AM mechanic changes, results and a few thoughts.

[live4treasure]

New patch, new experiences, new AM:

If you're a healer, great. Basically all your dreams have come true. You get to do a ton of different things, have two or three spells that can cast heals on the move, have ways to utilize your healing mechanic, so on and so forth. You can use any of two playstyles, where you will hardcast lifetaps first or just spamming a few dots that get disrupted, and it doesn't matter if they do, because you don't need to immediately start casting healing spells at the start of a fight and then cast quick, empowered heals at basically no AP cost or you can cast your usual heals and load up people with hots, build some mechanic points and then lay down damage, or life taps or whatever you really want. It's a great time to be a healer. You lost literally nothing over the course of all these patches and gained everything.

A small comment about the ability of the AM to have AP, again, you can never take that statement in a vacuum. You have to realise that shaman has much higher survivability than an AM. You have an auto-detaunt that actually stacks with regular detaunt, you have speed boosts upon being hit, allowing you to kite away from situations any AM would have 100% died in. I recall saying it before in a balance forum and I'll say it here again, if you want to have disrupt strikethrough and ap cost reducers, then these frankly excellent tactics will need to be sacrificed. Otherwise, shaman will simply be a better version of AM, and many say that in terms of healing, it already is that because of its innate ability to survive. As it stands, shaman is still the most popular healer on destro side (don't quote me on this because it's anecdotal, I don't have charts available) and AM is the least popular on order side. Or at least that's how it was before this patch, can't say anything about it now. (Again anecdotal. I simply see way more of any other healing class and AM is mostly just the same 3-4 names playing healer day in day out.)

My side of the story is less rosey though. So what's the situation with DPS AM at the moment? The short story is that before all these patches began, it used to be mostly a solo class or something that can stomp pugs in SCs because they don't have guard and resistance buffs. After the first patch, suddenly you were a viable pick for the healer slot, because you had healing abilities that were potent enough to actually qualify for that slot. It wasn't reliable, because in situations where you have nothing to cast at, for example when you would be holding a point, you still did horribly bad healing, but in situations where you did have something to cast at, your healing was pretty good. Sure you were squishy, but you could always juggle mechanics to self-heal and kite away if needed. To be able to go anywhere near a pure dps class in terms of damage output, you need full intellect talismans and to go completely glass cannon, so much so that the lightest whiff of damage will likely mean you're dead. It's never optimal to do so outside of pug scenarios however, so usually you go a bit defensive with renown and gear, but still slot full intellect talismans and end up at around 900 intellect with a 100 int pot. You'll usually have 6-6.2k hp, 2k armor and something like 550 resists with self buff across the board in bis gear. Aka, you're squishy as hell and still deal less damage than pure dps classes.

So what happened now? Well, the situation looks like this. You can't self-heal. Force empowered heals do not gain any benefit when cast on yourself and Lambent Aura + Shield of Saphery is by far not enough. Even if they did, you won't survive any kind of focus even with double guard and aoe-detaunt if you have to stop and heal yourself, because healdebuffs basically cut off your only source of survivability. You can still heal your group though, right? Yes, but also no. The fact that the new mechanic goes to 0 then to 1 then to 0 again means you can't juggle, this means that where before you could pop off Balance Essence - Boon of Hysh to single target heal your team mate for a good amount, now your healing can essentially "end" at some point and it ends up being lackluster. So in short, you can't be in a healer slot now. Well, it doesn't end there, because you can't actually be in a dps slot either. You're now squishier then any other dps, even a sorc, because they can all get their dps stats high without slotting a single intellect talisman. They can instead go for full wounds or full armor or full toughness, meaning they will have enough defensive stats so that relying on their tanks and healers to keep them alive will be enough, while still dealing spectacular damage. You don't get to deal spectacular damage and you can't rely on your tanks and healers alone to keep you alive, and spamming heals + life taps, your only method to survive enemy damage and a hardfocus, are now not viable. Even if you returned the juggle mechanic, frankly balance essence heals for 25-50% less than it did before for a dps AM, so it's basically non-existant. So you can't fill a healer slot and literally any other dps class in the game is a better fit into a 6 man group than you. Naturally, you'd think towards soloing to get your pvp fix... but alas, balance essense with tranquility stacks was a BIG PART of that and it made up a huge portion of your solo survivability VS other solo and even non-solo spec/classes. You lost that, which is about, I'd say, 40-50% of your solo effectiveness, and now you're only slightly better at it than a BW. Some might say that this is how it was on live, but it's not, because on live DPS AM had access to slightly more optimized itemization and it could load you up with dots then detaunt and heal itself, both of which aren't present anymore.

What I'm saying is that the way these patches are, DPS AM is a dead spec. I've though that perhaps my conclusion was subjective and overdramatic on the basis that I've simply had my favorite toys taken away, but I've spoken to other AMs, Rioz for example, that logged in to test things out. The conclusion was the same, DPS AM seems to be the in the absolute worst condition it's been ever and is very close to being unplayable. I'm simply left hoping that something is done about it soon, because that's my personal source of fun on this server withering away.

As a side note, Whispering Wind + Energy of Vaul made for a possible bombing spec that had me actually welcomed to a serious warband and hasn't left those folks wanting. That extra 3 second cooldown buffer changed that as well. It wasn't a broken ability, the way it was. It didn't do even close to Riftmagus or BW or even Engi aoe damage and didn't outheal pure healers at all. It also only had a 50% uptime and required you to stand closer to the enemy, which made you more vulnerable to things like choppa pull, but it was nerfed. Not really sure why that decision was made, but that's going to be another nail in the coffin for DPS AM.

[Telen]

I think what Ive learnt from this patch is they want you to be a pure healer and will punish anyone that plays outside that.

[ToXoS]

Welcome to the dead spec club. Here, take a sit next to DPS Shaman, a long time member of the club.

[dansari]

I think what Ive learnt from this patch is they want you to be a pure healer and will punish anyone that plays outside that.

Or maybe the mechanic wasn't working and they wanted to fix it? Seriously, the doom and gloom stuff is old. Play with it for a week or two, then open a proposal if you feel inclined.

[live4treasure]

So DPS being MUCH weaker than it was on live is doom and gloom? I get that the mechanic was broken for healers, but now it's broken for DPS. I'm not accusing anyone of any anti-dps conspiracy, but it's difficult to deny that this mechanic change benefits healers specifically and is detrimental to DPS, so in that sense, Telen isn't wrong. It does punish DPS players and benefits Healer players. You can play for a week, you can play for a day, but it doesn't change that this is a straight nerf and there's no exaggeration there.

[dansari]

So DPS being MUCH weaker than it was on live is doom and gloom? I get that the mechanic was broken for healers, but now it's broken for DPS. I'm not accusing anyone of any anti-dps conspiracy, but it's difficult to deny that this mechanic change benefits healers specifically and is detrimental to DPS, so in that sense, Telen isn't wrong. It does punish DPS players and benefits Healer players. You can play for a week, you can play for a day, but it doesn't change that this is a straight nerf and there's no exaggeration there.

The mechanic being good for healers and bad for DPS does not equal "they want you to heal and never play DPS AM/sham," so in that sense, it's way over the top.

[live4treasure]

The mechanic being good for healers and bad for DPS does not equal "they want you to heal and never play DPS AM/sham," so in that sense, it's way over the top.

Fair point.

[TeckPataf]

Hi there. I used to be a Arch-Vaul player on live, and I loved my hybrid role : dealing approx 70% of a DPS class, healing approx 70% of a healer, usefull in a group to help the pressure / solidity but never as decisive as a true DPS / healer. Thus, I look a these recent modifications with a genuine interest, and I tested them on my Arch toon.
Here are my observations and propositions about our new leach life skills :

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Balance Essence / I'll Take That!
Now :
- Cost 45 AP - consumes heal mechanic point - builds damage mechanic point
- Casts on the move if mechanic points (from heal) are consumed
- Damage not affected by Int (and not by target's Tou) - can not crit
- Heals for [150% dmg + (600 affected by Wil)] - can crit

Energy of Vaul / Fury of Da Green
Now :
- Cost 50 AP - 8s CD - consumes heal mechanic point - builds damage mechanic point
- Casts on the move if mechanic points (from heal) are consumed
- Damage not affected by Int (and not by target's Tou) * 4 target - can not crit
- Heals for [total 100% dmg + (299 affected by Wil) * #target] in a 20ft zone - can crit

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Observations :
- Correct healing for Wil specced, correct damage even on tanks, good mechanic after healing
- Bad dmg for Int specced, mediocre healing, bad mechanic use with damage skills

Conclusions :
- It was an exclusively Int / magic crit skill, it becomes an exclusively Wil / heal crit one

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Proposition for Balance Essence / I'll Take That! :
- Cost 45 AP - consumes 1 heal mechanic point OR damage mechanic point
- Casts on the move if mechanic point is consumed
IF damage granted mechanic point (tranquility) is consumed :
- Damage affected by Int and can crit
- Heals for [150% dmg (+ 600 not affected by Wil)] - can not crit
IF healing granted mechanic point (force) is consumed :
- Damage not affected by Int and can not crit
- Heals for [150% dmg (+ 600 affected by Wil)] - can crit
IF no point is consumed :
- Damage affected by 70% total item stat - half chance to crit
- Heals for [150% dmg (+ 600 affected by 70% total item stat)] - half chance to crit

Proposition for Energy of Vaul / Fury of Da Green :
- Cost 50 AP - back to 5s CD - consumes 1 heal mechanic point OR damage mechanic point
- Casts on the move if mechanic point is consumed
IF damage granted mechanic point (tranquility) is consumed :
- Damage affected by Int * 4 target and can crit
- Heals for [total 150% dmg + (299 NOT affected by Wil) * #target] in a 20ft zone - can not crit
IF healing granted mechanic point (force) is consumed :
- Damage not affected by Int * 4 target and can not crit
- Heals for [total 150% dmg + (299 affected by Wil) * #target] in a 20ft zone - can crit
IF no point is consumed :
- Damage affected by 70% total item stat * 4 target - half chance to crit
- Heals for [total 150% dmg + (299 affected by 70% total item stat) * #target] - half chance to crit


Why this proposition :
- Vaul / Da Green paths can be usefull for Int OR Wil specced characters.
- In a damage rotation, it uses some damage granted mechanic point and do not lose too much damage.
- In a healing rotation, it uses some healing granted mechanic point and do not lose too much heal.
- It will not build mechanic points, just consume some, so it can't be used to pump heal / damage.
- It is also usefull for an hybrid specced one (who will keep the mechanic around 0 point).


Well, here is my point of view. I hope it can help the debates !

[live4treasure]

It's honestly an interesting proposal. I recall Dabbart putting forth this idea earlier but without details and before the recent patch. However, this is one for the balance forums, unless your intent was just to get some opinions beforehand.

One thing that worries me about this is the essential ability of an intellect-based AM in a world where this is implemented to simply run around firing off 1s cast damage abilities one after another with little anyone can do to stop them. I'm wondering what your solution to the balance problem this poses would be.

[live4treasure]

Alright, so small change since the last post was written is that Balance Essence's ability to self-heal when using tranquility stacks has been upped significantly. The survivability has become a little better than it was before, although the fence you have to jump over to go from force stacks to tranquility stacks is still very real and I still often die in that small window. With the balance essence change it isn't as bad as it was before, but unfortunately, there's still no real place for DPS AM in group play. The damage just isn't good enough even if you sacrifice a reasonable amount of your survivability to get it and non-existant if you don't. It's gotten a little better for solo roaming most certainly, albeit I wouldn't recommend solo roaming with full int talismans or with the usual 2 merc/4 domi setup.

Hopefully in the future something will be done to boost the damage potential of DPS AM/Sham. It's my belief that they don't need a huge push to make them viable for group play, just enough that they will be capable of pressuring the enemy enough to justify their shortcomings. I've thought for the longest time that a 20% crit damage modifier added to one of their tactics, like the Master of Force one, and perhaps another ability that deals instant damage that they can use in their burst rotation or something along those lines would be enough to push them into a position where they bring enough damage to the table that their extra healing and cleanse will start entering into the equation of whether or not a group should invite a DPS AM into a DPS slot. I can't say for sure about sham, however Hurts Don't It? is an excellent tactic with morale drain and an incredibly powerful toughness debuff, together with their amazing racial tactics. Perhaps a BiS shaman with 3 piece genesis and gunbad acessories + Gettin' Smarter would be able to compensate their lack of strikethrough tactic and carve out a spot in 6man pvp for himself as well. In that regard, sorcerers also struggle until they have amassed enough strikethrough by way of gear.