When Does the Inquisitive Become. . .

[OfElectricMen]

This raging powerhouse of death dealing that necessitates nerfing?

I picked up the tree about a month ago, and have 4 characters using it, with different classes and the like, and so far, I'm not seeing it.

It's decent, but so far, it's not any better than a repeater Arty or a great-xbow mechanic. Actually, I would say it's a wee bit behind a solid repeater build.

Or is this one of those things that's only Bill Bad Butt when backed up with a ton of past lives, epic past lives, and reaper points? If so, then every discussion about it is moot since the game shouldn't be balanced around those conceits.

[HungarianRhapsody]

This raging powerhouse of death dealing that necessitates nerfing?

I picked up the tree about a month ago, and have 4 characters using it, with different classes and the like, and so far, I'm not seeing it.

It's decent, but so far, it's not any better than a repeater Arty or a great-xbow mechanic. Actually, I would say it's a wee bit behind a solid repeater build.

Or is this one of those things that's only Bill Bad Butt when backed up with a ton of past lives, epic past lives, and reaper points? If so, then every discussion about it is moot since the game shouldn't be balanced around those conceits.

Inquisitive is solid, but it's only the ridiculous monstrosity that people are fearing when it's in the hands of someone who has top tier gear and knows exactly how to tweak every little bit of DPS out of any build they're in. In other words, the people who will always be on the top of the heap no matter what build is top tier.

[zappy]

here is the problem. i have one, i have the reaper points but not the lives, it is incredibly powerful. it is fully geared and fully filigreed. the answer is no. SSG should not balance for me being one of the .1% that has over 100 reaper points. however, i went from being able to solo r7 or so on a great xbow build to being able to solo r10 just by using inquisitor. IT IS TOO POWERFUL.

if you look at the recent top raid completions on PN up to r7, every single DPS player is an inquisitor of some kind, if you look at the people that are zooming 1-20 lives, they are all sorc or inquisitor. its not d&d anymore, its inquisitors and sorcerers. this is bad for many reasons and changes are being made to even the top out. sorcs with dragon breath got a needed cooldown nerf. inquisitors will no longer be the top range DPS build bringing back some much needed variety

as far as to why you have 4 under performing inqusitors on live? did you take point blank shot, rapid shot, rapid reload, precise shot and improved precise shot as your feats? were you using a ratcatcher as your weapon from level 8-29 and using a sharn rage dps 3 piece set from level 15-29? if not give that a try to see what everyone is talking about.

[droid327]

Or is this one of those things that's only Bill Bad Butt when backed up with a ton of past lives, epic past lives, and reaper points? If so, then every discussion about it is moot since the game shouldn't be balanced around those conceits.

Yeah kinda - not so much PLs and EPLs, but it really jumps off the power curve at high-level endgame.

The thing that sets Inqui apart is its high ROF - far higher than even Repeaters were before it. That's a multiplicative channel that boosts everything else - alacrity, doubleshot, RP, and per-hit damage like Sneak and INT-to-dmg and Law die.

At cap, gear is hugely statflated, and combined with Epic/Scion feats and filigrees (which Artifacts give you more of). Then layer on any number of PLs as well. Combine those huge numbers with Inqui's ability to put out rapid fire hits, and it gets out of hand. However, leveling up and in any situation before you're running Legendary Reaper, you dont have that multiplicative statflation, and inqui is balanced just fine.

The sad thing is they seem to have managed to nerf Ranged builds overall but left Inqui the most unscathed among them, by letting it continue to do the things that it did best while nerfing things that other ranged styles relied more heavily on.

[HungarianRhapsody]

here is the problem. i have one, i have the reaper points but not the lives, it is incredibly powerful. it is fully geared and fully filigreed. the answer is no. SSG should not balance for me being one of the .1% that has over 100 reaper points. however, i went from being able to solo r7 or so on a great xbow build to being able to solo r10 just by using inquisitor. IT IS TOO POWERFUL.

If you can solo R7 without Inquisitive, I don't think you're the person that SSG should be balancing around.

Inquisitive is very good. It should be toned down a bit. The fact that someone like you can solo R10 isn't a reason to nerf it, though. I'm willing to bet that you'll still be able to solo at least R8 with whatever the current META is after this changeup.

[Chai]

here is the problem. i have one, i have the reaper points but not the lives, it is incredibly powerful. it is fully geared and fully filigreed. the answer is no. SSG should not balance for me being one of the .1% that has over 100 reaper points. however, i went from being able to solo r7 or so on a great xbow build to being able to solo r10 just by using inquisitor. IT IS TOO POWERFUL.

if you look at the recent top raid completions on PN up to r7, every single DPS player is an inquisitor of some kind, if you look at the people that are zooming 1-20 lives, they are all sorc or inquisitor. its not d&d anymore, its inquisitors and sorcerers. this is bad for many reasons and changes are being made to even the top out. sorcs with dragon breath got a needed cooldown nerf. inquisitors will no longer be the top range DPS build bringing back some much needed variety

as far as to why you have 4 under performing inqusitors on live? did you take point blank shot, rapid shot, rapid reload, precise shot and improved precise shot as your feats? were you using a ratcatcher as your weapon from level 8-29 and using a sharn rage dps 3 piece set from level 15-29? if not give that a try to see what everyone is talking about.

So the difference between soloing R7 on one thing and R10 on a different thing means the thing soloing R10 needs to cause a nerf of ALL RANGED COMBAT?

Not to mention needing to use one weapon, and a set, and EDs, all available to everyone. (much of the power is from other sources than the AP tree itself)

The feats youre talking about have been the ranged template for a straight decade at this point. If this person followed any ranged build template whatsoever they would have those. (AKA its not a secret, heh)

[Fivetigers33]

Inquisitive is solid, but it's only the ridiculous monstrosity that people are fearing when it's in the hands of someone who has top tier gear and knows exactly how to tweak every little bit of DPS out of any build they're in. In other words, the people who will always be on the top of the heap no matter what build is top tier.

It's actually not quite that hard.

I have a friend who has spent a lot of time on his main (assassin/vistani). He doesn't have the absolute best build/gear, but it's solid enough to lead kill counts in most R3 and lower LFMs he's in (I know, not the best dps measure by any means, but it's what DDO gave us).

He rolled up an alt to raid. Made a fighter inquisitive. I did some DPS tests with both his guys, and the alt inquisitive clearly out DPSed the main assassin/vistani toon by about 3k dps. My friend was ****ed lol.


Now he wasn't getting the crazy numbers that some people got, that does take what you described. But in terms of not really knowing all the best tips and tricks, you can make a well above average dps toon at 30 with little knowledge/effort.

[HungarianRhapsody]

It's actually not quite that hard.

I have a friend who has spent a lot of time on his main (assassin/vistani). He doesn't have the absolute best build/gear, but it's solid enough to lead kill counts in most R3 and lower LFMs he's in (I know, not the best dps measure by any means, but it's what DDO gave us).

He rolled up an alt to raid. Made a fighter inquisitive. I did some DPS tests with both his guys, and the alt inquisitive clearly out DPSed the main assassin/vistani toon by about 3k dps. My friend was ****ed lol.


Now he wasn't getting the crazy numbers that some people got, that does take what you described. But in terms of not really knowing all the best tips and tricks, you can make a well above average dps toon at 30 with little knowledge/effort.

I do think that's very true. You can make a solid character with not too much effort with Inquisitive. Other people who are good at building will beat you in DPS and utility and survivability with their build of choice, but just making a "merely" good Inquisitive is super simple. Which I think is the real problem that people have. It isn't that Inquisitive is "too good" at its best. It's that anyone can be good with Inquisitive. And that makes some people really, really mad.

[FlavoredSoul]

Inquisitive is top tier by default, first life no reaper points no gear required.

It becomes god tier at level 8 when you get ratcatcher (one of the most horribly broken weapons in the game) and combine it with inquisitive which is the most powerful dps tree in the game.

41 points in inquisitive (literally the rest don't matter, just grab rogue stuff or whatever helps ranged dps from the class split you have) and a ratcatcher stomps from mid heroics until elvel 29.

[FlavoredSoul]

I do think that's very true. You can make a solid character with not too much effort with Inquisitive. Other people who are good at building will beat you in DPS and utility and survivability with their build of choice, but just making a "merely" good Inquisitive is super simple. Which I think is the real problem that people have. It isn't that Inquisitive is "too good" at its best. It's that anyone can be good with Inquisitive. And that makes some people really, really mad.

No, the problem is two fold and you're ignoring the side that doesn't suit your narrative.

Inquisitive has a very high power floor AND and high power ceiling.

A random first lifer with zero reaper points can just slap on a ratcatcher and go inquisitive (class doesn't even matter, something gimpy like 11 sorc/4 druid/5 bard will still do good as an inquisitive) and it's already a B+ dps that crushes even optimized repeater and bow builds.

On the other hand when you actually optimize an inquisitive (like using a rogue based split) it's also the most broken dps in the game, literally outdpses every melee and ranged build except wolfs by a massive margin, except from ranged and with more utility.

"It's that anyone can be good with Inquisitive. And that makes some people really, really mad." This is you trying to reframe Inquisitive from being objectively overpowered into some kind of newb friendly build that all the uber elitists want nerfed out of pure malice, this falls apart when you realize that all those "elitists" are also playing inquisitive because it does double the sustained dps of the next best build.

[Chai]

No, the problem is two fold and you're ignoring the side that doesn't suit your narrative.

Inquisitive has a very high power floor AND and high power ceiling.

A random first lifer with zero reaper points can just slap on a ratcatcher and go inquisitive (class doesn't even matter, something gimpy like 11 sorc/4 druid/5 bard will still do good as an inquisitive) and it's already a B+ dps that crushes even optimized repeater and bow builds.

On the other hand when you actually optimize an inquisitive (like using a rogue based split) it's also the most broken dps in the game, literally outdpses every melee and ranged build except wolfs by a massive margin, except from ranged and with more utility.

"It's that anyone can be good with Inquisitive. And that makes some people really, really mad." This is you trying to reframe Inquisitive from being objectively overpowered into some kind of newb friendly build that all the uber elitists want nerfed out of pure malice, this falls apart when you realize that all those "elitists" are also playing inquisitive because it does double the sustained dps of the next best build.

When people frame it in terms of other people playing this OP build ruins my fun, we can conclude its not the same people playing the builds who are demanding the nerf.

The "its OP even when first life with zero progression in its underoos riding a zebra" cliche is posted in pretty much every nerf thread since bards. It wasnt true then, its not true now.

The nerf pushers are also ignoring how their demands resulted in nerfs of the rest of the ranged archetype, which is not overperforming, and some of which was actually underperforming pre nerf.

This is what happens when this stuff is demanded hand over fist in a completely subjective fashion using the same 5 year old cliches to the point where it polarizes the community. A scalpel is needed to make some adjustments and a grenade is lobbed in there instead.

[J-mann]

When people frame it in terms of other people playing this OP build ruins my fun, we can conclude its not the same people playing the builds who are demanding the nerf.

The "its OP even when first life with zero progression in its underoos riding a zebra" cliche is posted in pretty much every nerf thread since bards. It wasnt true then, its not true now.

The nerf pushers are also ignoring how their demands resulted in nerfs of the rest of the ranged archetype, which is not overperforming, and some of which was actually underperforming pre nerf.

This is what happens when this stuff is demanded hand over fist in a completely subjective fashion using the same 5 year old cliches to the point where it polarizes the community. A scalpel is needed to make some adjustments and a grenade is lobbed in there instead.

I fully believe that they likely over nerfed on Lama. That said inquisitive really needed a nerf, its combination of defense and offense is pretty broken and I and many other realized this in its first iteration on lama and told the dev's it would be so. On ips, it has always been too powerful imo, it's just that there wasnt many builds that could really demonstrate this before inquisitive. It simply stands to reason that you shouldn't get the same dos as you get st. Now instead of nerfing I think the buff to af would have been sufficient as long as ranged builds needed af to hit good st dps levels.

[Chai]

I fully believe that they likely over nerfed on Lama. That said inquisitive really needed a nerf, its combination of defense and offense is pretty broken and I and many other realized this in its first iteration on lama and told the dev's it would be so. On ips, it has always been too powerful imo, it's just that there wasnt many builds that could really demonstrate this before inquisitive. It simply stands to reason that you shouldn't get the same dos as you get st. Now instead of nerfing I think the buff to af would have been sufficient as long as ranged builds needed af to hit good st dps levels.

Anything with a repeater as well as fury shotters were demonstrating IPS power for many years. Add shuriken tossers in there as well later on.

Which ranged builds other than inquis needed to lose 20% DPS while in IPS mode? (this is the real issue here)

[Quikster]

No, the problem is two fold and you're ignoring the side that doesn't suit your narrative.

Inquisitive has a very high power floor AND and high power ceiling.

A random first lifer with zero reaper points can just slap on a ratcatcher and go inquisitive (class doesn't even matter, something gimpy like 11 sorc/4 druid/5 bard will still do good as an inquisitive) and it's already a B+ dps that crushes even optimized repeater and bow builds.

On the other hand when you actually optimize an inquisitive (like using a rogue based split) it's also the most broken dps in the game, literally outdpses every melee and ranged build except wolfs by a massive margin, except from ranged and with more utility.

"It's that anyone can be good with Inquisitive. And that makes some people really, really mad." This is you trying to reframe Inquisitive from being objectively overpowered into some kind of newb friendly build that all the uber elitists want nerfed out of pure malice, this falls apart when you realize that all those "elitists" are also playing inquisitive because it does double the sustained dps of the next best build.

First I will disclaim, I have played and optimized inquis to my play style/available power and it is hands down better than anything else.

You’re first statement is very tempered versus the nerf cry’s but I still think it’s overzelous. I’ve seen all ranger/rog inquis that couldn’t search for traps much less auto find. I’ve seen inquis with powerful level splits one shot constantly. It’s absolutely not an easy button. It’s an easier button. People that know the game and how to play, those are the crazy dps vids you see. 75+ reaper points, multiple triple completionist,everyslot optimized, and likely a few slots cheezed.

The average player finally had a way to contribute. And here is the crux of the problem. How can ssg let the new or average player feel like they are helping, and rope them into the game, without making the top players feel like their balls have been cut off?

[Iriale]

First I will disclaim, I have played and optimized inquis to my play style/available power and it is hands down better than anything else.

You’re first statement is very tempered versus the nerf cry’s but I still think it’s overzelous. I’ve seen all ranger/rog inquis that couldn’t search for traps much less auto find. I’ve seen inquis with powerful level splits one shot constantly. It’s absolutely not an easy button. It’s an easier button. People that know the game and how to play, those are the crazy dps vids you see. 75+ reaper points, multiple triple completionist,everyslot optimized, and likely a few slots cheezed.

The average player finally had a way to contribute. And here is the crux of the problem. How can ssg let the new or average player feel like they are helping, and rope them into the game, without making the top players feel like their balls have been cut off?

You're focusing poorly. Yes, the inquisitive is such a good tree that allows underdeveloped characters to compete as you get excellent results with little investment, but this is not a conspiracy of the devs to placate players with more OP characters. Rather, it is the result of a bad economic policy that has been managed even worse and is now out of control. Your previous statement is much more accurate, because yes, that is where the real problem is.

What do I mean? That SSG has gone crazy with the stackable benefits it has given to PLs and reaper trees. There have been too many benefits stackable on the same character, benefits that cost a lot of time to obtain (especially for players with weaker characters, which are those that start from below and with less knowledge and gear to accelerate the race). I continually read in these forums that the benefits of past / reaper lives do not matter, that viable characters can be made without them, but oh friends, they matter, and matter much more than an op tree like the inquisitive.

It is precisely on outlier platforms like the inquisitive when you see how much they matter. In the hands of a player without powergamer knowledge, the inquisitive varies from being simply a good tree that allows them to be decent to a tree that allows them to be competitive with characters with many more past lives / reaper points than they in other builds (according to the player skill / character development degree). But in the hands of a player with powergamer knowledge and a veteran character with a lot of past lives / reaper points, the tree becomes a powermonster capable of destroying content.

I have enough powergamer knowledge, although I don't enjoy it too much by putting it into play. I have been playing third edition since it was released and I know the ins and outs of how to combine small bonuses so that they act multiplicatively instead of additively. So when people in this forum tell me that 12 (14 with tomes) racial action points do not make a big difference, I laugh, I laugh in the face of people's ignorance. People who say that do not know what can be done with 14 more points, the possibilities of creating combos grow significantly, and also allow you to have all the important dps bonuses and also buy defensive bonuses for which you would not have points but . Similarly, having many reaper points provides very important survival bonuses without losing offensive capabilities.

I have played inquisitive in my main with all bells and whistles, and I felt the build as a powehouse. In my weakest alt, however, the feeling was of glass cannon: yes, high dps, but the toon was fragile and not OP.

What I mean, Quikster, OfElectricMen, is that yes, the inquisitive is an outiler tree, more powerful than any other ranged style. But that only becomes authentically OP (in terms of destabilizing the game) in the hands of the player with powergamer knowledge that also has a character developed enough to face the weaknesses of this type of builds (defense) (I also doubt some claims that have made certain members of the community in this forum, I think that their statements have a significant degree of exaggeration for bragging rights, wanting to boast how good they are in r10 ... I would like to see a video of them proving those claims, already)

In my opinion, it is ironic that the devs are charging not only against the inquisitive but against all ranged styles when the true imbalance in this game is given by a game model that gives such cumulative rewards that creates an impassable abyss between those who have and those who do not have. The current degree of accumulation of past lives and reaper points is the most OP that this game currently has, and that they will not touch. And for this, believe me, as soon as this update comes to live, the powergamers will find another combo, and the differences will continue exactly the same as now.

I have to point out that Turbine had the same economic model, but they handled it better than SSG. Turbine's old team did not allow so many stackable bonuses and favoured horizontal growth instead of vertical (aka, alts). Thus, there was a difference between the toons they had and did not have (and bought and did not buy), but It was not so big, so the imbalances were minor, and at some point, even negligible and erased by the gear. Turbine began derailing with the current SSG team in front of the development, so... I only can hope SSG will stop accumulating bonuses on a single character and favour the creation of alts. They should not let the difference grow further, because the differences have already reached a scandalous point.

But, as it has been seen with the recent introduction of 12 more EPLs, that is not their intention, so, my friends, expect balance problems to be enlarged even more with the time, and do not be surprised when SSG passes with a hammer to crush nonexistent problems instead of acting with surgical precision eliminating what really creates the problems. Ranged as a whole does not need nerfs (in fact, certain styles need a buff), and the inquisitive needs adjustments, yes, but not a thermonuclear bomb on the tree. And what the game really needs is to review this difference in power between those who have and those who do not have, in addition to reviewing the side consequences of having altered the D&D rules with the creation of the reaper ruleset.

And if some melee player believes that his problems with the style will disappear because the ranged are having a nerf, he deserves a good laugh from the rest of the community. Because their problems do not lie in another style, oh no, but in something very different.

[MistaMagic]

41 points in inquisitive (literally the rest don't matter, just grab rogue stuff or whatever helps ranged dps from the class split you have) and a ratcatcher stomps from mid heroics until elvel 29.

I would disagree here as I have a ratcatcher and its on a Mule

[MistaMagic]

"It's that anyone can be good with Inquisitive.

Being Good at something does not mean you are Excellent. To many people running Inquisitive that THINK they are good when in fact all they are is better than what they were before

[Kutalp]

Inquisit0r tree is awesome. Very well crafted. (Especially the diplomacy skill twist !)

The only downside about it was empowering a weapon/style to the extremes when that weapon and style was allready the strongest weapon/style at DDO.


The Inquisitve enhancement tree would get more love if it worked for all other weapons and styles and not for cbows.

[Iriale]

Being Good at something does not mean you are Excellent. To many people running Inquisitive that THINK they are good when in fact all they are is better than what they were before

Right. What I say in my post. If you want to be excellent with the inquisitive, you need enough powergamer knowledge to build the build with all multiplicative synergies and a platform with enough base strength (i.e., a toon with enough past lives / reaper points to get the most out of the tree)

In truth the inquisitive is not the only outlier tool in the game, and there are a few (some for melees) as good as this one, but, like the warlock in the past, this is useful for toons with less investment (the most of the others are not), so it is much more obvious than other equally synergistic numbers

[Ausdoerrt]

The average player finally had a way to contribute. And here is the crux of the problem. How can ssg let the new or average player feel like they are helping, and rope them into the game, without making the top players feel like their balls have been cut off?

It would be nice if the game allowed newer / less powergamey players to contribute properly withough forcing them into a specific tree / class / archetype.

It's one thing if some classes / builds are easier to play / gear for a new player than others. It's another one where you basically HAVE to build a certain way or fall back so far behind you're pretty much piking every group.