[Warrior Priest] Making Wrath viable

[Sigimund]

Some good ideas here. I look forward to seeing them in the balance forum.

Hopefully we won't have to wait long for it to open up, although I am sure that some will argue it should be delayed until after we have a working dark elf city, third faction etc etc.

[Agiond]

Personally i think that what DPS Wrath WP need is a reliable source of damage, not extra damage on certain conditions, plus reworked tactics, because what we have right now is quite ridicolous.

So i mostly agree with what Ramasee proposes, but i'd like to change a couple of things:

1: Hammer of Sigmar. Keep it to be used on enemies under 50%. 25% is way too low, and IF you want it to drain all your RF you could be wasting a lot of damage (unless you are hitting a tank, which you'd be dumb to do so). Building a skill to do overkills on a class that already is subpar on damage isn't a good move imo.

2: Divine Justice. If a teammate procs it and also deals damage to your offensive target you MUST put it on a long CD, otherwise it could be overpowered. And we want to balance a class, not make it OP.
Personally I'd simply prefer it to deal extra damage and get that tasty debuff you suggested. That should be enough to make people consider it over Prayer of Devotion.

3: Divine Fury and Fanaticism. These tactics are usually a must have to get a chance to deal damage, but that means 40% less sustain. Then what is the point about playing a dps WP over a single target Slayer? Absolutely none. That must change, and that's why these tactics should have their heal debuff removed.
Together with the changes on RF skills that Ramasee suggested should keep it balanced.

4: Avatar of Sigmar. This morale 4 is quite a joke. Maybe not now, when we are merely touching the start of T4 and 50 points in strength matter, but once the RoR progresses and gets the more advanced sets, this morale loses its utility.
Don't get me wrong, on rr80 you can easily surpass 1000 strength. In fact i did, and i was built around Weapon Skill, not Strength. That's a 5% extra str for a morale 4 (that doesn't mean 5% extra damage, in fact is quite lower). Same reasoning over all other stats it gives, besides some are absolutely useless to us.
This skill needs a total rework. Raising it's stat buffs could be a solution, but on stat buffs there's a very thin line between what is OP and what is worthless. I don't know how much the devs can rework existing skills, but making it a better Divine Replenishment (regenerating Action Points by whatever means) could make it worth it. It would also make dps wrath WP worth having in oRvR warbands.


Hope you like some of my suggestions.

[Dabbart]

Now, don't bite my head off here. WP was my main on live, and I love my WP. I use melee WP to farm PvE/grind/PL. But, why should Wrath spec be "viable" in RvR?

I have wondered this. Why must every spec "Work" in RvR? Imo, DPS on healers was designed specifically for PvE/solo content and super later-game. Why should a healer class that specs almost entirely in a tree that ONLY does damage be considered "viable"? Top players of it, in a good group, can perform quite well. Obviously it is not the "best" dps class or even honestly viable for most atm, but they still run it. DPS WP is a "fun" spec. And if you take it where it "works" PvE/solo(duels) or late-game with BiS gear, then you will find that it works quite efficiently atm. No, it is NOT more powerful or a better DPS choice than a slayer. Why the **** should it be?!

I don't understand the want or desire to have pure DPS WP viable or work in a PvP setting compared to a REAL DPS class. Zealot's(and by extention I assume RPs) need FAR more assistance in their tree's and abilities to be "viable".

The VAST majority of changes posted here would make the WP THAT DOESN"T utilize Wrath FAR more powerful. And that is a big no-no, as the class is quite powerful as it stands...

TLDR: What exactly do you see a Wrath WP doing? Pumping out ridiculous AoE damage, dropping decent single target, AND healing perfectly effectively? Oh, all of this with nearly 3k armor, AoE detaunt, multiple stat stealing debuffs, and you want to make it MORE powerful?

Melee WPs or DPS WPs fail for a bunch of reasons. Mainly, because they are designed to be a healer. The HARDEST issue with DPS Wp, is that you have to be in MELEE. And Dessie has been trained from a very young age to switch target and WAAAGH! whenever they see a healer. Especially a 2h healer. Especially a 2h healer that is running directly at them...

[Agiond]

Dabbart, the main use of a dps WP on RvR is... was (all my experience comes from War, not RoR, tho they are damn similar, tho i hope RoR changes most things War did wrong), to kill squishy marauders and witch elfs that come too close to your true healers, having Divine Assault to quickly raise their health if the need arises. Besides all other "must do" duties from a WP: resurrecting, purging enemy buffs and curing debuffs.

On oRvR dps WP can't go for the enemy healers because we don't have any kind of gap closer nor jump to go in, kill and get out. So we must keep to defensive duties. In fact, we have tools to be good at it, tho we are still subpar on any other mdps. Slow (castigation + Wigth of Guilt), knockback (Divine Shock) and a "panic button" to quickly heal whoever we are trying to protect (Divine Assault).
But we lack damage, and if we purely build ourselves to deal damage we are still sub-par to any mdps with worst gear than us, and we lose 40% heals.

That's why we need some quite extensive rework.

[Dabbart]

See, that is my point right there. You are subpar to ANOTHER mdps. You are not an MDPS. You are a Frontline Healer that is choosing to ignore the healing portion of his class to pump damage.

I am well aware of the issues melee WPs(of any type) face. My point, is why? And is there honestly a way to improve a pure DPS spec or melee spec that does NOT drastically improve the backline/healer spec even further? If the arguement was to try and make the front-line healer spec viable, then I would support it. But wanting to put a WP on par with a Slayer is just ludicrous imo.

[Ramasee]

Well I think the DPS specs of Healing archtypes should be oriented towards reducing the enemies ability to deal damage, or support your allies capabilities of dealing more damage.

As such, most of my proposed changes aren't meant to make wrath a stand-alone DPS, or even pull on-par dps with the damage careers. They are meant to make it a more offensively-oriented way to support your group in a way that isn't life taps and buffs, since that is grace's identity. Of course some of them are just to make useless abilities/tactics less useless.

I agree there is no place for 100% healing debuffs either, nor do I want exact mirrors of DoK trees either. We are a different class and are apart of a different healing core than DoKs.

I'm thinking now that it might be better just to have Hammer of Sigmar used under 50%, just do flat spirit damage, cost 100RF, and have ~10s cd. Would seem to fit the great points you guys brought up about RF usage and usability.

Divine Justice. What keeps my proposal balanced is that there is only a 20% chance to proc the aura in the first place. Also it is only roughly a 25% increase in damage over the original (and rather under-powered) tactic. 160% damage on each proc, or two sets of 100% damage (on potentially different targets). Tactics that only modify one ability should generally make that ability pretty grand.

Divine Fury is honestly fine as it is. Remember WPs are a support class first. You should never really be comparing a WP to a MDPS. Divine Fury is also a healer archtype tactic and would have to be looked at for all six careers.

Fanaticism has the same argument as Divine Fury. Except it is only a mirror tactic and only have to look at its effect across WP and DoK. It does its purpose, makes you closer to a DPS and farther from a healer.

A significant amount of morale abilities in the game are sub-par. I haven't taken a pass at them yet since they effect A LOT of things.

Dabbart, I reread the posts here because I couldn't find the VAST majority of changes that helps WPs that don't utilize Wrath. Except for my change to Prayer of Righteousness, none of the other proposed changes here can actually be used by someone with zero points in Wrath. And in order for them to make use of the Prayer change, they have the opportunity cost involved of not using the other prayers.

[Dabbart]

Holy thread ate my post...

Ok. a few things.

1, Backline spec WPs will have points in Wrath for the AoE detaunt(It is actually dumb to have that tactic in the Wrath tree, seeing as 2handers get it for free but I digress)

2, Your weight of Guilt change gives backlines a helpful get-away ability. I don't have Weight on my hotbar, if it didn't need curse first I totally would.

3, Your prayr of righteousness change is crazy for a 2 WP group. 5% less damage is nothing to shake a stick at. Divine Justice here too

4, REPLACING intimidating repent. Wtf are you gonna do with IR? You will never get to just dump the tactic. So what are you going to swap it with on another tree?

Edit: 1 and 4 are kinda similar, but 2 entirely different points honestly. 1 goes to your point htat backlines don;t have points in wrath, and 4 is pointed directly at your change.

The fact that I agree IR should be moved is irrelevant to the point however. I think it should be moved, but I have no actual answer as to what it should be replaced with, and where it should be moved to that I believe is fair/balanced.

[Ramasee]

1&4. Fairly certain the RoR developers put IR on 2H as a method of essentially removing the tactic altogether. They aren't able to remove the tactic for real since they do not currently have a way to edit the client; but can change server side things atm. As far as I know, they do not want salvation to have AoE detaunt period. So yes I would delete IR since it has been rolled into 2H.

2. You make a fair point that more salvation WPs would use weight of guilt without the curse requirement. What if we changed it to consume 40RF instead of 30AP? Wrath/Grace won't mind, and it will give another opportunity cost to salvation for utilizing it. (edit) Instead of two GCDs, it would cost almost a heal and 1GCD(/edit)

3. Was borrowed from AM's radiant gaze. As such it exists in the game already (I also prefer shaking a hammer at, given the thread we are in ). Prayer of Righteousness needs some kind of non-damage utility to be worth slotting for the Path that it is located in. To counter the coming argument of Radiant Gaze is single target versus the Prayer is AoE: Radiant gaze is 100% proc, 9s duration, 5s cd and reduces critical chance as well. Prayer is 20% proc, 5s duration.

I offered an idea for a replacement tactic for IR. I would love for others to bring their ideas on that front as well.

(2nd Edit) Idea popped in my head to address your prayer concerns and still use my ideas; and I hate double posting.

Base Prayer of Righteousness unchanged from current. Divine Justice redesigned to: Whenever an ally triggers prayer of righteousness, your next bludgeon cast within 10s deals X additional spirit damage (roughly equal to 75%{placeholder] of a bludgeon) and curses the target making it deal 5% less damage for 9s.
(/2nd edit)

[Gachimuchi]

You are a Frontline Healer that is choosing to ignore the healing portion of his class to pump damage

.. and heal-spec WPs are frontline healers that negate the damage and frontline portion of their class to pump healing. Saying DPS WP shouldn't be on part with Slayer is equivalent of saying Heal-spec WP shouldn't be on par with AM/RP heals. Both specs probably need complete reworking.

[Dabbart]

Spoiler:

1&4. Fairly certain the RoR developers put IR on 2H as a method of essentially removing the tactic altogether. They aren't able to remove the tactic for real since they do not currently have a way to edit the client; but can change server side things atm. As far as I know, they do not want salvation to have AoE detaunt period. So yes I would delete IR since it has been rolled into 2H.

2. You make a fair point that more salvation WPs would use weight of guilt without the curse requirement. What if we changed it to consume 40RF instead of 30AP? Wrath/Grace won't mind, and it will give another opportunity cost to salvation for utilizing it. (edit) Instead of two GCDs, it would cost almost a heal and 1GCD(/edit)

3. Was borrowed from AM's radiant gaze. As such it exists in the game already (I also prefer shaking a hammer at, given the thread we are in ). Prayer of Righteousness needs some kind of non-damage utility to be worth slotting for the Path that it is located in. To counter the coming argument of Radiant Gaze is single target versus the Prayer is AoE: Radiant gaze is 100% proc, 9s duration, 5s cd and reduces critical chance as well. Prayer is 20% proc, 5s duration.

I offered an idea for a replacement tactic for IR. I would love for others to bring their ideas on that front as well.

(2nd Edit) Idea popped in my head to address your prayer concerns and still use my ideas; and I hate double posting.

Base Prayer of Righteousness unchanged from current. Divine Justice redesigned to: Whenever an ally triggers prayer of righteousness, your next bludgeon cast within 10s deals X additional spirit damage (roughly equal to 75%{placeholder] of a bludgeon) and curses the target making it deal 5% less damage for 9s.
(/2nd edit)

1. I disagree entirely, but since we seem to be mostly opinion oriented, lets leave this be.

2. Good idea! That would balance it a bit more towards intended use.

3. I disagree again. Wrath is about DPS. Not debuffs. Straight damage yo. I think the prayer is the last thing that needs to be "changed" however. Far more about the WP can be balanced before that is required. Changing Bludgeon is interesting. But... I mean honestly. How often is Bludgeon going to be the best usage of your GcD?

Spoiler:

You are a Frontline Healer that is choosing to ignore the healing portion of his class to pump damage

.. and heal-spec WPs are frontline healers that negate the damage and frontline portion of their class to pump healing. Saying DPS WP shouldn't be on part with Slayer is equivalent of saying Heal-spec WP shouldn't be on par with AM/RP heals. Both specs probably need complete reworking.

I agree that backline WPs need a debolster of some sort. My WP is like a tank that heals. He has 3300 armor,(In Green renown gear) 0.0% chance to be crit, 24% dodge, 34% disrupt, 400 somethin toughness, and an AoE detaunt. But I am entirely defensive specced. I'm supposed to be tough to kill.

And I agree. A front-line healer like my WP shouldn't heal as well as a RP/AM. I don't. This is judged based on my avg heal totals in group combat. I heal quite well, and provide a lot of other benefits to the party besides raw heal power. The RP and AM have more kiting tools than me, I am tankier. I think my tankiness>their kiting however.

I think a tome/chalice should come with a armor/parry debuff of some amount. Holding a book/chalice makes it more difficult to defend.

However, all of this is meaningless and will just be repeated once the actual balance forums opens.