Well, you’ll get 15% additional damage across the entire C&D → Steal/Mug → Backstab combo. So if it was, for example, 3k C&D, 3K Steal, and 15k Backstab from a 10k non-signet, you’ll now get 3.45k, 3.45k, 11.5k. Instead of 21k damage, it’s 18.4k.
A few thousand health to keep from insta-killing and allowing reaction times. Also, a few additional 15% hits, perhaps for Heartseekers that land, if used properly.
Alduin Nightsong, 80 Human Necro
“He’s like a man with a fork in a world of soup.”
Actually cogbyrn that’s a good point. This nerf may be a blessing in disguise. One less skill to have to worry about activating when you already initiated the attack, and potentially even more deadly heartseekers.
I will absolutely not be surprised if Assassin’s Signet just became better for more situations. It’s more of a “play” now executed over a series of attacks instead of front-loading it all into one, which was the problem before.
I’m a warrior, I mainly just came to see what the reaction was. Naturally, some are already raising their pitchforks, but I’m guessing good/adaptive Thieves will be just fine.
EDIT – That’s a good point, Niim. Remember when Pistol Whip took a 15% damage nerf? Now you can spread a 15% damage buff across most of the hits. It requires a utility slot instead of just having it innate, but it’s an option.
Alduin Nightsong, 80 Human Necro
“He’s like a man with a fork in a world of soup.”
@Rottaran Owain.6789: It’s also notably much better used with clusterbomb now.
That’s a good point, I didnt think about clusterbomb, though I do use it at times. And the mention that this would be better for PW builds as well. Seems like a good change over all.
Makes the insta-backstab less viable if you’re pure glass cannon build, which was the whole point of Assassin’s Signet in the first place. (Note the basic name of the Signet.)
Also, glad someone else noted that the changes to Heartseeker to discourage the spamming have now been undone. WTG with that.
Am I upset? Of course. People have to stop complaining about Thief’s burst damage and learn to do something about it. Will I tweak and get over it? Yes.
Bring on the practice dummies.
Ink The Stained, Fizzlepip, Playground Bullies [SNFU]
Darkhaven
…beware the unicorns.
Do something about it? How exactly? It was pretty much insta damage. Not much you can do vs that except dodging when you think thief might attack.. and thats kinda dumb since ure limited with # of dodges.
This is a massive buff, simple reason is that for those backstabbbing the damage over 5 attacks is the same, sure you can’t kill someone in 3 but in 5 you deal the same damage additional damage so it really isn’t that bad and was neccessary.
now for the ton of other people that role a different spec this is great news it offers a utility skill that is now more versatile and even has led to me using a spec that is frankly capable of dumping the same kind of dps as a backstab spec just as quickly but for a longer sustained period.
Kyús – 80 – Guardian// All Classes Level 80
Hand of Blood [HoB]
EU – Aurora Glade
The whole change in damage is tottaly same. The first 3 hits deal 15% less damage.
This makes instagibs less possible and gives more time to react.
However we can enjoy it too, as now, thief can use that signet in a lot of builds not just Backstab.
it really doesn’t do much for an HS spammer if the target health is over 50%. If you get hit with a BS that take your health down below 50% then yes HS is overall more effective now.
Change in damage is negligible. It’s almost exactly the same (Hear that backstab whiners? Your damage is the SAME, change your rotation and you’ll be fine) except for the fact that every other build benefits from it. P/P is more useful and other stuff works well with it. Experiment and try it out.
Just wondering if activating it consumes all charges and thus only upgrading first few hits.