Preview of 1.2 - Lots of awesome changes and fixes

[dd0029]

Just tried this last night. It made me sad. There's no reason not to go this way if you want to DPS for real. Easily beat my normal necro/warlock DPS by 100.

http://bluedots.org/2011/05/16/stormcallerelementalist-video-guide/

About the only thing I would suggest different would be Cloudburst instead of Lightning Field for single target. Slightly less damage, but the mana cost seems to help my longevity. Also note, 32 points in Elementalist is Channel Elements which is charge to mana.

[Nebu]

Nebu, I tried making a stormcaller/ele build, but I have a thousand buttons.  I don't even know where to begin.  How did you set up your bars and what don't you use, and what do you use?  In other words, will you please cliffnotes me a quickie guide to stormcaller/ele?

I use Raging Storm > Ice Shear > Lightning Strike > Lightning Field 5 times > Forked Lightning to refresh Electrify and then repeat starting with Ice Shear.  Seems pretty much exactly what the guy in the blue dot link is saying.  Good guide really as it reduces the vast array of spells down to a simple rotation. 

This REALLY demonstrates how little thought went into some of the soul trees.  Electric damage is so much better than any other option that there's almost no reason to use most of the abilities in your tree.  I refer to this as the illusion of choice.  It's not much of a choice if you have zero reason to use alternatives.  The game is begging for a soul review, but it's unlikely to happen.  Players will scream bloody murder if class balance really happens. 

[Dren]

Clerics are versatile, but at least in the early stages, sloooowwww.  It seems to take forever to kill mobs.  I compare this to a mage and a warrior I started and ran through the first 10 lvls.  HUGE difference.  It sounds like that changes at higher levels though.  Maybe most people can't get past those first 20 lvls?

As mentioned, to get anywhere you have to wade through mobs.  With as slow as it is just to kill one, I am starting to really hate getting from place to place.  This is the first time in a MMO that I can see my target location and feel like it will still take 10 more minutes to get there.

I can't just ride through stuff either.  Too many times I pick up 4+ adds and get knocked off my turtle.  Then I'm really in for a long haul of fighting....typically I can survive, but it can be like 10 minutes in that one fight alone pushing every button available.  Get back on turtle and do it again 5 paces further...

[Zetor]

Also depends on what spec your cleric is.

You can go inq/cabalist/sentinel 31+/10/0 (or inq/justicar/sentinel, same point distrib), that build really picks up steam at 26 when you get fanaticism and 31 when you get CoO; it was definitely faster at murdering stuff than my dps warrior. Tag 4-5 mobs with vex (dot that heals you as well), fanaticism + soul drain, circle of oblivion to mop up stragglers. Use aggressive renewal when in danger of running low on mana. If you go justicar offspec, you'll never die while doing this; if you go cabalist, you'll take more damage, but deal more and will worry even less about mana. It's a very efficient and effective farming / general pve build at 50 too.

[Draegan]

Rogues are amazing tanks.  Amazing.

[Dren]

Also depends on what spec your cleric is.

You can go inq/cabalist/sentinel 31+/10/0 (or inq/justicar/sentinel, same point distrib), that build really picks up steam at 26 when you get fanaticism and 31 when you get CoO; it was definitely faster at murdering stuff than my dps warrior. Tag 4-5 mobs with vex (dot that heals you as well), fanaticism + soul drain, circle of oblivion to mop up stragglers. Use aggressive renewal when in danger of running low on mana. If you go justicar offspec, you'll never die while doing this; if you go cabalist, you'll take more damage, but deal more and will worry even less about mana. It's a very efficient and effective farming / general pve build at 50 too.

I've been playing a new alt warrior just to check that out last few days.  Much quicker kills, but die a lot more so far...

Anyway, I'll have to look at respecing.  I'm not using either of those.  I think my main is Sentinel.  Definitely hardy soul with no problems in staying alive or keeping mana topped off.  Just terrible DPS compared to other souls at the low level.  Actually, I'll probably just start a different alt and try that other build out.  Doesn't take long to hit 10, etc.  Still trying to find my niche, but having fun trying everything out.

Hey, anyone know if the servers cater to any particular time zone?  Looking for an EST if there is one.  I guess I don't mind PvP or PvE.  Suggestions appreciated.

[Nebu]

Rogues are amazing tanks.  Amazing.

For single target, I agree.  Seems some of their aggro management tools for multiple pulls aren't quite working right though.  I've been playing so much with cleric tanks that I had forgotten just how easy it is to heal rogue and warrior tanks.

Have you tried some of the new tear encounters?  The one in shimmersand was quite interesting.

[Maledict]

Rogues are amazing tanks.  Amazing.

For single target, I agree.  Seems some of their aggro management tools for multiple pulls aren't quite working right though.  I've been playing so much with cleric tanks that I had forgotten just how easy it is to heal rogue and warrior tanks.

Have you tried some of the new tear encounters?  The one in shimmersand was quite interesting.

Since they upgraded Rift disturbance, and I started really aggressively tab targetting through packs, even a raid geared stormcaller couldn't pull stuff off me. If there's 10+ mobs of course then yeah, it's impossible to hold them, but in general rogue tanks can hold aggro on packs fine. It just requires a *lot* more effort than it does for warriors, so the skill bar is naturally a lot higher.

[Draegan]

Rogues are amazing tanks.  Amazing.

For single target, I agree.  Seems some of their aggro management tools for multiple pulls aren't quite working right though.  I've been playing so much with cleric tanks that I had forgotten just how easy it is to heal rogue and warrior tanks.

Have you tried some of the new tear encounters?  The one in shimmersand was quite interesting.

Yea the new sliver is fun.  But yeah Rogues on AOE pulls aren't the best.  They are phenomenal raid tanks though.

[Falconeer]

From 1.2 Hotfix #7 patch notes:

PVP/WARFRONTS* Diminishing returns immunity timers now end 15 seconds after the initial application of movement-impairing effects, down from 24 seconds.*

This might be what makes me cancel my subscription and ragequit. Seriously. Just that stupid. I am back to not playing and watching my warrior permastanding still or running away in fear in the middle of a PvP battle.

[Nebu]

This might be what makes me cancel my subscription and ragequit. Seriously. Just that stupid. I am back to not playing and watching my warrior permastanding still or running away in fear in the middle of a PvP battle.

You could try being a mage.  It's awesome fun going from 100% - 0% health while unable to do anything when an invisible player decides to remove you from the field of play at will.   

[Threash]

Oh bullshit, the nerf to cc was extremely overdone.  If you are going to have cc at all you can't make it completely useless.  The way things are now every single low duration stun/root/snare is detrimental to use because of the inmune timer.  And honestly snares with DR are just retarded, that needs to be removed completely.  Right now warfronts boil down to clerics and rogues running around in circles kiting everyone, it is utterly retarded.

[Nebu]

Oh bullshit, the nerf to cc was extremely overdone.  If you are going to have cc at all you can't make it completely useless.  The way things are now every single low duration stun/root/snare is detrimental to use because of the inmune timer.  And honestly snares with DR are just retarded, that needs to be removed completely.  Right now warfronts boil down to clerics and rogues running around in circles kiting everyone, it is utterly retarded.

If you want longer cc, then make them so they have 3 min cooldowns.  I'm all for tactical use of CC.  The thing ruining pvp for me is all of the spammable abilities.  Pick the right class, get to r6, and faceroll your way to victory.  

That and giving stuns to any class that can be invisible is RETARDED. 

[Zetor]

What Threash said. The CC situation now is broken in a different way than it was before. It will be still broken with a 15-sec immunity window, just less so. It's a lazy solution, though: if you're going to do DR, do it via groupings or at least pull single-target snares off DR.

Nebu's point has merit as well, and I think I'd actually prefer that. However, that's not something you can patch in -- it needs a major design pass at the very least (you'd need to overhaul the entire dominator tree for instance, not to mention every single pvp tree). Like I posted earlier wrt CC, I would've been fine with no hard CC at all like in Guild Wars, as long as the game was designed for that from day 0.

[Falconeer]

I'm with Nebu, and against Threash and Zetor.

CC keeps being bullshit in these games, what part of "being unable to play your character for a huge chunk of of any PvP encounter" (especially as a melee class) you like is beyond me guys. Having your CC abilities not working is less frustrating than having your whole character not working.

[Threash]

Melee classes are the ones suffering the most with the way things are currently.  If I can't stay in melee range I might as well be ccd 100% of the time.

[Falconeer]

Exactly. With no 24 seconds DR what is gonna happen (especially with fears, but not just) is that we are gonna get CCed, they get out of range, when the CC is over we try to get in range and when we finally get there we get another CC, and so on. This is how it was before 1.2, where it was necessary to stack up on CCbreaking specs, sacrifying lots of damage (making warriors really dull). When you have to give up lots of cool things only to PRESERVE your ability to play, it's time to reroll a ranged class. Like, uhnn, a Cleric. See what I did there?

[Threash]

I actually play a warrior that does a lot of pvp and I promise you things are a lot worse than before.  The game was made with cc in mind, you can't just make it useless and expect it to work.  Pvp has been broken since 1.2 and the sooner they revert the changes the better.

[Zetor]

I pointed this out a few pages ago: snares on DR means you can't "stick on your target" in pvp as a melee class, especially if
- you have 50+ ping (and if you have 200+ ping... fuhgedaboutit)
- your target has speed boosts (*especially* always-on auras or stances) and/or teleport moves
unless your enemy is really slow / keyboard turns / backpedals instead of strafing.

This is just as bad as being perma-cc'd the entire match. As a warrior, bullrush will close the gap for you... but without the stun/root the enemy will just keep kiting.

Whether your game has CC is a design decision you make early, and it has a far greater impact than just a few skills in a few trees. FPS (including Global Agenda) don't have CC, but you need to aim to hit your target; GW doesn't have CC, but there's a limited skillset and you win by exploiting the weaknesses in the opponent's skillset while playing to the strengths of your own. IF all CC from rift was removed completely, fights would become about which side has the bigger sword / can do the best dps / healing rotation and which side has more/better bunnyhopping healers.

[Falconeer]

I actually play a warrior that does a lot of pvp and I promise you things are a lot worse than before.  The game was made with cc in mind, you can't just make it useless and expect it to work.  Pvp has been broken since 1.2 and the sooner they revert the changes the better.

Look, I play a warrior that does ONLY PvP and I promise you things were worse before 1.2. This is a clear example of us playing two different games. PvP was broken BEFORE 1.2, now it's alright. 15 secs DR is a huge step back.

The game was made with cc in mind, you can't just make it useless and expect it to work.

I love you and Zetor for helping me finding a very good warrior spec, but you are quite nuts.

[Falconeer]

IF all CC from rift was removed completely, fights would become about which side has the bigger sword / can do the best dps / healing rotation and which side has more/better bunnyhopping healers.

That's why I am with Nebu.
But given Rift and the way it is, CCs ARE in the game now, with the 24 secs DR, and it works great. I can see CC-lover complaining, but again, the other end of the spectrum is melee classes being close to unable to play, _unless_ you build around as many CC-breakers as you can, which are still not enough and probably your idea of fun but not mine.

On the "unable to stay in melee range" you still have to explain me how in hell a shorter "free to fucking play the game" time for melee characters is gonna help them catch blinking mages or survive rogue chainstuns, unless your really like to play with long cooldown CC-breakers and praying to have them up at the right time.

[Threash]

Short cc timers are perfect for getting OUT of melee range, useless for staying in melee range long enough to kill anyone.

[Zetor]

I don't disagree with you about the 'no cc = fun' part, but removing CC from rift would require rethinking a lot of things (and more than a couple of souls / abilities). I don't think doing such major changes could happen even in a content patch... maybe in an expansion, but there would still be ragequits and clenching of teeth.

About the cc thing being bad for melee: snares are on DR, and they share that DR with roots. If you charge someone and use leg sweep, you just made them immune to all snares/roots for the next 24 [now 15?] seconds as soon as your leg sweep falls off (and it will only last for 50% since the 2-second charge root put it on DR already). If someone used any kind of snare/root on your target in the previous half-minute, they'll be immune to your leg sweep and may even be immune to the root from bullrush. Sure, YOU won't be snared either, but marksmen and most other rogues have passive speed boosts -- you'll be running at 100% speed and they'll be running at 110%/120% while doing jumpshots and strafing. You can't catch up, since they'll be immune to the stun/root from your bullrush and your fear as well... so it just turns into a Benny Hill scene. Same thing applies if you're attacking a ranged class with any kind of 'gap creator' skill other than a knockback.

And if both of you are running at 100% (ie. not snared... this is the usual situation since both of you will be snare-immune), whoever has the better latency 'wins'. I stopped playing my warrior in pvp out of frustration because of this.

(yeah, paragon specs have a 1-min cooldown sprint ability, but it won't last longer than a second against a marksman spam-dispel-machine)

[Threash]

Yeah, the snare/root shared dr is the biggest problem.

[Falconeer]

Short cc timers are perfect to keep melee characters permafrozen while you heal yourself or get away or you pummel them/someone else.

And most of what you describe seems to be 1v1 stuff which don't mean much in Rift. What the hell, seriously what are you playing? Also, please keep in mind that playing perma-snared (which is what happens to leg-sweep recipients) is absolutely no fun either. They should have toned it all down, and they were doing it, not try to fucking balance it so some specific classes will have a supposed better chance at some other classes. It's team pvp anyway, dammit. One guy runs out of your melee range? Get another closeby! Or keep him targeted if you are MA and your ranged friends will finish him anyway.

[Azuredream]

You know there's really no difference to getting taken down 100-0 by an opponent that just out-heals and out-damages you and an opponent locking you down 100-0. In both cases nothing you could've done would've made any difference. I guess the perception would be different, in one case you literally can't do anything, and in the other you can do things but they won't have any effect.

[dd0029]

I guess the perception would be different, in one case you literally can't do anything, and in the other you can do things but they won't have any effect.

It's all about the illusion of choice. I know for certain that there is nothing I could have done against the mage that crit me for 9300 with a Fulminate, but there's the illusion I could have done something different. I could have seen him coming and been somewhere else or something. With most CC that illusion is gone for some reason. The choices don't seem as valid.

[Dren]

I noticed a strange power on my cleric the other day.  I'd love to remember the soul tree that has it, but I don't work that way.  Anyway, it read like a vacuum spell you cast on your teammate.  Up to 5 enemies within a certain range of that teammate will be sucked in to that teammate.

Are there more anti-kiting spells like that available that just aren't getting used because it was introduced more as a support tool rather than a direct dps/cc/etc. tool?  "Catch your own targets foo!"

[Falconeer]

PVP/WARFRONTS
* Diminishing returns immunity timers now end 15 seconds after the initial application of movement-impairing effects, down from 24 seconds.

Maybe it's not the end of the world.

CC in Rift is divided in:

- Movement abilities [Root, Knockback, Snare] which were not previously set up with diminishing returns.
- Control abilities [Banish, Disarm, Silence, Fear, Confuse, Mesmerize, Stun]

This is probably only lowering the timer to 15 for Movement CC, while leaving it to 24 for Control abilities. If this is the case, I take everything back, since it's only 3 out of 10 possible CCs, and I am fine with it.

You are still nuts for thinking it was OK when we were under the assumption it was all CC being lowered at 15.

[Flinky]

I noticed a strange power on my cleric the other day.  I'd love to remember the soul tree that has it, but I don't work that way.  Anyway, it read like a vacuum spell you cast on your teammate.  Up to 5 enemies within a certain range of that teammate will be sucked in to that teammate.

That's Maelstrom, a 20 point ability in the Cabalist soul. If you spend the points to make it a 5 target ability, then its also a 30% Snare for anyone caught in it.

[Shatter]

PvP update

Hey all,

We wanted to post a quick follow-up to some of the feedback you have been sharing with us.

As you may have seen, we've recently expanded one "Wargroup", or a group of shards who can engage in Warfronts together, to include additional shards. This was done to directly address queue times for Warfronts and to allow for more players to engage in PvP faster.

We're closely monitoring this change for any issues or bugs that arise as well as to see if it leads to improved queue times. We will keep you updated on our decision to expand additional Wargroups in the future.

Furthermore, we're also looking at improving match-making between pre-made groups so that, whenever possible, a pre-made will face a pre-made and have less mixing with random pick up groups.

Lastly, starting tonight in Europe and tomorrow in North America (05/27) you'll see a number of improvements to Warfronts that will encourage more competitive gameplay and coordination, here's a first look at the notes:

PVP & WARFRONTS

* The following objects can no longer be interacted with while under the effect of Slip Away, Twilight Transcendence, Scatter the Shadows, Defer Death, or Phase Shift:
- Black Garden: The Fang of Regulos
- The Codex: All control points
- Whitefall Steppes: The Sourcestone
- Port Scion: Sourcestone and capture points
* Using Slip Away, Twilight Transcendence, Scatter the Shadows, Defer Death, or Phase Shift while carrying Sourcestone in Whitefall Steppes or The Battle for Port Scion will now cause the Sourcestone to drop.
* Respawning in a Warfront now regenerates energy and power more quickly for Rogues and Warriors.
* The Codex: Reduced the amount of time it takes to flip control of a control point.
* The Codex: Increased the maximum match duration to 20 minutes.
* The Battle for Port Scion: The Bridge respawn point now becomes unlocked after the match has been running for one minute. The amount of time it takes to gain control of the respawn point has been halved.
* The Battle for Port Scion: Returning Sourcestone no longer grants a buff to your team members.
* The Battle for Port Scion: Slightly updated the paths that the heroes take when spawned from defeating the Endless boss. They now more regularly assault the southern objective on each side.
* The Codex has been updated with alternate routes out of the spawn areas for both teams. Several sections of the terrain have also been smoothed out to avoid wonky movement.

Thanks for your continued input and suggestions, your feedback is important to us and helps us to shape the decisions we make every-day. We look forward to your discussion!

[Azuredream]

PvP update

Hey all,

We wanted to post a quick follow-up to some of the feedback you have been sharing with us.

As you may have seen, we've recently expanded one "Wargroup", or a group of shards who can engage in Warfronts together, to include additional shards. This was done to directly address queue times for Warfronts and to allow for more players to engage in PvP faster.

We're closely monitoring this change for any issues or bugs that arise as well as to see if it leads to improved queue times. We will keep you updated on our decision to expand additional Wargroups in the future.

Furthermore, we're also looking at improving match-making between pre-made groups so that, whenever possible, a pre-made will face a pre-made and have less mixing with random pick up groups.

Lastly, starting tonight in Europe and tomorrow in North America (05/27) you'll see a number of improvements to Warfronts that will encourage more competitive gameplay and coordination, here's a first look at the notes:

PVP & WARFRONTS

* The following objects can no longer be interacted with while under the effect of Slip Away, Twilight Transcendence, Scatter the Shadows, Defer Death, or Phase Shift:
- Black Garden: The Fang of Regulos
- The Codex: All control points
- Whitefall Steppes: The Sourcestone
- Port Scion: Sourcestone and capture points
* Using Slip Away, Twilight Transcendence, Scatter the Shadows, Defer Death, or Phase Shift while carrying Sourcestone in Whitefall Steppes or The Battle for Port Scion will now cause the Sourcestone to drop.
* Respawning in a Warfront now regenerates energy and power more quickly for Rogues and Warriors.
* The Codex: Reduced the amount of time it takes to flip control of a control point.
* The Codex: Increased the maximum match duration to 20 minutes.
* The Battle for Port Scion: The Bridge respawn point now becomes unlocked after the match has been running for one minute. The amount of time it takes to gain control of the respawn point has been halved.
* The Battle for Port Scion: Returning Sourcestone no longer grants a buff to your team members.
* The Battle for Port Scion: Slightly updated the paths that the heroes take when spawned from defeating the Endless boss. They now more regularly assault the southern objective on each side.
* The Codex has been updated with alternate routes out of the spawn areas for both teams. Several sections of the terrain have also been smoothed out to avoid wonky movement.

Thanks for your continued input and suggestions, your feedback is important to us and helps us to shape the decisions we make every-day. We look forward to your discussion!

The Sourcestone buff just made no sense at all, it created a negative feedback loop of a team that is winning becoming even more likely to win. I'm glad they changed the "pop immune and cap" and I hope they extend it to include absorption effects.

[Falconeer]

Good changes. Now some content please. More raids coming with 1.3, and if there is gonna be nothing for PvP...

[Zetor]

Yea, good changes. And I'm fine with long DR remaining on 24sec immunity timer -- my main concern is/was not being able to stick on important targets in melee (flag carrier, FC's healer, sourcestone carrier, etc) so the change should alleviate that hopefully!

Regarding new pvp content - I think they have at least 2 more warfronts somewhere in the pipeline judging from the filenames (if you check the data files, you'll see there is warfront_01 to warfront_04, then there is a gap and the last file is warfront_07). Black Garden is extremely frustrating to pug, so I hope the other 2 will be more objective-focused...

[Shatter]

2 of those items are big problems for me since I only PvP.  The pre-made vs pug being the biggest and warfront ques.  Right now I have long waits and when I finally do get in Its  almost always a premade on the other side.  Very needed changes and yeah a couple more warfronts will be nice as long as they dont make the map Whitefall steppes size...TOO BIG