Guild Wars 2

I’m really, really dissapointed by “Ferocity” change. Why?

Because across all professions and all specs, Power Necromancers using Deathly Perception trait are hit the most.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/balance/PvE-Calculations-Ferocity-DPS-loss/first#post3798016

Shroud build highly relies on Critical Damage because it’s core is to maintain guaranteed crits when in Death Shroud.
With new changes, damage dealt from this build is nerfed to the ground. It’s a straight 30% damage loss from Life Blasts and all abilities in DS.

Worst of all, Ferocity is a flat nerf. That’s the main flaw. It doesn’t nerf full-zerker builds. It nerfs ALL Power builds.
It doesn’t scale like I hoped it will be – similar to toughness, going full into Critical Damage would be a loss, but it would actually encourage people to get couple other stats instead.
But hell no! Let’s kitten everything up in order to “fix” dumb PvE and zerker spam. We hit Necromancer the most with this changes instead of Warrior or such? Well, a pity. Aren’t they all Condition by now, tbh?

Seriously, ArenaNet.

You’ve done something good once (D. Perception, buff for Life Blast, better LF gain) so you have to kitten it up again. Design philosophy yadda yadda yadda… Bullkitten

Strangely, my power build isn’t going to take much of a hit. Then again, I don’t have much crit damage (just 30 in soul reaping and an exotic backpiece).

I read through the link and I dont get it. Why are we getting hit harder? Some clarification would be appreciated.

Stand The Wall.6987:

I read through the link and I dont get it. Why are we getting hit harder? Some clarification would be appreciated.

I think because the higher the crit chance, the higher the damage loss from Ferocity change.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Stand The Wall.6987:

I read through the link and I dont get it. Why are we getting hit harder? Some clarification would be appreciated.

I think because the higher the crit chance, the higher the damage loss from Ferocity change.

Essentially this. Builds with DP generally had 100% crit chance which means a reduction to crit dmg is a larger dps loss. In the end we can expect about a 25% reduction to crit dmg which is basically a flat 25% damage loss to DP builds. It Makes me sad seeing this happen I might just give up on PvE Necro at this point and save it for WvW/PvP.

I’d say Backstab Thieves are getting hit the hardest, personally, and I’m a Powermancer with all Cavalier/Zerker to max on LB crits. I’m going to take a hit, but honestly? It’s probably warranted. LB hits like a freight train, and sometimes you can tell your opponent just loses all hope when you’re in full LF in the middle of the fight after they’ve used their cooldowns and you start spamming them with steak sauce.

Not worried at all about it, especially since all crits are taking a hit. Elongating the fight only really helps me, imo.

Rym.1469:

I’m really, really dissapointed by “Ferocity” change. Why?

It doesn’t nerf full-zerker builds. It nerfs ALL Power builds.

Not all power builds use crit damage bud.

hwy does a flat 25% crit damage loss result in a flat 25% damage loss?
Unless for some weird reason, your skills only deal your critical damage bonus as damage, there is still the base damage and the base critical dammage to take into account.
Let’s just day, you had 100% crit chance and 100% crit damage before, and lose 25% crit dammage now.
Your attacks will deal 100% + 50% + 100% = 250% damage before and 100% + 50% + 75% = 225% damage after.
The total damage loss equals: 225/250=0.9, so you will lose a flat 10%.
For an all-in crit build, the damage loss will probably be closer to 13%, but that’s still far from the 25%, you claimed.

Rym.1469:

Worst of all, Ferocity is a flat nerf. That’s the main flaw. It doesn’t nerf full-zerker builds. It nerfs ALL Power builds.

Juggermancer laughs at your pathetic understanding of a “power build”.

Backstab Thief isn’t going to be hit the hardest. The fact that it can reset the fight anytime they want makes up for dmg loss

High-crit Powermancer I run relies on that finisher burst from Life Blast. There’re not many situations when you can clearcast Life Blasts without interrupting/opponent evading/stealthing and it’s crucial to get maximum of that dps window.
With this loss, it’s possible that I won’t have a chance to finish Thief before he jumps back to stealth, to kill Hambow in between his CC locks, get a Mesmer before his cooldowns are up again, get Engineer in between his dodge/block spam.

My point is that the Ferocity nerf doesn’t hurt All-round zerkers. It nerfs all players using any crit damage by flat amount.

If it scaled like Toughness, then no problem, I would just swap couple pieces to Soldier’s maybe.
But when it hampers all precision builds, it’s just simply dumb and forces to invest even deeper into zerker..

The DP build will get significantly buffed if they decide to implement a stat combo with Ferocity as main stat, though.

Axelwarrior.9084:

The DP build will get significantly buffed if they decide to implement a stat combo with Ferocity as main stat, though.

will not happened

Yea i dont think nerfing crit damage is the way to go :/ . I’m gunna have to rework all my builds even my non zerker ones. Cause even though some dont have full zerker they all rely on crit chance and damage. sighs

Rapier.3675:

Axelwarrior.9084:

The DP build will get significantly buffed if they decide to implement a stat combo with Ferocity as main stat, though.

will not happened

Uh, why not?

Rapier.3675:

Axelwarrior.9084:

The DP build will get significantly buffed if they decide to implement a stat combo with Ferocity as main stat, though.

will not happened

When ANet first announced the change to Ferocity, they stated that it opens up the door for having it as the primary stat for gearpieces in the future. ANet is already considering the possibility.

You. Are. Kidding. Me.

I just typed up an extremely long explanation on why I think the Ferocity changes don’t matter that much, and when I went to post the reply, I lost it all.

Sigh. Here are the main points:

1. naphack has the right of it. If you happen to lose 30% from your char sheet crit damage of 100%, if your base damage is X, your crits will lose:

Original : X + X*1.5 = 2.5X
New : X + X*1.2 = 2.2X
Damage Lost : 1 – 2.2/2.5 = 1 – .88 = .12 = 12%

On a 5000 total damage Life Blast, you’ll do 4400 damage with the Ferocity changes.

2. For high damage attacks, Number of Hits is the important metric for analysis. You’ll only notice the changes if you need to perform additional attacks on an enemy, and you’ll only need to do that for certain windows of health. In our 5000 old damage example, the first window is from 4401 to 5000 health. From 5001 – 8800 health, both old and new LBs would require two attacks to down an enemy. From 8801 to 10000 health, your new LB would require 3 attacks but your old LB would just require two, etc. etc. etc.

This goes on for a while, with the window of health getting bigger and bigger. Eventually, you need an extra new LB just to match the damage of the old LB. This turns out to be at 8 old LBs/9 new LBs. After this point, the window is such that you’ll need 2 additional new LBs to match old LB damage. If you’re doing 5000 damage per attack, this threshold is at 40000 damage. If you’re doing 3000 damage per LB, it’s at 24000 damage.

3. I don’t use Sigil of Air right now in lieu of Sigil of Energy. With the changes, I’ll be able to equip a damage sigil like Air. At a 50% proc rate, if the Air proc does only 600 damage (remember it can’t crit), then if it procs on my first attack, my new LB will do 4400 + 600 = 5000 damage. Which equals my old LB. If it doesn’t proc on the first LB and procs on the second, then my new damage total will be 8800 + 600 = 9400, leaving just a 9401 to 10000 window where new LBs require an additional attack.

4. I’m not even including other sources of damage like Chill of Death, which is basically another free crit, shifting the windows up even more.

Conclusion: Not worried at all about the Ferocity changes.

Additional note: Most people probably don’t realize this, but the healing potential between Healing Surge and Healing Signet follows a similar pattern. Between 0 – X seconds, Healing Surge is theoretically better than Healing Signet in raw HPS. Between X and ~30 seconds (when Healing Surge comes off CD again), Healing Signet pulls ahead. Then, once Healing Surge is off cooldown at ~30 seconds, Healing Surge is more HPS from ~30 – Y seconds. I don’t remember the exact cut-offs, but it’s a linear growth competing with a stepwise growth, so they’ll overtake one another at regular intervals.

“Oh, but you can interrupt Healing Surge, skillful play, blah blah” yes I know, but some classes don’t even really have a reliable interrupt. I’d counter that you can poison Healing Signet, and before you say “not all classes have access to poison”, see my comment about interrupts. The truth is that Healing Signet is, even in its current state, situationally useful. Especially in WvW.

Just something to chew on.

Cogbyrn.7283:

“Oh, but you can interrupt Healing Surge, skillful play, blah blah” yes I know, but some classes don’t even really have a reliable interrupt. I’d counter that you can poison Healing Signet, and before you say “not all classes have access to poison”, see my comment about interrupts. The truth is that Healing Signet is, even in its current state, situationally useful. Especially in WvW.

Poison vs. healing signet is a bad comparison, as you can reduce any heal (but Consume Conditions and Antitoxin Spray) through poison application. Difference is that Healing Surge, you only need to poison them for a moment while healing signet, you need to keep them perma-poisoned fo the same reduction effectiveness. For the last part, I think you meant “Healing Surge” not “Signet.”

/off topic

All that, and the first response is on the Warrior analysis. I’m not going down that “on paper” rabbit hole again, but I did mean that Healing Signet is situationally useful. I laugh when I see Warriors with Healing Signet that I just burned to half health in a few seconds, because I know they’re panicking more than usual since they don’t have a reliable burst heal.

The main point was the HPS argument that I don’t think people ever realize, but if it’s too tempting to not latch onto the phrase “Healing Signet”, I might snip that part out entirely.

First response was on the warrior analysis because you were right on the rest. Not a whole lot to say on the matter.

It’s like in Starcraft: it doesn’t matter if you hit that SCV for 20 or 39 damage: it still takes two hits to destroy.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

First response was on the warrior analysis because you were right on the rest. Not a whole lot to say on the matter.

It’s like in Starcraft: it doesn’t matter if you hit that SCV for 20 or 39 damage: it still takes two hits to destroy.

I was going to mention the RTS origins (at least that’s where I first heard that idea), as you can learn a lot about games and really help yourself become better at one genre by understanding the principles of another.

And I don’t blame you regarding the Warrior bit. Just lamenting that it might pull the whole discussion off-topic or undermine the point by providing too hot of a button to push at the end.

I admit that I went a little bit too far with my first post. I based my opinion on math from linked thread and didn’t check if it’s right in before. My apologies and shoutout for Cob for getting me out of mistake with that

Still, my point about Ferocity scaling is valid imoand current design just pushes condibunkers a little bit foward on WvW.

Thanks a lot Cogbyrn.

While its regrettable, I dont think it will be impossible to down people after the change. Life blast is ridiculous strong and to see it get a nerf is warranted.

Stand The Wall.6987:

Thanks a lot Cogbyrn.

While its regrettable, I dont think it will be impossible to down people after the change. Life blast is ridiculous strong and to see it get a nerf is warranted.

Too bad Life Blast doesnt get nerfed.

I wonder, will the crit damage, you get from the crit damage traitlines, also get nerfed or only the crit damage on gear?

Muchacho.2390:

I wonder, will the crit damage, you get from the crit damage traitlines, also get nerfed or only the crit damage on gear?

The nerf effects the total, not armor or traitlines individually.

Stand The Wall.6987:

Muchacho.2390:

I wonder, will the crit damage, you get from the crit damage traitlines, also get nerfed or only the crit damage on gear?

The nerf effects the total, not armor or traitlines individually.

No i mean, for example if you go 30 points in soul reaping will you still get 30% crit damage or 300 ferosity.

Muchacho.2390:

Stand The Wall.6987:

Muchacho.2390:

I wonder, will the crit damage, you get from the crit damage traitlines, also get nerfed or only the crit damage on gear?

The nerf effects the total, not armor or traitlines individually.

No i mean, for example if you go 30 points in soul reaping will you still get 30% crit damage or 300 ferosity.

Ratio is 15 ferocity = 1% crit damage. 30 Points in soul reaping will give 300 ferocity which is 20% crit damage after the patch.

Alondite.9620:

Muchacho.2390:

Stand The Wall.6987:

Muchacho.2390:

I wonder, will the crit damage, you get from the crit damage traitlines, also get nerfed or only the crit damage on gear?

The nerf effects the total, not armor or traitlines individually.

No i mean, for example if you go 30 points in soul reaping will you still get 30% crit damage or 300 ferosity.

Ratio is 15 ferocity = 1% crit damage. 30 Points in soul reaping will give 300 ferocity which is 20% crit damage after the patch.

So ofter the patch you will get ferocity instead of crit damage but doesnt this effect spvp then?
I am sure they said somewhere that the numbers in spvp will stay the same. I am confused…

Edit: Ahh ok i have rewatched the stream… They simple increased the stats in spvp on gear to get the old numbers. What a kittenty change if i use barbarian amulet i now will lose 10% crit damage.

Stand The Wall.6987:

Thanks a lot Cogbyrn.

Life blast is ridiculous strong.

Why is that? (I just started leveling a necro). :P

paleeshi.1924:

Stand The Wall.6987:

Thanks a lot Cogbyrn.

Life blast is ridiculous strong.

Why is that? (I just started leveling a necro). :P

Because there is a trait that will allow you to gain one stack of might every time you use Life Blast, because there is a trait that increases your precision 50% while in Death Shroud, and because there is a trait that allows you to pierce your targets and cause… I think it’s 3 stacks of vulnerability every time you hit someone.
Even untraited, with a power build you should hit something like 3 – 4k per hit, with a bunch of stacks of might I hear something like 8k just on autoattacks. I haven’t tried a build like this yet though so I’m not certain of those numbers. Either way, Life Blast hits like a semi on jet fuel if built for it.

2 stacks of vuln per hit, but yeah its stupid strong.
8k is high, maybe on a full glass light armor. Normal is 3-6k per hit.
It reaches 10k in pve (or an uplevel) with full might, vuln, and gear. At least thats the highest I’ve gotten.