You want skill balance? I'll give you skill balance

Mods please close. I did not intend this for the suggestion forums (it was moved from riverside) since it doesn't fit the suggestion guidelines as is.

I've done a third of the work, it's up to a.net to pick up the rest. I've complied a long, and I mean near or over 300 skills long, list of suggested skill changes that will finally make all the underused skills actually useful, and hopefully bring even more variety of skill choices into the game.

http://gw.gamewikis.org/wiki/User:8765/Nerf_Buff_List

A few questions to consider while deciding some skill changes:
Who uses this skill, and where?
What other skill(s) replace this particular skill, and why?
What's the damage (or effect) versus cast/cooldown/energy ratio? And how does that compare to more commonly used skills?
Where can this skill be useful?
How could this skill work (after some changes) in synergy with other skills?
Would I use this skill, and why?

Sadly enough, this list is NOT complete. I've only gone through 3 classes thoroughly, and I mean look at every single skill (by wiki, of course).

And, this is not to show off my wiki page (and it's pretty lame anyways), and I doubt the entire list will fit on these pages, nor am I willing to de-wikify it so it doesn't conflict with other codes.

Quite frankly, I didn't see a single thing there that I liked.

"Hundred Blades: Change to "Lose all enchantments. Swing twice at target foe and all nearby foes"

Quite simply, that is the worst idea ever. Warriors do not use enchantments, W/Mo do, W/Me might do, W/E also do, but if you notice, most skills are designed to be used with other skills of the same profession.

However, if you changed it to:

"Hundred Blades: Change to - "Swing twice at target foe and all nearby foes. Each attack hits for +5...10"

That would be more acceptable, since it provides an elite skill with more power, but not enough to break it.

um... i agree with about .1 percent of those....while i agree the unused skills should get a buff.... no like those :O

Ignite Arrows: needs a dmg buff instead, 3...15 dmg is really weak against 60+ armor

You have a few good things there, like the soul reaping fix.

Some of the things you have there are completely unnecessary, I don't really see the problem with shock/ (or in the past gale) wars, savage shot is basically the rof of rangers and should not be touched. I'm sorry but a large amount of the list seems to be like the unnecessary, and sometimes overzealous nerfs that Izzy implements occasionally.

thats pretty bad, please uninstall for the sake of the community

I'l royally glad your not izzy

I don't like any of the nerfs. You put PARAGON nerfs down? If anything, no Paragon skill should ever be nerfed again!

For Necros, the buffs look good.

Since I'm a big Paragon player, let me give my insight on your paragon stuff:

I disagree with your Incoming idea. Maybe more like "50% reduction but 25% reduction against foes." 50/50 would essentially be giving you the same benefit as the opponent... which is kinda pointless.

Help Me is just a worthless skill with reduction in time to be honest. Maybe "Spells targeting you cast faster and cost 5 less energy" or something.

FTW: No comment

We Shall Return: Good buff. Very good. I like.

SoC: Very good as well, but still seems rather useless IMO.

Godspeed: I don't think this skill is good even with more speed.

LtW: Ok I suppose.

MYT: Good.

Soldier Fury: Good

HA: Sure, why not.

The Power is Yours: Done badly. Have it increase allies energy regeneration, but cost what it does currently... an AoE Blood Rit or so... after all, it completely cripples your energy supply no matter how much energy it costs. Or make it a bigger energy gain spike.

EF: Not crazy about increase down time.

Song of Power: Meh. Ok.

Don't really care about spears.

There's my 2 cents.

Why? As far as I'm concerned, even though those changes mostly sucked, they were better than anything Izzy thought up lately. Best of 2 evils concept.

If you were in charge of skill balancing, i would have already quit this game. Honestly some of the suggestions you made either dont make sense, or do not need the buff/nerf you give them.

For the most part, your ideas are complete garbage.

Lol at this...I agree with maybe 2% of them

He's calling out nerfs on skills that don't have problems, and buffings ones unintelligently, such as adding cast times that shoudlnt' be there, blockrates that shouldn't exist, etc.

And Izzy never does so...?

Proof that things can be worse.

...Yeah, I'm going to keep this civil. Frankly, I don't really understand 99% of those changes. I mean, a nerf of "It's Just A Flesh Wound."? It's a pretty bad elite to BEGIN with, so why nerf it? 100% block rate spells? I don't know of any of those currently outside of monster skills, and its probably that way for good reason. Bringing B-Surge back down to 5 energy would probably make it popular on a lot of X/E's again, a.l.a the B-Surge Dom Mesmer(Although not in the same form since its other skills have been trashed as well). Mystic Regeneration needs a nerf, but it needs to be moved to Mysticism, not nerfed into a TERRIBLE skill;that suggestion makes it more terrible than Healing Breeze.

Also, this would destroy the 55 monk. Making Spirit Bond last for X hits was one thing. You could still monk farm, just not the insane number of monsters as before. If PS had that implemented, 55'ing would be impossible. Spirit Bond currently doesn't renew the number of hits if re-cast while still applied(i.e it has 1 hit left before it expires, you re-cast before it expires, doesn't renew to 10 hits). If PS made the same way, gg 55's.

Sorry to be so harsh, but...yeah. A lot of these changes seem really random and not thought out.

I take it most of you just read the nerfs part? BTW I've gotten several skills changed via sardelac sanitarium.

I agree with:

Strike as one
Revive animal
Penetrating shot
Focused shot
Power Shot
Arcing shot
Hunter's shot
Archer's Signet
Expert's dexterity
Quickshot (Just that it needs a buff, the given buff is way overpowered)
Ethereal burden
Shared burden (earshot-->in the area)
Psychic instability
Ignorance
Mantra of signets
Shatter Storm
Signet of midnight
Stolen Speed
Mark of Protection(either way)
Amity
Life Sheath
Strength and honor
Defender's Zeal
Bals Pendulum
Word of Censure
Glimmer of light
Healer's covenant
Healing light
Withdraw hexes
Remove Hex
Glim Mark
Shock Arrow
Stone Sheath
Mirror of Ice
Double Dragon
Second Wind
Vamp Swarm
Dark Fury (as said, not a buff, just change the desc to match wahat it does)
Weaken Armor
Wail of Doom
Primal Rage
Rage of the Ntouka
flourish
Magehunter's strike
Hundred blades (The only thing that would make that over-powered is conjure, which is an enchantment, hence lose all enchantments. Please don't flame for the hell of it)
Enraged Smash
Mark of Insecurity
Wastrel's Collapse
Preservation
Spirit Light weapon
Spirit Siphon
"Make your time!"
Pious renewal

Now.. that's about 30%. 1%? Are you guys like.. mending wammos or something?

Agreed. Seriously.

/unsigned

Thank you though for screwing the sins over.

~the rat~

I'm sorry, there are very few here that I agree with.