Announce post #2869: Classleads July 2018 - part 4 (warhounds)

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<pre>7/31/2018 at 5:00
Keroc, the Starborn
Everyone
Classleads July 2018 - part 4 (warhounds)

Hey folks,

With breeding becoming a lot easier, it's long due time that I made some changes to Carnifex to make them a little more balance. The key theme going forward here is to make sure when they select an option to cover an aspect (such as tanking ability), it comes at the cost of something else. You'll also notice I've made their lockdown a little weaker to compensate for their relatively strong locking tools.

Having said that though, I've also introduced some buffs to the limb route as it hasn't been as strong as I'd like since the Crush nerfs.

As always, I'll be keeping an eye on things and making any changes as necessary to ensure the class stays as a performable level. If you have any questions feel free to message me.

Savagery
=============================
- Removed Skill: Deepwounds.
- Reduced the damage on Spinning slightly.
- Increased the damage on Hack by a bit.
- Crushed knees is now a timed affliction and lasts for 12 seconds.
- Crushed elbows is now a timed affliction and lasts for 8 seconds.
- The Mastery talent Yanking now upsets balance for 0.15 seconds when using Hook.
* Increases to the current 1 second if they are mounted as before.
- Swapped the afflict order of indifference and stuttering in Batter.
- Swapped out crippled throat in Batter for blackout that lasts 4 seconds.
- Gutcheck now causes anorexia instead of vomiting.
- Charging movement type changed from unblockable to normal.
- Charging now allows you to choose a venom of choice to strike with when it procs.
- Charging will only proc weapon effects if the weapon you hold is a polearm or a hammer.

Deathlore
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- Removed Skill: Spiritchains.
- When using an ability that requires soul, the amount returned is now a percent of maximum soul rather then current soul.
* This means you need to be a little more careful with abilities that use soul.
- Enfrost now increases to 80% proc rate, up from 40%, if they are fallen.
- Distortion soul restoration decreased to 6%, down from 10%.
- Bloodburst soul restoration decreased to 8%, down from 12%.
- Frailty soul restoration decreased to 8%, down from 15%.
- Implant soul restoration increased to 15%, up from 10%.
- Disease soul restoration increased to 10%, up from 8%.
- Wraith reworked:
* No longer causes weariness when proc'd, but it will still strip the shield defence.
* It will now prevent soul from passively returning to the target for as long as it exists.
* Equilibrium recovery time for Wraith reduced to 2.5 seconds, down from 3.
* Wraith no longer restores soul when used, however it still requires 10% to be missing.
- Poison reworked:
* Poison now deals damage based on current afflictions, rather then the number at the time of application.
* Poison now lasts for 24 seconds, increasing to 32 if below 50% soul.
* Now requires at least 15% of soul missing from the target before it can be applied.
- Disease reworked:
* Base timer increased to 10 seconds, increasing to 15 if below 50% soul.
* Removed the variable timer on it based around how much missing soul the target had.
* Soul restored decreased to 8%, down from 12%.
- Implant cooldown has been shifted off the target and onto the caster.

Warhounds
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- Removed Skill: Barrel.
- Added New Major: Gifted.
* Increases the elemental coat resistance of the warhound by 5%.
- Intercept is now a major warhound ability and has been removed from the main skillset.
- Reduced the proc chance on Intercept to 10%, down from 15%.
- Stare major trait now gives shyness instead of confusion.
- Reworked Herding major trait:
* Now has a 10% chance of stopping enemies from leaving the location.
* The hound must be active in order to gain the proc chance.
- Reworked Focus:
* Adds additional effects to Poisonclaw, Shock, Acidspit, and Stare.
* Poisonclaw will give haemophilia if they have dementia.
* Shock will give berserking if they have epilepsy.
* Acidspit will give crippled if they have weariness.
* Stare will give peace if they have shyness.
- Cunning now increases the proc chance of hound abilities by 5%.
* Includes Intercept, Herding, and Twinheaded.
- Bloodtrace and Sleuth have been shifted into the main Warhounds skillset.
- Reduced base warhound elemental coat resistances to 5%, down from 10%.
- Astute has been removed and replaced with Procreant.
* Increases the amount of puppies that warhound can produce.
- Obedient is now required in order to grant a hound to another, without the hound will occasionally disobey.
* No longer allows you to ignore disfigurement.
- Haunting now always works, however it can no longer stack multiple times within the same location.
- Reduced the proc time on Haunting to 8 seconds, down from 20.
- Petite now lowers the carry weight for Deliver and Retrieve.
- Likewise, Heavy will increase the carry weight for Deliver and Retrieve.
- Bloodthirsty now prevents a warhound from wearing armour.
- Harmless has been removed and replaced with Bonded.
* This now prevents you from giving away the warhound.
- Removed the cooldown from Terror.
- Terror no longer uses hound balance, but 5 seconds of real balance.
- Terrifying minor trait is now applied on Howl instead of Terror.
- Terrifying minor trait now gives the terror affliction instead of fear.
* This prevents the person afflicted with terror from using COMPOSE.
- Removed Shatter, Ululate, and Terror from Initiative choices.
- Growl hound balance increased to 5.5 seconds, up from 5.

Miscellaneous
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- I've given each active Carnifex three dog biscuits which you can use to swap old traits for new.
* They are consumable, so make sure you're careful with what you want.
* You can give them away if you so choose.
* Type HOUND FEED to learn more.


Penned by my hand on Closday, the 3rd of Haernos, in the year 474 MA.</pre>

Xenia

I've been curious about the motivation to these changes. It's way too early to say this isn't viable or won't work. But in looking at the bulk of this rework to the class in general definitely translates to relearn the puzzle of the class, figure out the mechanics and rework offenses. In taking into consideration killstats and seeing that Carnifex class has been leading, I begin to ask if this is a response to a larger issue of a population of players working out the mechanics and rather than a rework for mechanical balance it's a rework of balancing what the players have figured out in using the mechanics. It appears to me this is more a response to giving players who have been using the Carnifex class something new to puzzle out and be less of a force for a bit.

@Keroc, would you be willing to shed more light on the motivation?

edit: To be clear, I am not calling this one way or the other on nerfed/OP/impossible. I haven't even attempted to test a single skill since I read it, and don't foresee myself logging in any time soon to do so while there's still this event and a feeling of pressure to have to be mechanically efficient in those moments I am logged on.

Toz

As an open letter of sorts, the Carnifex players who like this post hate breeding. I can't like my own post, but pretend I did.

Vyxsis

Xenia said:

I've been curious about the motivation to these changes. It's way too early to say this isn't viable or won't work. But in looking at the bulk of this rework to the class in general definitely translates to relearn the puzzle of the class, figure out the mechanics and rework offenses. In taking into consideration killstats and seeing that Carnifex class has been leading, I begin to ask if this is a response to a larger issue of a population of players working out the mechanics and rather than a rework for mechanical balance it's a rework of balancing what the players have figured out in using the mechanics. It appears to me this is more a response to giving players who have been using the Carnifex class something new to puzzle out and be less of a force for a bit.

@Keroc, would you be willing to shed more light on the motivation?

i can't speak for keroc, but uh... carnifex class was silly strong. stronger than a lot of people realized (or would believe), as even the best carnifex users haven't fully optimized their offenses. i don't think this rework will hurt carnifex at all, though - in fact, as i was reading the changes this morning, i kept saying how good some of these things look.

as far as motivation, i don't know that i'd read into it so much? killstats isn't necessarily a good metric of which class is strong - it's just as easily a reflection of what classes have the most play and/or raw damage output, and i think keroc's aware of that. i'd also keep in mind that there were a lot of reports on carnifex during this last round of classleads, and some were requesting changes to significant class mechanics (e.g. soul). rather than being some underhanded nerf targeted at players, it seems like it's the usual (if rather extensive) balancing that happens from time to time.

Toz

I tested without growl, which was given as a bandaid awhile back. Losing focus pressure/control and room control to gain.. focus affs? Is pretty unfortunate. I've swapped out of the class. It chugs badly without aff pressure/screen from growling and 5.5 means you have to hold lock - my ratio vs @Benedicto was like 4 locks to my 1, with mine sticking better. Now we are pushed further back. Carnifex was a little overwhelming, now there is not much going for it.

Xenia

For insight on how breeding had worked and how unintuitive it was, each hound has 3 major traits. Get your Sire and Dame and make some puppies. Each puppy will acquire 1/3 major traits from the parents. The last major trait would be determined by RNG, but the traits not selected by the parents would not be included from the list of possible traits for the new pups. And so months of ignorance in how a mechanic worked led to me hating the mechanic all together. Honestly, I have only my biology class to blame for this misunderstanding.

Vyxsis

i'm not super interested in arguing the details of the changes, whether carni was/is strong, etc., since my opinion on the matter is likely somewhat the minority and not really the point of my initial post. i was mainly trying to say that i don't think anything nefarious is going on, as xenia kinda-sorta suggested.

i will clarify, though, that not being nefarious doesn't mean things are just fine and dandy. @Keroc - i think the timing here is kinda horrible. as far as i know, other than the damage from Spinslash, most things reflected in these changes don't hugely impact large group engagements, but changes this far-ranging do necessitate a lot of work on the players' ends, which means they will be at a disadvantage for awhile. we're in the middle of a (proxy) war, and people have repeatedly expressed frustration that it seems like one side keeps getting boons in various forms. i don't think clotheslining that side's main competition - a number of whom primarily play carnifex - really does anything to allay that frustration. it seems like really bad judgement.

alright /$0.02

Xenia

Lenina