Feedback:User/Damysticreaper/Title Skills

=PvE only=

PvE only skills are generaly powerful pve skills often on equal level of an elite skill and being limited to 3 pve skills on a skillbar as a result. These skills are either loved for their power or hated for they imbalance.

What i like to see is a better balance between pve and pve only skills and reducing or removing the limit of PvE only skills. Mainly the EotN title skills could use some serious improvement on balance. My aim is to change the function of play of these skills, from imbalanced pve only skills with powerful unique functions to pve only skills with less powerful functions filling up skill bars offensive, defensive and supportive skills that can be combined with eachother and normal pve skills (I'm using the term pve skills for the normal skills because of the pvp split, altough the majority have the same function in both pve and pvp).

Allegiance skills
Enchantment spell (12 seconds). Spells targetting another ally cost less energy (minimum cost 1 energy).

Signet. Causes health loss to target foe. Steals health if target foe is suffering from a condition or a hex.

Bow attack. Deals + damage. Hits 2 foes near your target.

Sunspear skills
Spell. Interrupts a skill. Deals damage if target foe is suffering from a mesmer hex.

Shout ( seconds). Your pet moves and attacks 25% faster and has +24 armor.

Signet. Resurrects target dead party member to your location at full health and % energy.

Asura skills
Skill (10 seconds). Your next spell activates % faster.

Skill (10 seconds). Your next spell costs less energy.

Skill ( seconds). Summons a level Ice Imp that has Aura of Restoration, Blurred Vision, Glowing Ice, Glyph of Restoration, Ice Spikes, Maelstrom, Water Attunement and Water Trident.

Skill ( seconds). Summons a level Mursaat that has Air Attunement, Aura of Restoration, Blinding Flash, Enervating Charge, Glyph of Restoration, Lightning Orb, Shock Arrow and Thunderclap.

Skill ( seconds). Summons a level Naga Shaman that has Aura of Restoration, Dragon's Stomp, Earth Attunement, Ebon Hawk, Glowstone, Glyph of Restoration, Stoning and Unsteady Ground.

Skill ( seconds). Summons a level Ruby Djinn that has Aura of Restoration, Fire Attunement, Fireball, Glowing Gaze, Glyph of Restoration, Immolate, Liquid Flame and Savannah Heat.

Hex spell (10 seconds). Target foe activates skills % slower.

Deldrimor skills
Spell Projectile. Deals damage to target foe and foes nearby target. Inflicts poison condition ( seconds).

Melee attack. Deals + damage. Causes a knock down if target foe is suffering from a condition.

Spell. You are healed for.

Stance (8 seconds). You move and attack % faster.

Flash enchantment spell (30 seconds). Your stances last % longer and you cannot be knocked down while moving.

Melee attack. Deals + damage. Inflicts bleeding condition ( seconds).

Enchantment spell (30 seconds). You gain +24 armor and + health regeneration.

Weapon spell ( seconds). Target ally's attacks have % chance to critical hit.

Melee attack. Deals + damage and inflicts cracked armor condition ( seconds).

Ebon Vanguard skills
Ranged attack. Deals + damage. Inflicts cracked armor condition ( seconds) if target foe is suffering from a condition.

Ward spell (20 seconds). Allies in this ward have + armor.

Ward spell (20 seconds). Allies in this ward have % armor penetration.

Ward spell (20 seconds). Spells used by allies in this ward recharge % faster.

Signet (60 seconds). Inflict disease condition ( seconds) with your next attack.

Melee attack. Deals + damage. Always a critical hit. Counts as a lead attack.

Ebon vanguard ritual ( seconds). All allied projectiles move 100% faster.

Norn skills
Shout ( seconds). Your attacks have +% armor penetration.

Shout ( seconds). You gain % more adrenaline from non-skill attack.

Shout ( seconds). You take % less damage from foes suffering from a condition.

Shout. Knock down target foe and inflict crippled condition ( seconds).

Melee attack. Interrupts an action. Interruption effect: inflicts blind and dazed conditions ( seconds) if target foe is using a skill.

Melee attack. Deals + damage to target foe. Deals damage to foes adjacent to target.

Skill (20 seconds). You gain + maximum health and take less damage.

Elite Form ( seconds). Your attacks deal piercing damage. You have % chance to block and cannot be knocked down. Conditions on you end % faster than normal.

Elite Form ( seconds). Your attack deal blunt damage. You move % faster. You gain +20 armor and + health.

Elite Form ( seconds). Your attacks deal slashing damage. You attack % faster and your attack skills recharge 25% faster. You gain + health regeneration.

Summary

 * Allegiance rank skills

Not many of these skills need a change because they are all pretty good already but some of they could need a change.

Selfless Spirit is a good energy managment skill but it's duration vs recharge is just a little bit off so i decreased it's recharge to 30 and set it's duration to 12 and scaled the cost reduction instead. This should make it more usable and more competitive with other forms of popular energy managment.

Signet of Corruption is the type of skill a necromancer doesn't really need. For energy managment the necromancer has Soul Reaping and the damage it offers isn't that impressive, even if it's an Aoe skill. To improve it i looked at the name corruption and what skills with that name normally do and require to do. With that i designed it into an offensive signet that can penetrate any form of defense trough both health loss and life steal. It causes a moderate ammount of health loss and an aditional health steal when the target is suffering from either a condition or a hex. This makes it an effective form of damage against high armored foes and damage mitigation skills.

Triple Shot is also a skill that isn't really desired. It has nice synergy with some preperation and some enchantments but other than that it is nothing more than a buffed up Dual Shot wich is also heavily underused for the same reason. To make it more functional for PvE i made it an AoE bow attack based on Incendiary Arrows. It deals a small ammount of bonus damage but it's main power lies in that it's a non-elite AoE bow attack that does not remove a preperation.


 * Sunspear Skills

The sunspear skills also need little change but 3 of them do need some improvement.

Cry of Pain has been used alot in the past during the Cryway meta. After it had been nerfed the concept of AoE damage still remained. I only gave it a few small changes to make it more playable again. I removed it's degeneration and increase of it's initial damage. I also reduced it's range to a single target only and reduced it's cost to 5. It's now a cheap interrupt that can synergize quite well with skills like Frustration and Migraine.

Again a ranger skill. Never Rampage Alone is a decent skill but it's superior in function to it's elite counterpart Rampage as One. Instead of making it an improved copy of an elite i changed it into an improved Call of Haste only affecting the pet. I also replaced the health regeneration with an increase in armor, this gives the beastmaster some bar compression having both offense and defense in one skill instead of 2.

The last of the skills is sunspear Rebirth Signet. To be simple it's too close to Resurrection Signet to be worth taking and sacrificing a PvE slot for. To make it usable i gave it a recharge and to compensate increased it's casting time. This makes it more usable by alot and much more desirable to take for any profession.


 * Asura Skills

most noticable in this line are the summons. The summons are what you can say rather weak and hardly worth taking. I gave them a large buff by giving them a full skill bar including an elite skill and self managment. To compensate i greatly increased the cost to an initial 25 energy and a health sacrifice of 50% required to cast and it has a disabling time of a minute on all your skills. I also increased it's duration to 300 seconds wich is 5 minutes and to prevent the usage of both an asuran summon and a summoning stone (unless teamed up with another player) it causes summoning sickness and cannot be used while suffering from summoning sickness. My thought behind it is to give players a summon when no summoning stone is available to them.

Mindbender and Smooth Criminal have been changed into caster support skills. Mindbender has it's skill type changed and no longer has a casting time or aftercast. It's recharge has been reduced to 10 and no longer has a movement buff. It also affects only 1 spell but greatly reduces the casting time of it. Smooth Criminal has received a similar change and now reduces the cost of a spell to give casters a neutral form of energy managment. Both skills have been based on Intensity in both functionality and skill type.

Technobabble has become somewhat of a non-elite Migraine, a hex that increases casting time of skills on a single target. I went for this function instead of dazed so all skill types are affected by it. It cannot be maintained however but should give good synergy with interrupts, more so on powerful monsters in HM and bosses and boss-like foes who need to be interrupted.


 * Deldrimor Skills

First thing i decided to do with these skills is to remove the alcohol requirment to make skills work. Altough the idea behind it is nice iit often prevents skills from being used at all. The second objective is to make the adrenaline touch skills more usable by turning them into melee attacks. I also wanted to improve the usage of the self-managment skill.

Alkar's Alchemical Acid has been changed into an AoE spell that inflicts poison condition rather than dealing extra damage against destroyers. This makes it more usable when facing foes that are not destroyers and give spellcasters besides the necromancer a skill to inflict poison.

Brawling Headbutt has been changed into a melee attack so it returns adrenaline when used. It's damage has been reduced and it's adrenaline cost increased. It no longer inflicts a knock down unconditionally but requires a condition. However it does not cause a loss of all adrenaline when used.

Breath of the Great Dwarf has been turned into a self heal rather than a party heal. This allows players to have an effective self heal without having to invest attribute points into the attribute the primary heal of their professions is located in.

Drunken Master has received a change to keep it better in line with skills that give an IAS and IMS as well as those who do both wich are mainly elites. I set it's duration to 8 seconds against a recharge of 15 giving so it still has it's synergy with Dwarven Stability. I removed it's alcohol requirment and it's IAS and IMS have been reduced to 25% instead of 15% and 33%.

Dwarven Stability is an enchantment primarily used by runners and because of that i turned it into a flash enchantment so it can be used while running without stopping. Since i also removed it's alcohol requirment i changed the anti-knock down from while being drunk to while moving. Since running to locations in PvE isn't a problem of any sort to the game i don't expect this function to be problematic. It has no impact either to offensive playstyles like Dwarven Battle Stance warriors or rangers with Lightning Reflexes.

Earbite is been changed into a melee attack costing energy. It isn't anything special in function but rather something that was lacking on the martial classes. Sword warriors mainly are missing a skill like this. Axes and scyhtes can also benefit quite well from this skill. Nothing special in function but still quite usable to play.

Great Dwarf Armor is a nice skill already. A targettable enchantment that offers defense and a small increase in maximum health. It's aditional armor vs destroyers however is wasted as it is capped at 25 so instead i added a health regeneration and removed the aditional armor and the maximum health increase. This makes any class more durable when facing strong enemies.

Great Dwarf Weapon has been changed into a weapon spell that increases the chance of a critical hit and can be self-targetted. I greatly decreased it's power so it can be self-targetted making it usable in a martial bar and worth taking without wasting a skill slot.

Low Blow has been changed into a melee attack that inflicts cracked armor unconditionally to allow martial classes to deal better damage against foes with high armor. Dervishes already posses cracked armor but warriors are still lacking it, this allows them to inflict cracked armor as well and increase their damage. For the warriors in PvE it synergizes very well with Body Blow to deal a large ammount of damage and inflicting a deep wound.


 * Ebon Vanguard Skills

I also wanted to make these skills less conditional to use and give them skill functions that certain classes are lacking or making skills generaly more usable.

Deft Strike now inflicts cracked armor instead of bleeding while suffering from cracked armor. This gives rangers and paragons a skill to inflict cracked armor with both are lacking. Both professions can already inflict bleeding with ease making it useless. The caster classes who have cracked armor available do not use such a skill either because they rely on spells and not attacks.

The Ebon Battle Standards did not see much change with the exception of Honor. Honor has been changed from +damage to armor penetration to improve armor rated damage against high armored foes. This change should also remove the power creep that is also affects armor ignoring damage from skills, and primarily hexes. Courage now gives a scaling armor buff at the maximum cap of 25 and Wisdom now reduces recharge scaling up to 25% on all spells rather than a chance of 50% recharge.

Signet of Infection has been changed into a signet functioning like Poison Tip Signet. Removing it's condition should give the martial classes an effective way of inflicting disease in PvE. Altough disease is a strong condition and can be easily inflicted with this skill i don't expect it to be a problem in PvE.

I did not want to change Sneak Attack in the way that it can also function as a lead attack but still giving it a function that is usable as a normal melee attack as well as a lead attack for assassins and not being limited to a certain type of enemy only. Looking at the skill icon and it's name i decided to give it a moderate ammount of damage and an auto-critical hit giving it a good ammount of damage. The critical hit will benefit assassins as it returns energy and can be used to upkeep skills such as Critical Agility and Critical Defenses in PvE.

Wind has been changed into a ritual that improves projectiles of allies rather than debuff those of the enemy. It improves the speed of projectile spells like Lightning Orb and Fireball as well as arrows and spear attacks. It's activation time has also been greatly reduced and it's cost increased to compensate the decrease. This function should give it alot more flexibility in usage instead of being limited to enemies with ranged attacks.


 * Norn Skills

Like the Deldrimor skills i also removed the requirment of alcohol from it's skills. I also wanted to improve it's shouts and the elite skills in function.

Dodge This!, I Am the Strongest! and You Are All Weaklings! have been changed into shouts with an upkeep time with effects benefiting the martial classes the most. With an upkeep time they can synergize very well with the Soldier skills the warrior and the paragon posses. Dodge This! now gives armor penetration to attacks instead of a single hit unblockable with +damage. I Am the Strongest has been changed into a shout that improves adrenaline gain allowing warriors, dervishes and paragons to use their attacks more often and allowing them to deal more damage, or use their shouts and chants more often in case of the paragon. The adrenaline gain has been done by % to avoid synergy with For Great Justice! and Focused Anger (imbagon). Both skills been been redesigned to offer the martial classes better damage support. You Are All Weaklings! has been changed into a shout that reduces damage to make the martial classes last longer when they are drawing in an aggro.

You Move Like A Dwarf! hasn't been changed much. It's damage has been removed and it's recharge increased matching the duration of the crippled condition.

A Touch of Guile has been changed into a melee attack that interrupts an action and can inflict blind and dazed when the condition is met. This should make it more playable and still keep it's effect true to it's name. I removed the knock down requirment so it can be used in builds that don't have a knock down skill available to them.

Club of a Thousand Bears has been changed into a melee attack that deals AoE damage. I made the Aoe effect different than attacks like Cyclone Axe, Whirlwind Attack and Eremite's Attack to prevent too much synergy with Mark of Pain Bombers and general Hundred Blades and Vow of Strength build. This attack combines particulary well with the scythe as it can hit multiple enemies at once.

Feel No Pain has been changed into a skill that can be seen as a skill in function between Endure Pain and Defy Pain. It increases health like both skills do but also has a damage reduction like Defy Pain does but not the armor increase. Able to be maintained it is superior in function to Endure Pain but that is a skill that needs to be buffed.

And as last the Blessings. I overhauled the functions of the Blessings mimicing the form elites of the dervish but having their effects based on the effects and skills the Blessings give when the skill bar is replaced. Unlike the Avatars the Blessings give passive effects only so they can be used by all of the martial classes with their own unique way of functioning. In their new function they no longer replace the skill bar wich caused rank discrimination in the past with Ursanway. All of the Blessings support the martial classes best.

Raven Blessing following the effect of a form skill converts damage into piercing damage. Like it's old form it gives a chance of blocking attacks. It also prevents knock down wich like and reduces the duration of conditions. This makes it effective against areas with many martial styled enemies as well as condition heavy areas and knock down heavy areas. Raven Blessing is the most conditional but also the most defensive of the 3 Blessings.

Ursan Blessing converts damage into blunt. It offers a speed boost and increases armor rating by 20 to match up the speed boost and damage increase enemies receive in HM. It also increases maximum healh allowing the user to take more hits. Ursan Blessing has more neutral effects that can be used in any build at almost any location.

Volfen Blessing converts damage into slashing damage. It increases attack speed and decreases the recharge of attack skills. It also offers health regeneration. Volfen Blessing if by far the most offensive of the 3 Blessings greatly increasing the damage of any martial class.

The way the Blessing have their function set up i doubt they are effective in high-end PvE SC, but can apear in low-end faction farm team builds wich isn't that much of an impact on the game. Their effect are now limited to the martial classes only and generaly most usable against high level foes outside high-end PvE.

I'm sure it still needs some balancing but that's my suggestion for the title skills for now.