[PTS] Renown abilites

[Farrul]

At 110 range that works great... But when you're in melee, say a WH opens on you or a slayer gets the jump from around the corner, then being glass cannon doesn't work so well. That's essentially the difference between glass cannon and def, do you want to win every match up or only select match ups?

The thing about the Magi class is that they are never really glass like a sorc/bw/sw/sh would be.

Armor pot and self armor buff brings them closer to 3k armor or so(IIRC), they have top tier self resistance buff(300+ all). And incredible tools to kite with like their engineer mirror( except Engine ST is more squishy due to weapon skill itemization, tactics for armor pen. ''Glass'' Magi 8-8,5k wounds becomes 10k-10,5k wounds with Aegis of orange flames.

Since they do not need to build weapon skill, then the surplous stats can go into thoughness naturally and offence will still be formidable strong.

[nat3s]

At 110 range that works great... But when you're in melee, say a WH opens on you or a slayer gets the jump from around the corner, then being glass cannon doesn't work so well. That's essentially the difference between glass cannon and def, do you want to win every match up or only select match ups?

The thing about the Magi class is that they are never really glass like a sorc/bw/sw/sh would be.

Armor pot and self armor buff brings them closer to 3k armor or so(IIRC), they have top tier self resistance buff(300+ all). And incredible tools to kite with like their engineer mirror( except Engine ST is more squishy due to weapon skill itemization, tactics for armor pen. ''Glass'' Magi 8-8,5k wounds becomes 10k-10,5k wounds with Aegis of orange flames.

Since they do not need to build weapon skill, then the surplous stats can go into thoughness naturally and offence will still be formidable strong.

You're pointing out the obvious. Yes they are tankier than sorc/bw/sh, well known of course.

Engi is not squishier, just different, engi has significantly higher armour due to dwarf racial tactic. Most people play engi as glass cannon so they dont invest in tough, under those conditions, sure you'll be squishy. People get hoodwinked by WS and crit %, that's great for WB play, but that's not how you setup a solo engi for instance.

[Aethilmar]

Sadly i think the days of 2H tanks in the lakes will come to an end, with lowered defences across the board( Avoidances, crit ) and with the dominion of RDPS, 2h tanks will become a rare breed, i'm predicting only the 2H SM( due to Wods) will be seen a little more often.

It won't make much sense to be a shieldless tank anymore, except for premade groups and scenarios solo ques.

So yeah, i do agree this patch may for sure lead to a deterioration in build diversity, this makes me a little sad honestly. RoR may be going in a direction where players may depart from the game ( since not everyone likes to have their playstyle compromised, and told to play it differently, they may just quit instead)

I think with patch releases like these, it is important for the devs to address the situation with RDPS.

An honest question, does it really make balance sense that classes should be doing full DPS at max range?

I'm kind of assuming that tanks in general will decline because a lot of folks who play them want to be hard to kill/tough and that playstyle is going to be compromised even more. The ones that remain will be the 2H because in a world where defensive status are devalued the best way to survive is to kill your enemy first.

My overall predictions are:
SnB tanks will quit/re-roll or swap
Remaining 2H tanks will lean in to offense more
MDPS will just quit, re-roll or die
Heals will keep doing their thing
DPS Heals ditto (except WP/DoK ... well you had a good run)
RDPS will enjoy their golden age

[Farrul]

You're pointing out the obvious. Yes they are tankier than sorc/bw/sh, well known of course.

Engi is not squishier, just different, engi has significantly higher armour due to dwarf racial tactic. Most people play engi as glass cannon so they dont invest in tough, under those conditions, sure you'll be squishy. People get hoodwinked by WS and crit %, that's great for WB play, but that's not how you setup a solo engi for instance.

If engineer drops just 1 tactic for defenses the loss in dps will be big( Stoutness of stone rather than armor). Arguably even with 1 def tactic engineer, Magus is still going to be stronger defensively, due to Aegis of orange flames alone plus the extra 5 crit reduction from the demon pet.

Engineer probably would have to go with 2 defensive tactics (Ancestors + Stoutness) to surpass the Magus, but then dps performance would take a massive hit.

Obviously, if engineer does not go for WS stacking, it will never match or come anywhere close the Magus in ST.

So, no matter how we bend this equation, it will always end up in the favor of the Magus. I.e. same dps= engineer more squishy // similar in survivability = Magus higher dps.

[Farrul]

I'm kind of assuming that tanks in general will decline because a lot of folks who play them want to be hard to kill/tough and that playstyle is going to be compromised even more. The ones that remain will be the 2H because in a world where defensive status are devalued the best way to survive is to kill your enemy first.

My overall predictions are:
SnB tanks will quit/re-roll or swap
Remaining 2H tanks will lean in to offense more
MDPS will just quit, re-roll or die
Heals will keep doing their thing
DPS Heals ditto (except WP/DoK ... well you had a good run)
RDPS will enjoy their golden age

The RR for block iirc was not lowered (still 10%). Crit took a hit, but workable. SnB will be fine imo.

But yeah, with this patch players will feel tempted to take offensive renown since its more worthwhile point for point investment, in this case the 2H tanks still remaining will explode like living piñatas in the lakes. The days of regen 2H chosens will be no more and 2H tank will not bother to guard anyone anymore.

Going into this golden Age of RDPS may be short lived for them, if their target dummies decide enough is enough and stop showing up. I think the current live situation is toxic already and players tired of RDPS dot hot spam swarming the lakes, hence why this patch feels like a risky update to release, community backlash shouldn't be underestimated. We'll see.

[Killavilz]

This is cool.
BIG UP!

[lumpi33]

That's an interesting change.

I've played around a bit with the builder and this is my take on it:

*** HEALERS ***
On LIVE you can do::
Spiritual Refinement IV (45 points for +14%), Futile Strikes II (15 points for -8%), Deft Defender III (10 points for +12%), Wounds or Initiative III (10 points for +38)

On PTS you can do:
Spiritual Refinement IV (30 points for +12%), Futile Strikes III (20 points for -8%), Deft Defender III (20 points for 8%), Wounds or Initiative III (10 points for +40)

Conclusion:
Here you can already see their intentions. Cheaper offensive (+crit) abilities, more expensive defensive stuff. That's good and I think it was needed. Healers can still do a similar build to live but I think Deft Defender is no longer a no brainer since it got expensive for less increase. Id probably try different builds then and maybe do only Deft Defender II and something else. Something like that.

*** DPS ***
The situation is similar to healers with Opportunist instead of Spiritual Refinement. However, there is one important difference. Offensive classes now have access to the new Focused Power to counter defenses.

Now it becomes a bit more clear why max +crit got reduced from 45 points to 30 points. You now have 15 more to spend in pierce.

As RDPS you can do:
Opportunist IV (30 points for +12%), Focused Power III (20 points for 8% reduced chance to be parried/disrupted/dodged), Futile Strikes III (20 points for -8%) and probably Wounds III (10 points for +40)

Conclusion RDPS:
It's good to have an option to pierce defenses but since Deft Defender is becoming that expensive I doubt that many people gonna take it and then you also don't need high pierce. A bit hard to tell how this is going to play out. Whether it is needed or not.

As MDPS you can do:
Opportunist IV (30 points for +12%), Futile Strikes III (20 points for -8%), Deft Defender II (10 points for 4%), Parry II (10 points for 4%), Wounds or Initiative III (10 points for +40)

Conclusion MDPS:
Their defenses got heavily nerfed do to the increased cost and lower values of Parry and Deft Defender. I think a nerf was needed for sure but they are doing double nerfing again by increasing cost and lowering gains. I think it is worth a try and see how it works out. Nothing is graved in stone. Everything can be changed again.

*** TANKS ***
Defensive tanks got probably hit the hardest because they can't stack huge amount of defenses for little points anymore. That's good. It was too much. As with MDPS, lets see how it works out. The game is too complex with too many factors to theory craft the outcome.

*** FINAL THOUGHTS ***
I think their direction is good and I like the changes. The defenses on good sov tanks/healers/dps are just ridiculous and needed a nerf, especially that insane disrupt/dodge rates.

I still think that they should revert the willpower contributing to disrupt chance. It gives healers too much disrupt. They are standing far behind their group and only have to move a few steps to get away from ranged dps. With their high disrupts and getting away that easy, plus guard, plus potions, plus morals, plus other heals... their high disrupts are not explainable.

Same with that "can't pierce more than half of the defense". It's nowhere shown. Most don't even know that it is that way. Just revert it again...

[Mortgrimm]

Nice summary, Lumpi.
And do u see where this ends?
Melee dps and tanks getting nerfed in defence. Healer and ranged dps/casters can reach even higher strike through. Okay, only to half of the original stat of the opponent, but still.
Imo we will see less melee dps and tanks if this patch goes life. Say hello to even more ranged dps.

[lumpi33]

Nice summary, Lumpi.
And do u see where this ends?
Melee dps and tanks getting nerfed in defence. Healer and ranged dps/casters can reach even higher strike through. Okay, only to half of the original stat of the opponent, but still.
Imo we will see less melee dps and tanks if this patch goes life. Say hello to even more ranged dps.

Ty. It is a bit hard to predict. Gonna take months on live to see what people are gonna take and how it is going to play out.

In my opinion mdps and tanks are having too much defenses atm on live and healers are having too much disrupt. There is currently also no option on live to increase pierce via renown points.

Both things got addressed with that change. So I think I'm gonna like it.

The only issue I am seeing with this is that fragile classes like Choppas/Slayers gonna have a rough time. Without that wounds tactic and m1 absorb Slayers more than Choppas. Slayers are already super squishy and almost not playable without guard. The reduced disrupt/dodge/parry gonna hit them hard. For all the other classes it will be fine I guess. mSWs might blow up fast as well. They already do. Don't know how to fix that but they gonna need fixes.

[Aethilmar]

Nice summary, Lumpi.
And do u see where this ends?
Melee dps and tanks getting nerfed in defence. Healer and ranged dps/casters can reach even higher strike through. Okay, only to half of the original stat of the opponent, but still.
Imo we will see less melee dps and tanks if this patch goes life. Say hello to even more ranged dps.

Ty. It is a bit hard to predict. Gonna take months on live to see what people are gonna take and how it is going to play out.

In my opinion mdps and tanks are having too much defenses atm on live and healers are having too much disrupt. There is currently also no option on live to increase pierce via renown points.

Both things got addressed with that change. So I think I'm gonna like it.

The only issue I am seeing with this is that fragile classes like Choppas/Slayers gonna have a rough time. Without that wounds tactic and m1 absorb Slayers more than Choppas. Slayers are already super squishy and almost not playable without guard. The reduced disrupt/dodge/parry gonna hit them hard. For all the other classes it will be fine I guess. mSWs might blow up fast as well. They already do. Don't know how to fix that but they gonna need fixes.

It is not hard to predict and the only thing this is going to be "fine" for is RDPS and the rdps variants. We have literally seen iterations of the game (both WAR and RoR) that were very RDPS friendly. It ultimately results in more or less static firing lines of ranged classes exchanging pew-pew while the tanks and mdps either die when they step forward or take refuge in scenarios.

In the meantime, any new player choosing an mdps or tank should be classified as either a masochist or insane because they are going to go "BOOM!" if they try to advance under the unending withering fire of of massed rdps.

These changes, by themselves, would have constituted a substantial "ranged patch". But not only did we see range buffed in general (except poor SW) via the reworks, we are now getting it compounded with this.

"It is hard to predict" ... psht. What comes next is clear as day. Go ranged or go play something else.