Issue 1 : dominant zerker build
Issue 2 : condition cap
Issue 3 : stats not usable (Magi set anyone?)
Issue 4 : bosses are pure DPS check
Proposal :
Modify damage system. Instead of pure damage vs condition split the first into two parts. So we will have:
Power damage (the way it is right now) – (passed on power and precision – ferocity as planned)
Piercing damage (based on precision and condition damage)
Condition damage (based on condition damage and healing – someone who know how to heal is usually also good at poisoning ?)
And set them in scissors-paper-rock manner : Power wins against condition, condition against piercing and piercing against power.
Gain : the enemies (mainly bosses) can have the “weak against xxx” – 50% damage reduction or “immune to xxx“ 100% damage reduction (used sparingly). So if boss deal plenty of condition damage – he should be weak against power. So zerkers should melt him in no time. But they should have plenty of problems against piercing boss which rampagers could melt without thinking.
On the character screen there is 3 bars of personality. I do not think it is used at all. So instead it should show players attitude to the archetypes on the basis of his/hers stats.
Now condition cap – how to overcome it? Devs already said that the limit is technical one and there is no simple way to change it. But there is a way. For example : If someone is attacking enemy when cap reached with bleeding (let say 3 stacks for 100 per 5 seconds = theoretical 1500 damage) then on the basis of his stats there should be a chance to add some percentage of this damage to the flat one. Like we have now a critical damage modifiers – chance % and damage % – the same should be for condition. So 1500 theoretical damage should be converted into ~500 damage flat. May be more, may be less – it require testing and some statistical analysis.
What I can suggest is to have 3 pure archetypes build on one profession and then compare the damage done over x minutes to the target – all 3 should deal similar amount of damage over time. For condition we should assume that some percent of time is already condition capped to calculate it properly.
And the boss can have multiple phases (like the knights/holos). The separation of three attack types also allows the new tri-bosses have more strategic approach – for example one boss power based, one boss conditioner and one the piercing – it now require to spread the zerg on the basis of their builds as well.
Is that a solution to issues above? Let’s check:
1) Dominant zerkers – in the dungeon where majority of enemies is strong against power – zerkers would have the problems where rampagers shine
2) Condition cap : described above in details
3) Stats not usable : all the stats would now have their place – healing will become part of condition damage, Celestial allows to have all-around builds
4) Pure DPS check – depends on the boss.
TLDR : 3 damage types, rock-scissors-paper based, condition cap reached – damage flattened, weak against/immune to more used