The premise for this thread is that people don’t complain about Warrior damage, but do complain about Thief damage.
What is the difference?
Avoiding damage from a warrior is much easier than avoiding damage from a thief.
I believe there are several fundamental problems related to the mechanics not damage regarding certain skills and abilities.
To list the problems I’m here to discuss: certain skills can be spammed to death, the stealth system is too strong, and missing a backstab is too forgiving (and too easy to land).
- Proposal 1: My proposal is to add a .5/1 second cooldown to all initiative skills. This would still allow the thief to spam these skills, but would lower effective DPS as skill activation will be delayed. Players that do not spam a single skill will be unaffected.
- Proposal 2: My second proposal is to force the thief to be revealed if a certain threshold of damage is taken. The threshold could be 0 (in which case the thief is instantly revealed if hit whilst in cloak), or it could be 5 – 10% of max hp. Of course, there would need to be some period of invulnerability (.5/1 second) just after entering cloak so the thief cannot be decloaked when trading blows, etc.
A change such as this would prevent thieves from effectively being able to kite and injure other players in 2v1 up to even 5v1 scenarios. As someone that plays all the classes, I find it easiest to fight multiple opponents when playing a thief due to the fact I can stay in cloak almost indefinitely. Whilst in cloak I am free to allow my cooldowns to recharge, to heal up, and to reposition myself. Making a change such as this would change these situations into ones in which I will almost certainly lose.
It would also add another element of “player skill” in which entering stealth isn’t simply a free 3 – 4 second break of combat -> big damage, CC, etc. . Players would be forced to remain tactically aware and attempt to dodge or manoeuvre correctly in order to successfully backstab, pace, or escape.
Furthermore, it would allow all players to have a solid counter to stealth. As of now, swinging your autoattack where you think the thief is and successfully hitting does nothing other than add damage with no feedback. To decloak the thief when such hits are successful would provide much needed satisfaction and confirmation, not to mention force thief players to be more aware of AoE cooldowns, positioning, etc. for the duration of a fight.
- Proposal 3: My next proposal is a change to the backstab. As of now, a backstab is considered to have come from the back so long as you enter the 180 degree radius behind the player. This means you can technically be standing at what seems more to be the side of the player than the back itself in order to get the full damage. Because of this (and because mobs/players tend to stand still ), it is too easy to score successful backstabs both in PvE and PvP.
I suggest a change to the countable radius for the successful backstab. Perhaps decreasing the radius to 90 degrees or less. This would make claims that “backstabs require skill” more valid than they already are, and would add a more interesting strategic element to successfully backstabbing (making cripples, stuns, and immobilizes much more valuable).
- Proposal 4: My last proposal for now is again related to the backstab. To explain the situation, a thief is able to miss three or more backstab attempts and still remain in cloak. Clearly this is a problem, as the backstab should not simply be free damage.
Instead, I propose that the thief is revealed during the startup for the backstab animation. This would reduce the number of successful backstabs (and thus number of complainers), and also provide a solution to the claim that backstabs cannot be avoided.
It provides solutions to two problems with one change. It allows players to evade on reaction to a backstab, and it prevents a thief from having “more than one go” at hitting a successful backstab. I believe both of these would be very good things.
These are my proposals, feel free to share any changes to the mechanics you would like to see, other than simple damage nerfs (which punishes specs that don’t go full damage).