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Defiler - But wait, there's more!
Galt
Member, Beta Testers Posts: 305 ✭✭✭
So, everyone knows Defiler damage and burst is pretty OP. What risks being overlooked in this is other things about Defiler that stand out as likely overpowered, too.
Affliction tanking:
- AB SHADOWBINDING ANTIBODIES, AB SHADOWBINDING TRANSMISSION. Passive aff healing/transfer to enemy
- AB TORMENT BILESHROUD Passive % chance to ignore toxins
- AB DESECRATION HEARTBLOOD Ability to have a high chance to shrug off a specified toxin for a full minute*
- A def to greatly reduce limb damage taken
This is a problem for a variety of reasons - In isolation, all of the above are powerful, class-defining skills, like therapeutics is for Bard, yet Defiler has all of the above and they stack. %-shrugging of all toxins alone is incredible, even if it's only 10% or 15%, whilst being able to specify one toxin to have a high shrug for a full minute is incredible.
For comparison to bileshroud, we'll look at AB SHAPESHIFTING MOONAURA. Moonaura is a 20% chance to reflect a toxin back at an enemy, but the toxin still hits the hunter. As a comparison to shrugging in general, we'll look at AB SABOTAGE SHRUGGING, also found in predation. This allows the user to specify a single toxin to shrug and can be used again every 8 seconds.
The key thing here is that the above skills - Moonaura, shrugging - Are considered powerful individually, yet the Defiler has equivalents to both that are more powerful and also has passive aff healing/return.
Health:
- AB DESECRATION SUSTAIN, active heal. Costs treant HP, but they can heal the treant each combo using nurture.
- AB TORMENT BLOODDRINKER - Heals them passively based on any bleeding in room.
- AB SHADOWBINDING REGROWTH - Passive heal. Consumes haze if you're not at max health.
- AB SHADOWBINDING HEALTHDRAIN. Steal health. Scales up the lower the defiler is. Also has a mana version.
- AB TORMENT TEARS. Allows the defiler to LICK TARGET to heal, periodically. Doesn't require balance, can be used off balance.
Three passive/almost passive health restoring skills, none of which count to the regen cap, one of which scales up more in teamfights. Two active heals, because evidently one was insufficient.
Hinder:
- AB DESECRATION ENTANGLE, AB DESECRATION RIGIDITY, AB DESECRATION TEMPEST, AB BLACKVINES
- That's a spammable entangle, an aff that makes writhing take longer, a passive pet that hits with clumsiness.
Spammable entangle. Other examples of this were removed or gated - Hangedman now requires the target be prone, transfix requires blind stripped, druid entangle requires a two-step attack. Entangle, even in isolation, shouldn't work the way this currently does. Having a skill that makes writhing take even longer on a class that can passively entangle enemies on movement is a bit much, too.
Blackvines are... just awful. They entirely block flight, can be spammed in multiple rooms, always entangle enemies on movement. They shouldn't do all of that.
Holding:
- AB SHADOWBINDING MISTBIND. 33% chance to stop enemies leaving.
- AB DESECRATION BLACKVINES. Entangle on leaving a room. Completely blocks flight in the location. Can be spammed in multiple rooms. Impacts all enemies. (See also: Rigidity, entangle.)
- AB DESECRATION WHIRLPOOL - Flood. Because I guess they needed that, too. And waterwalking, since they have flood.
Timebomb classes shouldn't have good holding. It needs to have holes in it, or the timebomb becomes ridiculous. Take Bard for example - Icewalls from sketches and engage from sketches, and that's it because they're a timebomb class.
Damage:
- Relies on psychic damage, the hardest type to resist.
- Has a skill to drastically lower psychic resist. Not curable. Seems to drop people from about 30% (max minis, psychic resist ring) to -1%.
- Entropy. Entropy only decays 60 seconds after they last hit the target with an entropy-inducing skill. Almost every attack they have counts.
Each of the above categories Defiler is OP in - And there are other skills they have that seem unreasonable when looked at in a wider context. Often, their skills have multiple effects, such as rigidity and blackvines that both do multiple things which would be split into different skills on other classes. Simply put, Defiler was given far too many fun toys when it was being made, and to be made a timebomb class on top of that is frustrating as hell to fight. This is a class that can do 130-180 damage per combo, burst for 600+ using a resource that they can build up whilst still hindering a target enough to stop them having any chance of maintaining an offense, and it also happens to have random skills tacked - Flood, Waterwalking, Project, Apparition, resistance to limb damage, UnseenEye - It's like people kept asking if Defiler could have X, and just got it added without any sense for overall balance.
Defiler has more tricks in each of the three skillsets than some classes have across their entire 3 and that's not ok.
EDIT: Oh, and they get the ability to block also, for... some reason. I'm surprised they don't also get phase.
Affliction tanking:
- AB SHADOWBINDING ANTIBODIES, AB SHADOWBINDING TRANSMISSION. Passive aff healing/transfer to enemy
- AB TORMENT BILESHROUD Passive % chance to ignore toxins
- AB DESECRATION HEARTBLOOD Ability to have a high chance to shrug off a specified toxin for a full minute*
- A def to greatly reduce limb damage taken
This is a problem for a variety of reasons - In isolation, all of the above are powerful, class-defining skills, like therapeutics is for Bard, yet Defiler has all of the above and they stack. %-shrugging of all toxins alone is incredible, even if it's only 10% or 15%, whilst being able to specify one toxin to have a high shrug for a full minute is incredible.
For comparison to bileshroud, we'll look at AB SHAPESHIFTING MOONAURA. Moonaura is a 20% chance to reflect a toxin back at an enemy, but the toxin still hits the hunter. As a comparison to shrugging in general, we'll look at AB SABOTAGE SHRUGGING, also found in predation. This allows the user to specify a single toxin to shrug and can be used again every 8 seconds.
The key thing here is that the above skills - Moonaura, shrugging - Are considered powerful individually, yet the Defiler has equivalents to both that are more powerful and also has passive aff healing/return.
Health:
- AB DESECRATION SUSTAIN, active heal. Costs treant HP, but they can heal the treant each combo using nurture.
- AB TORMENT BLOODDRINKER - Heals them passively based on any bleeding in room.
- AB SHADOWBINDING REGROWTH - Passive heal. Consumes haze if you're not at max health.
- AB SHADOWBINDING HEALTHDRAIN. Steal health. Scales up the lower the defiler is. Also has a mana version.
- AB TORMENT TEARS. Allows the defiler to LICK TARGET to heal, periodically. Doesn't require balance, can be used off balance.
Three passive/almost passive health restoring skills, none of which count to the regen cap, one of which scales up more in teamfights. Two active heals, because evidently one was insufficient.
Hinder:
- AB DESECRATION ENTANGLE, AB DESECRATION RIGIDITY, AB DESECRATION TEMPEST, AB BLACKVINES
- That's a spammable entangle, an aff that makes writhing take longer, a passive pet that hits with clumsiness.
Spammable entangle. Other examples of this were removed or gated - Hangedman now requires the target be prone, transfix requires blind stripped, druid entangle requires a two-step attack. Entangle, even in isolation, shouldn't work the way this currently does. Having a skill that makes writhing take even longer on a class that can passively entangle enemies on movement is a bit much, too.
Blackvines are... just awful. They entirely block flight, can be spammed in multiple rooms, always entangle enemies on movement. They shouldn't do all of that.
Holding:
- AB SHADOWBINDING MISTBIND. 33% chance to stop enemies leaving.
- AB DESECRATION BLACKVINES. Entangle on leaving a room. Completely blocks flight in the location. Can be spammed in multiple rooms. Impacts all enemies. (See also: Rigidity, entangle.)
- AB DESECRATION WHIRLPOOL - Flood. Because I guess they needed that, too. And waterwalking, since they have flood.
Timebomb classes shouldn't have good holding. It needs to have holes in it, or the timebomb becomes ridiculous. Take Bard for example - Icewalls from sketches and engage from sketches, and that's it because they're a timebomb class.
Damage:
- Relies on psychic damage, the hardest type to resist.
- Has a skill to drastically lower psychic resist. Not curable. Seems to drop people from about 30% (max minis, psychic resist ring) to -1%.
- Entropy. Entropy only decays 60 seconds after they last hit the target with an entropy-inducing skill. Almost every attack they have counts.
Each of the above categories Defiler is OP in - And there are other skills they have that seem unreasonable when looked at in a wider context. Often, their skills have multiple effects, such as rigidity and blackvines that both do multiple things which would be split into different skills on other classes. Simply put, Defiler was given far too many fun toys when it was being made, and to be made a timebomb class on top of that is frustrating as hell to fight. This is a class that can do 130-180 damage per combo, burst for 600+ using a resource that they can build up whilst still hindering a target enough to stop them having any chance of maintaining an offense, and it also happens to have random skills tacked - Flood, Waterwalking, Project, Apparition, resistance to limb damage, UnseenEye - It's like people kept asking if Defiler could have X, and just got it added without any sense for overall balance.
Defiler has more tricks in each of the three skillsets than some classes have across their entire 3 and that's not ok.
EDIT: Oh, and they get the ability to block also, for... some reason. I'm surprised they don't also get phase.
2
Comments
You could remove half of the above skills entirely from Defiler and it would still be a solid, strong class. That's a problem.
Already agreed that entropy falloff and bellow need to be tweaked. Their passive aff shrugging can be a bit rough, especially on toxin classes. Blackvines shouldn't outright stop flying. A prone requirement on entangle wouldn't be terrible, considering team usage or that they can limb target without sacrificing too much. Could also translate it into one of the germinates that are not used ever (so 20% entropy cost or 10%+whirl balance).
All that together would be a pretty significant alteration in one round.
Demonic's professions have an incredible amount of team-fu. So much of it is holding/escape/utility unique to demonic, on strong, tanky classes. Part of it might even be a flip boot tax, heh (AM did have all the boots, for good long time).
One standout in Galt's list for sure, though, is that it's pretty unbelievable to me that Defiler can block, too. Let's give AM's Outrider block (a great, great class that got nerfs without being ruined, but certainly never had block), and then I will go be a blocking outrider.
And frankly, magick has very, very, very weak hold, and the disparity between demonic and magick there is particularly stark. We lack any sort of piety/gravehands effect. We have rubble, rubble, and also, more rubble. It took a bit for that to truly sink in when I went magick. AM can do some scary, terrible things now that Septus can stack ansuz + perma-prop with piety as a base (just add one outrider pet and things look pretty grim), but I'd really love to see someone like him leading demonic teams regularly, and using all of demonic's holds and hinders to their full capacity, all while annoying everyone greatly by also using the escape/other utility pieces and ensuring that everyone on his team also does so (I mean, I am pretty sure I wouldn't "love" it, but I bet an awful lot of cheese would shake out).
As for berserker, Owyn's actually done that... It's not a very impressive team comp mainly because berserker is surprisingly squishy and for the sentinel dance to really act as a piety, you have to dance it alone. You're also probably never going to bring a team of berserkers, but you can sure bring a team of knights. More knight more good. I mean, anyone with better options isn't jumping to use that. Runeguard totem is not perma-propped, either, and that's what makes that combination so deadly. For now we use the incredibly annoying costume, of course.
(may vanish for periods of time)
It's harder when you get a synergy between something neutral and something proprietary, or when something is totally proprietary to a circle, but transfix is transfix. No one really -likes- being handily transfixed (or entangled). I know I don't enjoy it.
As for Owyn, you really shouldn't be passing any sort of judgment on his abilities. At all.
I'm stuck on a plane with awful wifi, so just to note some things:
Defiler got block because demonic needed more professions with block. This is less relevant now because of the neutral classes, but previously they had either dk or assassin as blocking classes. Compared to the other circles, it was very subpar.
With that in mind, pick your poison. You could give block to shaman (lol), summoner (what could go wrong), old diab (it'd probably work prone too #stillbitter), or defiler. For that era of imperian, it was absolutely the right choice.
The reason noone really used to use defiler is more because of how dominant summoner damage was. If you wanted damage in demonic, you went summoner or pre nerfed shaman steal+belial.
Blackvines in multiple rooms is fine. You could make an argument that it should get the traps/piety/ghands treatment and only fire in or adjacent to the defiler's rooms, if it doesn't currently (not actually sure).
Blackvines blocking fly is an intended function, the defiler documentation is just not the best because of how many mini revamps its had.
Clever is the best offensive statpack for dk, but I'd still play athletic because tank wins fights as knight: you're slow and steady into burst if using longswords (which is where clever shines) so being able to soak some hits is vital. When clever works it really works, but athletic is much more consistent in most of the fights dk will have (vs am/magick). Basically back to the old stand by: dead people don't do any damage, and if you're rolling clever knight and someone notices you better bet you're going to get focussed hard and early.
Sentinel isn't really a piety clone. Its more like soulchains, but sentinel stops things other piety style skills don't but doesn't stop some things those skills do. It shines when you overlap it with something because though they don't stack, you get better coverage of the list of escapes you will shut down.
Most entangles are still instant functionally, just have a built in cd of some form (either on the entangle itself or the method of proning in combination with said entangle). Defiler might be the one hold out here, though I'm not including transfix in that because you can do some things to mitigate that.