Bullroarer Update 33 - Beta #4 - CLOSED

[Sk0field]

I am just curious why there are no complaints about hunters yet since they are as powerful in terms of st dps as yellow champs and cleary in front of red ones.

Well, hunters aren't even close in AoE DPS compared to yellow champs, and they won't be even with the nerf in place. Hunters should lead in ST DPS and Champs in AoE. Otherwise please buff hunters AoE (and I am not talking raid set bonus here...).

[Strider5548]

It outperforms Warden, a class which is also melee and is notably more lag-unfriendly. There's no such thing as "main aoe class", we've just historically been stuck in the situation where Champion monumentally outperforms every single other class in the game in AoE...that's not a good thing, there should be some actual choice between DPS specs but no, we've been stuck with Champions dominating the AoE meta for a decade and lately they've also been dominating the ST meta. Yellow Champ ST certainly needs a nerf but then Champ in general needs a nerf.

This argument makes no sense. Since Wardens take longer to ramp up DPS they should do more sustained DPS than champs? You are also ignoring the fact that a Warden can die, go link dead, leave the fight, and that 20-30 seconds they missed out on during ramp up time will continue to drain the boss down after the Warden stops fighting. Wardens can swap to ranged immediately if they need to, they can self heal, they have 2 extra lives with Never Surrender assuming it was up before the fight started. I'm just cherry picking these examples to show you what you're doing with champs. Class balance is more complex than this.

This change is a bad one, I recognize there are some players who have a strong hatred for champions, but this doesn't help solve any of the problems with champs.

The number one issue with champions is that the availability of so many trait points and traceries at this level have created opportunities to create a build where yellow line does more ST DPS than red line.

Instead of addressing the issue by shifting the trait trees around and/or modifying traceries, they nerf a base skill which is absolutely useless already without access to certain trait points and traceries. What's worse is this change also nerfs red champs.

Rather than create another useless skill for champs, why not balance it so that yellow line has a better distribution of DPS across existing skills. Blade Storm and the yellow capstone are virtually useless, maybe fix those as well and address yellow overall DPS by making some red trait points impossible to acquire while in yellow and possibly modifying the bonus from certain traceries.

This change is lazy and ineffective.

[Hephburz-2]

This argument makes no sense. Since Wardens take longer to ramp up DPS they should do more sustained DPS than champs? You are also ignoring the fact that a Warden can die, go link dead, leave the fight, and that 20-30 seconds they missed out on during ramp up time will continue to drain the boss down after the Warden stops fighting. Wardens can swap to ranged immediately if they need to, they can self heal, they have 2 extra lives with Never Surrender assuming it was up before the fight started. I'm just cherry picking these examples to show you what you're doing with champs. Class balance is more complex than this.

This change is a bad one, I recognize there are some players who have a strong hatred for champions, but this doesn't help solve any of the problems with champs.

The number one issue with champions is that the availability of so many trait points and traceries at this level have created opportunities to create a build where yellow line does more ST DPS than red line.

Instead of addressing the issue by shifting the trait trees around and/or modifying traceries, they nerf a base skill which is absolutely useless already without access to certain trait points and traceries. What's worse is this change also nerfs red champs.

Rather than create another useless skill for champs, why not balance it so that yellow line has a better distribution of DPS across existing skills. Blade Storm and the yellow capstone are virtually useless, maybe fix those as well and address yellow overall DPS by making some red trait points impossible to acquire while in yellow and possibly modifying the bonus from certain traceries.

This change is lazy and ineffective.

This 100%.

[WeirdJedi]

This change makes no sense to me

I tend to question a lot of things. Most of the time, they are trying to make an adjustment to classes when they are doing too well for the newest raid. It could also be some cutback for something they recently changed. All I can do is sit back and watch as they experiment with different things, like in the case of the minstrel's bubble.

Remember the class changes for when Remmorchant came out?

• Captain
  - Noble Mark is triggering a lot faster than intended and is pretty severely overpowered.
  - We had to change the type of effect that triggers the heal on Noble Mark, which necessitated a significant redesign of the skill.
  - Noble Mark now allows the captain to heal up to 3%/3s when they land an skill attack against any opponent.
  - Noble Mark's range is now only 12m, requiring the captain to remain in close proximity to their marked target to maintain the effect.
• Hunter
  - The Hunter's poison curative abilities have been powerful enough to effectively negate any curable poison mechanic in runs for a while. We felt it was necessary to implement a more significant cooldown limit on how often they can be used.
  - AoE poison cure now has a longer CD [10s->45s], single target cure now has a cooldown [0s->5s].
  - Tweaked hunter direct dmg up slightly across the board to help compensate for the reduced utility.

Or my personal favorite from Update 30 - https://forums.lotro.com/forums/show...Preview-1-OPEN

"Red Line
Telling Mark base effect reduced from (5->3%), Traited bonus from (5->2%), total (10->5%).
As a 100% uptime debuff with no action time cost, Telling Mark's group effect was too powerful."

If the group effect was too powerful, why did you nerf the entire functionality of it?

[Sk0field]

This change is a bad one, I recognize there are some players who have a strong hatred for champions, but this doesn't help solve any of the problems with champs.

The number one issue with champions is that the availability of so many trait points and traceries at this level have created opportunities to create a build where yellow line does more ST DPS than red line.

Instead of addressing the issue by shifting the trait trees around and/or modifying traceries, they nerf a base skill which is absolutely useless already without access to certain trait points and traceries. What's worse is this change also nerfs red champs.

Rather than create another useless skill for champs, why not balance it so that yellow line has a better distribution of DPS across existing skills. Blade Storm and the yellow capstone are virtually useless, maybe fix those as well and address yellow overall DPS by making some red trait points impossible to acquire while in yellow and possibly modifying the bonus from certain traceries.

This change is lazy and ineffective.

I truly believe you underestimate the time and resources that can be invested to balance this... You call it lazy, but it's simply efficient.

[Hephburz-2]

I truly believe you underestimate the time and resources that can be invested to balance this... You call it lazy, but it's simply efficient.

But it's not though? Because it literally doesn't fix or change anything lol

[gaara908776]

In Hiddenhoard T3, Champ is already behind Hunter on boss 2/3. They lose a ton of uptime and can hardly ever use their AoE skills due to reflects/CC/Etc. Warden DPS is in such a bad spot for Boss 2/3 because it has 0 burst damage.

Meta: Hunter>Champ>Warden=RK. Right now it’s barely even worth bringing a Warden for their utility. IMO Blade Wall damage is too high but it’s not causing some earth shattering imbalance.

Underperforming classes like Warden will maybe offer a higher value proposition in tier 4/5 because of utility but their DPS is just too slow to ramp up in fights like these.

ST DPS should really look something like this:

Warden>Red Champ/Red Hunter>=Red RK>Yellow Champ.

[Osglinthor]

This argument makes no sense. Since Wardens take longer to ramp up DPS they should do more sustained DPS than champs? You are also ignoring the fact that a Warden can die, go link dead, leave the fight, and that 20-30 seconds they missed out on during ramp up time will continue to drain the boss down after the Warden stops fighting. Wardens can swap to ranged immediately if they need to, they can self heal, they have 2 extra lives with Never Surrender assuming it was up before the fight started. I'm just cherry picking these examples to show you what you're doing with champs. Class balance is more complex than this.

No offense, but this even if sarcastically, and what person few posts before wrote where ward will "continue to DPS" if he has to move due to mechanic like champ (because dots definitly wont fall off to where you will result in same DPS loss as champ) is some of biggest nonsense I have seen. Does champ need nerf? Yes. Do I agree with how SSG is balancing? Nope.
Gap between DoT and Brust DPS needs to be reduced. And yes class with longer ramp up should obviously do more sustained DPS. The same way those classes are ignored by every single DPS mechanic. So there should be middle ground where, where certain classes brust DPS is toned down a bit, while those with bigger ramp up is increased (preferably trough way that would sacrfice their sustained DPS for short gain(still not high enough to match "brust" classes))

[Quazi-moto]

Warden: great sustained single target dps + AoE
Champ (red): great sustained single target dps + high burst
Hunter: great sustained single target dps + high burst + ranged
RK (red): great sustained single target dps + AoE + ranged

This is the dps short list for competitive content, i.e. all others not welcome.

Why not improve these DPS, yes DPS trait lines instead:
red LM
red mini (new and improved to be about 60% of short list)
yellow rk
yellow warden
red captain
red guardian
yellow and blue hunter
blue burglar
red bear
no idea which trait line for brawler, but yes

Not having solid options for alternative classes makes it all so tiresome. I love playing my champ and warden because it's like being a moose in a Swarovski store, every time you move, something breaks. I hate being forced to play moose.

[Hierona]

In Hiddenhoard T3, Champ is already behind Hunter on boss 2/3. They lose a ton of uptime and can hardly ever use their AoE skills due to reflects/CC/Etc. Warden DPS is in such a bad spot for Boss 2/3 because it has 0 burst damage.

Meta: Hunter>Champ>Warden=RK. Right now it’s barely even worth bringing a Warden for their utility. IMO Blade Wall damage is too high but it’s not causing some earth shattering imbalance.

Underperforming classes like Warden will maybe offer a higher value proposition in tier 4/5 because of utility but their DPS is just too slow to ramp up in fights like these.

ST DPS should really look something like this:

Warden>Red Champ/Red Hunter>=Red RK>Yellow Champ.

I disagree a bit. I think the list should be this way. Going of a normal st dps for 140: 400k
Red Hunter. 100% = 400k
Red Warden. 95% = 380k
Red Champ. 90% = 360k
Yellow Runekeeper. 85% = 340k
Yellow Champ. 85% = 340k
Red Runekeeper. 80% = 320k
Blue Hunter. 80% = 320k
Yellow Warden. 80% = 320k
Red Burg. 80% = 320k
Red Captain. 50% = 200k
Red Brawler. 50% = 200k
Yellow Burg. 50% = 200k

[Hephburz-2]

I disagree a bit. I think the list should be this way. Going of a normal st dps for 140: 400k
Red Hunter. 100% = 400k
Red Warden. 95% = 380k
Red Champ. 90% = 360k
Yellow Runekeeper. 85% = 340k
Yellow Champ. 85% = 340k
Red Runekeeper. 80% = 320k
Blue Hunter. 80% = 320k
Yellow Warden. 80% = 320k
Red Burg. 80% = 320k
Red Captain. 50% = 200k
Red Brawler. 50% = 200k
Yellow Burg. 50% = 200k

Period;

Red Hunter should not be the highest DPS class, yes, it's only function currently as a class is as a DPS but it has the luxury of range which means it's overall DPS output should always be lower or on par with anyone who has to be in Melee.

[Halphast]

Period;

Red Hunter should not be the highest DPS class, yes, it's only function currently as a class is as a DPS but it has the luxury of range which means it's overall DPS output should always be lower or on par with anyone who has to be in Melee.

I love yellow wardens, but I don't usually argue that we should have higher DPS for this exact reason. We can put heavily damaging bleeds on 10-15 enemies at 40 meters- the fact that it does less damage than some single-target nukes, or than melee classes who have to put themselves in harm's way, is a pretty fair trade-off.

Red hunters do an unrealistic amount of damage at little risk to themselves, with nothing but arrows. Melee classes wielding heavy weapons should not be doing less damage. I've never understood why red hunters' DPS is sacrosanct.

[Hephburz-2]

I've never understood why red hunters' DPS is sacrosanct.

It's understandable to the extent that they're probably one of three classes in the game who only have ONE role in content, which means in all fairness they should be pretty dam good at that role, which is fine, but not to the extent that how good they are becomes absurd, there is literally no downside to Hunter, and given the new raid set bonus, even their AoE damage on boss fights isn't that awful anymore either.

[Hierona]

It's understandable to the extent that they're probably one of three classes in the game who only have ONE role in content, which means in all fairness they should be pretty dam good at that role, which is fine, but not to the extent that how good they are becomes absurd, there is literally no downside to Hunter, and given the new raid set bonus, even their AoE damage on boss fights isn't that awful anymore either.

Not only that they have one Line, but they are so much bevind on champ. They can't move while dpsing, only have singletarget hits, little survivability and range does not much in raids. You want Them moving with the group so they move as much as the rest. Hunters who don't do that you can just kick.

[Arnenna]

Not only that they have one Line, but they are so much bevind on champ. They can't move while dpsing, only have singletarget hits, little survivability and range does not much in raids. You want Them moving with the group so they move as much as the rest. Hunters who don't do that you can just kick.

Not sure what you are talking about with this. Hunters can shoot from 40 metre range, and a bit more if they extend that range through a tracery. They will practically kill the mob before the melee group even get to it. Also there is blueline for when a hunter genuinely needs to keep up with the group, but that's a rare requirement. On occasions where they need to ball up for DD etc, they do have skills that they can fire while moving in red. One of those is a capstone skill, which coupled with full focus, which is not difficult to achieve in precision stance red while moving, hits like a freight train.

They are far superior to champ ST dps. Champ redline needs to be brought up to be close to hunter ST dps, and that isn't done by blanket nerfing a skill that affects every trait line on champ. This change will obliterate yellow line AoE champs, and yet - will still not fix red line. Its a complete waste of time.

[Gunhard]

They are far superior to champ ST dps. Champ redline needs to be brought up to be close to hunter ST dps, and that isn't done by blanket nerfing a skill that affects every trait line on champ. This change will obliterate yellow line AoE champs, and yet - will still not fix red line. Its a complete waste of time.

Blade wall was overperforming, but i personally think that skill itself is fine while bonuses from traits and traceries are too big. I would prefer bonuses from all traceries to be toned down. Since they create too big disparity for skills efficiency on different levels and especially when new level cap comes. Its funny that hunter was on the bottom of dps tier list on 130 level cap for more than a year but on 140 level its on top of it, and big part of it are new traceries which are too good.

[Hephburz-2]

Blade wall was overperforming, but i personally think that skill itself is fine while bonuses from traits and traceries are too big. I would prefer bonuses from all traceries to be toned down. Since they create too big disparity for skills efficiency on different levels and especially when new level cap comes. Its funny that hunter was on the bottom of dps tier list on 130 level cap for more than a year but on 140 level its on top of it, and big part of it are new traceries which are too good.

Hunters underperforming at 130 had nothing to do with the new LI system. Firstly, they had been abhorrently scaled from 120, so their damage was not on par with the other DPS classes, and secondly champs received quite the damage bump shortly after the Lightning RK Nerf. Around half way into 130, about the time that Remmo T4/5 were released they significantly buffed Hunter DPS and it was back on top in terms of ST. The REASON raids and groups still stacked champs was because the content designed was designed FOR champions, Remmo and FoKD especially (AD was a bit of both, but still mostly a superior environment for Champs because of the amount of adds).

Now, returning to the point about Champ DPS. There was nothing wrong with blade wall at all, and it does nothing to address the fact that Champion ST DPS in Yellow is absurdly high for its AoE spec. There is absolutely no reason to trait red currently, and irrespective of that, you use blade wall in both Yellow and Red which means all this has achieved is a nerf to both lines, when in actuality what should be happening is a redistribution of damage in yellow, take damage off of blade wall sure, but give it to another skill, like blade storm or mighty roar which are two heavily underperforming skills you have no reason to even have on your skill bar, furthermore by locking certain red-line traits into red line only (deep strikes and/or brutal and ferocious strikes), and then buffing red line ST DPS to be on par with Hunters.

As it stands, the blade wall change achieves nothing nor changes anything in regard to the current meta.

[Pavlin]

Let's take out that unnecessary vocabulary.

It's a DPS class that is capable of reaching and maintaining a DPS parse similar to the other-current top DPSers. There, I fixed it for you.

Its a DPS class that does 1/3 more dmg than any other class/ both st and aoe/ also have the best survivability and require 3 key smash to be played at top tier.
This is a balance, but what it needs, is nerf.
Let dmg stay, reduce self heal /blue line is ok.

[Hephburz-2]

Its a DPS class that does 1/3 more dmg than any other class/ both st and aoe/ also have the best survivability and require 3 key smash to be played at top tier.
This is a balance, but what it needs, is nerf.
Let dmg stay, reduce self heal /blue line is ok.

Everything about your post is incorrect. Sorry.

[DoRonRon]

"Champions blade wall skill has been significantly over performing in the DPS parses for a basic skill"

I see a load of gameplay vids where the players are just mashing keys with no thought to whether skills are on CD or not, is this how SSG think we are supposed to play or the way they play? Just the low CD on BW and the very poor Fervour management on display would explain why it might seem "over used". Reminds me of a guardian who avoided reactive skills because they were too confusing and just hit skills that were always active at the start of a fight.

The change kind of hurts the lower levels when they don't have the traits for so many of the bigger hitting fervour skills while later game players will be choosing to build and empty fervour as a priority and BW doesn't help with that. Seems like a change born out of a lack of ability to play a champ... sure I'll use it when all other options are on CD but never to use as it comes off CD.

[Arnenna]

Its a DPS class that does 1/3 more dmg than any other class/ both st and aoe/ also have the best survivability and require 3 key smash to be played at top tier.
This is a balance, but what it needs, is nerf.
Let dmg stay, reduce self heal /blue line is ok.

Champ doesn't out ST dps a hunter. It does better AoE, yes, but it has a specialisation in that line - so it should. I'd argue against them having better survivability than "all" classes, and even hunter. Maybe its because I play hunter a little more often, but survivability on hunter is up there IMO. I've been in boss fights that include a lot of adds on my hunter and if that melee champ starts to struggle with morale, I'll avoid using AoE when the adds are low health. I'll steal the killing blows and prevent the champ from utilising killing spree. Hunter has a lot of tools to avoid defeat. They can deflect the mob that is targeting them, drop threat, speed up their heal skill in their rotations or use stances to improve morale regen. Champion has none of those. Blue line is not ok, which is why we don't see champions tanking anymore.

[Thalian39]

"The Subscriber Buffs and Town Services item granted by the VIP Rewards daily quest will now last for two weeks."

BEST fix ever.

Thalian of Gladden

[Maedol]

The road to Annuminas still doesn't exist...

[JMakin]

Meta: Hunter>Champ>Warden=RK. Right now it’s barely even worth bringing a Warden for their utility. IMO Blade Wall damage is too high but it’s not causing some earth shattering imbalance.


Underperforming classes like Warden will maybe offer a higher value proposition in tier 4/5 because of utility but their DPS is just too slow to ramp up in fights like these.


ST DPS should really look something like this:


Warden>Red Champ/Red Hunter>=Red RK>Yellow Champ.

Welcome to reality. In FoKD, hunters were completely excluded. It's somewhat expected that the meta can change with every raid. Hunters currently have an advantage. I don't see how this is a bad thing...

Also, why would Wardens need to be the top ST DPS dealer?

Red Hunter should not be the highest DPS class, yes, it's only function currently as a class is as a DPS but it has the luxury of range which means it's overall DPS output should always be lower or on par with anyone who has to be in Melee.

I disagree. Red Hunters are stationary DDs, so they get penalized for not being able to move around while DPSing, which any other top DPS class is able to do (Warden, Champs, and RKs back in the day). So yes, once they are stationary, they should be dealing top ST DPS.

Red hunters do an unrealistic amount of damage at little risk to themselves, with nothing but arrows. Melee classes wielding heavy weapons should not be doing less damage. I've never understood why red hunters' DPS is sacrosanct.

I don't really understand how a melee class should be favored in DPSing just because they are closer to the target? Champs have heavy armor. Hunters are more squishy. Yes, they can decently self heal, but again, I do not see any correlation between receiving damage and dishing it out.

but not to the extent that how good they are becomes absurd, there is literally no downside to Hunter, and given the new raid set bonus, even their AoE damage on boss fights isn't that awful anymore either.

What do you mean by absurd? What has been absurd was champ ST damage in yellow since their overhaul. That is absurd. Hunters deal about the right amount of damage right now. It's in no way absurd. They actually have been nerfed if you can try to remember...


Also, you cannot count a raid set bonus towards overall performance of a class, otherwise please consider that hunters lost a very, very strong Remmorchant set bonus, and thus a lot of DPS. You cannot argue that way. Hunters AoE DPS relative to Champs ST DPS was ridiculously low. Instead of raising hunter AoE DPS permanently, they added a raid set bonus which should really have been something in favor of ST DPS.

Not only that they have one Line, but they are so much bevind on champ. They can't move while dpsing, only have singletarget hits, little survivability and range does not much in raids. You want Them moving with the group so they move as much as the rest. Hunters who don't do that you can just kick.

This!

Not sure what you are talking about with this. Hunters can shoot from 40 metre range, and a bit more if they extend that range through a tracery. They will practically kill the mob before the melee group even get to it. Also there is blueline for when a hunter genuinely needs to keep up with the group, but that's a rare requirement. On occasions where they need to ball up for DD etc, they do have skills that they can fire while moving in red. One of those is a capstone skill, which coupled with full focus, which is not difficult to achieve in precision stance red while moving, hits like a freight train.


They are far superior to champ ST dps. Champ redline needs to be brought up to be close to hunter ST dps, and that isn't done by blanket nerfing a skill that affects every trait line on champ. This change will obliterate yellow line AoE champs, and yet - will still not fix red line. Its a complete waste of time.

No sane hunter uses the extended range tracery (simply because it's a waste of a slot, except in the moors maybe), and there are other classes that are in the same spot. Just because in theory it is possible, just like running blue, does not make it a valid argument. It's like saying champs can take more damage when in blue. It's non-sense.


Yes, upshot can be used while moving, just like other skills, but to be fair: once you've actually used it you have no more focus, and that's the end of the line when it comes to dealing damage while moving for red hunters. Please do not argue that red hunters can do damage while moving. It's a misleading argument and it confuses those that do not know the class very well.


If you want to talk about DPS, let's talk overall DPS: Since their overhaul, champs have been far superior to hunters in pretty much any raid encounter. That's what actually going on. Not the other way round. Please do not twist facts. This nerf is coming for a reason, and it's coming at least 6 months too late. If it weren't for the expansion, it would have been implemented a long time ago. SSG was simply too busy and let it go. Blade Wall was totally out of line. It's the least they could do. They should have nerfed other things on top of that, really... I am not even sure it will "obliterate" yellow champ DPS, we will see (I am not aware of any numbers from BR at this point).

Its funny that hunter was on the bottom of dps tier list on 130 level cap for more than a year but on 140 level its on top of it, and big part of it are new traceries which are too good.

That is simply not true. Hunters were, for some time on 130, in a not so decent position, but they were NEVER at the bottom of the DPS list. With the implementation of traceries, they were too powerful, and this is why QS in Precision was nerfed. The way it is now is just about right. They are where they are supposed to be.

The REASON raids and groups still stacked champs was because the content designed was designed FOR champions, Remmo and FoKD especially (AD was a bit of both, but still mostly a superior environment for Champs because of the amount of adds).


Now, returning to the point about Champ DPS. There was nothing wrong with blade wall at all, and it does nothing to address the fact that Champion ST DPS in Yellow is absurdly high for its AoE spec. There is absolutely no reason to trait red currently, and irrespective of that, you use blade wall in both Yellow and Red which means all this has achieved is a nerf to both lines, when in actuality what should be happening is a redistribution of damage in yellow, take damage off of blade wall sure, but give it to another skill, like blade storm or mighty roar which are two heavily underperforming skills you have no reason to even have on your skill bar, furthermore by locking certain red-line traits into red line only (deep strikes and/or brutal and ferocious strikes), and then buffing red line ST DPS to be on par with Hunters

You can pick almost any content and it would favor champs. Apart from a situation where you deal with a single target at all times and no adds, there is no other scenario in which champs would not be superior to hunters (other than maybe Remmo ID1 fire, which contains a mechanic exclusive to ranged DPS). That's what is called being overpowered. It's not just DPS, it's also being able to deal damage on the move, heavy armor, stuns with two horn skills, spotting and reducing damage, etc. The list goes on. The problem was that the superior DPS at (almost) all times would simply make them a no brainer pick for group leaders. You cannot argue that it wasn't the champs, but it was the content. The content/meta you cannot change. It is what it is. You need to adapt the classes to it if they are too strong.


Like someone else in this thread already posted, and I agree, you cannot expect them to invest a lot of time and resources into a nerf. It's a quick band aid fix. It's somewhat nasty, but it was simply required. Let's just wait what the outcome looks like maybe? I am not sure it's as bad as many suggest...

Champ doesn't out ST dps a hunter. It does better AoE, yes, but it has a specialisation in that line - so it should.

The problem is though that it's way out of proportion... If you compare the AoE damage of a champ to the ST damage of a hunter and then the AoE damage of a hunter to the ST damage of a champ, it was simply out of line. We will see how it is after the "nerf", but I suspect it not to be as dramatic as some might be thinking. I am still missing any parse information from BR (not that I have been particularly looking for it...).

[JMakin]

[*]The Subscriber Buffs and Town Services item granted by the VIP Rewards daily quest will now last for two weeks.

Thank you!