Are our numbers still getting tweaked a little?

Shaxx

Id love Kinetic ward get maybe 5% more damage absorb and lower the Mana cost slightly aswell. Im having a hard time soloing stuff. Get an add and you are done anyway. Also lower Deflection Cooldown! And we dont have any means of solo pulling anything out, no lull/pacify etc.

Please change Telekinetic Infusion ...its totally useless. Make it Selfhaste for 20% stacking with everything or give it a 5-10% chance to flurry attacks buff. This way it would at least contribute!

ThePanda

Shaxx maybe more of a philosophical question - but should every class be good solo? SPB strikes me as a group-dependent DPS.

Shaxx

ThePanda

Depends what " good " is. Every class should be able to do the same progression solo , one better than the other. I dont see why Spellblade should not. One of the most asked questions across discord subchannels is how good classes can solo

Velthorian

we should have "weak" mobs. designed for solo targets. "a week fire beetle" that has 50% less hp, and 40% less xp. Or at the very least all classes should be able to solo light blue's at a fair clip. Im not a fan of the massive HP pools for group TTK, that feel wonderful in a group, but feel like complete shit solo. We should not be taking 90 seconds to kill green skeletons, those should get one rounded. Even the pyrmos guards in fallen pass have to wack at green skeletons for 20 + seconds to kill them. it's kind of ridiculous. Be pretty great to introduce Light blue con's before level 25 as well. The solution to "Dots suck, innately in a game like this" should not be "artificially increase Hp a stupid amount to compensate". How bout front loading dot damage and lowering ticks, or just a faster tick rate. Or something original for a change, how bout if a monster dies early before a dot finishes, you reclaim some mana. You know.. solutions that don't punish everyone, so one mechanic can still exist. I can get a bit slower TTK -- but lets not turn checkers into chess please. Even some kind of mechanism that boost damage significantly on targets xyz lower then player. this happens natrually though skills like offense and defense, but it's not enough right now. "Bonus" damage against targets 5-7 levels under player allows for high HP pools and TTK to still be a thing, without players spending minutes on trash mobs. Medding to full then getting jumped by 2 green con's should not be a 10 minute cycle. As of now, those 2 green con's are gonna dam near run most players OOM and another med break. IT's not rewarding or fun, just boring and obnoxious.

tuesday

Is 2-hander Spellblade viable? Only way I’d want to play the class

ThePanda

[unknown] well said.
It takes forever for an SK to solo a green mob. I don’t hit it noticeably harder. Took me 8 minutes to kill a level 40 when i’m level 59… something is wrong there.

I like the idea of “a weak fire beetle”

I do not however think every class should be easily able to solo anywhere… everyone should be able to solo in outdoor areas with open fields of roaming mobs though. To that end, spellblades might be relatively poor soloers in dungeons or when trying to camp a named mob.

BobWendal

So I only have experience soloing blues/whites in the lvl 40-50 range before the most recent mob damage change, but as a melee you are going to struggle if you just face tank mobs. The best way I found is to use kinetic ward/deflection and then run through your full combo until they run out, seclusion and meditate while waiting on cooldowns. A little cheesy but it works, I was able to survive accidental chain pulls this way and it's faster than killing on mob then meditating to full for the next.

Deflection is already an extremely strong defensive skill (100% physical damage reduction with a counter) and i cannot imagine them buffing it more. In my experience i took significantly less damage while tanking than full plate tanks with enough dps to hold aggro although named mobs would fully drain my mana and would need a small med break without an enchanter in party. it's hard to balance the defensives you would need to properly solo while not breaking balance in group play as things are right now.

SpectralAnubis

The health buff they gave the mobs, really changed the soloing dynamic when level 20 hits.

SPB as it's current implementation is very much a group oriented class. Pre-rework soloing was actually easier, once you mid-maxed your Dex to have procs from infusion. Your mana consumption wasn't bad either. You could sustain yourself vs blues, whites and even some yellows. Your toolkit was very repetitive and did not give any variation. You were essentially a 2-3 button class.

The rework gave the class a fresh look, but with the NPC buffs across the board, soloing took a hit. You can solo but you will be using your full toolkit and will need to manage your mana. Which means using 1 tier lower spells. SPB's are highly gear dependent. From what I've been studying AGI might be needed more aggressively after level 20.