Nibbon (Sage rep) has quit: I need your feedback

[Master-Nala]

Hello, my lightning throwing siblings. The Sage rep quit the game and has made no effort to compile any issues for the class. No one has stepped up to fill the vacuum and so I'm trying to compile the top issues facing the class.

 

There are some nice buffs coming in 2.7, but there seems to be some room for further improvement.

 

The biggest consensus among Sages/Sorcerers was making Egress/Fadeout available for all specs. While the devs have asked for a sacrifice to get it, that looks to be a reality.

 

What other issues do folks believe will still exist post 2.7, if any?

[Aerilas]

Hello, my lightning throwing siblings. The Sage rep quit the game and has made no effort to compile any issues for the class. No one has stepped up to fill the vacuum and so I'm trying to compile the top issues facing the class.

 

There are some nice buffs coming in 2.7, but there seems to be some room for further improvement.

 

The biggest consensus among Sages/Sorcerers was making Egress/Fadeout available for all specs. While the devs have asked for a sacrifice to get it, that looks to be a reality.

 

What other issues do folks believe will still exist post 2.7, if any?

 

As someone who has played every available spec and mainly focuses on full madness and full healing in arenas I'd say madness, hybrid aoe and lightning got very good buffs. (Shame hybrid won't get access to the fadeout though)

 

I think what should be focused on now is to improve the healing spec. Since the Mercenary buffs I feel like we are atm the worst healer in PVP. The difference between merc and sorc are very small but it's there nontheless. I haven't much thought about it yet what exactly we should need, but the first thing that comes to mind is some sort of hot we can put on every player the way an operative and Mercenary can. They both work differently, and so could the sorc's.

 

Apart from that I'd really enjoy a DCD. The Force Barrier buff is good, but it seems Bioware makes us put all our defensive capabilities in just 1 move that stuns ourselves.

[Master-Nala]

As someone who has played every available spec and mainly focuses on full madness and full healing in arenas I'd say madness, hybrid aoe and lightning got very good buffs. (Shame hybrid won't get access to the fadeout though)

 

I think what should be focused on now is to improve the healing spec. Since the Mercenary buffs I feel like we are atm the worst healer in PVP. The difference between merc and sorc are very small but it's there nontheless. I haven't much thought about it yet what exactly we should need, but the first thing that comes to mind is some sort of hot we can put on every player the way an operative and Mercenary can. They both work differently, and so could the sorc's.

 

Apart from that I'd really enjoy a DCD. The Force Barrier buff is good, but it seems Bioware makes us put all our defensive capabilities in just 1 move that stuns ourselves.

 

The next strongest consensus has been the need for a real defensive cooldown. I think that's probably the PRIMARY issue. I think the easiest fix for that is to share Resilience, like the Agents share Evasion. Then Rescue or something could go to Shadows/Assassins.

 

I also agree with you regarding the healers. I haven't really thought what would be a good change for that spec. I personally think it's not as potent as Operatives or Commandos, but I'm not clear exactly what should change. I'm open to opinions. The only thing I can think is that Sorcerers need some kind of "spam" heal like Slow Release and Trauma Probe.

[colemanron]

I haven't much thought about it yet what exactly we should need, but the first thing that comes to mind is some sort of hot we can put on every player the way an operative and Mercenary can. They both work differently, and so could the sorc's.

 

Asking for a heal like that would not be smart, if we don't want another round of L2P&H2F answers. Static Barrier is what Sorcs have as a preemptive heal. If we want a change in that department, we should ask for its lockout to be revised, for example make it shorter, or be exclusive to the caster, and by this make groups running with double Sorcerers more viable and the ability more spammable.

 

 

The next strongest consensus has been the need for a real defensive cooldown. I think that's probably the PRIMARY issue. I think the easiest fix for that is to share Resilience, like the Agents share Evasion. Then Rescue or something could go to Shadows/Assassins.

 

After seeing the previous answers and the devs' general consensus on the class I have the feeling getting a DCD is not going to happen. Ever. Sorcs are not supposed to mitigate damage, they are supposed to avoid damage. As of right now the class is lacking the tools to be able to do it well, but that is exactly what they are trying to address by moving Fadeout to tier 2. The Sorcerer is meant to be a kiting machine, and no facetanking is allowed.

 

If anything, we should ask for better selfheals, like lower cooldown on Unnatural Preservation or take it off the GCD, make Static Barrier have a shorter lockout/free of Force/off the GCD when casted on self, make the bubble HOT baseline on self, and buff it further with the talent for the healer tree, or something similar. There are plenty of ways to implement more survivability for the class, and while a DCD will most likely never happen, asking for better heals may not be unreasonable given the complete lack of DCDs, having light armor and the vulnerability to interrupts, damage, spell pushback and generally everything that is capable of hitting back.

 

 

 

On a sidenote: I thought KTap was going to be the class rep after Nibbon left. Did he change his mind, leave the game, or was it never in the cards in the first place? Just curious.

Edited February 25, 2014 by colemanron

[Dedrayge]

Most other classes don't have to sacrifice DPS for extra survivability. Not sure why they'd want a squishy class to have to make that choice. Especially considering how easy it can be to shut down lightning.

 

I'd still like to know how they plan on keeping a lightning sorcerer from being shut down too easily. Having Thundering blast being interrupted seriously hurts and we can't rely on polarity shift and force barrier due to their long CDs.

 

A few ideas:

 

- Give thundering blast a slight knockback

- Allow us to move while activating thunder blast. Even if it is at reduced movement speed, it helps us make use of the roots that lightning has.

- Set up thundering blast so that interrupts can't interrupt the ability but push back the activation instead.

- Make thundering blast immune to interrupts and the caster immune to knockbacks while activating. The cast should also receive increased damage reduction while activating the ability. It would go a long way to help lightning sorcerers act like a turret. After all, the spec would seem to be set up that way...

 

For lightning, I would mind seeing a life leach attached to force lightning.

 

 

As for corruption, I think part of the problem lies with how revivification works. Requiring people to group up in a small area for 10 seconds in a WZ is bad. It just makes it easier for the other team to spam out AoE abilities which can easily do more damage in less time. If it at least had an initial heal with a HoT effect that would help a lot. Just need to make sure to have an indicator only the sorcerer's group members can see to give people time to get in range to take advantage of the initial heal.

 

 

Even though post 2.7 it will make it easier for madness to make use of subversion I'm not sure that will solve it's force management issues. Even if does manage to solve the force management issues, madness sorcerers will have to sacrifice improved force management just to have fade out which kind of blows...I mean, not only will we be missing subversion, but we will have to make a choice between reserves and electric induction which means even worse force management than what we have now.

 

 

After seeing the previous answers and the devs' general consensus on the class I have the feeling getting a DCD is not going to happen. Ever. Sorcs are not supposed to mitigate damage, they are supposed to avoid damage. As of right now the class is lacking the tools to be able to do it well, but that is exactly what they are trying to address by moving Fadeout to tier 2. The Sorcerer is meant to be a kiting machine, and no facetanking is allowed.

 

^

 

I swear, it's easier to kite with a pyro PT.. :/

[Chemic_al]

The next strongest consensus has been the need for a real defensive cooldown. I think that's probably the PRIMARY issue. I think the easiest fix for that is to share Resilience, like the Agents share Evasion. Then Rescue or something could go to Shadows/Assassins.

 

Been asking for this for years, I think Shadows/Sins got enough utility via stealth, execute and taunts not to need any more. But yes self-heal and bubble has to be off GCD.

 

Personally, I'd like to see 30m stun restored for sorcs and mercs, while powertechs and sins get theirs kept at 10 - ranged class after all.

 

But whatever, it's clear they don't play the game, these buffs don't change anything meaningful, nor address the core problems facing each spec. Just looking at what they are going to give snipers, I just want to facepalm.

[Chemic_al]

After seeing the previous answers and the devs' general consensus on the class I have the feeling getting a DCD is not going to happen. Ever. Sorcs are not supposed to mitigate damage, they are supposed to avoid damage. As of right now the class is lacking the tools to be able to do it well, but that is exactly what they are trying to address by moving Fadeout to tier 2. The Sorcerer is meant to be a kiting machine, and no facetanking is allowed.

 

Only one problem, the lack of mitigation isn't just a pvp problem, but a pve one too. Sorcs getting one shotted in nightmare mode mechanics when other classes can shrug it off with no or little damage is just another in a long line of problems that got the 3 snipers and a mara or 4 snipers for raiding mentally so entrenched, and that's not even trying to address the problem of why Bioware insist on giving these classes vastly superior dps under pressure, and better raid utility. Because let's face it off-healing as dps, is vastly overestimated in Bioware's eyes.

A dps sorc having to stop to bubble and or self-heal, is a problem - it's a loss of dps that other classes don't face.

[colemanron]

Only one problem, the lack of mitigation isn't just a pvp problem, but a pve one too. Sorcs getting one shotted in nightmare mode mechanics when other classes can shrug it off with no or little damage is just another in a long line of problems that got the 3 snipers and a mara or 4 snipers for raiding mentally so entrenched, and that's not even trying to address the problem of why Bioware insist on giving these classes vastly superior dps under pressure, and better raid utility. Because let's face it off-healing as dps, is vastly overestimated in Bioware's eyes.

A dps sorc having to stop to bubble and or self-heal, is a problem - it's a loss of dps that other classes don't face.

 

Being oneshotted in pve is an issue, assuming it actually happens. The only place where I heard about 100% hp Sorc with bubble in full BIS gear getting killed like that is the Kephess jump in TFB. I'm not sure what was done about that, but I assume the damage was toned down soon after, because I personally never had that happen to me. As long as as there is no mechanic with damage like that in the new nightmare tier, that has a chance to happen more than once in a fight, instead of giving us a DCD the devs can rightly just say to get better healers or L2Barrier.

 

Sorcerers do require a bit more attention from healers than any other class, which is a good way to stop players from stacking Sorcerers for any kind of content. I think all classes should have a similar drawback. Snipers and Marauders have lost a significant amount of their appeal since their DPS is not far ahead of the other ranged/melee classes respectively, and with the Orbital nerf Sniper AOE damage isn't superior either, while Bloodthirst can't be stacked anymore.

 

Even having all the above said, a way to take some pressure off the healers would be a great utility to have, and the class' current selfheals are indeed not really viable in pve environment, except for certain very specific mechanics (hiding behind rocks on Titan 6, some phases of the Calphayus fight or being teleported in the Raptus fight, to name a few). Some of the changes I suggested above could help in that regard too, like removing Unnatural Preservation and/or Static Barrier from the GCD, and I think even one of the two were enough. Whether a change like this will be implemented or not, it would be a much more realistic buff to ask for, than a damage reduction CD.

Edited February 25, 2014 by colemanron

[judgeender]

From a progression/NiM Operation PvE perspective, Sorcs need a real defensive cooldown. Barring some change in the way Bioware designs these encounters, there is a lot of unavoidable damage. Egress/Fadeout is not useful in these cases. There are two types of unavoidable damage that we saw frequently (and presumably will see more of), (i) AOE damage to the whole raid (think Titan VI, lots of missiles and final phase, in S&V or Kephess in TFB) and (ii) damage targetted at a specific, but random, operation member (think Kephess' jump in TFB, Thrasher's snipe's). Those are by no means complete lists. In many cases, due to the nature of the damage, Sorcs/Sages take more damage from these attacks than most other classes simply because light armor mitigates less to begin with. I want to be clear that I am not focused on the multiple sources of damage that can be avoided, but only the numerous sources that cannot be avoided, only mitigated.

 

Nightmare Operations typically have very tight enrage timers which require maximum dps to meet. While every other DPS class has one or more defensive cooldown that (i) is off the Global Cooldown, (ii) cuts the damage they take and (iii) doesn't require them to stop performing their job (damaging the boss). Sorcs/Sages lack any such cooldown.

 

Force Mend/Unnatural Preservation does not provide any protection to damage incoming. While it can be useful for recovery, it is on the GCD (meaning some DPS loss) and it requires survival in the first place.

 

Force Armor/Static Barrier can mitigate some damage. But it is also on the GCD resulting in lost DPS and at least for Madness/Balance, can create force management issues. Moreover, a DPS Sorc/Sage's bubble is often inferior in terms of damage absorbed to that of a healing specced Sorc/Sage; it is often not ideal for the dps Sorc/Sage to use their own Force Armor/Static Barrier when the healer's is better.

 

Force Barrier is also not an acceptable defensive cooldown in PvE progression with tight enrage timers. Force Barrier essentially prevents the Sorc/Sage from doing their job (dealing damage). That lost DPS could mean hitting a hard enrage or prolonging a final burn phase that is effectively a race to beat the boss before the healers can't keep up. It is also not up anywhere near as often as the cooldowns of most other dps classes.

 

Sorcs/Sages need a real defensive cooldown that lets them keep performing their job in PvE progression. Otherwise they are at risk of not being desired when compared to other classes (such as Gunslingers/Snipers who are getting a fairly large buff to some of their defensive cooldowns) in PvE progression who will take less damage and have a better chance of surviving while continuing to perform their job.

 

Retsigam (hmd Magenta - The Shadowlands)

[Laforet]

DPS sorc has issues but can do surprisingly well in arenas, altho yoloq can get salty sometimes.

 

Dont want to be a b*itch here but healing sorcs need help. Plz ask fix.

 

Whos the rep btw?

Edited February 25, 2014 by Laforet

[Aerilas]

nvm.. Edited February 25, 2014 by Aerilas

[Master-Nala]

Whos the rep btw?

 

There is no rep. I'm starting the posts so we have some ideas floating out there. The first questions (for Marauders) are due this week so time is running short.

[Laforet]

As much as i would like to see some decent set of questions asked, having no rep (both quit) is a good sign of the state of the class.

 

Are the community managers even aware that we have no rep?

[Master-Nala]

As much as i would like to see some decent set of questions asked, having no rep (both quit) is a good sign of the state of the class.

 

Are the community managers even aware that we have no rep?

 

I made them aware and doing this thread is an attempt to get some momentum going, but yes both class reps quitting in disgust is demoralizing.

[af_raptura]

Hi fellow Sorcs (and Sages).

 

It is unfortunate that our previous turn was met with H2full, L2play, make them pay responses. That said, I think that if we want to avoid that again, we might need to aim a little bit lower. Perhaps state our questions as very specific issues that really bother us about playing Sorcs and Sages rather than just the blanket "we want more/better defenses." Because, let's be honest, the devs don't have as much love for our squishy class as we do.

 

Some things that come to mind

 

1. PvE players say that 2+ madness Sorcs teaming up in boss fights consume each other's deathmarks ---- not sure if this has been fixed because I do not PvE.

 

2. "cross bubbling" penalizes teams with more than 1 Sorc. What I mean is, if I as a Sorc in healing spec am bubbled by another Sorc, I don't get the 1%/sec hot on my Sorc. Similarly, if I as a lightning Sorc get someone else's bubble, no bubble stun for me. It would be kind of cool if these effects were changed to something like we recieve the 1%/sec hot/bubble stun on ourselves as long as ANY static barrier is placed on us, provided we are specced for it.

 

3. Why is force barrier considered an "escape" as far as electronet is concerned? (And yet force shroud isn't)

 

4. What is up with the funny bug that we can't seem to change the direction of our character when force barrier is active unless we zoom our camera in completly?

 

5. Make our knockback push enemies further then 10 meters so it would not be so easy to counter in pvp. Reduce the range of the cone if it would be too overpowered.

 

6. PVP - if consumption is not going to be off the GCD, could they at least buff the set bonus so that no health would be lost by using consumption

 

7. Healer - if static barrier is to be our proactive heal, maybe for healers, they could add a talent that puts a hot on a player after static barrier is destroyed. It would help a little against burst mechanics.

 

That's the ideas I have for possible question topics. Some might be bad, but that is a topic for discussion.

 

TY Master-Nala for trying to organize this.

Edited February 26, 2014 by af_raptura

[warstory]

When static barrier breaks it mezz targets within x range. Now the problem is this ability needs to be a hard stun for the simple fact that it is a kitting tool. How can I use this ability to get away if my dots or random dmg breaks the effect? There needs to be a deterrent for people just tunnelling us cause as everyone know we can't do dmg without standing still.

 

Since they nerf the knockdown of ops I don't think we need a AOE knock back. I will not know the answer to this on till I get on PTS on thrusday.

[Laforet]

When static barrier breaks it mezz targets within x range. Now the problem is this ability needs to be a hard stun for the simple fact that it is a kitting tool. How can I use this ability to get away if my dots or random dmg breaks the effect? There needs to be a deterrent for people just tunnelling us cause as everyone know we can't do dmg without standing still.

 

Since they nerf the knockdown of ops I don't think we need a AOE knock back. I will not know the answer to this on till I get on PTS on thrusday.

 

Its funny that lightning (the tree where bubble mez is located) requires that you have a DoT effect on the target all times (to crit TB and proc barrage) yet your defensive stun breaks on damage.

 

Bubble mez is a skill that is mostly used by healers, since madness hybrids have to DoT people too.

Edited February 26, 2014 by Laforet

[fire-breath]

I made them aware and doing this thread is an attempt to get some momentum going, but yes both class reps quitting in disgust is demoralizing.

 

Do we know for sure they left because of the state of sages? Since that would be a really weird thing to do. I assume a lot can contributed to other factors (as well).

I would find it way more important if they switched mains from sage to something else ;-)

 

I know only of one person strange enough to leave because of a class.

[MidichIorian]

1. Scrap Barrier altogether, don't put any more resources into trying to fix it. It's not worth it. It's a useless ability that only manifests everything that is wrong with this AC.

 

2. Rollback on electrolute range, armor rating, specced WW and 360 KB. There was no reason to get rid of any of them and the whole "unintended targets" BS might just be the dumbest thing I've ever heard. If you are close enough to a sorc to be affected by a KB then you're intended. Funny how it didnt apply to smash. Speaking of KB, how about a KB that actually puts the target in our prefered range (read: jugg push)

 

3. Force managent for healers and full spec madness/balance is still sillly when they're under pressure. I'm more or less never using my regen ability on sniper/GS and very rarely on scoundrel/operative but the one AC that actually needs an ability like that doesnt have it, it got a health drain instead. And the force return is so far from the mark that it's a dot in the distance.

 

4. They moved a tier 1 ability in the Corruption/Seer tree but it was apparently too much to put fadeout/egress there. You could buff 50 things on this AC and it still wouldnt be OP but putting an ability that should have been a baseline ability in the first tier was apparently too much. Just like our armor was too strong and had to be nerfed >_> Are they using dice or a dartboard when they come up with these completely random and uncalled for tweaks?

 

All these are QoL and/or survivability tweaks. They could implement all today and it wouldnt put sage/sorc over the top but I'm willing to bet that not a single one of them will be fixed...and that's why we don't have any representatives. It has reached the point where I wouldnt be surprised if they got rid of the "no CD on tele throw/FL"-ability in the madness/balance tree because that's how out of touch with the game they are.

[Aerilas]

1. Scrap Barrier altogether, don't put any more resources into trying to fix it. It's not worth it. It's a useless ability that only manifests everything that is wrong with this AC.

Static Barrier or Force Barrier?

2. Rollback on electrolute range, armor rating, specced WW and 360 KB. There was no reason to get rid of any of them and the whole "unintended targets" BS might just be the dumbest thing I've ever heard. If you are close enough to a sorc to be affected by a KB then you're intended. Funny how it didnt apply to smash. Speaking of KB, how about a KB that actually puts the target in our prefered range (read: jugg push)

I personally have no beef with the current knockback. I never miss it and it still feels like it has a 150degree angle. I like that it knocks back further than it used to. The only way I'd want the old 360KB back is if it would actually push back further than it used to

3. Force managent for healers and full spec madness/balance is still sillly when they're under pressure. I'm more or less never using my regen ability on sniper/GS and very rarely on scoundrel/operative but the one AC that actually needs an ability like that doesnt have it, it got a health drain instead. And the force return is so far from the mark that it's a dot in the distance.

100% agree. That doesn't happen often with me and you

4. They moved a tier 1 ability in the Corruption/Seer tree but it was apparently too much to put fadeout/egress there. You could buff 50 things on this AC and it still wouldnt be OP but putting an ability that should have been a baseline ability in the first tier was apparently too much. Just like our armor was too strong and had to be nerfed >_> Are they using dice or a dartboard when they come up with these completely random and uncalled for tweaks?

Again agree.

All these are QoL and/or survivability tweaks. They could implement all today and it wouldnt put sage/sorc over the top but I'm willing to bet that not a single one of them will be fixed...and that's why we don't have any representatives. It has reached the point where I wouldnt be surprised if they got rid of the "no CD on tele throw/FL"-ability in the madness/balance tree because that's how out of touch with the game they are.

God if FL/Tele wouldnt be on 0CD in madness...

[MusicRider]

- Egress even at tier 2 is great thing for pvp, even if tier1 would be of course more preferable given that now there is a tribunal to be made for the dps specs, and hybrid has no access to it. In fact lightnings tribunal of losing the 6% crit is heavier than madness which has to sacrifice some force management gains. But even if egress was tier1 the problems of lightning wouldnt really go away as long as arenas are concerned. In fact as it is now, madness is pretty strong cause you can access both egress and an 8% extra healing, which synergizes superb with madness self-heals and if there is a healer and a tank it is probably insanely great.

 

- Regarding healing in pve, where it was mentioned by someone that the other two classes have a spammable heal... well sorcs also have one in the form of static barrier. The problem as a healer is that, at least me I am using it mainly on tanks and on critical situations or continuous damage for others. But if for some reason smn been hit by a special attack putting a barrier is a waste of gcd and force given that no more damage is coming in. In other words although it can be spammed it is not really spammable due to the way it works.

 

But if it

a) was taken off the gcd with its own cd timer, and

b) upon expiring the deionize lockout if the bubble is not destroyed due to damage it returns its force cost to the one that cast it

 

then these two changes would make it truely spammable. I think this might benefit pvp also, especially having it on a separate gcd.

 

- It would be great if rejuvenate had better synergy with dark heal/infusion as it is great with innervate and fairly good with salvation. Basically reducing the force cost of infusion and giving crit bonus to heal is not really a motivation to use them with these abilities. Some other new synergies would be better. Reducing also rejuvenates cd to 3s would allow it to use it with more abilities other than innvervate. and as a tradeback remove the initial healing.

[MidichIorian]

-snip-

The 3 minute crap, Force Barrier. It feels like the only reason they implemented it in the first place was because they were working on Arenas and knew that we would get hammered at the start of more or less every game. They forgot to take into acccount that the same thing will repeat itself once those 10 secs are up and all those games you have where you don't have a healer on your team to heal you back up during the duration. They could have atleast made it so that our health went back up while using it, it's after all a 3 minute CD. As of now it's, in most cases, only delaying the inevitable. I would have prefered Kolto Overload although it's not hard for someone to burn through 35 % on sage/sorc.

[AdrianDmitruk]

The biggest consensus among Sages/Sorcerers was making Egress/Fadeout available for all specs. While the devs have asked for a sacrifice to get it, that looks to be a reality.

 

What other issues do folks believe will still exist post 2.7, if any?

 

Well I speak as a PVP corruption (2.0-2.4) and corruption/bubblemez hybrid (2.4-present) sorc. I've dabbled in full lightning, full madness, and 0/30/16 from time to time so I have some familiarity with our DPS as well.

 

The DPS truly needed access to fadeout to avoid facetanking, especially with the root inflation in the game (vigilance guardians have root hyperinflation, haha). So I'm glad they got it, even if they have to make a bit of a sacrifice to get it. I think Bioware decided to put it in tier 2 as a way of forcing the 0/30/16ers to pick a full spec, and believe it's a valid design decision--lightning had plenty of CC but no escapability, madness less CC but more mobile, and now both full DPS specs have that escapability. Trust me, as a sorc healer I am well versed in the value of fadeout.

 

But corruption in PVP remains fundamentally unchanged; the biggest buff for us IMO is not innervate getting immunity to pushback (we had 70% anyway, and tbh giving such immunity to hardcasted heals would make far more of a difference in being able to get a hardcast off before someone dies IMO) but rather polarity shift giving full pushback immunity. That's the only real buff for corruption I see as we can finally make WW semi-useful under pressure by popping PS and getting pushback immunity for it.

 

So corruption is still left wanting, the biggest issue with sorc DPS having (IMO) been addressed. With the buffs to mercs, corruption finds itself at the bottom of the 3 healers for PVP. Why? Let us consider the top third of our full heal tree, for it has lots of useless filler taking up space. Useful talent points between 22 and 35 in corruption:

 

1 point Force Surge (1 point is necessary but enough for Force Management under most circumstances if you're good, we don't want to consume and kill ourselves too much)

3 points Twisted Force

1 point Corrupted Speed

 

More useful for PVE than PVP but still has at least some value in PVP:

 

3 points Penetrating Darkness (should really be a 2 point still to free some space in the tree for a revamp, see below)

2 points Life Surge

 

So out of 13 points that we must put in corruption between our main channeled heal and our AOE heal, only five are truly, definitively useful and 5 are so-so useful. Keep in mind that the top third or so of full corruption has to compete with bubblemez for reactive CC to Make Them Pay for trying to kill us (of immense help in allowing us to save our Barrier instead of blowing it when the other team wants to force us to) and general arena viability!

 

Another 5 points, for a total of 10/13, are somewhat useful, but as mentioned above Penetrating Darkness can be consolidated a bit to free some space for an overhaul.

 

Talents in this category that could be useful with some buff love, but currently are lackluster:

 

2 points Conspiring Force (buff to 20%/40% slow)

2 points Corrupted Barrier (allow hot to apply to all, so we have a semi-out-of-LOS heal to help with positioning, and/or have it radiate a heal aura while in Force Barrier, see below)

 

Talents that should be added to fill the remaining deadspace in the top third of corruption tree:

 

--Give Overload at least as much airtime as Jet Boost so getting overloaded by a corruption sorc actually is of consequence/Makes You Pay, attach a slow to overload if Conspiring Force is left unchanged

 

--Take self-Static Barrier and/or Unnatural Preservation and/or Consumption off GCD (If consumption, add a short internal cooldown for balance purposes)

 

--Allow Static Barrier to crit (this would be awesome when used with Recklessness)

 

--Assorted other suggestions (see below)

 

Why is the top third of corruption tree in need of such an overhaul?

 

Well as much of a slap in the face H2F and Make Them Pay was to all of us, it nevertheless was a (poorly articulated) Dev Design for the class. It's also why I'm not pushing for a "real" DCD, because I know that it conflicts with said intended class design. Our challenge lies in convincing the Combat Team that we have incomplete tools to LOS/H2F/Make Them Pay; we basically need abilities that 1) buy us time to position (CC), 2) expedite positioning (Fadeout being moved down to Tier 2 so DPS could get it being a prime example of this), and/or 3) abilities that allow us to exploit proper positioning (eg. not requiring LOS), the latter of which we utterly lack other than dots (especially those of madness) ticking.

 

IMO the slated 2.7 change to Fadeout implies that the Combat Team is open to this kind of reasoning, whereas bluntly asking for another DCD is likely to be met with another H2F.

 

Currently both corruption and lightning have a major issue of being expected to LOS/H2F in arenas, but by LOSing we lock out pretty much any ability to affect others. Corruption needs LOS to heal, Lightning needs LOS to Make Them Pay. So if we're LOSing, we're not helping our team at all, we can only heal ourselves to full. In a warzone that is permissible as a team can usually hold an objective long enough for one person to come back from respawn. In an arena, LOS means the enemy just focuses someone else and 90% of the time, allowing that first death, for any reason, costs your team that round. Arenas are much, much less forgiving of the need to LOS and this is why sorcs struggle there. It is also why madness fares best as its dots keep ticking outside of LOS and they have some punch. The H2F Dev Response completely failed to account for this reality of arenas (which was predicted).

 

Now maybe having Fadeout up every 15 seconds (thanks to Force Haste) will allow lightning to pop in and out of LOS with guile; this remains to be seen. But full corruption needs to be out in LOS, risking leaps and pulls, to keep the team up, and ability to LOS is severely constrained by having to heal others on the team. Operatives can have their hots ticking away; mercs have their kolto shells that can last for several minutes now spammable on the whole group, our static barrier does nothing to actually heal health.

 

One of the solutions is to allow Corrupted Barrier to apply to any static barrier we cast, on anyone. We bubble up our team, they get hots while we LOS and H2F. Probably the least drastic of the possible solutions.

 

Another approach is to borrow from the discipline priest of WoW and allow us to heal directly through LoS. At last we could be properly rewarded for positioning ourselves with skill, rather than risk our teammates by doing what the devs expect us to do.

 

A third approach would be to give us a full-fledged group heal, much like the captain's Rallying Cry from LotRO. This group heal should share a cooldown with Revivification, so we must choose which one to use and which heal better fits the situation. Rallying Cry applies an initial heal and a HoT to everyone in your group (NOT ops frame) within your healing range, regardless of LoS. But it would only work on a fellowship-sized group or below, meaning that in a raid of 12, only the six people on YOUR side of the ops frame (including yourself) would receive the effect. In SWTOR an ability designed around the same principle would only affect a FP-sized group, i.e. the 4 people in your little section of the ops frame.

 

Rallying Cry has a 15 second cooldown (used to be 45 seconds speccable down to 15, which every captain did, so eventually that was streamlined). Equivalent SWTOR values would probably be around a 3K heal on all 4 within 30m+3-4kish hot over 15 seconds (in PVP gear). It's also a sticky heal. Revivification would still be much better for most PVE and some warzone situations, but a Rallying Cry-type heal would be much better suited for arenas and help us out with positioning. Again, for game balance reasons, this kind of heal should be mutually exclusive with Revivification and put Revivification on cooldown (and vice versa).

 

Note in LotRO this heal is instant (and also used to be gated by defeat events, a mechanic roughly comparable to ops' Tactical Advantage; recently that requirement was removed though defeat events still buff the ability), but as I am suggesting ways to make LOSing and positioning not entirely cripple our ability to support our team in arena I'd probably be OK with a cast time as long as it was kept reasonable.

Edited February 27, 2014 by AdrianDmitruk

[DneTrain]

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?p=7251479#post7251479

[MusicRider]

There are plenty of nice ideas on both posts above, although in my opinion they require a bit if time and if accepted they would be implemented as part of a major expansion.

 

I think quick changes that would greatly benefit the healing tree is to take force armor off the main gcd and on its own, make it return back a percentage of its force according to its hp left once deionise lockout expires and maybe give it a posterior HoT when they collapse from damage.

Edited March 3, 2014 by MusicRider