Balance changes moving forward
It’s time for another big classless update.
Before getting into all the new stuff, we want to talk a little bit about the future. Going forward, we’ll be releasing smaller and more frequent updates that are more focused on one specific aspect of the game. Changes following this new direction of design allow for changes to be more flexible overall and ensures that changes are covering the focus or matter most pressing at the time, allowing you to get a consistent stream of improvements to the game.
There! Now let’s get in to the stuff we’ve been working on. This update brings a lot of buffs focused on two main areas - creating new classless synergies and ensuring gameplay diversity. Let’s get into it.
Classless power unlocked
- Expose Weakness now gives Melee attack power in addition to Ranged attack power. It no longer triggers from Auto-Shot or Raptor Strike.
- Frozen Power now increases all Frost, Fire and Nature damage taken by enemies afflicted by your Frostbrand, instead of only increasing the abilities listed in the talent.
- Death’s Embrace now increases all Shadow damage dealt to targets below 35% health. It previously only increased the damage of Warlock Shadow spells.
- Maelstrom Weapon is now a 3-point talent, from 5. The final rank of the talent is equally strong as before, it just requires less talent points to get, making it easier to incorporate this talent into your build.
- Shockwave no longer requires Defensive Stance.
- Serendipity can now also trigger from casting Holy Light and Flash of Light.
- Living Seed can now also trigger from Lesser Healing Wave.
At the very foundation of the Classless project lies our commitment to unlocking more and deeper synergies between classes. The intent of these changes is to increase the amount of options you have for how to build your character in a way that transcends class boundaries.
In order for that intent to be actualized Expose Weakness was changed not to trigger off abilities that are off the Global Cooldown. This was to avoid a scenario where all melee builds would feel forced to pick it up due to being so powerful. Even with that adjustment, this change is a major step in filling the synergy gap between Hunter builds and other Melee builds.
And to fill that gap, a new Mystic Enchant has emerged from the shadows… :
- [New Legendary Enchant] Forbidden Technique - Replaces your Shadow Dance with Forbidden Technique, firing a projectile dealing 130% Ranged Weapon damage as Shadow, teleporting you to the target and activating Shadow Dance. Your Shadow remains behind. While Shadow Dance is active, your Ambush costs 30 less energy and causes your Shadow to throw a Shadow Dagger at your target.
When Shadow Dance ends you teleport back to your Shadow, absorbing some of its power. This gives you a chance to follow up your Ranged weapon attacks with throwing a Shadow Dagger at the target, dealing bonus damage and reducing the cooldown of your Forbidden Technique by 2 seconds.
Cross-class synergies created
Beyond existing talents being unlocked to work across classes, this update brings several brand new cross-class synergies!
- Arcane Synergy has been updated. The new tooltip reads: Your Arcane Missiles reduce the cast time and increase the critical strike damage bonus of your next Starfire by 4%. This effect stacks up to 5 times. In addition, dealing damage with Arcane Missiles also extends the duration of your Lunar Eclipse by 0.2 seconds.
- Flamekeeper now also adds an attack power scaling to the damage over time effects of Fireball and Pyroblast. In addition, it now allows Fireball and Pyroblast to stack 3 times, up from 2.
- Endless Agony now has an additional mechanic. It now reads - Each time your Curse of Agony ability deals damage it increases the damage the target takes from your Curse of Agony ability by 3%. Stacks 50 times. In addition, for 12 seconds after using Mind Blast or Shadow Word: Death your Shadow spell casts increases the duration of your Curse of Agony by 1 second.
- Judge, Jury, Executioner now also makes your next Execute ignore 30% of the target's armor.
- Thunder and Lightning now also increases the damage of Shockwave.
- [New Stackable Rare Enchant] Nature’s Synthesis - Increases the healing done by your Lesser Healing Wave by 2% for each of your Nature heal over time effect active on the target.
- [New Stackable Rare Enchant] Frozen Power - Increases your Frost, Fire and Nature damage dealt to targets affected by your Frostbrand Weapon by 2%.
Aside from these supportive changes, this update also brings an entirely new type of caster - the Harbinger of Pestilence, combining the forces of Nature with the corrupting power of Shadow.
- [New Legendary Enchant] Harbinger of Pestilence - Your Insect Swarm is transformed into Insect Swarm (Plague), a Disease spell dealing Plague damage, and benefiting from the damage increase from Haunt.
Your Wrath now increases the damage of your diseases by 20% for 5 seconds, stacking 3 times. Casting Haunt while this effect is active causes an explosion of bile around the target, dealing Plague damage on up to 5 nearby enemies. This damage increases with the amount of stacks you have.
Plague damage is a combination of the Shadow and Nature schools and will benefit from the highest modifiers to either school.
Moving into a self-regulating PvP meta
As you may have gathered already, this update is relatively light on purely PvP-oriented changes. But do not worry - our PvP team is hard at work on an update scheduled to go live after the current Al’ar arena season ends (in a week). This update is aimed at solidifying the foundation for a more adaptive PvP meta. Before getting into what that means, we’ll need a little bit of context.
The PvP meta on Ascension is always changing. Not only do different build types rise and fall in popularity, but different playstyles do as well. In the past, the meta has during times been slow-paced with a focus on being tanky and having good self-healing, other times the meta has been dominated by heavy CC being traded for outs, or where CD-heavy burst-oriented builds have created a very fast-paced and explosive meta. These meta-shifts often occur organically, but have also often been partially induced by balance changes being made to the game.
The idea for the forthcoming update is to implement more tools that you can use in response to the builds you most commonly struggle with. With powerful talents and enchants available to help you deal with, for example, a CD-reliant and bursty melee build, you will have tools at your disposal build your character to be strong against the builds and playstyles that are most popular. The more players pick up those anti-burst talents, the worse those bursty melees (or control-heavy casters, or whatever it may be) will become. Voilà, you now have tools to prevent you falling victim to the flavour-of-the-month builds, and we now have a meta that is less curated by us developers, and more is in the hands of you players.
The first set of changes in this direction will come in a week, containing talent updates, new Mystic Enchants and other balance tweaks. Let us know in the on our discord what tools you’re hoping to see!
Upcoming changes to tanking
Those of you active on our discord will have seen the recent player poll in which we asked the following question:
- Would you like to see tank design changed so that keeping threat is easier and that your gameplay as a tank is more focused on actively mitigating incoming damage in order to stay alive?
With an upvote-to-downvote ratio of more than 15:1, this was clearly something the the community wanted. We’ve started working on the changes, and while we aren’t ready to go into details we would like to give an overview of what we have planned.
The changes we’re working on are focused around the following points:
- Increased baseline threat for tanks, especially for entry-level tanking. In higher difficulties, managing threat will still be important.
- Increased predictable burst damage from bosses. This damage will be particularly punishing in higher difficulties.
- New short-duration defensive cooldowns, designed to be useful for mitigating the increased damage from bosses. These defensive cooldowns will be a significant part of your gameplay and identity as a tank.
- Additional support for new tank archetypes.
With the buffs to threat generation it will be easier to get into tanking (and thus also easier to fill the tank-slot for 5-man groups), and with more options for how to play as a tank you’ll be able to find a style that suits you. The extra layer of managing your active mitigation ability will make tank gameplay feel more dynamic, especially on single-target boss fights. While this layer will be relatively forgiving for entry-level content, its ruthlessness on higher difficulties will raise the skill ceiling for tanks participating in this content.
All in all, our aim is for these changes to make tanking more appealing and accessible to get into while also being harder to fully master. Tanking is a crucial role, and your command of it will be felt by the rest of your group.
Work on these changes has already begun. Stay tuned.
In the meantime, this update unleashes an entirely new variant of Bear tank, drawing power from darker forces to vanquish their enemies:
- [New Legendary Enchant] Corrupted Bear Form - Corrupts your Bear Form, reducing your Physical damage by 30% but making your melee attacks deal additional high-threat Shadow damage.
While in Corrupted Bear Form, your Maul and Mangle (Bear) have a chance to apply Corruption and your Swipe (Bear) drains life from targets afflicted by your Corruption. In addition, Shadow Bolts made instant by Nightfall or Backlash can be cast without leaving Corrupted Bear Form and will jump, dealing some of its damage to up to two additional targets.
More changes!
The full changelog will be posted on the 20th when these changes go live, but in order to give you a little bit of time to prepare for what’s coming, here are some highlights of the most impactful changes:
- Frugal Disposition now has an additional mechanic - When your Lesser Healing Wave does not overheal, your next Lesser Healing Wave is guaranteed to critically hit.
- Mental Dexterity capstone now gives you 50% of your Intellect as spell damage, up from 30%.
- Heart of the Crusader damage has been reduced by 10%.
- [New Epic Enchant] Emanating Light - Your Consecration is transformed into Consecration (Emanate), following you as you move. Dealing damage with this spell increases your Holy damage done and reduces your Physical damage taken by 1% for 3 seconds, stacking up to 3 times. This effect cannot trigger more than once per second.
- Unrelenting Assault now reduces the cooldown of Revenge and Overpower by 0.5/1 seconds, down from 1/2 seconds.
- Improved Execute has been changed into a 3 point talent, and now reduces the rage cost of your Execute by 2/4/6 and increases its damage by 4/8/12%. This damage increase is doubled against targets below 20% health.
- [New Capstone] Improved Execute - Capstone Bonus: Using Execute on a target below 20% health increases your melee critical strike chance by 10% for 5 seconds, stacking up to 3 times.
- Titanic Strike now benefits from Impale.
- The Ranged Attack Power coefficient of the bonus damage of Aimed Shot and Compound Shot has been increased to 20%, up from 10%.
- Multi-Shot now has a cooldown of 7 seconds, down from 10 seconds.
- Focused Burst also now increases the cooldown of Multi-Shot by 3 seconds (so with the baseline cooldown reduction to Multi-Shot, there will be no net change here).
- Guerilla Tactics now also increases the damage of your Wing Clip.
- Master of Arms now grants 5% of your Strength as armor penetration rating, down from 10%, but now stacks 2 times, and grants two stacks when consuming two stacks of Strength of Arms.
- Deadly Combo now also grants a buff increasing the damage of your next Execute by 15% (10% to players), stacking up to 3 times.
- Improved Eviscerate Mystic Enchants can now be stacked up to 3 times.
- Increased the damage of Instant Poison by 10% and Deadly Poison by 15%, except while in Cat or Bear Form.
- [New Epic Enchant] Methodical Assault - Your Ambush now ignores up to 30% of the targets armor (reduced against players), but its critical strike chance is reduced by 10%.
- Hurricane now deals 10% more damage.
- The cast time reduction granted after casting Temporal Blast can now be stored up to 3 times.
- The buff from the Fragmented Glacier Mystic Enchant now increases the damage of your Mage Arcane and Fire spells by 8% when used against monsters, and 5% when used against players.
- Backlash now has a chance to trigger any time you are attacked, even if you dodge, parry or block the attack. In addition, the buff granted by Backlash now lasts for 12 seconds, up from 8.
- Firestarter now also increases the instant damage of your Flamestrike by 30%.
- Hailstorm, Fire Storm, and Rain of Arrows now all have a radius of 5 yards, down from 8 yards, and now have a 6 second cooldown.
That’s all for now! The full changelog will be posted on Saturday. Let us know what you think of these changes in our Discord!
