Return of Reckoning

maxonian wrote: Sat Nov 28, 2020 1:31 pm Small disclaimer: I main rSH on RoR and have mained rSH for years on live

As some SH players have stated in this topic, I too would rather have the old pre-rework SH than what we currently got. Reason for this being that rSH always felt (and demanded!) to be very fluid and dynamic on the battlefield, always on the go, - that was the essence of this class, but now this is pretty much gone.

Also I will do myself and invite every player that is going to share their thoughts and feedback regarding rSH to preface their message or paragraphs with what game context they are referring to, as large scale RVR lake wb vs wb fights plays are different to solo roam, which are different to 6v6, which are different to keep/fort siege stages. I think this is crucial. I believe even in this thread I've witnessed person A mention something regarding rSH's performance in one context and got counter-arguments from person B implying a completely different game context, which makes it near impossible to find common ground and have a constructive dialog.

I would like to share my experiences and thoughts regarding rSH in
[keep/fort sieges]:

65ft feels awful during keep/fort standoff because:

* Hitting Oil is much more dangerous now, since 2 of rSH's dots (Yer Bleeding and Rotten Arrer) now have 65ft base range, which means that you have to come closer than any other destro rDPS (sorcs, shammies and even maguses all get the luxury of standing at a greater range), separating yourself from your wb, thus making you that much more visible to enemy defenders on the walls and when they start focusing you, you have that much more distance to cover on foot to break fire now.

* Applying your dots/debuffs to enemy backline when door is down and during funnel phase requires you to almost be on your tanks' backs, absolutely eating up all the AOE damage order is dishing out, which a) very quickly kills your squig, and that in turn makes slotting newly introduced pet-dependent tactics (Sharpened Arrers=25% armor pen and Shooting Quicka=50% AA haste) very questionable, b) puts excessive pressure on your healers to keep your fragile green bum alive or c) makes you need to back out from this position fast, thus removing your DPS/pressure from enemies and making you a less valuable member of the warband overall, compared to other destro rDPS

If I had to pick one most valuable ability of rSH -- guys, I know rSH has a whole bag of tricks and utility skills for different situations – but if I had to single out one skill that makes the biggest contribution in wb context – barrel to the head, pick one type of situation – it would be Rotten Arrer, spammable 98ft heal debuff (as it was just a few days ago). With that taken away, specifically range not really being feasible in keep/fort situations, what rSHs are left with?

In other words, there is of course always an option not to use QS abilities during standoff, and only use 100ft abilities but let's take a closer look at them?

- Plink, Lots o'Arrers and What blocks – 2 direct damage and one supplemental to them ability which makes rSHs invade and compete in raw sustained DPS domain of sorcs and maguses, a competition rSH will never (and should never) be able to come ahead in due to nature of the classes. Better than nothing but why bring a rSH to Fort defense or attack when you could bring a magus or sorc?

- Shrapnel Arrer – range reducing debuff. SWs are kinda your only target during standoff, since healers are far back/behind the columns etc and BWs and engies dont need to have direct LOS for destro backline to hit it with their AOE abilities. Dont get me wrong Shrapnel Arrer is nice and totally useable but still's it's a 5sec cd utility skill, recipients of which are mostly SWs. How much is one debuffed Sw going to help your warband push in or def enemy push? A little bit. What boggles my mind is that debuffed SW would still have 75ft range on their Broadhead Arrow (if they are not using AOE tactic), – BA being THE gem of an ability of Skirmisher tree, 100ft, 3x stackable – while not debuffed rSH now sits at 65ft for their heal debuff (THE gem ability of QS tree for rSH).

Let's reverse this situation, just to magnify and underline the discrepancy: not debuffed SW 100ft, debuffed rSH 49ft with their prime “medium range” tree abilities. Wow.
I'm not proposing to make Yer Bleedin 100ft and 3x stackable to mirror SW, I'm totally fine with the old status quo of BA having 100ft range ST/65ft AOE, 3x stackable and Yer Bleedin/Rotten Arrer having 98ft not stackable but spammable. Kind of the same range, different skills, different uses and different flavor to the classes but seems balanced to me.

- Choking Arrer – 30sec cd silence. Situational during standoff. But you are rarely going to get healer or BW in your crosshair during funnel phase, because of reasons stated above. Useless against Sws.

- Not So Fast – 20sec cd range kd. Very strong addition to rSH in recent rework. But unfortunately in keep/fort siege context, whether your target is knocked down or not, you are likely not going to kill your enemy without them having incoming heal debuff on.

- Exploding Arrer – 13 mastery pts (sic!) PBAOE punt on 20sec cd. Definitely has it's uses if destro tanks/melee push through the funnel was successful but there are still tons of alive order rDPS and healers on the sides/stairs. Very strong addition to rSH. But not worth 13 mastery points slot skill IMO.

So with QS tree abilities largely invalidated during fort/keep sieges (due to short range), rSH has to rely on BS. But then this dreadful question looms over – Why bring rSH into wb at all? Get magus, get sorc. This feels bad.


PROPOSALS:

1) Shoot Thru Ya
Back to core ability. @Wargrimnir said in this thread that the only other option for Shoot Thru Ya was for it to be gone. But why? Why not leave it as it was? What is the reasoning behind this change? Was it because 'the AOE spec' of SH is mSH and thus no other AOE skills should be accessed outside of this spec? I think even order players never stated that Shoot Thru Ya is OP and should be toned down because rSH are totally thwarting their fort/keep funnel pushes. And that says something, considering how each faction is at the throat of their opposing one. IMO Shoot Thru Ya was in a perfect spot: 1) The only real AOE skill of rSH 2) Okay damage. Doesnt need to be tuned up or down 3) Drawback of exposing yourself at 65ft range (i.e. Lag for 2 sec during a Fort def when order pushes through the destro funnel and you suddenly find yourself in a sea of slayers, WLs and order tanks, rooted or knocked down and then shortly after with a cute gray panel with a timer and word 'Respawn' on it) 4) Great for PVE trash clearing with Expert Skirmisher. Solid skill with hefty advantages (real AOE, okay dmg, cast on move) and just as serious drawbacks (2 sec cast, 65ft range).

2) Finish Em Off
Back to 13 pt BS mastery skill. Having finisher have 65ft range is very awkward. A lot of burst potential gone with the range changed to 65ft. Lack of Finish Em off reduces BS path to being mere plinkin-machine.

3) Not So Fast
Moved to QS with ranged reduced to 65ft.

4) Run-n-Shoot, Rotten Arrer, Yer bleeding
Range increased to 98/100ft innate. Notice I'm not suggesting to revert Shootin Wif Da Wind tactic to it's previous state. So this still leaves other QS abilities – Stop Running, Behind Ya, Red Tipped Arrer and Not So fast (as per (3)) at 65ft range.

IMO, these proposed changes are not as radical as some that players stated in this thread i.e. revert SWDW to it's original state or even make SWDW in it's previous state core. But that being said, I agree that 65ft is NO range for rSH to be at from their enemies. Too squishy on the defence. Or too useless on the offence if you stay farther than 65ft and rely on current-state BS skills and disregard your other (dare I say class defining) abilities.

If devteam is absolutely hell-bent on having QS tree limited to 65ft, that would really be strange for SWs BA and SFA to keep 100ft range (not to mention having stackable BA). Doesnt seem fair.

Mobility and fluidity is the heart of this class. At 65ft rSH is much more likely to be dead than be alive and mobile. So rSHs stay back and plink. With mobility gone, spirit of rSH is gone.



With all that being said, I want to thank devs for their continued support and development of the game. You guys have made an incredibly fun and wholesome game. Hat's off to you!


P.S. First post btw

Edits: Formatting