My rupture curing was perfect, actually. I'm using both applying and reading scrolls. If you would read posts by both Catarin and Geb (and others who have done the testing), it is actually impossible to outpace the offense by curing. Think oldschool heartburst. It's pretty much the same thing, except you can windpipe with virtually no requirement!

I can field this one.

Pinleg (like sap) is one of those things that makes it very hard to convince people to give you upgrades, and the warrior envoys (and druid envoys) understand this. They got a new affliction this month and may get an arm affliction for riposte/coule/whateverthatthingis on the February report.

I do want to give some reasoning behind the specific change for pinleg.

Pinleg is a skill that can keep someone in place. We all know this. Pinleg does not prone someone, so normally you can use your parry/stance to get yourself out of pinlock (eventually). However, people can also simply envenom mantakaya and paralyze you. Once you're paralyzed, you cannot focus body until you have completely writhed out of pinleg. At the same time, your parry/stance will have zero effect because - guess what - you're prone!

This is true and needed addressing. However, there is now actually only one reason to ever use pin leg and that is to stop someone from initiating a tumble. Impale is superior for actual combat purposes. Pin leg was the one interesting aspect of blademaster so I really hope the envoys are thinking on ways to bring the specification up to par with the other warrior specs. Hopefully having pin leg no longer be a factor will ease that process.

Ah, alright. I understand the pinleg thing a bit better. It's just BMs are generally considered the weakest spec and one of the few skills they have that made the spec worthwhile...is now a glorified web. Just thinking.

As for the Bard changes, I've been messing around to see what all changed. There are some major and not so major differences. Colourburst is slower, but still useful. Maelstrom hits every 10 seconds or so. The biggest change is rainbowpattern. The skill is now totally worthless. Beyond worthless. 1 affliction every 16 or so seconds. There is no reason to ever use rainbowpattern now. Awesome. Suppose I'll just start begging anyone with 8k health and up to heartstop.

NOWAII!!!!!! Is it that bad!?

16sec? that is a pretty big nerf stick..

Yup timed it on Vathael. It's not exactly accurate cause I used the second timer on Zmud and not timestamps (cause I don't have em) but yes, even with an afterimage, it's 1 every 16 seconds-ish.

Maelstrom is easy to avoid. Rainbowpattern is useless. Colourburst is decent, but not worth much by itself. I'm thrilled.

16 seconds is only (EDIT:4 seconds) longer than fae and with maelstrom and songs, you still end up with more passive offense that anyone else.

Did you seriously gripe about not being able to easily damage kill people with over 8k health? I know you like to whine about everything, but c'mon.... don't you think that's a rather lofty number to throw out there?

Afterimage only lasts 20sec..

for a three power costs, that's a big deal.. the phantoms of the aquamancers costs just 1power and ticks every 10sec.. afterimage does not even kill by itself.. :<

I think that all it does is make a perfectly good skill bad.. aka, heartburst..

a puzzling turn of events..



4sec is a long time..

Afterimage improves a number of skills though, that's why it's tricky to consider and pin down its effectiveness. Every single second stands the chance to increase its effectiveness exponentially.

I do disagree with the changes to rainbowpattern and such, but to argue their validity in the case of people with 8k health? Come on now.

but 16 sec for 3 power and it only lasts for 60sec? Actually, i suspect its 15sec for 4 afflictions in a minute.. but - pfft.. that hardly justifies the power cost..

I'm not a bard, but even I find this is too much..

You are not considering all of the skills that give afflictions, and help the bard stack auric afflictions on the person. Looking at something in a vacuum can make it look poor, but when you also consider the fact that bards also have abilities that knock a person off equilibrium, that allow the bard to transfix a person while that afterimage is up, that give afflictions and damage on a tick in maelstrom, and that gives afflictions to the person via rainbow pattern, and also that the bard can give afflictions via colourburst if they so desire, than a bard is not hurting at all in the affliction giving department from this nerf. So, that 4 afflictions per minute is only one ability amoung others that give afflictions too.

Oh, and while mages (and bards with glamours) with enough skill in Illusions can dispel much of that with no cost in power, other classes must have Transcendent Arts to dispel some of the abilities for a cost of 8 power.

Bards are fine now.

Pinleg is worthless now outside group combat. Fare thee well, pinleg. It was nice abusing you.

Though hopefully due to this nerf I can continue getting some better skills for Blademaster (Gashchest was a start...weaker than I thought it was going to be - but a start. .8 second stun at size 1 and 100 bleeding isn't what I was expecting..)

I'll never understand why people think it's difficult to cure anything glamours can spit out.

I never said it would be difficult killing someone with 8k health. I implied it is essentially impossible to do so with your average bard damage.

Bards needed tweaks, and they got screwed. Sorry. My opinion.

Great. Now the totally awesome and totally large number of bards will go down.

Music needs to be upgraded, please. Glamours nerfs, fine. But please, PLEASE upgrade Music.

That's precisely the idea, though. We can't even start to try to make Music specs valuable until Glamours is adjusted. It's a painful interval though.

What is the difference between rainbow pattern with sixthsense and without sixthsense? Faster afflict rate? I don't remember =S

While I am slightly miffed at he Glamours nerfs...



THANKYOUTHANKYOUTHANKYOUTHANKYOUTHANKYOUTHANKYOU

Assuming I wanted to stack auric afflictions, I'd drop octave.
Not like they're even that good or useful in a pinch, except minorseventh; I'd only really 'stack' them for discordantchord (and it's crap).


Let's see... that's... 9 power for a bunch of mostly easily cured passive, unmasked afflictions that weaken substantially after 15 seconds (unless you spend another 2 power), can be dispelled, are partially nullified by moving room, and occasionally do jack because afflictions can hit twice between passives. And that's not counting transfixion or octave (which can also be walked out of easily).
Colourburst will only give a maximum of 6 different afflictions (which can sometimes hit twice with the same afflictions, lowering it's effectiveness by 50-100%).
Most of these require recasting during the course of a fight, which is slowed down by the fact you're being hindered, refraining, and blanknoting. And there's no way to hinder curing, so you're doing this until you've got a few seconds to spam minorsecond and hope they're distracted enough for them to die (and if they don't die, congratulations, you're back to square one because they've cured out).
Playing the deathsong is another useless option: all they need to do is turn off their triggers and spam earwort, and you can't do anything to stop it (not enough time, even if you blanknote them right beforehand). The best song effects are all in Starhymn, hunger is easily negated with a little preparation, sleep is easily negated, and none of the effects work if you're deaf (which you will be, since stun's been nerfed, there's no reason to not keep earwort up).

So, yes, Bards can afflict, but it does bugger all. Once the afflictions are there, you're resorting to minorsecond spam once again. The useful part of colourburst, rainbowpattern and maelstrom is the damage and recklessness (to stop sipping health), the afflictions are just there for the same reason as acrobatics: to make sure we're not killed in 3 hits.

Of course, if you're a demigod, you're perfectly balanced.

Yes, just like other people have to re-spend power on attacks that can end up doing bugger all when it is all said and done. A person who understands how to use his/her abilities will understand when to use certain abilities to accomplish what is desiree. The person does not just throw power away by placing every ability up without any thought, expecting it to kill people (Though it seems that is how some people expect and desire things to work).

Anyhow, throwing demigod out there is a bit funny, since I've fought you plenty of times before I was a demigod and always defeated you no matter what class I was or which class you were in. I also fought more before I was a demigod than after, and killed plenty of demigods when I was only 76th level and a mage.