Agility 'debuff' on roots - is this wise?

[Rappy]

If agility reduction results in reduced avoidance, and roots have a percentage chance to break for every hit taken.  Why have an agi debuff at all?Lets face it, most wardens use root so that they can stand off and nuke something.  This renders the agility debuff worthless because melee is not being used.  If the warden did decide to melee, the agility debuff would make it far more likely that a successful strke would occur, rendering far more likely that the root and hence debuff would be broken, cancelling the debuff altogether.  So...

• If the debuff makes the root less effective by....
• Making the root is more likely to break leading to...
• The debuff being cancelled...

Doesn't this strike you as rather rediculous?  A debuff that by its very nature makes itself more likely to be stripped by the damage it is supposed to enhance.  It's therefore tough to classify this as a debuff at all.  This has led to the following use for these roots.Purely as that, roots which you dont melee on.  So...Why have the agi debuff at all?  Since it is...

• not practically usable
• more likely if used to make it break

The conclusion if I am being cynical --  The agility debuff is there to reduce the effectiveness of our roots and the greater you upgrade this agility debuff by Masters and such the more likely your root is to be broken.Dev's please consider taking off the Agi debuff since it is worse than no debuff at all.

[slayerwarrior]

Really only debuff we have does not effect epics in that sense it is rather useless, and is more suited to be put on 1 of are damage spells like solar flame. atleast It make solar flame worth wild to get upgrade .

Message Edited by slayerwarrior on 04-16-2006 02:37 PM

[Timber13]

I petition this bug several times but seems SOE don't care or don't see the spell is bugged/useless.

 

 

[Lilj]

Am I right in believing not all our roots have an AGI debuff? I ask because perhaps I simply can't read

I have Undergrowth, which has an AGI debuff, and Seizing Vines, which does not.  So far it seems the single target root doesn't have it and the group root has it.

Will this change later at higher level?

 

[Touryn]

I added it to the compliation, but I do think you are being a little cynical.  Generally, if you are rooting a mob, you are either attacking it from a distance (in which case you want to be able to hit it) or you are performing ghetto crowd control (in which case nobody should be attacking it).  However, it is a pretty blatant example of the general disharmony of the effects within our class.We have some buffs that depend on the tank getting hit, Spores and the Damage Shield.  The very nature of our heals work best when the tank is taking a solid stream of damage, accomplished by a large number of small hits.  However, our buffs work against that.  Sandstorm, and the little agility we provide, decrease the number of hits and turn the ones that make it through into spikes, the worst possible situation we could be in.  I can't help but come to the conclusion that we got stuck with left-overs during the design process.

[Severed Ha]

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Liljna wrote:

Am I right in believing not all our roots have an AGI debuff? I ask because perhaps I simply can't read

I have Undergrowth, which has an AGI debuff, and Seizing Vines, which does not.  So far it seems the single target root doesn't have it and the group root has it.

Will this change later at higher level?

 

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This is how it is now.. Back before the big combat update both the single target and the group target had the Agility debuff on it.  I highly doubt we will see it again...

[Crimson Dragon]

rappy, you make a very good point and have a very good argument. chances are, though, if we see a change, it will just be the removal of the agility debuff on it.what would be nice for us would be to take away the roots completely (we're supposed to be a defensive class) and give us another buff of some sort. sure, we don't need a debuff. but if we're lacking in buffs, as most seem to feel we are, this is a way to make up for that without overpowering the buffs we already have. meh, just a thought. i'm not sure that the devs will read this.:smileytongue:

[Nezumigami]

Please don't take the roots away.

[Crimson Dragon]

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Nezumigami wrote:

Please don't take the roots away.

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after my adventures last night, i agree. ignore my above post... at least the part about removing the roots.

[Vaylan77]

um, cannot see the reason for this post. first using group root is practicable because you can hold mobs off and fight one specific one and second the root has a really low chance to break when going melee. if often use this tactic and have no problems at all. too, it really helps in pvp. your tanks melee and the root will not break by the first strike. so whats the problem? cannot agree to anything written in this post.

[Rappy]

lol the point of the post is... the agility debuff makes the root more likely to be broken by meleeand if you are using the spell just for root.. theres no point in an agility debuff

[Crimson Dragon]

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Vaylan77 wrote:

your tanks melee and the root will not break by the first strike.

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the thing is this: the root can break on the first strike.from a flavor perspective, holding something in place should by its nature decrease its agility.... yes that makes sense. it's just very counterproductive to the purpose of rooting....perhaps i've been thinking about this wrong. maybe the root should have a definite duration if it lands... then have an additional period of root that has a chance for breakage. what would be wrong with having a root that actually does what it's supposed to do - hold something in place for a time.

[sAs-Bartleby]

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Rappy schrieb:If agility reduction results in reduced avoidance, and roots have a percentage chance to break for every hit taken.  Why have an agi debuff at all?Lets face it, most wardens use root so that they can stand off and nuke something.  This renders the agility debuff worthless because melee is not being used.  If the warden did decide to melee, the agility debuff would make it far more likely that a successful strke would occur, rendering far more likely that the root and hence debuff would be broken, cancelling the debuff altogether.  So...

• If the debuff makes the root less effective by....
• Making the root is more likely to break leading to...
• The debuff being cancelled...

Doesn't this strike you as rather rediculous?  A debuff that by its very nature makes itself more likely to be stripped by the damage it is supposed to enhance.  It's therefore tough to classify this as a debuff at all.  This has led to the following use for these roots.Purely as that, roots which you dont melee on.  So...Why have the agi debuff at all?  Since it is...

• not practically usable
• more likely if used to make it break

The conclusion if I am being cynical --  The agility debuff is there to reduce the effectiveness of our roots and the greater you upgrade this agility debuff by Masters and such the more likely your root is to be broken.Dev's please consider taking off the Agi debuff since it is worse than no debuff at all.

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You only think about a warden who solo. I use this spell in group situstions. First i cast this root and than begin with my HoT. If i root the mobs, the tank is the only one in range for the mobs. All casters can start nuking faster. The reduced agi makes the tank hit better and he can hold aggro better. not everything must make sense in every situation and must be changed. I like the spell the way he works now.

[Vaylan77]

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the thing is this: the root can break on the first strike.

from a flavor perspective, holding something in place should by its nature decrease its agility.... yes that makes sense. it's just very counterproductive to the purpose of rooting....

perhaps i've been thinking about this wrong. maybe the root should have a definite duration if it lands... then have an additional period of root that has a chance for breakage. what would be wrong with having a root that actually does what it's supposed to do - hold something in place for a time.

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5% - every 20th hit statistically. so you will be able - or the tank in your team - to hit 19 mobs and statistically they root won'T break. i think that's a good number.

and concerning agility: agility is for dodging hits. it has nothing to do with immobility due to root effects. this just holds you in place. and as the one before just said: in groups this thing works very well.

[Rappy]

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Vaylan77 wrote:

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the thing is this: the root can break on the first strike.from a flavor perspective, holding something in place should by its nature decrease its agility.... yes that makes sense. it's just very counterproductive to the purpose of rooting....perhaps i've been thinking about this wrong. maybe the root should have a definite duration if it lands... then have an additional period of root that has a chance for breakage. what would be wrong with having a root that actually does what it's supposed to do - hold something in place for a time.

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5% - every 20th hit statistically. so you will be able - or the tank in your team - to hit 19 mobs and statistically they root won'T break. i think that's a good number.

and concerning agility: agility is for dodging hits. it has nothing to do with immobility due to root effects. this just holds you in place. and as the one before just said: in groups this thing works very well.

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agility is indeed for dodging hits, more hits = more chance statistically for it to break in the same time period because you are hitting more.It's self defeating if you actually use this for roots, the debuff is removed if the root breaks and the debuff itself makes the root more likely to break.I'd much prefer to see a slow, perhaps str or attack debuff rather than agility since the agility itself makes the root far more likely to break and hence the agility debuff to go 'poof'.The argument here is not that the spell or a debuff is useless but rather linking an agility debuff to a root, where the root chance breaks on a hit renders the debuff more pointless.  The agility debuff is therefore more likely to be dispelled by the hits it is supposed to be helping.In Summary

1. Feel free to spend mana debuffing agility knowing the debuff itself is more likely to drop due to its own debuff effect /shrug.  I would be fascinated to find out exactly how much more dps your debuff allows before it gets kicked off by increasing the chance of dropping itself.
2. If however you are arguing that it is the ROOT component that is so important to your group - why have the debuff at all since the most important component the root is less reliable with the agility debuff than without it?!?

I realise this is all rather fruitless but it is a classic example of how other classes will point at a 'debuff' such as this and say there - utility when in fact the spell works against itself if used as a debuff.What if shammy slow or cleric stun was cancelable based on the number of times a mob is hit while the effect is on?

[Formangenavn]

I wrote something somwhere about the contradicitons we have, but can remember where.

We are an avoidance healer since we are given agility buffs and leather, yet we have damage shield. We are relied on to be hit for it to work, but by the very nature of our armour and buffs we do not want to be hit.

We have a tree the is killed by the very thing it is supposed to heal.

We have roots, but our best dps spell is killed if you use it with root.

And then there is the thing you mentioned.

Seems to me we are made up by lots of spare parts that not nececerily fits together very well. Tranquility and Tunaras fit into the spare part theory, but not the contradiciton theory I guess. For all I know every class could have contradictions like this.

Whens next expantion due? anyone know? Maby things will change then. :smileywink:

[Crimson Dragon]

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Vaylan77 wrote:

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the thing is this: the root can break on the first strike.from a flavor perspective, holding something in place should by its nature decrease its agility.... yes that makes sense. it's just very counterproductive to the purpose of rooting....perhaps i've been thinking about this wrong. maybe the root should have a definite duration if it lands... then have an additional period of root that has a chance for breakage. what would be wrong with having a root that actually does what it's supposed to do - hold something in place for a time.

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5% - every 20th hit statistically. so you will be able - or the tank in your team - to hit 19 mobs and statistically they root won'T break. i think that's a good number.

and concerning agility: agility is for dodging hits. it has nothing to do with immobility due to root effects. this just holds you in place. and as the one before just said: in groups this thing works very well.

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i understand how statistics work. but the fact is that 5% doesn't mean every 20th strike. i've had my 5% proc on my imbued weapon go off on 3 successive strikes in the past. does that mean my next 57 attacks won't proc? no. if you've studied biology, it's like the concept of genetic drift... think about doing 20 coin tosses. in theory, you will get 10 heads and 10 tails - that's your statistical analysis. now grab a coin and try it. i can almost guarantee that you get more of one result than the other. each strike is judged with its own 5% chance to break it. take a d20 and roll it. when it lands on 20, the root breaks. if you roll a 20 the first time, then the root is gone. it could also take you 100 rolls to get a 20. the thing is, statistics are nice estimates, but the world just doesn't work statistically. chance is chance.

[Unmask]

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Crimson Dragon wrote:

if you've studied biology, it's like the concept of genetic drift... think about doing 20 coin tosses. in theory, you will get 10 heads and 10 tails - that's your statistical analysis. now grab a coin and try it. i can almost guarantee that you get more of one result than the other.

 

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Well that's not what theory says.  You only have about an 18% chance of getting 10 heads and 10 tails after flipping a fair coin 20 times.  In fact the more often you flip a fair coin the more unlikely you are to have an exact split between heads and tails (assuming an even number of tosses).  However you are more likely to be "close".  I'm really not sure what your point is here though.

Anyway, if a root has a 5% chance to break I wouldn't expect it to break the first chance.  But I'd anticipate it since eventually I will be in an encounter where it will.

[Crimson Dragon]

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Unmasked wrote:

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Crimson Dragon wrote:

if you've studied biology, it's like the concept of genetic drift... think about doing 20 coin tosses. in theory, you will get 10 heads and 10 tails - that's your statistical analysis. now grab a coin and try it. i can almost guarantee that you get more of one result than the other.

 

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Well that's not what theory says.  You only have about an 18% chance of getting 10 heads and 10 tails after flipping a fair coin 20 times.  In fact the more often you flip a fair coin the more unlikely you are to have an exact split between heads and tails (assuming an even number of tosses).  However you are more likely to be "close".  I'm really not sure what your point is here though.

Anyway, if a root has a 5% chance to break I wouldn't expect it to break the first chance.  But I'd anticipate it since eventually I will be in an encounter where it will.

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read reply #14 by Vaylan77. my response was directed toward him (thus, why he was quoted in my reply). while i realize he doesn't expect the root to only break every 20th hit, i was simply expanding upon the reality of the 5% scenario.as for my biology reference, i've been doing a lot of studying for my finals and it's a related concept. not to say that it's identical, because it isn't. the coin toss was related to the genetic drift of, say, a specific gene getting passed on since you have a 50% chance of getting either of your father's genes for a given trait / protein / etc.then since most people aren't going crazy and studying biology like a madman, i used a more practical, game-oriented example. thus, the rolling of a d20 (20-sided die). this fit even better to illustrate my point because with 20 sides, you have a 5% chance of getting a given number on each roll.that was my point. i'm sorry if i didn't make myself clear enough for you the first time.