This is a stretch to post this here, but divine spark is as broken as the best Demi plus skill. Not even mentioning wonderpipe, Lucidian Demi plus is completely out of balance. Yes, Igasho has some niche, but most classes are Lucidan or go home. To clarify the issue: Guardian/bards power costs are high, but a Lucidian allows for this to not be as much of an issue. This can also be seen in monks ability to affliction spam. I would suggest making Lucidian Demi plus only 2% Regen or making it so they charge from ambient light as well so it could be 2% with no daylight restriction.
Edit: Lucidian Demi+ : Ambient light - recharge power reserves by 2% during the day and 1% during the night.
This is a stretch to post this here, but divine spark is as broken as the best Demi plus skill. Not even mentioning wonderpipe, Lucidian Demi plus is completely out of balance. Yes, Igasho has some niche, but most classes are Lucidan or go home. To clarify the issue: Guardian/bards power costs are high, but a Lucidian allows for this to not be as much of an issue. This can also be seen in monks ability to affliction spam. I would suggest making Lucidian Demi plus only 2% Regen or making it so they charge from ambient light as well so it could be 2% with no daylight restriction.
Edit: Lucidian Demi+ : Ambient light - recharge power reserves by 2% during the day and 1% during the night.
This is something more suited for the Gamewide Envoy System, feel free to submit a report about that.
Would it not be best to have all of the wonder item or artefact changes run through the game side envoy system so we all get a chance to comment on the direct suggestions?
I sort of thought that was the idea to be honest that this thread was for brainstorming before a report gets put though.
This was my fault. We should probably just focus on the three issues that the thread was started for. I definitely didn't mean to water down this thread with less impactful issues which would most certainly be better served as a report.
I do agree that the reporting system is too slow btw. Thankfully there is already a report up to streamline things. Please support all reports!
More on topic, our list of things appears to be:
1) Brazier Purify (no pushback even on the idea of just deleting it outright and replacing with something else).
2) Brazier IllSelf (only pushback is on whether the Glamours skill should be treated equally, the brazier version seems to be pretty consistently viewed as being too much in the hands of everyone).
3) Featherweight charm flooring resist from max to min instantly with no cooldown/balance use/anything (no real pushback on this either).
4) Pig nose (lots of pushback).
5) Timeslip (some pushback).
6) Wondermask Nymph (some pushback).
7) Vitals runes (some pushback).
8) Divine Spark / Racials ("take it to reports").
Did I miss anything stated in this thread?
To me it seems like the most egregious ones are still items one through three. That can be hammered out of the game pretty fast. Other stuff can maybe go the reports route based on commentary / replies.
Solutions still seem to read best to me as:
1) Delete purify. Replace with something minor. 1x per month offerings buff? Passive generation of 500/1000 esteem per weave (generating some contents for Soulfire usage later on)?
2) Make WonderBrazier IllSelf only function on NPC damage.
3) Add a timer when taking on or removing the charm, the toggle does not take effect until the end of the timer.
Other stuff we can take to reports as hash out in more depth if we want, but nothing else is coming across as essentially unanimous consent (and if arties are getting that much consent as to needing nerfing, that in itself is a sign that they do need it stat).
Well we have this envoys system process where everyone in the game can give good feedback and have a good discussion about it. We also have a report already in for point 3 with the socks/rooting issue. So we're 1/3 of the way though the three original issues raised in this thread.
We can use this discussion to make a report for the first two points when people are comfortable with the options. Then we can talk about it and help try and decide what the best option is.
Let use the system we have to improve the game and we can all work together for the betterment of it.
There was a lot of feedback in the comments on that, I figured the writer is in the stage of they'll rewrite it with the comments and advise given and resubmit it.
I like the idea of Purify being repurposed, can keep the name and just be like a 10% passive offering bonus while using the brazier. Wondermask nymph's pushback is for the same reason as Illself, in which people want to get rid of the original users of it, as well as everyone. Glamours bards are rare as is, and they need the survivability. Letting them have the skill they've also had is fair, samething with wiccans and their nymph fae. It was made for them so they should at least retain it, rather than just purging it entirely from the skillsets. Vitals runes were never a topic that got brought up. They only got mentioned when used in saying everybody has access to 13/13 by using them. And to echo back to @Innon the Divine Spark only does main race, so wonderpipe race gets Demi power, not the Demi+ at the very least. I do agree that Lucidian is silly strong though, to the point where it's been my wonderpipe race ever since becoming a mage.
No, the report writer submitted a different report, so that one is locked out for about 1.5 months. It would require someone else picking it up / rewriting it / burning their slot and no changes for a minimum of 2.5 rl months.
We can do better than that. The comments exist and can be reviewed, they seem to generally support the idea of a toggle delay (some people want to go further than that of course). We don't need to wait months longer than we already have to get some of the biggest issues sorted out (which is the purpose of this thread, it was not created by the admin to solicit report ideas, they promised an arty review and this is it).
Three things is actually fewer than I was expecting.
Ah ok if we want to run
though some of the most impactful artefacts to the game then here
instead of through reports.
The ones that jump to
mind for me first of all for resistance stuff is:
Vitality artifact. Has
a very similar issue to Illusoryself in that it gives a big anti
damage tool to every class that wouldn't normally have this.
On top of the vitality
artifact is the wonderbelt quickened shield which acts like a
vitality shield. Its not so powerful in group combat but is a strong counter to bards dchord set up solo. Worth looking at along side
the other ones.
In a similar vein the
Rune of absorption vs physical damage allows a big RNG resistance and
the ability to just ignore some strikes. Has a similar issue as
Illusoryself but only vs physical classes. It gives a big advantage to anyone who has it vs anyone who doesn't against physical
damage classes.
Rune of Absorption,
wonderbelt Vitality pendant and Illusoryself share very similar or
near identical issues. If you are looking to nerf or remove ilself I
figure you could probably do the same with the rune and pendant at
the same time for similar reasons.
Outside of that I
mentioned before that the resistance and vital runes plus the various
stackable buffs in game have created a situation where pretty much
every class can sit at 13/13 vitals and resistances should they
choose to. It's created the situation where classes like bards and
mages can stack up the same health and resistances as tanky classes
like warriors. Could we worth doing a review of the various buffs and
nixing a few of them. Maybe delete the aether crafting stuff as that
plays a big part in every class having easy access to high buffs or
look at reducing the strength of the runes themselves.
Second point to that
issue then is the Rune of Shielding combined with the current armour
system. It essentially allows any non acro class to sit at 25% armour
which is equivalent to warriors in trans plate forged armour. Mages have stronger
armour than monks or non forging warriors for example. And Bards with
tailoring have stronger armour than any style of monk for a few odd
examples.
Scent nose. Giving
scent to classes that don't naturally have it really buffs their
ability to chase by an insane amount. Classes that have no special
way to chase and follow people now can with the scent nose and path
track near instantly catch anyone without any delays. This is the
most impactful artifact in the game for pvp right now and one of the
ones that is always suggested as a must have to get. I know a lot of
people overlook this one but from my personal view the biggest
offender for artifact power creep is the nose. I know its one most
people overlook but that's really only because they are so used to
having it for so long. It's become such a must have arti that its almost assumed
that everyone can scent.
Wonderboots level 20
strut has a very similar issue as the nose in allowing a class to
stick on a runner very easily. Has a big cooldown though but wanted
to raise it as an issue similar to nose.
The Snowglobe/map scry
item. This is an artifact that lets the user bypass certain
defensives and natural terrain advantages. Similarish issues to the
nose but not as big a deal. Would suggest if the admin want this to
be a tool everyone can get then just put it in discernment and get
rid of the artifact.
The mana reduction use
Rune. This ones similar to the various physical resistance ones, bit
different in that it only reduces use not loss, but the concepts
about the same. It gives a big unfair advantage to anyone who has it
vs anyone who doesn't against mana use routes of combat.
The coal and solstice
disguise and make ups sets that were released recently are a tad insane
in group use as well. Even in a small group of three it can be tuned
for example to hit between 15%-60% ego/mana/health on a tick against
classes with passives such as bards and mages.
If the consideration is Illself is too good for combat I'd be looking at the other artifacts above as ones with similar levels of impact for adjustments as well.
Not combat related but
trade artifacts and curios are practically a must have for anyone who
wants to be part of the economy to try and make gold. They are a
massive buy in just to be able to run a shop in a competitive manner. Suggestion would be to look to make them much much cheaper, free to get to some extent or remove them entirely to help balance out the economy side.
By the way, my comment about reporting was more specifically on changing the Lucidian demi+ power and not so much the artifact. I'm not sure if that was clear or not, but figured best to clarify.
I've had some emails with some concerns as well. I do think for the few specific outliers that we'll go outside the reporting system to take care of them but anything we don't address is more than welcome to submit reports on.
I'll take this weekend to look over both the emails and this thread and come up with a proposal to move forward with. I'll post it on the forums for people to voice their opinions on it before we do anything else.
I think a major difference with illself is it is a constant. There is no work around. Vitality can be burst past (would need to test to verify it doesn't trigger on death blows), so if I am going for a health kill I know I need to have a huge last hit. Illself is a constant and can only be countered by a higher power cost arts skill. Moreover, illself removes health pressure.
Resistances are opposite of buffs. It is really easy to have 13/13 damage buff, so I feel like that's a wash.
Running is easy, so tracking should be easy. If you nerf scent/scry then you would need to buff hinder.
As far as other health buffs go, I don't think anyone wants for health kills to be better or easier than Mana kills, but I do think we want them viable. Illself is, in my opinion, is the best of all to have, so it is where a start should be made.
Strut in my opinion could be looked at, but it doesn't block entire kill methods.
Basically, illself literally negates or overly hinders the following kill methods from being viable: meteor, chem bombs, nunchaku/tessen kills, warrior damage kills, dchords just to name a few.
Cement socks and the Feather artifact I think is an easyish one to fix.
Make the feather an activate able buff that requires balance and equi to cast. Make it tag as a defensive action as well so being in aeon will delay using them.
With a small 2 sec equi use to turn on.
Sort of logic behind it is you can't just instant cast it and get out of trouble for no cost any more and enemies now have a way to counter it with disrupts, bal knocks and aeon locking.
Basically, illself literally negates or overly hinders the following kill methods from being viable: meteor, chem bombs, nunchaku/tessen kills, warrior damage kills, dchords just to name a few.
The vitality pendant and the quickened belt do pretty much the same thing to some extent.
It's generally considered that solo a bard will have to set up their dchord once to beat vitality and then do it again to kill.
One thing with that though is vitality has a cooldown so you can't just recast it instantly again.
I could totally get behind a cooldown on illself for sure akin to vitality. Can't recast it for 5 mins after it goes down. Also illself does last a long time so reducing how long its up after casting it sounds good to me too.
Vitality isn't just a health shield like illself, never has been. It triggers if you go below a certain % health and heals you back to full hp, it then goes on cooldown for quite a bit to where you cannot reactivate it. Saying Illself and Vitality have the same issues and properties is just false.
Vitality isn't just a health shield like illself, never has been. It triggers if you go below a certain % health and heals you back to full hp, it then goes on cooldown for quite a bit to where you cannot reactivate it. Saying Illself and Vitality have the same issues and properties is just false.
Well lets talk about it practically so you can see how they are similar.
First I never said they have the same issue exactly. I said they have very similar issues. Secondly Vitality doesn't heal you back to full health. Its a big heal but not a full heal.
Let me explain how they are similar to clear it up with a practical example:
I'm a bard I set up my dchord, my dchord kill set up is basically hit dchord which stuns then finish off with two m6's or a bit of extra damage from some other effect added on to finish the target while the stun from the dchord is still on.
So I hit my dchord and m6, I hit your vitality and that heals your health up enough to not be able to kill you. You recover from the stun heal up rapidly and are free to shield/run/whatever etc.
Vitality has saved your life for long enough for you to get out of the stun and heal up.
I now need to get the power back from the dchord and redo it before vitality comes back off cool down.
Illusoryself has a similar issue to my kill but isn't as reliable.
I do the exact same set up and illusoryself either does nothing and I kill you or it eats the dchord damage and means I don't do enough damage to kill you.
Can you see how while they work in a different manner they have a very similar result?
Illself has a chance to work and totally stop my kill set up. Vitality will totally stop my kill set up but has a cooldown so it wont stop it the second time I do it.
I have to burn through the vitality before I can kill solo. Illself is more RNG in that I could luck out and get the kill the first time round or I may have to burn through it first then get the kill the second time around.
Vitality isn't just a health shield like illself, never has been. It triggers if you go below a certain % health and heals you back to full hp, it then goes on cooldown for quite a bit to where you cannot reactivate it. Saying Illself and Vitality have the same issues and properties is just false.
You'll never get a direct comparison between artifacts (at least I hope not!) else there would be no point in that arti existing, as it already exists. What you have here are two artifacts that force someone to have to set up their kill twice. They both have their pros and cons.
Vitality is a given, Illself is a 50% chance. Vitality does have a cool down and I think that is what makes it somewhat reasonable. So why not apply that cooldown to Illself?
Also the fact that Illself has a 5p cost is not to be overlooked. That does prevent it from being spammed. But adding a cool down seems viable, just nerfs it a little too much for those who use it when hunting. I think halving the health pool so instead of double it is just your health reincarnate is also another way to ensure balance around Illself.
But I don't think Illself is as bad as people are making it out to be. I mean, if people have some recent logs of actual combat where they can prove how bad it is that would be super helpful. Because currently I am seeing a lot of talk about something that hasn't had much of a chance to be active! So come on down and test it out by...you know...playing the game!
Basically, illself literally negates or overly hinders the following kill methods from being viable: meteor, chem bombs, nunchaku/tessen kills, warrior damage kills, dchords just to name a few.
The vitality pendant and the quickened belt do pretty much the same thing to some extent.
It's generally considered that solo a bard will have to set up their dchord once to beat vitality and then do it again to kill.
One thing with that though is vitality has a cooldown so you can't just recast it instantly again.
I could totally get behind a cooldown on illself for sure akin to vitality. Can't recast it for 5 mins after it goes down. Also illself does last a long time so reducing how long its up after casting it sounds good to me too.
I am going to disagree here. The problem is illself. If a bard could work in some hits to Mana and ego while have egovice and manabarbs then this could start pressuring the person (without illself). Once the bard hit the threshold the dchord could be enough to kill instantly therefore bypassing vitality. The strategy wouldn't be build to dchord and cleanup kill. It would pressure vitals then dchord at a health lvl where it bypasses vitality. Moreover, the vitality may not be enough to save the person even through a dchord combo without illself. Right now the bard may not be able to dchord kill because illself and vitality. I don't have the means, but if we could get a log of the exact same kill sequence with vitality, with vitality and illself, and with illself. It may show if removing illself would be enough to resolve the vitality issue.
Innon, I literally have had to change how I go for kills because of vitality. I don't have that same problem with Illself. Because Illself isn't 100% and also if I wait long enough Illself dies in a fire. Vitality stays up until proc'd. We could shorten Illself's lifespan further.
I just want to also point out, Illself costs 5 power. This seems to be overlooked so much. If I am spending 5 power in the middle of combat to save myself, I am not killing you, and I am not defending myself nearly as half as much as any prismatic barrier does. I think there seems to be a lack of overall thinking regarding illusoryself. A pros and cons list from someone who knows all of these abilities in detail might help to clarify. But I am coming from actual experience in fighting someone who has these artifacts and better ability than me and FAR more artis than I...I can still kill them. And while it is a pain in the arse for sure, I don't think Illself is a big a problem as people are making out.
I really would like some actual evidence rather than just speculation. We seem to be trigger happy on nerfing these artifact which (may I remind everyone) cost a fair amount. 18 crystals for an ability with a 50% shot and 5p cost is not the end of the freaking world. It just isn't. I know crystals aren't worth as much as they were, but we are looking at 1800cr valued ability here. Not just some 200cr arti you won off of the wheel alongside everyone else.
Basically, illself literally negates or overly hinders the following kill methods from being viable: meteor, chem bombs, nunchaku/tessen kills, warrior damage kills, dchords just to name a few.
The vitality pendant and the quickened belt do pretty much the same thing to some extent.
It's generally considered that solo a bard will have to set up their dchord once to beat vitality and then do it again to kill.
One thing with that though is vitality has a cooldown so you can't just recast it instantly again.
I could totally get behind a cooldown on illself for sure akin to vitality. Can't recast it for 5 mins after it goes down. Also illself does last a long time so reducing how long its up after casting it sounds good to me too.
I am going to disagree here. The problem is illself. If a bard could work in some hits to Mana and ego while have egovice and manabarbs then this could start pressuring the person (without illself). Once the bard hit the threshold the dchord could be enough to kill instantly therefore bypassing vitality. The strategy wouldn't be build to dchord and cleanup kill. It would pressure vitals then dchord at a health lvl where it bypasses vitality. Moreover, the vitality may not be enough to save the person even through a dchord combo without illself. Right now the bard may not be able to dchord kill because illself and vitality. I don't have the means, but if we could get a log of the exact same kill sequence with vitality, with vitality and illself, and with illself. It may show if removing illself would be enough to resolve the vitality issue.
I mean there's ways around everything to some extent.
I can't see a bard doing what your suggesting though without the target just standing there in octave and aurics for a good thirty seconds doing nothing and not healing themselves properly. What you suggest is sort of possible in that its technically possible its not really viable in any real sense.
Sort of like how Illself has more counters than vitality in that I could choose to dispel it for example or burn though it first. Its easy to just remove illself for a number of classes for no real cost but its not a practical solution for the issue as a whole. Or against Illself I could burn it down entirely before I went for my kill as a monk bard or whatever but again similar to the first point. While its practically possible its not really a viable solution in itself.
I feel like illself would be fine if it had a cooldown between useage, but I also think it would be more evenly balanced if instead of just absorbing health damage; it could also absorb mana damage. Either or.
Similarly, I wouldn't be opposed to it staying as is if there was an artefact-way to dispel it (not sure if there is atm).
The problem I'm having with these forums is that most arguments seems to end up split down org lines despite the fact that this is supposed to be an OOC discussion focused on the good of the game. One side says illself is a problem, the other says it's not. And vice versa for vitality. And isn't it kind of odd that people with class access to scent are the ones saying scent is too good and the artifact needs to go?
We need solutions that are not one sided, and people need to think things through to their logical conclusion. If noses are removed, does it mean wolf scent also needs to go to make it balanced? What would combat look like in a scentless world? It would make it even easier for people to kick some loyal mobs and run away. Do we want that? If we don't, and scent needs to be an important part of this game that is free to play, lessening the barrier to entry - eg buying the nose - needs to be looked at. The solution could be to give it to everyone in one of the common skills, maybe reworking scan in discernment to work like scent instead of it's current form.
Deciding on whether we want escaping to be easier is quite hard, as it involves thing like, people getting frustrated by kick and run, vs people not wanting to raid due to the fact that escaping is too hard. I don't know if people will be less inclined to raid if they know they will die - maybe dying is not that much of an issue anyway.
@Niwynne It definitely will seem that way, and scent used to be a racial trait as well, before races got reworked. Right now, scent is only on 2 archetypes, druid and wiccan. I'd be onboard with a common skill getting introduced in Environment, maybe even just a lesser version so that the investment into the nose itself is an upgrade. Make the Environment version have a .5s or 1s balance/eq for the same information, and leave the arti nose alone.
Just as a note Niwynne, in-game I am on the same side as Veyils and Enadonella, but I am disagreeing on effects like IllSelf here. We can agree / disagree without being org driven!
Note that I would expect to see some agreements from people based on where they play because they will have similar observations (and are more likely to notice some things than people who are not seeing it as much).
Things like Scent have just become so ubiquitous that people who don't have access to it sans arty are so used to leaning on it that they can't imagine living without it. Pre-nose, everyone except totems users did just fine. Personally I would even accept totems scent itself being changed a bit, but that is because balanceless-free tracking is too strong in my mind. Not sure if I stated that earlier, but assuming that people who have something don't want it changed would seem to fit neatly into your "side vs. side" complaint (so you can see how easy it is to do that if you don't work to avoid it).
In general though, people do tend to be annoyed when class skills (IllSelf, Vitality, Scent, Trueheal, etc) just get handed out to everyone. I do think that is understandable too.
Also, what race had scent? Iirc Illithoid had something akin to Scan. It showed people in the area but not room names (it ignored the outdoor / indoor flag though, unlike scan). Am I misremembering that?
Comments
Edit: Lucidian Demi+ : Ambient light - recharge power reserves by 2% during the day and 1% during the night.
This is something more suited for the Gamewide Envoy System, feel free to submit a report about that.
I sort of thought that was the idea to be honest that this thread was for brainstorming before a report gets put though.
We can use this discussion to make a report for the first two points when people are comfortable with the options. Then we can talk about it and help try and decide what the best option is.
Let use the system we have to improve the game and we can all work together for the betterment of it.
Ah ok if we want to run though some of the most impactful artefacts to the game then here instead of through reports.
The ones that jump to mind for me first of all for resistance stuff is:
Vitality artifact. Has a very similar issue to Illusoryself in that it gives a big anti damage tool to every class that wouldn't normally have this.
On top of the vitality artifact is the wonderbelt quickened shield which acts like a vitality shield. Its not so powerful in group combat but is a strong counter to bards dchord set up solo. Worth looking at along side the other ones.
In a similar vein the Rune of absorption vs physical damage allows a big RNG resistance and the ability to just ignore some strikes. Has a similar issue as Illusoryself but only vs physical classes. It gives a big advantage to anyone who has it vs anyone who doesn't against physical damage classes.
Rune of Absorption, wonderbelt Vitality pendant and Illusoryself share very similar or near identical issues. If you are looking to nerf or remove ilself I figure you could probably do the same with the rune and pendant at the same time for similar reasons.
Outside of that I mentioned before that the resistance and vital runes plus the various stackable buffs in game have created a situation where pretty much every class can sit at 13/13 vitals and resistances should they choose to. It's created the situation where classes like bards and mages can stack up the same health and resistances as tanky classes like warriors. Could we worth doing a review of the various buffs and nixing a few of them. Maybe delete the aether crafting stuff as that plays a big part in every class having easy access to high buffs or look at reducing the strength of the runes themselves.
Second point to that issue then is the Rune of Shielding combined with the current armour system. It essentially allows any non acro class to sit at 25% armour which is equivalent to warriors in trans plate forged armour. Mages have stronger armour than monks or non forging warriors for example. And Bards with tailoring have stronger armour than any style of monk for a few odd examples.
Scent nose. Giving scent to classes that don't naturally have it really buffs their ability to chase by an insane amount. Classes that have no special way to chase and follow people now can with the scent nose and path track near instantly catch anyone without any delays. This is the most impactful artifact in the game for pvp right now and one of the ones that is always suggested as a must have to get. I know a lot of people overlook this one but from my personal view the biggest offender for artifact power creep is the nose. I know its one most people overlook but that's really only because they are so used to having it for so long. It's become such a must have arti that its almost assumed that everyone can scent.
Wonderboots level 20 strut has a very similar issue as the nose in allowing a class to stick on a runner very easily. Has a big cooldown though but wanted to raise it as an issue similar to nose.
The Snowglobe/map scry item. This is an artifact that lets the user bypass certain defensives and natural terrain advantages. Similarish issues to the nose but not as big a deal. Would suggest if the admin want this to be a tool everyone can get then just put it in discernment and get rid of the artifact.
The mana reduction use Rune. This ones similar to the various physical resistance ones, bit different in that it only reduces use not loss, but the concepts about the same. It gives a big unfair advantage to anyone who has it vs anyone who doesn't against mana use routes of combat.
The coal and solstice disguise and make ups sets that were released recently are a tad insane in group use as well. Even in a small group of three it can be tuned for example to hit between 15%-60% ego/mana/health on a tick against classes with passives such as bards and mages.
If the consideration is Illself is too good for combat I'd be looking at the other artifacts above as ones with similar levels of impact for adjustments as well.
Not combat related but trade artifacts and curios are practically a must have for anyone who wants to be part of the economy to try and make gold. They are a massive buy in just to be able to run a shop in a competitive manner. Suggestion would be to look to make them much much cheaper, free to get to some extent or remove them entirely to help balance out the economy side.
I've had some emails with some concerns as well. I do think for the few specific outliers that we'll go outside the reporting system to take care of them but anything we don't address is more than welcome to submit reports on.
I'll take this weekend to look over both the emails and this thread and come up with a proposal to move forward with. I'll post it on the forums for people to voice their opinions on it before we do anything else.
Resistances are opposite of buffs. It is really easy to have 13/13 damage buff, so I feel like that's a wash.
Running is easy, so tracking should be easy. If you nerf scent/scry then you would need to buff hinder.
As far as other health buffs go, I don't think anyone wants for health kills to be better or easier than Mana kills, but I do think we want them viable. Illself is, in my opinion, is the best of all to have, so it is where a start should be made.
Strut in my opinion could be looked at, but it doesn't block entire kill methods.
Basically, illself literally negates or overly hinders the following kill methods from being viable: meteor, chem bombs, nunchaku/tessen kills, warrior damage kills, dchords just to name a few.
Make the feather an activate able buff that requires balance and equi to cast. Make it tag as a defensive action as well so being in aeon will delay using them.
With a small 2 sec equi use to turn on.
Sort of logic behind it is you can't just instant cast it and get out of trouble for no cost any more and enemies now have a way to counter it with disrupts, bal knocks and aeon locking.
The vitality pendant and the quickened belt do pretty much the same thing to some extent.
It's generally considered that solo a bard will have to set up their dchord once to beat vitality and then do it again to kill.
One thing with that though is vitality has a cooldown so you can't just recast it instantly again.
I could totally get behind a cooldown on illself for sure akin to vitality. Can't recast it for 5 mins after it goes down. Also illself does last a long time so reducing how long its up after casting it sounds good to me too.
Well lets talk about it practically so you can see how they are similar.
First I never said they have the same issue exactly. I said they have very similar issues. Secondly Vitality doesn't heal you back to full health. Its a big heal but not a full heal.
Let me explain how they are similar to clear it up with a practical example:
I'm a bard I set up my dchord, my dchord kill set up is basically hit dchord which stuns then finish off with two m6's or a bit of extra damage from some other effect added on to finish the target while the stun from the dchord is still on.
So I hit my dchord and m6, I hit your vitality and that heals your health up enough to not be able to kill you. You recover from the stun heal up rapidly and are free to shield/run/whatever etc.
Vitality has saved your life for long enough for you to get out of the stun and heal up.
I now need to get the power back from the dchord and redo it before vitality comes back off cool down.
Illusoryself has a similar issue to my kill but isn't as reliable.
I do the exact same set up and illusoryself either does nothing and I kill you or it eats the dchord damage and means I don't do enough damage to kill you.
Can you see how while they work in a different manner they have a very similar result?
Illself has a chance to work and totally stop my kill set up. Vitality will totally stop my kill set up but has a cooldown so it wont stop it the second time I do it.
I have to burn through the vitality before I can kill solo. Illself is more RNG in that I could luck out and get the kill the first time round or I may have to burn through it first then get the kill the second time around.
Vitality is a given, Illself is a 50% chance. Vitality does have a cool down and I think that is what makes it somewhat reasonable. So why not apply that cooldown to Illself?
Also the fact that Illself has a 5p cost is not to be overlooked. That does prevent it from being spammed. But adding a cool down seems viable, just nerfs it a little too much for those who use it when hunting. I think halving the health pool so instead of double it is just your health reincarnate is also another way to ensure balance around Illself.
But I don't think Illself is as bad as people are making it out to be. I mean, if people have some recent logs of actual combat where they can prove how bad it is that would be super helpful. Because currently I am seeing a lot of talk about something that hasn't had much of a chance to be active! So come on down and test it out by...you know...playing the game!
I just want to also point out, Illself costs 5 power. This seems to be overlooked so much. If I am spending 5 power in the middle of combat to save myself, I am not killing you, and I am not defending myself nearly as half as much as any prismatic barrier does. I think there seems to be a lack of overall thinking regarding illusoryself. A pros and cons list from someone who knows all of these abilities in detail might help to clarify. But I am coming from actual experience in fighting someone who has these artifacts and better ability than me and FAR more artis than I...I can still kill them. And while it is a pain in the arse for sure, I don't think Illself is a big a problem as people are making out.
I really would like some actual evidence rather than just speculation. We seem to be trigger happy on nerfing these artifact which (may I remind everyone) cost a fair amount. 18 crystals for an ability with a 50% shot and 5p cost is not the end of the freaking world. It just isn't. I know crystals aren't worth as much as they were, but we are looking at 1800cr valued ability here. Not just some 200cr arti you won off of the wheel alongside everyone else.
I mean there's ways around everything to some extent.
I can't see a bard doing what your suggesting though without the target just standing there in octave and aurics for a good thirty seconds doing nothing and not healing themselves properly. What you suggest is sort of possible in that its technically possible its not really viable in any real sense.
Sort of like how Illself has more counters than vitality in that I could choose to dispel it for example or burn though it first. Its easy to just remove illself for a number of classes for no real cost but its not a practical solution for the issue as a whole. Or against Illself I could burn it down entirely before I went for my kill as a monk bard or whatever but again similar to the first point. While its practically possible its not really a viable solution in itself.
Similarly, I wouldn't be opposed to it staying as is if there was an artefact-way to dispel it (not sure if there is atm).
We need solutions that are not one sided, and people need to think things through to their logical conclusion. If noses are removed, does it mean wolf scent also needs to go to make it balanced? What would combat look like in a scentless world? It would make it even easier for people to kick some loyal mobs and run away. Do we want that? If we don't, and scent needs to be an important part of this game that is free to play, lessening the barrier to entry - eg buying the nose - needs to be looked at. The solution could be to give it to everyone in one of the common skills, maybe reworking scan in discernment to work like scent instead of it's current form.
Deciding on whether we want escaping to be easier is quite hard, as it involves thing like, people getting frustrated by kick and run, vs people not wanting to raid due to the fact that escaping is too hard. I don't know if people will be less inclined to raid if they know they will die - maybe dying is not that much of an issue anyway.