User talk:Isaiah Cartwright/Underpowered Skills/Paragon/Archive 1

Motivation

Motivation is extremely weak because it provides an insignificant amount of health to everybody. I do not believe a single PvP-worthy motivation-based build exists on PvXwiki, and barely any if any at all PvE builds. Motivation essentially sacrifices quality for quantity... besides one of the best condition removers in the game, It's just a Flesh Wound, most of the skills are weaker versions of heal party and LoD. Finales are perhaps the worst idea for a skill ever. In order for a finale to be effective, you must be running SEVERAL paragons, hence, paraway. 8 man para teams or whatever, you know the drill. These skills should be reworked as they support a poor play type and are useless for people not doing so, and the motivation line as a whole needs a rework to be pushed into usefulness. -Rakeman 08:36, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

Change the Finales to "next" and buff other numbers. --Deathwing 16:49, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

What about making them trigger the next X times a Chant or Shout ends and buffing the durations so they're more useful with only a single Paragon but not overpowered with several of them? -- Gordon Ecker 21:49, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

I think the problem is a bit deeper than that, though. Motivation is something that has to be weaker than many other things given how you cannot remove chants or shouts, and how it's harder to interrupt them than to interrupt spells (not timing-wise, rather skill-wise, although the buff to the Power X interrupts has helped with this). Worse, IMO, is how those skills are mostly passive defense - making them powerful would only lead to a kind of very defensive gameplay in which you spam Motivation skills as soon as they recharge, and that's something the game has been trying to move away with. In other words, I think this is something too broken from the start to be fixed. Erasculio 22:00, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

I think changing the finale mechanics would be all that is needed to make motivation more active... or just better. Who knows. -Rakeman 01:39, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

I disagree. You think of Song of Restoration as an unremovable buff, but it isn't. It is a Heal Party with a delayed activation. It is not an enchantment of sorts, only Ballad of Restoration can really be seen as unremovable. The biggest benefit of the chants is that they cost little to no energy to use, so they shouldn't be spammable. However, the recharge is too high at the moment to make the reliable. That can be fixed by increasing their energy cost a bit (to lessen the effect of Leadership) and reducing their recharge so they can be used more often, but cannot be spammed. Song of Restoration at 7 recharge, 10 energy would be a worthy alternative to Light of Deliverance. The other heal parties are fine, IMO, though I'd gladly pay some more energy if they recharged faster. Maybe add little more versatility to the rest of the Motivation skills, as most skills are a little too specific, but this should solve most problems.

I agree with the problems of finals. It's near to impossible to use in PvP with only 1 para and thats the biggest downside. I also /sign the idea with lower recharge/higher cost. The more the para chants, the less he can attack, and with less attacks comes less adren. So it would be pretty hard to un-balance. Another solution to echos would be: make them a lot stronger in effect, but trigger them only on your own shouts, thus encouraging single paras in partys. Maybe this should only affect the never used refrains... --Ineluki 11:56, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

Also, lower recharge/higher cost might begin to make Paraway pointless. Might.-Rakeman 15:28, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

The hard thing to get past when looking at skills in Motivation to buff is that almost all of the available skills do the same things, either giving health or energy to the entire team (under various conditions). Neither mechanic is terribly good for the game if it is too effective. Also, health restoration effects are a pain to balance on Paragons since their effectiveness scales so strongly with attribute level, and Paragons are not point-rich. As is almost all of the generally useful skills in Motivation have been gutted; the ones that are left that are powerful are rather conditional and gimmicky (such as Chorus of Restoration or Lyric of Zeal). The safest skill in the line to buff is Ballad of Restoration - it's a cornerstone style ability but the effect is not as strong as it appears at first glance. The heal rarely, if ever, triggers on the entire team, or even on a majority. The recharge on that skill could go down to 10s easily. The other key skill I'd look at is Aria of Zeal. Aria was pre-emptively nerfed when Energizing Finale got hit, and was made effectively useless because of it; it's not a skill that you want to make too strong since it will do bad things to the game, but it's also a skill that pretty much needs to be playable if Motivation is going to ever see play. Perhaps simply dropping the cast time back to 1s and seeing how it goes from there would be enough. There really isn't all that much to work with in Motivation, given the current mechanics. Seems clear the aim should be to make them marginal but effective in their niche. -Ensign 07:34, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

I think the easy way to fix a plethora of woes is to just change all the chants to offer more frequent and subtle effects. The increased frequency will make all the related echos much easier to operate, any echos which are too benificial can be reduced in output or increased in recharge time. By changing up the chants with high repetition and lower effect, the use of certain counters become stronger, helping nail down constant use and group synergy. It also makes it less effective for several paragons to use the same chant, since they will overlap and provide little additional effect. Wile on the flip side, making it much easier for a single paragon to maintain some echos, by spaming two or even one chant.

Most chants last 10 seconds, and most have a 20 second recharge. The cost is just enough for it to be an impact even with a large group, so that should not be changed. The recharge can be cut in half, at 10 seconds, the effectiveness can also be cut, but not in half, since your still paying the same energy, it can be cut by 1/3.

By doing this, a single paragon can much more easily maintain his own echos, and function with a better mix of echos and chants, wile slightly increasing the amount of benifit over time. It also reduces the amount of benifit with most chants when used by several paragons, and makes it difficult to spam the same thing.

Also, with higher reuse, the benifit of Leadership goes down, since even with 8 energy return, which requires maximum leadership and likely reduced motivation benifits, the paragon is actually getting less benifit per use, wile using the abilities even more. For all these normal chants, this means twice as much energy spent for only 1/3 more benifit. It is fairly moderate, since the energy and benifit are low, but it means just that much more energy out of a paragons pool.

But overall, this still needs a better counter, or it will be self represive, that is simply a neccessity. The existing hexes need to be spamable, particularly Vocal Minority, which should affect an area instead of nearby, and be used at least every 10 seconds, if not every 5. It may seem extreme, but in reality, it is only as strong as the number of foes being suppressed by it, and keeping a strong counter effort will ensure that teams are wary of over relying on shouts, pushing them to use other professions and pushing paragons to develop some utility with other skills. Roaring Wind would already increase greatly in counter measure, since the paragon is using more chant frequency for the same cost with less benifit, making the energy loss from this ability more determental.

Also, simply bringing back the AoE range and frequency to Elementist skills and AoE benifit back to Dervish would create strong opposition to Paragon. People take for granted that the benifit of shouts and echos, as well as their energy management relies on large groups being packed together. This is mostly because there arn't enough abilities that are strong enough to make this a serious risk. If DoT spells got their AoE and Frequency improved significantly, and other AoE attacks and spells gained greater frequency and or AoE, than the battle between staying together for a benifit, and risking AoE damnation would balance the encounter. Shouts are not the only unremovable effect in the game, DoTs are unremovalbe, and so are Wards. When AoE damage is given the recognition and position it deserves, the benifit of Chants and Shouts will have a natural counter which makes it difficult to benifit from, and both can challenge eachother for dominance instead of both relying on suppression to fit into the location ignorant gameplay we have now.--BahamutKaiser 17:12, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

Annoyed

→ moved from User_talk:Isaiah_Cartwright

I used to play the Paragon class before even through all its nerfs but now thanks to nerfing TNTF I'm about as much help as a minipet in PvE...well I guess its time to retire my paragon for good then. P.S- Why DID you make such a class if your nerf it every update? --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:122.167.23.165 .

You shouldn't let people put you down like that. A good paragon is very useful, most PUG's just don't see it that way (my Paragon hero is one of my second most used heroes in hard mode, with my monks being the first). And TNTF was overpowered, it outshone the entire motivation line, and a few command skills as well. Still, the supportive side could use a change, if not a buff. Nicky Silverstar 15:07, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

heh heh, wish that were true but I see more pointless nerfs in the future...lets be honest, Mending will be the metagame before Motivation becomes useful, honestly when NF came out I was in love with the Paragon, now with the constant stream of nerfs to everything I'm essentially useless. Seriously what CAN a paragon do well?Heal , u got to be joking , damage dealing? a monk wanding could outdamage us and if we gonna do damage we might as well play the warrior shouldn't we? Protection? Incoming is a joke , TNTF is gone with the wind and Defensive Anthem? it becomes useless if u want to attack. Its a beautiful concept but some whiny PvP'ers complain and every skill we have get nerfed...What's next? Exhaustion on Chants? Sorry if i seem pissed off its just cause I am, Paragons are one of the rarest classes in GW, rivaled only by Mesmers(and that's saying something). It just pisses me off when a character that I've invested considerable time and money is essentially useless.

I think nerfs in general are over-exaggerated and most skills are untouched in general and I would even say more skills are buffed then nerfed. Jigoku 19:08, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

All you gotta do is find elites/skills that no one uses in pvp therefore not nerfed but have extensive utility in pve, like War's Endurance for wars, never seen it in pvp while basic attack spam makes your normal str war into high damage assassin in pve + taking and while spamming high energy pve skills, makes monsters, especially margonites very very short lived. Biz 19:17, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Oh, you mean like that PvE skill TNtF? I can't wait to see the reaction when people realize that Aggressive Refrain is next on the Paragon nerf-list. Brothermallon 20:12, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes I agree. One thing I don't understand is why is the solution to everything NERF!! NERF!! NERF!!!! why cant we get buffs to the counters of an over powered skill instead of everything being under powered. I don't understand why pve continually suffers from the abuse in pvp of skills. --Lou-Saydus 21:23, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

It's not a matter of PvE suffering thanks to PvP. PvE needs its own kind of balance, although it is different from the balance seen on PvP. The best example of this is the nerf to "There's Nothing to Fear!" - I'm sure everyone knows that a nerf to a PvE only skill could not have possibly been thanks to PvP. It was a matter of PvE balance - just like many other skills had to be nerfed as much thanks to PvE as to PvP. TNtF was way overpowered - it could almost turn Hard Mode into Normal Mode - so it did deserve a nerf. Erasculio 21:40, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Simply buffing counters to overpowered skills doesn't work. All you end up with is a strict Rock-Paper-Scissors gameplay, with every skill still being overpowered UNLESS you bring its counter - and then it's underpowered if you do. If skills are truly overpowered, they deserve to be nerfed. Now, this same reasoning works the other way, as well - if a skill is underpowered, it most likely deserves to be buffed, as well. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 23:46, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Motivation is weak, but there's no real way to improve it without creating broken aspects of the game. I run a 8-paragon HA build on occasion, and it takes just about all 8 paragons with motivation chants to make them effective; but imagine if all it took was one or two paragons with Ballad/Chorus of Restoration to be effective... that build would be impossible to kill! I'd much rather see underpowered motivation chants that require running 8 copies than see 8 copies of a hugely effective party heal. -Auron 23:56, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Holders, gogogo. Also, I do favor the idea of occasional buffing, rather then constant nerfing. Makes the game interesting. Readem Warning: Ignore this User if at all possible. 23:59, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Seed of life also go nerfed nut at least monks have some other skills to replace it , what is the replacement for TNTF? NOTHING! You just destroyed the ONLY reason that paragon's were getting in PUGS...thanks a lot..-PissedOFPara

You're happy that the only reason you got accepted into crap pugs that have no idea what they're doing half the time was a skill that was broken? Get some friends and use a bar that actually requires skill. --Tensei 15:10, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Tell me do u even PLAY as a Paragon?

Nerfing skills which do not have alternatives doesn't solve any problems, it just creates new ones. 12 September 2007 (UTC)

(resetting indent) /agree

Nerfing skills that have don't have alternatives solves the problem of them being alternative overpowered and may even solve the problem of there not being any alternatives. --Edru viransu 18:39, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

WTF??

I lold. 12 September 2007 (UTC)

At my typo or....? --Edru viransu 22:28, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Just for you guys I played my pve paragon this morning with hero hench. I slaughtered everything I tried, I even pulled double plus bad on purpose. TNTF + Defensive Anthem still rapes pve. --Tankity Tank 00:06, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Posts like this doesn't prove anything. Just for you guys I played my pve necro this morning with hero hench. I slaughtered everything without TNTF + Defensive Anthem. 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, the thing most people are overlooking; paragons aren't monks. If monk heals were absolute crap, people would be justified in whining, because monks can't do anything else; but look at all the stuff a paragon can do on top of motivation! Paragons have quite high autoattack DPS (ranged, no less) with spammable attack skills that "spam" the effects of Anthem of Flame and the like, paragons have unlimited energy (via leadership's broken nature exploited by gtfe spam), and lastly, paragons have 80 armor; all of those add up to why motivation sucks (and why it has to keep sucking). If motivation was any good, paragons would be even more broken than they currently are. -Auron 01:34, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Wrong, monks are the only broken class in this game, you can survive without paragons but its much harder to survive without monks, thas why every pve party don't like to start before they got 2 monks. Gw is monk dependant and paragons are nerfed. 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Don't say broken so much , they'll find even more things about us to nerf , i see leadership changing from energy to health at this rate :P

Good, because paragons still could take a severe hit and be extremely powerful in both PvE and PvP. --Edru viransu 02:54, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

There's no need to CONTINOUSLY nerf paragons just because they can still be powerful..thats just dumb

If they can take a severe nerf and still be extremely powerful in both PvE and PvP, perhaps that's an indication that they're overpowered, and as such, in need of said severe nerf. --Edru viransu 12:10, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

That's a pretty big if. -- Gordon Ecker 21:41, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

(resetting indent) so Edru , you're plan is to nerf paragons until no one plays them just to show how powerful they are?

Actually, I'd support nerfing them until they no longer do warrior DPS at range while providing large amounts of offensive and defensive support with a free secondary, a free elite, and the energy and attribute points to run pretty much whatever they want. In other words, make them stop being overpowered. --Edru viransu 20:28, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

And I'd support his support 110%. Simply because people suck too much at using paragons to realize that it's probably the most imba standalone class right now doesn't mean it isn't.

I have to admit, though, paragons were originally more of a PvP class (sort of like mesmers); sure, you could use them in PvE, but it was boring and not hugely effective. Now, however, Paragons have stuff like TNTF and can easily take Save Yourselves (spammed, ofc, from aggressive refrain's nonstop IAS) and still have no energy problems. This isn't a case of Paragons being bad in PvE; it's a case of people being bad at paragon. -Auron 20:46, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

I have to disagree, I think its more the case that whilst Paragons have some great, versatile and very useful skills, they seem to have a lot less of these than most classes. They are a great niche class bogged down with a load of either to situational/conditional specific skills or completely underpowered skills. The command line is pretty bloody useless, e.g. Find Their Weakness, what is the point of this skill? 10e to cause a deep wound at some point over its duration, hardly a spike skill and for PvE Vicious Attack fulfils the criteria of will cause a seep wound eventually whilst providing extra damage. The Paragon skill list is littered with equally useless skills that will never see any play, each nerf pushes Paragons into picking from an ever shortening list of the viable skills. Buff some of these underperforming please if your going to nerf all great things they have, if you want to do skill balances do them properly. Ajax Baby Eater 22:02, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

The fix for crappy skills is a buff, not reliance on overpowered skills. --Tankity Tank 22:55, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

That is the problem. There is no Paragon Skill "Balance". It is Paragon Skill Nerf. "Balance" implies making things equal. Nerfing half of the Paragon skills into the ground while leaving the horribly underpowered skills untouched is by no means balancing. Nerf some of the overpowered skills, I have no problem with that, and it is probably needed, but please buff some of the useless skills into skills worthy of a spot on a skill bar. --Deathwing 23:58, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

So you're saying that nerfing things that are overpowered isn't balance? O ok. -Auron 22:35, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

No its nerfing. Nerfing is killing strong skills, buffing is making weak skills stronger, balance is a combination of the two. --Deathwing 22:49, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Look up balance. "a state of equilibrium or equipoise; equal distribution of weight, amount, etc." <--- if something is overpowered, it is not equal - thus, to maintain the state of equilibrium, it gets nerfed. That's what balance is. -Auron 22:53, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Ok...then compare I don't know..."Help Me!" to basically any skill in the game. Your equilibrium is threw off with the underpowered skills. I do agree that nerfing overpowered skills is part of balance, but buffing the skills at the other end of the leetness meter is also part of balance. --Deathwing 23:46, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Just don't use the bad skills and hope izzy listens to advice to make them less bad. Help Me in particular has some interesting feedback and ideas for improvement, I just don't think izzy's bothering to read these pages anymore. -Auron 00:07, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

LOL
WUT
UNDERPOWERED PARAGONS?
Because the fact that two hero paragons let me solo monk FoW makes them underpowered... No HM SY/TNTF/TOF build, sorry. Just paragons with defensive skills, which meant, when our prot monk (a guildie of mine, at the time) started leeching, we still had enough prot for me to LoD-spam the entire instance. Sure, it took a bit of a while (there were a few particularly messy points dealing with commanders in the shadow army or some such, when there were about 34839202 red dots on my minimap and idiot heroes), but even with huge DP we managed to clear the thing... Armond 09:57, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

Paragons, plural, that's the problem, you need more than one. The paragon is the least modular of the ten professions. -- Gordon Ecker 10:08, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

Imbagons still need nerfing. Except for noob island, etc, you have essentially no excuse for not bringing at least two paragons wherever you go. It's not hard to get the heroes. Armond 20:11, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

FoW isn't that difficult anymore. BTW, I would have loved to make a Paragon healer. 87.210.150.58 07:51, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

Even if that's true (not saying it is), since when is any profession balanced when it takes 0 damage - literally - from a vent coordinated junundu siege spike? Armond 11:51, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

Gordon; you don't need more than one. Their usefulness multiplies when you have two or more, but one is sufficient to be imba (30% party-wide damage reduction on a 10/20 timer; that's imbalanced. Hence why Incoming, the PvX equivalent, is 3/20 and elite). 2 are simply stupidly ridiculous (permanent damage reduction and +100 armor on every party member... can you say casters tanking hardmode mallyx?). -Auron 12:02, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

I think Anet should make the Paragon couterskills more flexible and stop nerfing the paragons skills!, for instance making Backfire damage shouts at half or 1/3 efficiency or making the necros Cacophony deal half damage whenever players use an attackskill. Against Imbagon teams, Anet should add or change an existing skill like Soul Barbs to function like this: "Hex spell. whenever a refrain is renewed on target foe, that foe takes X damage". The main problem I see with the paragon, is that to counter them you build becomes less flexible and won't function aswell against other more common builds.

Every profession has its edge or edges (that makes it better than other classes in some way). By removing/nerfing a professions edge/edges destroys the profession, adding counters against a profession is only a viable sulution if the counters are used. Make the counters more flexible so that ppl starts using them this way the game stays fun for everyone. I also have a suggestion to make the paragon more fun to play by changeing Leaderships function to affect all skills that affects allies not just shouts to give paragons more synergies. Previous paragonplayer that stopped playing due to the October 12, 2007 patch.--85.225.130.44 17:24, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

The thing is that most Paragon skills were nerfed because they were overpowered when you had several paragons chaining them. Which means that ONE paragon isn't really that effective due to duration, recharge, and effects of the skills. Take Incoming for example. Lasts 3 seconds and has a 20 second recharge. As King Bokka says, utter tripe by itself. If you chain it however, you can keep it up for quite a while. So I think the best way to fix Paragon skills is to make them unchainable.

Take a look at Xinrae's Weapon. The skill disables a skill party wide. Why not do the same for Paragon skills? Make it so that the Paragon skills are disabled a certain amount of time for each copy of that skill in your party. That way you could lengthen up the duration, power up the effects, and lower the recharge of Paragon skills, making the Paragon a potent character to take in groups of ONE. I really hope you're listening here. --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:147.226.224.53 .

I agree with you fully, but since Izzy and most others dislike paragons I get the feeling we they will stay as a broken class always useless as a singel paragon (exception for very rare cases in 8 playerparties). I wonder if Izzy ever bothers to visit here.--85.225.131.147 21:42, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

Unblockable Throw

I'm not convinced that paragons need any buffs on the offense side, but this skill's super-sad alongside Wild Throw, and really has no utility. Honestly, you'd have better luck with Mighty Throw to avoid a "stray." Kick this up to 8a if you must, but the activation time has got to go. A nonelite, adrenal heavy-hitter attack that doesn't suck would be interesting - doubly so if unblockable. ~Seef II <☎|→> 06:29, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

If you ask me, ALL activation times must go for those attack skills! I don't think I ever see them used... -Rakeman 08:36, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

I like Mighty Throw a lot with IAS.Nicky Silverstar 10:20, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Unblockable Throw - Remove casting time. Ashesfalldown 11/16/07

Then the damage would need to be lowered too. 87.210.150.58 07:47, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

At least lower it to 2 secs geez... 3 seconds is way too much 20:55, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

"Incoming!"

WTB Buff. Make it so that it only effects one ally, 10 sec rec, last 6 seconds, 1/4 Activation, 15 E, shout (Leadership Bonus, making it more playable). Then it would be more of an Elite Guardian, and functions similarly to SoD. The upside, is that it no longer sucks and cannot be removed via Shatter ect. The downside, is that it is in Command, and needs Leadership to maintain its high energy cost. Any other ideas/suggestions? Readem Promote My Ban Here 06:10, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

How would the 1 energy from Leadership make this maintainable? --Deathwing 06:12, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Edit: "Elite Shout. For 1...5...6 seconds, target other ally takes 50% less damage. You gain 1 energy for every point in Leadership." 15/0/10

Because Leadership is some of the best energy management in the game. That's how. You are now gaining a net of 2 Energy fool, every ten seconds lulz. Readem Promote My Ban Here 06:24, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Leadership gives you benefit for each party member effected. If you only use this shout on one person....guess what? 1 energy from it. You would gain a net of 2 energy every 10 seconds, if you have 16 leadership, but will that be dominant anywhere? Reasonable Leadership will be around 12, which will cost you 2 energy every 10 seconds. It is an elite, so wouldn't think it was that overpowered, protecting one person half the time for minimal energy. --Deathwing 06:42, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Except the fact that it would make Angelic Bond completely pointless. Longer recharge and longer duration, or just more energy would be viable ways to fix it. Or make it a Motivation skill, that would solve all problems, because it would have te be combined with weaker skills...Nicky Silverstar 13:55, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Deathwing...you do know I meant it to be 15 energy. Do you know how efficient AR+GftE spam is? That in itself makes fifteen energy a viable option. Readem Warning: Ignore this User if at all possible. 08:34, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Nice buff proposal. I support it.--Atlas Oranos 12:07, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

why is this one so hard ? "Incoming!" For 1...3...6 seconds, all party members within earshot take 50% less damage. This skill is disabled for every party member for 25 seconds. Paragon drama fixed. 12 September 2007 (UTC)

You don't have to think that much, it'd be fine at 1...4 duration. 3 second duration at a reasonable spec is the key. -Ensign 00:33, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Take a look at all the other Paragon shouts, most of them read the next (insert situation) occurs (insert effect) happens, why is incoming a duration effect? I think its this mechanic that has nerfed it to such an extent that it is now close to useless. This could easily be changed to be for 10 seconds the next time each party member takes damage that damage is reduced 50%. Or possibly changed to be like Song Of Purification, i.e. for 10 seconds the next 1...3...3 times each party member takes damage that damage is reduced 50%. It would still give protection, would be advantageous to full para parties but not invicible as it was when it recieved so much abuse in PvP. We don't need to reinvent the Paragon skill mechanics, there are acceptable, un-abused and useful skills out there, just take a look at how these work without being overpowered and try to match this one up. Ajax Baby Eater 22:38, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Good point....how about:

"Elite Shout. For 10 seconds, the next time each would take damage greater than 10% of their maximum health, that damage is reduced by 25...65...75%." 15/0/10

Except for the fact that Chants usually work on "next <insert situation here>", this would be cool for this skill I think. I don't know, just want it to be usable : /. --Deathwing 23:36, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

"Find Their Weakness!", "Go for the Eyes!" and some of the Norn shouts have a similar mechanic. -- Gordon Ecker 00:17, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

You could give the skill the proposed mechanical overhaul, but that would pretty much relegate it to being garbage forever - it would no longer be any good as an anti-spike skill at all, and would just be an extraordinarily bad anti-pressure one. "Incoming!" has a fine mechanic as a timed anti-spike skill, it just needs to last 3-4 seconds and no longer to be balanced - shorter and it doesn't do what it needs to do, longer and people start chaining it. You could remove the attribute from it entirely and fix the duration at 3 seconds and it'd be usable and fair. -67.161.44.231 23:46, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

This is really only interesting as a group ability, there are plenty of single unit spike counters, and angelic bond is available, so this really shouldn't offer that. To religate the spaming use, the ability can be reduced in potency and established as a self spamming ability, there is no point in having several copies if one basically does the job, and if the effect is reduced to offer powerful but limited damage reduction, it counteracts preasure well but not spiking.

10 energy, 10 second duration, 10 second recharge. Reduces damage by 50% the next X-X times on all allies in earshot.

Simply offers repeated damage reduction on a group, counteracting preasure. But with only a limited number of activations, it will not work as well against spikes. Trying to stack it would likely overlap and lose effectiveness, and running it on more than 2 players is not going to offer much. Depending on the effectiveness, the amount of hits blocked can go up or down, and the recast can go up or down, I would suggest 2-4...5 hits in this example. A foe can easily produce more than 5 hits in 10 seconds, and even 10 hits in 10 seconds if it is being provided by 2 paragons. Any more paragons and they are likely to loose effectiveness in the mix, so it will be hard for them to spam from more than 2 players. Also, increased duration doesn't help it any.

Spike counters are ment to be focused, and wile shouts are still limited to location, they are fairly widespread, and should naturally benifit in preasure reduction, not spike countering.--BahamutKaiser 16:25, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

How about making it last just 1-2 seconds, with 7-10 seconds of recharge? That way, you would really have to pay attention and time correctly to catch a spike. Or just yell at me because I don't understand the problem. :-) Nicky Silverstar 12:15, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

Anti-Spike Defense just isn't effective. It would have to block all damage or nearly all, in order to be valuable at even it's current time. This is a simple case of being over suppressed universally for a problem that lies souly in multiple copies of synergized use. Therefore it is broken down so even with multiple users it is entirely ineffective and not worthwile, wile making it pitteringly useless for a single user.

There are some remote uses for a skill that blocks half damage for a second or 2, but the simple problem is that it is so impractical, there is no point. If you time correctly you may be able to stop a group spike effort, but chances are, lasting partial defense moves like Stand Your Ground will clip off more damage more easily, and skills like Angelic Protection or bond will save a particular unit from a spike way better than this. Your just as effective shutting down an elementist with Dazed or just bringing one of many skills which grant reasonable armor.

Nobody needs an elite which blocks half damage for 3 or 4 seconds every 20 seconds, nor 1-2 seconds every 10 seconds, it isn't effective enough. The natural use of a defensive move or counter ability is to outmatch damage output, and unless AoE damage gets massive upgrades, there is almost no application to AoE momentary damage reduction, if you could reduce a spike of SF or AoE nukes even accurately, it would not hold up to the preasure, that's where the failure is. Ballad of Restoration works better, returning health on the next hit every 20 seconds, Incoming would work loads better if it simply reduced the next X damage every 10 or 20 seconds up to a maximum of 50% at a time, or more simply X number of damages every 10 seconds, seeing as a set number of hits is less effective than a set amount of damage reduced.

But to be most practical, in order for this to be good, the AoE opposition needs to be able to compete and outmatch this, so there's no sound way to change this without first addressing the lack of opposition in return. A simple DoT would eliminate the effect of a set number of damage reductions on a group given the frequency and AoE.--BahamutKaiser 16:30, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Thank god somebody finally talks some sense. Totaly agree with this, incoming in its current state is has such limited application as to be near uselss. Ajax Baby Eater 00:43, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

I still think "For x...x seconds, all party members within earshot take 50% less damage. This skill is disabled for every party member for xx seconds." would be the best. 87.189.247.19 17:23, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

Godspeed

Does anyone ever use this skill....Especially compared to fall back it's just mediocre. A conditional 25% speed boost for 50% of the time...I guess there's issues with making it better than charge, but it just seems to be kind of useless (I personally have never seen anyone running it, and that's saying something).

"Godspeed"...what gods do we have that have buffs? This should be "25% speed boost whenever under preparation, spirit, form, glyph, enchantment". Much more usable that way and it fits with the flavor. --Life Infusion «T» 04:06, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

Hexbreaker Aria

This one is another really never used one. I can see an issue with it being the possibility of destroying hex pressure, and although I personally have no problem with destroying hex pressure, that would be slightly unbalanced. I think this should have a lower cast first of all, as its current state is just interrupt bait, and possibly lower adren cost but w/ recharge. Maybe something like 6 Adrenaline with 6 recharge would see a little more use. 76.102.172.202 07:51, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

Increase duration to 15 secs. I agree with you 6 adrenaline sounds good. ashesfalldown 11/16/07

In PvP, it's mostly the fighters that are really affected by hexes (like SV, SS and Blurred) and this only works on casters. That in itself makes it a bit pointless to bring. 87.210.150.58 07:47, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

To tell you the truth, I hadn't noticed the spells only effect. Making it next skill would be a long way towards making it playable. 76.102.172.202 03:18, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

Changing this from an Aria to a Ballad, Song, or even Lyric would make it much better. - HeWhoIsPale 13:14, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

Chest Thumper

I think this one needs some +dmg, that and/or paragons need a way to cause cracked armor (besides on themselves...). Maybe nothing to significant, but giving it something like +5...18 dmg would be infinitely better than its current state.

All the motivation skills

Pretty much all of the 20 motivation skills are weak. The entire line really needs a buff, however considering how the whole idea of party heals has been looked down upon recently I'd say it's not gonna happen. The line has been dead from the beginning and is going to stay dead until the death of guildwars itself.

I agree, they should change all shout and chants to "When <Shout/Chant name> is cast all other <Shout/Chant name> in the party is disabled for X seconds" this way a paragon become less useful in Para only teams and makes it possible to increase the power of a singel paragon again.--85.225.131.215 19:22, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

A higher energy cost combined with a lower recharge could be an easy way to fix this. Dear Izzy, please make all of the party wide healing chants 5 energy more expensive, and 10 seconds recharge, and they would be uasable. Not spammable, not cheap (though cheaper with Leadership, but certainly not free), but usable. Or why not make them apply cracked armor? That would counter the heavily armored healer problem. Or just do SOMETHING please. Pretty please? Nicky Silverstar 19:39, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Aggressive Refrain

While I don't think this is truly underpowered, I think it needs to be reworked. The application of cracked armor constantly, while it does allow for a technically removable aspect to the -20 armor and does give the desired negative creates large issues, especially with hero ai. First of all, the reapplication of conditions basically means that, without the presence of an RC monk, your paragon suddenly cannot remove any conditions they suffer from (or the conditions can't be removed) and secondly it triggers the ai to use condition removal spells on you that a player wouldn't use (because its pointless to remove a condition that will be reapplied every few seconds). Make Aggressive Refrain read something like this: "For 5...21 seconds, you attack 25% faster but have -20 armor. This Echo is reapplied every time a Chant or Shout ends on you."

LOL

WUT

Actually, yeah, that's what should have happened in the first place. That said, it'll take a full blown coder to get this change in, so it may take a bit. Armond 09:50, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

Reduce cost to 15. ashesfalldown 11/16/07

Or increase the duration and remove the copying ability. That might fix it. I agree that the condition is breaking more than it fixes, an armor penalty is ok, even more than -20, but Cracked Armor causes so many problems you might as well have made the skill cost 50 energy. It is rather impractical now to say the least. Nicky Silverstar 13:33, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

"Lead the Way!"

Reduce to 5 energy and increase recharge to 15 secs. I would like to see this updated this way, and it is not like any other class can put points in Leadership any ways. ashesfalldown 11/20/06

Inspirational Speech

This skill has little to no use whatsoever, and Motivation needed all the help it could get already when Eye of the North came out. Please, change this skill into something useful, like a small regen for the entire party, or a small energy boost, or maybe a condition/hex removal skill. In fact, most Motivation skills could use a serious change. They need to be less situational, otherwise they will only be good in teams with nothing but Paragons. A good way to start would be lower recharge and higher energy costs. Nicky Silverstar 13:31, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

Completely useless skill. TTL or FGJ on a warrior work way better.

Barbed Spear

Increase the bleeding to 25 Prokiller88 01:50, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

Does it matter if the bleeding is 10 seconds or 65535 seconds? --Deathwing 02:53, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

a cheaper adren ranged sever artery... under powered how? 20:59, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

Re: Jagged Strike. Don't compare to other classes when trying to determine balance; the two classes have completely different purposes. Armond 01:00, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Sever Artery only has any use to help Gash have an effect. If anybody uses Sever Artery, and not Gash, then they need to find a new build. With the newly added Holy Spear and Spear of Redemption, I think this skill could use a little more umph. Some bonus damage, or crippling against bleeding targets would be nice. --Deathwing 01:04, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

It got a gash-like combo... Nicky Silverstar 19:32, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

better idea might have been if target is already bleeding, add +10-17 damage. --Life Infusion «T» 04:08, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

Paragons already have enough spear DPS, thanks. --71.229.204.25 02:22, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

EDIT: Nvm, but it is important in that game =.= Mr.Hobo 01:41, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Nothing to do with Age of Empires....--Deathwing 02:24, 21 December 2007 (UTC)