Coercer vs Illusionists - Balancing issues discussed.

[Tanatus]

<DIV>*Sign* </DIV> <DIV>Oki let look on coercers power drain</DIV> <DIV>We have Torment (our primary and most damaging dot) it drain 10 power every 4 second for 6 tic .... haha? major power drain you said?</DIV> <DIV>We have Devouring Toughts (I have master 1 so you can absolute maxium of this spell) it drain 68 power upon impact and 52 power for 5 more tics (4.8s) for total .... 328 power  - haha its what you call major power tap?</DIV> <DIV>Oki lets go deeper and see what else can be used for power drain</DIV> <DIV>Agonizing Silence (our stifle spell) at Adept 1  it drain ~45 power for 4 tic (5.3s) for total 180 power</DIV> <DIV>Eeri Focus (our stun that drain power over time and I GLADLY trade this for stun w/o power train so it wont brake mez) - ~25 power X3 time for total 75 power </DIV> <DIV>Seizure our secondary DD - have chance to drain power ....~46-52 per hit</DIV> <DIV>So let see who much power coercer can drain from mob within 24 second</DIV> <DIV>Torment = 40</DIV> <DIV>Devouring Toughts = 328</DIV> <DIV>Angonizing Silence =180</DIV> <DIV>Eeri Focus = 75</DIV> <DIV>Seizure = 52</DIV> <DIV>Grand Total = 675 power</DIV> <DIV>I am not taking in account resistance or recast timer here ....</DIV> <DIV>Now compare how much Illusionist can drain for same time frame?</DIV>

[Jaxidi]

<DIV>Woo, finally what I've been trying to get.  Please keep correcting my inaccuraces!  Aoine and KUPOPO, thanks for providing missing information.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>This is what I was hoping for, not the nerf me nerf you (which I probably helped fuel, sorry).  Once all of the inaccuraces of my original post are taken care of and I could re-write it to be completely accurate, at that time I would have a strong case of whether or not we're unbalanced.  I simply don't have a strong case until I know all of the facts.</DIV><p>Message Edited by Jaxidian on <span class=date_text>02-23-2005</span> <span class=time_text>08:52 AM</span>

[Jaxidi]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Tanatus wrote:<BR> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>So let see who much power coercer can drain from mob within 24 second</DIV> <DIV>Torment = 40</DIV> <DIV>Devouring Toughts = 328</DIV> <DIV>Angonizing Silence =180</DIV> <DIV>Eeri Focus = 75</DIV> <DIV>Seizure = 52</DIV> <DIV>Grand Total = 675 power</DIV> <DIV>I am not taking in account resistance or recast timer here ....</DIV> <DIV>Now compare how much Illusionist can drain for same time frame?</DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <DIV>At level 50, I'm not sure Illusionists can do more.  I'm not that high so I cannot say for sure.  Mid-level (level 40) illusionists can do more with Speechless but that spell cannot be used on end-game content (you cannot cast on mobs level 49 or higher).  I am currently level 41 and we have fought some level 49 mobs and I can't even drop the mob to 80% power before it dies (and it doesn't die quickly).  I'm sure I'll do better at 50 but right now with the spell that Coercers are so envious of Illusionists for having, I cannot.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>At any rate, I'll see if I can find some real numbers from a 50 illusionist here.</DIV>

[Ramir]

<DIV> <P><FONT size=2><EM>At level 50, I'm not sure Illusionists can do more. I'm not that high so I cannot say for sure. Mid-level (level 40) illusionists can do more with Speechless but that spell cannot be used on end-game content (you cannot cast on mobs level 49 or higher). </EM></FONT></P><FONT size=2> <P>Tanatus' numbers don't really take into a 'real world' scenario.</P> <P>Let's presume a single Coercer for a raid.  That Coercer will cast Withering Silence every 10 seconds, Devouring Thoughts every 47 seconds, and Seizure approximately every 4.5 seconds.  They will generally not use Torment since the long casting time makes it inefficient for either power drain or damage purposes.   Combing all this, you end up with a 47.5 second 'cycle' which provides one application of Devouring, a constant application of Withering, and 9.5 Seizures (due to Withering timing, on some cycles you use 10 Seizures, on others 9).  Presuming Adept III Devouring/Withering, you'll get about 600 drain over 47.5 seconds due to this pattern.  From Adept III Seizure, a good guess is that it will be triggering approximately half the time (rough guess - probably an overestimation) for a total drain of ~300 (very approximately).  This gives Coercers around 900 drain every 47.5 seconds in a raid situation.  A second Coercer will be able to (with proper timing) get nearly full efficiency from Devouring, but no drain from Withering, for 600 drain every 47.5 seconds.  A third or fourth Coercer will not be able to use either Devouring or Withering, so they will drain about 300 every 47.5 seconds.  In any case, a Coercer who is concentrating on the 900/47.5 seconds performance will be very little else - over 80% of their available time will be spent casting power drain spells.</P> <P>Illusionists using Mind Drain at Adept III will be able to drain 210 power every 10.5 seconds, or 950 drain every 47.5 seconds.  This effort will require about 20% of their total available casting time (they can do something else with the remaining 80% of their time).  A second, third or fourth Illusionist will be able to drain 150 power every 10.5 seconds, or ~680 drain every 47.5 seconds.</P> <P>Illusionists also receive a power tap roughly equivalent to Devouring that can be used once every 3 minutes.</P> <P>It should be apparent that Illusionists drain power marginally better in terms of the rate of drain, and substantially better in terms of the effort expended to drain.</P> <P>Against non-raid targets, the numbers aren't even close.  Coercers gain the use of Agonizing Silence, which is a marginal upgrade over Withering Silence (the spells share recast timers) and Eerie Focus.  Illusionists gain the use of Speechless, which will drain about 1600 power/47.5 seconds by itself, and their stun/drain which is equivalent to Eerie Focus.  Moreover, unlike Coercers, for whom stacking Withering/Agonizing makes no sense, Illusionists can combine Mind Drain (for the massive initial hit) with Speechless (for the large continuing drain) despite the recast timers.  Against a non-raid target, optimal Coercer performance is around ~25 power/second, while optimal Illusionist performance is around ~50 power/second.  And Illusionists still have about 75% of their time free to do other things, while Coercers are spending all their time power draining.</P></FONT></DIV>

[Tanatus]

<DIV>RamiroS <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> I just wanted to show phycical limit of power drain that can be theoretically achieved by coercer (who in sane mind will burn Eeri Focus for mana drain purpose? and who will use Seizure or Muddled thinking ( I have master 1 and its better drain then Seizure ever be even at lvl 50) for drain?</DIV> <DIV>Devouring toughs + Withering silence yes those a must (thirst give group crack second still stick on raid mobs and DO block low lvl special attacks like barrage, wild swing and crushing blow) - in between those coercer will most likely keep on mob - Ravage Psyche (resist debuff 1:12 duration) and Despair (even more resist debuff arcane-magic and 10% slow that stack with everything). May be in spare time I will hit target with Haruspex to keep supply tougtstones</DIV>

[Aoi]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Jaxidian wrote:<BR> <DIV>Woo, finally what I've been trying to get.  Please keep correcting my inaccuraces!  Aoine and KUPOPO, thanks for providing missing information.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>This is what I was hoping for, not the nerf me nerf you (which I probably helped fuel, sorry).  Once all of the inaccuraces of my original post are taken care of and I could re-write it to be completely accurate, at that time I would have a strong case of whether or not we're unbalanced.  I simply don't have a strong case until I know all of the facts.</DIV> <P>Message Edited by Jaxidian on <SPAN class=date_text>02-23-2005</SPAN> <SPAN class=time_text>08:52 AM</SPAN><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> <DIV>Np, I didn't really get the feeling you were one of the class envy clowns that tend to start all this mess.  Aside from what I pointed out, your original post was very accurate.  It was also a nice cross-section of Illusionist abilities and issues; thanks for the info.</FONT></DIV> <DIV></FONT> </DIV> <DIV>I think one thing we all can agree on is enchanters need some balancing "upward" in light of the recent wiz/warlock changes.</FONT></DIV> <DIV></FONT> </DIV> <DIV>I feel that probably includes the conjurors and necros as well.</FONT></DIV> <DIV></FONT> </DIV> <DIV>Cyene</FONT></DIV>

[Erasm]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Jaxidian wrote:<BR> <DIV><STRONG><U><FONT color=#ffff00 size=5>2. Crowd Control and Damage Mitigation</FONT></U></STRONG></DIV> <DIV>Again, let me first state my understandings of how the 2 classes compare:</DIV> <P><FONT color=#3300ff size=4>Stuns:</FONT></P> <UL> <LI>Illusionists get a single-target stun of significant length (10+ seconds) that has a power nuke as an added effect.</LI></UL> <P><FONT color=#ff0000>This stops working at lvl 32. And the power drain isnt noticable. </FONT></P> <P><FONT color=#3300ff size=4>Stifle:</FONT></P> <UL> <LI>Illusionists get a single-target nuke that also stifles the target.</LI></UL> <P><FONT color=#ff0000>I missed that one. I know of no such spell. All of our DD + Stifle are AoE. And its only a small chance to stifle. </FONT></P> <UL> <LI>Illusionists get an AoE DoT that also stifles the entire group.</LI></UL> <P><FONT color=#ff0000>Again, only a small chance to stifle. The AoE DD component is also very weak. At 30, Chromatic storm does 60ish and i have never noticed the stifle. Its either extremely short duration, or rarely occurs.</FONT></P> <P><FONT color=#3300ff size=4>Power Drain:</FONT></P> <UL> <LI>Illusionist's main stun is a power DD.</LI></UL> <P><FONT color=#ff0000>Again, this is in the real of not noticable. Its like daunting gaze, which you also get. Both have a power DD On them. Niether is useful for the power drain at all. </FONT></P> <UL> <LI>Illusionists get an AoE power drain (I don't know if it is DoT or DD) that also increases the group's power regeneration.</LI></UL> <P><FONT color=#ff0000>Its a power DoT/drain that we get at 48. It immobilizes us for the duration of the spell. </FONT></P> <P><STRONG><U><FONT color=#ffff00 size=5>5. Buffs</FONT></U></STRONG></P> <DIV>Let's categorize these as Haste and "Other buffs".</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Haste - First of all, please understand that haste really does suck.  There are TONS of discussions on it all over the place.  This needs not be considered for whether one is unbalanced with the other.  To clarify why, what I've seen is that a good rule of thumb to estimate how much dps Haste contributes to, basically take the haste %, divide it by 10, and that's the % increase in DPS due to haste.  For example, let's say you have a 50% haste and cast it on a tank who is doing 100dps.  The result is that the tank does 105dps.  So for you casting the buff, you just contributed to 5dps while the buff is up.  Sure, it's worth casting but it's not a huge thing.  So let's say an Illusionist's haste is 52% and a Coercers haste is 40%, that equates to very little difference in the long run.  So since they both get hastes in those general percentage areas, let's call them equal enough.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Other Buffs - there are just way too many of these to compare directly.  But based on the lack of anybody talking about them, let's assume they're roughly the same.  This needs not be considered for whether one is unbalanced with the other.</DIV> <P><STRONG><U><FONT color=#ffff00 size=5>6. Non-Combat Utility</FONT></U></STRONG></P> <DIV>Illusionists get group invisibility.  I don't think Coercers get anything for out-of-combat utility.  However, I'm going to wave the magic wand here (just like I did before when I said Illusionist's ability to solo high ^^ and named mobs needs nerfed) and say Coercers need something in this area.  I would have no problem if they got a group invisible as well.  Or something else. Whatever.  But I don't think this needs not be considered for whether one is unbalanced with the other.  This is something that absolutely in no way affects how well the group can fight and should not be considered for balancing purposes of in-combat abilities.</DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#ff0000></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#ff0000>This is where a little balance to the power regen area comes into play. </FONT></DIV> <DIV> <HR> </DIV></BLOCKQUOTE><BR> <DIV>**comments on OP in red above**</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>As for tanatus saying we can solo ^^ safely.... we cannot. We can solo one yes. That is, if you have 45 minutes, and a death wish, and a bit of luck. Its not safe by any means. Its not effective by any means. And named mobs are completely out of the qustion. The resist rates are too high. Lets jsut say I woulnt even consider killing a green ^^ much less a yellow ^^. I have killed a yellow ^^ once and I will never attempt it again. Lets put it this way. You cannot use dots, so you are stuck with mez and DD. The range on most DD is too shrot so we have to use our fast casting line ( like mind jolt from the echanter archetype). Which does 100-150 ish if not resisted ( and its resisted alot). At lvl 30 a yellow ^^ has roughly 7500 hp. At Mez has an 8 second recast and must be ready as soon as you nuke. Combined with having to move away from the mob again, you are looking at 125 dmg or so every 20 seconds. Thats a minimum of 20 minutes if everything goes perfectly and you dont have to regen power ( which is impossible). Add into that that you will need to regen power to full twice ( on average) and you also have to regen health back if you get hit. Thats another 20 minutes on average. Sometimes more, sometimes less. Combine that with a 50:50 chance ( probably alot worse) of actually surviving the fight, and its completely useless. </DIV> <DIV> </DIV>

[Scally W]

<DIV>Well [FAAR-NERFED!] like Jax won this one...</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>From the test server update notes:</DIV> <DIV>Mind's Eye, Dreadful Thoughts, and Consuming Thoughts have had their power reduction reduced to be more in line with that of Illusionists.<BR></DIV> <DIV>BTW the coercers are already getting a list of ill. nerfs together for Sony...  Maybe a taste of your own medicine will get you to [FAAR-NERFED!] and teach you how to ask for an improvement instead of pointing out someone for a nerf.  /flipoff</DIV>

[Tanatus]

<DIV>Scally list very simple</DIV> <DIV>Uninteruptable mez in conjuction with second mez line totaly tivilize raiding instances like SOF and make for Illusionist SAFE solo named mobs at lvl 50</DIV> <DIV>SINGLE spell Mind Drain - drain almost 2000 power per single cast - providing enouth targets within group but how many raiding targets you have seen a single mob - its almost always 4-5 targets</DIV> <DIV>Group invisilibity totally trivilize zones like LS and Solusek A  - there is no time or risk involved any more in travel...</DIV> <DIV>Illusionists AE doing over 2000 damage per cast providing big enouth group of monsters </DIV>

[KUPOPO]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Tanatus wrote:<BR> <DIV>Scally list very simple</DIV> <DIV>Uninteruptable mez in conjuction with second mez line totaly tivilize raiding instances like SOF and make for Illusionist SAFE solo named mobs at lvl 50</DIV> <DIV>SINGLE spell Mind Drain - drain almost 2000 power per single cast - providing enouth targets within group but how many raiding targets you have seen a single mob - its almost always 4-5 targets</DIV> <DIV>Group invisilibity totally trivilize zones like LS and Solusek A  - there is no time or risk involved any more in travel...</DIV> <DIV>Illusionists AE doing over 2000 damage per cast providing big enouth group of monsters </DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> <DIV>dude learn to spell.</FONT></DIV> <DIV>And seriously where are you pulling this info from? they said earlier mind drain takes like 200-300 power from a single target, not 2000! Someone already refuted this tstuff about safe soloing of named mobs at 50(of course he wasn't 50, so maybe...). </FONT></DIV> <DIV></FONT> </DIV> <DIV>As for trivializing raid instances, well, a mez is a mez. It looks like an illusionist could keep 4 mobs mezzed where a coercer gets 3(assuming cycled 40 second mezzes with 8 second recasts and some wiggle room since it breaks early, with the extra short mez suited for one extra mob). That difference would only matter if you fought five doubleups at once... is there a raid like that?  Most include a triple-uparrow that takes four or five times as long to kill as all the goons put together... mezzes and aoe's don't matter there. So the illusionists will lose their extra mez just like jax said, and they won't care. And they'll lose their aoe's, and also not care. The hit to the manaregen coercers are gonna get is so much worse.... it's really a shame....</FONT></DIV> <DIV></FONT> </DIV>

[Orki who Pos]

<DIV>kupopo, if most of us had not played back when you had 2 overlapping mez spells, just after becomming coercer or illusionist, we might believe it was not a major advantage to have 2 mez spells.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>The truth is:</DIV> <DIV>A: You can lock down mobs nearly twice as fast, mez 1, mez 2, stun, mez 1, is way way superior to mez 1, stun, wait, mez 1</DIV> <DIV>B: If you get resisted, you cast the other one. This is superior to getting beaten on by the longest shot.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>While it might seem trivial to you, i can sure remember how [Removed for Content] i became back when my first mez spell stopped working on mobs in varsoon, and suddenly i only had 1 mez spell left.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>You might also think that having a 3 seconds encounter stun is relatively useless, but this is actually the time it takes a scout to evac, or a healer to pop off one of the big group or single target heals. I think i can remember a situation i was in once where one of those could have helped slightly.. yah.. maybe more than once, eh?</DIV>

[Tanatus]

<DIV>KUPOPO</DIV> <DIV>you still did not realized power of uninteriputable mez dont you?</DIV> <DIV>Well allow me enlight you then  - then you do <STRONG><EM><U>multi group </U></EM></STRONG>encounter like SOF then you need deal with 2-4 group at once every time trap goes off. While for illusionist resistance on mez cause nothing but light annoiance for coercer it mean I am going TANK - and no way around it. Entrall cause serious agro I CAN NOT stun mob and then mez because my stun drain power of time and thuse will brake mez in first tic of drain occur - illusionist dont suffer such problem either your stun drain power once upon landing and as such allow you your long duration stun in conjuction with mez as CC tool. Oki back to resistances - If you insisting that coercer can hold 3 mob on ice (which never been a case even before resistance nerf) you are very mistaken. During Fright fight in SOF enchanter need to keep 2 mob on ice - but while for coercer it take all hist time to do so (Entrall, Ravage Psyche, Entral, Ravage Psyche) - for illusionist its simply trivial plus you can contribute greatly into actuall fight - coercer can not. More over as I said if my mez resisted I am going to tank - while for coercer it mean I dont know then I will able get that bloody mez off because of contant intruption, illusionist can simply run in circle and spawn his Entrance untill it stick with zero risk and zero efforts</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>About power drain do simple math Mind drain suck power much faster then Devouring Toughts but I can leave with it - but it suck power from every single mob in AREA  - do you realize that? Average raid encounter have 5 mob within pack - Mind drain suck 320 power from EVERY SINGLE MOB - doing 1920 power drain per CAST - now do another math coercer devouring toughts MASTER 1 lvl spell drain 313 power per CAST now go and figure how many time coercer would need cast before nerf Devouring toughts to achieve same effect</DIV>

[stewi]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Tanatus wrote:<BR> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>About power drain do simple math Mind drain suck power much faster then Devouring Toughts but I can leave with it - but it suck power from every single mob in AREA  - do you realize that? Average raid encounter have 5 mob within pack - Mind drain suck 320 power from EVERY SINGLE MOB - doing 1920 power drain per CAST - now do another math coercer devouring toughts MASTER 1 lvl spell drain 313 power per CAST now go and figure how many time coercer would need cast before nerf Devouring toughts to achieve same effect</DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <P>When you say it like that, the illusionist spell does indeed sound much more powerful that the coercer equivalent. But in practice you wont find this to be so. 3 reasons..</P> <P>1. in a raid this spell would not be the first priority. the primary concern is to get ^^^'s minions mezzed first thing.. which leads to 2. since its an aoe, any mob that is mezzed will not be affected by the power drain.  and finally 3. in a raid ^^'s drop so fast its hardly worth attempting to drain them, and 320 is just a drop in the bucket by the time we get this spell. And with a recast of 3 minutes its not like i will be chaining this to suck massive amounts of power.</P> <P>Now if we are talking normal groups, say a group of 5 with no arrows, that 320 power drain per mob is again essentially worthless. Mobs in those situations drop so fast that even if i try to drain them i rarely get more than 2 drained, and thats with chaincasting speechless.. Something you may not know, speechless requires 2 casts even on no arrow mobs. which equates to them having at least 750.. probably 1000 or more power. and this is at lvl 40. a one time hit of 320 power is not going to drain them, and i certainly wont be following up draining them either.. these mobs will die with reserves of power, and power draining has absolutely no effect unless you drain them completely before the fight is over.</P> <P> </P> <P>oh, and one last thing, Mind drain is our speechless upgrade, and is only a single target spell. The spell you are thinking of is Devitalizing Stare, an aoe power drain + group power regen.</P> <DIV> </DIV>

[KUPOPO]

<DIV> <DIV>Orki,</DIV> <DIV>I never called the extra mez trivial! Never said a darn thing about aoe stun either(don't both classes get it in the end though?). I said that an extra 20 second mez wouldn't trivialize raid instances like tanatus was claiming. It'll let you lock stuff down faster sure, but after that phase of locking htings down is over, it'll really only allow the illusionist to keep one more mob mezzed than the coercer. So it's not going to make too dramatic a difference - if 4 doubleups come, the illusionist will be doing better until the first one is killed, after which there will be only 2 mobs to mez, which will likely already be mezzed regardless of who's doing CC. And when it comes down to fighting a tripleuparrow mob, well, mezzing is gone entirely. So it won't trivialize fyst in the deathfist citadel raid, or the various raid mobs like coldtooth, agelidaes, the overfiend, steel golem, venekor, etc. etc. etc.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>And tanatus,</DIV> <DIV>running around while mezzing shouldn't make so much difference in a group. If the chanter gets aggrod on, he's dead. Illusionists don't have any more hp than coercers afaik. The advantage of that running mez thing is soloing, that bit about being able to solo doubleups/names in hour-long fights. That's really about it....</DIV> <DIV>So you should stop complaining about that 'uninterruptible' thing because it's not really what makes illusionists better at cc. That stun/dot thing you mentioned is by far a bigger problem, and the two-mez thing. I never said that illusionists weren't better at cc though, it's obvious that they are. But you should keep your points in order, you only defeat yourself by using this ranting, disconnected style. And keep facts straight.</DIV></DIV>

[Blub]

<b>running around while mezzing shouldn't make so much difference in a group. If the chanter gets aggrod on, he's dead. Illusionists don't have any more hp than coercers afaik. The advantage of that running mez thing is soloing, that bit about being able to solo doubleups/names in hour-long fights. That's really about it....</b>Thats not really true. Since your mezz cannot fizzle and is uninteruptable, it also has in groups a signifcant advantage. I can remember several occasions when I tried to mezz an add which instantly aggroed me due to the brezze aggro everyone creates, and got beaten down after my mezz was interrupted.If I could be sure that my mezz never gets interrupted (except if I get stunned) AND i can take some steps back, it sure would make group mezzing some more easier.On the other site, there was not _one_ single encounter where I needed to cast mezz while I was stifled or stunned. There are very few situations were you get stiffeld and and basicly none where you would want to mezz anything while stifled.<p>Message Edited by Blubby on <span class=date_text>02-28-2005</span> <span class=time_text>01:57 AM</span>

[KUPOPO]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Blubby wrote:<BR><BR>Thats not really true. Since your mezz cannot fizzle and is uninteruptable, it also has in groups a signifcant advantage. I can remember several occasions when I tried to mezz an add which instantly aggroed me due to the brezze aggro everyone creates, and got beaten down after my mezz was interrupted.<BR>If I could be sure that my mezz never gets interrupted (except if I get stunned) AND i can take some steps back, it sure would make group mezzing some more easier.<BR><BR>On the other site, there was not _one_ single encounter where I needed to cast mezz while I was stifled or stunned. There are very few situations were you get stiffeld and and basicly none where you would want to mezz anything while stifled. <P>Message Edited by Blubby on <SPAN class=date_text>02-28-2005</SPAN> <SPAN class=time_text>01:57 AM</SPAN><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <P>Never been stunned or stifled by a mob while mezzing eh? That's odd, I've been stifled dozens of times. Many mobs drop a stifle or stun as their first shot. It screws up tanks so they can't taunt, and often has an added interrupt effect that screws up chanters of either type if they're the target. Short ones of 3 sec duration or so are actually quite common. Some mobs(lamias for instance) can drop a stifle that lasts up to 12 seconds. Oh, and if they land during a casting of entrance, the spell doesn't get completed. It gets *gasp!* interrupted.</FONT></P> <P>Of course, if you tried to mez while stifled you wouldn't notice now would you? Your mez would go off, you wouldn't get a 'cannot cast' message, and you'd be none the wiser.</P> <P>The illusionist and coercer main-line mezzes are balanced compared to each other. It's the two-mez thing, and the no stun/mez combo because of power damage over time, that are unbalancing.</P> <P> </P>

[totalgarb]

<DIV>One of the major aspects of balance between the two classes seems to be that coercers can regenerate power for the group more effectively and illusionist can power drain more effectively.  Only one of these has been nerfed.  Even the illusionist's ability to AE drain power from mobs and increase group power regen, only the power regen part has been reduced.</DIV><p>Message Edited by totalgarble on <span class=date_text>02-28-2005</span> <span class=time_text>12:50 AM</span>

[Vurin]

Just my 2 cents. A lot of the new "epic" encounters as well as Hallmark related instances have large numbers of adds being commonplace.That said whether the fight is 2 double ups and 2 triple ups, or 8 double ups odds are in either case I'm not going to bother mezing. Our raid tanks can tank a pile of dobule up like that without breaking a swea, and I can't do Jack about the triple ups. So I break out the AEs, Stifle the double ups for 12 seconds and by the time 30 seconds passes over half of them are dead.In short what I'm saying is: yes, encounters exsist where it might seem to a Coercer "[expletive ninja'd by Faarbot] it'd be nice if I had that extra mez like illusionists since there's so many adds", but to the illusionist all he's thinking is "[expletive ninja'd by Faarbot], if Color Shower landed on triple ups I'd be doing twice as much DPS in this encounter."Not trying to trivalize 2 mezes usefulness either. I use both mezes far more than I first thought I might. A raid just isn't that place.BTW... how come no one mentioned the fact that @ 50 ( as well as mid 30s) both clases mez are blue and thus can't fizzile, and making our secondary feature partly useless =)Hmm... come to think of it I think Capture Mind can still Fizzile ( i.e. not blue)... should pay closer attention.

[Orki who Pos]

<DIV>>In short what I'm saying is: yes, encounters exsist where it might seem to a Coercer "[expletive ninja'd by Faarbot] it'd be nice if I had that extra mez like illusionists since there's so many adds", but to the illusionist all he's thinking is "[expletive ninja'd by Faarbot], if Color Shower landed on triple ups I'd be doing twice as much DPS in this encounter."</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>There, however does not exist situations where the illusionist would think, ughh, i wish i was a coercer..</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>and that.. is the problem</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV>

[Erasm]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Orki who Posts wrote:<BR> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>There, however does not exist situations where the illusionist would think, ughh, i wish i was a coercer..</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>and that.. is the problem</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> <DIV>What would it take to rectify that? Lets assume that Coercers and Illusionists will never be equal in Power regen ( going to the coercer) and power drain ( being the illusionists specialty). Its obvious by the recent nerf that this is intended. Coercers are intended to have better power regen, illusionists are intended to have better power drains. So that leaves mez, stuns, DPS, and utility. </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Coercers seem to have an advantage as far as stuns go, except the fact that it breaks mez ( no stun + mez for coercers). </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Illusionists win at mez, but mainly because we have 2 mezzes 40+. Believe me, as an illusionist, sometimes I wish I had the Coercer version. And other times Im glad I have the one that I do have. That aspect is situational ( and balanced). I agree coercers should have 2 mezzes. </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>DPS is situational. It would take some actual parsing from different characters to really make any kind of realistic projections here. I wont pretend to know which is better at this. Illusionists say coercers have better DPS. Coercers say Illusionists have better DPS. So many DPS skills are broken on both sides that its hard to tell anyway. </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Utility goes hands down to the Illusionist. Group invis is great. Coercers get a reactive hate proc to help the tank keep hate. Both are useful, but group invis wins. </DIV> <DIV> </DIV>

[Orki who Pos]

<DIV> <DIV>>Coercers seem to have an advantage as far as stuns go, except the fact that it breaks mez ( no stun + mez for coercers). </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#ccccff>On what do you base that coercers have an advantage in stuns?</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#ccccff>Coercers basically have one stun line with long duration, and so does illusionists. (daunting gaze line) Coercers stun also breaks mez. </FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#ccccff></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#ccccff>Illusionists also has short casting time stuns, and area stuns.</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#ccccff>The coercer short duration stun has a way too long casting time to be usefull, most does not have it on their hot-bars. It was nice till lvl 30ish, but the upgrade is really really bad. (supefy line).</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#ccccff></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#ccccff>When coercers finally get an area stun at 50, it still has 3x longer casting time than the equal spells illusionists have had since lvl 30.</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#ccccff></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#ccccff>If you think having no short cast short duration stun (post 33 mobs), and having no area stun (lvl 30), and getting no instant cast stun with hate reduction (lvl 43), is better than having them, then you seriously need to recheck your spell lists.</FONT></DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>>Utility goes hands down to the Illusionist. Group invis is great. Coercers get a reactive hate proc to help the tank keep hate. Both are useful, but group invis wins. </DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#ccccff>And besides that, the coercer spell doesn't work, invis does.</FONT></DIV> <DIV> </DIV></DIV><p>Message Edited by Orki who Posts on <span class=date_text>02-28-2005</span> <span class=time_text>01:03 PM</span>

[Scally W]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> KUPOPO wrote:<BR> <BR> <P>The illusionist and coercer main-line mezzes are balanced compared to each other. It's the two-mez thing, and the no stun/mez combo because of power damage over time, that are unbalancing.</P> <P> <HR> </P></BLOCKQUOTE>Excellent point Kupopo.<BR>

[KUPOPO]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Orki who Posts wrote:<BR> <DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#ffffff></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#ccccff>If you think having no short cast short duration stun (post 33 mobs), and having no area stun (lvl 30), and getting no instant cast stun with hate reduction (lvl 43), is better than having them, then you seriously need to recheck your spell lists.</FONT></DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>>Utility goes hands down to the Illusionist. Group invis is great. Coercers get a reactive hate proc to help the tank keep hate. Both are useful, but group invis wins. </DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#ccccff>And besides that, the coercer spell doesn't work, invis does.</FONT></DIV> <DIV> </DIV></DIV> <P>Message Edited by Orki who Posts on <SPAN class=date_text>02-28-2005</SPAN> <SPAN class=time_text>01:03 PM</SPAN><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE>You got some info about that level 43 spell wrong. Barrier of intellect is a self-only buff that stuns attackers, has a fairly short duration(as far as I know) and a really long recast timer. It is the illusionist equivalent of reek of terror, which coercers get at the same level. It is not an instant cast stun. <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>The issue of broken spell lines is a big one. The biggest one really.  bewilder and perplexity are short-duration stuns upgraded from stupefy, but have a 4 second casting timer instead of one second like stupefy. That is a fix that's been needed for a while. The illusionist second mez was a fix to a broken spell line btw... it's a shame that the emphasis in the latest patch has shifted from fixing broken spell lines for chanters, to nerfing them. Complaining about another person's class is unhealthy for everyone.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>And I'd like to know exactly how annoying demeaner works/fails to work please, in more detail. I have heard conflicting reports about how effective it is.  Is the problem that it only makes melee hits draw more hate, when melee damage only accounts for a tiny fraction of hate in the first place? </DIV> <DIV>Group invis that illusionists get is basically a cross-archetype style power - it lets the illusionist partially fill the role of a rogue... just like evac does for wizards. Balance ought to dictate that the power coercers get in place of it have similar effectiveness. It ought to allow a healer or scout who has it cast on them to hold aggro in a group, if necessary.</DIV> <P>Message Edited by KUPOPO on <SPAN class=date_text>02-28-2005</SPAN> <SPAN class=time_text>08:52 AM</SPAN></P><p>Message Edited by KUPOPO on <span class=date_text>02-28-2005</span> <span class=time_text>08:56 AM</span>

[Gildon]

<DIV>Please - when you start a 'comparison' and you already have it set that one is better than other (here you are mad at coercers) - you immediately negate any valid points.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>It's clear - each has advantages over the other.... SO WHAT.  </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>This game has so many other more pressing issues - copycat spells.... mobs that negate spells effectiveness because of level,  and you can't do anything......etc. etc.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Your entire 'post' is like a Michael Moore film, begin with  a bias point of view and find stuff to support YOUR opinion while ignoring all other facts.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>ESPECIALLY facts that contradict your opinion.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Also, another example is when you argue with conflicting opinions about YOUR opinion.  Serious indicator you ARE biased and not really trying to balance.... trying to improve your class at the expense of another.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Gildon</DIV>

[Tanatus]

<DIV>Gildon as it stands now Illusionist have upper hand in EVERY SINGLE ASPECT of been enchanter class</DIV> <DIV>Crowed Control</DIV> <DIV>Untility</DIV> <DIV>DPS</DIV> <DIV> </DIV>

[Jaxidi]

<DIV>Thus far following this conversation, my opinions are such for level 50 chanters:</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><STRONG>Against a single ^^ mob:</STRONG></DIV> <DIV>??? wins on power drain (single-target power drain)</DIV> <DIV>Coercer wins on DPS (bigger single-target nukes)</DIV> <DIV>Coercer wins on power regen</DIV> <DIV>Tie on stuns</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><STRONG>Against a group of ^^ mobs (where mezzing is needed):</STRONG></DIV> <DIV>Illusionist wins on mez (second mez) OR Illusionist wins on DPS (AE dps is a non-factor when you mez everything, Illu's have larger DPS nukes) but not both</DIV> <DIV>??? wins on power drain (due to mez, consider single-target power drain)</DIV> <DIV>Coercer wins on power regen</DIV> <DIV>Tie on stuns</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><STRONG>Against a group non-^^ mobs (i.e. no mezzing):</STRONG></DIV> <DIV>Illusionist wins on DPS (larger DPS nukes)</DIV> <DIV>Tie on power drain (based on the fact that you're probably not power draining in this situation - I don't unless healer is low on power)</DIV> <DIV>Coercer wins on power regen</DIV> <DIV>Tie on stuns</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><STRONG>Against a ^^^ mob + adds (no mezzing):</STRONG></DIV> <DIV>Illusionist wins on DPS for adds then Coercers win on DPS for ^^^ mob (AoE DDs versus single-target DDs)</DIV> <DIV>??? wins on power drain (ignore adds, just ^^^ mob is relavant here most likely, so single-target power drain on a ^^^ mob)</DIV> <DIV>Coercer wins on power regen</DIV> <DIV>Tie on stuns</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><STRONG>Against a ^^^ mob + adds (mezzing):</STRONG></DIV> <DIV>Illusionist wins on mez (second mez)</DIV> <DIV>??? wins on power drain (if you're mezzing, consider you're power draining too, single-target and then single-target ^^^)</DIV> <DIV>Coercer wins on power regen</DIV> <DIV>Tie on stuns</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><STRONG>When you're not fighting:</STRONG></DIV> <DIV>Illusionist wins by a lot on utility (group invis)</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><STRONG>When you are fighting:</STRONG></DIV> <DIV>Coercer wins by an arguable amount on utility (agro buff)</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Please correct me where I'm wrong in the above breakdown.  My assumptions for the above break down (again, correct me where I'm wrong):</DIV> <UL> <LI>Ignore imbalances because of broken spells - they need to be fixed.  Your arguing is better spent getting the devs to fix the broken spells than arguing here about it (both coercers and illu's alike)</LI> <LI>Only ^^ mobs get mezzed</LI> <LI>Only ^^ mobs get power drained</LI> <LI>50 Illusionist stuns = 50 Coercer stuns</LI> <LI>50 Illusionist AoE DPS > 50 Coercer AoD DPS</LI> <LI>50 Coercer single-target DPS > 50 Illusionist single-target DPS</LI> <LI>50 Illusionists get to keep their 2nd mez (they never used to have a 2nd mez until the big patch that gave us 15-min buffs)</LI> <LI>50 Coercer power regen > 50 Illusionist power regen</LI> <LI>In general, haste sucks and we need it to work better than it currently does before we consider basing any changes off of this (and for argument's sake, I would gladly let SOE nerf my Illu's haste to be exactly equal with Coercer's haste until this is done so there is no argument).</LI> <LI>I'm still not convinced one class is better than the other with power regen.  I've not read the test notes you guys have referred to and have been really busy, so pardon my ignorance in recent changes here.</LI></UL> <P>I've not considered other buffs (int, power, health, etc.) nor have I considered debuffs.  Both classes seem happy with their buffs and seem to hate or trivialize their debuffs.</P> <P>As before, if I have any misinformation here, please do correct me.</P> <P> </P> <P>A couple other comments:</P> <P>Illusionists mez gets interrupted a lot by stun and stifle (even the non-interruptable one).  Non-interruptable mez is only useful for solo'ing, which mind you, I never solo.  So for that effect, pick your poison.  You want to be able to mez when you're stunned or stifled for 10 seconds but can't mez when 6 / / mobs attack you - go coercer.  Want to be able to mez when 6 / / mobs attack you but not when you're stun/stifled for 10 seconds - go Illusionist.  Only reason Illusionists have a significant advantage in the mez department is from run/mez while solo and the second mez that has a 20-second duration (something I am not convinced will stay).</P> <P>Coercer stuns = Illusionist stuns.  There are 2 potentially valid arguments against this I've seen repeated: 1)  Coercers only get an AoE stun at 50   and 2) Coercer single-target stun has a power DoT effect that breaks mez.  Since I'm only talking about lvl50 chanters, the first concern doesn't apply.  The second concern I do see as an issue.  But my response is that you need to lobby for the devs to address the issue.  My suggestion is that you try to convince them to have a mez wipe out all DoT effects (and if you attempt this, I'm sure we Illusionists would wholeheartedly back you up).</P> <P>Power Drain:  Please educate me here as I'm no longer up-to-date on the status here.</P> <P>Utility:  My opinion is that Illusionists need a little in-combat utility fluff added and coercers need a significant out-of-combat utility added.  I don't know what these are, please offer suggestions!</P> <P><STRONG>Speechless:  <U>This CANNOT be used on level 49 or higher mobs.</U></STRONG></P> <P>Okay, back to work...</P> <P>-Jax</P>

[Ramir]

<DIV> <P><EM>Never been stunned or stifled by a mob while mezzing eh? That's odd, I've been stifled dozens of times.</EM></P> <P>Unless the mob is casting a spell on you, I'm a bit curious why you were standing there just taking the hit rather than kiting the mob and mezzing at the same time.  Coercers have to take that stun/stifle hit.  Illusionists don't, because they can mesmerize while in motion.  These mesmerizes are not remotely close in performance.  Illusionists have the best single target mesmerize in the game.  Coercers have the fourth best - after Illusionists, Swashbucklers, and Troubadors.</P> <P>A few other general inaccuracies:</P> <P>1. The pet compensates for a single superior nuke line.  In any situation where Beguile is not used, Illusionists have approximately the same single target damage and significantly better AE damage.  In situations where Beguile is used (which are fairly rarefied), Coercers have a single target damage advantage.  In raid situations, Illusionists have an enormous single target damage advantage since the Coercer main nuke does not stack with other Coercers.</P> <P>2. Illusionist power drain is significantly better than Coercer power drain.  Numbers are discussed elsewhere, but the difference against double-up and below is greater than the power restoration difference between the two classes.  Even against triple-up mobs, Illusionists are better.  Qualitatively, Illusionists are far better in one aspect: you don't want to drain many raid-level mobs, since their casting is significantly less than their melee.  Illusionists avoid casting a single spell.  Coercers must avoid casting half of their spells in such a circumstance.</P></DIV>

[Tanatus]

<DIV>Jax </DIV> <DIV>Its been told many time vs. Single target Scorching beam with Dot attached about as good as best Coercer nuke</DIV> <DIV>Illusionist win already on power regeneration - you power drain gave group 2X more power per tic then coercers ever was before nerf, Insight give on 33% more power per tic compare to Clarity (according to Mayo Insight give 53 power per tic vs. 40 power tic Clarity)</DIV> <DIV>What tie on stun you see? - coercers stun do NOT stack with mez yours DO - that's is you can use stun for CC I cannt what to discuss here?</DIV> <DIV>As it stands now</DIV> <DIV>lvl 50 Illusionist stuns > lvl 50 Coercer stuns</DIV> <DIV>lvl 50 Illusionist DPS > lvl 50 Coercer DPS</DIV> <DIV>lvl 50 Illusionist Power regeneration > lvl 50 Coercer Power Regeneration</DIV> <DIV>lvl 50 Illusionist CC >>>>> lvl 50 Coercer CC</DIV> <DIV>No please tell me how the [expletive ninja'd by Faarbot] this balanced ah?</DIV>

[Sephimu]

<DIV>Woah guys, is this really doing either class any good?</DIV> <DIV>I play a 50 coercer and good friend is a 50 illusionist. A lot of crowd control is simply down to player ability rather than number of spells anyway. And one small point on most of the spells since folks are talking about the top end game. Try them on a raid mob and you will find most of them wont land. All the stiffles, stuns etc will result in the message "mob to powerful".</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>In answer to the original post, thought stones are created when a monster dies after some of our dd spells have been cast on it. Easy to get annoying not to have at times, sometimes your whole inventory gets full of them. And they are small and blue <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>And if you want a chuckle, find a high lvl woodworker, get a totem of the hawk. Clickable item that grants 70mana per tick regen for 3mins. Yay! the piece of wood is the winner <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Nana</DIV> <DIV>lvl 50 chocolate fairy, oh and I mez stuff too.</DIV>

[KUPOPO]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> RamiroS wrote:<BR> <DIV> <P><EM>Never been stunned or stifled by a mob while mezzing eh? That's odd, I've been stifled dozens of times.</EM></P> <P>Unless the mob is casting a spell on you, I'm a bit curious why you were standing there just taking the hit rather than kiting the mob and mezzing at the same time.  Coercers have to take that stun/stifle hit.  Illusionists don't, because they can mesmerize while in motion.  These mesmerizes are not remotely close in performance.  Illusionists have the best single target mesmerize in the game.  Coercers have the fourth best - after Illusionists, Swashbucklers, and Troubadors.</P> <P>A few other general inaccuracies:</P> <P>1. The pet compensates for a single superior nuke line.  In any situation where Beguile is not used, Illusionists have approximately the same single target damage and significantly better AE damage.  In situations where Beguile is used (which are fairly rarefied), Coercers have a single target damage advantage.  In raid situations, Illusionists have an enormous single target damage advantage since the Coercer main nuke does not stack with other Coercers.</P> <P>2. Illusionist power drain is significantly better than Coercer power drain.  Numbers are discussed elsewhere, but the difference against double-up and below is greater than the power restoration difference between the two classes.  Even against triple-up mobs, Illusionists are better.  Qualitatively, Illusionists are far better in one aspect: you don't want to drain many raid-level mobs, since their casting is significantly less than their melee.  Illusionists avoid casting a single spell.  Coercers must avoid casting half of their spells in such a circumstance.</P></DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> <DIV>Kiting? In a group? In a zone full of aggro mobs? What would that mean, running around in a circle? Try it some time, even normal melee shots will land on you if you run an aggro mob in a circle. Furthermore, melee stuns have fast casts, as combat arts they work while running, and like I said show up as THE FIRST HIT. Ask any seasoned tank, they'll tell you about it. You think you can just dodge it? LOL. And yes, the stifles are often spells, too.</DIV> <DIV> And what is this nonsense about swashbuckler and troubador mezzes being better than a coercer mez? They work just like fascinate, but with a longer recast timer. How exactly is that better? </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I won't speak to the dps aspect; until a couple level 50 chanters of opposite classes have a burn-the-mob contest with a combat log parser to calculate dps, and post the results up somewhere, all the arguments about it amount to just so much hot air. </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>As for powerdrain, illusionists in the endgame lose that oh-so-powerful speechless entirely(all mobs level 49 and up are immune) so it's just an imbalance in how easy they are to level(but not really - look at stewieG's post <A href="http://eqiiforums.station.sony.com/eq2/board/message?board.id=26&message.id=2803" target=_blank>http://eqiiforums.station.sony.com/eq2/board/message?board.id=26&message.id=2803</A>&nbsp<img src="/smilies/8a80c6485cd926be453217d59a84a888.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> The powerdrain difference in the end-game is very minor(less than 25% difference if they both go all-out powerdraining), and made up for by the fact that coercers get a stifle(agonizing silence) they can use on endgame mobs, while illusionists get nothing but an aoe stifle with a long recast - basically as good as another stun. This means that against a level 50 mob, the coercer can keep it stifled permanently while the illusionist can not. How's that for an imbalance? Well it isn't really, when you think about it...</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I've said it before and it bears repeating, Illusionists and Coercers were never really imbalanced(unless you believe idiots like Mayo and Tanatus). They are meant to do different things better. Illusionists were meant to be better at CC. That is why they were specced with two endgame mezzes from the beginning. Coercers were meant to be better at power regen. That is why they were specced with two different power regen lines from the beginning. Illusionists were supposed to get better buffs, Coercers were supposed to get better debuffs. Illusionists were supposed to get better damage over time, Coercers get better upfront damage. There is a deliberate symmetry here, and most of the perceptions of imbalance come from taking a shallow and narrow view of things.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV><p>Message Edited by KUPOPO on <span class=date_text>03-01-2005</span> <span class=time_text>04:42 AM</span>

[Ma]

Are you kidding me every encounter I would bring more to my group with the power regen you coercers posess. Fights like Darth that are loooong fights what coercers bring just makes illus look completly PATHETIC. Dont worry the nerf bat will soon hit and hopefully they did it right and bring your regen in line with illus. But mayo you can run and mez woooooooooow [expletive ninja'd by Faarbot] that is some crazy ability huge imbalance because i can now solo blues in 25 min please nerf it. ohh yea what about your AE thats some crazy dps mayo. No its not even at 50 plus your having your AE fixed which I hope does a nice ammount of dmg so you cant complain about this BS ability we have over you. Power regen is king in this game coercer power regen is too powerful and throws our class balance way out of wack they need to even it out a bit and no if they do that it wont make us the same it will make us more equal and coercers less powerful. I think I covered the most common responses used over and over and over by you coercers. Oops i forgot one whaaaaaa my power regen is gettin nerfed whaaaaaa. hahaha

[Zephyrus1]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Mayo wrote:<BR>Are you kidding me every encounter I would bring more to my group with the power regen you coercers posess. Fights like Darth that are loooong fights what coercers bring just makes illus look completly PATHETIC. Dont worry the nerf bat will soon hit and hopefully they did it right and bring your regen in line with illus. But mayo you can run and mez woooooooooow [expletive ninja'd by Faarbot] that is some crazy ability huge imbalance because i can now solo blues in 25 min please nerf it. ohh yea what about your AE thats some crazy dps mayo. No its not even at 50 plus your having your AE fixed which I hope does a nice ammount of dmg so you cant complain about this BS ability we have over you. Power regen is king in this game coercer power regen is too powerful and throws our class balance way out of wack they need to even it out a bit and no if they do that it wont make us the same it will make us more equal and coercers less powerful. I think I covered the most common responses used over and over and over by you coercers. Oops i forgot one whaaaaaa my power regen is gettin nerfed whaaaaaa. hahaha<BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <P>I've basically stayed out of this argument to this point... but Mayo, you've absolutely lost your grip on reality it seems.  Read the post directly above yours.  Now that is a player that knows what they are talking about.  The subclasses in this game were always intended to be opposing forces.  While we all share similar spells, each class would specialize at something that was near the exact opposite of the other.  For enchanters it goes like this...</P> <P>Damge:</P> <P>  Coercer - Direct</P> <P>  Illusionist - AE</P> <P>Power:</P> <P>  Coercer - +regen</P> <P>  Illusionist - +drain</P> <P>Utility:</P> <P>  Coercer - debuffs</P> <P>  Illusionist - buffs</P> <P>CC:</P> <P>  Coercer - Mez while stifled</P> <P>  Illusionist - Mez on the move</P> <P>... do you see where I'm going with this?? You calling for a nerf to the coercer regen spells, is in effect the first move in actually UN-balancing the classes.  You are complaining in an attempt to remove a class defining effect.  So what that coercers could do a slightly better job as crack dealers.  Your class has it's own strengths that outshine anything even us Coercers can do.  Would you prefer that all spells get changed to the exact same thing??  That is the ONLY way the classes would ever be truly balanced.  Then, the only difference would be which city you call home.  </P> <P> </P> <P>Do some more research Mayo, and try looking at things from the other side of the table from time to time.<BR></P> <p>Message Edited by Zephyrus154 on <span class=date_text>03-01-2005</span> <span class=time_text>09:47 AM</span>

[Scally W]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Mayo wrote:<BR>Are you kidding me every encounter I would bring more to my group with the power regen you coercers posess. Fights like Darth that are loooong fights what coercers bring just makes illus look completly PATHETIC. Dont worry the nerf bat will soon hit and hopefully they did it right and bring your regen in line with illus. But mayo you can run and mez woooooooooow [expletive ninja'd by Faarbot] that is some crazy ability huge imbalance because i can now solo blues in 25 min please nerf it. ohh yea what about your AE thats some crazy dps mayo. No its not even at 50 plus your having your AE fixed which I hope does a nice ammount of dmg so you cant complain about this BS ability we have over you. Power regen is king in this game coercer power regen is too powerful and throws our class balance way out of wack they need to even it out a bit and no if they do that it wont make us the same it will make us more equal and coercers less powerful. I think I covered the most common responses used over and over and over by you coercers. Oops i forgot one whaaaaaa my power regen is gettin nerfed whaaaaaa. hahaha<BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> Mayo your ignorance has now reached rude levels.  Your post definately borders on harrassment and I for one will be using the link provided at the bottom of every message by SOE for just these occasions.  Go troll in your own forums we're done with you here.  Your unhappiness with your class is not related to any other classes' performance.  Enough is enough - someone else's abilities do not detract from you.  Given your attitude around here it's not your lack of spell-X that keeps you from getting groups;  if you think a couple of extra ticks of power is all it takes to be the best ever you are sadly mistaken.  What you have done here is set a nerf-bat cycle in motion.  You've stirred the feces and the karmic wheel will turn (sooner than you think), and your class may end up getting nerfed as well from all the negative attention you've sought. <P>Message Edited by Scally Wag on <SPAN class=date_text>03-01-2005</SPAN> <SPAN class=time_text>12:59 PM</SPAN></P><p>Message Edited by Scally Wag on <span class=date_text>03-01-2005</span> <span class=time_text>02:06 PM</span>

[TeveLeezardba]

Classes are ment to be different. If you want to contribute more power to your group, play a Coercer - Don't just "try to balance" it, because you've accomplished quite the opposite. Maybe if you actually put some facts behind what you said your arguements would be more convincing - even Tanatus backed up his arguement with facts, even if they weren't complete he's done more to prove his point than you have. You've done nothing but ride on speculation and hate, and made things miserable for all of us. Grow up, play a Coercer(Because you obviously envy our strengths more than your own class's strengths, seeing as you hate us for them) and learn to be less annoying, you're not helping anything by being iresome to an entire community of players that pay the same money you do to play this game. The difference is we're happy with our choice of class, we were happy to take 1 mez instead of 2. We were happy to take no AE stuns, worse buffs, and a total lack of AE damage for the strengths the devs gave us. Maybe if you responded to the points I just brought up previously, without saying "oh blah blah blah yur just mad becauz im 1337er than you now lolz, you do something better than my class so it MUST be imbalanced blah blah blah" I'd actually have some respect for you. So what say you? How can you justify us taking hits in Crowd Control, AE damage, AE Stuns, buffs, and a few other points - without having some compensation in return? Explain to me how it is balanced now, with facts - not just blind speculation and blanket statements as you've done in the past.

[Ma]

I backed all of my statements by facts and NUMBERS. NUMBERS dont lie but tant thinks its story time on these boards and his posts contain little facts. He completly over exagerats his posts and destroys all crediability. we were happy to take 1 mez instead of 2. umm they just added that and unless you just made your char which it really sounds like it then that could not have been a factor in choosing a coercer over an illus. No AE stuns? you have one at 50 but it currently is not working it soon will tho and you will see how useless these are. Illus is about a 3 sec durration with 35 or 45 sec recast making it a waist of power in 99% situations. AE dmg? you got use beat in single target dmg. How many times do i have to repete myself read my [expletive ninja'd by Faarbot] posts they will answer all your questions because i am not going to keep repeting myself and proving myself correct time and time again its getting tedious and I dont think people want to keep reading it over and over. Explain to me how a max of 174 power a tick to the group is AT ALL balanced. Power is used in every combat situation and is key to sucess in all combat. The benifit of all that power drasticly crushes the small smg we do in AE situations the 12% haste we have over coercer and the un needed running mez/2 mezzes that provide very little benifit themselves. If you had 20 power a tick more to each group member that would still be better then our advantages because you multiply that by the group members thats 120 extra power a tick that is somthing that goes a long way. Not a AE stun not a extra mez so you can lock down mobs you dont need to mez quicker and not our pretty weak AE.What are you gona say to that? I suggest you go back to blackburrow and get some levels.

[mino]

The numbers are all made up n your head Mayo you have no hard facts and to state that you do is purely a lie<p>Message Edited by minobu on <span class=date_text>03-01-2005</span> <span class=time_text>12:37 PM</span>

[TeveLeezardba]

You have backed up nothing with numbers. Where are the Damage levels and Recast timers for all these spells you claim to be worse? Maybe you should try doing what I asked instead of making more blanket statements. Including a few numbers doesn't mean you've included facts. This is what I want to see:Coercer spell NameEffectPower CostRecast TimerCast TimervsIllusionist Spell NameEffectPower CostRecast TimerCast TimerHell, lets go one step further - and put each spell in situations they might be used in. Get some actual Coercers and Illusionists to input data here, as the person who wrote the first post in the thread intended. The time for half-truths and half-measures is over, get down to the nitty-gritty and lets eliminate fiction from fact.Also, in response to you labeling alot of your spells "useless", perhaps you're just not skilled enough of a player to monopolize on them. I haven't seen any other Illusionist complain about their spells being worthless or pointless to cast. Yes, Power is the lifeblood on which groups run, which is why we had it better to begin with. I'm willing to bet if you parsed an entire fight with an Illusionist vs a Coercer in that group you would find that things balance out in the fact that you're more effective outside of your power regen. In other words, the extra damage you do and extra things you contribute cause the mobs to die just as fast as we cause them to. In other words, you have to cast more than 3-5 spells a fight to accomplish this - I'm sure other Coercers will agree with me when I say that our class achieves its potiential by being active, casting as much as possible without causing aggro or other problems in the fight. But don't take my word for it, lets get some actual facts up here where they should've been all along. I'd like to hear something different from you rather than the same pointless, discredited statements you've made verbatum since you started this whole arguement.Go back to Blackburrow? It sounds like someone just isn't secure enough about their "facts" and has to resort to name-calling to defend themselves. Grow up son, time to face the music.<p>Message Edited by TeveLeezardbane on <span class=date_text>03-01-2005</span> <span class=time_text>10:55 AM</span>

[Scally W]

<DIV>My best advice is if you think something is wrong with your class then post what and why - the devs have been very responsive to the consolidated issue posts.  Don't make comparisons to other classes, what they have or don't have isn't your concern.  What you feel is wrong with your class is your concern and you should be able to voice your opinion without harshing another class in the process.  There is no coercer vs. illusionist issue - similarity is not equality in all aspects.  The issue is whether YOUR class needs adjusted, worry about your own backyard not ours.</DIV>

[TeveLeezardba]

Thats exactly my point, actually. However I wasn't the one that turned this isn't a Us VS Them type arguement. Mayo started that long before we started responding to it. However, the context of this thread is to examine and cross-examine the differences and balance between the two classes. That is why the thread is titled "Coercer vs Illusionists - Balancing issues discussed.", if it were something else, I could see where you have merit in what you say. Whats funny is that this thread was started by an Illusionist, if you even read the first post you'd know that. I've already /feedback'd my opinion on the changes happening now, and many other have(and if you haven't, you should). My point is that while we both have our strengths and weaknesses, we're balanced in the fact that we do have strengths and weaknesses. There is no more to it than that. Do you call down nerfs on guardians for being too good at holding aggro? Do you call down nerfs on healers for being the only ones that can heal like they do? I don't think so, in fact I think anyone who saw that would respond very much in the way we have to this nerf coming our way - its rediculous. Looking at the spectrum of Enchanter-related abilities, Coercers recieve superior talent at two things: DebuffingPower Granted to the groupBy the same token, Illusionists recieve the following Enchanter-related abilities that are superior:Crowd ControlStuns(both AE and Single)BuffsOutside of those functions, Illusionists are slightly ahead of Coercers in a few other areas that I won't go into since they have been repeatedly mentioned before this post. The point of this is simple: Coercers are better with their Areas because they recieve less of them. Illusionists recieve many more areas to make up for the fact that Coercers get such a huge one as one of their two arenas of expertese.What I don't believe is that Illusionists are so bad at the two areas that they cannot function in a manner that still makes them useful to a group for those aspects. Their strengths make up for that, even though they are weaker in areas where Coercers remain dominant. The same goes for Coercers, they can survive just fine - though less able - on the abilities they are entrusted with. The point of all this is simple, we're different because we're different classes - we shouldn't be balanced in all areas because we're not the same class. We're individual. We're unique. We're different.It sounds to me like the Illusionist population as a whole isn't extremely displeased with their class, they have their downfalls sure - but I find that to be no different than every Coercer out here wishing they had some of the things Illusionists have. So please, don't tell me your class is horrible or that my class is way too powerful. We're all strong and weak in places that make us unique - the last thing I want to see in this game is a bunch of classes that are all effectively the same thing. That would make for a very poor game.

[Scally W]

<DIV>I wasn't referring to your post specifically Teve, it's a point I'm making to the community as a whole.  Either way what I posted does have merit regardless of the thread name.  It's an exercise in futility to debate the two classes and is just causing ill-will between the two groups.  Trolls started this argument and hijacked the discussion but we do not have to continue to feed their appetite for negative attention.  I stand by what I said, we need to move away from the comparisons and just directly address what each class feels they need regardless of what the other class has.  That approach will get something done.  SOE will ignore these types of argumentative threads other than to lock them if the thread gets too disruptive to the community.  Which at this point I think it has.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Edit: Clarified so Jax doesn't have another aneurysm.</DIV><p>Message Edited by Scally Wag on <span class=date_text>03-01-2005</span> <span class=time_text>04:02 PM</span>

[Zephyrus1]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Mayo wrote:<BR><FONT color=#ff0000>I backed all of my statements by facts and NUMBERS</FONT>. NUMBERS dont lie but tant thinks its story time on these boards and his posts contain little facts. He completly over exagerats his posts and destroys all crediability. <BR><BR>we were happy to take 1 mez instead of 2. umm they just added that and unless you just made your char which it really sounds like it then that could not have been a factor in choosing a coercer over an illus. No AE stuns? you have one at 50 but it currently is not working it soon will tho and you will see how useless these are. Illus is about a 3 sec durration with 35 or 45 sec recast making it a waist of power in 99% situations. <FONT color=#ffff00>AE dmg? you got use beat in single target dmg.</FONT> How many times do i have to repete myself read my [expletive ninja'd by Faarbot] posts they will answer all your questions because i am not going to keep repeting myself and <FONT color=#66ff00>proving myself correct </FONT>time and time again its getting tedious and I dont think people want to keep reading it over and over. <BR><BR>Explain to me how a max of 174 power a tick to the group is AT ALL balanced. Power is used in every combat situation and is key to sucess in all combat. The benifit of all that power drasticly crushes the small smg we do in AE situations the 12% haste we have over coercer and the un needed running mez/2 mezzes that provide very little benifit themselves. If you had 20 power a tick more to each group member that would still be better then our advantages because you multiply that by the group members thats 120 extra power a tick that is somthing that goes a long way. Not a AE stun not a extra mez so you can lock down mobs you dont need to mez quicker and not our pretty weak AE.<BR><BR><FONT color=#3333ff>What are you gona say to that? I suggest you go back to blackburrow and get some levels.<BR></FONT> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <P><FONT color=#ff0000>Your numbers were proven wrong time and time again.</FONT></P> <P><FONT color=#ff0000></FONT><BR><FONT color=#ffff00>Good to know we got ya beat in single target damage.  At least we have something then.  Oh... but let us not forget that over 80% of the encounters at high levels are multiple mobs.  So we get to throw one nuke and awit for recast while you can toss an area nuke and do upwards of x6 the damage.</FONT></P> <DIV><FONT color=#ffff00></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#66ff00>I have yet to see anything from you that shows the least bit of intellect, let alone anything showing you are correct.</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#66ff00></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#3333ff>Numerous people have responded to your posts providing hard facts.  Over the course of what 6 threads now, all you've resorted to are basic flames and heresay.  I'm sorry you think your class is weak.  Maybe you should learn to play better and get over your envy.  I suggest you go back to IoR and learn how to play again.  Better yet, stop spending so much time complaining, and try actually playing for once.</FONT></DIV>

[TeveLeezardba]

My mistake Scally Wag, I thought you were referring to my post. Yes, this is futile - but it still upsets me to see people with the wrong idea going unchallanged. That is the only reason I even bothered.

[Scally W]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> TeveLeezardbane wrote:<BR>My mistake Scally Wag, I thought you were referring to my post. Yes, this is futile - but it still upsets me to see people with the wrong idea going unchallanged. That is the only reason I even bothered.<BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> Np bro, I know we're on the same page.  It's very hard not to reply, can't tell you how many vicous posts I deleted before hitting the button concerning this issue.  On a brighter note, Moorguard did respond to our consolidated thread the other day on what we need fixed.  :smileyhappy:

[Jaxidi]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Tanatus wrote:<BR> <DIV>Jax </DIV> <DIV>Its been told many time vs. Single target Scorching beam with Dot attached about as good as best Coercer nuke</DIV> <DIV>Illusionist win already on power regeneration - you power drain gave group 2X more power per tic then coercers ever was before nerf, Insight give on 33% more power per tic compare to Clarity (according to Mayo Insight give 53 power per tic vs. 40 power tic Clarity)</DIV> <DIV>What tie on stun you see? - coercers stun do NOT stack with mez yours DO - that's is you can use stun for CC I cannt what to discuss here?</DIV> <DIV>As it stands now</DIV> <DIV>lvl 50 Illusionist stuns > lvl 50 Coercer stuns</DIV> <DIV>lvl 50 Illusionist DPS > lvl 50 Coercer DPS</DIV> <DIV>lvl 50 Illusionist Power regeneration > lvl 50 Coercer Power Regeneration</DIV> <DIV>lvl 50 Illusionist CC >>>>> lvl 50 Coercer CC</DIV> <DIV>No please tell me how the [expletive ninja'd by Faarbot] this balanced ah?</DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <DIV>Tanatus, my opinions/thoughts:</DIV> <DIV>- Regarding the stun, I think it best for SOE to change the Coercer stun such that if a mez is cast on top of it, the DoT effect is halted.  This would be a good resolution for what you're complaining about here.  Even without this though, I don't think it is fair to say Illusionists are unbalancingly (if that's a word) better than Coercers with stuns.  Afterall, you could, in theory, drop the stun as you're casting the mez (if/when SOE ever fixes the maintained spell window).</DIV> <DIV>- Regarding the single-target DPS, if a Coercer cannot provide more single-target DPS than an Illusionist, this is wrong IMO.  They should and SOE should make this so.  Maybe this means giving Coercers a line of DoTs or something, maybe it's so you can chain-nuke your big nuke like wizards can now, I don't know.</DIV> <DIV>- Regarding power regen, 2 things:  First of all the Illusionist power tap nuke/dot/whatever has a recast timer MUCH MUCH longer than the Coercer.  I believe Coercers have a 45-second recast timer that begins ticking down from the second you cast where Illusionists have a 150 second (this # may be off, I'm going from pure memory here) recast timer that begins ticking from when the last cast's effect was over (essentially making it a 170 second recast timer).  Secondly, what about the group-targeted power regen?  That stacking with Clarity makes coercer power regen >>> illusionist power regen.  I read somewhere that SOE posted they were changing Coercer power regen (if that was accurate, I've not read it yet - been uber busy at work).  If/when SOE changes coercer power regen, my opinion is that coercers should be able to do approximately 25% better power regen than Illusionists if all are in agreement that coercer power regen should be better than Illusionist power regen.  100% better was too much.  If they nerf coercers to be even or less than Illusionists, this is WRONG and should not be done.</DIV> <DIV>- If Coercers feel that Illusionists' second mez is completely and totally unbalanced, fine, take it back out.  I've said this from the start that I thought it was an accident that we got the second mez.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>So taking the above into account (balance, not actual abilities):</DIV> <DIV>lvl50 Illu stun == lvl50 coerc stun</DIV> <DIV>lvl50 Illu AoE DPS > lvl50 coerc AoE DPS</DIV> <DIV>lvl50 Illu single-target DPS < lvl50 coerc single-target DPS</DIV> <DIV>lvl50 Illu power regen < lvl50 coerc power regen</DIV> <DIV>lvl50 Illu CC == lvl50 coerc CC</DIV> <DIV>lvl50 Illu power drain <STRONG>?????????????</STRONG> lvl50 coerc power drain  (seems Illu should be > coerc to balance out the power regen of Coercers)</DIV> <DIV>lvl50 Illu out-of-combat utility >>> lvl50 coerc out-of-combat utility (Coercers need SOMETHING here)</DIV> <DIV>lvl50 Illu in-combat utility << lvl50 coerc in-combat utility (Illusionists need something here)</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>How would Coercers feel about this?</DIV>

[Jaxidi]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Scally Wag wrote:<BR> <DIV>Your response is out of line Jax, inappropriate and not keeping with your otherwise intelligent posts. <HR> </DIV></BLOCKQUOTE> <DIV>I agree</DIV><p>Message Edited by Jaxidian on <span class=date_text>03-01-2005</span> <span class=time_text>03:17 PM</span>

[ProteusTielaxi]

There is a key point here.Most of your complaints, Mayo affect the level 50 game. Quite frankly, other than some uber p0w3rG4merz...WHO CARES?You remind me of one person I grouped with who, after every fight ran a program that would tell the group everyone's DPS for the fight, and would whine if people "didn't perform. Min-maxer to the extreme.The KEY issue is balance in the 10-40 range, where the vast, vast majority of the player population are.Nobody cares if one class gives x better regen than another in Raid environments, because, quite frankly, the majority of players may raid only a few times in their career.You will find, as you level, and Raid, that you get invited on a raid, NOT because of the abilities of your class, but based on YOUR ability to PLAY your class, and work well with others.Raiding is all about people, and relationships. Nobody gives a #(*$(#@*( about 20 extra points of power regen, or 20 extra DPS. If they do, then you're in a l33t p0w3rd00d guild, and you might want to consider getting a life.In this range, our AE is clearly inferior, we don't have the ability to mez while moving, have two mez's..etc. We don't have the uber-powerdrain of stiffle. So, we get better DD.None of it matters. Instead of concentrating on useless garbage issues like this that only effect very limited situations, how about combining our efforts to get the devs to look at some of the REAL issues affecting both our classes.1) Since the last patch, mitigation is horribly nerfed, and makes the game, especially solo, no fun anymore. We get hit for 2-3x more melee damage now.2) Since the last patch, resists are horribly nerfed. This greatly affects soloing, and forces you to group with melee mobs of equal or lower level, since spells have a very low chance of hitting red mobs.3) We need to get our damage upgraded, to follow the archetype system. We are supposed to be mages, thus we should be able to at least outdamage Guardians and priest classes, if not scouts. Illusionist DD is, quite frankly, pathetic. Coercer AOE is equally pathetic. Both should be increased.4) Root needs to be fixed. As it stands now, its useless for both our classes.Lets worry about these REAL issues, and not muddy the waters with the other crap that affects 1% of the enchanter population. Remember, the game is supposed to be FUN. Its a GAME.<p>Message Edited by ProteusTielaxi on <span class=date_text>03-01-2005</span> <span class=time_text>12:55 PM</span>

[Scally W]

<DIV>Jax, I was referring to the overall argument going on.  The troll(s) are best personified as Mayo etc., who imo has hijacked your well-meaning if not poorly titled thread.  It was not necessarily a cut on you or this thread. -HOWEVER- This is not a "versus" issue.  The term "versus" suggests antagonism.  Your response is out of line Jax, inappropriate and not keeping with your otherwise intelligent posts.  See how hot this issue has made everyone?</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Faar-ver-nerfen - The ultimate in posting experience.</DIV><p>Message Edited by Scally Wag on <span class=date_text>03-01-2005</span> <span class=time_text>03:56 PM</span>

[Scally W]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> None of it matters. Instead of concentrating on useless garbage issues like this that only effect very limited situations, how about combining our efforts to get the devs to look at some of the REAL issues affecting both our classes.<BR><BR>1) Since the last patch, mitigation is horribly nerfed, and makes the game, especially solo, no fun anymore. We get hit for 2-3x more melee damage now.<BR>2) Since the last patch, resists are horribly nerfed. This greatly affects soloing, and forces you to group with melee mobs of equal or lower level, since spells have a very low chance of hitting red mobs.<BR>3) We need to get our damage upgraded, to follow the archetype system. We are supposed to be mages, thus we should be able to at least outdamage Guardians and priest classes, if not scouts. Illusionist DD is, quite frankly, pathetic. Coercer AOE is equally pathetic. Both should be increased.<BR>4) Root needs to be fixed. As it stands now, its useless for both our classes.<BR><BR>Lets worry about these REAL issues, and not muddy the waters with the other crap that affects 1% of the enchanter population. Remember, the game is supposed to be FUN. Its a GAME. <P>Message Edited by ProteusTielaxi on <SPAN class=date_text>03-01-2005</SPAN> <SPAN class=time_text>12:55 PM</SPAN><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE>Yes, yes... that's what we need.  Dump the nonsense threads and let's get this good material into consolidated threads the devs will read and respond to.  These angry threads they couldn't give two Faarnerfs about.<BR>

[Althena]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> ProteusTielaxi wrote:<BR>There is a key point here.<BR>Most of your complaints, Mayo affect the level 50 game. Quite frankly, other than some uber p0w3rG4merz...<BR>WHO CARES?<BR>You remind me of one person I grouped with who, after every fight ran a program that would tell the group everyone's DPS for the fight, and would whine if people "didn't perform. Min-maxer to the extreme.<BR><BR>The KEY issue is balance in the 10-40 range, where the vast, vast majority of the player population are.<BR>Nobody cares if one class gives x better regen than another in Raid environments, because, quite frankly, the majority of players may raid only a few times in their career.<BR>You will find, as you level, and Raid, that you get invited on a raid, NOT because of the abilities of your class, but based on YOUR ability to PLAY your class, and work well with others.<BR>Raiding is all about people, and relationships. Nobody gives a #(*$(#@*( about 20 extra points of power regen, or 20 extra DPS. If they do, then you're in a l33t p0w3rd00d guild, and you might want to consider getting a life.<BR><BR>In this range, our AE is clearly inferior, we don't have the ability to mez while moving, have two mez's..etc. We don't have the uber-powerdrain of stiffle. So, we get better DD.<BR>None of it matters. Instead of concentrating on useless garbage issues like this that only effect very limited situations, how about combining our efforts to get the devs to look at some of the REAL issues affecting both our classes.<BR><BR>1) Since the last patch, mitigation is horribly nerfed, and makes the game, especially solo, no fun anymore. We get hit for 2-3x more melee damage now.<BR>2) Since the last patch, resists are horribly nerfed. This greatly affects soloing, and forces you to group with melee mobs of equal or lower level, since spells have a very low chance of hitting red mobs.<BR>3) We need to get our damage upgraded, to follow the archetype system. We are supposed to be mages, thus we should be able to at least outdamage Guardians and priest classes, if not scouts. Illusionist DD is, quite frankly, pathetic. Coercer AOE is equally pathetic. Both should be increased.<BR>4) Root needs to be fixed. As it stands now, its useless for both our classes.<BR><BR><FONT color=#ff3300 size=4><STRONG>Lets worry about these REAL issues, and not muddy the waters with the other crap that affects 1% of the enchanter population. Remember, the game is supposed to be FUN. Its a GAME.</STRONG></FONT> <P>Message Edited by ProteusTielaxi on <SPAN class=date_text>03-01-2005</SPAN> <SPAN class=time_text>12:55 PM</SPAN><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE>amen<BR>

[Tanatus]

<DIV>Jax as it stands <STRONG><EM>now</EM></STRONG> ....</DIV> <DIV>Illusionist CC far superior over Coercer CC</DIV> <DIV>Vlast majority of encounters in the end-game are "pack" encounters that consist from 2+ mobs. Illusionist have 2 great spells for that case - Color Shower - its AE Rain spell in sence it give 4 wave X135 damage per wave per mob. In a sence you do ~520 damage per mob if you have average raid encounter we are talking about at very least 2K damage per cast. On top of it you have AE that do ~350 per target every 12 second - that's your primary attack toss here Scorching Beam 350DD + around 100-200 (?) afterward dot</DIV> <DIV>Coercer have naturally 2 nukes line Tyrranical Mind (if you have 2 coercer on raid only 1 can cast this spell they not stack...) that hit relaible at Adept 3 in mid 500s with 9 second recast and Seizure that hit every 2 second in low 200s but cost as much power as our big nuke. Combined damage, recast timer and power cost of our DoTs make em useless in comparisson to our DD</DIV> <DIV>Simply and blant say now coercer useless DPS wise during raid enviroment .... </DIV> <DIV>Untility what debuffs you are talking about? The only worth while debuff that coercer have (and it not work properly because it dont stack with other classes debuffs) - is broadband resistance debuff (~1100-1500 at lvl 50 at Adept 1)</DIV> <DIV>But all in all - I'd give everything to Illusionist for 1 and only 1 thing - powerfull charm. I dont want to be manawhore, I dont want to be buff/debuff monkey - that was not a reason I made coercer in a first hand. I wanted CHARM. SoE fixed many problem with Biguile few more remain. If my beguile will work on full power I wont give a danm about every other skill</DIV>

[Blub]

<b>Regarding the stun, I think it best for SOE to change the Coercer stun such that if a mez is cast on top of it, the DoT effect is halted. </b>Actually the best would be if sony would fix our broken second (supposed) fast caststun line, instead of only fixing grammer errors on this spell. If this had a casttime of 1 second like the first version had, it would be a viable backup stun which oculd be used before mezzing again.4 seconds casttime for this spell is just so stupid and shows that noone from those devs has every played a coercer beyond lvl 30 to evaluate the use of our spells.

[Jaxidi]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Tanatus wrote:<BR> <DIV>Jax as it stands <STRONG><EM>now</EM></STRONG> ....</DIV> <DIV>Illusionist CC far superior over Coercer CC</DIV> <DIV>Vlast majority of encounters in the end-game are "pack" encounters that consist from 2+ mobs. Illusionist have 2 great spells for that case - Color Shower - its AE Rain spell in sence it give 4 wave X135 damage per wave per mob. In a sence you do ~520 damage per mob if you have average raid encounter we are talking about at very least 2K damage per cast. On top of it you have AE that do ~350 per target every 12 second - that's your primary attack toss here Scorching Beam 350DD + around 100-200 (?) afterward dot</DIV> <DIV>Coercer have naturally 2 nukes line Tyrranical Mind (if you have 2 coercer on raid only 1 can cast this spell they not stack...) that hit relaible at Adept 3 in mid 500s with 9 second recast and Seizure that hit every 2 second in low 200s but cost as much power as our big nuke. Combined damage, recast timer and power cost of our DoTs make em useless in comparisson to our DD</DIV> <DIV>Simply and blant say now coercer useless DPS wise during raid enviroment .... </DIV> <DIV>Untility what debuffs you are talking about? The only worth while debuff that coercer have (and it not work properly because it dont stack with other classes debuffs) - is broadband resistance debuff (~1100-1500 at lvl 50 at Adept 1)</DIV> <DIV>But all in all - I'd give everything to Illusionist for 1 and only 1 thing - powerfull charm. I dont want to be manawhore, I dont want to be buff/debuff monkey - that was not a reason I made coercer in a first hand. I wanted CHARM. SoE fixed many problem with Biguile few more remain. If my beguile will work on full power I wont give a danm about every other skill</DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> <DIV>I'll agree with much of this.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><STRONG><EM>Now</EM></STRONG>, Illu CC > Coercer CC but I half expect it to change and would welcome that change.  I expect either Illu's will get <EM>nerfed</EM> (although I think what we have <STRONG><EM>now</EM></STRONG> is a mistake so this nerf is just going back to how it was before) or I would be happy for Coercers to get a second mez.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Illusionist AoE DPS > Coercer AoE DPS - no arguments here.  Do you think it's unbalanced too heavily in Illu's favor - is that your point?  (Wasn't quite sure where you were going talking about Color Shower.)</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I would be very happy to see Coercers get a more useful charm.  How about something like this:  You can charm any even or ^ mob of any encounter (well, level-dependent) and your charm will last 45 seconds and will have a 20-second recast.  This will allow you to have a resist and still have a second chance to try to recharm it.  I was about to say I'd be happy to see the Coercer be able to keep the charmed pet until all other mobs of that encounter die but I can see some serious exploitation of that going on.  Would this be more useful to Coercers?  Hell, I'm probably the wrong guy to make suggestions here.  I don't know jack about your charms.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>-Jax</DIV>

[Blub]

<b>You can charm any even or ^ mob of any encounter (well, level-dependent) and your charm will last 45 seconds and will have a 20-second recast. </b>Um actually we can already charm ^ mobs up to orange I think and have a 8 seconds recast timer. The charm lasts only 36 (?) seconds through.However while this sounds quite useful, it really isn't in most fights. For soloing it won't work and when you are in a group the added dps doesn't makes up the hassle you have to charm the pet, keep it attacking and deal with the aggro after charm breaks. It is not like in EQ1 were a charmed mob could outdamage everything (and thats understandable).I personally would rather like to have the illus pet, but all in all I think it their pet and the fixed charm are more or less even.<p>Message Edited by Blubby on <span class=date_text>03-02-2005</span> <span class=time_text>03:09 AM</span>

[Jaxidi]

<BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Blubby wrote:<BR><B>You can charm any even or ^ mob of any encounter (well, level-dependent) and your charm will last 45 seconds and will have a 20-second recast. </B><BR><BR>Um actually we can already charm ^ mobs up to orange I think and have a 8 seconds recast timer. The charm lasts only 36 (?) seconds through.<BR>However while this sounds quite useful, it really isn't in most fights. For soloing it won't work and when you are in a group the added dps doesn't makes up the hassle you have to charm the pet, keep it attacking and deal with the aggro after charm breaks. It is not like in EQ1 were a charmed mob could outdamage everything (and thats understandable).<BR>I personally would rather like to have the illus pet, but all in all I think it their pet and the fixed charm are more or less even. <P>Message Edited by Blubby on <SPAN class=date_text>03-02-2005</SPAN> <SPAN class=time_text>03:09 AM</SPAN><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <DIV>If the spell sticks for 36s and you can recast it every 8 seconds, why is there ever a problem for when it breaks?  You should have plenty of time to refresh it before it breaks.  I fail to understand.</DIV>

[Vurin]

I'm not even a coercer but you can't cast offensive spelsl ( such as Beguile) on your own pet. hence its certain to break before it can be refreshed.

[Jaxidi]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Vurin wrote:<BR>I'm not even a coercer but you can't cast offensive spelsl ( such as Beguile) on your own pet. hence its certain to break before it can be refreshed.<BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <DIV>That sounds like it would be nice if you could and that it would solve a lot of their problems.  Makes sense to me...</DIV>

[Signal9]

<DIV>We've also got the old Frenzied Burnout bug - Once the mob breaks charm, it keeps all of the group buffs as if it was still part of your broup.  Including the Coercer's resist buffs, that make it a [expletive ninja'd by Faarbot]-sight harder to re-charm at all.</DIV>

[Tanatus]

<DIV>Jix couple problems with Beguile...</DIV> <DIV>Major problem that mob after brake lose keep ALL buffs (including my own mental resistance buffs ... what an irony...). Coercer can boost Mental resist 2K+ easy thus same per simply cannt be recharmed - beguile will resist. Still no answer from developers either this been done by design (to prevent coercer from keeping same pet for a long time) or it stimply bug. As it stands now I can achieve higher DPS with charmed pet then with stacking ALL my offensive spells all together (that just to give you an idea how badly suck coercers DPS at lvl 50)</DIV> <DIV>About raw DPS via offensive spells </DIV> <DIV>I am not talking about just AE - I am talking average DPS of class over duration of raid/grouping. Using Color Shower on single target is probably overkill and overburn of power but none the less it give same damage as coercer best single target nuke at Adept 1 lvl. What I would like to see is 1K nuke with 9 second recast - which will be still far behind warlocks but will give coercer far advantage in DPS over Illusionist</DIV>

[Blub]

<b>As it stands now I can achieve higher DPS with charmed pet then with stacking ALL my offensive spells all together</b>Hmm what are you charming? Vision of Vox? <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> Within 36 seconds i can land about 3-4 times 600 from our main nuke + and maybr 500-800 with dots (~2300-3200 dmg) without any hassle. I have yet to see a ^ mob who really does more damage in that time while beeing charmed (hmm well except casters maybe, but those are quite rare to charm)<p>Message Edited by Blubby on <span class=date_text>03-02-2005</span> <span class=time_text>05:23 PM</span>

[Shagittari]

<DIV>Its hard to tell how much DPS the charmed mobs are putting out but it sure seems like with all the dancing around and hesitation that a charmed mob does I can do more DPS by nuking.</DIV>

[Tanatus]

<DIV>Blubby I normally I charm regular or + type of mob and guess what? They EASY do 2000 damage per pop with special attack (Crushing Blow, Barrage) and around 400-900 with regular melee attack. Toss here that once mob charmed it fully buffed with group buffs that include haste, str, agi </DIV> <DIV>Just to give some sence what can do NPC vs. you DPS wise.....</DIV> <DIV>Go to Feerrott, find 2 lvl 38-39 (just for your safety really, since I dont give a danm about get killed at lvl 50 I did it at higher lvl mobs) recluses and attack em....</DIV> <DIV>Try 2 different tactic</DIV> <DIV>a) Mez one and nuke [expletive ninja'd by Faarbot] out second - go you worst</DIV> <DIV>b) Angonizing Silence + Ravage on 1 mob and Charm on second .... and compare time that it take to kill 1 mob</DIV> <DIV>I have see what can do 1 (ONE) special attack of mob on other mob (it can cut like 1/3-1/2 life of other mob). Ya its true special not always goes off but if it do.... jesus</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Once I hit mark 50 I dont have much to do with my time so I am finishing book quests (because I like house decorations and trophy) - well since I realize power of Beguile I dont bother anymore for HO or nuking the need solo group of mobs - I simply pull with Agonizing silence closest mob - immideatly target farest for charm and mez rest. </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I tell you little trick how trigger mob use special while it charmed.... you need charm mob before it have even single chance to execute single attack on you.. "Usual" mobs using special attack in very first round of attack and then just do regular melee attack (consider it as some sort of Harm Touch)</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>About damage of your dots...</DIV> <DIV>At adept 3 Torment do 109 damage a tic (4s) at lvl 50 take 4 second to cast and have 7 second recast timer ... if its resist</DIV> <DIV>At adept 3 Despair do 91-106 (random) damage per tic (4.8s) at lvl 50 have 2 second cast and 10 second recast</DIV> <DIV>True to be told maximum what you can achieve over duration of 36 second is</DIV> <DIV>Ravage Psyche on pull, immideatly trigger HO, hit target with Tyrranical Mind (so recast timer start clocking) if you lucky you'll get Arcane Fury then you can finish HO with Seizure if you not lucky you'll get Arcane Storm and in this case you can finish it with Despair or Ravage or Gloom (what ever you have active and ready to cast). As soon as HO completed and Arcane Augur timer refreshed (10 or 15s). You should start HO again this time you use Seizure first and finish with Tyr Mind (timer should allow you do that).... That's pretty much max what you can do during 36s DPS wise w/o using Beguile.</DIV> <DIV>Net result of Arcane Fury (assuming Adept 3 lvl of spells and lvl 50 of caster and arcane debuffing of target before HO) ~210 (average for seizure) ~560 (average for TM) and ~350 (average for Arcane Fury) for total ~1120 per HO. or ~560 for TM, ~500 (total damage from despair over 24s) and 175 for Arcane Storm ~1200 ...</DIV> <DIV>In other word you would do around 2300 damage on average - charmed mob (if you do things fast) can do that much in single round of attack</DIV>

[KUPOPO]

<DIV> <DIV> <DIV>I'm shocked. I didn't believe it until I saw it. Met a 48 coercer in EF today and he showed me how much power regen he can do.</DIV> <DIV>100+ a per 6 seconds without ising the power tap, with adept 3 clarity and mind's eye. It's true. It's really true.</DIV> <DIV>The power tap pushed it over 160. </DIV> <DIV>I did some stopwatch work, regen was around 1000 power in 45 seconds(the recast time of devouring thoughts). And yes, this was subtracting my baseline power regen, so as to account only for the buffs.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I take back what I've said about the classes being balanced.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>That power regen is just insane. Illusionists can CC 50% better, can powerdrain 25% better, can aoe twice as well, sure I'll give you all of that. Those abilities are each relevant in different circumstances. Mez matters with multiple big pulls, powerdrain for single mobs, aoe's on big groups of weak mobs.</DIV> <DIV>Coercers can regenerate power 150% faster. And it's always there, always useful, in any situation.</DIV> <DIV>Group invis? you can have it. Mezzes? you can have them. Take them all I don't want them anymore. Don't care about aoe's anymore either. I would rather have that kind of power regen. I don't even need to mention that coercers are better at stifling and debuffing in the end game.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>And to add injury to insult, another thing I never thought would happen, happened today. I got passed up for getting in a group because this coercer was standing next to me and looking too. Guess I should get used to it eh?</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I'm done. It's easy to disagree when a fool like Mayo is saying it, but I'm telling the truth. You guys can flame me all you want. Good riddance to this argument I won't post again.</DIV></DIV></DIV>

[Tanatus]

<DIV>KUPOPO *sign*</DIV> <DIV>Mind eye give 34 power every 4.5s at Apprentice 1 and 37 power every 4.5s at Master 1</DIV> <DIV>Clarity give 40 power every 6 second at Apprentice 1 and at Adept 3 same</DIV> <DIV>Do the math .....</DIV> <DIV>You was getting around 80 per tic own natural regeneration ...</DIV> <DIV>If you'll use insight you will have just slightly lower regeneration compare to Clarity + Mind Eye (bear in mind Insight give 53 power / 6 second Clarity only 40 power / 6second)</DIV>

[Aoi]

<DIV>"Group invis? you can have it. Mezzes? you can have them. Take them all I don't want them anymore. Don't care about aoe's anymore either. I would rather have that kind of power regen. I don't even need to mention that coercers are better at stifling and debuffing in the end game."</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>No offense here KUP, but it sounds like you are playing the wrong class then.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Additionally, assuming stifle actually works on end game encounters (which thus far it appears our mid-level one sticks but doesn't actually stifle.....sounds like a bug considering the 40+ stifle doesn't even stick), what debuffs aside from stifle are you talking about?  The 10% slow on our DoT? Or is it the uber "reduction in melee capabilities" on our root, which incidentally is useless as a debuff considering it drops when anyone hits the mob?</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Once again, say what you will, Coercers are a one-trick pony at present when compared to Illusionists.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Funny thing is, we never really asked to be compared.  Someone said it before, and I agree, Karma is a bit ch.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Cyene</DIV> <DIV> </DIV>

[Blub]

<b>Clarity give 40 power every 6 second at Apprentice 1 and at Adept 3 same</b>Actually if thats true, then this spell was stealth-nerfed already because once it used to be like insight and regenerate 53 per 6 seconds (was verified by tests a quite while ago). Since I'm not level 46 yet, I cannot find out myself, can anyone do a real test?(not wanting to comment the nerf or if 160 regen would be bad here, just wondering if our powerregen was already nerfed once)

[Jaxidi]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Tanatus wrote:<BR> <DIV>KUPOPO *sign*</DIV> <DIV>Mind eye give 34 power every 4.5s at Apprentice 1 and 37 power every 4.5s at Master 1</DIV> <DIV>Clarity give 40 power every 6 second at Apprentice 1 and at Adept 3 same</DIV> <DIV>Do the math .....</DIV> <DIV>You was getting around 80 per tic own natural regeneration ...</DIV> <DIV>If you'll use insight you will have just slightly lower regeneration compare to Clarity + Mind Eye (bear in mind Insight give 53 power / 6 second Clarity only 40 power / 6second)</DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <DIV>Assuming these numbers are correct and you have both spells at app1, this gives 85.333333 per "tick" where "tick" is defined as 6 seconds (just to keep power regen comparisons on the same ground).</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Are these numbers based on the spells' descriptions when you examine them or are they based from actual tests?  I'm almost willing to bet that tests will show the regen higher than what the examine information shows.</DIV>

[Geldo]

"So in conclusion, the power regen is an issue that I think needs addressed. In the current state, the ONLY reason I can compete with coercers is because both Illusionists and Coercers are so very rare. Once there are 10-20 lvl50 coercers and 10-20 lvl50 Illusionists on my server . . ."Stop. Ok when this becomes a problem - it will be a problem. Now its not one.