Report 848

Report #848
Skillset: Necromancy Skill: DeathWeapon
 Org: Ur'Guard Status: Completed Apr 2013
Furies' Decision:
We will remove the stat malus from Death Weapons. If a warrior's death weapon
attack causes contagion, the damage from the attack will be reduced slightly. If
a warrior's death weapon attack does not cause contagion, it will cause a little
more damage depending on how dark the person's mark is.
Problem: The Ur'guard have submitted envoy reports for this particular skill
four times already, and this will be the fifth. Despite the fact that the skill
has been boosted three times, the stat malus is still too bitter of a pill to
swallow. This skill will never be used until it is gone, but the only way for
that to be done is to change the focus of the skill.
[A: 0 R: 0] Solution #1: Remove the deathmark building aspect of death weapon.
 Instead, the deathmark will have to be increased by
 other means, and in return get rid of the stat malus
 entirely.
[A: 0 R: 0] Solution #2: Remove the stat malus, affliction chance, deathmark
 building and other effects from DeathWeapon entirely.
 Instead, create a symbiotic link between the skill
 and excorable glands. Give necromancers the ability
 to charge their weapon with excorable power from
 their gland for short bursts of increased damage on
 strikes.
[A: 0 R: 0] Solution #3: Remove the stat malus and deathmark building, but
 increase the chance of plague afflictions based still
 based on death mark levels.
Player Comments:
---[Celina on 3/20 @ 02:44 writes]:
I'm confused. What will deathweapon do then if it doesn't build deathmark.
---[Daevos on 3/20 @ 23:17 writes]:
There are two possibilities. It can be a tool used to take advantage of existing
marks or the link between deathmark and deathweapon. Either way, the stat malus
has to go.
---[Daevos on 3/20 @ 23:19 writes]:
I meant that the link between deathmark and deathweapon can be broken.
---[Eventru on 3/21 @ 03:28 writes]:
What do deathmarks serve for warriors? It's really been a while since I've
looked at Deathmarks - what purpose do they serve in warrior combat? IIRC you
can use it to sense where your target is (which also shows their afflictions and
stats, more detail relative to how 'much' their deathmark is built up), it
increases crucifix time and makes contagion tics more likely to give its uglier
afflictions, and weakens wound healing. For warriors specifically it gives a
stat malus, does a small chance of contagion afflictions and lets hitting have a
chance to build deathmarks? Am I missing anything?
---[Eventru on 3/21 @ 03:32 writes]:
Also: What does the wound healing reduction look like in practice? How quickly
do marks build? Sorry, it's just been so long since the last time I'd looked at
them. I think it'd probably help us if this stuff was added in the comments,
just so we can see how things look to you in practice versus what it seems like
they should be to us.
---[Daevos on 3/21 @ 04:14 writes]:
The main practical benefits of deathmarks right now is the sensing, the chance
of afflictions, and the wound healing reduction. In a previous report, it was
requested that the affliction chance be increased to 20 percent on max deathmark
level. I have no idea what it was actually increased to though. I will do some
tests on the wound healing component when I'm able to several days from now. Oh,
and as far as deathmark building goes, the best method is lich touch.
---[Eventru on 3/24 @ 18:36 writes]:
It's not that high (at max it's about 12-13%).
---[Eventru on 3/24 @ 18:39 writes]:
Okay, so my general thought is: do Ur'Guard need this? Do they suffer without
this? Deathweapon was added for the precise purpose of giving Ur'Guard a benefit
for using deathmarks beyond Nihilist's uses - if deathweapon is insufficient for
this, then we should look at boosting it. I'm not really sure that attempting to
divorce it - or largely divorce it - of deathmarks is the route it should go.
The reason for the stat malus was that it was felt, iirc, that Ur'Guard didn't
need this, however it offered them another value while not being - directly - an
accross-the-board buff (iirc around that time damage kills weren't uncommon from
knights, either). If we just outright deleted DeathWeapon tomorrow, would
Ur'Guard be at all diminished in combat - or, do ur'guard need a buff?
---[Eventru on 3/24 @ 18:41 writes]:
That doesn't mean I'm against altering death weapon, I'm just kind of curious on
what your feelings are in this regard. I, personally, would rather see
DeathWeapon and the DeathMarks system made appealing to Ur'Guard, versus just
divorcing them. At that point, it seems like we may as well just delete
DeathWeapon as useless and consider DeathMarks simply something Ur'Guard don't
use. (I don't think we're going to delete it, heh)
---[Llandros on 3/24 @ 19:42 writes]:
Deathweapon got some use when it allowed for a free assess back before assess
was free for everyone. Even at max level the wound healing malus doesn't make up
the difference for the lower weapon stats. Nobody uses is these days.
---[Daevos on 3/26 @ 01:40 writes]:
If Deathweapon was deleted outright right now, nothing would change because the
skill is not being used. The stat malus is too painful for warriors. We strive
to boost our weapons every little bit that we can, and it hurts to intentionally
damage it. Right now, Deathweapon has been boosted, and I've tested it but I
still feel that the cost is too great. The plague affliction rate and wound
healing malus would have to be boosted significantly to counter the stat malus,
but I wanted to see if a different path forward was possible.
---[Thoros on 3/27 @ 00:36 writes]:
Deathweapon is useless for BOTH, Ur'guard and Nihilists. It gives a weapon stat
malus, and a malus towards symbol strike in terms of damage and speed for
building deathmarks. Completely useless. The stat malus has got to go.
---[Thoros on 4/2 @ 03:47 writes]:
I think deathweapon should be on par to skills similar in other skillsets that
change warrior weapon damage (Sacraments Righteousarms, Paradigmatics
Chaosaura.) When deathweapon is active, the necromancer's weapon damage will
have 1/6 of their damage be converted to excorable damage, and then either 1)
20% chance for an unmasked plague affliction on each hit, or 2) it will cause
the target to become hungrier. For Nihilists, it will make symbol strike and
symbol evoke cause hunger.
---[Eventru on 4/3 @ 16:34 writes]:
Anything other than "copy the other orgs"? I've seen dozens of envoy reports in
that vein and they always get rejected. I mean, add it in if you want, but I
think you should look for broadly different solutions as well that would still
be beneficial.
---[Rivius on 4/3 @ 17:17 writes]:
After some discussion on envoys about the skill, as suggested by Vivet, the
simplest solution might be to remove the malus and simply make deathmark
building chance-based. Deathmark's wound reduction is actually a fairly decent
chunk and is being surprisingly undervalued. Speaking as a warrior, it's quite
enviable. The problem lies in Deathweapon itself not being a desirable way to
build them. Replacing the malus with one that does not affect weapon statistics
seems to be the way to go (or removing it outright). Perhaps then if deathweapon
becomes an across-the-board buff though, consider adding a power cost to keep it
in line with other skills. As Eventru gave examples of on envoys chat, there's
lots of ways to approach this, but my general support goes toward an option that
removes the effect on weapon statistics specifically.
---[Daevos on 4/4 @ 05:24 writes]:
What would justify the stat malus? That was a question asked in a envoy
discussion about deathweapon, and I want to focus on it. So I wrote a addendum
to this report. You can read it here: http://pastebin.com/T3ZGZrwB
---[Rivius on 4/4 @ 15:00 writes]:
Reading your addenum, all your suggestions are fine to me. In regards to the
solution 3, is this meant to be in combination with the current healing malus?
How much stronger will it be at max-deathmarks? As for the comments at the end,
I noticed there was one that was 'baffled' at what I said, so allow me to defend
my position. At max deathmarks, I quote that it was revealed to be a reduction
in wound healing by 150(+-30). This means that for most people you will always
have some residual wounds left over after an application on a bodypart. Keep in
mind that not only does this define "wound-building", but it also means that you
have residual wounds on that body part pushing higher the chance to get better
afflictions on your next hit (due to the nature of wound rolls). For comparison,
without drawdown or forging runes, I do about 374 wounding on myself in a single
strike. With drawdown, I do 389. That's a 15 point difference, which is
comparatively smaller to what it does for the RNG roll and isn't likely to
increase the number of applications needed. There's a lot of other factors to
consider (like armour values) and the context is not exactly the same, but in
general I'd say the current healing malus is nothing to discard as remotely
useless. I still maintain that people are not fully considering the implications
and value behind this, which is a bit surprising. Nevertheless, I support most
of the ideas suggested for deathweapon, as I honestly don't see a very
compelling reason for a stat malus. I understand that there are simply better
ways to build deathmarks without it and it's just not worth the sacrifice.
---[Shuyin on 4/5 @ 04:41 writes]:
Any solution is fine, but tbh, I feel like after 4 reports, the admin really
want that stat malus to stay.
---[Daevos on 4/5 @ 06:31 writes]:
Yes, I understand that there will be a lot of resistance to the idea of removing
the stat malus or divorcing Deathweapon from Deathmarks, but I have to try. The
skill has a lot of potential but it's limited right now, and all efforts to
boost the skill at the margins haven't been enough to make it both useful and
unique. The Ur'guard have offered so many reports for this one skill because we
see the potential and we would love see it realized.
---[Thoros on 4/5 @ 16:53 writes]:
The stat malus makes deathweapon useless, that's why it needs to be removed. No
warrior is going to suffer minus damage, wounds and speed, and no nihilist wants
his only source of damage to be lowered and slowed.
---[Viynain on 4/16 @ 03:26 writes]:
Solution 1 is my preference of the three proposals.
---[Daevos on 4/17 @ 02:08 writes]:
I would like some comments on the addendum as well. Check it out if you haven't
already.