Play-tested feedback for Rings

[Happyfunba]

<div>I did some brief testing of the new rings as I hope many others are doing as well, but I don't want that information to get lost in the shuffle of complaints about how and why these changes occured; not to mention I would like to compare my impressions/thoughts with others who've also played within these new changes. Please then, use this thread to post your own tested feedback on the new changes and express what specifically about them is either good or bad.</div><div> </div><div>For my own testing:</div><div> </div><div><div>I ran thru a short series of a little over 70 kills. On average, the encounters I chose were solo and one to two levels below me. The fights generally lasted 30 to 40 seconds depending upon my Combat Art usage (which in many cases I tried to spam in order to get the Agility proc). I am a level 60 Berserker and used dual wield weapons. I tested both the t6 Agility imbue (2% chance to increase attack speed by 23%, procs off Combat Art usage) and the t6 Strength imbue (1% chance to increase DPS by 27%, procs off melee attacks). Each imbue lasts for 45 seconds once activated and also increases the stat mentioned by 22 for the same duration. </div><div> </div><div>Within the kills I did (and granted, I have not done EXTENSIVE testing yet), I was able to get the Strength imbue to proc on eight encounters. I was able to get the Agility proc to occur 4 times. There was only one time where I was able to get both procs going simultaneously. In many cases, I was left with at least 20 seconds on the buff timer after the encounter was over, meaning nearly half my time went unused. The total procs then were 12 out of 70 encounters, or once every 6 to 7 kills.</div><div> </div><div>I found as a Berserker I was able to get the Strength to occur more often if I pulled encounters with multiple mobs and then used Open Wounds which turns all my melee attacks into AE attacks. This greatly increased my chances of procing mainly due to the fact that my sheer volume of melee attacks increased so dramatically. Even at this, I was not always able to get the Strength buff to proc for me, and again in the 4 instances where I successfully used this tactic I was still left with several seconds remaining on my buff and nothing left to use it on.</div><div> </div><div>Impressions:</div><div> </div><div>I'm not excited with how often the procs occur or the length of time the procs last. The effects themselves are great and would no doubt be viewed as overpowering if they were simply persistent effects, but because the effects are so often NOT triggered during encounters I would have to say they hold little to no real value and certainly would not be on my required items list. That attitude alone does not bode well for the crafting community who will be attempting to make and/or sell these items.</div><div> </div><div>My own experience now has be concerned that I wasted the rares for these rings when I could have converted them into Adept3s instead. Doing so would have certainly made a greater and more favorable impact on my character. That is not to say the imbued rings are completely worthless now, but they absolutely do NOT feel like a reasonable option to purchase above simply settling for a non-rare version, and definitely would not override the desire to upgrade an Adept3 instead. Basically, in my mind, the rare imbued rings go to the bottom of the upgrade food chain and will only be sought after by players who have first maxxed out on Adept3s and Masters. Whereas prior to these changes, it could be argued that an imbued ring was a good choice over certain Adept3s, that seems very unlikely now.</div><div> </div><div>What I would suggest:</div><div> </div><div>Change both the proc % and the effect's length. As a Berserker, I'm familiar with the manner in which the Berserk state comes into effect and think the same ratios would be great for these procs as well. Currently, Berserk has a high chance of procing but only lasts for 10 seconds at a time. This would be fine however, at least in the case of these two procs as it would offer short bursts of increased DPS and Attack Speed, but not so much as to make them absolutely overpowered. The mere fact that the proc was occuring more often and would seldom outlast the length of the fight would allow the players to feel as though they were getting something out of their investment while at the same time they wouldn't be seeing a lot of "unused" effect wasted on a finished encounter.</div><div> </div><div>Ideally, for the rings to feel like they offer any real benefit, I would say they need to proc at LEAST once every other encounter for those 10 second bursts that Berserkers are familiar with. I don't need these effects to be persistent, but at the same time I want to feel as though I can count on them fairly often to provide the boosted power they suggest. If that means reducing the effects themselves so that they're not over-powering when they do proc, so be it. But procing a modestly powerful effect more often is far better than only occasionally procing a more powerful effect. </div></div>

[Kain Hammersmith]

<div></div><div>Nice post. Thanks for the info I hope a dev swings by and reads it.</div><div> </div><div>I think that the best solution would be to leave them as is but make the buffs not stack. That way it is like it was when everyone was happy, but not overpowering by stacking stats. Please though do not make rings useless like they sound like they will be. I am a jeweler, and I dont sell rings, but I make alot for my own toons and my guild-mates. I would hate to have everyone who gave me a rare lately to want it back because their rings are useless.</div>

[Aienaa]

<div></div><p>I tested this a little on Beta the other day...  My character on Beta is a 61 Assassin and I use dual wield weapons...  The only ring I use is the Imbued Strength Ring....</p><p>While soloing, I killed roughly 50 mobs...  Over the course of killing these, my ring proc'd 3 times...  so that is roughly 1 proc per 17 mobs (close to what the OP stated, since he was using 2 proc rings and had 1 per 6-7 kills, it would have been 1 per 12-14 kills if only equiping 1 ring)....</p><p>Problem here is that I wear my rings to get closer to the Strength cap, which at level 60 is 420, and I only ever reach this number when in a raid with ful raid buffs on....   Since increasing strength increases your damage, the loss of strength due to the loss of the rings old buff equals a perminate decrease in DPS, except for the odd time that the ring actually procs....</p><p>Ok, I understand the rings were too powerful before and were better than fabled for thier specific stat, and the Devs wanted comparisons between like equipment while people make suggestions....</p><p>Currently the 2 rings I wear are the Legendary Strenth Imbued ring and a T6 Treasured ring with +17 Strength on it (Mogrof's Signet or something like that...  not at home and work blocked out EQ2 Players site so can't check)...</p><p>Ok, so I have a Treasured Ring with +17 Strength on it, so I would think that +19 Strength should be in the realm of posibility for a Legendary Ring...  While the Earthen Band (Fabled) has +22 Strength.....  So, what I am about to suggest is based on the above Information....</p><p>When Imbued Rings are made, alter the stats of the ring to include the Imbued Stat....  IE T6 Imbued Ring of Strength would become...</p><p>+10 Sta, +19 Strength, +9 Agility and then the rest of the stats....   And then make the effect the only thing that is Proc'd...  IE....</p><p>+10 Sta, +19 Strength, +9 Agility, +HP, +Power, +resists  EFFECT 1% change to proc Blaze of Str on a successful Melee attack...  Increases DPS by xx%</p><p>Reason why I suggest this is because people rely on the stats of the rings when they decide what armor and jewelry they wear....   When I prepare for a raid I am looking to maximize my DPS....  First stat I work on is Strength...  I adjust my gear till I am at or slightly over my Strength cap....  Then I go and adjust gear to increase my Int which effects my poison damage....</p><p>Now, with the Imbued rings the way they are right now, I can not rely on the proc occuring while I am fighting, so I can not rely on the Strength bonus from the proc to increase my DPS.... So, I would have to swap out the ring for something that has a reliable amount of strength on it...</p><p>The same holds true for all the other Imbued rings...  with the main stat of the imbued ring only happening on the proc, people can not rely on that stat and would therefore need to choose a different ring with reliable stat......</p><p>IE ring would need to change as follows...</p><p>Strength = +9 Sta, +19 Strength, +9 Agility +effect</p><p>Agility = +9 Sta, +9 Str, +19 Agility +effect</p><p>Stamina = +19 Sta, +9 Str, +9 Agi +effect     And   +19 Sta, +9 Int, +9 Wis +effect</p><p>Inteligence = +10 Sta, +19 Int, +9 Wis +effect</p><p>Wis = +10 Sta, +9 Int, +19 Wis +effect</p><p>This would not overpower the rings as compared to T6 Treasured and the main stat would be less than that of T6 Fabled....  The effect of each of the rings would not be so over powering as to make people want to wear these over the T6 fabled because of the infrequency of the procs....</p><p>Becuase of the constant stats, people would continue to include these as thier perminate armor sets, but because the stats on the Fabled would be better, they would get replaced by Fabled rings....</p><p>The only draw back to this I see is how they are proc'd....  I know I would wear Inteligence rings whem my strength is above cap (just like I swap out my Str dolls for Int dolls at raids when str is over cap), but I would be at a major disadvantage on being able to proc them, as I use CA's not spells....   Though, this is not as much as a factor as it was before if the main stat is already included in the stats of the ring and only the effect is proc'd ....  IE the reason I would wear a INT ring is for the Inteligence on it... If it happened to proc on one of my few spells, that is just a bonus to me...</p><p>Anyways, that is how I would make the rings desirable still, while not stepping on the toes of the Fabled equipment....</p><p> </p><p>Gwern - 60 Assassin - Kithicor</p>

[Aienaa]

<div></div><p>So, has anyone else tested these and come up with a reasonable solution for resolving the problem with Imbued Rings being over powered?   I would like to see other people's ideas on this, not just the ranting that is going on in other threads....</p><p> </p><p>Gwern - 60 Assassin - Kithicor</p>

[Mabes]

<div></div><p>Any healers on test server try these rings out?  I would imagine, they're near useless for a healer, but can anyone verify that?</p><p>At 3% chance, that's 1 proc in about 33 heals, and a slight temporary increase in wis isn't that good.</p>

[Kaedi]

<div></div>The simplest solution is to cut down the imbue effect to a number that is acceptable to the dev base and puts them in line with treasured - legendary - fabled stats per tier.  Drop the proc completely and make the rings useful, desireable and yet not overpowered.  They should be worth crafting and purchasing, yet not replace raidable gear, certainly there is a middle ground to be found there without relying on the almighty random number generator.

[Tomanak]

<div></div><blockquote><hr>Kain Hammersmith wrote:<div> </div><div> I would hate to have everyone who gave me a rare lately to want it back because their rings are useless.</div><hr></blockquote>Aye, I've already suggested to all guildies sending me rares for rings to hold off until LU20/KoS and see how things pan out before 'wasting' a rare on what may become a worthless item.

[Ranja]

<div></div><p>It gets even worse for us Rangers. We, like Assassin want our strength higher to mazimize our DPS yet we do not melee. So, the strenght ring is utterly useless to us. The agility proc is stupid as well since we never run out of power and we have a self buff that hastes us.</p><p>So, at the very least, the strength ring should proc <strong>OFF ALL ATTACKS RANGED OR MELEE. </strong>Obviously, the rings would still be way underpowered but at least they would proc for us rangers as currently I have a strength ring and Mogref's ring wihch is +17. Which by the ways ,as the OP pointed out is treasured. I hope they dont nerf that anytime soon.</p><p>I think a good solution would be to reduce the stat a little to maybe something like +19 as the OP said and make them not stack. You can keep or leave the buff. As is, no one is going to buy these rings for a useless buff. And the buff is just that useless for almost every class.</p><p>Elbryan60 Ranger</p>

[Tanit]

lol. as if +29 would be less overpowered than +32.Having it proc on all attacks is a good idea though, but it shouldnt be procing all the time so its like a permanent buff. Even without the proc the ring is far from useless, i see lots of players buying the other jewelry from me also (although not as much as rings), which all have the same stats.<div></div>

[Ranja]

<div></div><p>No not +29 , +19.</p><p>Elbryan60 Ranger</p>

[Finora]

<div></div><blockquote><hr>Mabes wrote:<div></div><p>Any healers on test server try these rings out?  I would imagine, they're near useless for a healer, but can anyone verify that?</p><p>At 3% chance, that's 1 proc in about 33 heals, and a slight temporary increase in wis isn't that good.</p><hr></blockquote><p>I've yet to get my wisdom ring to proc after several hours of soloing. Of course I don't often have to actually heal, though I ward quite a bit (just to see if it will proc).  And it does say benificial spell not just heals ... so seems it should have proced once by now.</p><p>And of course my agility ring is pointless since I 've no combat arts to make it fire.</p><p>Message Edited by Calendri on <span class="date_text">02-14-2006</span><span class="time_text">06:01 PM</span></p>

[Tanit]

<span><blockquote><hr>bentgate wrote:<div></div><p>No not +29 , +19.</p><hr></blockquote>Ah, thought you meant +19 instead of +22. <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></span><div></div>

[TalanRM]

<div></div><p>"The simplest solution is to cut down the imbue effect to a number that is acceptable to the dev base and puts them in line with treasured - legendary - fabled stats per tier. "</p><p> - Bingo and so simple. Just adjust the stats to place them at acceptable levels, maybe increase the resistance bonus on them to compensate a little, or a a minor +<tier level> to a skill instead.</p>

[Seregfe]

<div></div><span><blockquote><hr>TalanRM wrote:<div></div><p>"The simplest solution is to cut down the imbue effect to a number that is acceptable to the dev base and puts them in line with treasured - legendary - fabled stats per tier. "</p><p> - Bingo and so simple. Just adjust the stats to place them at acceptable levels, maybe increase the resistance bonus on them to compensate a little, or a a minor + to a skill instead.</p><hr></blockquote>It's SoE, they dont know what simple mean or rpg or balancing or ....</span><div></div>

[Happyfunba]

<div>I actually do like the notion of offering effects to the rings, but under the current conditions I feel little gain from them and more times than not I instead feel a sense of frustration that my rings can go so many fights without activating. Mind you, this is not just to the extent that I would gladly switch out a Fabled ring for either one of my crafted rings (which I would), it's more the fact that I doubt I would bother buying a crafted ring at all, especially one that requires a rare. I have to further doubt that anyone other than the ultra-wealthy would bother buying these rings either.</div><div> </div><div>Again, being a Berserker, I'm used to not having permanent effects anyways so that aspect doesn't neccessarily bother me. The benefits offered once they've finally proc'ed -- I feel -- are quite nice. In fact, they would be overpowered were they set to be permanent.</div><div> </div><div>I have to also agree with what was said earlier (and lost in other threads) that most people ONLY care about the added stat bonus. They don't care about the proc effect itself. If the rings were able to offer a permanent enhancement to the desired stat which was then simply re-tuned to better fit between Treasured and Fabled stats, most people would be more than content with that alone.</div><div> </div><div>The proc's at that point might simply be seen as an added bonus, though I still feel strongly that a greater chance to proc a less-powerful bonus is better than a rare chance to gain a stronger one. The proc's really would do well to be about half as powerful but increased 5x  the current chance to be triggered. I would be much more content with a 12% DPS increase over 23% if I knew I could count on the seeing such an effect far more frequently.</div>

[Aienaa]

<div></div><p>Thanks everyone for not turning this into some kind of rant / flame fest like I have seen in several other threads....</p><p> </p><p>I have to agree with what a few other people here have said...  Casters are going to have a much harder time to proc the rings...  Unlike melee classes, where auto attack would be hiting the mob at least once per second, caster can not possibly cast fast enough to provide the same opertunity to trigger the proc...   Not to mention, some non-caster classes would also be wearing caster type rings (myself included), and as it is right now, I have a total of 2 CAs that act like spells that could trigger the ring</p><p>I feel that if procs are going to be added to the rings (either as they are now, or similiar to what I proposed earlier) that all classes will need to have the same opertunity to trigger the proc...   As an Assassin, the 2 stats that I rely on the most for my damage is Strength (melee DPS) and Inteligence (poison DPS)....  With rings in thier current state (on Test and Beta) there is virtually no chance that I could ever get the proc on the Inteligence ring to trigger....  As you have done with several spells (troubador hate reducing song comes to mind as well as Assassin Apply Poison) you have put different restrictions on spells...  Applying this to the ring procs could aliviate some of the disparity in the ability to trigger the rings...  Something like this could be used...</p><p>First let's assume the proposed changes I made earlier go into effect and the main imbue stat is added to the ring...</p><p>Intel Ring...   +10 Sta, +19 Int, +9 Wis +HP/power + resist Effect Flare of Inteligence</p><p>- If caster is a Fighter, Scout, Brawler</p><p>--- 1% chance to cast Flare of Inteligence on successful melee attack- added effect</p><p>- If caster is a Priest, Mage, Shamen</p><p>-10% chance to cast Flare of Inteligence on successfully casted spell - added effect</p><p>(successfully casted spell would include buffs, heals, debuffs, damage spells) (the percentages were just made up to show that casters would need a much higher percent chance in order to trigger over that of a melee class)</p><p>And the same would go for rings with stats traditionally considered melee....  (I personally do not want to see our casters and healers having to risk jousting AEs in order to get a traditionally melee stat ring to trigger by melee attacking the mob)</p><p>Putting in stipulations such as this, it should allow the playing field to be more equalized between melee and casters to have the same opertunity to trigger all of the rings....</p><p> </p><p>Any other idea are more than welcome and keep them comming... Maybe we can get something they might consider using...</p><p> </p><p>Gwern - 60 Assassin - Kithicor</p><p> </p>

[TalanRM]

<div></div><p>My main concern is that although it is nice to occaisionally see a proc unless you are proccing every fight, or virtually every fight, the ring is not a piece of equipment you can count on at all - just pure fluff.</p><p>Extra permament attributes and resists scaled to a sensible level are definately the way to go. If, however, the point of escalation has been reached where SoE don't want to change the design decision on tests please make the rings proc very regularly even at notably reduced effect.</p><p>Most fights against non-named group mobs last between 10-15 seconds, so unless you can virtually guarantee a proc in the first 5 seconds the effect is little more than nice fluff.</p>

[Yarginis]

The thing that I actually find the funniest about all of this, is that before LU19 when the ring buffs were castable, these rings did not replace fabled rings because people would cast them, and then equip their overall better-statted fabled. If they want to go back to making fabled rings worthwile, the easiest solution is to simply return to how we had it pre-lu19. (making a max total of 2 cast buffs useable at 1 time if their issue was people casting all5 at once) Then these rings are still valuable, but people will also have a use for the fabled raid rings.<div></div>

[Varl]

<div></div>Procing rings for healers (+WIS) are ABSOLUTELY USELESS!  The ring is procing off of heals, that is great.  Good concept, bad execution.  As a healer, the ONLY thing that +WIS does for you is increase you power pool.  Yes, it does add resists, but the difference in the amount that it would add from the proc is about +60, which, while not "nothing", is surely something close to negligible.  So, you wear a ring for +Power to your char.  The problem is, that when the ring procs a stat increase AFTER you have begun useing power, your actual pool DOES NOT increase.  The CAP increases, but not the actually amount of Power points that you have.  So, since wisdom does not actually help healers heal any better (e.g. Higher wisdom meaning you heal for more) the rings for healers are totally, 100%, useless.  Just FYI.  So, if you ran out and got a second WIS ring after LU19, sorry, you just wasted about 2pp on a rare and an imbuing agent that would have been MUCH better spent on an Adept 3.

[Kaknya]

 By the way, we have gotten word from the devs that these WILL in fact be changing again.. how and in which way we will have to see, tho i believe it will mainly be changes in the proc rate<div></div>

[Tro]

<div></div><div></div><div><p>Not trying to divert the thread or anything but I see folks recommending to leave the rings as they are (worn efffect) or going back to original version.</p><p>The devs have already stated that the rings are not going back to either of the previous versions. I take that as meaning they have made the decision to stick with the proc effect version. </p><p>If any changes are made, they will be based on the ring stats, the % at which the effect procs, the duration of the effect or a combo of all three. </p><p>Although, maybe if enough folks recommend to not go with the proc version.. they will actually [expletive haxx0red by Raijinn] can the proc idea.. I personally feel the proc effect (In it's current form) makes the effect useless. So we get a ring with stats and a proc that is not even noticable.  They went from one extreme to the other.</p><p>Also, what does the STA ring proc effect do? I see what the AGI and STR rings effects do but not sure if the STA ring effect changed.  </p></div><p>Message Edited by Trook on <span class="date_text">02-15-2006</span><span class="time_text">06:05 AM</span></p>

[Jai1]

<div>I'm hoping they are just making them crappy now so that ANY improvements to them will be seen in a good light.  As a jeweler, I cringe when I sell a ring now.  I can't help by think that the buyer is ill-informed.  I'm caught between wanting to move them and my conscience.  I have not made anymore since the annouced changes and in their current state I will not be making any more. </div><div> </div><div>The percieved value of my craft is important to me. I deal more in T5 items than T6 because the rares are cheaper and more availible.   When I can get a cheap rare and make a ring out of it, they move fast because they are relatively cheap.  T6 moves slow because of the rares still being pricey. </div><div> </div><div>The proc idea is unfair to me because of the variables that affect the RNG.  A melee can have more changes to proc, especially if they have haste, than a caster with set casting times.  If they make them proc so rarely, they wont be worth the price of the rare and lambent it took to make them.  Might as well take imbued rings out of the game.  Actually that sounds like Sony.  If they are worthless they might as well because nobody will be making, buying or using them, unless they like procs and have no other options.</div><div> </div>