The Balance Change post

[Grailhawk]

Shields really do so much damage that they tip the DPS balance in favor of Vanguards significantly?

I don't think thats what he is saying. He is saying that shields add enough defense that if Vanguard is better DPS then THF or TWF which offer less defense there is no point in playing a THF or TWF when you can be a Vanguard with better defense and better offence

[Robai]

~ Just confirmed, our quarterstaff tests are with Thunderforged weapons.
~ Our build is doing excellent DPS, just behind Tempest but in front of most other builds we've tested.
~ We will be interested to see how your builds do when Lamannia comes back up.

Sev~

The nerf to Improved Critical feat is needed, I think almost everyone agree with that (I mean crit range bonuses from Enhancements, ED, Holy Sword, etc. should NOT be doubled).

The problem with the proposed IC feat nerf is that it will nerf special weapons, which has expanded BASE crit range.
Btw, it will result in a new bug, because the description of Keen says that: The base critical threat range of this weapon is doubled.

You tested Thunderforged Quarterstaff, but it doesn't have expanded base crit range and thus won't be nerfed harder than other weapons (I mean it will be nerfed correctly).
So I don't see a point of testing TF Quarterstaff for that matter.

Please check the list of weapons here:
https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...-Nerf-incoming!
(please check both tables, in the second table is the list of correctly nerfed crit ranges)

[Qhualor]

Yeah, it kind of is.

If we change Holy Sword to work with shield then Vanguard will out DPS two handed and two weapon builds. Why would anyone put down the shield to use the other styles?

(The other thing to consider is this: Vanguard for Paladin and Vanguard for Fighter need to also be balanced. If we found that Vanguard was still behind we'd boost that tree directly rather than putting the DPS into the Paladin specific Holy Sword.)

Sev~

fighter havent had their pass yet as you obviously know. I would assume even if Vanguard tree was untouched, the fighter pass would still affect Vanguard fighters. note that im not specifically talking about a Vanguard Fighter using a shield. I would assume there would be some changes to the other trees that a Vanguard might dip into and maybe the class itself that could tip the scales.

[Tlorrd]

The best part of this update is when I nerf my credit card.

This ^^

[redoubt]

Keep in kind that we can't test changes until we implement them. That means we can either get builds into your hands early as possible, or hold off on builds and keep them away from the players longer.

All player feedback has indicated that players would prefer us to get things on Lamannia early and listen to player feedback. The thing I am concerned about with your quote above is you are basically telling us we should hold off putting changes on Lamannia and then don't make changes based on player feedback because if we do that, well then our claims are "suspect."

We don't really adhere to this line of thinking. Once we become hesitant to put early builds up for player testing, and once we stop tweaking changes based on player feedback because we are afraid that players will find our discussions "suspect" then the communication between players and devs will completely break down. We don't feel that is healthy for the game.

Sev~

I think you should put the changes on lamania in stages. i.e if you want to nerf TWF, holy sword and heavy armor then you:

1. Week one: put the TWF nerf on lama.
2. Week two: undo the TWF nerf, put in HS nerf.
3. Week three: undo HS nerf, put in armor nerf.
4. Week four: decide which of these 3 changes that all can affect a single build does what you want. If not, then start putting them on in combinations.
5. etc...

If you dump all the changes at once and you find a large synergistic affect, you have a harder time figuring out what is happening. For example, if you reduce defense and offense at the same time you may find that what you though was OP is now at the bottom of the stack because less offense means mobs live longer, which increases incoming damage, but you also reduced defense, so did you just double the incoming damage? Triple it? Square it?

As far as getting things to test to us, yes do that. Also get stuff to us to paper test. Put out your whole list of ideas. I.e. the long list of changes in this post. That is good. What you need to add to it is the time phased approach to testing it. By showing the whole plan, but testing in increments you get multiple benefits. Players can bring obvious things to you attention based on paper, or maybe point out things that you didn't know like how moving while TWF is different than all the other styles. You also get more specific test results.

Put another way:

If you drop all the changes at once you might find that: Paladin TWFr time to complete quest X increases by 78%. This is more change than desired and you are left guessing what happened.

Or, If you drop the changes in stages you might find that:
TWF change creates a dps decrease of 7.2% and results in a 10% increase in quest completion time.
HS change on TWF paladin creates a 12.3% decrease in DPS and a 18% increase in completion time.
When combined these create a 37% decrease in DPS and a 78% increase in completion time.
The math doesn't add up, but as the monsters live longer, LOH become used up faster and sp run out and they fall back on potions and scrolls, thus greatly increasing completion time.

[redoubt]

Yeah, it kind of is.

If we change Holy Sword to work with shield then Vanguard will out DPS two handed and two weapon builds. Why would anyone put down the shield to use the other styles?

(The other thing to consider is this: Vanguard for Paladin and Vanguard for Fighter need to also be balanced. If we found that Vanguard was still behind we'd boost that tree directly rather than putting the DPS into the Paladin specific Holy Sword.)

Sev~

I'm on my third Vanguard Paladin life. I've not played them back to back. I've played assassin, swashbuckler, moncher, warlock in between. Moncher is the one I really noticed as lagging behind. Assassin is the one I had to work the hardest with to maintain my usual place in the pack. Warlock is the one I had to work the hardest to keep from dying.

I've not played a non-assassin TWF since the AC changes years ago, so I can't comment on the effectiveness of those builds by contrast, but I'm not seeing the disparity that you are seeing during my gameplay.

As far as balancing Vanguard for paladin and fighter, why? One is a paladin and one is a fighter? Paladin runs with HS and the fighter runs with whatever new goodness you give them in their pass. Please make them different. I for one, do not want more homogenization of builds.

[edana]

On Lama, Spirit blast and Eldritch burst tooltip shown ASF, WAI?

Did not see this mentioned on the current balance list. If it is WAI, why single out these two SLA subject to ASF while most other SLA are not?

Do not understand the logic behind this change (if its WAI), if SLA are subject to ASF, it should be carry across the board and apply to all SLA, don't cherry pick to nerf a class

[blerkington]

Keep in kind that we can't test changes until we implement them. That means we can either get builds into your hands early as possible, or hold off on builds and keep them away from the players longer.

All player feedback has indicated that players would prefer us to get things on Lamannia early and listen to player feedback. The thing I am concerned about with your quote above is you are basically telling us we should hold off putting changes on Lamannia and then don't make changes based on player feedback because if we do that, well then our claims are "suspect."

We don't really adhere to this line of thinking. Once we become hesitant to put early builds up for player testing, and once we stop tweaking changes based on player feedback because we are afraid that players will find our discussions "suspect" then the communication between players and devs will completely break down. We don't feel that is healthy for the game.

Sev~

Hi,

It's responses like this, set in contrast with your very late and short testing period on Lammania, which is why I think the development team has lost a lot of credibility with these recent changes. Don't even bother pretending that player testing is important to you when you give us so little time on Lammania to do that testing.

You should also be able to model the results of your changes mathematically, preferably before you even consider making a change. If you aren't able to do that in a way with good predictive power of how builds perform in game, something is seriously wrong.

At this point I'm not terribly concerned about communication breaking down, because I think the state of it now is already bordering on useless. You have shown us apart from a couple of minor cases, that you'll do pretty much what you want to do, and that is a very unfortunate situation for us when it's being done by a team with a very imperfect understanding of how the game works and how we play it.

You and your team have simply ignored large and important parts of the discussions of some of these changes, misrepresented the degree of their severity, ignored solutions provided by the community which are better than the ones you came up with yourselves, and are now backtracking on others.

I'll say it again; this is a farce.

Thanks.

[slarden]

On Lama, Spirit blast and Eldritch burst tooltip shown ASF, WAI?

Did not see this mentioned on the current balance list. If it is WAI, why single out these two SLA subject to ASF while most other SLA are not?

Do not understand the logic behind this change (if its WAI), if SLA are subject to ASF, it should be carry across the board and apply to all SLA, don't cherry pick to nerf a class

These were always intended to have arcane spell failure

[CeltEireson]

Hi,

It's responses like this, set in contrast with your very late and short testing period on Lammania, which is why I think the development team has lost a lot of credibility with these recent changes. Don't even bother pretending that player testing is important to you when you give us so little time on Lammania to do that testing.

You should also be able to model the results of your changes mathematically, preferably before you even consider making a change. If you aren't able to do that in a way with good predictive power of how builds perform in game, something is seriously wrong.

At this point I'm not terribly concerned about communication breaking down, because I think the state of it now is already bordering on useless. You have shown us apart from a couple of minor cases, that you'll do pretty much what you want to do, and that is a very unfortunate situation for us when it's being done by a team with a very imperfect understanding of how the game works and how we play it.

You and your team have simply ignored large and important parts of the discussions of some of these changes, misrepresented the degree of their severity, ignored solutions provided by the community which are better than the ones you came up with yourselves, and are now backtracking on others.

I'll say it again; this is a farce.

Thanks.

Ahhh so what youre basically saying is for the devs to ignore everything you say and just dump it straight on to live? Because obviously upsetting the customers is their primary goal based on what youre saying, despite the fact that the game closing means theyre out of a job and its looks kind of bad on their resume for any future jobs, and of course none of the team care at all about the game from a professional or job satisfaction point of view.

Yes, makes perfect senses.

[Jetrule]

I wonder if I am too much a flavor of the month player. I started playing DDO in early 2014, My main character is currently playing a pali15/rogue 5 build relying on bonecrusher and will use epic bone crusher. I started playing after raiders boxes were a thing so I have no sireth. He dose have 5 heroic past lives and 3 pdk past lives and 3 double strike etrs. 2 other etrs. I am heavily relying on the mrr and prr from heavy armor and sacred defender stance for mitigation and the enhanced crit range of the bone crusher + holy sword for damage. So this character will be one of the hardest hit by incoming nerfs.

My primary alt is currently a halfling pure warlock E.S./T.S. tanklock build with a couple of arcane etr's, no heroic reincarnations. I keep him at epic levels as a warlock to group up with friends and guildies doing epic content. He is ee viable in groups for most tanking. His lack of dps makes solo ee a chancy prospect for most ee's. He can solo any e.h. quest at any level. He is overpowered for his lack of past lives gear and tomes etc.. But he is not over powered offensively. His medium armor losing the 10 mrr or so is not a big deal the dps may be. I never participated in dupapalooza. my characters have limited access to thunderforged options.

My two currently most played characters They feel like the two characters that are most targeted for nerf..

My old primary alt is a assassin pure rogue with a rogue past life and a double strike etr. He is parked at 28 and just got the new epic slice and dice set which is outstanding dps. He has a assassins kiss and a high priestess blade combo for assassinating. He feels unaffected.

These are the only three characters I play with any regularity. I am very worried for the viability of my main and concerned about the viability of my warlock. I think my rogue will be unaffected as long as he sticks to slice and dice anyway.
So yeah the 2 lr5 stones will work for me. Despite the fact I really liked being a staff fighter and a tank lock I will probably pull out of those builds.

The warlock I get it. He is by my own admission O.P. The staff fighter has weak damage compared to his last life's rogue mech, and I don't think he can stand to lose 2 of his crit range from bone crusher. I would accept the 1 from holy sword. but -3 total to endgame crit range and even -2 to his epic leveling crit range may be the difference between survival and death in many instances. I am most definitely not a player who has characters that never die or "faceroll" E.E. quests. I just wanted to give you the perspective of a midtime - new player on the nerfs.

[Drwaz99]

Hi,

It's responses like this, set in contrast with your very late and short testing period on Lammania, which is why I think the development team has lost a lot of credibility with these recent changes. Don't even bother pretending that player testing is important to you when you give us so little time on Lammania to do that testing.

You should also be able to model the results of your changes mathematically, preferably before you even consider making a change. If you aren't able to do that in a way with good predictive power of how builds perform in game, something is seriously wrong.

At this point I'm not terribly concerned about communication breaking down, because I think the state of it now is already bordering on useless. You have shown us apart from a couple of minor cases, that you'll do pretty much what you want to do, and that is a very unfortunate situation for us when it's being done by a team with a very imperfect understanding of how the game works and how we play it.

You and your team have simply ignored large and important parts of the discussions of some of these changes, misrepresented the degree of their severity, ignored solutions provided by the community which are better than the ones you came up with yourselves, and are now backtracking on others.

I'll say it again; this is a farce.

Thanks.

Words right out of my mouth. Thank you.

[blerkington]

Ahhh so what youre basically saying is for the devs to ignore everything you say and just dump it straight on to live? Because obviously upsetting the customers is their primary goal based on what youre saying, despite the fact that the game closing means theyre out of a job and its looks kind of bad on their resume for any future jobs, and of course none of the team care at all about the game from a professional or job satisfaction point of view.

Yes, makes perfect senses.

Hi,

No, what I'm saying is there should be a longer development cycle for changes of this magnitude.

My main point is there hasn't been enough discussion of these changes, enough modelling, enough time for us to test them, enough details about their testing methods and results, and enough consideration given to alternative solutions.

If you are satisfied with how this is proceeding, that's fine, everyone is entitled to their opinion. But there's no need to mischaracterise my position, when what I'm advocating is very far from ridiculous.

Thanks.

[Krell]

I disagree with this. I have played all 3 styles extensively. Vanguards do not come close to out dpsing TWF or THF builds. The only way you could justify that argument is in situations where a vanguard can survive and keep swinging when THF or TWF can not. But thats not a good reason to nerf S&B, thats the very reason to go S&B over the other styles. Assuming all 3 builds CAN survive and keep swinging, then the vanguard is behind in DPS by a good amount.

Agreed. I don't see them leading currently and they will be less effective if this is implemented.

[Lopnel]

Holy Sword (Paladin)
This is now a spell that affects the paladin and buffs whatever melee weapon is being wielded in the main hand.
It no longer persists on your weapon but instead buffs the melee weapon you are holding in your main hand. (Yes, this buffs your two handed weapons.)
It no longer affects missile weapons.
It no longer can be used to buff off hand weapons or shields.
If you change weapons the spell will drop off the unequipped weapon and instead be applied to the newly equipped weapon.

"Holy Swords should be only for melee weapons but should also include off hand weapons when cast. My reasons for this opinion is based on what few feats the paladin has to work with. As it is a spell where the caster looks at their off hand weapon and targets it! Cast it twice?"

Blood Strength (Barbarian Ravager)
The portion of this enhancement that heals the user when they kill an opponent now has a 1 second internal cooldown.

"Reasonable"

Critical Rage (Barbarian Ravager)
The bonus to critical threat range is now a competence bonus.

Two weapon fighting animations have been fixed so there is no longer a weird jump on the fourth animation. This has made the fourth attack slightly quicker.[/B]

"Multiple sources of critical threat ranges should stack as long as those sources are of a different named source of bonus."

Two Weapon Fighting no longer grants melee power.
Improved Two Weapon Fighting no longer grants melee power.
Greater Two Weapon Fighting no longer grants melee power.

"Fixing the animation and causing a slightly faster damage roll is long over due and greatly appreciated."
"Why single out a weapon style? Having 2 weapons attacking at the same time is GOING to produce more damage rolls per second. If you should decide to nerf one weapon style then all weapon styles should equally be nerfed. DPS is based on Race, class, elected feats, elected enhancements and on a major note the quality of weapon(s) being used. I for one appreciate the addition and minor stacking weapon power adjustment as it is relative to LEVEL PROGRESSION as well as the weapon(s) quality."

Doubleshot values over 100% now have a chance of producing a third attack. The chance is equal to the amount the value exceeds 100. A doubleshot value of 130, for example, would always produce one extra shot and have a 30% chance to produce a third shot.

(Doublestrike will still cap at 100 for technical reasons.)

"Appropriate and long overdue and hopefully in the future applied to melee aswell"

Repeating Crossbows and Doubleshot
Fixed a bug where Doubleshot was not being reduced for repeating crossbows. (Doubleshot chance is divided by 3 for repeating crossbows.)

"Should it be meant to reduced this should be stated on the item so players can relate to this. Why hide something people need to know?"

Manyshot
This ability is being redesigned.
For the next 20 seconds you add your (base attack bonus * 4) to your Doubleshot and Ranged Power. This ability puts Ten Thousand Stars on a 30 second cooldown. Cooldown 2 minutes.
(This ability no longer gives a doubleshot penalty when activated.)

"Reasonable. But it appears this is not a nerf but a fuel injected rocket boost to damage rolls and could cause serious lag during both raids and regular dungeons."

Ten Thousand Stars
This ability is being redesigned.
For the next 30 seconds you add your Wisdom ability score to your Ranged Power and you add your monk level * 5 to your Doubleshot. This ability puts Manyshot on a 30 second cooldown. Cooldown 1 minute.
(This ability no longer gives a doubleshot penalty when activated.)

"Reasonable. But it appears this is not a nerf but a fuel injected rocket boost to damage rolls and could cause serious lag during both raids and regular dungeons"

Mechanical Reloader (Rogue Mechanic)
The alacrity for non-repeating crossbows is now 30%. (Was 40%)

"Reasonable."

Pulverizer (Legendary Dreadnought)
The bonus to critical threat range for bludgeoning weapons is now an Insight bonus.

"Multiple sources of critical threat ranges should stack as long as those sources are of a different named source of bonus. Epic feats, epic enhancements, heroic enhancements and base weapon threat ranges SHOULD ALL STACK as these areas are all ways to increase threat range for those that specialize with those weapon types due to level advancement."

Improved Critical
These feats now add a bonus to critical threat range based purely on weapon type.
* Adds +3 to critical threat range for falchion, kukri, rapier, and scimitar.
* Adds +2 to the critical threat range of bastard sword, dagger, great crossbow, greatsword, heavy crossbow, khopesh, light crossbow, long sword, repeating heavy crossbow, repeating light crossbow, short sword, and throwing dagger.
* Adds +1 to all other weapons.

"This is a distinct and separate function to base qualities of weapons. Very reasonable. However it has nothing to do with enhancements and feats and should be appropriately stackable."

Keen
This loot effect now add a bonus to critical threat range based purely on weapon type.
* Adds +3 to critical threat range for falchion, kukri, rapier, and scimitar.
* Adds +2 to the critical threat range of bastard sword, dagger, great crossbow, greatsword, heavy crossbow, khopesh, light crossbow, long sword, repeating heavy crossbow, repeating light crossbow, short sword, and throwing dagger.
* Adds +1 to all other weapons.

"Reasonable and should be completely separate from feats and enhancements."

Armor Changes
The amount of Physical Resist Rating that armor provides has been changed.
* Heavy armor now increases Physical Resist Rating by (base attack bonus * 2) and no longer adds Magical Resist Rating.
* Medium armor now increases Physical Resist Rating by (base attack bonus * 1.5) and no longer adds Magical Resist Rating.
* Light Armor now increases Physical Resist Rating by (base attack bonus * 1) and no longer adds Magical Resist Rating.
Fixed a bug where players were getting Physical Resist Rating for armor with which they were not proficient.

(Note: The Physical Resist Rating and Magical Resist Rating offered by shields remain unchanged.)

As a result of dialing back armor, some fighter only feats that will boost their effectiveness with armor and add to tactical DCs will also be included.

"A loss of even 1% should be reconsidered as each individual monster can deal over whelming damage to a single player and to have mobs of incoming damage along with potential lag. Base PRR should be INCREASED and not nerfed. The increase should be based on armor quality for all types (base level requirement of ANY armor)."

Tactical Training
Requires Fighter Level 4
You gain +2 to the DC of all tactical feats.

Tactical Combatant
Requires Fighter Level 8
You gain +4 to the DC of all tactical feats.

Tactical Mastery
Requires Fighter Level 12
You gain +6 to the DC of all tactical feats.

Tactical Supremacy
Requires Fighter Level 16
You gain +8 to the DC of all tactical feats.

Notes: All tactical feats stack for a total of +20. The lower level feats are not prerequisites for the higher level feats so a higher level fighter could save a feat if he/she wanted to skip Tactical Training and forego the +2 but still have access to Tatical Supremacy.

"Restricting these feats just to fighter class is inappropriate as all classes may potentially use tactics."

Heavy Armor Training
Requires Fighter Level 2
You gain +3 Physical Resistance Rating and Magical Resistance Rating while wearing heavy armor.

Heavy Armor Combatant
Requires Fighter Level 6
You gain +6 Physical Resistance Rating and Magical Resistance Rating while wearing heavy armor.

Heavy Armor Master
Requires Fighter Level 10
You gain +9 Physical Resistance Rating and Magical Resistance Rating while wearing heavy armor.

Heavy Armor Champion
Requires Fighter Level 14
You gain +12 Physical Resistance Rating and Magical Resistance Rating while wearing heavy armor.

Notes: All Heavy Armor feats stack for a total of +30. The lower level feats are not prerequisites for the higher level feats so a higher level fighter could save a feat if he/she wanted to skip Heavy Armor Training and forego the +3 and still have access to Heavy Armor Champion.

"Restricting these feats just to fighter class is inappropriate as all classes may potentially use heavy armor and already must stress heavily on enhancements to be able to do so. PRR and MRR should be based on the level requirement of armors equipped. Without the proficiency of equipped armor the PRR and MRR values should not appropriate. It is in my opinion that the higher quality of armor, regardless of type, should provide qualities of AC, PRR and MRR based on those that FORGED the named or craftable armors and then equated with the level requirements. Feats should increase max DEX, AC and even ablation/absorption of different types of incoming damage"

Divine Grace (Paladin)
Divine Grace now provides a maximum bonus equal to 2 + (Paladin level x 3).

"Very reasonable."

Eldritch Blast and other enhancements (Warlock)
The spellpower scaling for Eldritch Blast and several enhancements has been reduced.

Spellpower scaling of Warlock Abilities

Ability	Old	New
Eldritch Blast	150%	130%
Eldritch Blast Cone	130%	130%
Eldritch Blast Chain	110%	95%
Eldritch Blast Aura	150%	130%
Stricken (Souleater)	150%	125%
Consume (Souleater)	150%	125%
Eldritch Burst (Enlightened Spirit)	120%	100%
Spirit Blast (Enlightened Spirit)	120%	100%

"Why change the Warlock rating. Instead increase appropriated creatures with MRR?"

"Nerfing the DPS of all classes is not a solution to whiney complainers who have no respect to those that work full time and enjoy what they have available already. These people have invested time, resources and research into their WELL DESRERVED, OP, KICK *** builds. And respectfully towards the programmers and developers of this game: consider those that do not have unlimited time to play this game and NEED the shorter duration and larger damage numbers to excite and entertain them due to the already massive HP monsters: in what limited time they have BECAUSE the real world must come first."

[Spoonwelder]

Yeah, it kind of is.

If we change Holy Sword to work with shield then Vanguard will out DPS two handed and two weapon builds. Why would anyone put down the shield to use the other styles?

(The other thing to consider is this: Vanguard for Paladin and Vanguard for Fighter need to also be balanced. If we found that Vanguard was still behind we'd boost that tree directly rather than putting the DPS into the Paladin specific Holy Sword.)

Sev~

Sigh.....someone who is on Lamma please do the tests for Sev & the Devs (new band name?).

I have played both in the past year (Pally/Ranger 15/5 (pre-ranger pass) then some warlock to get completionist back - now Pure Pally)- nearly identical gear - I had tried vangaurd before but it was while rolling some ETRs and it was a messy 15/3/2 Pal/Rng/Fi build that didn't really synergize at all for Vanguard. So I wanted to try a pure Vanguard. There are no real splashes that make a Vanguard build better (IMO) so I think my starting point for a comparison is fair.....

Vanguard is noticeably less DPS than TWF pally (pre ranger pass as well so significantly behind the currently available version) by a fair margin (I'd say 20% or more and this is with HS working)- the shield bash proc rate with the cooldown is not fast enough to equate to offhand attacks and I would much rather have a T3 TF in my offhand vs. shield for pure DPS. I haven't checked recently but I also don't think you get stat mod to the damage. That said you have much higher durability (AC/PRR/MRR of Towershield) I think that is arguably fair for 10-20% DPS shortfall depending on the design goal but I don't think HS needs to be nerfed for shields.

That said I can't argue it being a big factor either way since you are only buffing a shield and that means the nerf is losing (or keeping) for 1W (3d10-Ultimatum) and 5% crit range 5% damage on one swing per second - so maybe a hundred DPS all in....not sure it's worth fighting over but that also implies it's not likely worth making the change for either.

[edana]

These were always intended to have arcane spell failure

Just test SLA on live server, equip sorc with heavy armor, 35% ASF, 0% ASF reduce. Lighting Loop, Shocking Grasp, Lighting bolt, Scorch, fired 25 times each, ZERO ASF Fail, ability fired 100%. (roll dice didnt even show up). When regular spells used, an ASF roll dice show up.

If SLA's ASF is WAI, than do it across the board, apply ASF to all SLA, don't cherry pick to nerf a class.

[Severlin]

Thoughts on named weapons and threat range:

~ We definitely do not, going forward, want Improved Critical to affect any bonuses to threat range for named weapons.

~ We are also sensitive to players who don't want to see existing weapon lose relative power.

We will be increasing the threat range of the following named weapons. I am including the new threat range which is increased to compensate for the loss of improved critical. Keep in mind that this will be on top of the threat range Improved Critical adds for weapon type, so with that feat Epic Sword of Shadows, as an example, would have a threat range of 6 and become 15-20.

I apologize for the short hand in listing the threat range - that number represents the base range of the weapon and should be increased enough to match the previous range with Improved Critical. As a side effect this will make some weapons more powerful if your character does not have Improved Critical.

Named Item: Base Threat Range

Epic Sword of Shadows: 4
Sireth: 5
Bone Crusher: 3
Epic Bone Crusher: 5
Pinion: 3
Mutineer's Blade: 5
Deathnip: 3
Tiefling Assassin's Blade: 4
Whirlwind: 4
Rebellion: 4
Drow Bastard Sword, Dagger, Khopesh, Longsword, and Shortsword: 4
Drow Waraxe, Light Mace, Warhammer, Great Axe, Maul and Quarterstaff: 3.
Drow Rapier and Scimitar: 5
Carnifex: 3
Silver Longbow: 3
Elemental Bloom (and Epic): 3
Oathblade: 4
Sickle of Sypheros: 3
Snowstar: 5
Theurgic Stave: 3
Ratcatcher: 4
Nightforge avanger blade and stiletto: 4
Nightforge spike: 5
Treason: 4
Breeze: 3
Unwavering Ardency: 3
Coronation: 3
Phospor: 5
Razorend: 4
Epic Zephyr: 4
Epic Thornlord: 3
Epic Collapsible Shortbow: 3
Epic Mirage: 5
Epic Bow of the Elements: 3
Epic Staff of Nat Gann: 3
Bow of Sinew: 3
Cutthroat's Smallblade (top heroic weapon) and Epic Cutthroat's Smallblade: 4
Luminous truth and Epic Luminous Truth: 3
Chieftain's Spear: 3
Forester's Brush Hook: 3
Forgotten Light: 3
Fellblade: 4
Sapphire Sting and Epic: 3
Death's Touch: 3
Devourer's Reaping: 3
Tharkuul's Bane: 3
Widowblight: 3
Mornh, Hammer of the Mountains: 3
Staff of the Seer: 3
Braisingstar: 3
Fossil: 3
Star of Irian: 3
Bonesplitter: 3
Shining Devastation: 3

(I believe we have all named items with a base threat range higher than their weapon type with this list.)

Sev~

[Livmo]

Thoughts on named weapons and threat range:

~ We definitely do not, going forward, want Improved Critical to affect any bonuses to threat range for named weapons.

~ We are also sensitive to players who don't want to see existing weapon lose relative power.

We will be increasing the threat range of the following named weapons. I am including the new threat range which is increased to compensate for the loss of improved critical. Keep in mind that this will be on top of the threat range Improved Critical adds for weapon type, so with that feat Epic Sword of Shadows, as an example, would have a threat range of 6 and become 15-20.

I apologize for the short hand in listing the threat range - that number represents the base range of the weapon and should be increased enough to match the previous range with Improved Critical. As a side effect this will make some weapons more powerful if your character does not have Improved Critical.

Named Item: Base Threat Range

Epic Sword of Shadows: 4
Sireth: 5
Bone Crusher: 3
Epic Bone Crusher: 5
Pinion: 3
Mutineer's Blade: 5
Deathnip: 3
Tiefling Assassin's Blade: 4
Whirlwind: 4
Rebellion: 4
Drow Bastard Sword, Dagger, Khopesh, Longsword, and Shortsword: 4
Drow Waraxe, Light Mace, Warhammer, Great Axe, Maul and Quarterstaff: 3.
Drow Rapier and Scimitar: 5
Carnifex: 3
Silver Longbow: 3
Elemental Bloom (and Epic): 3
Oathblade: 4
Sickle of Sypheros: 3
Snowstar: 5
Theurgic Stave: 3
Ratcatcher: 4
Nightforge avanger blade and stiletto: 4
Nightforge spike: 5
Treason: 4
Breeze: 3
Unwavering Ardency: 3
Coronation: 3
Phospor: 5
Razorend: 4
Epic Zephyr: 4
Epic Thornlord: 3
Epic Collapsible Shortbow: 3
Epic Mirage: 5
Epic Bow of the Elements: 3
Epic Staff of Nat Gann: 3
Bow of Sinew: 3
Cutthroat's Smallblade (top heroic weapon) and Epic Cutthroat's Smallblade: 4
Luminous truth and Epic Luminous Truth: 3
Chieftain's Spear: 3
Forester's Brush Hook: 3
Forgotten Light: 3
Fellblade: 4

(I believe we have all named items with a base threat range higher than their weapon type with this list.)

Sev~

No Needle?

http://ddowiki.com/page/Item:Needle,_Quill-slinger

Needling for the Needle to be added to stack.

[blerkington]

(I believe we have all named items with a base threat range higher than their weapon type with this list.)

Hi,

Your list is missing the heroic and epic versions of the Sapphire Sting.

Thanks.