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Official Skill Balance Thread: 22 February Update

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Karl McLain

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Hello and thank you for taking the time to read these messages and respond to the community.

My question is what is Arenanet’s perspective on the skill Epidemic in its current state? I am a passionate WvW player, and Epidemic has been a hotbed issue in our communities for the greater half of the past year. Unlike nearly every other skill in the game, a player is punished if an ally fails to evade or invuln- not the player him/herself! There is no reasonably visible tell for a player to dodge this skill before it hits, and the frustration is compounded by the fact that Epidemic can also be cast on non-player objects and NPCs such as keep lords and siege equipment. Entire metas and gameplay styles have evolved around this single skill and I am concerned that the absence of any changes or reworks of this skill will further push the dwindling WvW player base to its breaking point.

Thank you for reading.

Thanks for posting!

There are some aspects about this skill that we want to fix when we get a chance, such as negative condition duration not affecting transferred conditions (it also doesn’t increase durations, but that wouldn’t be desirable). Some aspects of it are odd and we’ll be looking at certain epidemic targets (such as wvw doors).

The ability (in its design and in-game-play) does what we would like it to, where if conditions stack up you get to condition-bomb everything. With that said, we do want there to be some counter-play available to large groups. In this update, the addition of condition clears when blasting light fields was made in part to help combat Epidemic and area condition spikes.

Cheers,
-Karl

Official Skill Balance Thread: 22 February Update

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Are you guys considering reworking or balancing food, runes, sigils, utility and so forth along with class balance changes? (at some point)

Food/utility/runes/sigils are “on the table”, but haven’t really been a primary focus. Being as these also have a monetary, economic or progression impact, we tend to vet any changes much more before iterating and it tends to have a lower impact in general.
From the PvP side, we’re able to change runes and sigils at-will, but also want to keep them feeling the same as on the PvE side.

Edited for kittens

(edited by Karl McLain.5604)

Official Skill Balance Thread: 22 February Update

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- I believe the treatment you gave to GoTL and banners to be a really positive change: are you planning on giving the same treatment to other unique proffesion buffs?

- Alacrity on revenant is a change I don’t quite understand, would you mind elaborating on what was the thought process behind it?

- Do you beta test all these changes extensively?, if you do, can you share part of the evaluation and tweaking process with us?

Question 1: Answered above!
Question 2: We’ve vetted giving alacrity to revenants for a long period of time internally, specifically on Ventari.

The healing aspect for the legend is already very powerful, but the utility granted through constant energy use didn’t quite make up for the loss of DPS you take when not using other abilities. The legend itself is close to feeling like the high-healing support that it was intended to be.

Often times in the past, characters that are strong at healing are also extremely tanky, which hamstrings our efforts of making a more capable healing support build. We wanted give a good reason to take both the Salvation specialization line along with the tablet, but not give the wielder superior self-sustainability or damage as a result. As the revenant is less reliant on cooldowns and more reliant on energy management, Alacrity was a natural option. Thematically, the tablet is assisting with ‘growth’ and thus speeds up a target’s cooldowns.

Question 3: This particular change (and many others) go through several phases of testing and iteration. We did a large amount of assessment in this change, as we were also adjusting energy and healing values at the same time.

Official Skill Balance Thread: 22 February Update

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How much further do you guys plan to up the target cap on skills? I know you are cautious about adding more, but can we see things like spotter see 10 man cap?

(for reference) As indicated in the dev notes: “We will not be looking to increase our five-target-maximum standard for player skills and will seldom (if ever) increase existing skill/trait caps.”

Traits that apply constant AOE benefit are not candidates for target increases. Primarily, they’re heavy on server performance. Secondarily, while we want to increase group diversity, we want to do so in a meaningful fashion.

Taking a trait and standing around doesn’t really hit the bar for participation, where ensuring proper placement and timing of a Timewarp has significant meaning.

Official Skill Balance Thread: 22 February Update

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I think power guardian is in a really good spot right now. Are there any future plans to buff condi guardian a little bit aswell? Maybe a change to the spirit weapons could help it a lot.

There are thoughts on this that we’re exploring. As it is, we’ve got to be careful with anything we do condition-wise because of the guardian’s interaction with Justice and the virtues line. With the wide variance of burning, it’s going to be something we’ll approach with caution.
As for Spirit Weapons: we have some plans for them, but haven’t had the right timing/tech to implement the changes in the way we want.

Official Skill Balance Thread: 22 February Update

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  • What was the thought process behind giving Alacrity to ventari? From my understanding its the clunky mechanic of the tablet that is keeping ventari from being a viable legend, and alacrity won’t change that. It feels like putting burn cream on frostbite. You tried to help but will it actually do anything?

As we work to improve the tablet over time, we also felt that there was a certain growth aspect we could apply to the Revenant’s support. We’ll continue to monitor the results, but we do feel that this is a good direction for the rev’s support role to go in.

Upcoming Changes to Skills

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For those asking about it: We’ll be keeping tabs on a few of the buff (+nerf) splits and will take them into other parts of the game in future updates, as is seen fitting.
Thanks for your continued feedback!

-Karl

While you’re here:

Are there also skill changes for warrior, necromancer and ranger coming next week as well? The skill balance preview didn’t include them so i assume they won’t be receiving changes on this specific patch?

I’m always here.
This update featured very directed changes with PvP specifically being the target, to herald in the new season and shake things up a bit. It’s not a full balance update and not all professions are being covered at this time.
Does this update substitute for a full balance update? No. We’ll still be doing game-wide balance updates in the future, in which case you’ll probably see a full spectrum of changes.

-Karl

Upcoming Changes to Skills

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For those asking about it: We’ll be keeping tabs on a few of the buff (+nerf) splits and will take them into other parts of the game in future updates, as is seen fitting.
Thanks for your continued feedback!

-Karl

1/4 Update Notes broke Continuum Shift

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Posted by: Karl McLain

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Continuum shift is indeed bugged when shattering additional illusion. We’re actively investigating the issue and hope to have a resolution on it soon.

-Karl

Patch note 17/11

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The true shot note was indeed intended to indicate Deflecting Shot. True Shot is definitely not slated for any unblockable state at this time. :P

Phoenix not blasting Wildfire fixed?

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FYI, this is something we’re aware of and do indeed want to fix. The issue with it is a bit more in-depth, however, so it’s taking a bit longer.

Pulmonary Impact bug?

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P.I. is set to trigger its damage when the mark expires. Currently, the mark removes when the target goes down or dies (by design). As players receive invulnerability when they go down, the damage from P.I. probably just gets negated. I could see allowing the buff to continue on downed enemies in the future.

Purification

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Purification and Maw’s duration are known issues.

Purification

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This trap applies healing and regeneration to the guardian only, but blind to all enemies in the trap’s radius. The guardian’s position when the trap triggers doesn’t matter.

True Shot got a DMG nerf?

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There were zero damage reductions to true shot…

Daredevil updates, post BWE 3 (launch)

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Here’s a couple other updates that had been in the works and are now in testing.

  • Vault: Reduced aftercast by 80ms. Added a 500ms evade at the start of the ability.
  • Distracting Daggers: Projectiles from this ability are now counted as 100% projectile finishers.
  • Impairing Daggers: Projectiles from this ability are now counted as 100% projectile finishers.
  • Weakening Strikes: This trait now grants 10% damage reduction when being struck by a weakened foe, in addition to weakening foes on critical hit.

Dragonhunter updates, post BWE3 (launch)

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Hi all,
Here’s a list of new stuff we’ve got going as we draw closer to launch. Traps are gaining a functionality and are branching out just a tad bit, granting boons to the guardian when the trap is triggered.
We’ve also been evaluating a secondary ability for Spear of Justice, which will pull all tethered enemies toward you, should you desire. In testing with the interaction of Radiance’s Justice refresh mechanic, we felt like this would blow out in quite a few scenarios. Thus, the cooldown of this secondary is separate from Justice itself, allowing for adjustments more freely. Renewed Focus does recharge this ability.

  • New skill: Hunter’s Verdict
  • Hunter’s Verdict: Pull all tethered enemies to you, breaking the tether. This ability’s cooldown (40s) is separate to that of Justice.
  • Procession of Blades: Increased damage per attack by roughly 20%. This trap now grants Fury for 8 seconds when triggered.
  • Fragments of Faith: Fixed this trap striking multiple times. Base damage has been reduced by 40% and is no longer unblockable. This ability is now instant and breaks stuns, as well as granting 3 stacks of stability for 5 seconds when triggered. note: The design of this trap is moving back toward its defensive nature and has much more functionality than before, thus the reduction in overall damage.
  • Test of Faith: This ability is now instant and grants protection for 6 seconds when triggered. Additionally, it now strikes enemies for 66% of its full damage when it triggers.
  • Light’s Judgment: This trap now grants Swiftness for 10 seconds when triggered. Reduced cooldown from 45 seconds to 30.
  • Purification: This trap now grants regeneration for 10 seconds when triggered.
  • Dragon’s Maw: This trap now grants 10 stacks of might for 8 seconds when triggered.
  • Pure of Sight: This trait now grants bonus damage of 7% from 0-600 range, 13% beyond 600 range.

Once again, thanks for the constructive feedback through the beta weekends.

Cheers,
-Karl

(edited by Karl McLain.5604)

Dragon hunter traps instakill thieves?

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Karl, the fragments (aegis on pickup) also seem to have some kind of delay – is that intended? I’ve popped the trap multiple times and I would follow fragments around attempting to essentially spam aegis on myself during fights and there seems to be some kind of ICD (~1sec).

The fragments themselves won’t pop if you have Aegis on when you enter them. They don’t have an ICD though or anything like that. If you lose aegis while standing on top of them, though, they probably won’t re-apply the boon until you move into it again.

RIP the only useful trap

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Alas, it was indeed a bug and needed to be fixed. A single skill that deals that much damage (from being CC’d, nonetheless) was a bit much. Sleight of hand was your best friend this last weekend in PvP.

Dragon hunter traps instakill thieves?

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The trap was bugged. It’s intended to strike enemies only once as it explodes and will be fixed.

Daredevil updates, post BWE 3 (launch)

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Aloh,
As we continue screaming toward launch, I’ll update this thread with the goings-on for Daredevil. Here’s a few things we’re testing now:

  • Reduced channel time of Channeled Vigor from 2.25 to 0.75
  • Vault: Fixed an issue that caused it to not travel its full distance.
  • Fist Flurry: Reduced cast time by 20%. note: The final strike occurs just prior to 1 second.
  • Evasive Empowerment: This trait has been renamed to Havoc Master and grants the player 7% bonus damage to enemies within the 360 range threshold.
  • Impaling Lotus: Increased bleeding duration from 8 to 10 seconds.
  • Bounding Dodger: In addition to granting access to the Bound dodge ability, the thief will gain 10% bonus physical damage for 4 seconds after dodging.
  • Lotus Training: In addition to granting access to the Impaling Lotus dodge ability, the thief will gain 10% bonus condition damage for 4 seconds after dodging.
  • Unhindered combatant: In addition to granting the Dash dodge ability, the thief will gain 10% damage reduction against physical and condition damage.

We like the interaction that Evasive Empowerment had with your endurance bar and wanted to carry it further, but didn’t feel like it could have the desired impact in the adept tier. Thus, each of the grandmaster traits have their own version, geared toward their specific style of play.
Havoc Master has taken its place, as we felt that the line could use a more guaranteed damage increase. For trait mods, we’d like to experiment with Weakening Strikes slightly, adding a secondary to it within its role of debilitation. Options we’re looking at it:

  • Inflict X (torment, bleeding, something) when you weaken a foe.
    or
  • Receive less damage from weakened foes.

Once again, thanks for your continued constructive feedback. It’s greatly appreciated.

-Karl

BWE3 live feedback chat room

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cut!

Typo has been fixed.

BWE 3 Reaper Specialization Feedback Thread

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Hi all,
As the third beta weekend has begun, let’s use this thread to compile feedback for the Reaper. All feedback is welcome, positive and negative… or anywhere in-between. Please continue to keep it constructive. We’re looking forward to hearing from you!

-Karl

Berserker BWE3 Feedback

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Hello, Warriors of Tyria.
As the OP indicates, let’s use this thread to gather constructive Berserker feedback for BWE 3. Looking forward to hearing from ya!

-Karl

BWE3 Chronomancer Feedback Thread

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Hi!
Being as this thread’s already going, let’s continue to use it as the main place to gather feedback for BWE 3. Feel free to let us know how the chronomancer’s playing for you, good or bad. Please keep in mind that as we grow closer to the Heart of Thorns, we’re more able to action smaller changes than larger ones.
Thanks again for your constructive feedback!

-Karl

BWE3 live feedback chat room

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Looking into the vault distance a bit today (noticed it as well whilst pvping).
Re: Weakening Charge- That’s sort of an intent for Weakening Strikes, in that against players and smaller creatures you have to work for your damage (positioning-wise)… While in encounters against larger creatures, high damage is easier to maintain. I’m not sure that it’ll keep that design, but at this point it’s fairly set.

Edit: Typo fix.

(edited by Karl McLain.5604)

BWE3 live feedback chat room

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Hi all,
Let’s use this thread as the main place for feedback, if possible. Please keep it constructive! We’ll be able to make a few changes between now and Heart of Thorns launch, but they will likely be smaller. We’ve already got some in testing, but I’ll talk about those a bit later.
So, if you’ve got feedback, send it on in! Animations are in-progress, you’ll notice that we’ve got a few stubs in for the dodge abilities. note: This isn’t all of the animations we’re working on, but further feedback on animations at this point (we’ve been locked down for quite a while) won’t be very useful. We’ll be looking at making smaller adjustments as time fades, so feedback in that area is definitely easier to action.
Enjoy the BWE!
-Karl

[BW3] Feedback Thread

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Bam!
Thanks everyone in advance for your constructive feedback. Please keep in mind that we’re getting close to day zero and that the smaller the change, the more likely we’ll be able to discuss and action that feedback. This isn’t the end, however. We’ll continue to make changes, when necessary, after HoT releases, as well.

Thanks!
-Karl

BWE 3 Guardian Feedback (Core/DH)

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Goes here!
Constructive feedback is always the best way to go. If something’s frustrating, let us know why. It’s okay to just post your feelings if you can’t quite pin it down, but giving us some suggestions for positive changes really helps. If you encountered something really cool with the way something worked with your guardian in the Heart of Thorns, feel free to share!
There are three weeks until launch. As you can imagine, things are locking down as we work to polish, fix bugs, and tune everything. It’s quite unlikely that you’ll be seeing gigantic changes between now and then. The smaller the change suggestion, the more likely we’ll be able to discuss and action it. We’ll also continue to review and update, as necessary, after launch as well.

Cheers,
-Karl

BWE 3 Daredevil Specialization Changes

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Animation update: All dodge animations are in the process of being iterated on. With that being said, in the next Beta weekend each custom dodge ability has had its animation replaced with what is called a ‘stub’, or a placeholder.
These stubs aren’t necessarily what the final animation will look like and may not even resemble the final product remotely (Huge disclaimer: Everything’s subject to change). However, we needed to replace the previously existing animations due to issues that couldn’t be resolved otherwise (i.e. Lag).

We are looking forward to the new functionality, but there’s a few pains that we’re getting through. During the next beta weekend, you’ll find that the Leap combo finisher for Bounding Dodger only works if you land inside a field. This is not intended and we’re already working on the fix for it (it’s in testing now). For now, it’s going to be trickier to get your leap finisher from Black Powder. There’s also a bug in the skill facts that indicate that it delivers a blast finisher, but it in fact a leap and will remain as such.

Other stuff:
As I talked about last update, Channeled Vigor’s now being tested as a 0.75 second cast (down from 2.25 seconds). We’re also toying with the endurance/healing values. The role of this heal is shaping more toward being high spike healing for the thief.

-Karl

So the "Pistol" wasn't buffed...

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FYI the damage increases weren’t part of a re-work of pistols or anything (something I’ve discussed in the past). We realize it still needs some work to get it to where we want, but we wanted to get it closer to being to that point with these changes. We’ll be looking at pistols more in-depth in the future.

-Karl

Anet looking for an idea for Earthen Proxy.

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It’s totally feasible to have an aura trait, as they’re fairly generic and supported throughout multiple lines (you have at least one application with every weapon set). Being that auras are fairly bountiful for the Tempest, it would likely be more beneficial to have something without an ICD (or really low) so that you’re not running into a wall by just using the tools you’ve got. Stability’s already an option in the master line, so we probably wouldn’t want to have two of the same applications in the same slot.
I’ve got to run for now, but wanted to stop by and talk traits.

-Karl

Anet looking for an idea for Earthen Proxy.

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These are all great ideas. Earthen Proxy and Latent Stamina are two traits that need a bit more. It’s a possibility that E.P. could be merged with H.C.. I’ve seen quite a few mentions of that so far and it’s something that we’ve talked about a bit internally. If that were the case, we would need another Master slot trait.

One way that E.P. will probably change is that it will only affect the elementalist, because it’s just way too difficult to tell if someone is being affected by your protection, or someone else’s… so it would be the case that 100% of protection applied to you would reduce 40% damage.
It’s possible to add a ‘no crit’ line to H.C., but it would start to be crowded for the master slot and might overlap too much (and be out of theme) when compared with Stone Heart.

With that being said, what sort of support/boon trait would you like to see it replaced with? Keeping in mind the roles of Tempestuous Aria (Shout ally DPS-add/Enemy weakness trait) and Harmonious Conduit (DPS/anti-control trait), is there something that you’d imagine would fit AoE support in a generic way.
H.C. was intended to be a generic anti-dps option (with ties to the spec’s stengths), so keeping it in that vein would be something we’d want to shoot for.

Cheers,
-Karl

BWE 3 Daredevil Specialization Changes

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To the question regarding dash being able to remove immobilize:
Yes, the dodge ability will continue to remove immobilize. It was originally in the design to behave this way, but didn’t have a way to enable it being that you couldn’t actually initiate a dodge while you were immobilized. We now have the tech to make it work cleanly and would like to test it all out in the next beta.

-Karl

BWE 3 Daredevil Specialization Changes

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Re: Dash update!
The original reason we had removed the extra distance on Dash was that we lacked the tech. Since that post, it’s been resolved. Thus, the distance of Dash is back, with a fervor. Now you’ll travel a full 450, up from the 360 previous (~300 base dodge), while moving at a faster-than-running speed. Swiftness duration increased to 10 seconds, up from the 8 we talked about originally.
This thing’s about solid movement, so we’re going to push it in that direction for this BWE. Please check it out and let us know how you feel about it. The animation’s going to remain as your character’s run for now.
We are aware that this new distance will cause some de-sync in synergy with Shadow Refuge, but feel that the open-field movement capability for daredevil needs to take precedence over this abliity. note: You can still dodge from edge-to-edge and remain inside the field, but it’s pretty tricky.

BWE 3 Dragonhunter Specialization Changes

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Oh yeah, I should mention that the auto-targeting stuff has been fixed. We were testing out some new tech with it, but have since pulled that as it wouldn’t allow your character to auto-turn toward your target if they’re behind you. Tech did its job too well.

BWE 3 Daredevil Specialization Changes

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So does this mean Dash will still use the Warrior GS animation but now shorter?
Cant imagine this will look anything but clunky and juddery which is a shame since thief dodge looks so nice usually.
Cant you just make it a shadowstep for the old distance? One that’s instant but add 3/4 sec evade during and after?
A shadowstep would fit better with some existing thief sets and not be as likely to launch you off cliffs..

Dash, right now, is no longer the greatsword charge and will just run you in whichever direction you desire, while evading. As indicated, it’s in flux!

As for a shadowstep dodge: It’s not really in-theme for the daredevil, being a more of a physical-moving type of specialization. We’ve definitely talked about it internally. Here’s some of the collective thoughts on it:
Theory-wise, if we were to implement Shadowstep in lieu of dodge, you more than likely wouldn’t get any evade frames attached to it, being as it’s instant movement… Unless there’s a cast time to it. Typically with dodge-roll design, you’re only allowed to evade so long as you don’t have control. Example: stand in place and evade while ‘charging’ your shadowstep, or begin a dodge and get a few evade frames, then again when you land at the spot. In addition, there’s many areas in the game where you’d want to move the distance (I.E. standing on top of a rock), but simply couldn’t move at all because there’s no valid path and the shadowstep would fail.

BWE 3 Daredevil Specialization Changes

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I will say: We’re still tuning Dash a bit and testing it internally. Thanks for your feedback and initial thoughts on it.

BWE 3 Dragonhunter Specialization Changes

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Additions to the initial notes:

Puncture Shot: Increased damage by 10%.
True Shot: Increased damage by 25% (instead of the 12% increase we had indicated) note: The overall damage potential of the ability wasn’t quite up to where we wanted to test it at, so here we are!
Wings of Resolve: Increased leap distance to 800, up from 600. note: This has been in discussion for a bit. Now’s a good time to check it out, being as there’s a lot of conversation on it here already.

-Karl

Edit because typos do happen.

(edited by Karl McLain.5604)

BWE 3 Daredevil Specialization Changes

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A short update:
We’ve been working heavily on the dodge abilities, making them react the same way that your normal dodge occurs. There have been a lot of long hours, but we managed to get this functionality in for the next beta.

  • The ‘Bound’ dodge animation is shorter and more appropriate for a dodge.
  • Dash – The extra distance has been removed for now as well. Dash now breaks immobilize in addition to its other effects. For now, the animation is just going to run you in the direction you’re dodging.
  • Impaling Lotus – The jump has been removed, as it caused issues that couldn’t be remedied. I’ll update if other things happen.

Other things:

  • re: Shalien. I haven’t got this in the next beta, but the plan is to drastically reduce the cast time of Channeled Vigor. (3/4 to 1 second or so)
  • Idle/running animations while wielding a staff are not planned to change at this time. There are, however, a couple of animations being worked on as development continues.

-Karl

BWE 3 Tempest Specialization Changes

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Hi Karl.

I want to show you some tweaks I made to some of the Tempest Traits. Made sure to keep them rather similar to what we have now, just adding extra functionality, merging, better numbers, etc…

Overall, I think these would help improve the Tempest in all game modes. What do you think about them?

(Just focused on Traits here, even though some skills also need tweaking.)

Regarding Latent Stamina and Earthen Proxy: We’d like to change these up a bit, being as they don’t feel all that great and don’t have the best impact yet.

-Karl

BWE 3 Tempest Specialization Changes

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We added two things to overloads today:
Overload Air will imbue allies with electricity, giving them the Static Charge buff. An ally with this buff will deliver a Lightning Jolt to the first enemy they strike.

Overload Earth will now leave behind a dust-nado (name ongoing) at the tempest’s location when complete, which delivers the same effects that occur while overloading (cripple, bleed, protection). Increased bleed duration to 9 seconds per strike.

Dust Storm – warhorn: Increased the velocity that each storm appears by 33%.

BWE 3 Daredevil Specialization Changes

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Let’s not forget that Mantras, once pre-casted, immediately start cooling down for future use

I believe this was fixed in the July 28th release. It’s possible that they could behave the exact same as mantras. At this time, we’re going with the theme that Distracting Daggers are something you can hold over your opponents for a period of time, and then it’s gone. We’d rather encourage using the daggers and getting those interrupts off, than simply holding the daggers for hours at a time.
Please feel free to let us know how they play during the next beta event. There’s quite a few ways to go with the ability and I’m not sure they have to behave exactly like mantras.

BWE 3 Tempest Specialization Changes

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Posted by: Karl McLain

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Following up on the Stunbreak conversation: This is something we’ve talked about in the past and felt like it might just be way too strong. However, it still sounds like way too much fun to not try it out… so I’m going to change them over and we’ll see what that plays like in BWE3.
Please keep in mind that this will be a test and we may have to compensate for or remove it at some point in the future, if it’s too strong.

-Karl

Wash The Pain Away range?

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Posted by: Karl McLain

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It currently has three pulses and heals for smaller amounts each pulse (skill facts will be visible next beta). Radius is 180, 240, 360. It’s a bit unique in that it heals all allies for the full amount, so long as they receive all three heals (the ele always receives all three).

Bring back ricochet trait!

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Posted by: Karl McLain

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Ricochet in its previous implementation is not slated to return at this time.
When the trait system was condensed, the standard was set in that each weapon set could only have one trait. Being that a player might want to receive increased damage from pistols, but not necessarily inherit the RNG bounce attacks from the secondary trait, this secondary trait was cut.
I will say though that pistols are something we’ll be looking to improve, being as they feel under-tuned at the moment.

-Karl

BWE 3 Daredevil Specialization Changes

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Posted by: Karl McLain

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Hey all,
here’s some other changes that happened today.

note: There was a bit of feedback that the auto-attack wasn’t up to snuff. We took a look today and decided that it was quite the case, being that damage on this weapon set is more localized onto the auto-attack.
Staff Strike: Increased damage by 5%.
Staff Bash: Increased damage by 18%.
Punishing Strikes: Increased damage by 20% per attack. Added a missile reflect skill fact.
Hook Strike: Increased damage by ~250%. note: The damage is still on the lower side for the weapon, but now deals more than practically zero. This ability is intended to set up high damage combos through crowd control, thus we’re trying to keep the damage lower than other from-stealth abilities.

Weakening Charge: This ability is now targeted, with the animation being cleaned up a bit. Distance traveled is slightly less, to increase the ease of landing multiple hits on a target. Reduced aftercast slightly (120ms).

Debilitating Arc: Included an evade fact. This ability continues to evade from the start of the ability.

Impaling Lotus: Removed the hidden initiative cost.

EDIT FOR BOLD!!!!!!

(edited by Karl McLain.5604)

BWE 3 Tempest Specialization Changes

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Posted by: Karl McLain

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Hello,
With another round of beta weekends complete, here’s where we’re going for the next beta:

Overloading:
We’ll be normalizing the casting time of each overload to four seconds. This way, you’ve got a guaranteed amount of time to overload before the pay-out. We’ll be looking at improving the pay-out for each overload ability.

Overload Earth: Cast time reduced from 5 seconds to 4. Bleeding has been added to the pulsing effect, one application of 6 seconds per pulse. The effects of this ability now trigger when the ability starts, instead of waiting one second before it applies cripple and protection. This ability no longer has a break bar, but instead applies 3 stacks of stability for 4 seconds when it begins.

Overload Water: Cast time increased from 2.75 seconds to 4. The first pulse of this ability now occurs when it is initially cast and will cleanse also when the final blast occurs.

Overload Fire: Reduced cast time to 4 seconds. note: We’ll be reducing the damage of this overload, as it’s got too much in its current state. I don’t have the numbers on this right now, but will update when I get a chance.

Overload Air: The damage for this skill now activates at 0.5 seconds, rather than at 1 second. Increased duration of the static area by 1 second. Increased the radius of the static area from 240 to 360. Reduced cast time 4.75 seconds to 4 seconds.

Warhorn:
We’ve been looking at expanding the warhorn’s utility and will continue to work on its overall effectiveness and purpose.

Dust Storm: Removed vulnerability application. This ability now applies two stacks of bleeding for 10 seconds on each pulse.

Sand Squall: Added a number of targets/impacts skill fact. Fixed an issue that caused this ability to double the intended duration increase on themselves.

note: Heat Sync is currently over-performing in its ability to spread all boons to allies. We’ll be looking to narrow down the boons it can spread, to just the Might boon, in order to keep its purpose more clear.

Rebound: This ability now applies an effect to nearby allies for 5 seconds. If the ally would take a lethal blow, they are healed instead of going into the downed state. If this effect expires naturally, grant an aura based on your current attunement. Reduced cast time from 3/4 second to 1/4 second. note: It heals for about 2000 at level 80 and heals additionally based on 1.5x your healing power.

Traits
We wanted to re-work a couple of traits for this beta weekend, being as a few traits didn’t feel all that great, or were way too strong in odd scenarios. As you’ll notice, there’s now an option for Stability when overloading.
note: We’d like to add something more to Earthen Proxy at some point if it remains based on protection. It’s not going to go all that great if EP affects allies, because it’s hard to know when your own protection is on them and not your ally Guardian standing next to you. This trait is more likely to remain a bit selfish, or change to something else.

Speedy Conduit: Increased swiftness duration from 5 seconds to 8.

Elemental Bastion: Fixed an issue where shouts would cause this trait to double-heal. Increased base healing per level by 50%. Increased healing contribution by 50%. Reduced the base heal from 40 to 10.

Harmonious Conduit: This trait has been re-worked. Upon activating an overload, gain stability for 4 seconds. If the overload is successfully completed, gain 10% damage for 5 seconds.

Imbued melodies: This trait has been re-worked. While wielding a warhorn, your boon duration is increased by 20%. Use sand squall when you are struck while below the 90% health threshold.

Thanks for your continued constructive feedback.

-Karl

BWE 3 Dragonhunter Specialization Changes

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Posted by: Karl McLain

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Greetings all!
Now that the betas are over and we’ve been working through quite a bit of feedback, we now have the chance to give you the list of changes that will be available for the next beta.

Virtues:
This specialization will ask that you make a trade-off of instant-cast abilities in order to gain access to a more physical aspect of them. With that goal in mind, we want to ensure that the virtues are rewarding while, while still maintaining some risk about them. In this iteration we’ve shored up a bit of the risks. We’ve lowered recharges of both Justice and Resolve while specialized as a Dragonhunter, in addition to lowering the cast times and improving battle effectiveness.

Spear of Justice: Increased missile velocity by 100%. Reduced the casting speed from 3/4 second to 1/4 second. Updated skill facts when virtue traits are equipped. Fixed a bug that caused this trait to not trigger with Wrath of Justice. Reduced recharge from 25 to 20. This ability is now unblockable.

Wings of Resolve: This ability now removes Immobilize at the beginning. Cooldown has been reduced from 50 seconds to 30.

Shield of Courage: Reduced the cast to 0.25 seconds. The after-cast of this ability has been reduced by 200 ms. This ability now blocks all attacks from the front, while attacks from behind will strike the guardian.

Longbow:
As with the virtues, we want to continue to ensure that the longbow feels rewarding. A few of the missile velocities felt slow and not as deadly as they could be, so we’ve been making steps at increasing both velocity and lethality, while ensuring that there’s a bit of utility to go around.

Puncture Shot: Increased missile velocity by 66%

True Shot: Damage increased by 12.5%

Deflecting Shot: Reduced missile velocity by 25%. Reduced after-cast by 300
milliseconds. Increased base damage by 13%. Destroying a projectile with this ability increases the damage it deals by 100%. Increased the blocking radius by 33%. The attack radius of this ability has not been increased.

Symbol of Energy: Increased missile velocity by 60%. Increased symbol damage by 10%. The initial burning impact now inflicts two stacks of burning, up from one. This skill can now be fired behind you.

Traps:
We’re continuing to work on trap usability, functionality and improve visual effects. There’s not a whole lot in this update, but we continue to appreciate your feedback on these abilities.

Traps (general): Reduced the cast time of all traps to 1/2 second, down from 1 second.

Purification: Fixed an issue that caused this ability to not function correctly with Runes of the Trapper.

Traits:
We’ve updated the trait line a bit to be more in line with other profession trait lines.

Piercing Light: This trait has been reworked. While activating, traps will now daze enemies in the radius for 1 second. Trap recharges are reduced by 20%.

Hunter’s Determination: This trait has been reworked to apply aegis to the guardian and drop a Fragments of Faith trap at their location when controlled.

Hunter’s Fortification: This trait has been reworked to remove conditions when blocking attacks. In addition, receive less damage when you have no conditions on you.

Dulled Senses: This trait has been updated: Enemies you knock back are crippled. Enemies you cripple are also inflicted with vulnerability.

Zealot’s Aggression: This trait now allows Justice’s passive effect to cripple, in addition to dealing extra damage to crippled enemies.

Heavy Light: This trait has been updated: Longbow arrows knock back when enemies are within the range threshold. Gain stability when you knock an enemy back.

Cheers,
-Karl

BWE 3 Daredevil Specialization Changes

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Posted by: Karl McLain

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Yo!
First off, let me say thanks for all of the constructive feedback you’ve been providing. We had a great weekend watching everyone jump around like madmen. Here’s where we’ll be going with Daredevil in the future.

First thing’s first:
There’s a few pacing issues we’ll be wanting to solve. The first issue would be that of the new dodge rolls (I don’t have a section for this just yet, so we’ll talk about it here). We’re actively working on making this a more desirable experience and are looking to make them function the same way your baseline dodge-roll behaves.

Staff:
We’ll be looking at updating these abilities as we are able. There was a common tone in that the staff was too slow and didn’t feel as well as it could in its utility. We’ll be working on this now and in the future, so please continue to give feedback as you play the Daredevil.

Weakening Charge: Increased the maximum number of targets from 1 to 5. note: we’re still working on making this animation feel better. In addition to basic clean-up I’m hoping to make it targeted (ala Heartseeker) but still pass through the target. At the point of writing this, though, it’s not in yet.

Dust Strike: Reduced cast time from 1/2 second to 1/4 second.

Vault: Reduced initiative cost from 6 to 5. Reduced cast time from 1 second to 3/4 second. note: We’ve discussed leaving the initiative high and giving this ability an evade component at the beginning or end. Feel free to let us know what you think.

Bandit’s Defense: Increased recharge from 10 seconds to 15.

Utilities:
For this beta, we looked at increasing damage for a few things as well as clearing up bugs that could be skewing an ability’s usefulness.

Impact Strike combo: Removed endurance gain from Uppercut and Finishing Blow when Brawler’s Tenacity was equipped. _note:

Distracting Daggers: Reduced equip cast time to 1/2 second. This ability now lasts for 25 seconds. Thrown dagger velocity has been increased by 100%. Fixed an issue that wouldn’t allow this ability to increase interrupt cooldown.

Impairing Daggers: Removed the hidden initiative cost from these abilities. note: no more spending initiative on utilities, yay!

Fist Flurry: Increased damage per hit by 36%. Each successful hit applies one stack of vulnerability for 5 seconds. Removed hidden initiative cost.

Palm Strike: Increased damage on hit by 40%.

Traits:
This iteration was mostly bug fixes. I’ve seen a lot of feedback on how Escapist’s Absolution should be baseline. It is the case that we believe this trait is powerful enough that it should be a choice in the trait line between damage, survivability and utility, rather than just a given. Driven Fortitude’s healing allows for usefulness in all modes where you take damage, where EA’s condition removal is situationally useful in a combat scenario.

Brawler’s Tenacity: Fixed an issue that allowed this trait to grant endurance though the skill was canceled.

Endurance Thief: Updated Steal to reward the full 50 endurance, rather than 25.

Evasive Empowerment: This trait now grants 10% bonus damage after dodging for 2 seconds, rather than just the first attack after dodging.

See ya soon.

-Karl

(edited by Karl McLain.5604)