Vastin, RK is close, just needs this minor suggestion

[hunter4215]

Nerfing DNF and boosting Yellow RK DPS would be a net benefit to the spec in all content. DPS specs should compete on DPS, not on who has the most overpowered tertiary support abilities. Under no circumstance should RK be allowed to have competitive DPS and current DNF, it's one or the other and personally I would much prefer a DPS spec to be focused on DPS.

Can I ask with all due respect where are you playing your RK? Are you playing one at 130 end game context? Are you also doing End-game content and at what tier on or not on an RK?

You have nearly half of the replies to this thread all about DNF. Which has nothing to do with the topic raised in the initial point. This initial point is about end game balance for DPS, yet all your points are about the utility of a DNF. Not many raids in AD/Remm or being done currently with a DNF. I don't really get your hyper focus on this one utility lol. What raids are you in where you need more than 2x yellow cappy 2x red cappy, 1 mini 1 bear rez?

[Joedangod]

What raids are you in where you need more than 2x yellow cappy 2x red cappy, 1 mini 1 bear rez?

We're in a period of massive stat bloat where DPS specs are over half a million morale in raid content and we don't actually have content balanced to those morale thresholds as the current "most challenging" content was cleared by people with 60% of those stats. Of course DNF is devalued right now.

This thread is the equivalent of a yellow Captain making a thread saying "Our aggro management needs to be improved". It's absolutely correct in that regard but it totally ignores that several other changes would need to be done to the spec/class at the same time to actually balance things out to the point where players would have multiple options for a role rather than the single class/spec meta.

If you truly believed that DNF was useless you'd honestly just accept its removal in exchange for the boost to DPS, you're only arguing against it because you seem to be one of those "I want my class to be the best and everyone else can suck it" crowd.

[Shanaar]

When looking at other classes and the rune keeper balance is important and yes damage is an issue with doing the hardest challanges ingame.

But I would much more like the redline (fireline) too get a boost, and have the dnf removed from redline only. So why redline ? pretty simple really.

When looking at class balance some classes are in the same group, so red hunter and red runekeeper, where both have induction skills. Also red warden and red rune keeper are dot classes. All this makes it easier to balance the game and keep all classes at the level they need to be.


I must say I see lightning rune keeper as they are today with some damage and some support. Great for doing 1-6 person stuff ingame. Beside having too many rez in raids another challange with the raid concept is there are no room for hybrid line. and the reason for that is that they lack too much behind other classes that only do healing, only do damage and so on..

I love having a hybrid line, it's abid in the old days where one could change line in combat. Go from damage too healing since when it was needed and then swap back again, but I can also see that being to powerful is bad. RK did have a stacking in raids with too much damage combined with too much support. Everytime a class is too powerful and is much have in raid it's really bad balance. (group stuff should certer around tank, healer, damage, debuff, buff ) and not certain classes.

[hunter4215]

We're in a period of massive stat bloat where DPS specs are over half a million morale in raid content and we don't actually have content balanced to those morale thresholds as the current "most challenging" content was cleared by people with 60% of those stats. Of course DNF is devalued right now.

This thread is the equivalent of a yellow Captain making a thread saying "Our aggro management needs to be improved". It's absolutely correct in that regard but it totally ignores that several other changes would need to be done to the spec/class at the same time to actually balance things out to the point where players would have multiple options for a role rather than the single class/spec meta.

If you truly believed that DNF was useless you'd honestly just accept its removal in exchange for the boost to DPS, you're only arguing against it because you seem to be one of those "I want my class to be the best and everyone else can suck it" crowd.

So as I suspected, didn't answer the initial questions.

The whole point of this thread is to balance RK's DPS. Worry about their other utility, even though I've already pointed out DNF is not a game breaking utility, when their DPS is balanced. By spending as much time as you have just pointlessly arguing about DNF and bubble is kind of a meme. Those cooldowns are literally not used in those the highest tiers of either Remmorchant or AD (Yes, people use DNF and Bubble in Remm t5 Shelob because an RK is taken. That is the ONLY place an RK is taken).

This isn't about making a class overpowered, by any means. It's just balancing. And the whole pillar of your argument is "Careful on balance because they have some good utility!" But again, the content is being completed, really easily, without those current utilities lol.

[BinaryTertiary]

Those cooldowns are literally not used in those the highest tiers of either Remmorchant or AD (Yes, people use DNF and Bubble in Remm t5 Shelob because an RK is taken. That is the ONLY place an RK is taken).

today i learned rks never used dnf and it wasnt useful during remmorchant

[Curhadbor]

As I said, why would you expect SSG to give us a dps improvement if they took away or nerfed DNF? I've seen takeaways with nothing in return many times.

[HolyDuckTape]

I want to say that the most recent RK buff was almost exactly what was needed for the class to catch up in DPS. In terms of single target dps on a training Dummy is not far off from other classes.

lol

[Joedangod]

So as I suspected, didn't answer the initial questions.

Kinda an obnoxiously worthless thread then isn't it? Balance requires looking at the whole picture, if you want to only look at DPS and ignore everything else that exists your method would be about as valid as a tank spec complaining "Hey, my DPS is a bit low too, flat buffs please!".

You're trying to make the argument that DNF is currently not that impactful but stubbornly refusing to acknowledge the "currently" part of that sentence. DNF is a very powerful tool during challenging content progression, the fact that we don't have that at this current point in time doesn't justify ignoring the impact it has on overall balance. If your wishes came true we'd then have to deal with RK's being the primary DPS spec during the next raid pushing other specs out of the meta.

As I said, why would you expect SSG to give us a dps improvement if they took away or nerfed DNF? I've seen takeaways with nothing in return many times.

Whilst DNF exists, they can't give RK a DPS increase in yellow as it would almost certainly push it into being the strongest DPS spec to stack. It's not a situation where "If they nerf DNF they will increase DPS" it's a case where "They can't increase DPS whilst DNF exists".

[Curhadbor]

for example, a while back, SSG nerfed yellow's 3 skills by reducing the cooldowns, writ and ceaseless etc. and gave NOTHING in return. I've seen similar things by Turbine and SSG over the years. They take away or give with nothing else. But you say it has to be balanced? too much of something can't be given unless they take away something? I'm sorry, I don't buy your argument which is consistent and you never give up with it everytime we say that the RK was nerfed and we need dps improvement.

[wisap701111]

Respectfully I disagree with the original poster.

The latest Closing Remarks up while a step in the right direction only added 4-5% more DPS based on a series of training dummy runs we tracked with and without the new closing remarks traited. Compared to other DPSers we are still significantly behind other classes with comparable gear. RK was launched as a combo Main Healer and Top Tier DPS but is no longer either. In the lvl 60-85 days the RK was on par with HNT and Mini-RK combos were excellent. That balance worked very well and there were alot of options to fill raids.

I agree that DNF needs to be considered as part of the package, but DNF should not be restricting the RK as a main DPS class, nor should improvements to the class bump out other DPS classes, such as the Hunter. Yellow RK is a short range, scoot-and-shoot tactical class that needs to move and get up-close-and personal for the big hits, and has some moderate AoE. Yellow RK should be getting a 25%'ish percent increase to be on par, but play into med-short range game space. Hunters stay as the benchmark ranged DPS, massive range, and king of adds/target assist. (our kin HNTS can almost completely kill spider adds on Remm B1 Fire before I can even get my RK in range! lol) Thus, both classes can have raid acceptable DPS throughout T1-T5, but still have different play styles and slightly different DPS roles.

We also cannot forget about levelling and non-raiding toons. Roll a new HNT and RK and check the DPS in the lvl 10-20 range. RK DPS needs help at low levels too.

RK Fire is pathetic and needs a huge DPS boost to be useful anywhere. Fire should, in my opinion and only in the correct circumstances, out-DPS a HNT on sustained single target boss burns through layered fire dots and land somewhere between HNT and WRD DPS. However, the fire RK should take time to build (ie 1min+) and be difficult to shift DPS from target to target. Unlike Yellow, moving with Red RK should be a problem (when is the last time you tried shifting a camp fire to the other side of the camp-site...) Thus, a red RK would only run fire on bosses that permit this play style, and continue to leave HNTs as the benchmark ranged DPS with long range and rapid target shifting ability.

Blue RK is close but needs help. I heal a lot and raid a lot. But as soon as you move to more difficult tiers Mini-Bear is the go to and RK healers are bumped out. Mini's buff DPS, bears are raid wide healing. Something in the dps buff OR raid-wide heals needs be added to put RK healers on par, but not above, bears and mini.

Add this up. The RK is a superfun class to play, but we are not top Tier DPS or Top Tier healing, and somewhat restricted from moving to harder content without an extremely supportive kin that will let you come along for the ride.

But I do support the original poster in that the class is close. No full rework needed, but just a few more tweaks to get the dps and healing raid utlity/heals right...

[DiannaHimi]

Lightning RK is close to being nicely balanced, indeed. I would prefer to see their skill range being made bigger and maybe a slight overall damage increase. They are almost like a melee class currently, but without the mitigations for it.

Fire RK needs a serious buff and should be looked at before lightning. It is not at all useful for questing, small dungeons, raids, PvMP. I think its only purpose currently is to get the trait skills on the top, in order to boost the other two lines and that's it.

Healing RK, in my opinion, is not okay at all. While the numbers are great and seem to be where they need to be, numbers alone are not enough for them to be considered as main healers for hard content. People don't want their high heals, people want someone who can buff or debuff. Out of all the healers, blue RKs deal the least amount of personal damage, have almost no DPS utility for the group, outside of Flurry of Words, a nerfed defensive utility in the form of Our Fates Entwined and a pretty good DNF, which I still think is lesser compared to an on demand in-combat target revivals (I put it on key players, who rarely die and it almost makes me feel that I've wasted it, as I could have used it on a less equipped DPS player, but the risk of losing the main tank or co-healer can lead to a wipe), are pretty immobile and are the squishiest. Even Minstrels have a shield and extra mitigations from their trees.

- Compared to Minstrels, who can buff DPS and provide anthem support, as well as minor debuffs here and there from their cries and ballads. Easier access to AoE healing as well.

- Compared to Beornings, who have vital debuffs, extremely powerful raid wide healing, easy to play, no power management and the best of all, serious (for a healer) personal DPS. With a two handed axe, yellow Beorning's own DPS is quite high and can be considered a mini-DPS player by themselves, helping the group with more than just healing.

I cannot speak for the DPS lines, as I play only Blue, but what I'd like to see as a start is a rework of Flurry of Words. It being one of our only 'support' skills, wouldn't it be amazing if it was a ground targeted spell, like the stones or Captain's banners? I'd like to see it (at least as a Blue tree trait) being an instant cast, ground targeted debuff, with increased duration to at least 20 seconds. Even if they remove its damage component to balance this, I would still use it nonstop, as the 3% added crit chance is very helpful and is a step further for the improved Support for Healing RKs.

I honestly would pay money to see our Frost Spells reworked and made useful, maybe part of the Blue Tree. Thematically, it would fit as well. Yellow is lightning, Red is fire, Blue is ice. We already have a healing 'ice' spell called Rune-sign of Winter. Its added -10% incoming damage buff is also a very nice touch, which I'd love to see added in some form to the other frost spells as well. Maybe rework Essence of Winter to make monsters take extra % Tactical Damage, rather than the 'mostly useless' Power costs debuff?

We once had pretty neat ice spells called Frozen Epilogue and Distracting Winds. I would love to see them being brought back, with slightly reworked or changed effects, to make them compete with the Beorning debuffs or Minstrel buffs. Anything really, which would allow us to get a spot and be an organic and viable addition to a group - for the scenarios where the kinship or pug cannot find either a Beorning or Minstrel. I think all healers, including Blue Captains, should be made viable and able to get the job done, without one class being wanted over the other. That is what I call balance.

I also agree that DNF should be kept as it is for Blue line, as it fits the 'healer' theme, but have increased cooldown for the DPS lines, to allow their damage spells to be buffed more.

[Tullkas]

Lightning RK is close to being nicely balanced, indeed. I would prefer to see their skill range being made bigger and maybe a slight overall damage increase. They are almost like a melee class currently, but without the mitigations for it.

Fire RK needs a serious buff and should be looked at before lightning. It is not at all useful for questing, small dungeons, raids, PvMP. I think its only purpose currently is to get the trait skills on the top, in order to boost the other two lines and that's it.

Healing RK, in my opinion, is not okay at all. While the numbers are great and seem to be where they need to be, numbers alone are not enough for them to be considered as main healers for hard content. People don't want their high heals, people want someone who can buff or debuff. Out of all the healers, blue RKs deal the least amount of personal damage, have almost no DPS utility for the group, outside of Flurry of Words, a nerfed defensive utility in the form of Our Fates Entwined and a pretty good DNF, which I still think is lesser compared to an on demand in-combat target revivals (I put it on key players, who rarely die and it almost makes me feel that I've wasted it, as I could have used it on a less equipped DPS player, but the risk of losing the main tank or co-healer can lead to a wipe), are pretty immobile and are the squishiest. Even Minstrels have a shield and extra mitigations from their trees.

- Compared to Minstrels, who can buff DPS and provide anthem support, as well as minor debuffs here and there from their cries and ballads. Easier access to AoE healing as well.

- Compared to Beornings, who have vital debuffs, extremely powerful raid wide healing, easy to play, no power management and the best of all, serious (for a healer) personal DPS. With a two handed axe, yellow Beorning's own DPS is quite high and can be considered a mini-DPS player by themselves, helping the group with more than just healing.

I cannot speak for the DPS lines, as I play only Blue, but what I'd like to see as a start is a rework of Flurry of Words. It being one of our only 'support' skills, wouldn't it be amazing if it was a ground targeted spell, like the stones or Captain's banners? I'd like to see it (at least as a Blue tree trait) being an instant cast, ground targeted debuff, with increased duration to at least 20 seconds. Even if they remove its damage component to balance this, I would still use it nonstop, as the 3% added crit chance is very helpful and is a step further for the improved Support for Healing RKs.

I honestly would pay money to see our Frost Spells reworked and made useful, maybe part of the Blue Tree. Thematically, it would fit as well. Yellow is lightning, Red is fire, Blue is ice. We already have a healing 'ice' spell called Rune-sign of Winter. Its added -10% incoming damage buff is also a very nice touch, which I'd love to see added in some form to the other frost spells as well. Maybe rework Essence of Winter to make monsters take extra % Tactical Damage, rather than the 'mostly useless' Power costs debuff?

We once had pretty neat ice spells called Frozen Epilogue and Distracting Winds. I would love to see them being brought back, with slightly reworked or changed effects, to make them compete with the Beorning debuffs or Minstrel buffs. Anything really, which would allow us to get a spot and be an organic and viable addition to a group - for the scenarios where the kinship or pug cannot find either a Beorning or Minstrel. I think all healers, including Blue Captains, should be made viable and able to get the job done, without one class being wanted over the other. That is what I call balance.

I also agree that DNF should be kept as it is for Blue line, as it fits the 'healer' theme, but have increased cooldown for the DPS lines, to allow their damage spells to be buffed more.

RKs have sailed West don't roll them or bother logging in anymore....

[Lotro_Dancer1]

Lightning RK is close to being nicely balanced, indeed. I would prefer to see their skill range being made bigger and maybe a slight overall damage increase. They are almost like a melee class currently, but without the mitigations for it.

Fire RK needs a serious buff and should be looked at before lightning. It is not at all useful for questing, small dungeons, raids, PvMP. I think its only purpose currently is to get the trait skills on the top, in order to boost the other two lines and that's it.

Healing RK, in my opinion, is not okay at all. While the numbers are great and seem to be where they need to be, numbers alone are not enough for them to be considered as main healers for hard content. People don't want their high heals, people want someone who can buff or debuff. Out of all the healers, blue RKs deal the least amount of personal damage, have almost no DPS utility for the group, outside of Flurry of Words, a nerfed defensive utility in the form of Our Fates Entwined and a pretty good DNF, which I still think is lesser compared to an on demand in-combat target revivals (I put it on key players, who rarely die and it almost makes me feel that I've wasted it, as I could have used it on a less equipped DPS player, but the risk of losing the main tank or co-healer can lead to a wipe), are pretty immobile and are the squishiest. Even Minstrels have a shield and extra mitigations from their trees.

- Compared to Minstrels, who can buff DPS and provide anthem support, as well as minor debuffs here and there from their cries and ballads. Easier access to AoE healing as well.

- Compared to Beornings, who have vital debuffs, extremely powerful raid wide healing, easy to play, no power management and the best of all, serious (for a healer) personal DPS. With a two handed axe, yellow Beorning's own DPS is quite high and can be considered a mini-DPS player by themselves, helping the group with more than just healing.

I cannot speak for the DPS lines, as I play only Blue, but what I'd like to see as a start is a rework of Flurry of Words. It being one of our only 'support' skills, wouldn't it be amazing if it was a ground targeted spell, like the stones or Captain's banners? I'd like to see it (at least as a Blue tree trait) being an instant cast, ground targeted debuff, with increased duration to at least 20 seconds. Even if they remove its damage component to balance this, I would still use it nonstop, as the 3% added crit chance is very helpful and is a step further for the improved Support for Healing RKs.

I honestly would pay money to see our Frost Spells reworked and made useful, maybe part of the Blue Tree. Thematically, it would fit as well. Yellow is lightning, Red is fire, Blue is ice. We already have a healing 'ice' spell called Rune-sign of Winter. Its added -10% incoming damage buff is also a very nice touch, which I'd love to see added in some form to the other frost spells as well. Maybe rework Essence of Winter to make monsters take extra % Tactical Damage, rather than the 'mostly useless' Power costs debuff?

We once had pretty neat ice spells called Frozen Epilogue and Distracting Winds. I would love to see them being brought back, with slightly reworked or changed effects, to make them compete with the Beorning debuffs or Minstrel buffs. Anything really, which would allow us to get a spot and be an organic and viable addition to a group - for the scenarios where the kinship or pug cannot find either a Beorning or Minstrel. I think all healers, including Blue Captains, should be made viable and able to get the job done, without one class being wanted over the other. That is what I call balance.

I also agree that DNF should be kept as it is for Blue line, as it fits the 'healer' theme, but have increased cooldown for the DPS lines, to allow their damage spells to be buffed more.

I think you've got some great points there for Blue Line. In difficult content (it T2+ raids) RK's are not wanted for either DPS or Heals right now. I like where you are going with the Blue line thinking and overlaps with my thoughts below on Yellow RK changes. I wouldn't touch DNF given that DNF < mini rez since you have to guess in advance who gets the DNF. Perhaps in Blue Line the DNF's could work after death and also rez the RK healer...

YELLOW LINE SUGGESTIONS
Yellow RK should stay as is from a play-style perspective... med-short-range... shoot & scoot... its a great and fun class with great self heals, slows, stuns, descent AoE etc... But! Yellow dps is not ok. DPS RK's are not taken on T2+raids with a few boss exception where the DNF's are asked for. I stated in an earlier thread that RK DPS is off by about 30%. However, since then I've done 50+ kin-house dummy parses with fellow kinnies and would update this to say that the RK, with full Remm Set + the new Closing Remarks/Aftershock trait change, is about 15-20% behind assuming DNF stays as is... if I could add suggestions:

- CHALLENGE: the closing remarks/aftershock is too RNG dependent... sometimes over a minute to proc... other times it will proc every few seconds.. can often time-out before Epic Conclusion refreshes = DPS gap
- CHALLENGE: The RK yellow is often restricted since you can't get close enough to the boss to use your big DPS skills (Vivid and Static are 5m and thus useless on things like Remm B1 Fire Spider adds) = DPS gap
- CHALLENGE: Yellow skills rotation is a bit clunky and limited. either CD are slightly off, or needs +1 skill to have better flow and choice during combat
- CHALLENGE: Frost skills are never used in-combat.
- CHALLENGE: Shocking Words (one of our bigger hits) is eliminated from rotations since the attunement loss causes greater DPS loss.
- CHALLENGE: Concession and Rebuttal has useless Sustaining Bolt and Shocking Word benefits
- CHALLENGE: Sustaining bolt is useless heal and kills your DPS = Never use

SOLUTION 1: SHOCKING WORDS unused in DPS rotation due to attunement loss
--- CONCESSION AND REBUTTAL: Shocking Words adds 9 attunement. <-- can now advance, rather than reduce DPS

SOLUTION 2: CLOSING REMARKS management:
--- SCRIBES SPARK increase damage by 10% (so it is in between Writ and Ceaseless when at full attunement), add + 10% Thunderous Words proc chance
--- ORATORS SPARK (new skill) exact as Scribes Spark except +10% Harsh Debate proc chance (make icon for ORATOR and HARSH DEBATE the same)
--- HARSH DEBATE (add -1s Scribes Spark CD), THUNDEROUS WORDS (add -1s Orators Spark CD)
--- players now have more skill choice and advanced players can monitor buffs and alter rotations to improve closing remarks proc' chances. + slight DPS bump in base skill DPS

SOLUTION 3: SUSTAINING + ARMOUR of the ELEMENTS
--- CONCESSION & REBUTTAL: Sustaining Bolt. Add 3% morale heal per attunement consumed. <-- now worth using occasionally as a save-your-butt skill.
--- ARMOUR OF THE ELEMENTS. CD 30sec. Move to Frost Line. Bubble = 20% RK's morale. 30% damage reflect for 20s. BLUE LINE - Armour of the Elements is targetable (ie put it on another player)

SOLUTION 4: FROST SKILLS
--- Remove inductions from all frost skills. Now usable in all lines without significant rotation interruption. Remove damage (it hasn't been scaled properly anyways)
--- FLURRY OF WORDS. Ground Targetable. Increase to 5%. 20m AOE benefit, sustainable throughout combat if player is focused. (non-stackable) (increase to 10% DEVASTATING for blue line = overall average 10% DPS increase)
--- CHILLING RETORIC (instant) -50% run does NOT break on damage, next skill is +5m range
--- ESSENCE OF WINTER: (instant) add, next skill is 10m Aoe (works on blue as Aoe 20m heal)

SOLUTION 5: Shocking Touch (never used)
--- SHOCKING Touch: +10% tactical damage on target boss for 10s (non-stackable), keep the 20s cd. (provides an average 5% increase if triggers on every refresh), increase DPS by 50% as it is far behind other DPS skills.
--- blue line.. skill becomes Shocking Cry. 10m Aoe. 8 target. 10s Daze, +10% tactical, melee, ranged for 10s.

SOLUTION 6: Static Surge arc is too narrow (90').
--- I'd recommend it is widened to 135' or 180'.

[Pasxas]

Ok to get it all straight.. A pay-to-unlock, casting, light class that does way lower dmg than heavy champs (even ST on aoe spec 270k), hunters (ofcourse with 400kparse) +4skill class-beornings (363k parse) , red burg (275k parse) while poor rk can do 230-240k max.. even red guardian being close to rk parse with U30.. Rk support skills: dnf nerfed, group Inc dmg on target, nerfed.. On other side..heals on rk are lowest.. Nothing to compare with beo on heavy who brings up maybe double numbers from rk plus very nice beo utilities in raids, while rk seems like garbage... Ok I give rks that they have a sweet bubble and -Inc dmg.. This class looks it's no worth.. And is being downgraded from mordor... Nope, I'm sorry for my time and money.. And no VASTIN, rk is NOT CLOSE