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Constructive Discussion on Shield of the Gone

Changes to Shield of the Gone  

192 members have voted

  1. 1. If Shield of the Gone is nerfed, what do you feel is an appropriate change?

    • 30% Passive Damage Reduction
      6
    • 25% Passive Damage Reduction
      30
    • 20% Passive Damage Reduction
      17
    • 15% Passive Damage Reduction
      5
    • 10% Passive Damage Reduction
      9
    • Activated Ability - Please post how long the activation period, and cooldown.
      18
    • Other
      8
    • No Change
      99


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In the latest Q&A it was pointed out that because of the large number of complaints received about Shield of the Gone it will most likely be looked at and possibly reworked. However I have not seen any public discussion about what kind of changes they want to Shield of the Gone. So in that regard I am posting this thread to give voice to everyone's opinion on the change.


 


Please keep things civil and related to constructive discussion about what changes you feel would make SotG balanced but not useless. I've included the activated ability option because I've heard many people mention this as an idea when discussing it. But I would like to point out that all other lvl 11 Meditation abilities are passive and I don't feel it would be fair to force Insanity's to be one as well. A reduction in the damage reduction percentage seems to be the best option. Originally I was going to include both 40% and 35% but someone pointed out thats hardly any change at all.


 


I've also included the 'Other' option for new ideas, but if you vote this please post a detailed accounting of what your idea is to help balance Shield of the Gone. When a change to Path of Love was proposed threads like this were a great help in assisting the developers in choosing an option so I urge you to take this seriously. In the interest of fairness I have also included the option for 'No Change' so those that think SotG is not an issue will have a voice.


 


Full Disclosure - I am on Path of Insanity on a PvP server and am only 1 meditation level away from SotG. I am currently voting on 25% because I feel like that would be a fair compromise.


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*I am coming from a PvE standpoint as I have little experience with PvP in wurm*


 


I voted: Other.


Why did I vote other? It should remain passive, much like how Path of Knowledge gets passive +25% skillgain.


 


My idea is that instead of reducing damage by 50%, rather it becomes some sort of 'dodge', fully negating an attack. This way, you can still take full damage from a hit that actually lands. My reason for this is that when I played a character that had SotG, I could stand an tank a crocodile, with no armor on, as when you cut an attack in half, you rarely take med/bad wounds but rather lots of lighter wounds. Taking a single bad wound impacts you more than lots of light ones, as you can still take a lot of damage in a short amount of time. (It will also require some sort of first aid, whether that is a spell or a healing cover etc to fix rather than just waiting for it to go away)


 


It would also add a luck factor to the ability, where in a short fight you might never dodge and still take full damage.


 


The ability may have to function differently in PvE and PvP.


 


 


Or alternatively, boost the effectiveness of all the other Path 11 abilities. (I think this is a better idea)


Edited by Outlaw
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Or alternatively, boost the effectiveness of all the other Path 11 abilities. (I think this is a better idea)

 

I personally like this option but everyone I spoke with personally about SotG changes were against this.

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I don't think it needs to be changed, I believe it is fine as it is!


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20% damage reduction instead of 50%.

Issle,

Black Legion, Chaos.

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Literally no other meditation path helps you as much as Shield of the Gone... and if you have semi-half way decent gear, you're pretty much impossible to kill in some situations. Its easier to get 11 PoI then 11 PoH because of how shite the game is for tiles, and all the other 11 effects have no promising pvp effect. Lower it to 25%, or make it a 1 hour long buff... or as that fancy dodge mechanic that was said.


 


There is literally no reason to have a slightly nerfed champion buff, and not have the same downtimes as a Champion does.


Took the time to get 70 Meditation: Got SoTG, never die unless you are hard targeted, live everything, no debuffs, for 50%


Champion: 50 faith (not hard, just tedious), have to balance champion points, lives, and a time period for 60% (Not to mention they cant actually cast spells onto weaponry and stuff without a penalty.


 


This coming from someone with sotg.


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I voted no change, though I don't think it would hurt to give some other paths a slight buff - especially hate level 11, it only seems to block spells that literally nobody uses. The others are probably fine though, and don't forget that the insanity path abilities below level 11 are pretty useless whereas all of the other paths have good abilities at lower levels.


 


Everything good takes a long time in Wurm, and so anyone who argues that meditation paths should be nerfed because they're "hard" might as well be asking to make weaponsmithing easier and give making bricks a 1 second timer. It could be good from a development standpoint though to make the skill less infuriating, the ticks can be very random and I'm sure a lot of people wouldn't want the nerfs as much if the skill wasn't so damned confusing and if it seemed more achievable.


 


To anyone who hates meditating, I would strongly recommend trying to grind with Wurm Assistant. It makes the whole process much, much easier to have it calculate when you can gain skill. http://forum.wurmonline.com/index.php?/topic/68031-wurm-assistant-enrich-your-wurm-experience/


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Everything good takes a long time in Wurm, and so anyone who argues that meditation paths should be nerfed because they're "hard" might as well be asking to make weaponsmithing easier and give making bricks a 1 second timer. It could be good from a development standpoint though to make the skill less infuriating, the ticks can be very random and I'm sure a lot of people wouldn't want the nerfs as much if the skill wasn't so damned confusing and if it seemed more achievable.

I don't think anyone is saying meditation should be nerfed because it is hard, people want SoTG nerfed because it is a huge permanent bonus. If anything the argument goes the other way, 'I spent at least half a year meditating so i should be automatically have a big bonus over anyone who did not" (or picked another path).

 

It really just creates too big of a gap, especially between newer players and veterans, sure people argue body stats matter too, but SoTG doubles whatever advantage you get from them. if you had 2x the effective health of a new player from body stats, with SoTG you get 4x.

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I don't think anyone is saying meditation should be nerfed because it is hard, people want SoTG nerfed because it is a huge permanent bonus. If anything the argument goes the other way, 'I spent at least half a year meditating so i should be automatically have a big bonus over anyone who did not" (or picked another path).

 

It really just creates too big of a gap, especially between newer players and veterans, sure people argue body stats matter too, but SoTG doubles whatever advantage you get from them. if you had 2x the effective health of a new player from body stats, with SoTG you get 4x.

 

 

This is possibly the worst argument for nerfing SotG.

 

Many veteran accounts have massively over inflated stats due to the 'windows of opportunity' that are no longer available to newer players.

 

If you nerf SotG then you remove the only accessible way a new player has of competing with these veteran accounts.

 

SotG was never an issue until some guy tried to buy an SotG account on the cheap and was unable to get it so started making suggestions to get it nerfed.

 

Leave SotG alone. It is available to anyone who is willing to put in the time and effort earn it.

 

Instead of fixing things that don't need fixing, go fix the bugs in the game that should have been dealt with years ago.

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If you nerf SotG, then Stamina of the Vibrant Light will be "overpowered" and you'll want to nerf that, then PoL11 LT buff will be overpowered and you'll wanna nerf that too... Soon all the paths will be nerfed and we'll be back to right where we are now.


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This is possibly the worst argument for nerfing SotG.

 

Many veteran accounts have massively over inflated stats due to the 'windows of opportunity' that are no longer available to newer players.

 

If you nerf SotG then you remove the only accessible way a new player has of competing with these veteran accounts.

How does that make sense?

Those veteran accounts also have SoTG, and SoTG does a LOT more on a good account than it does on a new one.

If a new player gets it, they get a small bonus, if a veteran player gets it they get a huge one.

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An Old account without SotG has a massive advantage over a new account, if both have SotG then the new account can stay in the fight long enough for backup to come.


I have no idea whether or not you PvP and I am certainly not trying to sound condescending but you seem to believe that Chaos and epic is about 1v1's, It is not.


SotG is the only equalizing factor in PvP. To remove it would make every newish account completely uncompetitive.


Edited by Embolism

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FIrst of all, many dominant strategies have grown around shield of the gone. Enlightening is an option for those who know how. The others usually go hate (for damage bonus at level 7) until about 60 meditation skill, then switch to insanity path while grinding to 70 skill for shield of the gone. Another is the simple fact that most PvP players go for it. A few go for power because the stamina drain reduction is a pretty useful bonus, and the ability to negate frost brand and flaming aura at level 9 is also very good. Very few use knowledge because it has no benefit during combat, only during skilling, an act of preparation. Love is generally use only on alts for grass because its level 11 is effectively useless.


 


Shield of the gone is like WoA shortswords used to be - an overpowered dominant strategy that decided fights based on WoA cast. Now it's whoever has the most gone players, except now people try to run when a bunch of gone pop local, which is also a bad thing. No one runs when someone with 99 fight skill, archery, etc. pops local because those have useful bonuses that aren't completely overpowered.


 


I you have ever played Battlefield 3, then you should understand that shield of the gone follows the exact same principle as the M16A3. That gun was great overall and could destroy players using other weapons that should have had a statistical advantage in a given situation, but were beaten by the all around nature of the M16A3 that had almost no shortcomings in any situation. It was just too good. Combine that with the fact that it was assault exclusive, which means that players using it had medkits to AoE heal mid combat, and stuff gets really bad. The controversy was the same as with gone - all the M16A3 fanbois couldn't admit that their dominant strategy, which was objectively better than anything else, was overpowered. It was not nerfed out of greed because the majority of the paying customers used this gun. With that in mind, any feature of any multiplayer online game, regardless of genre, must be balanced to have advantages and disadvantages and be optimized to fit one or more specific roles, but not be amazing at everything.


 


A main advantage of gone is that it has almost zero reliance on the RNG - it gives 50% damage reduction in addition to the RNG defense aids (block, parry, glance, opponent's hit/miss, etc.)


 


Compared to the other paths, power is the second best, but still falls short by quite a bit. Level 9 negates elemental damage, including fire/ice pillars and damage enchants. The former is fine for avoiding hurting status, but sitting on a pillar alone will get you killed due to separation from the group. The latter is actually quite good, and gives a very slight bonus to rotting touch users, which do not have a reduction against this ability (rotting touch is otherwise inferior to frost brand/flaming aura). The stamina bonus is nice for driving boats, carrying loot and heavy items, and almost anything else you can think of. It can be argued that a player with vibrant light could stun-lock and special move spam the gone player to zero stamina, then finish him. This is not as plausible as it sounds when you factor in current health as a hard cap on stamina, and special moves cannot be used until about 30 seconds into a fight. This also suggests a 1v1 situation, which is very rare. Vibrant light has very little effect in a group setting compared to gone. The player's lifespan remains roughly the same, while the gone player's is doubled. The damage reduction from elemental immunity is variable and relies on the aggressor's use of frost brand or flaming aura, as well as the cast power. The actual reduction caps at about 34.4% (against a 103 cast, which is rare), while gone is still 50.0% While the stamina reduction is very good, its outcome relies heavily on the RNG because it only delays the massive penalties to combat ability and moving speed that would undoubtedly result in death at 0 stamina - your defensive and offensive capabilities remain the same in magnitude and rely on the RNG, only being increased in duration. Gone users have their defensive capabilities in terms of damage reduction increased independently of the RNG and are further aided by RNG rolls on other defensive capabilities (block, parry, etc.) as well maintaining offensive effectiveness.


 


Double life transfer from path of love sounds great to those who don't know how life transfer actually works. Level 11 path of love is effectively useless in PvP. It can only heal one wound at a time, and it always heals the most recent one. This means that you end up healing a lot of AoSP, shield bash, and frost brand wounds that are often very small and would have been full healed without double healing. The full amount of healing is often not seen without a bonus, with the bonus it is nearly unheard of to take full advantage of it. You also can heal with your hands, meaning you don't have to use cotton, but those few kilograms aren't worthy of a level 11 path, and LT is much more useful in PvE where weight doesn't matter quite as much. Level 4 is probably the most useful for PvP due to the instant stamina regen, which is still vastly outclassed by vibrant light. This path relies the most heavily on the RNG because it requires you to land a hit to feel the primary effects of this path. If you don't hit the target, you get no benefit whatsoever from the double LT effect. Gone users have the damage reduction and gain the normal amount of healing from LT, which is still usually the same as someone would gain under this path due to the broken LT function.


 


Hate provides spell immunity, but this only affects those cast directly on the player. It is activated and on a timer with a cool down, much like level 7 hate. It is the only level 11 ability to have this function. It is a functional counter to spell spam, which is not supposed to be an aspect of PvP anyway, meaning that actually fixing the spell spam problem would make this ability nearly useless. It also relies on the use of spells, which is not definite and even with spell changes, is generally only a nuisance against Libila priests. There is no justification for a level 11 to be best suited to fighting one type of priest. This doesn't really rely on the RNG, but it does rely on the opponent using a specific strategy. This is actually a good thing except that the specific strategy is not widely available and results in effect only being effective against black lighters.


 


Knowledge gives its effect during skill training, the only level 11 ability to only affect the preparation stage as opposed to directly impacting combat. Love comes close to fitting this description, but just barely falls short. This relies on the RNG for skill tick frequency, but still does not have a great impact during PvP. It also relies on the player's willingness to grind and will have little effect for those who play very casually.


 


With all of this said, I would like to point out a few things. First is that people will argue that gone users chose the best option and should be rewarded for that. This is a completely invalid argument because there should be no overall best option, that is an imbalance that needs to be fixed. The same is true for arguing that it took a long time. Secondly, people call targets based on priority. Gone and champ are the only factors that automatically get you put on the bottom of the list because you are the hardest to kill just for choosing one meditation path.  A 99/99/99 (fight/weapon/shield) player with 70 body would be targeted and killed if focused by several enemy players before an 80/80/80 50 body gone player, who would take longer to kill than the former because of one specific ability on one path tied to one skill. Lastly, the way gone stacks with healing abilities is broken - healing is received at the normal rate, making gone players even harder to kill. Allegedly, gone is supposed to reduce damage and healing by 50%. It doesn't.


 


As usual, the majority of the players arguing against this have gone or allies with gone and don't want themselves nerfed balanced. The facts point to this ability being objectively overpowered, and those who deny it are lying to themselves. Fix this now.


 


EDIT: Please don't break PvE servers and start another massive PvP vs. PvE "you got us nerfed" whine fest. Players think this is OP, not wild cats.


Edited by SotG_is_OP
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An Old account without SotG has a massive advantage over a new account, if both have SotG then the new account can stay in the fight long enough for backup to come.

I have no idea whether or not you PvP and I am certainly not trying to sound condescending but you seem to believe that Chaos and epic is about 1v1's, It is not.

SotG is the only equalizing factor in PvP. To remove it would make every newish account completely uncompetitive.

SoTG shines even more in group pvp when you are being focused, and I seriously doubt it ever let a new account survive for much longer than it would without it.

 

I can't seem to understand your logic, making new accounts able to survive slightly longer=they are competitive, but ignoring the fact that all the accounts stronger than them can survive much longer because of it, as well as the fact that SoTG existing makes anyone without it(which is pretty much only new/newish accounts) "uncompetitive"

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Look at Elevation. Log in, meditate, log out. Do it again 30/60/90/120 minutes later. Do it again every three hours. People are going about their normal daily activities or player other games and logging in just to meditate so they can leave deed a year from now when they have gone. They aren't even playing the game, they're just keeping prem for shield of the gone. It's completely absurd.


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Anyone can be shield of the gone therefore it is not overpowered.  If you elect to not go for it, the rest of those who have should not be nerfed.  


 


Are you complaining because you do not want to have to get 70 meditation?  Who said that meditation has to be balanced across the entire game and that each path has to be viable in every and all pvp situations?  Is it possible that some paths are more effective in pvp and some are not and that is OK?  One could think of SOTG as a pvp meditation path sort of like shields and shield bashing are more useful pvp skills than in pve. 


 


On Chaos, which is a kingdom vs kingdom server, several paths are utilized by players to some degree depending on their play style and account choices.  There are those who stand in the front lines who need to be able to withstand the few extra hits that shield of the gone affords them and there are those that use other paths with great success behind the front lines.  Path of love is great for those who like to heal during a prolonged battle.  POK is very handy in tower caps when you can't find the guards.  Hate gives players with less than 70 meditation the ability to do some extra damage.  From a pure pvp perspective you have the ability to progress from a new player with 20 in each stat to a damage dealer to a tank with the help of meditation if you are dedicated to advancing your account's skills.  


 


If you want instant gratification and a completely balanced playing field you are playing the wrong game.  Wurm is a grind and those who work at it should enjoy the abilities they spend countless hours unlocking.  The closest to your ideal is the new challenged server, you might want to give that a try before you implore that your version of balance is better for every server.


Edited by madnezz
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Anyone can be shield of the gone therefore it is not overpowered.  If you elect to not go for it, the rest of those who have should not be nerfed. 

That is just a ridiculous statement.

What if 90 shield bashing gave you 20 second stuns, not overpowered, anyone can grind up for it,

99 shield skill let you block 90% of attacks, not overpowered, anyone can get it.

 

 

Path of love is great for those who like to heal during a prolonged battle.

Or you can have SoTG and effectively have the double LT+take less damage.

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I voted activated ability; I have SoTG and agree it's overpowered but I really don't like how SoTG is always singled out; the knowledge +25% skillgain buff is ridiculously OP too. Meditation as a whole really needs to be reworked to only provide niche bonuses and not things that give you a massive leg up on everyone who doesn't have it.


 


The main issue more than anything is that there is always one trump card in Wurm; look at PvE servers and there is very little reason to choose anything other than knowledge; conversely on PvP servers there is little reason to choose anything other than SoTG. It's the same with large metal shields; great helms and to a lesser extent longswords and longbows.


 


I don't understand the argument that isn't not OP if everyone can get it; exactly what was the purpose of adding meditation if the intention was for everyone to end up on one path eventually; wouldn't it have been easier to just lower the damage everyone took lol?


Edited by Gavin

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In reply to Kagrenac:


 


What is your point?  If you have higher skill you are better at using that skill, what is the problem?  Seriously, you are playing the wrong game if you see a problem with that.  


 


If you had 90 in the skill weaponless fighting because you want to be some kind of Bruce Lee, would you complain about the other accounts that had 90 in the longsword skill that were more powerful than you in pvp?


 


My point of view is strictly from playing on Chaos.  If SOTG is a problem on Epic then amend your suggestions to changing the rules on Epic only please.


 


 


In reply to Gavin:


 


Where does it say that meditation must create diversity and its wrong if more players pick one path over another if those players are enjoying the same facet of the game?  


 


SOTG is powerful, yes, anything that takes a minimum of 190 days should be.  How is it overpowered when others can still attain it?  We have no problem killing players with shield of the gone, they just take different tactics and a few extra hits.  Chaos is not about your ability to 1v1 someone, it's about your ability to improve your kingdom.


 


Overpowered is an account that took advantage of exploits and/or several years worth of "windows of opportunity" that newer players will never have the chance to do, that is overpowered.

Edited by madnezz

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obviosly this is people trying to change the rules in their favor because they know they can,because they know if 3 people complain everyday about anything it will be changed.


 


and im sure even if this poll said 100% of votes wanted no change they would just take this topic as a reason to change it.


 


thats the real problem which is much bigger than the sotg topic


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obviosly this is people trying to change the rules in their favor because they know they can,because they know if 3 people complain everyday about anything it will be changed.

 

and im sure even if this poll said 100% of votes wanted no change they would just take this topic as a reason to change it.

 

thats the real problem which is much bigger than the sotg topic

 

I disagree.

 

In the Q&A it was clear to me that they decided to look at SotG only because of the large number of complaints they've received. But that they were not certain they were going to change anything because they hadn't been convinced anything was wrong. Just that it would be looked at in case a balance was needed.

 

Thats exactly why I made this thread, to give a voice to the argument besides 'Nerf This'. Given the fact we have 50% voting 'No Change' I think thats already shown its not a universal agreement that anything is wrong. The perception that you can complain about a feature in Wurm long enough and it will get changed, although not without precedent, is still inaccurate.

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