Spellsword Changes 6/12/18

[Drak]

Hello,
I just hit level 30 today, and an hour later, we were hit with a rather large nerf bat. And I mean a BIG nerf.

- INT damage scaling removed.

This removes a flat 10 damage for me, as my INT was 31. This is a fairly large damage reduction.

- Discipline bonus now granted as a flat +15 bonus at level 28.

I only have 23 Wizard levels, so now I receive 0 Discipline? Whoa

- Armor Imbues disabled until critical issues involving Breach (in)vulnerability and stacking are resolved.

Any word on how long until this is fixed? Because Acid Sheathe is a big part of fighting bosses and PvP.

- Each Weapon Imbue effect may now only activate once per flurry (once every 2 seconds).

This is a fair change. I 1,000% agree with this one.

- Spellswords may no longer imbue their weapons using spells from their barred school.

Okay, this is the one that hurts the most. I barred Necromancy, because I was told that we were able to use Necrotic spells on our weapons. Now, I am level 30, and I have no ability to change my barred school? This is kind of absurd, and not very fair. Paired with Acid Sheathe, this was my ability to stay alive. Now, I am stuck without life leech, and no way to change that. That isn't fair at all, not one bit.


There are very few Spellswords who I have come across in the months I've been playing this game, and I've spoken to the few that I know, and everyone agrees that this is a bit much. We lost a lot, and I(we) feel that this is just too much.

[PinataPlethora]

Unfortunately, this is the kind of thing you sign up for, when you take an experimental class path.

I actually went with Enchantment on mine, because I assumed the restricted imbuing would be fixed.

You might try lobbying the staff for partial rebuilds, but I wouldn't count on any sort of completely satisfactory compensation, because changes were inevitable.

[Hunter548]

- INT damage scaling removed.

This removes a flat 10 damage for me, as my INT was 31. This is a fairly large damage reduction.

Spellswords, with imbues, still do really good damage. All this does is mean they don't completely outclass every other melee class.

- Discipline bonus now granted as a flat +15 bonus at level 28.

I only have 23 Wizard levels, so now I receive 0 Discipline? Whoa

You mean like every other class that isn't pure spellsword or fighter? They can survive, you can too.

- Armor Imbues disabled until critical issues involving Breach (in)vulnerability and stacking are resolved.

Any word on how long until this is fixed? Because Acid Sheathe is a big part of fighting bosses and PvP.

You can just cast Acid Sheath before you go to fight, you know. Armor imbue has some really absurd issues in PvP because it's not breachable and will stack with regular spells. That's kind of problematic.

- Spellswords may no longer imbue their weapons using spells from their barred school.

Okay, this is the one that hurts the most. I barred Necromancy, because I was told that we were able to use Necrotic spells on our weapons. Now, I am level 30, and I have no ability to change my barred school? This is kind of absurd, and not very fair. Paired with Acid Sheathe, this was my ability to stay alive. Now, I am stuck without life leech, and no way to change that. That isn't fair at all, not one bit.

..so you mean your barred school actually affects you, and isn't 100% irrelevant?

There are very few Spellswords who I have come across in the months I've been playing this game, and I've spoken to the few that I know, and everyone agrees that this is a bit much. We lost a lot, and I(we) feel that this is just too much.

You haven't seen a lot of spellswords because the class has been banned for two months. For what it's worth, me and a couple of other people who have played spellswords suggested a lot of the changes that happened here.

[flower]

I find it absurd that someone is upset he cannot část spells from forbidden school as imbues.


It makes totally no sense it was even possible before…!

[Drak]

My main point here is that I am level 30, and I don't get the ability to change what school i barred. How is that fair? Had I known things were going to suddenly drastically change, I wouldn't have picked the way I do, so even going to level 1, I am locked out forever. Making a huge change like this without giving us the ability to change something in return is absurd. Might as well erase all Kensai's now as well since no one else can take Kensai levels.

[Drak]

I find it absurd that someone is upset he cannot část spells from forbidden school as imbues.


It makes totally no sense it was even possible before…!

You are missing the point. How would you like it if I took the staple of your class away from you?

[Dr. B]

Spellsword is an experimental path. There were ongoing warnings that the class could be disabled or changed, and people knew for a long time that it was buggy and likely to be changed, perhaps significantly. You should have known all of this when you selected the path; it wasn't hard to find out.

[Peppermint]

So you made a build reliant on an obvious bug and were bit when that bug was fixed. Why would you expect a rebuild?

[Tarkus the dog]

Yeah I also yell loudly when I'm hurt, but eventually you realize it's all pointless. Sometimes it's wise to play stuff that you know it won't be changed, like weaponmasters and simple mages, if this kind of thing troubles you. Looking for comfort? Not much of it to be found here. Some stray, agitated spellsword player might share your frustration and they, just like you, will likely come with nothing more than "ah, the pain!". Most will say that the changes are on point, you see.

An end to the world of Arelith and you guy in it? Unlikely. I still play my character to this day, after her toys were taken away. There is some strange and newfound fun to be found in vulnerability. And I'm still having fun, for the most part. I think you can have fun as well if you ignore the changes. Want your guy to impress a lady that is also man? Win as an underdog. Oh and uh, the peppermint speaks wisdom. But I won't judge you in that regard.

[ReverentBlade]

Spellsword is an experimental path. There were ongoing warnings that the class could be disabled or changed, and people knew for a long time that it was buggy and likely to be changed, perhaps significantly. You should have known all of this when you selected the path; it wasn't hard to find out.

Could you point me to some of these warnings? My fiance picked spellsword and he is pretty bummed out. Nothing in what we looked at indicated that "Your character can randomly become weaker at the whims of devs." in any of the class' literature. Certainly doesn't say that when you select it IG at character creation (which is where the vast majority of critical information belongs.)

Now, I understand the need to occasionally nerf classes. Balance is an ongoing, moving target, but this "you were warned" argument kinda annoys me. Players should be able to log in and get all the information they require from IG text.

[PinataPlethora]

Could you point me to some of these warnings? My fiance picked spellsword and he is pretty bummed out. Nothing in what we looked at indicated that "Your character can randomly become weaker at the whims of devs." in any of the class' literature. Certainly doesn't say that when you select it IG at character creation (which is where the vast majority of critical information belongs.)

Now, I understand the need to occasionally nerf classes. Balance is an ongoing, moving target, but this "you were warned" argument kinda annoys me.

There's supposed to be a big red warning message about potential changes when you select the path during character creation. I've seen it on other experimental paths in the past, but if it's not there now, something will need to be done about it.

[Baron Saturday]

- INT damage scaling removed.

Spellswords did insane amounts of damage. Strength + Int + Imbue + Imbue secondary effect, all of which stacked on a magical, essenced weapon. It was nuts. It was equivalent to (or, frankly, better than) battleclerics being able to stack GMW, Keen, and Darkfire - which they haven't been able to do since before I joined the server, because that is just crazy strong. Something, somewhere, needed to go.

- Discipline bonus now granted as a flat +15 bonus at level 28.

The point of the discipline bonus was to bring them in line with other melee classes. Spellswords that cross-class already have the opportunity to get roughly equivalent discipline, and thus do not need the bonus that pure spellswords do.

- Spellswords may no longer imbue their weapons using spells from their barred school.

Previously, the ability to imbue from your barred school made necromancy the clearly optimal choice, since none of the necromancy spells are, in themselves, terrible relevant to a magical fighter. Now, no matter what school you choose to sacrifice, you are giving up something significant.

I get it, though. I do. Playing a class that gets nerfed isn't fun. I promise you, everyone in this thread has been there, and we've all written our share of posts bemoaning the unfairness of it. And then... you get used to the new balance, and you move on.

[TimeAdept]

Could you point me to some of these warnings? My fiance picked spellsword and he is pretty bummed out. Nothing in what we looked at indicated that "Your character can randomly become weaker at the whims of devs." in any of the class' literature. Certainly doesn't say that when you select it IG at character creation (which is where the vast majority of critical information belongs.)

Now, I understand the need to occasionally nerf classes. Balance is an ongoing, moving target, but this "you were warned" argument kinda annoys me.

There's supposed to be a big red warning message about potential changes when you select the path during character creation. I've seen it on other experimental paths in the past, but if it's not there now, something will need to be done about it.

There is, for Spellsword, Shadowmage, and Kensai.

~~~

- INT damage scaling removed.

Should never have had it to begin with. It already gets damage from imbues, allowing it to add 2d12 imbue damage. Flat INT damage was not needed - now Dex and Str is a choice between AC and higher damage, rather than great AC and fighter damage, or pretty good AC and better-than-WM damage.

No class should get outside-STR-always-on-damage that isn't an activatable ability, i.e. Rage, Divine Might, PDK, etc. Adding these outside sources of constant flat dmg sorely unbalances the scales for damage and removes standard dmg classes from relevancy. Fighter's only "class feature" is the need to spend 2 feats, one epic, on 6 damage for one weapon. Spellsword, just for existing, got 10 damage to every weapon regardless of weapon while also being GMW'd to +5 and +2d12 damage imbues and level 9 spells. I know we like to joke in DnD about wizards winning everything, but it was a little absurd.

I only have 23 Wizard levels, so now I receive 0 Discipline? Whoa

??? Druid, Cleric, Rogue, Shadowdancer, Assassin, Sorceror, and Palemaster would all like a word with you about being melee classes that don't get bonus discipline for free, but also have less AC, less damage, and in some cases, no level 9 spells backing them up. Even FIGHTER got nerfed and only gets its discipline at pure level 28 now because Brycers got the equivalent of skill focus discipline for free. The Discipline boost was entirely unnecessary to begin with and that it stayed for pure Spellswords is a concession to the nature of class vs cross class skills in the game.

Any word on how long until this is fixed? Because Acid Sheathe is a big part of fighting bosses and PvP.

I'll just copy paste what I said in Discord about this and make it nicer.

"Defensive imbues should have specifically disallowed acid sheathe death armor and elemental shield.
Because they were going to be the only ones anyone used and they're such incredible tempo to be able to pop off as free actions forcing your opponent to 1: melee you to activate it INSTANTLY proccing it and 2: forcing them to now disengage and waste 2 rounds breaching and then re engaging
This is even assuming they're not bugged and broken
At this point you have gotten a minimum of 8-10 free attacks on potentially flatfooted AC
It's really stupid, who thought that was a good idea?
Tempo is not often a thing in nwn but it TOTALLY is there"

- Spellswords may no longer imbue their weapons using spells from their barred school.

Anyone who made a spellsword expecting to be able to imbue from their forbidden school afte going out of their way to choose a forbidden school understanding what "forbidden" means when you chose it, deserves this to happen to them. That spellsword was released allowing you to imbue from your forbidden school to begin with mystified me, and I always preached to people to treat it as a bug and not to treat it as permanent, and lo and behold, here we are.

You are missing the point. How would you like it if I took the staple of your class away from you?

Fam you have what, 6 other imbues? No one took the staple of your class, you chose to lose it by banning Necromancy.

[Twily]

Just to offer my input as a player of spellswords more or less non-stop since their release...

I definitely think these nerfs were needed, and on paper I feel like they're pretty on-point(haven't been able to get in game to try it out though).


The removed damage does stink for spellswords out there who were used to it, but personally I don't think it ever made logical sense.
The standard meta on Arelith(and NWN/DnD in general) has always been Str builds get more damage, less AC. Dex characters can get more AC, but less damage.
Spellsword was no exception to this and fit into that meta just fine.

Spellswords having the IntBonus like that is comparable to a dex based character getting damage from their dex mod. It just doesn't make sense with how the game has always been designed and balanced.
(and this is a fair comparison, because spellswords go into Int either way for their spells/imbues. That damage they were getting was essentially free)

TL;DR, I built my spellsword as a standard dex based warrior, with int as the secondary stat. I did as much damage per hit with a one-handed weapon as the majority of two-handed users I came across did per hit. Str based spellswords out damaged two handed pure fighters per-hit. This is all while having near full access to the entire spellbook. That's not right, this was sadly a necessary change.


Just think, If you have more int than you need now and don't mind losing a few spellslots, you can go swap the int enchants on your gear for Con instead, to get some more HP in there.

[RedGiant]

There is a usual crowd that shows up to these things, predictably dividing into the usual camps.

So why break with tradition?

I'm not a fan of all the changes. On the sensical side of the changes are the forbidden schools (as painful as they may be) and the flurry limitations. On the "why" side of the changes are the int factoring as a combat stat and perhaps more pointedly the discipline issue. The latter two are things many if not most spellswords factored into their builds, that were NOT bugs with a reasonable chance of being quashed.

There is also theme here with first with bat totem and now with spellsword where pure classing nets you a cross-class skill bonus. I suppose my question here is, will these bonuses allow epic skill focus selection? My guess is that unless there was some coding gymnastics, the answer here is "no".

If not, especially in the case of discipline, this is incentivizing something weird and highly sub-optimal. If the answer is "yes", then I withdraw the objection!

[PinataPlethora]

There is also theme here with first with bat totem and now with spellsword where pure classing nets you a cross-class skill bonus. I suppose my question here is, will these bonuses allow epic skill focus selection? My guess is that unless there was some coding gymnastics, the answer here is "no".

If not, especially in the case of discipline, this is incentivizing something weird and highly sub-optimal. If the answer is "yes", then I withdraw the objection!

It'll be a soft bonus contributing to the +50 (or whatever it is) cap.

The goal is not to make Spellswords better than Fighters. It's to make them equally useful/powerful in a different way. At the end of the day, they're still Wizards with swords. They shouldn't be able to match skills with masters of either art.

[ProbablyAMage]

To be fair, the spellsword designer made a post about how being able to imbue with your forbidden school was intentional some time ago. Until I read that, I'd avoided doing so myself since I assumed it was a bug. Like the thread maker my spellsword loses access to vamp regen......ah well. Frankly, it loses an awful lot of utility in high epics in my experience anyway. Kits are your friend if you engage in melee. Since I haven't played my spellsword often lately, I mostly checked here for one thing. Does the damage nerf put spellsword damage in a reasonable place? Good-to-decent but vastly outclassed by weaponmasters? If they dialed that in properly I'm completely on board with these changes. I'm just thrilled that I get to keep my undispellable Epic Mage Armor, because losing THAT is about the only thing that would make me say spellswords went from great to terrible.

[RedGiant]

The goal is not to make Spellswords better than Fighters. It's to make them equally useful/powerful in a different way. At the end of the day, they're still Wizards with swords. They shouldn't be able to match skills with masters of either art.

Your point on class balance is valid. But, what I am saying is that cross-class skill bonuses are just a bad idea as a class feature, even more-so as a 28th lvl perk.

For example, a pure druid is arguably the new druid powerhouse, yet due to the bat totem changes, people who took bat totem are now stuck with an untenable choice. You cannot max your most important skill and be pure class.

Spellswords, in their way, are even more egregious in this regard. In fact, I''m not sure why anyone would actually build a pure class spellsword with the fat list of optimized dip classes sitting around on the build-thread. Like the "junk-stealth" discussions of yore, "junk discipline" is the same as no discipline on Arelith.

My point is, in both these tweaked classes we are oddly structuring the incentives so that there either really isn't a choice or there are bad choices all around.

[Twily]

I'm just thrilled that I get to keep my undispellable Epic Mage Armor, because losing THAT is about the only thing that would make me say spellswords went from great to terrible.

I can definitely agree with that one- I don't mind any nerfs that they want to do, unless it's making EMA dispellable, or removing the 3/4 AB progression.

[Tourmaline]

Spellswords, in their way, are even more egregious in this regard. In fact, I''m not sure why anyone would actually build a pure class spellsword with the fat list of optimized dip classes sitting around on the build-thread. Like the "junk-stealth" discussions of yore, "junk discipline" is the same as no discipline on Arelith.

I don't see why anyone would go pure wizard spellsword either, especially just for +15 discipline, unless some other boon is coming down the pike.

BUT, a spellsword with GSF enchantment could pretty easily add another 20 or more disc from +2 skill gear. That plus +6-12 from strength, 15 from cross classing and the 15 level 28 bonus does put you in an acceptable place.

Still sounds like you need a lot more incentive to go pure though.

[Peppermint]

There was never any reason to go pure. Pure spellswords were given a cookie so as not to completely demolish those that did anyway. Which is not to say that pure spellswords were good or are good now. Simply that a bone was thrown out to existing (albeit already suboptimal) builds.

Were spellswords made from scratch, they'd probably receive no discipline bonus at all. It is, indeed, not the cleanest design choice.

[Queen Titania]

I don't believe there was ever a spellsword warning, and I also believe the player(s) giving the feedback are newer in this case, not avid forum users, and so not aware.

I am going to add a warning to the wiki page for this information, and for future paths so those who read that can be aware should they be more of a wiki reader than a forum reader.

[Rwby]

I don't believe there was ever a spellsword warning, and I also believe the player(s) giving the feedback are newer in this case, not avid forum users, and so not aware.

I am going to add a warning to the wiki page for this information, and for future paths so those who read that can be aware should they be more of a wiki reader than a forum reader.

While that's super nice of you Titania, I do want to echo what others have said and call for more in-game warnings and less Wiki/Forum stuff. While the Wiki/Forums are great to have, I really don't want them to feel like they're mandatory to have any idea what's going on.

[Cortex]

I never played a SS, I remember another path having the "experimental warning" upon being selected on character creation, was this not the case with SS?

[Jagel]

I am sympathetic to the OP but one of the conditions we have to accept when playing on a server regularly updated with new races, classes, paths, loot etc. is that the metagame can and will change. Classes will be changed, buffed or nerfed and these changes have been mostly direct improvements lately (the last year at least).

Class changes also end up being either direct or indirect nerfs to some characters. The devs have lately taken a more lenient stance when it comed to rebuilds. There used to be a strict no rebuild policy. Still some characters will end up subpar or slightly gimped by updates. Even buffs.

Take druids. Since the implementation of gifts a pure druid was a ridiculous idea when compared to a druid with, say, a druid/monk or any disc. dump really. Update: dragon shape nerfed from ultimate ability to useful early/mid-epic shape, monolithic shape new late-game powerhouse. A monk/druid went from being a very powerful build to an ok build with obvious downsides.

Barbarians: first update to rage gave damage shields as main rage cookie. A min-max approach to making this work was to invest everything into survivability to the point where HP was more important than ab/ac. Class revision removed damage shield in favour of boosts to melee prowess. Probably left more than a few barbs with underwhelming builds.

Things are going to change. I level so slowly that many of my build designs become irrelevant half way through. It also means that some chars suddenly see a huge boost in their viability and not least fun new mechanics.

If we are to receive warnings put it on every class ormake it part of the message displayed when entering the server.