ESF: Illusion Nerf

[Gouge Away]

What build was killed by this?

I'm not a master of the meta by any means, but what build actually effectively used the ESF: Illusion and was unfairly killed by this?
This is not a gotcha, I just want some concrete examples rather than "so many existing characters"

Zen archers, mostly cleric. Anyone who says there were no builds that made ESF Illusion work in combat never saw this in action.

[AstralUniverse]

I have little sympathy for people who built zen archers with ESF illusion just for the mechanical benefits of the clone in combat and the extra DPS it offers. But I do agree that it is a legitimate reason for -relevel in this case, due to an immense lose of build functionality.

[Gouge Away]

Saying you have "little sympathy" is needlessly antagonistic, those players are playing a build that was allowed and that should be that. Arguing whether it should be changed or not is something else but no need to shame anyone like they're cheating the system for playing a legal character.

For the record I have a zen archer and would rebuild if offered but it's still a perfectly valid character and that was never the prime MO so whatevs. I do think in general relevels should be offered with big changes just because there are always people playing odd builds outside the meta who get hurt the worst and besides, after everyone got a free relevel last year I think the time of making that something carefully rationed is probably over. But.. either way!

[dallion43]

I have little sympathy

Simply out of curiosity.
You never took a feat/whatever combination of classes/skill/etc for *just* mechanical benefits?
How can one even define *just* from the line above properly? Even playing a cookie build is 100% mechanical benefits if you look at it this way.

Not to mention it is perfectly legal to plan a PC with only mechanical benefits in mind.
Then, RP according to the optimized PCs stats, classes, feats and skills combination and the PC pre-history one created based on the combination.
Even building a PC around 1 specific mechanic is completely legal. Is it smart? Depends on how much play time you have. But legal? Yes.

Is the above not true? Not great RP, prejudged, *heretical* and whatever else, maybe. But not true?

Saying you have "little sympathy" is needlessly antagonistic,

+1

Edit: if the above imho sounds offensive in any way I humbly apologise. This was never my intention.

[Nevrus]

I think there's a better place to have person-to-person confrontations than on public forums discussing a specific issue.

Rule of thumb, for those reading who want to avoid (or recognize) this trap: The word "You" being used as a singular pronoun to refer to a specific user, or as a plural to refer to multiple users on the other side of an argument, is usually around the point it becomes an ad hominem flame war.

When writing, recognize if you're making a post to advance a discussion's topic or to address a specific individual. If it's the latter, don't, and change the wording and presentation so that it isn't a callout to someone offering their thoughts, even if you vehemently disagree with them.

At the same time, if you are ever specifically called out by another user, the attack doesn't become a war until you respond in kind, and no one will remember the thread in three weeks anyway if you don't escalate. So just ignore it and press your point without making it an argument between two people.

I don't really have much else to offer on ESF Illusion so I am a hypocrite for detouring but I'm trying to help discourse here, so forgive me. I fell into the same trap myself time and again in the past and these are the lessons I learned from it which I am sharing.

[AstralUniverse]

I find it cheesy to build a character with lvl 9 spells just to be a better archer out of all things. I have no sympathy for cheese. If I build a paladin with monk dip to get tonnes of ac and then it would get nerfed I'd smirk and tell myself that karma is a bitch. And that happened before when I cheesed monk's movement speed and gonnes 24/7 and the movementspeed was suddenly gone. And yeah, I too argued on the forums back then that the nerf to the movement speed was too big, except that you cant make it any smaller without uncapping the movement speed, which I learned shortly after posting my rants. That's my point of view now.

[ReverentBlade]

Hail the arbiter of cheese, it shall be by their decree if your character may be functional or not!

[AstralUniverse]

I just said I think this is cause for relevels, even though I dont sympathize, because there was a drop in functionality and a drastic change in the purpose of this spell. I'm entitled to my opinion. This is cheese. But that's unrelated.

[cornelius_4]

Personaly would love it if we could possess the clone like a familiar as that would help so mutch with moving it around and speaking through it.

That remains very much my own wish also.

Given how some have built around this I think it almost certain rebuilds will be offered, but I first want to be absolutely certain it will not change further.

That one would get my vote too. That would make it believable as a player character since it's being fully controlled by one (there could very well be some intended ways to see through it still, either through it's inability to cast a real spell or perhaps true sight or divination focuses gets a roll to detect it).

One use this would give would be the ability to interact with people with your real body far enough away, that you could likely escape before they'd find you, in case hostilities did break out.

Another use would be scouting ahead, something I sometimes do on MoD characters with a familiar and I'm not sure whether entering an area could kill me. Occasionally you might also have monsters chase the illusion, if they have clustered in a hallway and you'd rather have them somewhere else, a little further away from the entrance perhaps.

There also seem to be some promise to the idea of having a choice in what the illusion looks like, maybe it looks like what you cast it on (cast it on an ogre, it looks like the ogre, cast it on yourself, it looks like you). Maybe some pesky adventurers manages to spill your coffee. Ha! next thing they know, a mystery horse comes out of nowhere and attempts to steal their muffins. Only, the muffins never really moved and before they could make sense of it, mystery horse vanishes, never to be seen or heard from again. Although legends say, on a cool moonlit night, mystery horse can be heard rummaging somewhere behind the bakery.

Somewhere in these options, there could very well be something of value to people.

[Gouge Away]

I find it cheesy to build a character with lvl 9 spells just to be a better archer out of all things.

Well. Zen archery clerics (and shamans now) have been a common build for ages so that is not going away with illusion changes.

We're all certainly absolutely entitled to our opinions, but the world outside sucks right now and maybe we could be a little more respectful to each other. This game is supposed to be fun.

[Archnon]

Instead of harshing on this, I keep thinking how can we give it a new niche instead of just another DPS tool. It seems you don't want to just turn it into a high level SD shadow. That already has a niche and it is interesting and fun. I really like the idea of being able to illusion other races in order to travel in forbidden areas. However, one thing that struck me was creating a really nice tool for espionage.

If clones are illusions and incorporeal, could they, say walk through a wall. I don't know if that is even possible programming wise, but if you gave them a high enough hide and move silently, let them be possessed, a player could walk through a wall into, say, an important meeting and listen in. You could build in counters like true sight and stuff, but it could make for some fun RP, again, if it is possible.

[RedGiant]

This is a major change. I would respectfully ask for rebuilds should this change stay.

[Terminal_Templari]

The rule of thumb i generally as is "would i have a revolt on my tabletop game if i dropped this change on my players"

If yes, allow a rebuild.

This change breaks a build i have which i use to play along side my tabletop group who came here at my request b/c er cant play tabletop until this damned virus (one of my team is a nurse)

Now i either delevel and cant play with them, or suck it up, which i shouldnt have to do. I never asked for this nerf, deserved though it may be. I shouldnt have to suffer for a situation not of my making.

I just want to remain an effective team member with a casual group.

[Seren]

For the record, I was not implying that ESF Ilu is good on druids. I was implying that some people use illusion for off-meta 'for-fun' builds. However, when the thing that makes it fun for a 'for-fun' build becomes basically useless, it's hard to justify burning 3 feats on a class that already doesn't get very many compared to many other builds.

If you want to play your character your way, no matter how good or bad, and then that way is no longer mechanically possible, you should be able to re-build your character in some other way that brings satisfaction to the player, minmaxing aside. That was the prime concern.

If they add more malleability for roleplay then the justification begins to tilt back into the positive. But as it stands, some people are just superfluously disappointed with the way they planned their character vs what they now have to show for the time / effort spent planning, and then subsequently leveling.

[Zaphiel]

Personaly would love it if we could possess the clone like a familiar as that would help so mutch with moving it around and speaking through it.

That remains very much my own wish also.

Given how some have built around this I think it almost certain rebuilds will be offered, but I first want to be absolutely certain it will not change further.

Just bumping this in case of someone didn't see.

[Gouge Away]

Personaly would love it if we could possess the clone like a familiar as that would help so mutch with moving it around and speaking through it.

That remains very much my own wish also.

Given how some have built around this I think it almost certain rebuilds will be offered, but I first want to be absolutely certain it will not change further.

Just bumping this in case of someone didn't see.

Without pressuring anyone, would that be something happening soon or is it “maybe eventually?”

Considering just asking for a de-level if it’s the latter and would be a while or may not happen. Thanks.

[RedGiant]

Without pressuring anyone, would that be something happening soon or is it “maybe eventually?”

Considering just asking for a de-level if it’s the latter and would be a while or may not happen. Thanks.

Same.

[Cybren]

It's been floated in the Discord before and I know some people pointed out that the game can get VERY wonky with possessing things that aren't familiars, like "permanently overwrite your character" wonky, so assuming that isn't workable, a function I've always wanted with it is to be able to switch places with it, which is silly and basically stolen out of naruto, but I feel like it would help the functionality of having it be a distraction for you (I would also very much love having it be able to copy personal only spell VFX, as an earlier reply in the thread did point out that you can tell who the caster is by which one is wearing the spells that can only target themselves)

[Nitro]

A workaround would be a widget to change the appearance of your familiar for illusionists, that would allow for possession of it.

[sarithia]

Honestly? Playing an epic illusionist, I'm okay with the lack of damage they do. To counter a zen archer argument above, it's done absolutely nothing that is crippling to my character in terms of that. The one thing I'm concerned with is the sudden transparency that the clone has acquired. It's suddenly become this interactive thing that has been utilized in RP to... well, a thing that can't hold up someone walking through them. It's a little disappointing having to suddenly explain why this can no longer be the case, if that makes sense? Regardless of whether the clone can do damage or not or, I don't know, insert phrases to do with 'optimal' which I've never really cared about, it's the RP aspect for me that's a little bit of a bummer.
As for the suggestions of being able to possess a clone, though, that'd be great.

[Ork]

A workaround would be a widget to change the appearance of your familiar for illusionists, that would allow for possession of it.

What a novel and workable idea. Don't remake with possession, just reskin what's already possessable.

[Zaphiel]

A workaround would be a widget to change the appearance of your familiar for illusionists, that would allow for possession of it.

Not every caster gets familiar to possess.

[AskRyze]

I'm just sad that the ESF Illusion AA build is no longer a thing. :/ Oh well.

[Ork]

A workaround would be a widget to change the appearance of your familiar for illusionists, that would allow for possession of it.

Not every caster gets familiar to possess.

cant you add the ability to anyone in a similar way to hexblade? on taking ESF: Illusion, you gain a familiar if you didn't have one but that familiar is always reskinned to look like you.

[Zaphiel]

A workaround would be a widget to change the appearance of your familiar for illusionists, that would allow for possession of it.

Not every caster gets familiar to possess.

cant you add the ability to anyone in a similar way to hexblade? on taking ESF: Illusion, you gain a familiar if you didn't have one but that familiar is always reskinned to look like you.

Sadly no. I tried to add the feat to a class that doesn't have familiar by default and nothing happened.