BW and upcoming dps patch

[gadielballart]

Hey everyone, Im new to BW. My in game name is OvenBaked 40/65

I was just curious what changes or tweaks you would like to see for the Bright Wizard class in Return of Reckoning.

This isn’t a balance request or a proposal to shake things up—I’m not trying to cause disbalance. I just wanted to hear different perspectives from players who’ve spent time with the class (either playing it or fighting against it).

What do you think works well?

What feels lacking or could be improved?

Any fun ideas you’ve always thought would fit the BW to make it more versatile outside of just WB blob play. Which i know is most of the game but I do enjoy going solo or duo even though I die quick, still find it fun.

[Tisaya]

My perspective as BW is that you're super squishy, not very mobily, barely have any cc, damage self... And for all that, your damage is not THAT high, compared to other dps classes.

[Sever1n]

your damage is not THAT high, compared to other dps classes.

Direct dmg nerf, prock nerf, disrupt patch nerf, aura resist shred nerf. Feels like witches must burn.

[Nelly74]

The damage is laughable compared to what it should be. Very few tools, not to mention the damage it inflicts on itself. This class needs to deal more damage at the very least. Yet another class left abandoned and nerfed by the devs for no valid reason—unless it’s just some whim, maybe?

[leftayparxoun]

Direct dmg nerf, prock nerf, disrupt patch nerf, aura resist shred nerf. Feels like witches must burn.

What "direct damage nerf" are you refering to? None of their direct damage abilities have received a targetted nerf since the new ability rework (to my knowledge). Do you mean the nerf to their career resource mechanic?

As for the resist buff/debuff changes that were part of the September 12th 2025 patch, they ended up benefiting non-physical damage dealers in every single organized setting. This is especially true for Sorc and BW ST specs who kept their resist strips nearly intact (If for whatever reason you are talking about solo roaming on BW/Sorc then I think the minor resist strip drop will be the least of their problems).


The one thing you do not mention and I think it's actually the biggest bane to Sorcs and BWs since the ability rework is the repeated history of the balance team adding anti-crit tools in support classes:

• Starting Dec 9th 2023 with the (undocumented) change to Shaman and AM 8pc Sov granted ability, Absolute Preservation, which since then provides -100% chance to be crit to all party mates.

• Continuing on March 19th 2025 with the healer update introducing the very strong Warrior Priest absorb prayer and Zealot absorb Master ritual.

• And finally on September 12th 2025 with the addition of party-wide absorb shields for both Chosen and KOTBS that are basically baked into their preexisting base kit.

For those unaware, while an enemy has an absorb shield on them, they cannot receive critical damage until it is depleted.
And Sorc/BW are the 2 most crit reliant classes in the game, lacking both dmg% bonuses and base ability damage to make up for their very strong crit based career mechanic. These changes have gradually hit these 2 classes harder than any other balance decision since the ability rework imo, perhaps only rivaled by the strikethrough system changes from last October and their impact to ST mage rotations.

[Illuminati]

For those unaware, while an enemy has an absorb shield on them, they cannot receive critical damage until it is depleted.

Could you unpack that and simplify it a bit?

What happens, in what order, do absorb shields and toughness work to negate critical damage. I think I know but would trust you to confirm.

Thank you

[wonshot]

Fun topic, I'll bite

A couple on alternative concepts I'd personally like to see as contrast to the pbaoe aoe spam, and singletarget timestamp:

A "Cast-time build" of some sorts. Either reworking closequaters tactic to make it not only a pve tactic but reintroduce it to a hard-casting playstyle also for RvR.
Maybe something as simple as a Stacking casttime reduction when you are standing close to an enemy (or enemies in general) and it would ramp up, giving interrupt counterplay and put you at risk but then also allowing for a higher skill ceiling by you selecting the right target(s) and not getting your abilities defended against by only clicking enemy tanks but instead their guarded dps.

An aoe Detonate build, where you consume any remaining DoTs and snapping their values into burst damage. That would allow for underused aoe dots to become more releveant without oneshotting target by 50% of their health. Could be something like Flamebreath + Spreading flames + Backdraft + Wildfire tactic into Detonate on the affected targets and it would trigger like 400-700 aoe DD crits ish. Raising up some of the underused and poor skills to be real abilities instead of combustion and combat tools.

Flamebreath becoming an inhale with a ramp up, the longer you inhale out of the 2-3sec buildup the stronger the DoT/converted into DD it would be when you exhale on your enemies.

Doing "something" new with Backdraft. it doesnt thematically match a closerange aoe build, to punt them away with a long strong dot.

Giving the class and mirror class some alternative to Crit-only playstyle. We have seen Trivial Blows added, pocket items with 3%less critdmg, healers having anti-crit for the whole group instead of self+deftarget. And yet still you can only build Crit builds on BW/Sorc. Realisticly the Timestamping playstyle will never be balanced and keeps making the classes too strong pugstompers or too much of a nonfactor that a good balanced enemy group can shut down with rather ease.

Also after the unlogical nerf the mages got a bout a year ago, the class mechanic is still showing the old values of 100%critdmg on max classmechanic value ingame.
Most of these concept-ideas are only that, a concept. Lets see what the balance team cooks up.

[leftayparxoun]

For those unaware, while an enemy has an absorb shield on them, they cannot receive critical damage until it is depleted.

Could you unpack that and simplify it a bit?

What happens, in what order, do absorb shields and toughness work to negate critical damage. I think I know but would trust you to confirm.

Thank you

While I haven't tested it extensively to verify every step, this is what was shared to me a while back:

Hit -> Damage -> Toughness -> Damage Increase -> Damage Reduction -> Absorb -> Crit -> Armor/Resist

Hit = avoidance checks
Damage Increase = Dmg% increase modifiers like Bloodlord weapon bonus
Damage Reduction = Dmg% decrease modifiers like We'z Bigger/Vaul's Tempering


To give an example:

Let's imagine a Choppa on Red or a Sorc at 100 career meter hitting the same target.

Ignoring dmg% bonuses, crit and penetration, lets imagine both the Sorc and the Choppa would connect an ability and hit that target for 300 damage after Toughness (Hit > Damage > Toughness).

A Red Choppa will have 55% dmg increase usually while a Sorc will have 5%.
Let's assume the target has -5% chance to be crit while Choppa is at 41% crit with 25% crit damage bonus and Sorc is at 78% crit with 100% crit damage bonus.
For simplicity's sake let's also assume that the target would end up with 25% dmg mitigation from armor/resists vs both classes.

I'll calculate the statistical average of the damage in the crit step, but here's how it goes for each class in each step:

• Choppa: 300 > 465 (dmg increase) > 582 (Crit averaged) > 436 (average after armor)

• Sorc: 300 > 315 (dmg increase) > 648 (Crit averaged) > 486 (average after resists)

As you can see, in this fictional example the Sorc would hit on average for 486 while the Choppa would hit for 436. Both starting from a 300 hit.

But what happens if we add an absorb shield of e.g. 500 in the mix? The damage stops at the "damage increase" step which means that the Sorc will deplete 315 damage while the Choppa will deplete 465!

In the above example (and also in practise) the Sorc lost the majority of her damage due to the absorb while Choppa actually ended up dealing more damage than they would. Both of course where "consumed" by the absorb, but imagine trying to deplete a 2000 absorb shield with Choppas vs Sorcs and check how many theoretical 300 hits each would take.

Other crit-based dps classes like Mara and Shadow Warrior to some extent also run into the same issue, but Sorc and BW are the most heavily impacted due to relying almost exclusively on crit to boost their damage (outside of increasing their mainstat).