1.11 Skill Balance Changes Discussion

[Origin]

1.11 Skill Balance Changes Discussion

Many skills are flawed in D2 in that they are either overpowered or nowhere near viable in hell. Being the naive little boy I am I'm hoping they might change some of these in 1.11 ^_^

Basically my personal opinion is that you should be able to use ALL skills in hell with sufficient results (yes even things like fire bolt, and to make such early skills not be overpowered early in the game you give them a low base damage and high synnergy with something further down the skill tree so don't whine about that). I don't know if people agree but why wouldn't you? We're all for variation right? I'd love to see more builds out there. I think skills should have different uses and different flavours but not different effectiveness, because then it's not balanced is it?

Anyway I'll go through all the skills I'm familiar with (some skill trees I just don't have enough experience with so I'll leave those). And you guys can pick my stuff apart where I'm wrong, agree with me where I'm right, and fill in on my blank spots. Maybe in a while we'll have a nice list we can post on the bnet forums or some such. I know the chance that they read and/or act on it will be minimal but hey. Hope is nice, plus making lists is fun ^_^

This is all PvM btw. I'm not gonna get into PvP as balancing D2 for PvP and PvM at the same time would be extremely hard and I also personally lack experience in PvP.


SORCERESS

ICE TREE

Ice Bolt
Fully synnergised this spell does almost 700 damage which is a joke compared to the other ice spells. Imo since the ice bolt only chills where the other similar skills freeze and even have splash damage, ice bolt should have the highest damage once fully synnergised (of course it should start out lower than the other skills though). Also the ammount of synnergies needed for this is not only rediculous but also unreachable (120 skill points total, counting the skill itself). A way to make this skill appealing would be to make the projectile faster than ice blast and glacial spike (while also upping the damage of course).

Ice Blast
Fully synnergised the spell does around 1600 damage and also freezes for a good while. While the damage is considerably higher than Glacial Spike it lacks splash damage and splash freeze (if you hit more than 1 enemy with glacial it will do more total damage than Ice Blast). How often do you see a build utilizing this skill? One fix would be to raise the damage a bit (though Ice Bolt should still have the highest damage). Another solution could be to make Glacial Spike a timered spell and in return increase its splash radius or duration. Work with me here and maybe we can find a solution. I believe Glacial Spike will always be used to an extent because the splash freeze is very very handy.

Glacial Spike
Fully synnergised the spell does 1026 _splash_ damage and _splash_ freeze. I don't think this skill needs a nerf. It certainly does not need a boost.

Frost Nova
This spell does around 300 damage fully synnergised. While a nova spell can hit very many enemies I personally think this is offset by the danger of being so close to the enemy. The mana cost is also quite insane, thus lowering your survivability if you want to use it regularly (as you will spend more items on mana that could have been used for HP or other defensive stats) So I'd say damage needs to be upped on this one. You could argue it has an insane chill duration but really what is chill compared to freeze? And who would put 20 points in this skill only to be able to chill well?

Blizzard
About 2700 damage per hit fully synnergised and how often does it hit? 2-3 times per cast? That's quite insane and I know from personal experience that PvM is far too easy to play with this skill. Time to bring out the nerf stick? I must admit though that I haven't used this spell in Hell so I might very well be wrong.

Frozen Orb
Very hard to calculate the damage of this spell but with a meager investment of 40 points this spell is hell viable. Again I lack the experience to know how viable. Help me out people.

Frozen Armor
While this spell is certainly useful to put points in I believe most people have better things to invest in. Most people use it as a one point wonder which is fine but I think all spells should be viable to take to level 20. To pull this off I say lower the ammount of synnergies in the cold tree (and up their efficiency instead). That way people will have points to spare on frozen armor if they wish.
Edit: Also I think the synnergies should be far more effective. If you're sinking 60 points into an armor I think it should be pretty damn good.

Shiver Armor
Chosing Shiver instead of Frozen armor you give away your life saving freeze to chill and you run the risk of setting off lightning/fire/cold enchanted monsters with the damage you give them. What you get in return is such a rediculous ammount of damage that it clearly isn't worth it. I'd up the damage significantly and maybe synnergise the damage with a risky spell like Frost Nova.

Chilling Armor
Same problem as Shiver armor. Same solution.



LIGHTNING TREE
Sorry to say I lack experience with many of the lightning skills but I'll do the ones I know.

Nova
A great fun skill to use. However the damage is pathetic and it has no synnergies. It is also highly risky to use because you need to be close to the enemy and with the hefty mana cost you need to sacrifice alot of defensive powers to maintain nova spamming. I propose raising the damage and giving it a few synnergies.

Telekinesis
I know this is mostly a utility skill but the utility aspect of it has been nerfed hard due to exploits. Also what's level 2+ doing there if nobody is ever going to use them? I say make telekinesis worth investing points in. Make it an actual attack skill with real damage and synnergies. Wouldn't it be nice to see people actually using this skill? Diversity is your friend ^_^
The skill could have decent damage and a nice knockback but short range.

Chain Lightning
It's probably fine the way it is (not sure though, haven't used it alot) but how's this for flavour? Make it a timered spell with a long cooldown (8 seconds maybe?) and have it bounce many more times more like the javazon version. So you'd set one off and it'd dance around with the enemies for a good while until you set the next one and meanwhile you can use other skills to spam (nova, lightning, telekinesis, charged bolt, considering those were all made useful of course). Again that is strictly a thing of flavour but hey. Lightning doesn't have any timered skills so introducing one could give more diversity in skill usage (as you typically want to use one timered and one non-timered spell at the same time).


FIRE TREE

Fire Bolt
The damage is puny when it should be higher than that of fireballs due to its lack of splash damage.

Fire Ball
Does some more damage than Glacial Spike but doesn't freeze. Perfect in my opinion. With fire mastery the damage is huge but let's not forget it's negated by fire resistance on enemies as opposed to Glacial Spike with cold mastery.

Inferno
Fix the bug so it does its real damage. And even then I believe the damage needs an upgrade.

Blaze
Up the damage enough so that it's worthwhile to max this out. Maybe a synnergy with Firewall also?

Firewall
Haven't used it much at all. Would love some input here from people!

Enchant
Seems to do its job very well no? I think a synnergy from Hydra would be cool though since you could then summon hydras to spam firebolts while you whack away at the enemy. Just a thing of flavour though. Really why is it synnergised to warmth? It's not like an enchantress needs alot of mana.

Meteor
Someone mentioned turning the impact damage into physical somewhere in this forum and I am inclined to agree. Fire sorceresses probably struggle the most with resistances and immunities in this game. Physical meteor would give them a good but far from great way to dispose of fire immunes. Maybe even 50% physical 50% fire for the impact damage? Also why not synnergise it with Blaze instead of Inferno? Seems a good combo (if Blaze did damage that is).

Hydra
A thing of flavour I guess but wouldn't it be nice if Hydras were indeed a support and not a main damage spell? I think this could be accomplished if you increased their duration alot but put a max number on them much like assasin traps. Then you could actually see people using 3 skills in the same battle! (lay down hydras, then launch meteors/firewalls, and spam untimered spells during the whole time).



Wow that's alot.. I'm gonna take a break and see if there is any interest whatsoever in this before I continue.

 

[millys]

i'd like to describe your post in 1 word, so i will: nonsensical. you admit you have never really pvp'd or even used most skills in hell so how can you propose changes to things you know nothing about

 

[owbaer]

I mentioned this in another thread about the 1.11 patch. I also think they should boost up some of the utterly useless skills, but some skills I think are there just as skills to hold you over till you can get something better and/or as a synergy for something better.

 

[Origin]

i'd like to describe your post in 1 word, so i will: nonsensical. you admit you have never really pvp'd or even used most skills in hell so how can you propose changes to things you know nothing about

You're missing some things here. First of all I am proposing a joint effort, not for me to dictate anything. Secondly yes I have used many skills in Hell but far from all. Third, PvP balance in D2 is a joke as it is and I doubt it can be saved so I'm not going to bother with it. If you want to do that then go ahead.

 

[Merick1]

Not every skill should be end-game material. Ice and fire bolt work very nicely to help you out at lower levels and provide synergies later. They used to be purely 1 point material, synergies made them useable.

 

[Origin]

I mentioned this in another thread about the 1.11 patch. I also think they should boost up some of the utterly useless skills, but some skills I think are there just as skills to hold you over till you can get something better and/or as a synergy for something better.

But why should that be? What is the point of having skills you're only supposed to use for your first 30 levels? Wouldn't it be more fun and diverse if all skills were hell viable?

 

[Origin]

Not every skill should be end-game material. Ice and fire bolt work very nicely to help you out at lower levels and provide synergies later. They used to be purely 1 point material, synergies made them useable.

Again, exactly why is this good game design?

 

[owbaer]

But why should that be? What is the point of having skills you're only supposed to use for your first 30 levels? Wouldn't it be more fun and diverse if all skills were hell viable?

I don't mean like all of them shouldn't be viable at later levels. Hmmm you may have a point, , but like sometimes skills are there more for the synergies of other skills, like firebolt is there really until you get fireball. I don't know if it'd really make much sense to put firebolt on par with fireball.

 

[Cooked]

The lower level skills were designed to help you get to the higher level skills just like the low level weapons help you level to higher level weapons. Shadowfang sword was never meant to be an endgame weapon. Same for Iceblast.

Still, I can see how it would be fun if there were more builds. There are so many builds now it is hard to keep track but who cares. The more variations the better.

 

[Origin]

The lower level skills were designed to help you get to the higher level skills just like the low level weapons help you level to higher level weapons. Shadowfang sword was never meant to be an endgame weapon. Same for Iceblast.

Still, I can see how it would be fun if there were more builds. There are so many builds now it is hard to keep track but who cares. The more variations the better.

That is just a waste of game content then. As it is now, skill choice is extremely limited unless you want to make a novelty build. Why not add more diversity? Give me a single reason against it.

 

[owbaer]

I'm so happy to hear about 1.11 coming out tomorrow. I just got d2 not too long ago. So now I dance. :clap: :thanks: :winner: :jig:

 

[Origin]

I don't mean like all of them shouldn't be viable at later levels. Hmmm you may have a point, , but like sometimes skills are there more for the synergies of other skills, like firebolt is there really until you get fireball. I don't know if it'd really make much sense to put firebolt on par with fireball.

It could make sense or not depending on who you asked. But most importantly it would add more interesting choices for the gamer and better more diverse gameplay.

 

[Origin]

I'm so happy to hear about 1.11 coming out tomorrow. I just got d2 not too long ago. So now I dance. :clap: :thanks: :winner: :jig:

I wouldn't hold my breath for tomorrow. It's not official is it?

 

[owbaer]

That is just a waste of game content then. As it is now, skill choice is extremely limited unless you want to make a novelty build. Why not add more diversity? Give me a single reason against it.

Sometimes it just seems silly to put something on par as something else that's supposed to be the same thing but better (like the firebolt & fireball thing). Or amp is a good spell, but decrepify is basically amp but better.

 

[owbaer]

I wouldn't hold my breath for tomorrow. It's not official is it?

Omg I hate you. You ruined my moment in the sun. Lol I dunno I read that on one of the 1.11 threads that it comes out tomorrow I think it said. Still reading through it.

 

[Merick1]

Sometimes it just seems silly to put something on par as something else that's supposed to be the same thing but better (like the firebolt & fireball thing). Or amp is a good spell, but decrepify is basically amp but better.

Decrep is most certainly NOT better than amp. Melee skeles will do half again as much damage with amp, and decrep's defensive properties aren't needed for skeles, which can suvive fine without it.
Decrep is really only the curse of choice for bonemancers, who don't have a curse to help them with damage.

Anyway, about skills. If firebolt did much more damage it would just be fireball without splash, and they'd still be very similar. Meteor, fireball, fire wall, and hydra are very different skills in the way they do their damage. There's not much else firebolt can do that isn't done elsewhere. You could make it zig zag or move in some new way, but that would be awfully flashy for a level 1 spell.

 

[owbaer]

Decrep is most certainly NOT better than amp. Melee skeles will do half again as much damage with amp, and decrep's defensive properties aren't needed for skeles, which can suvive fine without it.
Decrep is really only the curse of choice for bonemancers, who don't have a curse to help them with damage.

Anyway, about skills. If firebolt did much more damage it would just be fireball without splash, and they'd still be very similar. Meteor, fireball, fire wall, and hydra are very different skills in the way they do their damage. There's not much else firebolt can do that isn't done elsewhere. You could make it zig zag or move in some new way, but that would be awfully flashy for a level 1 spell.

Lol ok to the decrep & amp thing. Hey I'm new so ya.

 

[Origin]

Decrep is most certainly NOT better than amp. Melee skeles will do half again as much damage with amp, and decrep's defensive properties aren't needed for skeles, which can suvive fine without it.
Decrep is really only the curse of choice for bonemancers, who don't have a curse to help them with damage.

Anyway, about skills. If firebolt did much more damage it would just be fireball without splash, and they'd still be very similar. Meteor, fireball, fire wall, and hydra are very different skills in the way they do their damage. There's not much else firebolt can do that isn't done elsewhere. You could make it zig zag or move in some new way, but that would be awfully flashy for a level 1 spell.

But its better with one spell good for taking out single monsters and bosses and one spell for crowds than only having one spell against everything isnt it?

 

[Bhruic]

Comparing the two spells is pointless, as they are both better in different situations.

As for the whole "every spell viable in Hell" option, that's just silly. You can max Firebolt at level 20. If a level 20 firebolt was a viable skill in Hell, then you'd be completely breezing through normal and nightmare. The whole point to having different skills is to have them perform a specific role. The role of some of the low level spells is to provide decent usage for low level chars.

There are some spells that certainly could use some tinkering with, as they aren't good at all. Blaze, for example, just isn't a good spell no matter what level you are. But making every spell good? Not a good idea. In general, the lower level a skill is, the weaker it should be, and the higher, the more powerful. Making every skill equally as good completely defeats the point of skill levels.

Bh

 

[Origin]

Comparing the two spells is pointless, as they are both better in different situations.

As for the whole "every spell viable in Hell" option, that's just silly. You can max Firebolt at level 20. If a level 20 firebolt was a viable skill in Hell, then you'd be completely breezing through normal and nightmare. The whole point to having different skills is to have them perform a specific role. The role of some of the low level spells is to provide decent usage for low level chars.

There are some spells that certainly could use some tinkering with, as they aren't good at all. Blaze, for example, just isn't a good spell no matter what level you are. But making every spell good? Not a good idea. In general, the lower level a skill is, the weaker it should be, and the higher, the more powerful. Making every skill equally as good completely defeats the point of skill levels.

Bh

I'm glad you read through my entire post before you replied -_-

Your "problem" is easily fixed by having low base damage and high synnergy bonus. Gosh some people....