Elric Galad Posted February 20, 2023 Author Posted February 20, 2023 On 2/19/2023 at 10:35 PM, Shai Hulud said: Sorry for delayed response. Looks like I missed a lot of discussion, can't address everything said but have a few comments. First I like the idea of buffing heal companion to more like savage defiance, though since this is a low level pick it does nothing to address making SC rangers preferable, which is why I think you need a better healing buff on Bonded Fury. I really don't get why you are so obsessed in making SC Ranger a better pet healer. I mean, I see why you could consider the class underwhelming, but I fail to see why this would be the problem. SC Rangers already get better pet healing through Shadowed Hunter anyway, so I have no reasons to buff bonded fury in this direction. On 2/19/2023 at 10:35 PM, Shai Hulud said: Like could do hardy companion => robust companion and add more healing on bonded fury, alternatively hardy companion gives heal 10+health per 3s for 15s, hardy, and bonded fury gives robust for stacking. Have you tried changing Bonded Fury to give all tier 3 inspirations? Then playtested it a bit? I think that would be enough to make SC ranger competitive. And it sounds overpowered because "all tier 3" but it's on the pet so it really isn't. I don't think it would be OP indeed. But : - Courageous is quitte meaningless. - Brilliant has no effect and is therefore confusing (and this is a big No) - Intuitive is redundant with Shadowed Hunters. The 3 physical Inspirations could work though, even if it is not what I'm heading too. On 2/19/2023 at 10:35 PM, Shai Hulud said: It will still be worse at combat than any properly built character including companions by a ward margin, and keeping it up requires most of your bond. I'm honestly not that familiar with most of the SC bond regeneration, though I know distraction training doesn't really work as is. Distracting Training is just there to add up, no denying about this. On 2/19/2023 at 10:35 PM, Shai Hulud said: And I'm pretty sure adding pet on-crit resource regen will not work in the encounters you need it to work without intuitive. So here is a proposal for bonded fury 2 bond, gives all tier 3 inspirations for 30 seconds, 50% chance return bond on pet crit This is way too weak. This would hardly compensate the Bond Spent. This is only 12.5% per Hit WITH Intuitive. Any solution based on On Crit Bond regen would be too fragile, especially since PER affliction can remove Intuitive. That's why I proposed Bond Regen based on Hit/Crit rather than Crit. You haven't say what you don't like with my proposal, which give me few reasons to move from it. On 2/19/2023 at 10:35 PM, Shai Hulud said: Keep it .5s cast, 0 recovery. If you add recovery you are really going in the wrong direction with SC ranger. Besides, it is a passive buff, not like an attack ability, doesn't make sense to have a recovery. If I make Bonded Fury a net Bond Gain and instant, using it will be a no brainer. Every active ability requires either time or ressource, or it would be Just a passive to refresh peroodically with a gameplay about as interesting as injecting larvas in your hatchery as a zerg (That's an insult). So I can't remove the recovery. It might have have to be compensate by 2 steps further (I could increase duration) , but I won't create inconsistent gameplay. There are buffs that require activation time, this is perfectly consistent with PoE2 gameplay. On 2/19/2023 at 10:35 PM, Shai Hulud said: The 50% chance is just an educated guess, would have to playtest it. But the on-crit bond return is really only going to work with intuitive except in easy encounters. Intuitive + Energized will give the pet some combat utility so it can do some interrupts, swift some mobility, and robust some tankiness. It still won't do a lot of damage but it will be useful at least. Alternatively the on-hit/crit seems all right. I think making the pet better at combat is what can make SC ranger something you'd actually want to pick, as the pet is really the identifying hallmark for the ranger. Or if you don't like robust since it isn't stackable, 2 bond, gives intuitive, energized, swift, brilliant, courageous, hardy, +10 (or more) health per 3s for 30s, 50% chance return bond on pet crit I'm not fully closing the door to Energized and Swift. On 2/19/2023 at 10:35 PM, Shai Hulud said: I don't think having Bonded Fury pseudo-mandatory is that big a deal. You basically get four L8 picks (2 at 16, 1 at 17, 1 at 18) and there are five L8 choices. And I'd think most builds probably wouldn't pick both twinned shots and whirling strikes. Or if they wanted to, less pet-focused builds could skip Vengeful Grief (or Great Souls). This could be my own words. On 2/19/2023 at 10:35 PM, Shai Hulud said: I like the Vengeful Grief 25% action speed buff, though could just make it an enhanced fury on pet death which is similar effect and matches the description of the ability better (fury with tenacious / nimble or whatever) I will probably stop at this 25% action speed. This is still supposed to be a backup mode. On 2/19/2023 at 10:35 PM, Shai Hulud said: Having some kind of healing available to the ranger himself would also be cool, not strictly necessary but could make melee rangers better. Ahem... Shadowed Hunters? On 2/19/2023 at 10:35 PM, Shai Hulud said: Like add to bonded fury a "ranger receives 15% of pet damage dealt as healing". This is a nice idea. Still not fully sure how to tweak Bonded Fury, this option would thematically go well with Bond Regen. A tiny bit Stalker biased maybe. On 2/19/2023 at 10:35 PM, Shai Hulud said: -------------------- I know you think I'm basing all these suggestions on solo play but I'm not. Solo is what initially made me notice how bad SC ranger is compared to MC, but the same holds in parties, and I've played with parties quite a lot, though recently more focused on solo. The SC shortcomings just aren't as noticeable in parties because you have other characters to pick up the slack. But the fact a build can do okay in parties doesn't mean anything by itself. I could make the worst build possible and it would still do okay in well-built parties because if this is a game where some classes can solo (and it is), then you really only need one truly well-built party member and the rest can just stand there getting murdered. I know that's an extreme comparison but you probably get my point. Not really. I share your doubt about SC being Underpowered even in a party. The only thing I suspect to be solo biased is your idea that SC pet healing should absolutely be improved. I really don' t get why it could be preferrable over more damages or Bond regen or whatever... Unless speaking about Solo where pet needs to tank. On 2/19/2023 at 10:35 PM, Shai Hulud said: For role comparison, I did mention a ranged crit build centered on stunning shots for CC is the only real reason to consider a SC ranger. Though even a ranged CC build has good (better imo) alternatives like ranger / monk (instruments of pain, stunning surge) or ranger / chanter, ranger / cipher, both of which don't have this specific method of single target CC but have arguably better ones available like mental binding, thunder rolled like waves on black seas etc., in addition to other resources like better healing, summons, etc. For ranged DPS, ranger/cipher is better, ranger/chanter (sure-handed ila + energized + summons), probably also ranger / rogue and ranger / fighter For melee striker, ranger/cipher is better, ranger/barbarian is better, ranger/fighter, ranger/wizard, ranger/monk, probably ranger/priest and ranger/rogue (haven't played rogues that much outside of parties) For offtank, ranger/cipher, ranger/fighter, ranger/barbarian, ranger/paladin, ranger/monk, ranger/wizard, ranger/priest all better For tank, no combinations are ideal but same listed above are better I need to think about all these. I'm sure other People could have something to say too, I can't base my change on a single opinion. On 2/19/2023 at 10:35 PM, Shai Hulud said: Parties or solo, there is presently very little reason to pick a SC ranger over something else. And I didn't even mention the combinations without ranger, like SC monk, monk/fighter, monk/barbarian which are way better at striker, offtank, and tank roles, or devoted/troubadour which is better at ranged dps. (And I may be arguably off on some specific comparison because I haven't played every single one of these, not the point, the point being there is virtually always a better choice) Idem On 2/19/2023 at 10:35 PM, Shai Hulud said: -------------- And I know you like Heart Seeker, and *maybe* in a party that is a good enough reason to have a SC ranger, at least in encounters where enemies heal a lot, but generally I think you are better suited by something else. I think it is a good reason to take a ranger. Whether it is enough to compensate for the loss of MC is the real question. On 2/19/2023 at 10:35 PM, Shai Hulud said: My perspective is this: anything that requires 4 bond is just going to be really expensive in the hard encounters (megabosses, DLC bosses) where you will run out of resources very quickly if you use the active abilities, hence active abilities becomes less important than things like stacking accuracy to hit with normal attacks or stacking deflection and healing to tank or CCing the enemy. Potions of enlightenment address resource loss somewhat, so that you can still use *some* abilities that require limited resources, but I've found you can sustain at most one 12s/bond duration ability (with max INT and INT inspiration). You can sustain multiple abilites in some cases if the durations are longer and/or there is resource return or ability to extend the ability (like blood storm on crit). Generally it is much better to use your resources on long duration passive abilities you can sustain (like hardy companion / bonded fury / shadowed hunters, or swift flurry with monk, or blood storm + stalwart defiance for barb) than using on twinned arrows or whirling strikers or whatever. This probably isn't true in easy encounters, but it is the hardest encounters that function as gates for builds and therefore it is important to make sure a build has a chance of surviving the toughest encounters, moreso than how it performs fighting mooks. Really I think this point does not make a lot of sense for me. You're talking about the sustainability of an ability with a permanent effect. If you only have to cast once, why should it be sustainable? This is the most powerful attack of the game, it takes 30% base hp of a Megaboss away (and helps your Rogue Buddy to get their Sneak Attack / Deatblows) and hurts a lots in standard fights as well. Do you have to cast it Every fights? Probably not. Is it enough to go SC ranger? Probably not either. Hence this discussion about how to make them better.
Shai Hulud Posted February 21, 2023 Posted February 21, 2023 (edited) Quote I really don't get why you are so obsessed in making SC Ranger a better pet healer. I mean, I see why you could consider the class underwhelming, but I fail to see why this would be the problem. SC Rangers already get better pet healing through Shadowed Hunter anyway, so I have no reasons to buff bonded fury in this direction. @Elric Galad I'll try to explain better why pet needs better durability and healing. 1) It is very hard to keep up both shadowed hunter and bonded fury and more important the pet can't tank while invisible so shadowed hunters while a nice ability is not a substitute here 2) Not the most important issue, but the most obvious, thematically ranger class is both the ranger and the pet, and the class distinguishes itself from others more when the pet can actually stay alive and be useful in combat, which is why I also suggested buffing other combat abilities for the pet (level scaling the L1 pet talents, giving the pet tier 3 inspirations with bonded fury, could possibly give accuracy / pen bonuses on pet abilities etc) 3) Ranger has no defensive abilities or healing abilities besides shadowed hunter (use of which depends on pet being alive), and you usually don't want to stick him in heavy armor, so it is important to keep enemies away from the ranger. Having a pet that can actually engage enemies without dying allows the ranger to do his thing with maximum bonuses. 4) Ranger loses a huge number of bonuses and abilities if the pet dies, which it usually will in boss fights. This is REALLY, REALLY BAD, even with vengeful grief. And despite what you've said even in well-built parties the pet WILL die in some engagements if used in combat (e.g., Dorudugan can one-shot him). Things you lose if this happens bonded grief: -10 accuracy, -2 might, -2 resolve stalker's link: -10 accuracy distraction training: effective -10 accuracy against affected enemies for your entire party shadowed hunter: lose intuitive, plus this ability is the ONLY way the ranger can heal besides potions/scrolls marksman: -5 accuracy if you can't maintain 4m+ distance, which is much easier with pet alive pet abilities: most important is takedown combo, but also furious call etc stalker bonus: -1AR, -5 deflection hearth orlan: lose minor threat for -10 hit to crit (applies mostly to solo) multiclass abilities: lose many MC abilities that require an ally, e.g. seer echoing shield, tactical meld (applies mostly to solo) Indirect attribute losses: If the pet is dead, the ranger needs to compensate stats in his build that could otherwise be dumped. A ranged ranger can have stats like 11/7/18/18/18/3, because we don't expect to be hit much, but with pet dead we want higher resolve and con so you don't die instantly, meaning you may have to sacrifice accuracy, attack speed, and/or ability duration Basically the ranger tends to fall apart when the pet dies, and the effect is worse the higher the difficulty / challenges / fewer companions. Not proposing the pet be an invulnerable tank but it needs some help so it doesn't get killed so much from 1 to 3 hits. Quote I don't think it would be OP indeed. But : - Courageous is quitte meaningless. - Brilliant has no effect and is therefore confusing (and this is a big No) - Intuitive is redundant with Shadowed Hunters. Stated all tier 3 more for simplicity, but courageous isn't useless. Tested some against Dorudugan and boar gets interrupted even with resolute, and prones are quite bad. Brilliant is useless but not as if it is harmful. Somewhat disagree about intuitive, since keeping up shadowed hunters and bonded fury both might not be possible given the large bond cost. But I'd be happy with like energized/robust/swift/aware/resolute/acute Quote This is way too weak. This would hardly compensate the Bond Spent. This is only 12.5% per Hit WITH Intuitive. Any solution based on On Crit Bond regen would be too fragile, especially since PER affliction can remove Intuitive. That's why I proposed Bond Regen based on Hit/Crit rather than Crit. You haven't say what you don't like with my proposal, which give me few reasons to move from it. I was just guessing on the X% bond on crit. Though with high INT bonded fury does last 60+ seconds, and most pets attack roughly once per 5 seconds, so on average would return 1ish bond (less with misses). How much bond do you want returned? 2 is too much since the ability costs 2. 1 seems reasonable, so my guess was a bit too low after accounting for misses, but adjust it to whatever returns on average 1 bond IMO. On hit/crit rather than crit is fine, doesn't really matter as long as the expected value of bond regeneration is the same. What I don't like - costing 1 bond with your proposed rate of bond regen makes SC ranger an infinite bond class, which is OP. I did some testing with Dorudugan to get conservative hit/crit rates for the pet. At L20, base boar accuracy is 103. With bonded fury and marked prey (don't think stalker's link applies to pet, though it should IMO), boar has accuracy 118. Dorudugan has deflection 147 on POTD upscaled. So the attack roll has a -29 adjustment. You hit on a 79+ and graze on a 54 with half grazes converted to hits. P(graze) = P(not miss) - P(hit+)= (1-.54) - (1-.79) = .46 - .21 = .25, P(hit+) = .21+.25*.5 = .335 So with aware or intuitive the boar hits/crits Dorudugan with probability .335. If the boar attacks 12 times over the shadowed fury duration (roughly one attack per 5 seconds, 60 seconds), and returns bond with probability .3 on hit/crit, then the boar returns 12*.3*.335 = 1.2 bond This is against DORUDUGAN. And he still returns more bond than the ability costs. I also don't like having tier 2 inspirations on the pet which are quite weak. I would prefer the effects of Bonded Fury be stronger (tier 3 inspirations or at least tier 3 physical inspirations) so it isn't just a resource farming thing. This is more impactful than making the ability cheaper IMO. Quote If I make Bonded Fury a net Bond Gain and instant, using it will be a no brainer. Yes, there is an easy solution here in not making Bonded Fury provide more bond than it costs. Be realistic, this ability is going to be used constantly if it provides net resource gain. While I don't see this in itself as a problem, since there are many abilities so good we want them up always (e.g. cipher's borrowed instinct), having a recovery or not is not going to make any difference in how often the player uses it. Quote Every active ability requires either time or ressource, or it would be Just a passive to refresh peroodically with a gameplay about as interesting as injecting larvas in your hatchery as a zerg (That's an insult). So I can't remove the recovery. It might have have to be compensate by 2 steps further (I could increase duration) , but I won't create inconsistent gameplay. There are buffs that require activation time, this is perfectly consistent with PoE2 gameplay. Blood Sacrifice (in vanilla) costs no resources and has no recovery. There may be others. Not really the point though as I don't think Bonded Fury should cost 0 bond effective. You can remove the recovery. You have in fact done so. And yes there are buffs that require activation time, but there are more that do not, particularly with martial abilities like this (frenzy, disciplined strikes, every wizard martial buff, etc.). It makes more sense that these types of abilities with very short animation have no recovery time. It does have a cast time of .5, it isn't zero. There are many many wizard buffs with a cast time of .4 and no recovery, and other martial buffs with instant cast and no recovery. The cast of .5 is appropriate, 0 recovery is appropriate. Net bond gain without cost (unlike blood sacrifice which has large costs to health) isn't, and it won't be balanced by adding a 3s recovery. Quote I will probably stop at this 25% action speed. This is still supposed to be a backup mode. Ahem... Shadowed Hunters? This is a nice idea. Still not fully sure how to tweak Bonded Fury, this option would thematically go well with Bond Regen. A tiny bit Stalker biased maybe. Fair enough, and...fair enough, I should have said *additional*. Although Tier 9s are harder picks than Tier 8 since you only get 3. Shadowed Hunters is also pretty expensive, particularly if we almost always have up Bonded Fury. I'm just thinking of things to incentivize using the pet in combat and make certain abilities better. Having a 15% pet damage returned to ranger (and pet?) would be a cool addition to Bonded Fury IMO. Yeah it benefits melee rangers more but even ranged ones get hit. And it wouldn't be so strong healing that the ranger could tank. You could alternatively attach it to Shadowed Hunters or maybe Distraction Training but thematically seems to go better with bonded fury. Quote Not really. I share your doubt about SC being Underpowered even in a party. The only thing I suspect to be solo biased is your idea that SC pet healing should absolutely be improved. I really don' t get why it could be preferrable over more damages or Bond regen or whatever... Unless speaking about Solo where pet needs to tank. I've spoken enough about why to buff pet healing and combat (e.g. level scaling with resilient/vicious companion). And admittedly this does benefit solo more than a party with tanks, but it does benefit both, and there is no reason you can't buff the pet and buff bond regen and damages etc.? They're hardly exclusive. Basically this is a very large improvement to the class in solo, a major improvement for parties with 1 or no tanks, and a minor improvement for parties with multiple tanks. Even in parties with tanks, though, using the pet for combat is useful for the accuracy buff it provides the ranger. Quote I need to think about all these. I'm sure other People could have something to say too, I can't base my change on a single opinion. Fair enough, though it is the nature of things you'll get more (and usually better) input from fanatics like me who've played thousands of hours experimenting with many builds. Quote I think it is a good reason to take a ranger. Whether it is enough to compensate for the loss of MC is the real question. Really I think this point does not make a lot of sense for me. You're talking about the sustainability of an ability with a permanent effect. If you only have to cast once, why should it be sustainable? This is the most powerful attack of the game, it takes 30% base hp of a Megaboss away (and helps your Rogue Buddy to get their Sneak Attack / Deatblows) and hurts a lots in standard fights as well. Yeah I could have been more clear here, and admittedly this is a bit of a tangent. I was generalizing about the cost of attack abilities vs buff/healing abilities. Heart Seeker isn't the best example since you made its debuff permanent. My point was using resources on abilities that give passive buffs is usually preferable to spending the resources on attack abilities. E.g. with potion of enlightenment, for a barbarian we can keep up stalwart defiance or we can use the roars (not both). Can also look at Shadowed Hunters, which provides moderate healing, invisibility to take potions, escape engagement etc., plus intuitive for a really long time (120s with high INT). Much, much better than three twinned arrows or one whirling strikes. In general I'd rather spend bond on something like this that provides huge buffs while allowing attacks for two minutes vs one big attack. Heart Seeker may be the most powerful attack of the game, it may even be an exception to this rule, just saying with enemies that require 10000+ damage dealt (or solo sometimes vastly more) sustaining buffs for normal attacks is higher priority than using special attacks. And you may sometimes have enough bond to use Heart Seeker and sustain buffs but it is a risk in long fights relying on potions of enlightenment (or worse, not having it) where you may run out of bond trying to sustain passives where if you used heart seeker first you have 4 less max bond (probably 5 after marked prey which is pretty much obligatory). Heart Seeker could be an exception I haven't tested it enough to see if the -30% max health is worth starting a long fight with 4 less bond. Quote Do you have to cast it Every fights? Probably not. Is it enough to go SC ranger? Probably not either. Hence this discussion about how to make them better. Well I'm trying to give suggestions on how to make SC ranger better. In general, and this is in theme with my previous paragraph, making attack abilities better is going to be much less impactful than making buff abilities better. The changes you made to shadowed hunter for example are far more impactful than the change to twinned arrows. Why I'm focusing mostly on Bonded Fury. Shadowed Hunters is good as is except would be nice if it could be decoupled from pet being alive. Could reduce Shadowed Hunters to 2 bond, though I think 3 is fine given the long duration. To summarize: My proposal for Bonded Fury: Cast .5s, 0 recovery, Energized, Robust, Swift, Intuitive, Courageous, Acute, 15% of pet damage returned as health to ranger (and pet?), 30% bond return on pet hit/crit for 30s, cost 2 bond (if cost 1 bond need to adjust bond return downwards) (Can remove or reduce Intuitive/Courageous/Acute if they bother you so much, first three are most important, though harder to crit for interrupts without intuitive) And (but less important than above) some kind of power level adjustment for pet abilities. I don't know enough about how it scales to be real helpful, but like have better damage scaling at high level with Vicious/Merciless Companion, and more armor and/or health for Resilient Companion, as is the pet can be one-shot by some enemies which is problematic And Hardy Companion => provide 10+ health per 3s for 15s, hardy for 15s (this one may be a lost cause, but one can hope) Stalker's Link => accuracy bonus applies to pet also Edited February 21, 2023 by Shai Hulud 1
Bosmer Posted February 21, 2023 Posted February 21, 2023 7 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: So with aware or intuitive the boar hits/crits Dorudugan with probability .335. If the boar attacks 12 times over the shadowed fury duration (roughly one attack per 5 seconds, 60 seconds), and returns bond with probability .3 on hit/crit, then the boar returns 12*.3*.335 = 1.2 bond This is against DORUDUGAN. And he still returns more bond than the ability costs. I don't see how that argument is important here. Look for example at the BPM change to Wall of Flashing Steel. In combination with Gambit (that ideally has 0 costs) you will have far higher expected resource return by using that ability... the goal of the Single-Class resource changes (as I understand it) is to bring the higher resource-pool (and the higher resource generation with Brilliant) of Multiclasses more in line with Single-classes. Hence, the internal costs (after 60 seconds!) of one ability is not relevant, but the total resource generation of the class compared to multiclasses in the fights where it matters. I also don't understand your argument against giving Bonded Fury some recovery time to increase its opportunity costs. Most buffs that are not self-only do have recovery and the recovery time will make a difference (especially in shorter fights) for the player to use it or not ... why should bonded fury in that regard be any different from any other ability in the game? 1
Elric Galad Posted February 21, 2023 Author Posted February 21, 2023 (edited) 1 hour ago, Bosmer said: I don't see how that argument is important here. Look for example at the BPM change to Wall of Flashing Steel. In combination with Gambit (that ideally has 0 costs) you will have far higher expected resource return by using that ability... the goal of the Single-Class resource changes (as I understand it) is to bring the higher resource-pool (and the higher resource generation with Brilliant) of Multiclasses more in line with Single-classes. Hence, the internal costs (after 60 seconds!) of one ability is not relevant, but the total resource generation of the class compared to multiclasses in the fights where it matters. Yes, pretty much what I think. Same for toughened fury and Divine Retribution (althought I even had to nerf it) Basically you're rewarded for doing something "challenging" but doable, sucha as getting crit with a rogue, or keeping pet alive and active as a ranger. 1 hour ago, Bosmer said: I also don't understand your argument against giving Bonded Fury some recovery time to increase its opportunity costs. Most buffs that are not self-only do have recovery and the recovery time will make a difference (especially in shorter fights) for the player to use it or not ... why should bonded fury in that regard be any different from any other ability in the game? Indeed. There is no active ability without time and without cost. Even in vanilla, Blood Sacrifice has a health cost. BPM Take the hit is basically instant and free BUT comes with a huge drawback (potentially concentrating damages on your fighter). I don't think there is a single ability that you can click mindlessly when available. Edited February 21, 2023 by Elric Galad 1
Shai Hulud Posted February 22, 2023 Posted February 22, 2023 (edited) 21 hours ago, Elric Galad said: Yes, pretty much what I think. Same for toughened fury and Divine Retribution (althought I even had to nerf it) Basically you're rewarded for doing something "challenging" but doable, sucha as getting crit with a rogue, or keeping pet alive and active as a ranger. Indeed. There is no active ability without time and without cost. Even in vanilla, Blood Sacrifice has a health cost. BPM Take the hit is basically instant and free BUT comes with a huge drawback (potentially concentrating damages on your fighter). I don't think there is a single ability that you can click mindlessly when available. Totally missing the point, bypassing the meat of the post, and I actually said blood sacrifice has a health cost so why are you pointing that out like it is enlightening? The recovery time of bonded fury is probably the least significant thing I mentioned but since it is the only point you've addressed-- There are many abilities you can click mindlessly, via scripting. It doesn't detract from the gaming experience that you'd always want them up. That you think it is "mindless" to activate a 60s net resource ability when it ends but "not mindless" to activate a 60s net resource ability with a 3s recovery on cast is just absurd. It is going to be mindless and scriptable either way and you are just trying to rationalize costless resource gain. You apparently saw some reason to remove the recovery from bonded fury and shadowed hunters. Now you're reversing on bonded fury cuz logic but not shadowed hunters cuz reasons. I think no recovery makes more sense for these types of abilities regardless of original implementation but whether they have it or not is ultimately quite arbitrary, and I'm sure you'll do what you want regardless. Edited February 22, 2023 by Shai Hulud
Bosmer Posted February 22, 2023 Posted February 22, 2023 1 hour ago, Shai Hulud said: I think no recovery makes more sense for these types of abilities regardless of original implementation but whether they have it or not is ultimately quite arbitrary, and I'm sure you'll do what you want regardless. Well, ultimately it's Eric's Mod, so.. but I think there is enough evidence in this thread (45 pages long..) that he involves in a frequent and thorough discussion with other people on how to improve the game. But if it's "quite arbitrary", then why shouldn't he do what he wants anyway? Personally, (might be just me, because I'm lying ill at home) it's hard to follow your key arguments, since I feel that some of your points contradict each other. The discussion changes too often between the extremes of "(singleclass) rangers suck and are beaten in each and every aspect by 10 different classes" and "bonded fury providing one net bond after 60 seconds is completely unbalanced" (again, just my loose interpretation!) On a different note: How does bonded fury work with the ghostheart pet? If the duration is too long and the ghost pet cannot be sustained long enough than it might be close to a trap choice for ghosthearts. 1
Shai Hulud Posted February 22, 2023 Posted February 22, 2023 2 minutes ago, Bosmer said: Well, ultimately it's Eric's Mod, so.. but I think there is enough evidence in this thread (45 pages long..) that he involves in a frequent and thorough discussion with other people on how to improve the game. But if it's "quite arbitrary", then why shouldn't he do what he wants anyway? Personally, (might be just me, because I'm lying ill at home) it's hard to follow your key arguments, since I feel that some of your points contradict each other. The discussion changes too often between the extremes of "(singleclass) rangers suck and are beaten in each and every aspect by 10 different classes" and "bonded fury providing one net bond after 60 seconds is completely unbalanced" (again, just my loose interpretation!) On a different note: How does bonded fury work with the ghostheart pet? If the duration is too long and the ghost pet cannot be sustained long enough than it might be close to a trap choice for ghosthearts. Of course it's his mod and he can do what he wants. Just don't present arbitrary decisions as logical when it suits, right? Personally I'm kind of tired of repeating what to me seem very obvious points just to see them ignored and misconstrued. But I never said either of those strawmen. First, for a given role there exists at least one alternative multiclass that is better at that role than the single class ranger. Therefore little reason to pick single class ranger. So the clas should be improved. And I've given many suggestions to improve it. Second, I think bonded fury with the proposed changes at 1 bond is stronger than it needs to be. Not "completely unbalanced". 1
Elric Galad Posted February 22, 2023 Author Posted February 22, 2023 7 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: You apparently saw some reason to remove the recovery from bonded fury and shadowed hunters. Now you're reversing on bonded fury cuz logic but not shadowed hunters cuz reasons. Shadowed hunters cost bonds. My proposed version of Bonded Fury should generate bonds. This is the difference. Your proposed version of bonded fury would cost Bonds so it won't make sense to add recovery in this case. But I want to do it in another way. The reason why I'm pushing Bond generation is that ranger has a lots of nice Bond costing ability that makes it unique. So I want to reinforce this uniqueness. There could be other ways to buff SC Ranger, but I feel this would be the best. You said SC Ranger is Underpowered. And that my proposition with 30% Bond Regen on Hit is over the top. So there should be a number x between 0 and 30 that would feel balanced. By the way, - Swift on Bonded Fury would make Maia pet less unique. - Ghostheart summon is 30s, so Bonded Fury will always last less if cast right after it. Increase BF duration would be bad for this reason though. PS : I'm writing on a phone from holidays with 2 young children. So I try to Focus on what I feel to be the most important point. It costs me time and a bit of stress to provide answers the best I can. So next time you dismiss a written argument (that @Bosmerseemed to understand by the way) with such a familiar tone as "cuz reasons" be sure you'll be the first in 45 pages of thread that I will have to ignore.
thelee Posted February 22, 2023 Posted February 22, 2023 (edited) On 2/20/2023 at 8:22 PM, Shai Hulud said: My proposal for Bonded Fury: Cast .5s, 0 recovery, Energized, Robust, Swift, Intuitive, Courageous, Acute, 15% of pet damage returned as health to ranger (and pet?), 30% bond return on pet hit/crit for 30s, cost 2 bond (if cost 1 bond need to adjust bond return downwards) i think this is just way too good. i think you're overemphasizing the pet. if you need to have an ability this overtuned at tier 8 to make a pet viable, then what you're basically saying is "pet isn't viable." which i don't agree with. imo, it should be reasonable to have a pet build and go w/out a talent without major cost, but you're basically making a skill that would be a trap for pet builds to not take. (for this reason I don't particularly like Vicious and Resilent companion, they are basically talent taxes for rangers, at least on PotD) the problem we're trying to address, if I were to summarize, is simply that Bonded Fury as it is, isn't a particularly great payoff for single-class rangers, especially since a party of 5 (or a multiclass) will frequently be able to cover several tier 2 inspirations. We don't have to go all the way to all that to make it useful. I honestly believe as I mentioned upthread that simply just granting a medium-duration Swift even is Good Enough to make it worthwhile. Tenacious+Swift if you want a bit more (and Tenacious is a bit more "Fury"-ish). (Energized + Swift would be pretty good, but might be busted on lower difficulties where crits are easy to come by with a pet.) Yeah, it kinda breaks the original theming of Bonded Fury, but I don't think it was a particularly compelling theming to begin with. It would give pet builds a lot more survivability and utility, and would make single-class pet rangers less of a trap compared to just including Maia into your party (again, her bird basically is the best all-around pet and there's nothing much the mainchar can do about it). And it would not be a talent tax for pet builds, because you still have relative alternatives (Master's Call). Edited February 22, 2023 by thelee
thelee Posted February 22, 2023 Posted February 22, 2023 (edited) 4 minutes ago, Elric Galad said: - Swift on Bonded Fury would make Maia pet less unique. you ninja-ed me on post-timing, but I disagree that this is bad. Maia's pet is too good. Maia's subclass is too good. Swift on a pet would be a payoff for SC Rangers that gives them an option that can compete with Maia's pet. As it is, it's frequently hard not to feel like a mainchar or merc ranger+pet setup is a bit of a trap compared to just rolling with Maia. Maia would still get an incredible pet for 100% of the game, and could multiclass and still have an incredible pet. Swift on Bonded Fury would just let mercs/mainchars have a similar lategame option in their toolkit if they want to. Edited February 22, 2023 by thelee 1
Elric Galad Posted February 22, 2023 Author Posted February 22, 2023 (edited) @thelee mmm but if Swift becomes the "main reason" to go SC : - why would Maia herself go SC Ranger? - why would one go SC Ranger instead of Scout or Geomancer Maia (who get the engagement immunity and either better sustained DPS or caster utility)? Note that I have found no arguments against Energized. It remains a valid possibility even if it's not what I'm privilegiating right now. Edited February 22, 2023 by Elric Galad
thelee Posted February 22, 2023 Posted February 22, 2023 41 minutes ago, Elric Galad said: - why would Maia herself go SC Ranger? 41 minutes ago, Elric Galad said: Note that I have found no arguments against Energized. It remains a valid possibility even if it's not what I'm privilegiating right now. I guess Bonded Fury granting Energized + Swift would solve the problem for Maia 42 minutes ago, Elric Galad said: - why would one go SC Ranger instead of Scout or Geomancer Maia (who get the engagement immunity and either better sustained DPS or caster utility)? for a non-pet maia I think Heart Seeker is a great capstone (esp bpm version) BTW does BPM do anything with Twinned Shots? It always struck me as underwhelming.
Elric Galad Posted February 22, 2023 Author Posted February 22, 2023 (edited) 47 minutes ago, thelee said: I guess Bonded Fury granting Energized + Swift would solve the problem for Maia Still not too enthusiastic with Swift, but Energized has 2 great advantages : - Goes fairly well with Ranger interrupting theme - Reduces the anti synergy between Bonded Fury and Shadowed Hunters. Aware becomes useless but Intuitive and Energized synergizes which makes using both more neutral. 47 minutes ago, thelee said: for a non-pet maia I think Heart Seeker is a great capstone (esp bpm version) Yeah! 47 minutes ago, thelee said: BTW does BPM do anything with Twinned Shots? It always struck me as underwhelming. It costs 1 Bond. It involved a lot of maths to compare with accurate wounding shot as a benchmark DPS. Accurate wounding shot is still on top with single ranged weapons but isn't instant damages (through stacking with CP) and does not have the utility of double procs. Edit : another option for Bonded Fury would be 0 Bond, 0 recovery but a cooldown (as other signature abilities such as BPM spiritshift and radiance). With either 90s or 120s cooldown. With Energized and maybe 15% Bond or hit. Something like that. Edited February 22, 2023 by Elric Galad
thelee Posted February 22, 2023 Posted February 22, 2023 58 minutes ago, Elric Galad said: Still not too enthusiastic with Swift, but Energized has 2 great advantages : - Goes fairly well with Ranger interrupting theme - Reduces the anti synergy between Bonded Fury and Shadowed Hunters. Aware becomes useless but Intuitive and Energized synergizes which makes using both more neutral. alright i think you've convinced me on energized v swift. it also means you have a little bit more work to benefit from the interrupts (even if it's just marked prey and stalker's link) whereas swift would have been an easy pickup for anyone. 1
NotDumbEnough Posted February 23, 2023 Posted February 23, 2023 Yes I think Swift would have been kind of redundant for ghost heart as well. I actually think Shadowed Hunters healing could use a nerf. It is a bit too powerful and eclipses previous pet healing abilities in the tree. Having 4 different abilities to heal the pet feels overly redundant. Maybe straight up remove the healing but cut the bond cost by 1 or 2 even.
Elric Galad Posted February 23, 2023 Author Posted February 23, 2023 (edited) 5 hours ago, NotDumbEnough said: Yes I think Swift would have been kind of redundant for ghost heart as well. Good point. I might go with a hard Interrupt on Crit + Tenacious to keep the thematic. It would also be slightly better in case of Might affliction. 5 hours ago, NotDumbEnough said: I actually think Shadowed Hunters healing could use a nerf. It is a bit too powerful and eclipses previous pet healing abilities in the tree. Having 4 different abilities to heal the pet feels overly redundant. Maybe straight up remove the healing but cut the bond cost by 1 or 2 even. Heal Companion is going to be buffed (12s, with 12s of Hardy + 25% flat damage reduction for Hardy Companion). Play Dead is a full heal and Deadly Surprise applies a debuff. Revive is a rez. So I think the 4 are fine. Shadowed Hunters is powerful but very slow though. And has been the only Ranger self heal. I don't want to remove this option. I think I'm going to go with +50% attack speed with Vengeful Grief. As pointed recently, loosing the pet is really hurting the ranger. The goal is not to make dead pet builds viable, but to make Dead Pet strategy sometimes interesting, such as when keeping it alive is too tedious, when its claws can't penetrate or when hit and run is preferable. Having the ranger penetrating and running better while having their own DPS greatly improved does help this goal. Final note is that pet damages aren't that bad when thinking about it twice. When the +2PEN talent and +15% are picked they basically deal scaling stilettos damages (-1 Pen but dual Type). They have lots of +% damages talent too, so ultimately their damages is close to an endgame rogue with dual generic legendary stilettos. I start to suspect their bad reputation comes partly from their low damage per hit, but they have fast weapons and high PEN type (lowish damages but reliable). Granted they won't hit as hard as a party member with full custom weapons and better stats/build combination. Edited February 23, 2023 by Elric Galad 1
NotDumbEnough Posted February 23, 2023 Posted February 23, 2023 (edited) I think pets kind of lack DPS because they don't have dual wielding attack speed bonuses, or any attack speed/recovery time bonuses in general. Also since you inherently have a ranger dealing large amounts of ranged damage, enemies tend to die before the pet reaches them even on higher difficulties. So technically, yes, your pet does have legendary tier weapons. But a multiclass chanter summoning weapons has 3x legendary weapons, each with their own class abilities for extra damage, and are inherently disposable so you don't care if they die. A single class Beckoner has 8x legendary weapons, though for a shorter duration and they are very flimsy. Also, the pets are extremely bad at dealing with Arcane Archer friendly fire. They will spend the majority in the fight caught in a web or sucked in by Pull of Eora, it's absolutely pointless to take anything other than boar or bear for Arcane Archer. Edited February 23, 2023 by NotDumbEnough
Elric Galad Posted February 24, 2023 Author Posted February 24, 2023 14 hours ago, NotDumbEnough said: I think pets kind of lack DPS because they don't have dual wielding attack speed bonuses, I'm pretty sure they do (- 30% recovery). Granted that they also get an armor malus. They don't get the - 15% recovery talent, but their first offemsive talent grants them +15% damages on top of +2 Pen which is pretty much an equivalent of 2 hander talent. 14 hours ago, NotDumbEnough said: or any attack speed/recovery time bonuses in general. Yes, apart Nimble. An attack speed bonus could fit in the bonded fury new premium package 14 hours ago, NotDumbEnough said: Also since you inherently have a ranger dealing large amounts of ranged damage, enemies tend to die before the pet reaches them even on higher difficulties. Then you have won anyway. The same apply to any melee build. 14 hours ago, NotDumbEnough said: So technically, yes, your pet does have legendary tier weapons. But a multiclass chanter summoning weapons has 3x legendary weapons, Yes, no denying that Ancient Weapons are among the strongest abilities in vanilla. BPM made other chanter summons closer. I won't pretend pet is on this level, but not having to summon it is great. 14 hours ago, NotDumbEnough said: each with their own class abilities for extra damage, BPM slighly reduced this by limiting them to 3x per cast. 14 hours ago, NotDumbEnough said: and are inherently disposable so you don't care if they die. A single class Beckoner has 8x legendary weapons, though for a shorter duration and they are very flimsy. I won't dare comparing pet with chanter summon indeed. Not sure anything can compare in term of brute force. The fact that it is passive and instantly available is still a nice feat, and I will never discard an extra body. My point was that the Animal companion does compare with actual character passive DPS. 14 hours ago, NotDumbEnough said: Also, the pets are extremely bad at dealing with Arcane Archer friendly fire. They will spend the majority in the fight caught in a web or sucked in by Pull of Eora, it's absolutely pointless to take anything other than boar or bear for Arcane Archer. Funny thing is that SC Ranger does help with that since at least Circle of Death is foe only. 1
Shai Hulud Posted March 1, 2023 Posted March 1, 2023 (edited) On 2/23/2023 at 2:30 AM, Elric Galad said: Good point. I might go with a hard Interrupt on Crit + Tenacious to keep the thematic. It would also be slightly better in case of Might affliction. Heal Companion is going to be buffed (12s, with 12s of Hardy + 25% flat damage reduction for Hardy Companion). Play Dead is a full heal and Deadly Surprise applies a debuff. Revive is a rez. So I think the 4 are fine. Shadowed Hunters is powerful but very slow though. And has been the only Ranger self heal. I don't want to remove this option. I think I'm going to go with +50% attack speed with Vengeful Grief. As pointed recently, loosing the pet is really hurting the ranger. The goal is not to make dead pet builds viable, but to make Dead Pet strategy sometimes interesting, such as when keeping it alive is too tedious, when its claws can't penetrate or when hit and run is preferable. Having the ranger penetrating and running better while having their own DPS greatly improved does help this goal. Final note is that pet damages aren't that bad when thinking about it twice. When the +2PEN talent and +15% are picked they basically deal scaling stilettos damages (-1 Pen but dual Type). They have lots of +% damages talent too, so ultimately their damages is close to an endgame rogue with dual generic legendary stilettos. I start to suspect their bad reputation comes partly from their low damage per hit, but they have fast weapons and high PEN type (lowish damages but reliable). Granted they won't hit as hard as a party member with full custom weapons and better stats/build combination. Sorry for my flippant tone in my last couple posts. I spent A LOT of time thinking about, testing, and writing out feedback and I got a little frustrated. So I took a break from checking this thread. I agree with @theleeregarding Swift, and I don't think Ishiza being immune to engagement is much of an argument here. Not sure why you nixed Robust for Bonded Fury, at some point you were considering Swift/Energized/Robust. Disagree with thelee that my proposed Bonded Fury is too strong, certainly not the inspirations part. It does make Bonded Fury a must-take talent, but it is going to be like that anyway for the resource regen, and you get four picks for Tier 8 abilities, so I don't see the problem. My only other comment here that I haven't already beaten to death is that pet damages are in fact pretty bad compared to the ranger and really any character. Pet base accuracy is 103 at L20. With Marked Prey and Bonded Fury it is 118. My ranger I'm testing with a mythic hunting bow has accuracy 133, and with marked prey, stalkers link, and various items that jumps to 158. 163 with Swift Hunters. This difference of 40/45 means the ranger will graze/hit/crit vs miss/graze/hit vastly more often. The boar penetration is okay at 14 (with vicious) but the damage type is piercing which is overall the worst in the game. A mixed damage type would help a lot in output. Not sure about damage type for all the others, haven't tested all the pets. Ranger has similar penetration with hunting bows but has mixed damage types. The damage roll is also much lower with the pet. Base damage is quite a bit lower (how much depends on weapon, but even with hunting bow the boar base damage is lower), and the modifiers are lower. With bonded fury, vicious, and 60% tusk scaling my boar gets +93% damage with normal pen, which isn't bad but my base 12 might ranger has +137% damage. So combining the lower base and lower modifiers the end result is pretty low. Ranger also benefits from items like hit to crit with power of money, blackblade hood etc Attack speed is also worse. Hard to tell exactly, but the boar seems to attack about once per 4 to 5 seconds (if it's really fast like a stiletto, then 3.5, but I've tried timing and seems more like 4.5). My 15 dex ranger attacks once per 2.4 seconds with hunting bow modal, once per 3.3 without. If we have dex inspirations or things like Sure-handed ila being chanted the difference is higher. There is no way an endgame rogue dual-wielding legendary stilettos does similar damage. Rogue gets dirty fighting, sneak attacks, death blows etc. But even ignoring that, dual-wielding stilettos with two-weapon-fighting I get one attack per 1.7s with base dex 15 and blackblade's hood (what I was wearing anyway). Plus higher accuracy and damage modifiers hit to crit etc. I think the base character should do a lot more damage than the pet (4 times as much seems fine), but in practice it is much higher, like 10x+ except in the easiest fights. In the toughest fights the difference is extreme. Vs Dorudugan for instance I'm getting 3 damage on a hit with the pet and 60ish on a hit with the ranger, and since the ranger hits/crits more and attacks faster the damage output is more like 50x higher. And given the pet will die vs Dorudugan, ranger/pet ratio shifts even higher. This is an extreme scenario since the pet always underpens vs Dorudugan, but it is not so uncommon that tougher enemies have high pierce AR, and bows have pierce/slash or pierce/shock etc. so ranger has some options to do better pen, or switch to melee weapons and so forth. Pet DPS may look okay on paper but you add up all these little differences in practice and it's really bad. Worse than even one chanter summon usually. To me the problem can be summed up like this: Pets don't have enough combat utility to justify risking them in fights where they're likely to die. So one can solve this problem by making using them less risky and/or improving their combat utility to justify said risks. Preferably both. --------------- By the way, I've mentioned this before but pet (actual pet) party wide buffs don't work on a lot of the pets for summons or animal companion, like animancy cat doesn't give the bonuses to many summons, and sky dragon wyrm doesn't give any of the bonuses to the boar. Oh and how much armor malus do pets get? Not sure why they have any honestly since they don't wear armor. Edited March 1, 2023 by Shai Hulud 2
Elric Galad Posted March 1, 2023 Author Posted March 1, 2023 19 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: Sorry for my flippant tone in my last couple posts. I spent A LOT of time thinking about, testing, and writing out feedback and I got a little frustrated. So I took a break from checking this thread. Thank you for desescalating, a break sometimes helps. 19 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: I agree with @theleeregarding Swift, and I don't think Ishiza being immune to engagement is much of an argument here. Not sure why you nixed Robust for Bonded Fury, Just quoting a post from someone else : On 2/23/2023 at 3:50 AM, NotDumbEnough said: Yes I think Swift would have been kind of redundant for ghost heart as well. I actually think Shadowed Hunters healing could use a nerf. It is a bit too powerful and eclipses previous pet healing abilities in the tree. Having 4 different abilities to heal the pet feels overly redundant. Maybe straight up remove the healing but cut the bond cost by 1 or 2 even. So there are other people than me that consider Swift a bit redundant for Maia/GH and believe that SC Ranger already has too much healing. Hard to satisfy everyone But for me the statuts quo is ok (Shadowed Hunters would remain the extra SC Ranger heal) provided that Heal Companion is buffed because this one was a bit meh. Especially if SC Ranger gets more Bond, he could heal more than MC. 19 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: at some point you were considering Swift/Energized/Robust. Energized will be implemented on Bonded Fury. For the other 2, refer above. 19 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: Disagree with thelee that my proposed Bonded Fury is too strong, certainly not the inspirations part. It was not my argument at least 19 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: It does make Bonded Fury a must-take talent, but it is going to be like that anyway for the resource regen, and you get four picks for Tier 8 abilities, so I don't see the problem. me neither. 19 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: My only other comment here that I haven't already beaten to death is that pet damages are in fact pretty bad compared to the ranger and really any character. Actually thanks to you I have found a relevant glitch, see below about attack speed. That doesn't explain everything, but that should reduce the gap between our perception. 19 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: Pet base accuracy is 103 at L20. With Marked Prey and Bonded Fury it is 118. My ranger I'm testing with a mythic hunting bow has accuracy 133, and with marked prey, stalkers link, and various items that jumps to 158. 163 with Swift Hunters. This difference of 40/45 means the ranger will graze/hit/crit vs miss/graze/hit vastly more often. Vastly, the ranger himself is king of accuracy so there's no surprise it comes on top (and you haven't even use Hunter's Claws, which can help vs bosses). That is why I'm comparing the pet to a Rogue, who doesn't have huge accuracy but high damages bonuses. 19 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: The boar penetration is okay at 14 (with vicious) And tenacious I guess. Because without, it would be 12. 19 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: but the damage type is piercing which is overall the worst in the game. A mixed damage type would help a lot in output. Well, it IS Pierce / Slash actually. 19 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: Not sure about damage type for all the others, haven't tested all the pets. They are all Pierce / Slash. I've checked once again. 19 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: Ranger has similar penetration with hunting bows but has mixed damage types. The damage roll is also much lower with the pet. As I said they have the damages roll lof a Stiletto (actually better : 8-13 vs 8-12), minus 1 PEN but dual type damages. The base and attack speed are actually exactly the same as the stiletto, except for the glitch I found today. 19 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: Base damage is quite a bit lower (how much depends on weapon, but even with hunting bow the boar base damage is lower), and the modifiers are lower. With bonded fury, vicious, and 60% tusk scaling my boar gets +93% damage with normal pen, which isn't bad but my base 12 might ranger has +137% damage. So combining the lower base and lower modifiers the end result is pretty low. I'm not sure how you get so high with ranger. Maybe with unique items and Mythic Upgrade (which are limited). But that's quite expected from a well-equipped DPS build which indeed top a pet. That said, the pet has +50% from Predatory's Sense and +30% from Merciless Companion. That is above what ranger gets. But Ranger has way better accuracy. 19 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: Ranger also benefits from items like hit to crit with power of money, blackblade hood etc Indeed. Items and better starting stats are what gives Ranger an edge. 19 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: Attack speed is also worse. Hard to tell exactly, but the boar seems to attack about once per 4 to 5 seconds (if it's really fast like a stiletto, then 3.5, but I've tried timing and seems more like 4.5). My 15 dex ranger attacks once per 2.4 seconds with hunting bow modal, once per 3.3 without. If we have dex inspirations or things like Sure-handed ila being chanted the difference is higher. Here we are. This is the Issue I just spotted. Some pets count as dual wielding while some other do not, with absolutely zero justifications. They all get 3s base attack recovery, but only Cat, Bear and Wolf counts as dual wielding (Cat gains a speed modifier on top of that). I've checked in game, then checked the game files and they are absolutely aligned with my observations (which makes it easy to correct). Basically Boar, Bird, Antelope and Stag all all gimped. They should get -30% recovery. That's a x1.42 multiplicative DPS factor that is missing on your particular pet DPS !!!!!! I will obviously correct this. Note that Car and Bear Aspects of Galawain (but not wolf) seem to have the same issue. 19 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: There is no way an endgame rogue dual-wielding legendary stilettos does similar damage. Rogue gets dirty fighting, sneak attacks, death blows etc. Pet gets Predatory's Sense, Merciless, Marked Prey and (against about half of targets) Survival of the Fittest. That's comparable bonus damages, and only items can grant Rogue similar accuracy. 19 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: But even ignoring that, dual-wielding stilettos with two-weapon-fighting I get one attack per 1.7s with base dex 15 and blackblade's hood (what I was wearing anyway). Plus higher accuracy and damage modifiers hit to crit etc. Most of this results from higher stats and items. (and no armor I presume). But without unique items, pet damages are still comparable to a lvl 20 Rogue with DW Legendary Stiletto and Legendary Light Armor. The unique weapons / items do make a big difference though. 19 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: I think the base character should do a lot more damage than the pet (4 times as much seems fine), but in practice it is much higher, like 10x+ except in the easiest fights. In the toughest fights the difference is extreme. Vs Dorudugan for instance I'm getting 3 damage on a hit with the pet and 60ish on a hit with the ranger, and since the ranger hits/crits more and attacks faster the damage output is more like 50x higher. And given the pet will die vs Dorudugan, ranger/pet ratio shifts even higher. This is an extreme scenario since the pet always underpens vs Dorudugan, but it is not so uncommon that tougher enemies have high pierce AR, and bows have pierce/slash or pierce/shock etc. so ranger has some options to do better pen, or switch to melee weapons and so forth. Indeed. But Dorudugan is extreme and makes many builds suboptimal, because of its immunity to many things including interrupts. That thing is why I plan adding 50% attack speed on Vengeful Grief, granted that the Ranger would still do suboptimal damages with it, but less (counterbalanced by the utility of Heart Seeker making the fight less long, which is enough utility at least with a party). 19 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: Pet DPS may look okay on paper but you add up all these little differences in practice and it's really bad. Worse than even one chanter summon usually. It's unlikely, if you pick the damage talents. But the speed factor glitch lead to this conclusion on a vanilla / current BPM Boar. 19 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: To me the problem can be summed up like this: Pets don't have enough combat utility to justify risking them in fights where they're likely to die. So one can solve this problem by making using them less risky and/or improving their combat utility to justify said risks. Preferably both. Yet you seemed to discard the Bond Generation solutions. It is combat utility (especially because Rangers have quite varied abilities) but somehow you didn't like it. That's why you sounded a bit hard to satisfy to me I'm not set on what I'll do. Current plan for Bonded Fury : - 0.5s/0s cast/recovery - 0 bond, 60 cooldown (up more than half of the time). I want to make SC Bond pool more forgiving. - Energized and all other Tier 2 Inspirations - 15% chance of +1 Bond on Hit/Crit But I'm not completely decided. That said, from this point, I would prefer to tweak the values. 19 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: --------------- By the way, I've mentioned this before but pet (actual pet) party wide buffs don't work on a lot of the pets for summons or animal companion, like animancy cat doesn't give the bonuses to many summons, and sky dragon wyrm doesn't give any of the bonuses to the boar. Yes, I checked it, but seems a hard code bug and I can't correct it. 19 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: Oh and how much armor malus do pets get? Not sure why they have any honestly since they don't wear armor. +25% recovery. Basically a bit more than light armor, but the armor doesn't have a "weakness", so it isn't so bad. Basically a generic scaling light armor. Oh and Monastic Unarmed Training for everyone has been implemented and tested. All classes will get it in next version. 2
Shai Hulud Posted March 2, 2023 Posted March 2, 2023 (edited) 8 hours ago, Elric Galad said: Thank you for desescalating, a break sometimes helps. Just quoting a post from someone else : So there are other people than me that consider Swift a bit redundant for Maia/GH and believe that SC Ranger already has too much healing. Hard to satisfy everyone But for me the statuts quo is ok (Shadowed Hunters would remain the extra SC Ranger heal) provided that Heal Companion is buffed because this one was a bit meh. Especially if SC Ranger gets more Bond, he could heal more than MC. Energized will be implemented on Bonded Fury. For the other 2, refer above. It was not my argument at least me neither. Actually thanks to you I have found a relevant glitch, see below about attack speed. That doesn't explain everything, but that should reduce the gap between our perception. Vastly, the ranger himself is king of accuracy so there's no surprise it comes on top (and you haven't even use Hunter's Claws, which can help vs bosses). That is why I'm comparing the pet to a Rogue, who doesn't have huge accuracy but high damages bonuses. And tenacious I guess. Because without, it would be 12. Well, it IS Pierce / Slash actually. They are all Pierce / Slash. I've checked once again. As I said they have the damages roll lof a Stiletto (actually better : 8-13 vs 8-12), minus 1 PEN but dual type damages. The base and attack speed are actually exactly the same as the stiletto, except for the glitch I found today. I'm not sure how you get so high with ranger. Maybe with unique items and Mythic Upgrade (which are limited). But that's quite expected from a well-equipped DPS build which indeed top a pet. That said, the pet has +50% from Predatory's Sense and +30% from Merciless Companion. That is above what ranger gets. But Ranger has way better accuracy. Indeed. Items and better starting stats are what gives Ranger an edge. Here we are. This is the Issue I just spotted. Some pets count as dual wielding while some other do not, with absolutely zero justifications. They all get 3s base attack recovery, but only Cat, Bear and Wolf counts as dual wielding (Cat gains a speed modifier on top of that). I've checked in game, then checked the game files and they are absolutely aligned with my observations (which makes it easy to correct). Basically Boar, Bird, Antelope and Stag all all gimped. They should get -30% recovery. That's a x1.42 multiplicative DPS factor that is missing on your particular pet DPS !!!!!! I will obviously correct this. Note that Car and Bear Aspects of Galawain (but not wolf) seem to have the same issue. Pet gets Predatory's Sense, Merciless, Marked Prey and (against about half of targets) Survival of the Fittest. That's comparable bonus damages, and only items can grant Rogue similar accuracy. Most of this results from higher stats and items. (and no armor I presume). But without unique items, pet damages are still comparable to a lvl 20 Rogue with DW Legendary Stiletto and Legendary Light Armor. The unique weapons / items do make a big difference though. Indeed. But Dorudugan is extreme and makes many builds suboptimal, because of its immunity to many things including interrupts. That thing is why I plan adding 50% attack speed on Vengeful Grief, granted that the Ranger would still do suboptimal damages with it, but less (counterbalanced by the utility of Heart Seeker making the fight less long, which is enough utility at least with a party). It's unlikely, if you pick the damage talents. But the speed factor glitch lead to this conclusion on a vanilla / current BPM Boar. Yet you seemed to discard the Bond Generation solutions. It is combat utility (especially because Rangers have quite varied abilities) but somehow you didn't like it. That's why you sounded a bit hard to satisfy to me I'm not set on what I'll do. Current plan for Bonded Fury : - 0.5s/0s cast/recovery - 0 bond, 60 cooldown (up more than half of the time). I want to make SC Bond pool more forgiving. - Energized and all other Tier 2 Inspirations - 15% chance of +1 Bond on Hit/Crit But I'm not completely decided. That said, from this point, I would prefer to tweak the values. Yes, I checked it, but seems a hard code bug and I can't correct it. +25% recovery. Basically a bit more than light armor, but the armor doesn't have a "weakness", so it isn't so bad. Basically a generic scaling light armor. Oh and Monastic Unarmed Training for everyone has been implemented and tested. All classes will get it in next version. I guess one of the things that makes rangers hard to test is how opaque the pets are, like you can't see their armor type or attack speed and apparently some dual-wield and others don't. I couldn't even tell the damage type was pierce/slash. And yeah I was keeping up bonded fury during testing so the boar had vicious and tenacious with the 14 pen. Didn't have merciless or predator's sense but they wouldn't have procced much on Dorudugan anyway. That's another thing though, you have to take SO MANY pet talents to make it just sort of viable that it's usually better to skip them. Lot of builds don't take any of the talents. I like vicious and resilient, but typically don't have space for much else since I consider stalker's link important and that takes two, plus all the abilities I want for the ranger and the generic utility stuff like bear's fortitude. Eh, swift being redundant with Maia and ghost heart...there are lots of redundant abilities but sometimes you still want them. That said swift isn't a huge thing to me so...meh. Robust isn't redundant though since it stacks with other heals. Your buff of heal companion is actually enough to keep the pet alive in most situations though, so I'm relatively satisfied. I was pushing for more healing on bonded fury mostly because that one is available to single class only whereas heal companion isn't. I guess I'm mostly satisfied with these proposed buffs and that's as much as one person can ask. Items my ranger was wearing: high harbinger's robes, mythic essence interrupter, ring of the marksman, ring of prosperity's fortune, rekvu's cloak, gauntlets of accuracy, upright captain's belt, footprints of ahu taka, charm of bones, blackblade's hood. I find this type of super high DPS build optimal for ranger. If the enemy is getting to your back line you've done something wrong so don't really need armor. I'm still skeptical I can't make a 2x legendary stiletto rogue that will outdamage a pet (even a lion) quite a bit but I'll let it be for now Monastic unarmed training for everyone is much appreciated! --- Edit: I still haven't figured out to separate quotes like you did. Probably something simple, but idk how to attribute using the quote tag so I either attribute a big quote or have a bunch of manually separated non-attributed quotes Edited March 2, 2023 by Shai Hulud
Elric Galad Posted March 2, 2023 Author Posted March 2, 2023 (edited) 9 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: I guess one of the things that makes rangers hard to test is how opaque the pets are, like you can't see their armor type or attack speed and apparently some dual-wield and others don't. I couldn't even tell the damage type was pierce/slash. And yeah I was keeping up bonded fury during testing so the boar had vicious and tenacious with the 14 pen. Didn't have merciless or predator's sense but they wouldn't have procced much on Dorudugan anyway. That's another thing though, you have to take SO MANY pet talents to make it just sort of viable that it's usually better to skip them. Lot of builds don't take any of the talents. I like vicious and resilient, but typically don't have space for much else since I consider stalker's link important and that takes two, plus all the abilities I want for the ranger and the generic utility stuff like bear's fortitude. That isn't false. But at least SC Ranger has a lots of ability point to spend on Ranger side (granted it is... well... their only side). So I would say it is a bit less an issue for SC. For MC, it might be a reason picking Ghost Heart since it requires a couple less talent (can ignore every defense and healing talents) I wouldn't pick Bear Fortitude over Predator's Bond, though. I think most pet talent are rather balanced, usually granting at least twice the benefit of what they would do for an actual character. 9 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: Eh, swift being redundant with Maia and ghost heart...there are lots of redundant abilities but sometimes you still want them. That said swift isn't a huge thing to me so...meh. Robust isn't redundant though since it stacks with other heals. Your buff of heal companion is actually enough to keep the pet alive in most situations though, so I'm relatively satisfied. I was pushing for more healing on bonded fury mostly because that one is available to single class only whereas heal companion isn't. I guess I'm mostly satisfied with these proposed buffs and that's as much as one person can ask. Nice to hear. That being said I'm considering another change, to Shadowed Hunters. Shadowed Hunters is currently rather balanced on its own, but I see a potential issue and an opportunity : 1) now with more Bond regen, one might want to keep Shadowed Hunters up most of the time, even more than previously. But it feels suboptimal since Intuitive lasts much more than the other effects. Basically, by refreshing the regen/debuff reduction, one waste 30s of Intuitive. So I would like to set Intuitive to 30s too. It is not possible to rise the overall duration of Shadowed Hunters or lower the bond cost. - With 45s base duration and a lots of Intellect, one could reach the critical duration of 90s for Shadowed Hunters. Potion of Enlightenment would allow permanent invisibility. This + Lover's embrace means super slow auto-win. - 30s base duration and 2 Bonds cost would lead to the same consequence. I will probably simplify Shadowed Hunters to set all components to lasts 30s from the cast. The current mechanism where Intuitive only starts after invisibility can be fun, but might have been a bit obscure. 2) If I had to nerf Shadowed Hunters Intuitive, I would obviously have to add another effect (with regular 30s duration) to make it balanced. I was thinking about something defensive to synergize with the healing. Initially, I thought about adding some Deflection (as BPM Shadowing Beyond for Rogue which provides Deflection even after invisbility breaks). But maybe something that is harder to get with party buff would be better. Such as 25-50% Hit to Graze. I'm not set about the value. There would be an obvious synergy with Distracting Training. Could be also another defensive effect. I could also add a bit of healing (12 per tick instead of 10 maybe). I'm not suggesting more to avoid copying too much Savage Defiance. The idea is that SC Ranger could go perma Shadowed Hunters to endure in battle when necessary, sometimes throwing Heal/Hardy Companion in the mix. Thanks to regenerating bond, one could sustain this for quite a while. With Potion of Enligtenment and reasonable Intellect, it would already be half funded. I think it should do the trick of "extra healing for SC ranger" since it would encourage using Shadowed Hunters defensively. 9 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: Items my ranger was wearing: high harbinger's robes, mythic essence interrupter, ring of the marksman, ring of prosperity's fortune, rekvu's cloak, gauntlets of accuracy, upright captain's belt, footprints of ahu taka, charm of bones, blackblade's hood. I find this type of super high DPS build optimal for ranger. If the enemy is getting to your back line you've done something wrong so don't really need armor. I'm still skeptical I can't make a 2x legendary stiletto rogue that will outdamage a pet (even a lion) quite a bit but I'll let it be for now Monastic unarmed training for everyone is much appreciated! Thanks ! 9 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: --- Edit: I still haven't figured out to separate quotes like you did. Probably something simple, but idk how to attribute using the quote tag so I either attribute a big quote or have a bunch of manually separated non-attributed quotes Just quote the post as usual, then go to the part you want to add your reply, and type twice on the Return Key. EDIT : Also, hunter's Fang seems a tad weak compared to Beast's Claw. Up +20 all defenses is huge. Up +20% damages... err less. I would probably set Hunter's Fang to up to +30% or +40% damages. Edited March 2, 2023 by Elric Galad 1
Bosmer Posted March 2, 2023 Posted March 2, 2023 1 hour ago, Elric Galad said: EDIT : Also, hunter's Fang seems a tad weak compared to Beast's Claw. Up +20 all defenses is huge. Up +20% damages... err less. I would probably set Hunter's Fang to up to +30% or +40% damages. Yes, I changed it for my own game to +30% (based on your mod), which definitely doesn't feel too overpowered. +20 all defenses (that stacks quite nicely afaik!) is a huge buff for a defensive build, +40% damage might be very powerful for caster multiclasses, however they usually have a harder time using melee abilities, so could still feel rewarding and fair enough. 1
Shai Hulud Posted March 2, 2023 Posted March 2, 2023 3 hours ago, Elric Galad said: I wouldn't pick Bear Fortitude over Predator's Bond, though. I think most pet talent are rather balanced, usually granting at least twice the benefit of what they would do for an actual character. If you're running with 12 might and 8 con you might want it =/ I consider bear's fortitude pretty much obligatory even if I have decent might and con. Only one I usually skip is snake's reflexes because I tend to max perception and have high dex. Predator's Bond sounds good in theory but you have to be able to apply DOTs consistently and even then it isn't a 50% increase of total damage, it's 50% more damage of the base, applied on top of the 93% bonus damage (l20 tusks, bonded fury, vicious) for effectively 25% more damage. So if I'd normally do base damage like a stiletto (8 to 12), then a 10 roll becomes a 24 instead of a 19, and my 3 roll from earlier becomes a 4. If it didn't require the DOT I'd take it, but it's just kinda meh with that requirement. The ability was better in POE1 mostly because the hunting bow Persistence was easy to get and applied Wounding with every shot. 3 hours ago, Elric Galad said: Nice to hear. That being said I'm considering another change, to Shadowed Hunters. Shadowed Hunters is currently rather balanced on its own, but I see a potential issue and an opportunity : 1) now with more Bond regen, one might want to keep Shadowed Hunters up most of the time, even more than previously. But it feels suboptimal since Intuitive lasts much more than the other effects. Basically, by refreshing the regen/debuff reduction, one waste 30s of Intuitive. So I would like to set Intuitive to 30s too. It is not possible to rise the overall duration of Shadowed Hunters or lower the bond cost. - With 45s base duration and a lots of Intellect, one could reach the critical duration of 90s for Shadowed Hunters. Potion of Enlightenment would allow permanent invisibility. This + Lover's embrace means super slow auto-win. - 30s base duration and 2 Bonds cost would lead to the same consequence. I will probably simplify Shadowed Hunters to set all components to lasts 30s from the cast. The current mechanism where Intuitive only starts after invisibility can be fun, but might have been a bit obscure. 2) If I had to nerf Shadowed Hunters Intuitive, I would obviously have to add another effect (with regular 30s duration) to make it balanced. I was thinking about something defensive to synergize with the healing. Initially, I thought about adding some Deflection (as BPM Shadowing Beyond for Rogue which provides Deflection even after invisbility breaks). But maybe something that is harder to get with party buff would be better. Such as 25-50% Hit to Graze. I'm not set about the value. There would be an obvious synergy with Distracting Training. Could be also another defensive effect. I could also add a bit of healing (12 per tick instead of 10 maybe). I'm not suggesting more to avoid copying too much Savage Defiance. The idea is that SC Ranger could go perma Shadowed Hunters to endure in battle when necessary, sometimes throwing Heal/Hardy Companion in the mix. Thanks to regenerating bond, one could sustain this for quite a while. With Potion of Enligtenment and reasonable Intellect, it would already be half funded. I think it should do the trick of "extra healing for SC ranger" since it would encourage using Shadowed Hunters defensively. Thanks ! ....Why? The long duration intuitive is the main reason to keep up Shadowed Hunters at 3 bond. I don't get what you mean by saying you waste 30s of intuitive? It starts whenever you leave stealth. What is wasted? True Love's Kiss is not an issue. You can already stealth stab megabosses with it. Or you can flee the battle with invisibility, come back, do some damage, flee, etc., with Berath's Challenge off. This is not some new strategy, and if someone wants to play the game in this horrible way, who cares? If anything you should decrease the invisibility duration since you lose it on attack. That is a better way to deal with the true love's kiss "issue" but really this is nothing and nobody is going to use this tactic because it is incredibly tedious compared to the tried and true cheese method of attacking from stealth with TLK. Could also just nerf that aspect of True Love's Kiss. I'm guessing you tried this and couldn't, because I don't know what legitimate reason you'd leave an infinite duration DOT otherwise. Look at the pros and cons of reducing the intuitive buff to 30s. The "pro" of blocking theoretical perma-invisibility is meaningless to nearly everyone and can be addressed through other means (shorter invisibility duration, nerfing TLK). But the con of not being able to keep up intuitive even with potions of enlightenment is pretty serious to this build. And yeah you could add something to "balance" but that doesn't really address the issue. In long fights you will run out of resources, so it doesn't really matter if the new Shadowed Hunters is super awesome once you've run out of bond, since you can't cast it. And with a 30s duration and 3 bond, you will run out in the fights that really matter. I tried to explain this before but apparently wasn't very clear. Being able to maintain a moderate strength buff is much much better than not being able to maintain a super awesome buff. Maybe Bonded Fury can regenerate enough resource to keep it up, but you have to keep the pet alive, and to keep the pet alive, you have to spam heal companion, which at 12s duration costs a lot of bond. And even spamming heal companion there are fights where the pet can get one-shot and without bond regen you won't be able to keep up Shadowed Hunters at 10s / bond. And all this brings me back to the point of "Hmm, ranger/cipher or ranger/troubadour is looking way better than straight ranger" My 2 cents...please leave Shadowed Hunters as is for now. 3 hours ago, Elric Galad said: Just quote the post as usual, then go to the part you want to add your reply, and type twice on the Return Key. Wow that is really easy but not obvious at all, thanks. 3 hours ago, Elric Galad said: EDIT : Also, hunter's Fang seems a tad weak compared to Beast's Claw. Up +20 all defenses is huge. Up +20% damages... err less. I would probably set Hunter's Fang to up to +30% or +40% damages. Agree. +20% damage is in effect going to be less than a 10% damage boost on any well-built ranger, since it is applied to base damage not total.
Elric Galad Posted March 3, 2023 Author Posted March 3, 2023 (edited) 14 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: If you're running with 12 might and 8 con you might want it =/ I consider bear's fortitude pretty much obligatory even if I have decent might and con. Only one I usually skip is snake's reflexes because I tend to max perception and have high dex. You'll be happy finding Bull's Will available for SC Ciphers then (since MC Ciphers could get it from their other class tree and stack with Iron Will... didn't seem faire). 14 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: True Love's Kiss is not an issue. You can already stealth stab megabosses with it. Or you can flee the battle with invisibility, come back, do some damage, flee, etc., with Berath's Challenge off. This is not some new strategy, and if someone wants to play the game in this horrible way, who cares? If anything you should decrease the invisibility duration since you lose it on attack. That is a better way to deal with the true love's kiss "issue" but really this is nothing and nobody is going to use this tactic because it is incredibly tedious compared to the tried and true cheese method of attacking from stealth with TLK. Could also just nerf that aspect of True Love's Kiss. I'm guessing you tried this and couldn't, because I don't know what legitimate reason you'd leave an infinite duration DOT otherwise. Look at the pros and cons of reducing the intuitive buff to 30s. The "pro" of blocking theoretical perma-invisibility is meaningless to nearly everyone and can be addressed through other means (shorter invisibility duration, nerfing TLK). But the con of not being able to keep up intuitive even with potions of enlightenment is pretty serious to this build. Good point about TLK usual strategy. I'll leave this out of the equation. 14 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: ....Why? The long duration intuitive is the main reason to keep up Shadowed Hunters at 3 bond. I don't get what you mean by saying you waste 30s of intuitive? It starts whenever you leave stealth. What is wasted? OK, maybe I haven't explained super well. Shadowed Hunters is a package with : - a 30s max invisibility - a 30s defensive buff - a 60s intuitive that starts only after invisibility. (I'm taking into account base duration to simplify, but using the real duration basically add a multiplicative factor to all durations). Let's say you attack right after a few positionning seconds (not significant). 30s after cast, the defensive part run out, but intuitive is still up. If you want to re-cast SH, when do you do it ? 1) You wait until intuitive runs out. This means your defensive buff won't be up. 2) You re-cast SH, meaning you waste 30s of intuitive. 3) At some point between 1) and 2) Having more Bond, means re-casting SH several times in a single battle more likely. Hence making the SH dilemna more annoying (minor annoyance maybe). It is basically the only buff in the game with these different durations. I made it this way because I wanted to give something strong for the price of 3 Bonds, so I rised Intuitive duration alone a bit artificially. That's why I think having all durations harmonized would be a good thing. (I can keep the Intuitive after invisibility since it is slightly more interesting gameplay wise and adds some flexibility). Now that TLK is out of the equation, I could consider : - a 45s max invisibility - a 45s defensive buff - a 45s intuitive that starts only after invisibility (but is likely to end about the same time as defensive part in most cases). It would feel more or less neutral in term of balance, with still a quite long Intuitive. I could increase healing to 12 hp per 3s tick to round things up. This would be a Robust equivalent you'll get on your road to Intuitive (granted that Bonded Fury provides the Hardy part). 14 hours ago, Shai Hulud said: Agree. +20% damage is in effect going to be less than a 10% damage boost on any well-built ranger, since it is applied to base damage not total. I have implemented up to +30% as reviewed by Bosmer. It seems fair. I would still consider +20 all defense better in raw power, but : - the damages bonus synergizes better with the acc bonus for DPS. - it is ideal for any hybrid melee / ranged build. Gather some charges in melee then focus on ranged DPS - bonus damages is a more rare buff than all defenses (which is still somewhat rare). I don't remember a party buff to damages. - bonus damages is relatively more efficient with spells (for MC Ranger / Caster). For weapons, I use the same metric as you : +X% damages bonus = +X/2% multiplicative factor (even less for Rogues). For for spell, it is close from +X% multiplicative (bar MIG and a couple other). Edited March 3, 2023 by Elric Galad 2
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