Minstrel Tweaks

[sahanto]

Vastin you are taking the skill cap from super easy to new levels of incredibly easy. Mini has been a very easy class for a long time I think you are misguided when you say the skill cap is too high.

[splatterthrash]

1) It's much harder to balance a class when one of its primary mechanics is allows it to break the timing of most of its skills.

Said mechanic is what allows the class to be viable in the first place, considering the extremely slow and awkward animations. Tle class is already considered relatively weak for the hardest contenty by the best players, how does breaking a core class mechanic fix anything?

2) It puts a higher skill cap on the minstrel class than I believe is desirable for the game's core healer.

Using keybinds = extremely high skill in LOTRO 2k19
Are we literally balancing the game around clickers now?

The skill cap issue creates a different problem, where we can and do get complaints that a class is both significantly over-powered and under-powered at the same time.

Absolutely no one is complaining about minstrels being overpowered now. And I shouldn't have to say this, but the complaints of people struggling to heal t1 content shouldn't be taken seriously. Case in point, the vast majority of lotro players are clickers and the vast majority of lotro players make ANY class look weak and mediocre. ANY class will feel underpowered in the hands of the average player. How in the world does trying to bring down your best players to the level of people struggling to heal t1 content be considered a reasonable goal? How in the world does that adress the class issues with the hardest content?

This can absolutely be true when there's a high skill cap, and especially so when that skill cap is dependent on understanding complex hidden mechanics like SoS animation breaking - our interface just doesn't provide any feedback for that sort of thing.

Which is why this thread exists, so you can listen to the feedback of people who actually know how to play the game.

In short, *I* may have to write up massive spreadsheets in order to properly understand and work with our character classes - and some of you obviously enjoy doing the same in your spare time - but I'd really rather that most players not be required to. I want to try to keep most of the major mechanics visible to players wherever reasonably possible.

I've never written a spreadsheet or even read a class guide in my life, and I had no issues whatsoever improving my playstyle. Have the standards fallen so low that being able to press skills in quick sucession is considered an unsurmountable wall for the playerbase? Minstrel is already one of the class with the lower skill ceiling as it is, what does that imply for classes with more complex playstyles?

Anyhoo, I definitely want to further refine the balance between a few of the core skills to get them in a good place and I'm certainly considering the various arguments around the cool-down changes. I'm also going to see if I can do something about a few of the clunkier Minstrel anims, if possible. I'll try to get this stuff in front of you folks ASAP so that you can run some actual tests and see how it plays out in practice.
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Even with animation canceling the class is considered fairly slow paced and weak, I shudder to think the state of the class will be without smoothing up animation unless all the numbers across the board receive a considerably boost (exactly what almost every high tier player asked you NOT to do).
If the goal is to make things easier to those struggling to heal sammy t1c and remove any "toxic" skill expression from the people who actually know how to play the game then you might as well revert the bolster courage nerfs. It was many's field day after all, when even a comatose monkey could heal the hardest content by repeteadly clicking one skill.

[Edelanor]

- I'm happy for improved strikes for soloing/duoing. (Though if a Mini is in Resonance stance, they will be in a group, and if they're using Healing Strikes, the group has problems not related to Minstrel class balance. That said, I don't see a problem with Healing Strike simply being analagous the other strikes, even if it doesn't get used.)

- Improved Major Ballad is very helpful, because LMs and RKs generally have the good sense to be near the healer.

- I'm still going to argue for *Resonance* skills to be *group focused*, and specifically for *Coda of Rosonance* to be a *targeted group heal*, which would strengthen the Minstrel's weakest point of group heals.


I am, however, a bit worried that some of the shouters on this thread are getting responses, but potential concerns for Yellow healers (which your initial post promised to look at) have not been addressed:

1. "Improved Chord of Salvation group heal component increased by ~300%, cooldown increased (10->15s)" -- This appears to increase a Blue trait, but do nothing for the base skill, yet increasing the cooldown, presumably for all versions of this skill. This would amount to a *nerf* in Yellow and Red.

2. "Inspire Fellows heal increased by ~90%, cooldown increased (5->10s)" -- Buffing a heal by 90%, but increasing the cooldown by 100% is a net *loss* of healing. The Blue line does have extra group heals to rotate, but Yellow does not - "Raise our Spirits" has not even been addressed. This would be a net loss for Yellow healers.

3. "Raise our Spirits" is still broken.

[Vastin]

Many of you seem to forget that I do have the power to change animation times - within reason. The animation tails on your primary heals are clearly WAY too long if you've become this wedded to the interrupt mechanic, so I'll just trim them - it's not like the extended animation is doing you any good aesthetically given as you are intentionally cutting them.

-Vastin

[TheRedfox]

Many of you seem to forget that I do have the power to change animation times - within reason. The animation tails on your primary heals are clearly WAY too long if you've become this wedded to the interrupt mechanic, so I'll just trim them - it's not like the extended animation is doing you any good aesthetically given as you are intentionally cutting them.

-Vastin

<swoon> this is why we love devs that give constant feedback on what they're doing.

[dsltn07]

I just want to reply to say:

Thank you for spending time on classes.

Please don’t be discouraged by the polarized reaction to animation slicing.

Please keep up the good work, as a tank I look forward to being supported by more successful well balanced minstrels.

[hanxcve]

Many of you seem to forget that I do have the power to change animation times - within reason. The animation tails on your primary heals are clearly WAY too long if you've become this wedded to the interrupt mechanic, so I'll just trim them - it's not like the extended animation is doing you any good aesthetically given as you are intentionally cutting them.

-Vastin

You are creating so much more work for yourself than there is needed to be, no one suggested this in the first place. Please just own up to your mistakes and revert the changes the current system is fine

Minstrel is slowly turning into beorning 2.0 with all this "skill gap" "lower to 5 skills total pl0x" bs

[dsltn07]

You are creating so much more work for yourself than there is needed to be, no one suggested this in the first place. Please just own up to your mistakes and revert the changes the current system is fine

Minstrel is slowly turning into beorning 2.0 with all this "skill gap" "lower to 5 skills total pl0x" bs

So you would instead propose to leave every other skill as it is and buff BC by 300%? Yes, that balance worked great for the Beorning when encouraging roar became broken. Instead Vastin is taking the time to try and catch up all your additional heals and skills that were never scaled, and you’re complaining? The Beorning’s biggest current problem imo is that it lacks utility heal skills and overheals too much. Vastin’s trying to increase your viable skill pool from 1-2 to 5+ heals and that’s what upset you?

[Fureo]

So you would instead propose to leave every other skill as it is and buff BC by 300%? Yes, that balance worked great for the Beorning when encouraging roar became broken. Instead Vastin is taking the time to try and catch up all your additional heals and skills that were never scaled, and you’re complaining? The Beorning’s biggest current problem imo is that it lacks utility heal skills and overheals too much. Vastin’s trying to increase your viable skill pool from 1-2 to 5+ heals and that’s what upset you?

Where did he said BC needs a buff by 300%...

just the SoS changes...

Nobody wants BC as it was 105/115 just broken

[Dairos]

The more I think about a BC cooldown the more I feel we're getting further away from the class Ive been playing 12 years and that I love. Induction is enough punishment for that skill these days; don't give us cooldown, please.

About SoS and cutting animation I have mixed feelings. I use it, ofc, but it's also a source of skills not working sometimes when you hit keys very quickly (becasue of the way that macro wargs were fixed). It could actually be good if post animations were reduced.

PS. Just for the nostalgic with good memory. Before Chord was added we mainly had induction heals that would heal at the end of it. Then they added Chord with the philosophy of: "ok, you will heal instantly but you'll spend 2 seconds doing nothing afterwards". And post animations were a torture until they were reduced a lot (in Watcher raid times).

[dsltn07]

There were multiple posters talking about reverting the changes to BC entirely, I’m not going back to find them. If something is changed and it’s not BC, not SoS, not the aoe or peripheral heal skills...what do you want? I referenced a buff to BC because I thought it was funny for him to say “don’t change the peripheral skills” yet in the following sentence mocked the Beorning for having few heal skills as though that were a design choice.

If Vastin doesn’t update the peripheral skills (leaving them unscaled, nearly useless) then how is having BC spam better than only having 5 heal skills like the Beorning?

Edit to add: maybe Vastin should ditch mini changes altogether and move on to help with burg. They’d likely be more appreciative.

[Erethal]

I actually didn't realize that. It seems like any dev in the past made changing animation times sound like a monumental effort that was never within the "scope" of what they could do. I'm sure every class has at least a couple skills with clunky animations and delays, if not a lot of skills. I definitely wouldn't complain if an entire update cycle was dedicated to speeding up skill animations and trimming pre/post skill delays across all classes.

I can't actually re-animate things, but I've learned a few tricks that will let me truncate them, at least in some cases. Doesn't look quite as nice - but that's what you're already doing with the interrupts, so.... <shrug>

Hopefully I can get the animators to come in behind me later to clean them up a bit and make them look nicer in the shorter time frame, but its much more important that they feel responsive.

-Vastin

[Pelind]

I would think adding a line into the tutorial or one of your happy little popup tips regarding fast, immediate, etc skill speeds would be easy enough to incorporate, and more desirable than over-simplifying your classes to the point of brain-dead level playability.

[jomanjy]

Many of you seem to forget that I do have the power to change animation times - within reason. The animation tails on your primary heals are clearly WAY too long if you've become this wedded to the interrupt mechanic, so I'll just trim them - it's not like the extended animation is doing you any good aesthetically given as you are intentionally cutting them.

-Vastin

^^^^^ this... i don't mind the SoS change at all if you planning to fix the annoying animation on most of mini skills. esp please look into triumphant spirit, perfect ending,even SoS since it won't me immediate anymore it still has long animation.

[luckygirl1]

Many of you seem to forget that I do have the power to change animation times - within reason. The animation tails on your primary heals are clearly WAY too long if you've become this wedded to the interrupt mechanic, so I'll just trim them - it's not like the extended animation is doing you any good aesthetically given as you are intentionally cutting them.

-Vastin

Holy ....please take a closer look at red line's burglar Flashing Blades, coup de grace, exposed throat, Double-Edged Strike and cunning attack animations....specifically the male hobbit and female hobbit which are significantly slower than a man burglar for some reason.


Along with Lore-master animations all around specifically Frost-Lore


Sorry, i know this is the minstrel thread. But I have been banging on the door about hobbit burglar animations for so long now with no response whatsoever from a dev regarding skill animations. Didnt even know it was in your teams capability to shave the animations down at this point but you just made it sound so easy

[dsltn07]

He did a fantastic job with the Beorning hearten/FR animations. Each used to take 2 or so seconds, now they’re .5 second each or so.

Expose, bash, and thrash for bear could be shorter too though @Vastin

[keztryl]

Any healing Minstrel in melee range of a boss is in the wrong place. Its just a pure simple fact.

I can't believe how many people just said this. How have they played lotro and never experienced a classic "Tank and Spank" boss fight? Unbroken? Sagrog? Hrímil? Storvâgûn? The howling pit? Honestly? Feeling sorry for all of the fellowships who have had to run with a minstrel who isn't able to remove corruptions between heals.

@sapienze. I have to believe you misspoke.

[keztryl]

No one asked for any of these changes.. please read the feedback from Karnage_Arkenstone or myself and then do those changes.

Those interrupts were THE fun thing with the Mini and sorry, but that wasn't hard to learn.
Just don't delete the instant mechanic... just don't...
If some say this is crying ... it actually is

Sorry guys, my bad… Having experienced the changes from blue to red hunter, this is one of the changes I was actually hoping for.

So if your rotation is dependent on Call of Ioreth followed by Chord of Salvation, but you click chord too quickly and end up interrupting CoI preventing you from gaining that effect, then that critical 80-100k heal you were depending on suddenly becomes a 20k wheeze. Same goes for if you accidentally interrupt CoS with SoS. My thinking here is that immediate skills such as Chord and Triumphant Spirit should be allowed to cut the animation/induction of the currently executing skills as these skills already have long CDs and are so important to responding to burst damage that their overuse is not a problem. There is no reason for SoS to be a skill that interrupts induction heals. Induction heals followed by immediate skill heals should just have faster animation transitions and the post animation of bolster courage should be slightly reduced (in the way hunter inductions skills seem to transition smoother when followed by a focus skill).

Don’t get me wrong. I’ve been interrupting bolster w/ SoS for like EVER? I’m more worried about breaking an engrained habit, but at this point interrupting bolster with SoS no longer feels like a special talent. Its just automatic. I’m hoping players who’ve experienced some of the recent animation changes to other classes are less worried. Apart from the pedagogical reasons mentioned by Vastin, I think there is also the possibility that this change could make the transition from other heals to SoS feel more natural and smooth. I’m also hoping that Chord and Triumphant no longer cancel the current heal and just allow them to go through while adding the immediate heal. But I could live without this last bit. It just feels like it would make minstrel immediate skills behave in way that is more consistent with those found on other classes.

I honestly like all these changes. I'll want to see how the SoS change works out in practice before I comment on it "ruining the class". Thanks a ton for the Spirit of Freedom and Story of Courage changes! I also like RtS replacing Bolster as spammable ability due to Bolster getting a cooldown and RtS getting a significant buff.

Same for me. I am a little worried about having to learn another healing rotation so soon after the changes this summer. At a glance, I think this rotation will require the use of more skills, and therefore greater skill. But not in a way that is dependent on the perfectly timed execution of just a few critical skills. At lvl 50 cap, RtS use to heal non-tank classes to full morale and bolster was reserved for the heavies... I haven’t used RtS since Helms Deep. I’m looking forward to including it again in my rotation, and the possibility of major ballad applying a larger group heal. Should be interesting.

Many of you seem to forget that I do have the power to change animation times - within reason. The animation tails on your primary heals are clearly WAY too long if you've become this wedded to the interrupt mechanic, so I'll just trim them - it's not like the extended animation is doing you any good aesthetically given as you are intentionally cutting them.

Thanks for taking the time to explain your thinking! I don’t believe there is any way you could have made the necessary changes without ruffling a few feathers (including mine), but your reasoning seems sound to me.

[sapienze]

I can't believe how many people just said this. How have they played lotro and never experienced a classic "Tank and Spank" boss fight? Unbroken? Sagrog? Hrímil? Storvâgûn? The howling pit? Honestly? Feeling sorry for all of the fellowships who have had to run with a minstrel who isn't able to remove corruptions between heals.

@sapienze. I have to believe you misspoke.

I actually meant what I said. Here is why. Piercing Cry no matter the build or stance removes one corruption every ten seconds. This is enough for any situation. For every boss you named I can name 3 where no Minstrel would dare stand near a frontal aoe or radius aoe. There was a time back at level 65 where a Minstrel played a more prominent role in corruption removal with their one melee skill but since the addition of two more corruption incorporations, this being Piercing Cry and Cry of the Valar a Minstrel has plenty of choice in their arsenal regardless of build or trait line.

I always remove corruptions and in most cases before any other class. You mention The Howling Pit. I been trying this with 3 Minstrels all red line. I am always kiting non stop and main target selector in this group. Corruptions for all purposes of this post could be said to be non existent and all while at range using one skill. This being Piercing Cry. With 3 Piercing Cries all with the resets from Ballad crits it is a magical sight to behold.

[sahanto]

Many of you seem to forget that I do have the power to change animation times - within reason. The animation tails on your primary heals are clearly WAY too long if you've become this wedded to the interrupt mechanic, so I'll just trim them - it's not like the extended animation is doing you any good aesthetically given as you are intentionally cutting them.

-Vastin

Oh no vastin, you just opened a huge can of worms, if you can do this to mini (which you pretty much are going to have to do for almost every healing skill), you must do it for literally 75% of the other classes in the game with terribly long animation, specially lms.

[Vastin]

As an aside, I generally didn't expect raid minstrels to be diving into the fray with their swords brandished high, howling for blood and HPS when I made the Strike changes.

Mostly I did it to try to tempt Minstrels to their doom with the promise of slightly higher groups heals.

-Vastin

[sapienze]

Many of you seem to forget that I do have the power to change animation times - within reason. The animation tails on your primary heals are clearly WAY too long if you've become this wedded to the interrupt mechanic, so I'll just trim them - it's not like the extended animation is doing you any good aesthetically given as you are intentionally cutting them.

-Vastin

Concerning Bolster Courage:

It has always had an induction much like many of the Minstrel skills in the early days. You suggested a cd added to the end. Combined both make the healing process rather slow. Mine in a Blue line currently has 1.9 seconds in total with the 3 seconds CD thats 5 seconds with a heal kind of centered in total the length. I understand why you want the CD. If it must be so, then eliminate the induction. I know the induction can be reduced further but just for the sake of this discussion, all Minstrel's BC have an induction. As you stated you can shorten the animation but why bother if you can instead remove the induction. Inductions are the main stay of the Minstrel but times change. These days even the quickest reactions after the fact can come up short.

[Norana]

Great to see all these changes.

Could you possibly change Timeless Echoes of Battle to do any other damage besides the common damage it does now?

Back in the day our instruments changed it to beleriand etc. but for the last 30 levels or so they never added it back leaving us stuck with common damage on that skill.

[Fureo]

As an aside, I generally didn't expect raid minstrels to be diving into the fray with their swords brandished high, howling for blood and HPS when I made the Strike changes.

Mostly I did it to try to tempt Minstrels to their doom with the promise of slightly higher groups heals.

-Vastin

I wrote some Feedback regarding the Group heals and there won't be any "higher" group heals if the Cooldowns are too high

[TheRedfox]

As an aside, I generally didn't expect raid minstrels to be diving into the fray with their swords brandished high, howling for blood and HPS when I made the Strike changes.

Mostly I did it to try to tempt Minstrels to their doom with the promise of slightly higher groups heals.

-Vastin

Bwahahahaha! Some of the funnest things I've done on my mini is to go yellow line, use anthem of prowess for the 3 fast strikes in row, and go wild alongside the tank in a group. RAWR! I'm hoping the changes to strike heals & damage will make this something I can do for more than just giggle runs.