Cross Posting to the Right Forum. Cloth Casters and Pets

[Rerfu]

Problem:

Damage Casters are not on Par with the melee damage classes in a raid setting.
When an Air geared Cleric meleeing with Panther outdamages an Air geared Magician, you know there's a big problem.

Suggestion:

Tweak casting times and spell damage to fit into the current damage order.
Example:
Newly 70: 1600 DPS
SSRA Gear: 1850 DPS
ToV: 2250 DPS
Sleeper: 2700 DPS
Fire: 3300 DPS
Air: 4900 DPS
Fear: 6000 DPS

This would have to be tweaked depending on player feedback, but its really what is necessary to bring casters in line. Also, the main nukes for the casters need better negative resist mods, nothing is more frustrating then casting 5 or 6 nukes for 0 damage.

Problem:

Due to the raid mechanic of rampage on the server, pets are mostly a 1 hit wonder on serious raid targets. Pet classes are designed with their pets as a large portion of their characters abilities. Making the caster take time out of their DPS casting to heal their pet further pushes the disparity between caster and melee DPS.

Suggestion:

Make pets IMMUNE to Rampage. Give each class a AE spell ward buff for their pet that lasts 4 or 5 times per cast. So the pet caster still has to keep some kind of an eye on their pet if the encounter has AoE spells, but at least it can contribute to the fight.

[Pyronost]

Totally agreeing. Insofar, as I play a mage as a main, thats one HUGE difference Ive noticed. Even in ToV, there are times where I will blow through a good 6k mana in resists, and all that while trying to keep my pet alive.

Solution to this, might be to power up the malo spell line, so we at least have a *chance* to push some of the resists on bosses down. Not only does this give other casting classes a chance to really put the hurt down on a boss, but it brings up the utility of certain caster classes within raids.

Another possibility might be to raise the cap on mana regen so if we *do* end up blowing half our mana on longer fights to try and bring down a larger mobs resists, we are at least able to pull some mana back in and rail the dam things.

I sit in some raids and cast away, watching people AFK auto-attack on bosses with boxes half the time, and they do 2x to 3x damage output/min on the buggers while Im doing everything I can to keep pets alive, keep my casting going, and maintain above 6 or 7% mana.

Give us a hand, eh?

[ChaosSlayer]

Disclaimer: want to warn you that my opinion below is not an official dev team opinion, but only my own =P

I see the game balance between melees and caster in a form where melees produce unlimited amount of dmg over unlimited time frame, while casters produce massive burst damage in a very short time frame, albeit at a cost of consuming their mana which they cannot quickly restore. And of course there are classes in between (dot casters like necro, or pet classes) who still consume mana, but do not produce as much burst dmg as pure nukers, but can hold out for a while.

The thing is that with introduction much powerful melee weapons from the level 1 (epic 1.0 included), melees got a massive head start on the casters. The first 15-20 levels this advantage is not as apparent, cause casters getting a benefit from mana regen from their charm, and enjoy much larger mana pool they would normally have otherwise, which fuels their spells. However past level 40 or so, this gap starts to increase, as casters start significantly fall behind (specially casters that use to rely on dots to do damage : we have like 2 druids and 4 necros on entire server, and shaman role is nothing more but a buff box).

I have a few ideas how to give a dps boost to some of these classes falling behind in the 30-60 level range, and Lillu gave me a green light, to work on some improvement for these classes, but for high end balancing, one of our more experienced devs will be needed

Should my plan be approved, I will get back to you with specifics.
Again, this is not an official ruling of entire dev team, and may or may not impact the high end game.

[ChaosSlayer]

Oh yeah, Rerfu (and everyone else), could you guys rate the power rank of the casters (necro, mage, wizard, and guess BST since its a primary pet class) in terms where their dps now (compared to say warrior and monk), for following ranges:

-just arrived at level 70 (fully Sebilis geared)
-fully pre-raid geared
-raid geared around Tier 3
-raid geared Tier 4/5

if there are shifts in their power rating (like for example: "X fresh at 70 are better than Y, but by Tier 3, Y becomes much stronger" etc)

[Lola]

I guess we should start again to parse DPS against Vlad.
I will parse tonight with my wizard (ST/PoF) and post.

[ChaosSlayer]

before you go crunching numbers, give me your personal impression from experience

[Rerfu]

Let's not get started with Vlad again, for one thing, the NPCs in town are not accurate to raid situations. Use actual Raid bosses and post foci, bard or no bard and such.

Due to resist rates even with my pet alive, ToV geared Necromancer isn't even parsing 1000 DPS its more like 650.

Fully T5 geared Magician was coming in at right around 1750 DPS as long as the 2.0 pet stayed alive.

T4 Beastlord with 2.0 is also right around 1700 DPS.

Very few people actually have Mana Flare which also drops when you are hit.

I believe T3/T4 Wizard was right around 1800 to 1900 at one point.

Enchanter doesn't contribute DPS unless they have a Donator weapon and charm something in PoAir.

So that puts us currently at: Wizard > Magician / Beastlord > Necromancer > Enchanter.

[ChaosSlayer]

ok here is the first step of my plan.

1. Upping the pets. I plan to up the pets for all primary pet classes (BST, Necro, Mage)
On top of that I want to change pet roles.
So BST pet will be a general good all around pet, necro pet will be be dps oriented, and mage pets will be more situation based (this of course would have greater effect in out of raid play, rather that in raid, but overall pet upping should come out beneficial to the raiders as well)

Once I have the pets where I want them, I will look more closely necro, and then mage spell combat potential. Then we can reevaluate enchanter and wizard, as they are hardest to balance in my eyes.

Another question- hows Druid and Shamy healing/utility usage at a raid level? Try to be specific.

Another thing - I want to make sure I do not miss any pets, so please post links to any items (like epics) that summon pets which usually do not come as spells (mage 2.0 I believe?)

-----------
Update: I am making live changes right now, so the pets should become updated in real time. You will need to zone, and resummon them.
Please note that these are trial changes, and they may be tuned down =P

What is beign increased:

HP by +50% to +80%
Ac (mostly mid level) by +50%
Min Dmg by +20%
Max Dmg by +50% to +80%
Regeneration of pet now aprox equal to its level (more for 60+ pets)

Progress:

BST pets - UPDATED
http://www.thehiddenforest.org/pets.php?class=bst

[Rerfu]

Upping the pets AC / HP isn't going to do much in the long run, pets need to be IMMUNE to rampage.

[ChaosSlayer]

I release that if a tank needs chain healing to survive- so would a pet... but unfortunately there is no such option as "immune to rampage" for us =( It has to be codded into a source, and thats is not a trivial task (at least well outside by expertise)
But hopefully extra hps will help the survival, as well as dps boost

Perhaps pets could be saved with a reactive healing buffs? or runeing?