Distortion Nerf

[Sun is in us]

I think you misread me then Tsume. I don't usually say Afternoon to someone I am trying to disrespect.

So I hope that either you or Pat won't feel that was my intent, because it wasn't. That is a laugh emote...not a roll eyes.....


The reason I listed the recharge on RM is salient. It's 18 seconds every 30 seconds. Nine seconds of no coverage I don't think is terrible. Plus of course we have myriad ways to increase/decrease recharge etc.....so even then it could have full coverage if Aechoed.

But there are some assumptions I think people (it seems) make when they discuss a skill as "overpowered":

They tend to think in terms of point A to Z. A ----being the use of the skill....and Z being the death of that opponent. Just because I can't interupt every single action of an opponent does not mean that interupts are a failure. Sometimes when using a counter....all I want to happen is to get to the letter F twice......and then eventually somebody else will take that char to Z (savvy?). So when a counter is suggested, I think it will sometimes be dismissed as only being partially effective; well, in terms of group dynamics, many times the partially effective is exactly what is needed.

Second, sometimes I think people also concentrate on a Skill Vs. Skill situation as opposed to several interactions between those skills and a combos. For example, you mentioned that Distortion is spammable.....well in one sense you are correct. You can keep hitting Distortion in PVE when you are standing outside LA until the Mursaat come home. But not when you are being attacked, or under enegy denial, or etc etc etc. RM is 18 seconds...that is almost 4 casts of Distortion.....and by that time the Distortion User should be dead (cover hexes etc still part of basic tactics etc). And it is not about perfect calling here either.....if one warrior says...."Hey, I'm going to keep going after that Mes....keep an eye out"...then the Nec can do that...and re-apply and cover whenever they have a chance....so you may not get him the first time...but over a period of time. It is not in context of a single tete a tete encounter between one skill and another. But a series of unfortunate events.....

Third, most likely I can create any scenario I want to make a skill seem effective or rotten, that is the strength of the game. But, as we saw when LuLu created the "Necro's Suck" video, visual, "real world" demonstrations can open all our eyes. So when somebody says a skill is overpowered, and then describes a scenario, would'nt you think that perhaps it might be more effective to back that up with "real world" auditable proof? If Distortion is really a seriously overpowered skill, why not show us that after creating a build and team to destroy its use, and then show us that video when you come up with a total failure to do so? Bring the build into the forum, have people suggest tweaks (just like a PVE thread), trot it back out another time...and if it fails there. Then you have a POWERFUL argument regarding the UBER ness of that particular skill you want changed.

But I have not seen this very often. Why is that? Is it possible that perhaps we really have not given the counters a fair shot? You mentioned that RM has failings....have you actually tried this out in GVG contests, in conjunction with the whole team, and found that it absolutely is no solution? Even with all the other tricks in the bag to back it up etc? And not half-heartedly at the last minute...but with a purpose?

[Patccmoi]

First Sun (now it's not a flame fest Tsume, it's a reply! I'll keep it civilized)...

Yes, ty, i heard of that thing called tactics.

But you see, i told in my long post how it's used : it's a life-saving skill. As i said, i usually never even have to reactivate it because a guardian is on me before it's over most of the time. If warriors stay on you for 15 sec, your team should be HAPPY. Do you realize how much energy your monk saved by having no one taking damage from the warriors for 15 sec? No one else than you to put enchants on? Wow.

There is ONE exception where i'd stay on a distortion target for long in 8v8, and that's if the distortion user is a monk. Otherwise, you lose your full pressure. The other team isn't going to watch the 2 warriors swing at the distortion guy forever without reacting, there's gonna be Guardian over him very soon (which blocks before distortion), etc.

Rigor Mortis is nice, but as Tsume said unless you're running hex-overload it's relatively hard to use. Is there any better way to tell the other team 'HERE IS OUR NEXT TARGET'? Unless you are extremely well timed (which is already relatively hard for warriors) it'll either be removed, or a Prot Spirit thrown on your target, etc. Rigor Mortis is a fairly good hex, and we use it sometimes too, but we don't even put 1 point in Curses for it. If your target isn't dead in 8 sec, you failed or it's already removed.

Malaise is decent as it's annoying. But i think anyone past rank 1000 knows that if you're below 15E you can get rid of it anytime with F4-F1. It CAN screw up someone in distortion if the guy is already below 5E, but otherwise it still gives the guy time enough to kite a bit in Disto while their monk have time to take care of them, or someone can snare the warrior.

Now just one last point that exasperates me so often. The fact that i want to point out a problem and how a skill is extremely good doesn't mean i lose to it and can't counter it and i want ANet to change the game for me. We started a guild lately and we're still undefeated running nothing but warrior pressure (Fear Me! spam) with support (don't feel like saying the full build, it's pretty uncommon). We simply ignore Distortion people and put the pressure elsewhere as it's pointless to try to kill them first. I DON'T ask for a distortion tweak because it favor me. I ask for a gale nerf too, and we're currently running 3 wars with it. I ask for a HOD Helm nerf too and we all wear it. I ask for what i believe is fair, not what i can't counter (i think i've shown often enough in these forums that i can think of counters by myself) or something i want to improve my builds. I'm ready to restart my builds from scratch after next patch no matter what is hit or not (i actually just developped a new GvG build that doesn't use a single controversial skill, so all i can hope for is buffs to it). So be respectful of other people's intelligence enough to think that maybe they're not 'crying for a nerf' but stating rationally why they believe a skill is too strong. And for the last time, i'm asking for an attribute rescaling, not to take the skill out of the game. It has its purpose, it serves it, that's fine. I love distortion and don't want it gone. But i want a real cost associated with one of the best anti-attack skills in the game.

Now, Tsume (Ok, the flame war starts now!!!! =p)

I don't actually believe Blackout is broken. Because it HAS many drawbacks, enough imo to make it balanced.

Advantages :

- Total shutdown of a target
- Resets adrenaline on warriors
- Touch skill, i.e. absolutely no counter exist once the guy is in melee range

Disadvantages:

- Self shutdown
- Touch skill, i.e. you HAVE to get in melee range =p
- 10E (fairly high cost, lower for warriors tough)
- Requires a serious investment to be good against non-warriors (below 8 domination, it lasts for longer on YOU)

There is ONE thing that i believe might be too strong with Blackout and it's adrenaline reset. Because then it's worth running it even with 0 Domination as an anti-warrior skill. But that alone imo isn't enough to call for a nerf to it. I'd prefer Blackout to only lock warrior skills just like other classes without reseting adrenal.

Out of that, it's a very good skill but it's fair. It's short without proper investment, and think of a spike, if you shutdown someone you can't take part of it. Are you adding more to the spike by using Blackout on the monk, or throwing PP-SD on him? It is the strongest shutdown in the game no doubt, but with enough drawbacks to balance it out. I'm not liking the adrenal reset, i'd personally want an adrenaline lock (adrenaline can't charged, but it doesn't empty), but not to the point of wanting it changed in priority.

[Sun is in us]

We must have been writing at the same time as many of the things you talk about are addressed in the post above.

GL & HF!





Edit: I never asked you if you knew tactics...I asked about...two skills not mentioned in your posting (although Wild Blow was mentioned)....But as a double MA in English....I always have to watch my reading skills as well....I hate it meself when I get sloppy in reading comprehension so maybe I missed a previous post on by you on those......but it is a Friday.....woot.....we all get to be sloppy! Giggity Giggity Goo!

[Mystic Memory]

All of you are your gigantic posts... =/

Really, when i look at it, I dont see why it is sooooo good.

I know you cant really compare some skills, but take

RoF vs Distortion. I mean they are equally good. And even more so when it is boon prot monks spamming RoF.

[Awcasper]

Blackout resetting adren is a bit harsh. Warrior was my first class in this game, and i still use it frequently. Being blacked out while having full adren is a big bummer. Perhaps it should lock adren but does not allow for adren to be increased while blacked out.

[Tsume]

What the heck?

I thought it was Pat and Sun that were gonna get miffed at each other, but no, they carry it on like full grown adults...meanwhile we get an argument, ok debate?, about propper grammar?

I don't care what your grammar is, or if you can't spell. Does car it seem like i do? Many people on these forums have trouble getting their points across cause they aren't native english speaker and it really chaps me when I see them ridiculed for it (that didn't happen here, I'm just saying that really ruffles my feathers).

But honestly guys what the heck? I deleted the two posts about 'grammar', well deleted one and removed everything that wasn't relevant to the conversation in the other.

If anyone wants to talk grammar in this thread again, I'll just delete it too. Natural evolutions, or slight side tracks from a topic if related are completely acceptable. But...Grammar?. Please don't do it again.

==============================

Now I want to actually talk about some of the things.

Pat those are some good points on Blackout, and yah of course I wasn't blind to the self shutdown and attribute specs silly :P. I suppose those are pretty heavy counter points to thinking its overpowered, but I really...just can't get over the feeling that its become pretty standard on most top tier teams because its so useful. And regardless of a skills power, I think anytime something gets so overused, its probably gonna be changed. I honestly can't think of a fair change to Blackout though. Like you pointed it out, it has some pretty substantial drawbacks. I think the problem lies in its use. It's very easy to put it on a player that doesnt need to take an active role in spikes, so it doesn't effect your offense to a tangible level while it can devestate the enemey's defense, or viceversa be used to eliminate their offense. It's another one of those thats highly useful for multiple situations. Being hassled by an ED? Keep him Blackout locked anytime he surges forward with support to drain the casters. Warrior spikes troublesome? Adrenal reset. Need to solo that runner? Lets shutdown their infuser, etc etc. But yah. I really feel it doesn't take much away from offense, but very much, makes your offense much more effective. Rangers can get off the deeper penetrations to the backline more easily, but I've seen many a Mesmers use it as well. They seem to be more defensive based though, shutting down the ED's, resetting an adrenal, etc. And having atleast 2 copies of Blackout on the team can prove very very effective.

As we've discussed in depth in this thread, much of the spikes at this point in time depend upon 2-3 warriors, with slight support, though you do have me intrigued by your team build...at the same time you say its untypical but you also said you ran 3 gale warriors which really gets me to wondering what else you have. If its not that typical, the rest of your team must really be varied from the normal we see with Galers commonly found today.

Both Pat and Awcasper point out the adrenal reset on Blackout as well, which although I consider it strong...I feel its justified on the skill. There are very few adrenal shutdowns or locks in the games. I'm not talking speed modifiers which will affect adrenaline, but straight up skill to adrenaline effect. Sympathetic Visage, Soothing Images and Blackout are the only ones, right? I think its fair for Blackout to stay as an adrenal wiper, and I don't really consider that aspect of it as too powerful.

Odd how that is, in part I'd be lieing if I said I didnt feel the skill was slighlty powerful. But I also think the aspect of the skill you others might consider is too powerful, is justified on it. Afterall it locks down all skills on the enemy, and your skills as well. It would be unfair to say 'hey this works on every target but Warrior skills, they are gonna be immune'. Perhaps they could disable the skills, without stripping adrenaline? Hmmm. I like it as an adrenal wipe so I really cant derive an unbiased conclusion on that.

However....I'm not sure how likely that is. Adrenaline is the recharge of such skills, thought we do know they can be thrown into a 'proper' recharge from Diversion and the like, so in theory it could work. I'm not sure the game is coded such though, since adrenaline basically is the recharge for such attacks.

Do we have a 'what will they buff' thread? That would be fun.
Oh, and before I forget. *sets Pat on fire*

Ok, flame on dude! Lol. I thought it was funny.....

[Patccmoi]

Alright, let's keep going on Blackout. I'm tired of Diversion really, talked about it in numerous threads and i think all i had to say about it has been said, so if some of you disagree and aren't convinced, that's perfectly fine and that's how you see it, won't debate on it again, none of us has the last word anyway.

For Blackout wiping out adrenaline, i see it this way... Blackout is balanced because you're locked approximately the same time as your opponent, right? Let's face it, if you weren't locked for nearly the same time, it would be grossly overpowered.

But on when you use it on a warrior that has say 5 hits of adrenal charged (that's really not a lot).

Now, you use Blackout on him at level 8 dom (5 sec for each i think), which is what usually Rangers use on it. You're locked for 5 sec. How long exactly is the warrior locked tough? Can you say he's locked 5 sec? Cause really he's locked 5 sec AND he has to get his 5 hits of adrenal back before using any skill (say a traditional axe warrior) out of maybe his stances and gale. So you do a complete lock on him for 5 sec only, but he's mostly locked for more like 10+ sec if he has his adrenal charged at all.

How many skills you know force a spell to recharge from 0 with its normal cooldown? None, that's what i tought... If a warrior has a Backbreaker charge and you Blackout on him, his Backbreaker is locked for about 20 sec, not 5.

Mesmers already have a direct hex locking adrenaline, it's AOE and can last insanely long with MoP. If you want to take out adrenal, there's Sympatetic. Think about it, Sympatetic is an enchant, on one target, and it's 10E cost/30 sec cooldown to drain adrenaline from warrior. Blackout is 10 sec recharge and you can use it directly on the war AND it has TONS of other uses while Sympatetic is extremely limited.

I'm not saying it's necessarily broken btw, i'm not screaming for a nerf. But from my pov, it's too good that it empties adrenal. Locking it would be enough imo.

It's relatively new in the metagame tough, was far from popular not too long ago. So i think it might be a little early to change it. Will depend a lot on what the other changes are in the patch, how good warriors will be afterwards, etc.

And if you're curious about our GvG build i can PM you part of it so you see the idea. It's not totally different from most high level guilds build currently, but there's 1 fully original build and small tweaks in the other that makes it played totally differently in the end.

Ok, lastly...

EDIT by Tsume- Hah Hah, very funny. <- who else wants to talk about grammar? Sidenote: Yes my grammar/spelling/whatever else is horrible at times.

(i added the dotted line so it's easy to know where to cut with your Mod scissors... however that's spelled lol)

[Ju Smurph]

I still fail to see how a 5 self black out for what 8 secound blackout on an oppenent is OP. A good team can easily work around it.

[IMMORTAlMITCH]

I havent read the entire thread, but distortion needs to have a higher illusion req to get the -2

[Archedgar]

Many people on these forums have trouble getting their points across cause they aren't native english speaker and it really chaps me when I see them ridiculed for it (that didn't happen here, I'm just saying that really ruffles my feathers).

I'd just like to point out, regarding the above quoted, that I myself am not a native english speaker, I don't ridicule others, at any point, based on their grammar and/or choice of posting style. Of course, not that Tsume implied otherwise...

I simply gave advice, which, was not meant to undermine anyone or start a "debate" on grammar. I didn't even know that there was a "heated debate" going on, I didn't read this thread at all until I noticed my post was deleted, I only read Awcasper's reply to my original comment that he would get his point across much easier if his posts were a bit easier on the eyes.