Kensei Competence HP bonus

[SpartanKiller13]

Kensei's +25% Competence HP bonus was added onto Weapon Master, which require Greater Weapon Focus. GWF requires 8 levels of Fighter, hence you need Fighter 8 to get HP from T5 Kensei.

Can this be changed to a different enhancement (I'd pick Keen Edge), or can GWF be removed as a pre-requisite from Weapon Master, or can GWF be changed to only require Fighter 5? Otherwise it's strictly behind other T5's which support multiclassing better than Kensei does.

I've done a variety of Fighter 6 splits to get melee crit profile from Kensei, and any T5 Kensei with <8 Fighter levels is going to be in an awkward spot. Some builds can use Stalwart Defender stance sometimes, but that gives +150% threat minimum which isn't viable in a lot of cases, costs 13 AP, and requires Medium/Heavy armor or a shield.

My understanding is that one of the design principles is to encourage build diversity, but this is definitely discouraging a variety of builds I can see. I'm starting this thread because I'm writing up a 10/6/4 Monk/Fighter/Ranger Dex-max GSword build; I could go 8/8/4 and get +25% HP but then I can't get a Monk PL - and as a centered build I don't qualify for StD's improved stance.

[01000010]

Kensei's +25% Competence HP bonus was added onto Weapon Master, which require Greater Weapon Focus. GWF requires 8 levels of Fighter, hence you need Fighter 8 to get HP from T5 Kensei.

Can this be changed to a different enhancement (I'd pick Keen Edge), or can GWF be removed as a pre-requisite from Weapon Master, or can GWF be changed to only require Fighter 5? Otherwise it's strictly behind other T5's which support multiclassing better than Kensei does.

I've done a variety of Fighter 6 splits to get melee crit profile from Kensei, and any T5 Kensei with <8 Fighter levels is going to be in an awkward spot. Some builds can use Stalwart Defender stance sometimes, but that gives +150% threat minimum which isn't viable in a lot of cases, costs 13 AP, and requires Medium/Heavy armor or a shield.

My understanding is that one of the design principles is to encourage build diversity, but this is definitely discouraging a variety of builds I can see. I'm starting this thread because I'm writing up a 10/6/4 Monk/Fighter/Ranger Dex-max GSword build; I could go 8/8/4 and get +25% HP but then I can't get a Monk PL - and as a centered build I don't qualify for StD's improved stance.

Heh, Design principles? Encouraging Build Diversity? Ignore what people say, watch what they do. Yeah, 8fighter req for tier 5 is absurd, plainly.

[Wizard1406]

Yeah 8 fighter req., 3 feat and 9 (!) points enhancement tax is much too high, please change. Lost over 300 HP in reaper from the change (outside only ~200 for some reason)

edit: seems, heroic toughness buff gives significantly less HP than old EDF. You need the competence bonus from enhancements to be higher than old EDF, sometimes quite a bit higher, which is nice. But that bonus should be reachable for all.

[SpartanKiller13]

Heh, Design principles? Encouraging Build Diversity? Ignore what people say, watch what they do. Yeah, 8fighter req for tier 5 is absurd, plainly.

I mean that was part of the theory with the imbue pass, right? *shifty eyes*

Yeah 8 fighter req., 3 feat and 9 (!) points enhancement tax is much too high, please change. Lost over 300 HP in reaper from the change (outside only ~200 for some reason)

edit: seems, heroic toughness buff gives significantly less HP than old EDF. You need the competence bonus from enhancements to be higher than old EDF, sometimes quite a bit higher, which is nice. But that bonus should be reachable for all.

If you're getting any source of Competence HP it's probably a HP buff, but if not it's rough lol. I think they expected melee T5's to be getting said Competence bonus, but there are a variety of niche builds and some (like this) which aren't always available even to builds using that T5.

If you're using Med/Heavy/shield and don't mind the threat, can try StD's defender stance? It's not always an option but might be available depending on your split.

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Conversely my current life as a Fire Savant Sorc I hit 20 and respecced for T5 EK, I'm getting 15% HP for very low opportunity cost I was going to run Feydark C5 for free Enlarge, but the HP are definitely worth it for me.

I'm definitely a melee build, ignore the spellcasting spam lol.

[Strider1963]

Apparently the devs "build diversity" only works for some people? I wish they had just left EDF and eliminated the no casting penalty. The way it is now is really not very diverse at all, but merely another unwanted change to a lot of peoples builds. The same with the damage dice. They only work if you have access to an imbue, right?? So if your favorite build doesnt have an imbue somewhere in their trees, again, just another nerf. Isnt it great?

[SpartanKiller13]

Apparently the devs "build diversity" only works for some people? I wish they had just left EDF and eliminated the no casting penalty. The way it is now is really not very diverse at all, but merely another unwanted change to a lot of peoples builds. The same with the damage dice. They only work if you have access to an imbue, right?? So if your favorite build doesn't have an imbue somewhere in their trees, again, just another nerf. Isn't it great?

So you're fine with just +25% HP to every caster that can afford 4 feats? I'm not sure that's build diversity either though lol. Also like 90% of DDO's toons getting the same +25% Competence HP sorta defeats the purpose, no? Maybe if it did something like set your non-positive spellpower to 0 (and ranged power like originally), or your spell crits all to 0 or something?

I mean the point of EDF was to help melee survivability lol. It had problems (such as rezzing or less teamwork in general), and this fix also has problems (like some caster/ranged builds getting the HP and some melee builds not) but the direction at least seems good? In theory there's opportunity cost so melees will get defensive perks and ranged/caster toons have to choose between getting the same tankiness or getting better at their specialty (although I'm not sold on the current iteration thereof).

Same with imbues; if you don't have one now you probably didn't have a +1d6 enhancement prior to the update, so it's no loss. Not a nerf if you didn't get something lol, that's just not a buff? The enemy HP didn't go up so your expected output vs result is the same.

If you did have one, it's usually a gain? Possibly some builds lost 2.5% damage by dropping 16d6 from 2-piece Reverb on a non-imbue Cha build?