lesser to make him a Stormsinger. I noticed very early in the TR process that I was not being offered the electric spells. I checked my enhancements, and the Stormsinger Enhancement tree *is* there. I finished levelling, logged off and back on, and tried to trade spells with the bard trainer and no luck.

[LittleLexi]

I would honestly prefer Sleet Storm to Snowball Swarm. Especially since Bards can give themselves and others FoM.

This tree having Shout(ugh not again) and Horn of Thunder seems more thematic than in Spellsinger. Yet it's a big thing for both trees. That's quite some overlap and takes away the uniqueness from each tree.

And could we have some more details on how Reverberate is being buffed please?

[Targal]

Tier 5 spell should get thunderstroke, not iceberg only.

[Lotoc]

Tier 5 spell should get thunderstroke, not iceberg only.

you get thunderstroke as a 6th level spell selection as a stormsinger, it doesn't need to be.
The spell you get from the enhancement tree isn't an SLA and is added to your spellbook.

[Targal]

you get thunderstroke as a 6th level spell selection as a stormsinger, it doesn't need to be.
The spell you get from the enhancement tree isn't an SLA and is added to your spellbook.

Oh **** I was blind

[Draxis]

I don't know if anyone else has mentioned it yet, but lots of SLAs + Multiple enhancements to reduce metamagic costs = Kind of pointless?

[Tanky]

One possible gear setup that maximizes crit dmg for cold, sonic and electric:



Devotion, CHA 14 and Insightful CHA 5 augments have to be slotted.

[Madja]

For a tree that's supposed to be about sonic and lightning it sure has a lot of cold in it Is that a typo meant to be sonic?

[dogsoldier]

The Horn of Thunder SLA seems to be broken. Taking one rank for it, not only locks out all other tree Tier 5s, but also any other Tier 5s in the same tree, including the two more ranks for Horn of Thunder.

My initial thought on looking at this tree was that it would be fun to have Sonic, Electric, and Cold spells to pair with the Mantle of Nature Sky. It is hard to fit them all in though. You could take Shout in Spellsinger, but Cure Light Mass is too good to pass up. You can take Snowball Swarm instead from Stormsinger, but that locks you out of Shout, which is going to be the stronger SLA. You can grab Electric Loop as a spell, which is nice, but not Snowball Swarm. Each of the SLAs put the others on cooldown, which is annoying (cure light SLA on cooldown after sonic blast is cast, cure light mass on cooldown if you use shout, reverberate on cooldown if you use Niac's Biting Cold).

The Tier 5s don't seem to be worth losing Spellsinger T5s. Same for the Capstone. It does seem like a strong secondary tree, the tough choice is not with the capstones or T5, but how much you are willing to give up from Warchanter, Fighting Spirit is hard to pass up, which doesn't leave many APs for this tree.

[QuantumFX]

One possible gear setup that maximizes crit dmg for cold, sonic and electric:

FYI: you could replace the Leaf Mail with a Dinosaur Bone Light Armor for the Exceptional bonuses and 5 piece dread.

[mikarddo]

One possible gear setup that maximizes crit dmg for cold, sonic and electric:



Devotion, CHA 14 and Insightful CHA 5 augments have to be slotted.

You might find the Pomura's ring useful with electric + cold spell power and spell lore.

[Drinkfist]

This whole thing should replace the Spellsinger tree and not the Swashbuckler. Honestly I see Spellsingers everywhere and this is just going to add lightning strike procs with no stated caster level max. Its already heavily overlapping with Spellsinger so this just makes it Spellsinger+.

[cru121]

Spellbook:
Spell Level 1:
Added: Shocking Grasp
Removed: n/a

Spell Level 2:
Added: Electric Loop
Removed: n/a

Spell Level 3:
Added: Lightning Bolt
Removed: n/a

Spell Level 4:
Added: Ball Lightning
Removed: n/a

Spell Level 5:
Added: Chain Lightning
Removed: n/a

Spell Level 6:
Added: Thunderstroke
Removed: n/a

Shocking Grasp is meh. How about Shocking Bolt?
Lightning Bolt is overused. Arcanes, Clerics, Artificers can have it. Maybe replace with something more esoteric, from Druid/Artificer/Alchemist spellbook?
Electric Loop is probably not going to see much action. It's decent on a sorcerer with fast casting speed, but not so much on a wizard. On a bard with slow casting speed and small blue bar for metamagics, I don't see it used much.

[Targal]

Shocking Grasp is meh. How about Shocking Bolt?
Lightning Bolt is overused. Arcanes, Clerics, Artificers can have it. Maybe replace with something more esoteric, from Druid/Artificer/Alchemist spellbook?
Electric Loop is probably not going to see much action. It's decent on a sorcerer with fast casting speed, but not so much on a wizard. On a bard with slow casting speed and small blue bar for metamagics, I don't see it used much.

1-3 level spells are compatible with Master of Air, and it looks SSG wanted us to use it.
But still I agree that shocking touch is something not good spell to take as a bard spell, but you don't get good stuff always

[Pandjed]

OK, what is the point? I mean, why the heck would this half-baken approach make me think of this as something, I want to see next to a normal bard? Unless you want to play a swashbuckler, this is basically an upgrade. It gets more spell-variety and the only trade-off is a tree, which is bad in its current reincarntion.
So that's how you want to sell us on archetypes?

"Archetypes! Play a character like you never did before! By exchanging one tree and adding a tiny bit more, but making no other big changes, you will get a DDO experience like you never did before. Except you probably did, cuz electric damage isn't that seldom. But hey, you get the same bard buffs as always! This has count for something, right? Also, you don't lose any spells! Do you feel the excitment burning in you?"

Seriously, if a launch archetype starts so tame with its changes to the base class, we'll end up where iconics are now. Go, grab the bard by its songs, change some of the buffs, exchange fascinate with another abilty, take some spells away, make it feel like an actual trade-off.

The more I look at it, the more borish and uncreative it becomes and make me think, that adding stormsinger as 4th tree would make much more sense (which could add the spells to the spellbook by itself).

[NemesisAlien]

[Caarb]

I feel the archetype is trying to do too much with sonic electric and cold - I would double down on the electric/cold giving electric SLA options and cold spells to give the enhancement tree a little synergy

Right now it plays like just a better spellsinger bard. At least the other 2 archetype give interesting new options.

[EinarMal]

One possible gear setup that maximizes crit dmg for cold, sonic and electric:


Devotion, CHA 14 and Insightful CHA 5 augments have to be slotted.

It's possible, but it doesn't seem that useful to me, given the cold spells you can actually cast, would still seem better to just take this archetype for the spells and maybe the enhancement tree, and ignore cold and use sonic with electric (draconic). Personally I would still go T5 and 41 in Spellsinger, no way I am giving up heal and mass hold.

I would have to run some numbers, this might be a better 2nd tree than falconry 30% helpless damage.