Long Overdue WE/WH

[vertolet]

I think it is hard to change something for the WE that isnt direct a buff for every situation. I think there is a reason why top 6vs6 grps play mostly with 1 or 2 WE as DD.

City is another thing but

[Brickson]

I would prefer ST solutions as well and thought about some changes (Disclaimer: I'm not a super experienced WH (just RR53) and haven't played around with path of inquisition much.). Wall of text incoming:

- Replace 'Get thee behind me!' with a skill to prevent people from being rezed, like people already suggested. Something like 0,5 to 1s cast and 10 to 15s cd. I would even make it so that people affected by this won’t spawn in keeps. This way sneaking into a keep and killing someone or roaming with a small group to kill defenders who want to reach the keep actually become valuable tactics, which could make the gameplay more interesting for more than just the WH. Right now those things are rather pointless since people will just spawn inside the keep or have a healer at hand (inner keep).
TBH I’m not too familiar with all things related to the mechanics of rams. I’m not sure if killing the person, which spawned the ram, this way would cause more problems than intended.

- Give the effect of 'Get thee behind me!' to the stealth openers ('burn armor', 'sudden accusation', 'fanatical zeal'). This would improve the survivability in bigger fights. You don't have to waste the action points and GCD on a detaunt and can start doing what you're supposed to do. You could have almost 100% uptime on detaunt if you use your stealth skill accordingly (see next point), but you would have to time it. If that sounds too strong maybe reduce the effect duration to 10s. However: If your stealth runs out or someone detects and attacks you first, the effect would obviously not apply and you won't have a backup detaunt. So you still have to be careful. Unlike changing the armor type this wouldn’t affect 1v1 situations.

- Decrease the casting time and cooldown of stealth (e.g. 1s and 15s) to make them more versatile. It would also make ‘Sanctified Oil’ (6 points into path of judgement) feel less like a mandatory skill to get and would open up new possibilities to skill.

- Replace ‘Flowing Accusations’ with a tactic to increase movement speed, dodge and disrupt (e.g. 15%, 10%, 10%) while you’re stealthed. WH has no gap closers. This would make it easier to reach targets in the back line or engage someone in a 1v1.

- Give 'Sever Blessing', 'Confess!' and 'Snap shot!' (!) the ability to build 1 accusation so these skills are more valuable to work into your rotation.

- Give the effect of ‘Flowing Accusations’ to all finisher skills. This and the preceding change will lead to a faster accusation build up and thus to a higher damage output through higher finisher damage and lower AP costs.

- Update the finishers:
o Dragon Gun: I don’t have a very creative idea here. Just bump up the damage a bit since morale bumping/dumping got less useful now.
o Trial by pain: Not sure either. Maybe make your bullets proc with half the damage on each hit instead of only once in the beginning.
o Burn, Heretic!: The debuff will always be first in line to be cleansed and will deal all remaining damage instantly. This will give you the option to protect the debuffs of your allies.
o Exit Wound: The first 1, 2,..5 enemies behind the target (up to 65ft) will get the debuff too (depending on number of accusations used). Maybe add initiative to the debuffed stats as well.
o Burn Away Lies: Increase the range to 30ft to match with the other finishers.
o Absolution: Maybe a small damage increase, but no big change needed, I think.

- Give ‘Fervor!’ a small damage increase and make it deal its remaining damage if dispelled (like ‘Burn, Heretic!’).

- ‘Snap Shot’ is not affected by strength, although it’s a pistol shot like the finishers. This leads to completely ignorable damage and, as far as I can see, to a pretty low hit rate. Just change it.

- Change ‘Full Confession’ to make ‘Confess!’ always critically hit. It shouldn’t have a big impact, but ‘it will nearly always critically hit’ is just a weird effect and not a very useful description in my opinion.

Besides making the gameplay for WH (and others) in PvP more enjoyable the changes to ‘Snap Shot’ would also make PvE encounters where you can’t have melee around a bit less boring for them

PS: Obviously not all of the changes can be directly transferred to WEs.

[Huurl]

I think it is hard to change something for the WE that isnt direct a buff for every situation. I think there is a reason why top 6vs6 grps play mostly with 1 or 2 WE as DD.

Interesting. I would really much like to know who are those top teams playing with WE. Because when I talked to 6 team players that I know they all told me that WE were burdens since the other team just have to focus on them. At some point they will be killed since they are too squishy. Stealth won't help. Self bump will give you few extra time (none if playing against WL).
Of course a Sov WE will hit hard but I bet a 6 team will never pick her instead of a choppa or a marauder or a mSH with same gearing/RR.

[lyncher12]

I think it is hard to change something for the WE that isnt direct a buff for every situation. I think there is a reason why top 6vs6 grps play mostly with 1 or 2 WE as DD.

Interesting. I would really much like to know who are those top teams playing with WE. Because when I talked to 6 team players that I know they all told me that WE were burdens since the other team just have to focus on them. At some point they will be killed since they are too squishy. Stealth won't help. Self bump will give you few extra time (none if playing against WL).
Of course a Sov WE will hit hard but I bet a 6 team will never pick her instead of a choppa or a marauder or a mSH with same gearing/RR.

3/4 groups ive fought in group ranked there has been a WE clearly needs buffed and isnt worth playing

[Arcrival]

WE/WH Neither one of them need to be AOE. It is a shame that they are not plan to have any buffs Especially now that burn away lies can be cleansed That being said I agree with all dots abd debuffs being cleansable.
I would like to see detaunt removed I don’t see an enchanter anywhere and there is no rubberband to pull me back to my pve mob anchor point lol
WH/we should be just heavy ST punishers I don’t see A problem with healers healing tit for tat with my damage I do see a problem with them being able to heal themselves And their group with little fear of dieing
But I am not going further go look in feedback suggestions and proposals there are many good ideas and suggestions out there. The devs have them they have not done anything with them that we know of but I imagine eventually they will I am sure let’s just hope it’s sooner than later.
OP and others keep creating good ideas and submitting proposals. Also the WH @ WE are both overdue but aoe is not the answer survival DD, crit, stealth, and group buffs are the direction we need to look in

[wargrimnir]

Touch one class and everyone comes out of the woods to beg for theirs next. We do have plans for a couple classes pending, and we're simply not adding more to the active list until we clear some space. Balance will continue based on review of classes. The best thing you can do is wait for your turn, and post coherent suggestions that avoid wildly hyperbolic/exaggerated circumstances that focus solely the reasons your class is bad.

Largely, we feel that all classes have viability in their core roles, and most classes will likely only need small adjustments to expand beyond that core role. Our goal in the end is for each mastery path to be a viable or contributing factor to the roles a class is intended to perform.

Being told "your class does not currently have plans for balance" should focus more on the word "currently". Your time will come.

[Brickson]

Was my suggestion coherent enough or should I add/edit something?

[wargrimnir]

Was my suggestion coherent enough or should I add/edit something?

It's better than a lot of balance-related threads that I've seen.

[velenne]

Largely, we feel that all classes have viability in their core roles, and most classes will likely only need small adjustments to expand beyond that core role. Our goal in the end is for each mastery path to be a viable or contributing factor to the roles a class is intended to perform.

I don't know what more to tell you beyond the fact that this is simply not the case for the Witch Hunter (and I suspect Witch Elf, but I haven't played one). We do not fill a role that another class can do better, even tank classes. Stealth is highly overrated in its current state.

I appreciate what you guys do. I can be patient and play another class, or another game.

[wargrimnir]

Largely, we feel that all classes have viability in their core roles, and most classes will likely only need small adjustments to expand beyond that core role. Our goal in the end is for each mastery path to be a viable or contributing factor to the roles a class is intended to perform.

I don't know what more to tell you beyond the fact that this is simply not the case for the Witch Hunter (and I suspect Witch Elf, but I haven't played one). We do not fill a role that another class can do better, even tank classes. Stealth is highly overrated in its current state.

I appreciate what you guys do. I can be patient and play another class, or another game.

Being the best at a role and being viable in a role are not the same thing, you might be conflating otherwise. There are a great many highly performing Witch Elves and Witch Hunters out there who make their way into 6v6 and warband level content. This is definitely one of the harder classes to be successful on, and they probably will be in the future as well. Again, that doesn't mean we won't find some tweaks, but if you're expecting a broad overhaul I would find that unlikely.

Also, my comments are not intended to stifle discussion, but to provide appropriate expectations so people don't take those expectations upon themselves or derive expectations from a lack of staff feedback.