3 replies to this topic

[Jumpluffspore]

Okay so warlock can function without heals well enough now, but what about priest? They still have their main dps at 30% now, which I think is horribly unfair. It's hard to find any priest who can pvp without any type of heals, which is why I propose that the priest class be given a buff at start that goes away if you heal. First off, instant heal and wide heal should be banned in pvp, leaving only slow heal and hp restore, which is more than enough. The buff at start would be a speed buff of 50% movespeed, 50% aim/crit damage buff as well. (If this is too much can always modify.) Furthermore, I believe the warlock class should be punished for slow healing-- maybe a block dash jump option tacked on for the duration of the heal, and maybe a 40% total defense debuff.

[Rimmy]

TBH, that setup sounds too unnecessarily complicated, IMO. Personally, I would vastly prefer that they keep things the same and all heals enabled in PvP and just nerf them more, *by nerfing the heal values*.

I begged and begged for them to do this so we could use Instant and Wide Heal in PvP without people griping about it, but all they did was double the (already low) MP cost, meaning it really didn't make much of a difference. I recommended nerfing the actual values of the heals, so they didn't restore as much HP with a single heal -- which I think would have been a more balance-friendly nerf overall.

But no, they decided to increase MP cost, which I guess sort of works since we have to burn through obscene amounts of MP just to fuel our only decent catching skill (Lightning Magnet). Then you have the massive MP cost increases for most of our other useful skills (Spark Rock, especially)... It seems to me like they're almost trying to force us to rely on MP Recovery. I don't really have a problem with that, just an observation.

I think the reason so many players hate playing priests/invokers now in PvP is b/c we were all so used to the days when we were offensive powerhouses and DPS was our main strength (since heals were considered cheap and rarely used -- still the same in that department, really). Times have changed, of course, and IMO, the class is much better suited to cautious, hit-and-run play where you kind of stick to the outskirts of the battle and just dash in occasionally to provide support where needed, saving teammates and assisting in holding down locks.

Personally, I think that the priest/invoker class actually works pretty well now in the sense that the focus is almost always on supporting teammates. HOWEVER, we need MORE support skills that are worth casting. Skills like Blessing that give a max of 13% of BASE values are utterly worthless. Oh, and Striking's max of +500 ATK/MATK is kind of a joke now too at higher levels, seeing as how most other classes can get boost of 2K+ ATK/MATK just from passive skills (I'd like to point out that our passive MATK skill, Staff Mastery, still uses the base value, which is silly and unfair, IMO).

• Make Staff Mastery amplify final MATK (like other classes' passive buffs -- heck, even Sorcerers get one that does it this way, now).
• Make Blessing amplify final ATK/MATK/DEF/MDEF rather than base.
• Change Striking so it provides something based on a % rather than a flat value, so it will always remain useful (and it should amplify using a final/absolute value, too, not base). Personally, I don't see why we need another attack-boosting skill since that's what Blessing should be for, so make it provide something else. For instance, maybe Striking could buff Critical Damage by 25% and Critical Rate by 5% or something.
• Make Barbarian and Witch's Curse use full Aim Rate to determine initial hit %. I've been asking for this for over a year now. It just makes no sense to me that thief classes get a 95% stun-rate Rocket Punch and warriors get a 90%+ stun-rate hammer, while the "support class" of the game gets two disable/stun skills that hit only about 30% of the time even on someone with low evade, if you're lucky -- and ours doesn't even do any damage, lol.
• Change Healing Wave. That skill is just dumb as is, and I already suggested some creative ways to fix it in another thread here, I believe.
• Change the way Detect works. Instead of decreasing base MDEF by 100%, decrease final MDEF by a max of 20%.
• Fix Barrier and Energy Absorption. At max, they can block 7500 damage, which is a joke when a single critical hit can deal thousands of damage. Change it so Barrier provides a maximum of 5% PDD at level 5. Change Energy Absorption so it adds a maximum of 5% MDD at level 5. So if you get both to level 5, that's 5% PDD/MDD (minor but still useful at any level and still in keeping with the basic concept of the skill).
• Give us a few more *creative* support skills. I have a few ideas (mind you, these are just rough ideas that probably aren't all realistic and that probably would need some adjustments):
  
• "Dispel" - Remove buffs from enemies. Give this skill a long CD (like 30 seconds) and a small range so it can't be spammed/abused and it can't usually be used on all enemies at once.
• "Prayer" - Grant every party member/teammate in range a special buff that lasts for 30 seconds, chosen randomly from a list of minor buffs (kind of like overlord's Gamble, but with a wider variety of possible buffs that would be more class-appropriate for priests/invokers).
• "Martyr" - PvP only, *not* enabled in EW/BSQ. The caster chooses a teammate who has already died, revives and restores them to whatever % of max HP/MP the caster has, exchanging the caster's vitality to bring back the teammate (the caster dies after the teammate is revived).
• "Celestial Pillar" - You know those beams of light Paris has that knock you back? Yeah, summon just a single one of those, directly in front of the caster. Give it a reasonable duration and make it knock back but *not* deal damage, so it isn't overpowered.
• "MP Drain" - The caster drains and absorbs up to 3% of the max MP of all enemies in range. Give it a long cooldown (1 minute or so) and a small range so it can't be spammed/abused.
• And the list goes on...

I could go on for pages and pages about all this, but I've already done so multiple times in the past so I'll just stop there for now.

[Bicho]

TBH, that setup sounds too unnecessarily complicated, IMO. Personally, I would vastly prefer that they keep things the same and all heals enabled in PvP and just nerf them more, *by nerfing the heal values*.

I begged and begged for them to do this so we could use Instant and Wide Heal in PvP without people griping about it, but all they did was double the (already low) MP cost, meaning it really didn't make much of a difference. I recommended nerfing the actual values of the heals, so they didn't restore as much HP with a single heal -- which I think would have been a more balance-friendly nerf overall.

But no, they decided to increase MP cost, which I guess sort of works since we have to burn through obscene amounts of MP just to fuel our only decent catching skill (Lightning Magnet). Then you have the massive MP cost increases for most of our other useful skills (Spark Rock, especially)... It seems to me like they're almost trying to force us to rely on MP Recovery. I don't really have a problem with that, just an observation.

I think the reason so many players hate playing priests/invokers now in PvP is b/c we were all so used to the days when we were offensive powerhouses and DPS was our main strength (since heals were considered cheap and rarely used -- still the same in that department, really). Times have changed, of course, and IMO, the class is much better suited to cautious, hit-and-run play where you kind of stick to the outskirts of the battle and just dash in occasionally to provide support where needed, saving teammates and assisting in holding down locks.

Personally, I think that the priest/invoker class actually works pretty well now in the sense that the focus is almost always on supporting teammates. HOWEVER, we need MORE support skills that are worth casting. Skills like Blessing that give a max of 13% of BASE values are utterly worthless. Oh, and Striking's max of +500 ATK/MATK is kind of a joke now too at higher levels, seeing as how most other classes can get boost of 2K+ ATK/MATK just from passive skills (I'd like to point out that our passive MATK skill, Staff Mastery, still uses the base value, which is silly and unfair, IMO).

• Make Staff Mastery amplify final MATK (like other classes' passive buffs -- heck, even Sorcerers get one that does it this way, now).
• Make Blessing amplify final ATK/MATK/DEF/MDEF rather than base.
• Change Striking so it provides something based on a % rather than a flat value, so it will always remain useful (and it should amplify using a final/absolute value, too, not base). Personally, I don't see why we need another attack-boosting skill since that's what Blessing should be for, so make it provide something else. For instance, maybe Striking could buff Critical Damage by 25% and Critical Rate by 5% or something.
• Make Barbarian and Witch's Curse use full Aim Rate to determine initial hit %. I've been asking for this for over a year now. It just makes no sense to me that thief classes get a 95% stun-rate Rocket Punch and warriors get a 90%+ stun-rate hammer, while the "support class" of the game gets two disable/stun skills that hit only about 30% of the time even on someone with low evade, if you're lucky -- and ours doesn't even do any damage, lol.
• Change Healing Wave. That skill is just dumb as is, and I already suggested some creative ways to fix it in another thread here, I believe.
• Change the way Detect works. Instead of decreasing base MDEF by 100%, decrease final MDEF by a max of 20%.
• Fix Barrier and Energy Absorption. At max, they can block 7500 damage, which is a joke when a single critical hit can deal thousands of damage. Change it so Barrier provides a maximum of 5% PDD at level 5. Change Energy Absorption so it adds a maximum of 5% MDD at level 5. So if you get both to level 5, that's 5% PDD/MDD (minor but still useful at any level and still in keeping with the basic concept of the skill).
• Give us a few more *creative* support skills. I have a few ideas (mind you, these are just rough ideas that probably aren't all realistic and that probably would need some adjustments):
  
• "Dispel" - Remove buffs from enemies. Give this skill a long CD (like 30 seconds) and a small range so it can't be spammed/abused and it can't usually be used on all enemies at once.
• "Prayer" - Grant every party member/teammate in range a special buff that lasts for 30 seconds, chosen randomly from a list of minor buffs (kind of like overlord's Gamble, but with a wider variety of possible buffs that would be more class-appropriate for priests/invokers).
• "Martyr" - PvP only, *not* enabled in EW/BSQ. The caster chooses a teammate who has already died, revives and restores them to whatever % of max HP/MP the caster has, exchanging the caster's vitality to bring back the teammate (the caster dies after the teammate is revived).
• "Celestial Pillar" - You know those beams of light Paris has that knock you back? Yeah, summon just a single one of those, directly in front of the caster. Give it a reasonable duration and make it knock back but *not* deal damage, so it isn't overpowered.
• "MP Drain" - The caster drains and absorbs up to 3% of the max MP of all enemies in range. Give it a long cooldown (1 minute or so) and a small range so it can't be spammed/abused.
• And the list goes on...

I could go on for pages and pages about all this, but I've already done so multiple times in the past so I'll just stop there for now.

LOL RIM !!! U dont like a priest... u want a monster...
With all this a priest will be inmortal...
I think priest is hard to kill and a good class for pvp and pve and perhaps in the next game balance (Gravity understand game balance as make pally more stronger) they will fix alot of thing... i am just dissapointed with double shoot duration (4 mins is nothing).
And at least HEAL OR NOT is your decision, u can heal if u want, the skill is not blocked at pvp. Personally i saw alot of ppl saying things like no heal, no lock and all they do it when are loosing...

[Rimmy]

Want to know why almost no one plays invokers in PvP anymore and most of those that wanted to play mages switched to sorcerers? Go try playing an invoker in end-game PvP with the current "balance" in place, and then tell me what you think.

How would these changes make us immortal? The only things I mentioned that would affect our survivability are nerfing heals (nerfing, not buffing, which would mean we'd be less able to survive) and giving us a max 5% PDD/MDD from Barrier and Energy Absorption (which, btw, is far less than the 30-40% PDD that your class gets from Mana Shield).

EDIT: Oh, and regarding my proposed change to Staff Mastery? Your class already gets a final attack amplification from your own Spear Mastery, so I don't see why we should be any different.

Regarding heals... Here's the problem, Bicho:

Invokers are the healing class. Our healing skills are what make us unique (for the most part), and by far our most powerful abilities. Now, why is it fair that I'm not allowed to use my character's best skills -- Instant Heal, especially -- yet pretty much every other class can use just about any skill on their tree, regardless of the restrictions placed on the match? Sure, you can set up rules ahead of time, like don't lock/don't heal -- but that's just it. If you say don't heal, you're taking away my class's most powerful skills completely. If you say don't lock, you're not taking other classes' best skills away -- you're just saying they can't use them infinitely.

And yes, you could agree to some arbitrary number ahead of time, and say "no more than two Instant Heals" or something like that. But that doesn't work either for one major reason: Instant Heal has a limited range, and despite what many players seem to think, it does actually require careful timing to catch teammates with it when they're all jumping/dashing all over the arena at top speed trying to avoid getting locked/killed (especially with the insane movement speed that many players have nowadays). If someone is in the range and decides to dash just as you're about to heal them to avoid being attacked and killed, then you've just wasted one of your casts. Oh, and actually, Instant Heal can also be interrupted (despite the fact that it's "instant"), which just adds further potential for failure and waste in this case.

The point is this: Even when you place restrictions on other classes -- like the no lock rule -- the restrictions don't matter that much b/c they can still make use of the skills that are restricted within reasonable boundaries. If you say no heals -- even if you just say "no more than 2-3 heals" -- you're still crippling the invoker far more than you are the other classes with the "no lock" rule.

Heck, even differentiating between what is and is not a "lock" leads to a debate most of the time. But with heals, there's no room for interpretation -- either you do or you don't, and everyone can tell right away when you do.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying I feel it's unfair that invokers don't get to spam Instant Heal in PvP as it is now, b/c I completely agree that's unnecessary and boring for the other team. I'm just trying to explain why saying "no heals" affects us more than saying "no locks" to other classes.

As for the rest of my suggested changes, none of them would make the invoker itself a "monster." All they would do is give the invoker the ability to actually serve its purpose in PvP and *support* teammates with support skills that actually make a difference. As it is now, the only support skills we have that are even remotely useful are Quagmire, Cure and Lightning Magnet -- and magnet consumes so much MP and requires so much preparation ahead of time (Awakening charging) that it's not practical to use it more than 5 or 6 times a round, at maximum (and magnet, btw, is easy to see and avoid as well as easy to escape if you know what you're doing). Casting Acceleration can be pretty useful, too, but far less so now that many of the classes that benefited from it the most (sorcerers, ninjas, overlords) got decreased cooldowns on the skills that benefited from CA -- and CA is usually only used once per round, right at the start, so it really doesn't add much to playing an invoker from a skill usage/diversity standpoint.

Edited by Rimmy, 02 October 2011 - 08:28 AM.