2.0 Chanter Changes

[Panserbjorn]

I'm abit concerned about chanes to Chanters coming in 2.0. Namely due to two factors:

 

Attributes, Abilities, Spells, and Skills

• Changed Perception bonus from Deflection to Accuracy.

 

 

Gameplay

• Chanter invocations now have durations.

 

 

The Off-tank Summoner type character is a fairly popular way of building a Chanter. It sems to me that the hit to deflection from the Perception change will affect off-tanks more than pure-tank fighters due to the more limited ability of off-tanks in general to boost their deflection.

 

So it seems that 2.0 will bring a possible reduction in Chanter defense.

 

Invocations having a duration would indicate a limit on the lifespan of Chanter summons. For most Chanter off-tanks types, their summons are a huge component of their damage potential and all-round usefulness.

 

So it seems that 2.0 wil bring a possible reduction in Chanter damage.

 

I'm not sure I understand why these changes are being implemented. Are Chanters that powerful that they require doublehit reductions to both damage and defense?

 

I'm also curious as to how long these summon durations actually are? Can anyone using the beta client post on these durations?

 

Are there any compensating feats, talents, skills or mechanics? For example, having say, a 30sec cap on summon lifespan, but allowing more than one summon out at a time would possibly be compensatory, or having a feat that made the summon combat-long would be non-ideal but still not quite as ardous.

 

[evilcat]

Perception change affects everyone. Tanks or offtans in the same way and even interupt builds.

 

If the change applies to all summons (from items as well) its ok then. Mabe the timmer will be 60 sec which will be like whole fight, or summons will die from dmg in that time anyway.

 

It dosnt matter if build is popular or not, there should always be variety of possible builds.

Summoning from chanter is worth one item slot,  spending a whole party slot for that is ok in single player game if someone enjoys that, but there are other options more useful.

Being able to summon ogres after 20 sec of combat have drawback of fight being already controled by blast abilities of real casters.

 

Generally chanters are second tier class. Playable but not impressive. Perception change does not influence them. And summon timer is a nerf but dosnt matter. The class will remain in second league.

 

In patch notes is written summon timer is for both item and chanter summons, so it is general change to summons being less important, and cant do exeption for chanters.

Edited August 9, 2015 by evilcat

[alexis13]

Ah well thats 8 points I can put into something else I guess *shrug* still Id prefere perception not to be changed.

[Gary1986]

 

 

I'm also curious as to how long these summon durations actually are? Can anyone using the beta client post on these durations?

 

 

 

I believe its 20 seconds (for figurines its 20 seconds, so im guessing it'll be the same for chanter summons)

[HoopleDoople]

I haven't tried the beta patch yet but I assume Chanters will be even more irrelevant than they are now. The Perception change allows for increased DPS and more reliable CC, while reducing tank potential. This would presumably punish a slower combat that heavily utilizes tanks and summons, making it far harder for the Chanter to reach his higher level invocations. The supposedly improved AI might draw combat out a bit longer, but unless enemies are better at preventing and avoiding CC it probably won't make much of a difference.

[Panserbjorn]

 

I believe its 20 seconds (for figurines its 20 seconds, so im guessing it'll be the same for chanter summons)

 

 

That's...very unfortunate. It means, especially with higher level phrases, that you have to choose either between summons OR utility invocations, and can't use both if you want to maintain your summon.

 

This may be intentional, but I find it inexplicable as the invocations aren't exactly game-breakingly powerful.

[Boeroer]

Do your fights last longer than 30 seconds? 3 chants at 3 seconds each plus 20 seconds duration seems ok for me. In mid- to endgame the summons die way earlier anyways. I think they wanted to nerf the abuse of summons - for example with 6 chanters you could summon an army, let one puny enemy live that punched effordlessly at your tank while your summons roamed the area till every enemy was dead. Still doable, but requires more management now.

[Panserbjorn]

Do your fights last longer than 30 seconds? 3 chants at 3 seconds each plus 20 seconds duration seems ok for me. In mid- to endgame the summons die way earlier anyways. I think they wanted to nerf the abuse of summons - for example with 6 chanters you could summon an army, let one puny enemy live that punched effordlessly at your tank while your summons roamed the area till every enemy was dead. Still doable, but requires more management now.

 

 Which one of your chants ticks at 3 seconds? From my understanding, level 1 chants are a minimum of 4 seconds?

 

I'm not going to say that fights last longer than 30 seconds. But throwing a 'nerf' after a bad mechanic hardly seems like the way to fix things.

 

I actually agree with you...they do seem to be wanting to reduce the power of 6 chanter parties. The thing is though, they seem to be doing so by making single chanters...ineffective? Curtailing a very esoteric playstyle by making the 'normal' playstyle ineffectual seems abit...illogical.

 

 

[evilcat]

They are nerfing duration of all summons including items. And it has merits since rotating summons from items could be more important than class you play.

Chanter gets shot in the process, since otherwise it would be unfair or troublesome.

They may add chanter talent "Bind Spirit: Summon duracion last twice as long." to make everyone happy.

 

In fact they could any talent/chant/invocation for chanters to make them interesting to play.

 

It is funny, since multiclass talent Summon Sceletors suits Chanters so well. Now they could do something at the start of combat. Wow. But then every caster can do that, and after that we are back at starting point.

[Panserbjorn]

I'm also curious as to how long these summon durations actually are? Can anyone using the beta client post on these durations?

 

Just to answer my own question, I finally got around to installing the beta client.

 

The current beta duration of Level 1 summons is 20 seconds, the duration of Level 2 summons is 25 seconds. I've only been able to load a mid-level game so far, but I have not seen any new Chanter abilities that compensate for the summon durations.

 

Just as a side note, Ancient Memory/Beloved Spirits is unchanged (i.e. still fairly negligible)

 

I'm not entirely sure what to make of Chanters at the moment as I still find the changes to their utility inexplicable. If the aim really was to reduce the power of 6-chanter-summoning-map-clearers, I'm not sure that this has actually been fulfilled. It's still entirely possible to just sit back and *only* summon...the ones whom this change affects most are single Chanter parties who now have to do summon-utility-summon-utlity casting instead of summon-utility-utility-utility type patterns...which is once again fine except I just don't think Chanters were that over-powered to begin with, and their utility invocations were not that amazing that now being only able to use them half as much still allows Chanters to be a contributing team member...assuming the fights last long enough anyway. I don't know...will be interesting to see where Chanters are going exactly...

 

 

 

I do also find it interesting that Druid Spiritshift seems have had a massive boost to its usefulness especially since Druids were already a fairly powerful class.

[Panserbjorn]

Just as abit of an addendum, in the beta patch, Intelligence does not extend the duration of the summons.

 

Unsurprisingly, I think it should. Possibly a beta bug, but I doubt it.

[Raven Darkholme]

Just as abit of an addendum, in the beta patch, Intelligence does not extend the duration of the summons.

 

Unsurprisingly, I think it should. Possibly a beta bug, but I doubt it.

Have you testetd the effect of Survival?

Edit: Oh, nvm I was thinking figurines for some reason.

Edited August 18, 2015 by Raven Darkholme