Since Nibbon has quit: Sage/Sorcerer Top issues discussion

[Darth_Dreselus]

You can think of me as upvoting 1 and 2 in current state (bar minor edits) and downvoting 3 in favour of skill tax or set bonus question (particularly the latter).

 

I have nothing to add at this stage, after all the months this has been up.

 

Also Nala, as soon as these are posted and answered people will be ************ about the questions, particularity those who have never posted in this thread. Ignore them and I personally thank you for taking time to do this.

Edited April 27, 2014 by Darth_Dreselus

[MusicRider]

As far as the skill tax goes seer has always paid up to 2nd tier TK for the Force Armor talent, ever since launch. You can argue that the willpower bonus in madness isn't a tax because it's 1st tier, but seer has been taxed since launch, and now DPS gets taxed for Fadeout in PVP (again, contrast with changing HtL to baseline). Balance got taxed up to second tier TK for Force Management and now has to decide which of the two skill taxes to pay in PVP, as it cannot pay both and remain a pure spec.

 

That is broken. The problem isn't the existence of skill taxes per se, it's that our class simply has too many of them. We're the most heavily taxed class in the game, to the point where it now breaks one of our pure specs for PVP. And Bioware wonders why we hybrid LOL.

 

As far as set bonuses go, I agree and tried to get some discussion of that in question 2 as honestly lacking set bonuses do gimp seers even more in PVP. Imbalance between PVP and PVE set bonuses for seer is a large problem; with bolster it is literally impossible to argue for taking 4 piece PVP over 2 piece PVE...for PVP. I'm not as familiar with the DPS set bonuses but it should say something that I seriously considered getting sin 4 piece PVE. As a PVP sorc healer. That was before 2.7 came along and I pretty much stopped PVPing because seer/corruption was utterly neglected as DPS got all the love.

 

That is true, that force armour is 2nd tier and seer specs have always taken it... is it a tax though? IMO not really cause a) you are already spending 5 points to take must have as seer skills on tier-1 so you are already in tier-2, b) personally, my full seer specs and in particular the pve one leaves me with one point extra to put as I please, while my pvp also just comes just right taking everything I want. Should force armour be a tier 1 skill? Yes probably? Where? Replacing the 3-point skill upheaval, well from a seer build point of view it makes no difference, while such a move at the same time creates an actual tax for full tk and hybrid tk/balance dps point of view as in order to reach tier-2 and beyond your are going to waste 1 skill point (for pvp: 0 in reserves and 2/3 in inner strength is the best). Now you might see move it to the seer tree, but where? And in case is that the best approach, the skills have to exist in one of the three trees, your definition of skill tax is points that are spent outside your primary tree. Well, firstly they have to be allocated somewhere as there is no common low core with branch specialisations, and b) according to your definition then there will always be two trees that pay taxes.

 

To me "skill tax" comes in two flavours:

1) You are forced to waste points on a lower level skill in order to reach a highly desirable skill on higher level, like the example I have given you above,

2) There are two highly desired skills but can't have both, e.g. in a full TK spec egress and critical kinesis.

 

Bottom line is that with the exception of the new fadeout dilemma the trees of the sages are quite nicely designed.

[MusicRider]

Starting with question 3, does it really matters to more than a handful of people? I mean, come on people, didn't we choose a class in the first place because of its particulars? How many of us actually care to how we swing our lightsabers around when we have so many other issues? Tbh, what bothers me the most here is that it'll obviously be answered with a "no plans, it's all about the class uniqueness". What do people really expect, that we get saber throws or start using saber strike, for real? What could we possibly get from this that'd benefit us as a class? Do you think they'd actually change animations/give new spells just because of that?

 

I understand this question can bring some curiosity, but to use an entire slot for something so trivial? It just feels so "meh". Oh well, that's just my opinion.

 

Oh you will be surprised how many people have requested and discussed that.... there are threads with dozes of pages. My stand in the past was that there were more pressing matters than aesthetic concerns, I am happy for this question to be asked but my stand still holds.... if people think that there are really important and urgent issues with respect to the performance of the class it could go as feedback and be replaced by this matter.

 

IMO, the pvp set 4-piece crap bonus is something that the devs should look at. I haven't met a single dps sage/sorc that plays with 4-piece master, and personally I haven't played since ranked war zones where I used it for a period in order to be able to interrupt caps quicker and that was so highly situational that I don't think it actually helped for more than a few times in hundreds of games back then.

Edited April 27, 2014 by MusicRider

[AdrianDmitruk]

That is true, that force armour is 2nd tier and seer specs have always taken it... is it a tax though? IMO not really cause a) you are already spending 5 points to take must have as seer skills on tier-1 so you are already in tier-2, b) personally, my full seer specs and in particular the pve one leaves me with one point extra to put as I please, while my pvp also just comes just right taking everything I want. Should force armour be a tier 1 skill? Yes probably? Where? Replacing the 3-point skill upheaval, well from a seer build point of view it makes no difference, while such a move at the same time creates an actual tax for full tk and hybrid tk/balance dps point of view as in order to reach tier-2 and beyond your are going to waste 1 skill point (for pvp: 0 in reserves and 2/3 in inner strength is the best). Now you might see move it to the seer tree, but where? And in case is that the best approach, the skills have to exist in one of the three trees, your definition of skill tax is points that are spent outside your primary tree. Well, firstly they have to be allocated somewhere as there is no common low core with branch specialisations, and b) according to your definition then there will always be two trees that pay taxes.

 

To me "skill tax" comes in two flavours:

1) You are forced to waste points on a lower level skill in order to reach a highly desirable skill on higher level, like the example I have given you above,

2) There are two highly desired skills but can't have both, e.g. in a full TK spec egress and critical kinesis.

 

Bottom line is that with the exception of the new fadeout dilemma the trees of the sages are quite nicely designed.

 

Delete reserves. There is no reason why we cannot just have 600 points Force baseline. It's a pointless talent whose only function is to act as a skill tax.

 

Move the Force Armor talent down to where reserves used to be.

 

Replace the void in the 2nd tier middle tree with something specific to said tree. Maybe it'd be a good place to add pushback protection on Crushing Darkness or something--healers don't need it and madness can get it insta procced.

 

Also you act like skill taxes out of primary tree aren't an issue for seer because at most, you will have only 37 points in seer anyway. That is not necessarily the case--to me having only 37 desirable points in seer tree is indicative of a different problem, the useless bloat in the upper third of seer that I have previously written about. Full seer doesn't have enough actually desirable talents between HT/Innervate and the AOE; instead it has too many filler talent points that do very little if anything and/or are too situational to be of significant use.

Edited April 27, 2014 by AdrianDmitruk

[MusicRider]

Delete reserves. There is no reason why we cannot just have 600 points Force baseline. It's a pointless talent whose only function is to act as a skill tax.

 

Move the Force Armor talent down to where reserves used to be.

 

Replace the void in the 2nd tier middle tree with something specific to said tree. Maybe it'd be a good place to add pushback protection on Crushing Darkness or something--healers don't need it and madness can get it insta proceed.

No argument there... might just as well give baseline 2/3 in inner strength and will of the jedi and remove these skills. Of course got to do similar things for all classes and invent new skills or make the trees smaller.

 

Also you act like skill taxes out of primary tree aren't an issue for seer because at most, you will have only 37 points in seer anyway. That is not necessarily the case--to me having only 37 desirable points in seer tree is indicative of a different problem, the useless bloat in the upper third of seer that I have previously written about. Full seer doesn't have enough actually desirable talents between HT/Innervate and the AOE; instead it has too many filler talent points that do very little if anything and/or are too situational to be of significant use.

I am not acting anything. It is true in my case cause I will repeat again, with these 37 points I can take anything I want for my pvp and pve builds. Also there are useful skills in the upper tree.... salvation, force warden, resplendence, clairvoyance, etc. The only skills that are useless in the tree and I have never actually taken are confound and amnesty.

[Chemic_al]

While I don't disagree with #1 and #3 being issues and/or in need of tweaks I don't see those questions representing the community.

 

Well, what do you ask for at this point? The issues with sages and sorcs have been pointed out numerous times to no avail and by enlarge ignored. The infamous H2F and L2P answers still ring in the ears of every sorc and sage. Bioware's utter disdain for the class coupled with downright ignorance on class balancing over many patches has brought us to the point where I'm just "meh" about it all. They never gave sorcs a chance outside of bubble stun, which was obviously broken, but it's clear they absolutely loathe this class and never want to see it as anything other than a pve healer.

 

If we gave every sage in the game a poll, how many of those do you think would be concerned about NiM or even put that on their top 10? 1%? How many are even running NiM's when those NiMs are at their level? It's probably not even 1 % and out of those there's probably not more than a maximum of one sage per 8 players. So, 0.125%? We have three questions, no more no less, and you want to cater to the 0.125 %? Groups like that have to, IMO, lobby for themselves. Not to mention that it has been brought up in the past. There's no doubt in my mind that BW is aware of the issue but choose to linger since they don't know how to fix it without turning sage into a shadow tank.

 

Got to ask for something I suppose. Again the fact they insist on making maras and snipers are the g oto dps classes for raids is disappointing, but when there is so literally zero incentive to bring sorc dps it's hardly surprising. The over-estimation of how much off-healing is worth in Bioware's eyes, is a direct pointer to their ignorance on class balancing has once again brought this about. In fact the off-healing is worth so little, it actually feels like a dps tax, and a tax without anything to show for it. Sniper shields and bloodthirst have always been WAY more useful than a bubble or an off-heal, and not only that the classes get the best dps to boot, but I suppose worse is that the dps delta between a sniper and a sorc is so large now it's just beyond disappointing and into sad and ridiculous territory. As a tangent don't you feel that bloodthirst from a class perspective really fits with a sorc rather than some meathead warrior with two glowsticks?

So we really to my mind have to be the best dps class bar none - to compensate for out pitiful raid utility and the fact we cannot cheese, or otherwise come out of other raid mechanics without losing GCDs to our self-heal and our bubble (cf things like dodge, sniper roll, shroud or even things like cloak of pain/energy shield). The problem is our dps doesn't come close if we don't do these things, stressing healers more, and if we do the dps delta gets wider between us and other classes. It's truly moronic design, but unsurprising at this point.

 

#3 is another question I don't see representing the community, in this context I'm expressing what the change would do to players post lvl 15

Look, sage melee will never, NEVER, be buffed to the point that it can replace a force ability. This is why we have sents and shadows in the game. Even if sage melee was buffed to a decent level it still shouldnt be in a sage's interest to be up close and personal, use the GCD to run the hell away instead. So who is this for? Even if it should turn out to be nothing but a RP thing, which I don't have a problem with, I don't see that many RP'ers putting aside their force abilities for an option that is worse. And should we even, through a question, promote that people play the class in a way that isnt optimal or intended?

 

 

There is some merit to this point, and I kind of agree, but by the same token, saber strike and thrash should never have had their willpower bonus damage taken away. It would be nice to have SOMETHING to use when a shadow pops resilience in your face and can easily point to snipers retaining shiv and mercs retaining their damage on rocket punch. This has been asked for and ignored, so I guess, I wouldn't recommend advocating this one.

So ask for a defensive CD then? I still don't get how sorcs don't have shroud. Mercs get their energy shield shared with powertechs, snipers get their dodge and sorcs get another one where the sun don't shine, all the while buffing melee to the point where they literally have an answer for ANYTHING a sorc can do (heck maras have for ages), and we have nothing to retaliate with. Yay for Bioware.

 

I guess I'm at the point where I don't even really care what's asked, I full expect us to be ****** over again. Years of pointing out problems or explaining why changes have hurt us have gone unheeded, why is this going to be any different? Not to take away from the effort Master-Nala has put into this, and kudos to him, but there is a reason my sub is expiring, and I fully expect whatever asinine changes the team makes to backup the decision. One hopes there might be an unexpected surprise, but yeah, let's get real.

[ottoisblotto]

I'm fine with the questions as they are, they may not totally represent what my issues are but that's okay.

People should take this as an introduction to a long dialogue and not our final words.

My thanks to whoever is taking the time and effort to put it together

[Ycoga]

the questions are fine IMHO.

 

1. PVE NiM - If sages are being denied places in NiM ops just because of their class mechanics, that's discrimination and BW needs to give a good answer as to why they allow it to continue.

 

2. PVP Seer spec - It's true that Sorcs are always the top priority target for enemy teams. It's also true that the seer sage has different healing mechanics to the commando and scoundrel - particularly the instant cast bits. The question is valid because it's truthful. Do I think it's beating a dead horse? Yes, but I support it because it's truthful. TBH I'd choose to replace this with a question to the devs to ask them to include the community in future design plans to make sages less of a priority in the opening moments of PVP combat. (e.g. an out of combat stealth that has a 3 min cooldown).

 

3. This is a valuable question and it must be included. It's about more than just cosmetics. If BW ackowledges the Mage origins of the class, then we can start working with them on ways to make the class more Jedi-like, which might have an impact on everything, from survivability to being a priority target in PVP, to how the animations look. Plus, there've been loads of ability-oriented questions made by the community, let's ask something different while we have the dev's ear? There've been threads on the matter for two years, it's time to blow off the cobwebs on this one.

 

A note about skill tax: It doesn't exist, from a design point of view. Sure there are some abilities in each tree that seem less powerful than others. But you're not being taxed by taking or avoiding them. We should not ask the devs about skill tax - instead, we could ask them questions about SPECIFIC 'underwhelming' skills and ask how they might improve them so that we feel satisfied in adding them to our build.

In other words, forget about the 'skill tax' - tweak abilities instead.

 

Oh, and about the taking of force armor in the Telekinetic tree as Seer - are you crazy? lol. +10% on force armor is certainly not worth the 3 points required to reach tier2.

http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#600GRrbdRrRrGukZbZb.3

 

My last point about seer sage is that having a good Tank with you makes the world OK. We should be responsible enough with our questions to remember the bigger design principles (that include tanking mechanics) and ask questions that are mindful of that.

Edited April 28, 2014 by Ycoga

[mr_twopercent]

Not to toot my own horn here, but I'm one of the top parsing Sorcs, I know that means nothing in raids but I put out high numbers there too. But I'm not selected for my guilds top progression team. Why? 2 reasons. Dotsmash maras and Pyro mercs. Dotsmash shouldn't exist. It's a freak. Pyro has an exploit that is being used to put out ridiculous numbers too. Please break us too so we can be the next OP FOTM.

 

Also it's been mentioned here already and sone have said it's not worth mentioning, but we need something to happen regarding DCD's. Either take unnatural preservation and barrier off the gcd or, preferably, give us a new cooldown that increases our armor for a short period of time. Cos on DF NiM Draxus, when your on the bulwarks at the side with 2 dispatchers and they start focusing you, you go down quicker than (insert joke here).

 

It saddens me that a class I've spent 2.5 years playing is still like the black sheep of the dps family when it comes to being picked for the hardest content. We have to perform unbelievably well to even get close to an average pyro merc or Dotsmash mara. That's not balance, that's bulls**t.

[Capote]

Not to toot my own horn here, but I'm one of the top parsing Sorcs, I know that means nothing in raids but I put out high numbers there too. But I'm not selected for my guilds top progression team. Why? 2 reasons. Dotsmash maras and Pyro mercs. Dotsmash shouldn't exist. It's a freak. Pyro has an exploit that is being used to put out ridiculous numbers too. Please break us too so we can be the next OP FOTM.

 

Also it's been mentioned here already and sone have said it's not worth mentioning, but we need something to happen regarding DCD's. Either take unnatural preservation and barrier off the gcd or, preferably, give us a new cooldown that increases our armor for a short period of time. Cos on DF NiM Draxus, when your on the bulwarks at the side with 2 dispatchers and they start focusing you, you go down quicker than (insert joke here).

 

It saddens me that a class I've spent 2.5 years playing is still like the black sheep of the dps family when it comes to being picked for the hardest content. We have to perform unbelievably well to even get close to an average pyro merc or Dotsmash mara. That's not balance, that's bulls**t.

 

This. That's exactly what I meant when saying that there were more important issues than question #3.

 

Anyway, if it is going to stay there no matter what, perhaps we could try to change question #1 to include the DPS factor of the trees too? Perhaps make a more "PvE-overall" question? Or would it ended up being too generic?

 

Just a draft to make my idea more clear:

"PvE - overall"

Right now sages are facing two main issues in PvE: the lack of DPS representatives on top parses/competitive cores and the lack of specific DCDs in certain situations. Are there any plans to improve the class tools when it comes to competitive DPS (when compared to a pyro merc, for instance)? And what about DCDs tweaks (such as preservation ignoring GCD)?

 

We could, of course, make the question longer to avoid misinterpretations, but I think the comments pre-question would cover this issue. I think it is also important to make it clear that we do not want an overall buff for the class (since it would interfere in PvP and make the answer another "no, just h2f").

Edited April 28, 2014 by Capote

[Ycoga]

This. That's exactly what I meant when saying that there were more important issues than question #3.

 

So, you're suggesting a question to the devs about why we can't have broken damage dealing specs like dotsmash and the PTExploit? :/

Doesn't seem wise to ask the devs that.

Edited April 28, 2014 by Ycoga

[Capote]

So, you're suggesting a question to the devs about why we can't have broken damage dealing specs like dotsmash and the PTExploit? :/

Doesn't seem wise to ask the devs that.

 

I think it is also important to make it clear that we do not want an overall buff for the class.

 

Anyway, not only compared to pyro mercs, but more to any class other than assassins and powertechs (I know parses don't mean that much, but it is the only data we have atm, and I can't find a single sorc getting near the top. Hell, I can't even see dps sorcs on the top progression teams).

Edited April 28, 2014 by Capote

[mr_twopercent]

You know that's not what we meant. That was tongue in cheek. But if they're so serious about balance, at least fix the exploits in other specs. We neither put out enough dps to compete nor do we have the survivability to make us viable in certain fights. We're a light armored class with practically 0 DCD's. Why would any team pick a sorcerer over a mara or pyro merc? They wouldn't. That needs to change.

[MusicRider]

And since there have been all kind of weird requests on the pvp forum, can we also ask that mental alacrity allows double/tripple/quadrable (something not OP) casts for its duration...

[Drahy]

Big addition to Balance damage should be fixing this long time bug: http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=707888

 

Situation in these days in PVE with two sages with balance tree: You both cast Force in Balance to achieve Force Suppression on the target ... Now you have the effect twice ... 15 and 15 on target but it takes only one sage dot to take them all - one dot effect makes effect looks like 14 and 14 instead taking only one from one effect... Thats bad and it is there for more than a year now ...

Edited April 28, 2014 by Drahy

[Master-Nala]

This. That's exactly what I meant when saying that there were more important issues than question #3.

 

Anyway, if it is going to stay there no matter what, perhaps we could try to change question #1 to include the DPS factor of the trees too? Perhaps make a more "PvE-overall" question? Or would it ended up being too generic?

 

Just a draft to make my idea more clear:

 

 

We could, of course, make the question longer to avoid misinterpretations, but I think the comments pre-question would cover this issue. I think it is also important to make it clear that we do not want an overall buff for the class (since it would interfere in PvP and make the answer another "no, just h2f").

 

The thing you have to remember about the DPS question is that it has recently been discussed in the 2.7 testing forum. I hate that they lock out those posts, but the devs have already commented on PvE DPS & Pushback. And they did so POSITIVELY. There's no need to waste a question on those issues.

[Capote]

The thing you have to remember about the DPS question is that it has recently been discussed in the 2.7 testing forum. I hate that they lock out those posts, but the devs have already commented on PvE DPS & Pushback. And they did so POSITIVELY. There's no need to waste a question on those issues.

 

I wish I had paid more attention to those posts. Kinda of my fault, I know. Anyway, I read a couple of those during PTS time and iirc they were more RNG/wrath changes specific. I think that our question is more after-patch oriented, since this is a new phase of DPS analysis (post 2.7). What I mean is that the already discussed wrath/rng changes did not improve to the point we were expecting, reason why it is a new moment of analysis.

 

We could, perhaps, just make the DPS part of the question I proposed focused on how the DEVs see the sorcerer DPS in comparison to all other DPS classes (avoiding the problem ycoga mentioned). Something like this (again, just a draft to explain the idea):

 

"PvE - overall"

Right now sages are facing two main issues in PvE: the lack of DPS representatives on top parses/competitive cores and the lack of specific DCDs in certain situations. How do you see the class as a DPS in comparison to others in high-level end-game? And what about DCDs tweaks (such as preservation ignoring GCD)?

 

Taking that aside, if you guys think the question is too generic or will just get another "contentless" answer, perhaps we should just keep the questions as they are.

Edited April 28, 2014 by Capote

[MusicRider]

I wish I had paid more attention to those posts. Kinda of my fault, I know. Anyway, I read a couple of those during PTS time and iirc they were more RNG/wrath changes specific. I think that our question is more after-patch oriented, since this is a new phase of DPS analysis (post 2.7). What I mean is that the already discussed wrath/rng changes did not improve to the point we were expecting, reason why it is a new moment of analysis.

 

We could, perhaps, just make the DPS part of the question I proposed focused on how the DEVs see the sorcerer DPS in comparison to all other DPS classes (avoiding the problem ycoga mentioned). Something like this (again, just a draft to explain the idea):

 

 

 

Taking that aside, if you guys think the question is too generic or will just get another "contentless" answer, perhaps we should just keep the questions as they are.

 

They were looking into buffing the damage of sever force.

[Capote]

They were looking into buffing the damage of sever force.

 

That's nice to hear, do you remember where they said that? I'd like to read more about it.

[judgeender]

I believe the DPS follow-up to the PTS forums is already covered. They already said they are looking at DPS for Balance/Madness. Focusing a question on this will simply detract from any other part of the question.

 

On the "survivability" question, that is probably the biggest issue for DPS Sorcs/Sages in PvE beyond the aforementioned actual DPS issue. There are a number of solutions to it: (i) taking things like Force Mend and Static Barrier off the GCD (and perhaps reducing cost of Static Barrier) when used on oneself, (ii) providing a more traditional GCD, (iii) changing the way armor works, or (iv) even making us a true glass cannon. There may be even other options to take to alleviate the problem. My concern is that we shouldn't change/draft the question too narrowly so that they can simply respond to only one option and not others. We should explain the problem and make sure that we point to options that could be used to fix the problem. If we focus on only one solution, we may get an answer that addresses the proposed solution, but not the underlying concern.

[Master-Nala]

That's nice to hear, do you remember where they said that? I'd like to read more about it.

 

You can't. They locked out the posts on the PTS forum. That's what I was talking about. It was a great discussion with a lot of dev feedback on Sages/Sorcerers. We got more attention during the 2.7 test than most classes get in their answers.

[colemanron]

deleted Edited April 29, 2014 by colemanron

[MusicRider]

One other thing if it is not too late that personally I would like to know the BW devs view is regarding the balance self-healing from dots which is based on crits but given the crit nerfs from 2.0 onwards these talents have not been rescaled/ratackled accordingly, so that was a definite nerf and none has complained about them prior to 2.0. Together with the higher overall damage of all classes nowadays it seems to me that dot self-healing has much less value that it used to. Are there any plans to either a) modify the crit deminishing returns in general, or b) adjust the dot self-heals in some way?

[Ycoga]

One other thing if it is not too late that personally I would like to know the BW devs view is regarding the balance self-healing from dots which is based on crits but given the crit nerfs from 2.0 onwards these talents have not been rescaled/ratackled accordingly, so that was a definite nerf and none has complained about them prior to 2.0. Together with the higher overall damage of all classes nowadays it seems to me that dot self-healing has much less value that it used to. Are there any plans to either a) modify the crit deminishing returns in general, or b) adjust the dot self-heals in some way?

 

So, while this is an interesting point to talk about here, the devs have stated that they're looking to changes to crit already (that was also on the PTS). So I feel that, if we were to ask about crit changes, they'll merely tell us again that they're looking at it already. For that reason, I don't feel we should spend a question on the matter...

Edited May 1, 2014 by Ycoga

[MusicRider]

Not a full question just a bullet point in the feedback section:

 

- The increased diminishing returns of crit value post 2.0 had a big impact in specs that have skills that rely on it. One such skill is balance dot self-healing, which has not been rescaled/readjusted for these 2.0 changes, and hence its effectiveness is much lower than before. The devs stated on the pts that they are looking on the crit in general. Is there an update on this matter or specifically for balance dot self-healing are there any plans of rescaling it taking into account the 2.0 crit limitations?