U82 Preview 1 - Ranged Adjustments

[Lotoc]

Hello! One of the goals in this Update is to bring some better balance to the Ranged Weapon ecosystem. At the moment, the state of Ranged Weapon builds seems to break down to:

• Crossbow builds are overperforming relative to other Ranged builds, and we have a constant problem point in Endless Fusillade/No Holds Barred, where it impacts performance and represents too much of the DPS percentage to do meaningful balance in other ways.
• Bow builds have been in a state where we've been buffing their raw power, but their attack speed is low and their builds are significantly less powerful than Crossbow or Shuriken builds.
• Thrown Weapon builds are dominated by Monk Shuriken builds, which are significantly stronger than all other thrown builds and punching above their weight in the overall DPS ecosystem.

As a result, we're targeting the following changes in this Balance Pass. Please note that this is not 100% complete, as we are still testing exact speeds and numbers to try and bring these builds closer to each other. The goal is not perfect equivalence across all of these styles and builds, but to bring the outliers closer together and put Ranged in a good spot relative to Melees and Spellcasters.

• Longbow/Shortbow:
  • The Base Attack Bonus speed scale for Bows has been rebuilt by adding a baseline bonus to speed equal across all levels, making Longbow and Shortbow attacks significantly faster across all levels.
  • Manyshot now deals +2 Critical Threat Range and Multiplier (was 1)
  • Scattershot (in Horizon Walker) now deals +2 Critical Threat Range and Multiplier (was 1)
  • Manyshot and Scattershot no longer have charges, and instead share an 8-second cooldown. (There’s still one or two other sources of Manyshot Charges out there - let us know what you’d like them replaced with.)
  • Horizon (Core 6 Horizon Walker) no longer grants Manyshot charges, and instead grants +10 Ranged Power.
  • Combat Archery (Epic Feat) now grants Longbows and Shortbows an additional +1 Critical Threat Range in addition to its other effects.
• Crossbows:
  • Endless Fusilade and No Holds Barred are removed entirely. They are replaced with the below single-shot, low-cooldown, high-damage attacks.
  • Battle Engineer's Endless Fusillade replaced with Engine Volley: Crossbow Ranged Attack: +400% Damage, +1 Threat Range, +1 Multiplier. 6 second cooldown.
    • See the Enhancement Changes thread for further changes to Battle Engineer
  • Inquisitive's No Holds Barred is replaced with Take 'em Down: +400% Damage, +1 Threat Range, +1 Multiplier. 6 second cooldown.
  • Damage on Rogue Mechanic’s Line Up and Sit Down is increased to +400%.
  • Engine Volley, Take 'em Down, and Line Up and Sit Down now share a cooldown.
• Thrown:
  • We'd initially approached the Shuriken DPS outlier as an issue with 10k Stars, but as we dug further, its superior DPS over other Thrown builds comes down to Ninja Spy Core 2. In addition, the thrown experience at low levels is considered pretty slow. As a result:
  • Advanced Ninja Training (Core 2, Monk Ninja Spy) has its Shuriken bonus to Doubleshot based on your Dexterity cap at a maximum of 50 Dex.
  • Poisoned Coating (Core 2, Vile Chemist) gains the above bonus to Doubleshot based on your Dexterity (with 50 cap), except with Simple Throwers instead of Shuriken.
    • Simple Thrown Mastery (T4, Vile Chemist) allows that bonus to Doubleshot based on your Dexterity to use INT instead if it is higher.
  • Whirling Wrists in Shiradi Champion no longer grants 30% Attack Speed with Thrown Weapons, and instead grants +1/2/3 to Critical Confirmation and Damage.
  • The attack speed bonus from Base Attack Bonus on Thrown Weapons has been raised by 30% at all levels.

There are certainly other oddities and standouts within Ranged, and we may be able to accommodate smaller ones if they can fit into the time we have for this pass.

Let us know what you think here!

People are gonna hate me for this but you really do not need to nerf simple thrown mastery.
Ninja spy is an issue of having both the Shuriken Mastery feat and Advanced Ninja training at the same time, giving an additional 2 shots at 100 dex between them, if you do the nerfs to shuriken this way (leaving out Shuriken mastery) and punish simple thrown weapon mastery by tangent you're just reinforcing the gap between other throwers and Shurikens even worse because you're basically overall nerfing shuriken half as much as you're nerfing simple.

Edit: my fault for reading these notes at 4AM, this is adding a 50% extra shot chance to alchemist, the Simple Thrown Weapon Expertise and Shuriken Expertise feats seem to be completely untouched.

 

[Burtle]

Hello! One of the goals in this Update is to bring some better balance to the Ranged Weapon ecosystem. At the moment, the state of Ranged Weapon builds seems to break down to:

• Crossbow builds are overperforming relative to other Ranged builds, and we have a constant problem point in Endless Fusillade/No Holds Barred, where it impacts performance and represents too much of the DPS percentage to do meaningful balance in other ways.
• Bow builds have been in a state where we've been buffing their raw power, but their attack speed is low and their builds are significantly less powerful than Crossbow or Shuriken builds.
• Thrown Weapon builds are dominated by Monk Shuriken builds, which are significantly stronger than all other thrown builds and punching above their weight in the overall DPS ecosystem.

As a result, we're targeting the following changes in this Balance Pass. Please note that this is not 100% complete, as we are still testing exact speeds and numbers to try and bring these builds closer to each other. The goal is not perfect equivalence across all of these styles and builds, but to bring the outliers closer together and put Ranged in a good spot relative to Melees and Spellcasters.

• Longbow/Shortbow:
  • The Base Attack Bonus speed scale for Bows has been rebuilt by adding a baseline bonus to speed equal across all levels, making Longbow and Shortbow attacks significantly faster across all levels.
  • Manyshot now deals +2 Critical Threat Range and Multiplier (was 1)
  • Scattershot (in Horizon Walker) now deals +2 Critical Threat Range and Multiplier (was 1)
  • Manyshot and Scattershot no longer have charges, and instead share an 8-second cooldown. (There’s still one or two other sources of Manyshot Charges out there - let us know what you’d like them replaced with.)
  • Horizon (Core 6 Horizon Walker) no longer grants Manyshot charges, and instead grants +10 Ranged Power.
  • Combat Archery (Epic Feat) now grants Longbows and Shortbows an additional +1 Critical Threat Range in addition to its other effects.
• Crossbows:
  • Endless Fusilade and No Holds Barred are removed entirely. They are replaced with the below single-shot, low-cooldown, high-damage attacks.
  • Battle Engineer's Endless Fusillade replaced with Engine Volley: Crossbow Ranged Attack: +400% Damage, +1 Threat Range, +1 Multiplier. 6 second cooldown.
    • See the Enhancement Changes thread for further changes to Battle Engineer
  • Inquisitive's No Holds Barred is replaced with Take 'em Down: +400% Damage, +1 Threat Range, +1 Multiplier. 6 second cooldown.
  • Damage on Rogue Mechanic’s Line Up and Sit Down is increased to +400%.
  • Engine Volley, Take 'em Down, and Line Up and Sit Down now share a cooldown.
• Thrown:
  • We'd initially approached the Shuriken DPS outlier as an issue with 10k Stars, but as we dug further, its superior DPS over other Thrown builds comes down to Ninja Spy Core 2. In addition, the thrown experience at low levels is considered pretty slow. As a result:
  • Advanced Ninja Training (Core 2, Monk Ninja Spy) has its Shuriken bonus to Doubleshot based on your Dexterity cap at a maximum of 50 Dex.
  • Poisoned Coating (Core 2, Vile Chemist) gains the above bonus to Doubleshot based on your Dexterity (with 50 cap), except with Simple Throwers instead of Shuriken.
    • Simple Thrown Mastery (T4, Vile Chemist) allows that bonus to Doubleshot based on your Dexterity to use INT instead if it is higher.
  • Whirling Wrists in Shiradi Champion no longer grants 30% Attack Speed with Thrown Weapons, and instead grants +1/2/3 to Critical Confirmation and Damage.
  • The attack speed bonus from Base Attack Bonus on Thrown Weapons has been raised by 30% at all levels.

There are certainly other oddities and standouts within Ranged, and we may be able to accommodate smaller ones if they can fit into the time we have for this pass.

Let us know what you think here!

so.. taking away ranged full auto is supposed to be balance.. more like "oh look.. the ranged rogue or ranger is out dps'd the caster...let's nerf them to nothing other than a *plink, plink, plink* ... and let the caster be king once again.. cause ALL HAIL THE CASTERS... "... yea.. no thanks..

 

[ShawnVW]

I don't care whether Engine Volley is more or less effective than Endless Fusillade. The latter was just more fun. Why choose between a Great Crossbow and a Repeating Crossbow when you can have a Repeating Great Crossbow?

 

[Burtle]

@SteelStar sorry but this is a giant copout. As someone who has played arguably as long as you have worked on this game I have witnessed developers gaslight or nerf players anytime they can’t fix something with the game.
I remember the 2 weapon DPS nerf bat because our dwarven axes were doing too much damage. I’ve witnessed our systems being gaslit as creating lag, I’ve seen casters squashed, I’ve seen stats squashed all because of developers unable to fix the spaghetti code.
It’s not DPS breaking the game, it’s SSG refusing to spend the resources needed because it cuts into the profit of a game at its end of life cycle.
Call it what it is but stop penalizing players after putting hours and money into builds we enjoy.

Nailed it

 

[Gavaleus]

Just need throwers auto-attack speed to be the same as mouse-click spam instead of the current 20%(?) difference in rate of fire. Shouldn't need to depend on an auto-clicker to have competitive damage.

This, absolutely. The same happens with nearly all melee styles, too, to varying degrees. Unarmed while standing still and Handwraps while moving can gain around 30% dps just from spam clicking. Two handed styles can gain ~11-14% dps, and pretty much every other style benefits ~3-4% or so.

 

[Oliphant]

Just need throwers auto-attack speed to be the same as mouse-click spam instead of the current 20%(?) difference in rate of fire. Shouldn't need to depend on an auto-clicker to have competitive damage.

Yes, this weird animation slowdown when you hold is not good.

 

[knightime]

While it may look that way on paper, the combination of the whole of Bow changes - especially the large increase in attack speed at all levels - means Bow builds will be doing significantly more DPS than before, even with this change. And especially outside a DPS test window, where you're likely to have enough Manyshot charges to burst down a single for. Less of the DPS is contained in this one set of buttons' burst, and more of it is now in general, sustained damage.

I'm curious to see peoples' responses who have tested the changes.

Most of my builds are some sort of longbow build, it's just my preferred playstyle. Please reconsider the 8 second cooldown, and also a rework of the AA tree.

Also, I can't believe the number of posts complaining about the nerfs after ranting for months about nerfing these builds. You get what you ask for.
Also, I never asked for any of this.

 

[Eleron]

Cooldown reduction for Manyshot / Scattershot would be nice.

Bold move, Cotton, let's go to the comments to see how the community takes it.

I get why its current form is seen as too powerful and about to be rendered redundant by the inherent attack speed buff, but surely you could add something worthier of tier 4 Shiradi, like a Doubleshot bonus?

It should be separated from imbue. +3 critical hits, and damage cannot compete with +3 imbue dice in a tree that gives you more damage as you increase your imbue dice.

 

[cdbd3rd]

My favorite game, rearrange/redo the trees on my pure Arty, non-min/max/multi'd main. Again.

Always feels like:

I'll lurk the thread continuing to leave her parked by the Mimic and see how this all pools out.

 

[Jaspar]

My favorite game, rearrange/redo the trees on my pure Arty, non-min/max/multi'd main. Again.

Always feels like:

I'll lurk the thread continuing to leave her parked by the Mimic and see how this all pools out.

If youre an arty with fusilade and expanded clip then you by default were maxed

 

[Fnordian]

• Crossbows:
  • Endless Fusilade and No Holds Barred are removed entirely.

:(

 

[Underflow]

Coolio, so goodbye monks, hello Vistani Alch throwers, who have gotten +50% doubleshot out of this update.

Edit: At the very least, I don't need to care about 10k stars any more.

 

[Natashaelle]

While it may look that way on paper, the combination of the whole of Bow changes - especially the large increase in attack speed at all levels - means Bow builds will be doing significantly more DPS than before, even with this change. And especially outside a DPS test window, where you're likely to have enough Manyshot charges to burst down a single for. Less of the DPS is contained in this one set of buttons' burst, and more of it is now in general, sustained damage.

I'm curious to see peoples' responses who have tested the changes.

I haven't, though on paper the changes look good -- but could some of the former +1 manyshot charge enhancements instead shorten the manyshot cooldown ?

 

[VinoeWhines]

Crossbows:

• Endless Fusilade and No Holds Barred are removed entirely. They are replaced with the below single-shot, low-cooldown, high-damage attacks.
• Battle Engineer's Endless Fusillade replaced with Engine Volley: Crossbow Ranged Attack: +400% Damage, +1 Threat Range, +1 Multiplier. 6 second cooldown.
  • See the Enhancement Changes thread for further changes to Battle Engineer
• Inquisitive's No Holds Barred is replaced with Take 'em Down: +400% Damage, +1 Threat Range, +1 Multiplier. 6 second cooldown.
• Damage on Rogue Mechanic’s Line Up and Sit Down is increased to +400%.
• Engine Volley, Take 'em Down, and Line Up and Sit Down now share a cooldown.

Being that Great Crossbow is slower than Bow, it should get the same buffs included in what Bows get with the Range Feats.

Repeater Crossbows(Artis) and Inquisitive Double Crossbows were the ones that got the main DPS boost with Endless Fusilade and Extended Clip.

Mechanic Rogues are getting no improvements to Great Crossbow slow attack speed and non rune arm benefits and that is why them getting similar boosts to Bow (added bonus' to Feats) should be included.

Feats such as...

• Rapid Shot: (Longbows and Shortbows, Great Crossbows you also gain Ranged Power equal to 1.5x your Base Attack Bonus.

And other bonus' that Bows get as they are both Single Shot attacks.

Bows get boosted with Horizon Walker as well with Improved Archers Focus (Tier III Horizon Walker) and that should be in Mechanics Tree Tier III as well (can easily swap that out instead of low performing

	Use Magical Device: +[1/2/3] Use Magic Device (Tier III) instead: Mechanic's Focus: If Archer's Focus is enabled, remaining stationary for 6 seconds grants you 1d4+4 stacks of Archer's Focus. This can trigger once per time you remain stationary.
AP Cost: 1	Ranks: 3	Progression: 10

You could also bring down Ooze Flask to Tier II, since there is nothing above Tier I's: Thunderstone (and it naturally fits above Tier I Thunderstone) so that:

Tier III instead gets in balance with Tier III's Battle Engineers:(to give an AOE as well)
Shatter Defenses (Crossbow): AOE Tactical Ranged Crossbow Attack: Deals +[10/30/50]% Damage. Fire your Crossbow, hitting every enemy in an area around where the shot hits. This attack can fire as many shots as you Crossbow fires normally. On Hit: Reduces the target's Armor Class by 5 and lowers fortification by 10%. A successful Fortitude save negates this effect. (DC 10 + INT mod + half Artificer level + Sunder Bonuses). Regardless of saving throw result target will suffer the Trauma effect, -3 penalty to Fortitude saves due to shock, stacks 5 times. Lasts 24 seconds. This ability shares a cooldown with Sunder.

• Thrown:
  • We'd initially approached the Shuriken DPS outlier as an issue with 10k Stars, but as we dug further, its superior DPS over other Thrown builds comes down to Ninja Spy Core 2. In addition, the thrown experience at low levels is considered pretty slow. As a result:
  • Advanced Ninja Training (Core 2, Monk Ninja Spy) has its Shuriken bonus to Doubleshot based on your Dexterity cap at a maximum of 50 Dex.
  • Poisoned Coating (Core 2, Vile Chemist) gains the above bonus to Doubleshot based on your Dexterity (with 50 cap), except with Simple Throwers instead of Shuriken.
    • Simple Thrown Mastery (T4, Vile Chemist) allows that bonus to Doubleshot based on your Dexterity to use INT instead if it is higher.
  • Whirling Wrists in Shiradi Champion no longer grants 30% Attack Speed with Thrown Weapons, and instead grants +1/2/3 to Critical Confirmation and Damage.
  • The attack speed bonus from Base Attack Bonus on Thrown Weapons has been raised by 30% at all levels.

There are certainly other oddities and standouts within Ranged, and we may be able to accommodate smaller ones if they can fit into the time we have for this pass.

Let us know what you think here!

Throwing Daggers are far behind Ninja Spy as there is nothing that comes close (as a Shuri/Dart throwers) to having Double Shot and Range Power in Throwing Daggers (especially Intelligence based builds using Throwing Daggers).

Assassin Rogue lost it's only range weapon in Shortbows (in it's Tree) as it got removed but never replaced with Throwing Daggers, as it's Thematic with it's Daggers in the Tree.

This could be put there as a replacement to the removed Shortbow that was there before and out of nowhere just was removed, and could pair with Shadow Dagger(that as of now does just about no damage at all with its Unholy Damage).

Shadow Dagger could be an AOE Crowd Control attack instead. (similar to other AOE crowd control attacks: Greater Color Spray, Dragon's Roar but with Assassinate as it's DC.)

Simple Thrown Mastery (T4, Vile Chemist) allows that bonus to Doubleshot based on your Dexterity to use INT instead if it is higher.

This could be in Assassin Tree (Tier IV or Core IV) as Assassin uses Intelligence in its Tree as well.

 

[Jaspar]

Being that Great Crossbow is slower than Bow, it should get the same buffs included in what Bows get with the Range Feats.

Repeater Crossbows(Artis) and Inquisitive Double Crossbows were the ones that got the main DPS boost with Endless Fusilade and Extended Clip.

Mechanic Rogues are getting no improvements to Great Crossbow slow attack speed and non rune arm benefits and that is why them getting similar boosts to Bow (added bonus' to Feats) should be included.

Feats such as...

• Rapid Shot: (Longbows and Shortbows, Great Crossbows you also gain Ranged Power equal to 1.5x your Base Attack Bonus.

And other bonus' that Bows get as they are both Single Shot attacks.

Bows get boosted with Horizon Walker as well with Improved Archers Focus (Tier III Horizon Walker) and that should be in Mechanics Tree Tier III as well (can easily swap that out instead of low performing

	Use Magical Device: +[1/2/3] Use Magic Device (Tier III) instead: Mechanic's Focus: If Archer's Focus is enabled, remaining stationary for 6 seconds grants you 1d4+4 stacks of Archer's Focus. This can trigger once per time you remain stationary.
AP Cost: 1	Ranks: 3	Progression: 10

You could also bring down Ooze Flask to Tier II, since there is nothing above Tier I's: Thunderstone (and it naturally fits above Tier I Thunderstone) so that:

Tier III instead gets in balance with Tier III's Battle Engineers:(to give an AOE as well)
Shatter Defenses (Crossbow): AOE Tactical Ranged Crossbow Attack: Deals +[10/30/50]% Damage. Fire your Crossbow, hitting every enemy in an area around where the shot hits. This attack can fire as many shots as you Crossbow fires normally. On Hit: Reduces the target's Armor Class by 5 and lowers fortification by 10%. A successful Fortitude save negates this effect. (DC 10 + INT mod + half Artificer level + Sunder Bonuses). Regardless of saving throw result target will suffer the Trauma effect, -3 penalty to Fortitude saves due to shock, stacks 5 times. Lasts 24 seconds. This ability shares a cooldown with Sunder.




Throwing Daggers are far behind Ninja Spy as there is nothing that comes close (as a Shuri/Dart throwers) to having Double Shot and Range Power in Throwing Daggers (especially Intelligence based builds using Throwing Daggers).

Assassin Rogue lost it's only range weapon in Shortbows (in it's Tree) as it got removed but never replaced with Throwing Daggers, as it's Thematic with it's Daggers in the Tree.

This could be put there as a replacement to the removed Shortbow that was there before and out of nowhere just was removed, and could pair with Shadow Dagger(that as of now does just about no damage at all with its Unholy Damage).

Shadow Dagger could be an AOE Crowd Control attack instead. (similar to other AOE crowd control attacks: Greater Color Spray, Dragon's Roar but with Assassinate as it's DC.)



This could be in Assassin Tree (Tier IV or Core IV) as Assassin uses Intelligence in its Tree as well.

I think the big problem with bow and great xbow remains the lack of AOE. Paladin bow users are probably loving these changes - they get a heap more raw power plus have their KOTC AOE, but Ranger and Dark Hunter really get no AOE.

And Mechanic GXB users went Arty 4 not just for Fusilade, but also for Shatter Defences.

 

[Teh_Troll]

Most of my builds are some sort of longbow build, it's just my preferred playstyle. Please reconsider the 8 second cooldown, and also a rework of the AA tree.

Also, I can't believe the number of posts complaining about the nerfs after ranting for months about nerfing these builds. You get what you ask for.
Also, I never asked for any of this.

I get what you're saying, but after seeing how much faster bows shoot now I can't say it's needed.

 

[VinoeWhines]

I think the big problem with bow and great xbow remains the lack of AOE. Paladin bow users are probably loving these changes - they get a heap more raw power plus have their KOTC AOE, but Ranger and Dark Hunter really get no AOE.

And Mechanic GXB users went Arty 4 not just for Fusilade, but also for Shatter Defences.

Yes many went 4 Arty but for the 20 Rogue Class having a Mechanics Focus = "Improved Archers Focus"(see above) and a Shattered Defense in its Tree would at least raise the low floor of Mechanic Trees low damage and lack of AOE damage.

 

[Tharkeen]

Finally. Very much looking forward to this. My only complaint is that there are buffs in there as well. My dream scenario is that everything in the game is nerfed down to the level of the worst performing class/role/fighting style/whatever there is (and tbh probably even more). Maybe, just maybe, then r10 would not be the new Normal difficulty, and the devs would not have to introduce Super Duper Gigachad mode to keep up with the power creep.

 

[Falroth]

Other than people having to rebuild chars, learn new rotations and playstyles, and possibly ER/TR into something different, these are great changes.

 

[mikarddo]

Yep, any melee build that could get to 200% DS is suddenly twice as powerful, which is ahead of any of the other changes.

200% DS is not twice as powerful but 1.5 times as powerful seeing you add the DS to a bse if 100%