Post your suggestions to fix clunky class mechanics for 6.0

[SlimPikinz]

With the 6.0 expansion potentially on the horizon, let's all post suggestions to fix clunky or inconsistent class mechanics for our favorite class or classes. These should not be changes that would push your class into broken territory, but to allow the class or spec to play more fluidly.

 

As a Mercenary/Commando player starting at launch and again in 2014, I recently started playing again late 2018. Although I welcome the great new DCD's Mercenaries and Commandos have received since the last time I played (before reflect bubble and heal after shield), some mechanics are still the same and maybe Bioware can streamline some of the functionality. Let's begin:

 

**Note: These are just base class mechanics / functionalities. NOT Utility Points.

 

1) Mercenary Abilities

• Change Rocket Out / Propulsion Round to instead move the player forward.
  --Having to backpedal even for less than a second to line up a straight one or hitting terrain feels bad--
  

 

2) Bodyguard / Combat Medic

• Add utility to Chaff Flare / Diversion. Immune to soft CC for 6 seconds maybe.
  --DPS specs get some utility from this--
  
• Allow Kolto Shot / Med Shot to trigger and consume Kolto Shell / Trauma Probe off of the rate limit
  --As a "fire and forget" ability, it is quite boring. This would make it more interactive to use as a core ability--
  

 

3) Arsenal / Gunnery

• Fix Heatseeker Missile sound animation to trigger on each use
  --It rarely goes off but when it does, it sounds amazing--
  

 

4) Innovative Ordnance / Assault Specialist

• Remove Fusion Missile / Plasma Grenade from other specs and replace Mag Shot / Mag Bolt with it. Remove the cast time and give it the placeable AOE reticle.
  --The separate DoT spread mechanic tied to 2 unreliable abilites is very clunky. This will allow spreads to be much more reliable and consistent. Get rid of Mag Shot / Mag Bolt completely--
  
• Change Serrated Shot / Serrated Bolt damage to yellow damage.
  --Getting this deflected or missed kills half of the DPS. We have plenty of other white damage to compensate if this gets absorbed or resisted by yellow DCD's from other classes.--
  

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Other classes that I play, although not as often as Mercenary:

 

1) Annihilation / Watchman

• Move Ravage / Blade Barrage DoT to Annihilation / Watchman and away from Fury / Concentration.
  --Annihilation / Watchman is the DoT spec after all--
  

 

2) Fury / Concentration

• Remove Obliterate / Zealous Leap ability to jump to in-cover or un-leapable enemies.
  

 

4) Assassin Abilities

• Change Phantom Stride / Shadow Stride to appear behind the enemy.
  --This change will allow more predictable leaps and synergize better with core abilities--
  

 

4) Hatred / Serenity

• Move DoT spread back to Deathfield / Force in Balance
  
• Lacerate / Whirling Blow roots enemies for 1.5 seconds with a ~15 internal cooldown.
  --The root duration is to allow Deathfield / Force in Balance to be cast immediately after the GCD.--
  

 

Feel free to leave feedback or criticism on the above suggestions but more importantly:

 

POST YOUR OWN!

Try to make them PVP / PVE friendly!

 

I realize that this may fall on deaf ears to Bioware but it is still fun to see what other players can come up with.

[Sarova]

4) Assassin Abilities

• Change Phantom Stride / Shadow Stride to appear behind the enemy.
  --This change will allow more predictable leaps and synergize better with core abilities--
  

Plus one for this! I've always felt this was missing on my assassins.

---

The class I play most is a lightning sorcerer; almost the entire spec needs an overhaul for PvP (it's a decent spec for the most part in PvE). In PvP, most things take too long to cast or have too long a cooldown leading to many fast deaths as well as becoming the priority target for all but other lightning/telekinesis specs. As lighting/telekinesis is good in PvE, I don't think altering the abilities will work; I think an overhaul of the utilities may be more useful. Thundering Blast and Crushing Darkness I think are most in need; I barely ever use them in PvP as they take so long to cast. "Overwhelmed" targets (via forked lightning) could also take 25% increased damage (up from 10%) from both direct and aoe lightning (or energy) damage. I'm sure TrixieTriss could add more useful suggestions for Lightning, especially about improvements to abilities.

[SlimPikinz]

As lighting/telekinesis is good in PvE, I don't think altering the abilities will work; I think an overhaul of the utilities may be more useful. Thundering Blast and Crushing Darkness I think are most in need.

 

I've played Lightening Sorc / Telekinetics Sage here and there as well. Taking a step back and really trying to understand and analyze the mechanics of a class, you can really start to notice where some of the major drawbacks are.

 

I think a major flaw with Lightening / Telekinetics is that some of its rotation and DPS is tied to taking damage and using mobility to proc Lightening Bolt / Telekinetic Burst. If you use Force Speed to do more damage, now you have a harder time to escape melee or get to LoS.

 

Intentionally taking damage in PVE and PVP to increase your own damage is less than ideal. Using Force Speed in PVP to increase damage is more costly than it is to use in PVE.

 

1) Sorceress / Sage

• Phase Walk needs to be looked at as well. Maybe reduce range to 30 meters.
  --It's all ready one of the strongest mobility tools in PVP to respond to objectives and pretty much breaks Huttball. No other ability in the game let's you travel through walls or floors and instantly break LoS. It completely nullifies any map design or obstacles that all other classes have to overcome.--
  

 

2) Corruption / Seer

• Roaming Mend / Wandering Mend should be changed to include some kind of internal cooldown or rate limit on the bounce or heal.
  --I think this currently heals too fast during the GCD.--
  

[Balameb]

Other classes that I play, although not as often as Mercenary:

 

1) Annihilation / Watchman

• Move Ravage / Blade Barrage DoT to Annihilation / Watchman and away from Fury / Concentration.
  --Annihilation / Watchman is the DoT spec after all--
  

 

2) Fury / Concentration

• Remove Obliterate / Zealous Leap ability to jump to in-cover or un-leapable enemies.
  

 

4) Assassin Abilities

• Change Phantom Stride / Shadow Stride to appear behind the enemy.
  --This change will allow more predictable leaps and synergize better with core abilities--
  

 

4) Hatred / Serenity

• Move DoT spread back to Deathfield / Force in Balance
  
• Lacerate / Whirling Blow roots enemies for 1.5 seconds with a ~15 internal cooldown.
  --The root duration is to allow Deathfield / Force in Balance to be cast immediately after the GCD.--
  

 

 

1- Lots a non DoT specs have a dot on some skill. Why can't Fury / Concentration ?

2- Is this a joke or a sarcasm? Sorry if it sound harsh but is either that or you actually main a sniper/gunslinger. First i belive that inmunity to leaps/pools while having several skills to keep or send players away is simply wrong. And second i think you have not played Fury/Concentration much; i'm very new to the spec but i think that without leaps, you don't get procs, that means a lot less damage and rage management issues.

 

4- Carefull. While dot spread might be nice with a little range, it does not solve the main issue with Hatred. Its just made of glass and will still need to move to the middle of the melee to do something usefull. What hatred/Serenity need in my opinion is: better AOE protection (as it had the moment 5.0 landed but was quickly nerfed) and a little better force management. Non proc usage of skills really handicap your force. Too much strike fillers.

 

Now what i would really love to be fixed is something that does no even require mayor update mechanics change, it could have been solved in 5.1 by changin a couple numbers:

* Put PT/VG leap in a low level and not in 59!!!!!!!!

But, why would i hope for it to change? It is already dead easy to do and BW decided to ignore all feedback.

Edited January 29, 2019 by Balameb
clarification

[SlimPikinz]

1- Lots a non DoT specs have a dot on some skill. Why can't Fury / Concentration ?

2- Is this a joke or a sarcasm? Sorry if it sound harsh but is either that or you actually main a sniper/gunslinger. First i belive that inmunity to leaps/pools while having several skills to keep or send players away is simply wrong. And second i think you have not played Fury/Concentration much; i'm very new to the spec but i think that without leaps, you don't get procs, that means a lot less damage and rage management issues.

 

I mostly play Annihilation / Watchman when I play Marauder / Sentinel but sometimes switch over to other specs. Fury / Concentration is currently the best Mara / Sent spec and mainly due to CC immunity every 30 seconds. Moving the DoT to Annihilation / Watchman but excluding it from the DoT spread mechanic from Smash / Force Sweep will give it some better single target DPS. Correct me if I am wrong but isn't Fury / Concentration supposed to be the burst spec? Why give it sustain damage as well? AP Powertech / Tactics VG has the same functionality of which I also think it should be moved to Pyro / Plasma.

 

Leap immunity from Obliterate / Zealous Leap only applies to 1 class (2 others if you take the respective utility but no one does) and rightfully so. Snipers / Gunslingers are the best ranged DPS at dealing with melee and complete leap immunity allows them to perform better in this role.

 

4- Carefull. While dot spread might be nice with a little range, it does not solve the main issue with Hatred. Its just made of glass and will still need to move to the middle of the melee to do something usefull. What hatred/Serenity need in my opinion is: better AOE protection (as it had the moment 5.0 landed but was quickly nerfed) and a little better force management. Non proc usage of skills really handicap your force. Too much strike fillers.

 

Wouldn't moving DoT spread back to Deathfield / Force in Balance allow them to do what the class is designed around without having to be in melee range as much? Lacerate / Whirling Blow is no longer a necessary part of your rotation but still gives functionality to the spec. Maybe add a stackable damage reduction mechanic to Deathfield / Force in Balance based on each enemy you hit up to a certain maximum percentage.

 

Now what i would really love to be fixed is something that does no even require mayor update mechanics change, it could have been solved in 5.1 by changin a couple numbers:

* Put PT/VG leap in a low level and not in 59!!!!!!!!

But, why would i hope for it to change? It is already dead easy to do and BW decided to ignore all feedback.

 

This doesn't change how the class plays at max level so I'm pretty indifferent about this suggestion.

[Majspuffen]

• Move DoT spread back to Deathfield / Force in Balance

 

I'm not keen on the idea of returning DoT-spreading to Force in Balance and Deathfield, and I say this as a someone who has played Serenity since the original game (Balance, as it was called back then). I think it would do us more harm than good. Balance Shadows back then were, in comparison to the modern Serenity Shadow, in a stronger position in the meta. It didn't have any burst but it had very high sustained single target damage as well as higher AoE damage than Infiltration. What it also had was unique utility; instant Force Lift/Whirlwind was exclusive to the Serenity spec, and the 2 second root of Sever Force was nothing to scoff at back in those days. The modern spec doesn't really have anything unique going for it except the DoT-spreading, and DoT-spreading can be a detriment to your team as it prevents tactical use of mezzes. It's better if we have control over our DoTs.

 

I would like to see the gameplay of the Serenity Shadow revolve more around the synergy between DoTs and our other abilities. In the original version of the game, Force Breach/Deathmark stacks would not only increase the damage of DoT ticks but a consumed charge would also generate a bit of Force. Our Force regeneration back then was much more involved but it was smooth and if you had DoTs ticking on three targets and struck them with Force in Balance you'd be in Force regen heaven, which was a direct reward for playing smart. There was an elegant synergy back then that the modern version of Serenity lacks. I'd happily see DoT-spreading removed if it meant we could have that back, but I digress. Time to remove the rose-tinted glasses and post some of my own ideas!

 

 

• Increase the range of Force in Balance / Deathfield to 30 meters.
  -- This would restore some of the unique utility that Serenity Shadows have lost as well as increase our survivability. We are the melee spec that kites other melee specs because we have no passive defenses. Having a 30 meter range on Force in Balance synergized well with how we had to play, and the current 10 meter limit forces us dangerously close to our enemies.
   
   
  
• Change Battle Readiness / Overcharge Saber: instead of increasing the damage of Force Technique/Saber Charge, increase the damage of our DoTs instead. Increase our self-healing from DoTs and Force in Balance/Death Field by x%.
  -- Force Technique is really boring, mechanically. The proc is weak and it doesn't synergize with anything aside from this one cooldown and even with this cooldown the damage is lacklustre. The healing received from Force Technique requires us to enter melee which can put us in a disfavourable position, especially if we're fighting another melee class (they'll tear us to shreds regardless of the healing). Increasing the heal of our DoTs and Force in Balance would suit our playstyle much more.
   
   
  
• Change utility slot Shapeless Spirit / Formless Phantom so that Serenity/Hatred gets the 30% damage reduction when stunned rather than 30% less damage taken from AoE damage.
  -- This was originally a Serenity talent back when there were talent trees. We are extremely squishy and vulnerable to hard CC and we require this ability more than Kinetic Combat/Darkness, in my opinion. The AoE damage is a non-issue as we can dodge a lot of it due to our high mobility.
  

 

And, finally...!

 

 

• Reinstate Project / Shock to our rotation somehow!
  -- Project synergized really well with the playstyle of Serenity in PvP. Back in the original version of the game there was a talent that made Project increase our melee damage by 5 or 10% for 20 seconds. Perhaps we could get something similar. For PvE, we'd want to use Project to keep that buff up but for PvP we could use it when it suited the situation. I miss Project ...

Edited January 30, 2019 by Majspuffen

[DarthCasus]

Not a fan of removing or replacing abilities with existing abilities for other specs. The game already feels like a boxed in experience where experimenting or enjoying play in an unoptimized manner is damn near impossible besides purposefully using filler nonstop, abilities in an incorrect order or purposefully missing gcd's. Really, I like a few ideas here but simplifying further does nothing for the game except makes sure everyone plays in a uniform manner and lack options besides the mostly terrible spec points.

[Sarova]

 

1) Sorceress / Sage

• Phase Walk needs to be looked at as well. Maybe reduce range to 30 meters.
  --It's all ready one of the strongest mobility tools in PVP to respond to objectives and pretty much breaks Huttball. No other ability in the game let's you travel through walls or floors and instantly break LoS. It completely nullifies any map design or obstacles that all other classes have to overcome.--
  

For the love of God please don't suggest they nerf Phase Walk by reducing it's range - it's all we have as lightning sorcerers. I've used it occasionally in regular Huttball (I don't do ranked) to help score but usually as lightning you are dead before you get the chance! I use phasewalk mostly as an "oh s**t" button to get out of range of melee and heal myself. I do think however that phase walk breaking huttball is one of the reasons sith assassins no longer have it & are unlikely to get it back.

 

I've learned how to survive longer than I should in PvP on my lightning sorcerer however I've noticed our squishyness & lack of damage is a benefit to the team, especially in Huttball. Whilst melee classes are focusing their attention on killing me and any fellow lightning sorcerers/telekenetics sages, the rest of the team is busy scoring. Being the team's sacrifice does have it's benefits in wins but I'd rather be able to damage other players, rather than having to constantly defend/protect myself.

[SlimPikinz]

Not a fan of removing or replacing abilities with existing abilities for other specs. The game already feels like a boxed in experience where experimenting or enjoying play in an unoptimized manner is damn near impossible besides purposefully using filler nonstop, abilities in an incorrect order or purposefully missing gcd's. Really, I like a few ideas here but simplifying further does nothing for the game except makes sure everyone plays in a uniform manner and lack options besides the mostly terrible spec points.

 

Honestly, my biggest desire is to see Innovative Ordinance / Assault Specialist DoT spread mechanic be reworked into something more fluid and less clunky. I think it is currently the only spec in the game that requires each of it's DoTs to be spread by different abilities. Those 2 abilities are even harder to use efficiently to spread damage, both being tied to a target and one being a delayed interaction. Also, replacing abilities with more powerful versions (some with worse animations than the original -- looking at you Mag Shot) that do nothing but increase damage is not exciting at all.

 

For the love of God please don't suggest they nerf Phase Walk by reducing it's range - it's all we have as lightning sorcerers. I've used it occasionally in regular Huttball (I don't do ranked) to help score but usually as lightning you are dead before you get the chance! I use phasewalk mostly as an "oh s**t" button to get out of range of melee and heal myself. I do think however that phase walk breaking huttball is one of the reasons sith assassins no longer have it & are unlikely to get it back.

 

I've learned how to survive longer than I should in PvP on my lightning sorcerer however I've noticed our squishyness & lack of damage is a benefit to the team, especially in Huttball. Whilst melee classes are focusing their attention on killing me and any fellow lightning sorcerers/telekenetics sages, the rest of the team is busy scoring. Being the team's sacrifice does have it's benefits in wins but I'd rather be able to damage other players, rather than having to constantly defend/protect myself.

 

It needs to be changed somehow. No other ability in the game ignores terrain, i.e. walls, floors, etc., instantly breaks LoS up to 60 meters away, and trivializes responding to objectives. When people who know how to abuse it and use it to it's maximum capabilities, it begins to be frustrating playing against it. A range nerf is least likely to diminish it's functionality.

[SlimPikinz]

Need more suggestions folks!

[Jevaruss]

Honestly, my biggest desire is to see Innovative Ordinance / Assault Specialist DoT spread mechanic be reworked into something more fluid and less clunky. I think it is currently the only spec in the game that requires each of it's DoTs to be spread by different abilities.

 

Uhh... patch 5.6 in Nov 2017:

Innovative Ordnance

Fusion Missile and Explosive Dart now spread both Incendiary Missile’s burn and Serrated Shot’s bleed effects.

Assault Specialist

Plasma Grenade and Sticky Grenade now spread both Incendiary Round’s burn and Serrated Bolt’s bleed effects.

Edited February 11, 2019 by Jevaruss