U58 Preview 3: Acolyte of the Skin Warlock Archetype

[Duhboy]

As a blaster replacement for ES it's still missing the imbue toggle to make it a viable replacement on that aspect. An extra +25% to the ray blast isn't going to match let alone surpass the imbue from ES given how it scales with imbue die which isn't that hard to acquire.

[Axcarth]

If this is the evil version of ES, why there is no Imbue Stance: Evil? I really think this should be somewhere in the tree in order to, you know, give imbues some space on the class and a little more flavor.

[Targal]

Want to have wings 24/7

[Pretty_Good_Old_One]

How about going all in on Fire. Replace one of the other two Warlock trees with Fire Savant? You would have to choose between demon form or the ability to strip fire immunity. The extra caster levels don't help with much more than the Fire Savant SLA's, but all the fire spell power is nice.

[elvesunited]

Testing on a dwarf acolyte of the skin
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The eye beam doesn't look like it's coming from the eyes at all unless acolytes of the skin have eyes in their hands.

I don't see the movement penalty from the eye beams. I timed my self running from one end of arena and couldn't tell the difference if firing eye beams or not.

If you do use eye beams while running they actually appear to be firing from behind you. It seemed to affect their range.

Eye beams require a targeted enemy. Firing without one sends them off at the oddest angles.

If enemies are lined up perfectly it will sometimes hit the next enemy in the line.

The animations for the glare attacks are a bit slow. Quicken does nothing as far as I can tell. The range isn't that big. It's a dps loss since it takes you out of your eldritch attack.

The demon form hit everything within it's short melee range. That said the range is pretty short so you got to get into hug range. If it provided defensive bonuses while active it did not show up on my char window.

Thoughts
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The demon form is pointless. A character that fights from a medium distance with moderate defensive bonuses closes into hug range for a minute. But there is very little offensive benefit to it and the defensive bonuses you get don't make up for the fact you have to run up right next to the target.

While both eye beams and demon form have the potential to hit multiple targets it requires a good set up and some luck. This makes the acolyte of the skin the only warlock tree without a reliable multi-target hitting shape.

Due to animation and stopping the eldritch attack, the glare doesn't really add to DPS. It's main value seems to be to it's fear effect. Si if being attacked by multiple enemies in close tange you can use the glare to scatter them so you hunt them down with you single target eldritch shape.

[Bjond]

Y'all haven't addressed the immunity issue, which I see as a make or break for the archetype. Any class locked into a particular damage type to which a vast swath of the game is immune is a waste of time to play and thus also a waste of time to add to the game.

For a small additional non-DDO data point, I punted playing wizard in EQ when ONE mob in the game was added that was utterly immune to magic and I wasn't the only one. Damage type immunities are one of those "nice story" things that sound cool and fitting for a fantasy realm creature, but are actually a defacto soft-delete of any class using that type -- at least in the eyes of players.

I'd strongly urge you to shelve this archetype until you eliminate all immune-to-type issues from DDO. There are lots of great suggestions about how to handle it, such with absorb and absorb-bypass (in gear and/or tree), changing the "type" of this class' damage to "hellfire" instead of regular fire, or by simply replacing immunity with a small not-removable flavor absorb (eg. full immune changes to 10% absorb).

[CaptainSpacePony]

So did some testing with this, and I have to say... it's doesn't feel much better than when most of the stuff was broken.

Having enemies run away from you in fear from your Glare abilities is horrible. I still VERY HIGHLY recommend making the glares paralyze with fear...

How about it still instills fear but ALSO slows them 50% or so?

[elvesunited]

Beams need to be wider
Glare needs longer range.
Glare should cause a cower effect not a run away effect.
Demon form attacks need to be increased to a longer melee range so you don't have to run up between the giants legs.

The demon form needs a lot more pizazz. My thought would be that going into demon form heals you but with the penalty that you're stuck in demon form and can only attack using melee range attacks until it wears off. Going to demon form weakens you by forcing you into a suboptimal fighting style. Might as well lean into it and give the warlock a reason to do it.

[LurkingVeteran]

Y'all haven't addressed the immunity issue, which I see as a make or break for the archetype. Any class locked into a particular damage type to which a vast swath of the game is immune is a waste of time to play and thus also a waste of time to add to the game.

For a small additional non-DDO data point, I punted playing wizard in EQ when ONE mob in the game was added that was utterly immune to magic and I wasn't the only one. Damage type immunities are one of those "nice story" things that sound cool and fitting for a fantasy realm creature, but are actually a defacto soft-delete of any class using that type -- at least in the eyes of players.

I'd strongly urge you to shelve this archetype until you eliminate all immune-to-type issues from DDO. There are lots of great suggestions about how to handle it, such with absorb and absorb-bypass (in gear and/or tree), changing the "type" of this class' damage to "hellfire" instead of regular fire, or by simply replacing immunity with a small not-removable flavor absorb (eg. full immune changes to 10% absorb).

This isn't really as much of an archetype issue as a warlock issue though. Further, half the damage is force (or Evil) so it's not actually immunity for warlocks. Fire may suffer a bit more at this in certain end-game content, but there might also be a possibility to use Tiefling (not sure if you need all racial AP for this, you probably have to ditch T5 SE/Wave anyway if you go deep AotS).

The real issue with this tree is that Beam is not actually a beam, Glare should paralyze and demon transform needs more upside (how about continuous regen from a fire aura, or is there already some way to heal yourself with fire? I don't think EB/Holy Fireball works since it has to be typed as beneficial in that case. Possibly the PA fire dmg+heal?).

[newmart]

Shape Stance: Beam Concentration: Eldritch Blast Shape: Transform your Eldritch Blast into a magical beam of Force dealing damage to all enemies in a straight line. This scales with 125% Spell Power. While active, you have -1 Pact Damage die.

I don't understand these calculations... Raise spell power scaling and removing a die? Why not 100% spellpower without die penality?

[SpardaX]

How about it still instills fear but ALSO slows them 50% or so?

https://ddowiki.com/page/Fear_(spell)

Assuming that the glare effect causes a copy paste effect of fear, which Im like, 95% sure it does

An area of effect of terror in the shape of a cone causes each living enemy in an area to become panicked. A successful will save causes enemies to become shaken. Creatures that fail their save are also slowed 35% by necrotic energy.

Creatures that fail their save are also slowed 35% by necrotic energy.

We're kinda most of the way to 50% anyway.

[Pretty_Good_Old_One]

https://ddowiki.com/page/Fear_(spell)

Assuming that the glare effect causes a copy paste effect of fear, which Im like, 95% sure it does

An area of effect of terror in the shape of a cone causes each living enemy in an area to become panicked. A successful will save causes enemies to become shaken. Creatures that fail their save are also slowed 35% by necrotic energy.

Creatures that fail their save are also slowed 35% by necrotic energy.

We're kinda most of the way to 50% anyway.

I like increasing the slow to 50%. Thematically I like making glare visually have a big impact.

I’d love it if it did even more. Would it be unbalancing if it also started a progressive burn effect? It might make up for having to chase the feared mobs, if they got a fire DoT. Something that hits kind of hard, like pact dice every 2 seconds, with progressive spell point scaling every tick. 100% first tic, 200% second tic, 300% third, etc. (or 150, 200, 250). Add in a good visual fire effect. Maybe skip the slow, or even haste them while they are fleeing - for a more chaotic visual and making it more disruptive.

[cmecu]

I didnt see Howl Of Terror... Did I miss it somewhere? How can you be a Pit Fiend , Fire Warlock, and not have Howl of Terror any more?

[droid327]

The real issue with this tree is that Beam is not actually a beam

Make it scale 150% with spellpower and full instant line AOE, but manual targeting only - it wont lock to target, only to your reticle - so you gotta line up all your shots

That'd be a unique playstyle and reward player skill

[cmecu]

As a blaster replacement for ES it's still missing the imbue toggle to make it a viable replacement on that aspect. An extra +25% to the ray blast isn't going to match let alone surpass the imbue from ES given how it scales with imbue die which isn't that hard to acquire.

I was thinking of that too. One thing that comes to mind if wanting imbue.. is possibly Teifling Race, because you can use Toggle from their Core Bloodhunt. You will do more damage was the monsters health goes down to 75, 50, 25 percent.

I still am disappointed that gutted tiefling core the way they did and made it an imbue thing. But maybe it would be ideal with pitfiend ... They really should give this Archetype Howl of Terror. Makes no sense not to have that. Its pretty lackluster so far.

[LurkingVeteran]

Make it scale 150% with spellpower and full instant line AOE, but manual targeting only - it wont lock to target, only to your reticle - so you gotta line up all your shots

That'd be a unique playstyle and reward player skill

Yeah something like this would be fun. Maybe make it as wide as lightning bolt.

With the lag being what it is I dont understand why they insist on making more slow projectiles instead of instant, more like crossbow.

[Duhboy]

I was thinking of that too. One thing that comes to mind if wanting imbue.. is possibly Teifling Race, because you can use Toggle from their Core Bloodhunt. You will do more damage was the monsters health goes down to 75, 50, 25 percent.

I still am disappointed that gutted tiefling core the way they did and made it an imbue thing. But maybe it would be ideal with pitfiend ... They really should give this Archetype Howl of Terror. Makes no sense not to have that. Its pretty lackluster so far.

I've tested the tiefling imbue to see if it would work on EB let alone from the skin-lock on Lamannia when it was up. It doesn't.

[EdsanDarkbane]

@Dev's

After much constructive feedback, none of the player suggestions were used. Which begs the question...

What's the point of this preview if player feedback isn't taken seriously?

Just to recap a few shortcomings after several weeks of "development," the AToS...

- Performs Eldritch beam attacks that are unusable within the game-mechanics of DDO. Example: Tall players will not be able to hit small mobs standing directly in front of them.

- Lacks good symmetry with itself or the adjacent Warlock trees.

- Has a gaze attack that fears mobs, causing them to run off. Which, if you think about it, will 100% get your Reaper / Raid group killed.

- Demon-Form melee ability is set at T5, yet lacks any supporting melee abilities earlier in the tree. Would be better to focus on a melee or caster tree, not both.

Currently, as the AToS is, no one but the fanboys want it, nor did anyone specifically ask for this garbage Archetype. Strongly recommend restarting from scratch, as AToS is likely to bomb no matter the amount of imbue dice you throw at it.

-Smoke

It was a real blow to see that the changes implemented were wholly lacking and not ina direction that was profitable for the community and the game.

I hope that SSG understands, that this spec really had a lot of DnD in it. I am dismayed, deflated. Like a boot on my face. I apologize if my post from last week was entitled, arrogant or otherwise offensive to the team.

My hope is that we can have SSG and DnD around for a long time.

I do believe that an extension of the Demon Stance, and an overtune of the numbers while in said state will be fun.

Big Thank You to Smoke for Remembering alot of us got together and tried to give good useable criticism.

[Stravix]

I like that on release they at least did something to make the demon form worthwhile with that 200% spellpower scaling, but it still leaves a bad taste that they finally got all alternate shapes down to 100% spellpower scaling, and in the same breath now introduce two new shapes that have non-100% scaling.

something something two step forward something something

[Dark_Lord_Mary]

Playtesting this was literally the worst class I've ever tried in ddo. Worse even than the undead negative energy warlock that presently holds that title.

you've gutted and killed the warlock class so much over the years, introducing this broken archetype is like
offering fresh lime to put on an open wound.

just un-nerf warlocks, give us back the old shining through and make this new archetype something actually fun and effective.

I have a friend who used to play with me, big whale, the kind you want playing,
he won't play ddo anymore bc of how warlocks were ruined. he used to main one and left saying he'd not come back unless they were fixed.
Now he gives his money to another mmo, I won't say which but it is very sad.
You guys really need to listen to the player feedback
and stop listening to whoever it is recommending you 'balance' classes.

'balancing' really should only be done in a gym during yoga class.