Not another balance thread!

In this thread, I'm just gonna focus on (attempting to) balance some old school Prophecies and Factions skills.

For example:
Bulls Charge
5e 20r
Elite Stance. For 5...10...11 seconds, you move 33% faster and if you strike a moving foe in melee, that foe is knocked down. Bull's Charge ends if you use a skill.

The problems with it is that since it is a stance, you can have no ias while it is active, it is not maintainable, and does not allow you to use skills. With no ias and no skills, your dps is gonna be crap.

I think it should read like this.
6a
For 1...12...15 seconds, you move 25% slower, attack 33% faster, and knock down moving foes.
Basically flail and bulls strike rolled into one stance. The requirement for kd would be difficult to meet, however.

Cleave
4a
Elite Axe Attack. If this attack hits, you strike for +10...26...30 damage.
Since spamming this skill like it was designed for hinders adrenaline build up, it is inferior to Eviscerate.

I think it should read.
7a
If this attack hits, you strike for +1...12...15 damage and cause cracked armor.
It would now how great synergy with body blow and assist spikes

If that is op, maybe something like this.
5a
If this attack hits, your strike for +1...24...30 damage. If target is suffering from a deep wound, you strike for an additional 1...12...15 damage and this attack is unblockable.

Preservation
5e 3/4c 20r
Elite Binding Ritual. Create a level 1...11...14 Spirit. Every 4 seconds, this Spirit heals one non-Spirit ally in the area for 10...94...115 Health. This Spirit dies after 90 seconds.
It seems like a good skill, but the problem is it chooses who it heals randomly. So it often heals a fully healed party member while another is dying.

I suggest this.
10e 3/4c 25r
Create a level 1...11...14 spirit. All party members in earshot receive 1...5...6 health regenerartion.
Making it stack with recuperation will give an almost constant (but expensive) party heal.

Power Shot
10e 1c 6r
If Power Shot hits, you strike for +5...17 damage.
To little damage for the energy it costs. Penetrating and Sundering are better than it in every aspect in PvE.

I think it should be.
5e 1c 4r
If Power Shot hits, you strike for +5...17 damage.
Make it a bit more spammy.

Mind Burn
5e 1c 5r
Target foe takes 15...51 fire damage. If you have more energy than target foe, that foe takes an additional 15...51 fire damage and is set on fire for 1...6 seconds. This spell causes exhaustion.
It is now completely outclassed by Burning Arrow and Searing Flames. The exhaustion is unnecessary.

10e 1c 15r
Target foe takes 15...51 fire damage. If you have more energy than target foe, that foe takes an additional 15...51 fire damage and is set on fire for 1...6 seconds.
Removing the exhaustion clause but increasing the recharge and energy will buff it a little, but it still would be crap compared to other fire elites. At least I could bring Cynn again w/o worry about her burning her energy in the first 5 minutes.

Second Wind
5e 2c 5r
Elite Spell. You gain 1 Energy for each point of Energy lost due to Exhaustion. This spell causes Exhaustion.
...This skill is just plain crap. What was anet thinking?

Umm this one is tough. How about something like this?
5e 1c 20r
Elite Enchantment. For 20 seconds, your elementalist skills recharge twice as fast, but cost 30% more energy.
Making it a personal QZ without the hassle and the worry of the spirit dying and the requirement to spec into a worthless PvE line. Its the best i could think of. :P



I'm gonna add more as I think of them.

Edit button is in the lower-right.

If it can work like I think it might, it would be a huge buff for Bull's. Not sure if want.

Also, I think it'd be bad if melee classes could do Cracked Armor on their own in any PvP setting.

Preservation should be heals, just make sure it heal allies with 80% HP or less.

Your ideas are horrible and simply rework the entire skill,not buff/balance it.Cleave was meant to be a cheap spammable attack,there's decapitate and eviscerate for spikes...No way in hell I would take preservation like that or bulls charge.Granted these skills need buffing but just not like that.

Most prophecies skills could definately use a rework. 90% of them are terrible.

Bull's Charge in that form would be incredibly overpowered. Build adren, run up to target, KD, hit Bull's Charge, they don't move for the rest of the match.

Cleave is still perfectly fine in pressure builds because it can turn out so many DWs and still follow with a strong attack.

Preservation stacking with Recup would be broken as hell. The whole team would have +8 regen for 90% of the match.

except they ea have a 30sec or 45sec recharge and all you gotta do is kill the spirit...plus in pvp they are still 2-4sec. casting time so it would be a waste if you got interupted.

Why would you cast spirits in a place where they could easily be killed? Better yet, why would you be casting spirits in a place where you could be easily interrupted?

That preservation buff would make it way too powerful in GvG, and could arguably destroy any kind of pressure build left in the game. Bull's Charge would be the new insane stance like pre-nerf Primal Rage, and honestly wouldn't help with the sudden uprising of stances.

1 suggestion per post? Won't bother to discuss any of your ideas since the topic will get locked for violating the forum rules.

Bull's Charge = OP'd (IAS with no downside like double damage clause... and KD? lolwut?) but Adrenaline vice e-cost would actually be a rather nice exchange and can even allow releasing bull's strike from the bar! ^^
Cleave = (1st suggestion) Has Synergy with Body Blow = Me Likey
Preservation = Leave as is tbh (don't need a 2nd, cheaper recup.)
Power Shot = OP's (in PvP; don't care about PvE tbh.. everything in PvE is OP'd anyway)
Mind Burn = Reduce e-cost to 5e and recharge to 3 seconds = 1337 version of immolate tbh
Second Wind = Does not coincide with the meaning of the phrase "second wind" which is "continuing on with renewed energy"; maybe energy should be renewed to full amount + exhaustion? Would prolly be much better.. either that, or cap exhaustion at 25-33% of total energy.

I can't see it being used/implemented. Axes would be over powered with it, just imagine a shock warrior that no longer has to shock you to knock you down as well as putting out some dangerous DPS along with Agonizing chop to interrupt.

The first one I'm fine with, as there should be more ways to apply cracked armor anyway, but the second doesn't sound very appealing to me. +45 damage at max, unblockable, armor penetrating due to strength, on someone with a deep wound. That's a nasty piece of damage and I could easily see that becoming part of a new meta.

Preservation was meant to be a cheap spirit in the Restoration line that would synergize with Mend B/S, Spirit Light, etc and not die from being hit once. It should be reworked to prioritize healing to allies that are hurt, but you can't have everything. The change you propose would work for huge teams, but for a small group it would cost too much for its use. And it's health regen, which isn't that incredibly useful...


If you changed Mind Burn to remove exhaustion not only would you create a new meta, as the fire damage isn't compound into one packet of damage, but two, thus making protection spells like P.Spirit and Spirit Bond pointless against the spike, but you would also have to rework all the other Mind spells in suit and I don't feel like dealing with Mindshock spamming when that won't exhaust either. And fire eles are the masters of energy return, following Mind Burn with Glowing Gaze would basically recoup any energy lost without exhaustion. Mind Burn is incredibly powerful to the people who know how to spike with it and deal with the exhaustion, but the exhaustion is the limiting factor... Without that the spell becomes a very dangerous overpowered spike force.

I think you have a problem with understanding the rules in the first place ...

one suggestion =/= only one skill per thread

OP wanted to suggest a solution to (in his opinion) problem with some skills, as easy as that.

It's like someone made a thread concerning overhaul of assassin class to make it more viable in all formats of pvp and not necessarily in gimmicks, proposing changes to dagger mastery attribute and critical strikes, but then you came in and posted some kind of bullshit post saying 'baaaaaaaaaaah two ideas in one thread, locked'.

Apply some common sense to your posts.

Plus, I can't imagine any day Sardelac Sanitarium subforum having over 40+ on-going threads, each having a suggestion to only one skill ...

Bull: Make it so that bull's affect only actives on attack skills and make it to 0...12...16 so that other classes couldn't find a way to abuse it, even with 1 sec.

Clev: Increase cleave's dmg to 40 @ 15 so it becomes a power attack adrenaline version. Well it alrdy is for axes only, but increasing dmg by a bit should help it to see some more action. As for implementing Cracked Armor, I think keen chop should do that That would make it useful.

Pres: Add remove 1 hex and condition to an ally healed in this way to it's original effect and it'll be pretty good.

Mind Burn: Function changed to reflect a more elite immolate, so it would be like 5e 1c 3rc dmg change to 7...25...30 @ 16 FM remove exhaustion and burning duration increased to 9 maybe? Should probably stay the same as it is now...

@Zera, indeed having mind burn be able to do over 100+dmg in 1 sec without exhaustion is pretty op'd and would create tons of gimmicks around it. So dmg should be decreased dramatically if mind burn gets no more exhaustion. As well the other Mind spells would have to follow suit. I would think that Mind Shock would probably need to change it's secondary function all to together. Like target foe gets Cracked Armor, or maybe blind or daze?
@Regulus, I'd rather have a skill that is rather useful for AoE spam for ele than it being completely useless and only continues to be useless because Anet wants to keep the function to what it means. Why did they increase the C to 2s anyway? I can't imagine thinking that pve monsters that were using them were too OP'd.

Can there really be a rule against blanket "here are my skill suggestions" styled posts. I don't think a single thread in this style has avoided becoming a flame war, much less being productive.

this is a forum to discuss things, there are flame wars in every forum on the net
and this is the suggest section

Talking about specific problems and specific skills affect upon those problems is fine and has led to good discussions. For instance Mind Blast, is it mind blast itself? Is it distortion? The buff to Aura of Resto? The blanket buffs to the fire line? That it has so many free attribute points to put in whatever secondary support? Is it the tiebreaker mechanic?

Someone coming out of nowhere with how "they think" that skills should be balanced, normally combined (as is the case with this OP) with little discussion of what problems such a change is even addressing, never lead to anything usable. Are these skills that the author can't find a way to get around, things the author refuses to try to get around, a problem that the author (but not community) feels needs to be addressed, is it to buff a skill to force it to see play, is it to buff a personally liked skill.

Going back to the Mind Blast example saying "Mind Blast is too strong, change it to XXX," is worthless. It is worthless to the community. It is worthless for discussion. It is worthless as commentary for anyone that is actually doing balance. Taking the stance "Mind Blast returns too much energy, an increase in recharge or a reduction of energy returned should put it in line," can facilitate actual, usable discussion.

I don't think you quite get how this skill works. It can actually net you a ton of energy, if used properly.

I plan on bringing this up at the next staff meeting.

In your terms, cleave + body blow = lololol

Cleave is for PvE, so just leave it imo.

Second Wind would become like an enchantment version of QZ, but I don't really like either skill description, so don't really care either way...

YAHYAH Power shot - /signed

I like your idea for Preservation - /signed

Bull's Charge: Disagree
Cleave: Disagree; there's a very old thread about cleave dealing more damage than eviscerate.
Preservation: Disagree
Power Shot: Agree
Mind Burn: Disagree
Second Wind: Yes this skill is rather difficult to think of a suggestion for, but your current suggestion is better than what they have right now.