Spellsword, Overpowered

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Twily
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Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by Twily » Fri Mar 16, 2018 7:17 am

I made a thread like this way back when the path was first released, and it was concluded I wasn't aware of the specifics, and would try things out before reporting back on my findings.

I imagine this thread will likely get a lot of hate, simply due to how hard of nerfs I suggest here, but from what I have seen on my two different spellswords(both hit epics), says they are in the severely overpowered category from my perspective.
As is, I get as much AC as my fully geared Kensai Monk that had a 4AC/4WisArtifact. (54 AC with just EMA/Cat'sGrace... all without a single point in tumble. If I had tumble, Haste, and then turned on Improved Expertice, I could hit 70 easily).

Additionally, I hit harder than any other strength based single-handed warrior I come across. At the present, without EpicWeponSpec, I'm hitting for around 40-50 damage per hit, and have seen crits as high as 106, all without a single buff from others, on enemies that are not weak to piercing.
These hits are as hard as many strength based two-handed users.

All of this, is while able to cast timestop, multiple Maximized IssacsGreaterMissileStorms, as well as all the other buffs that come with the territory.

Some say saving throws are the spellswords weakness.
That said, if I forgo tumble entirely and take some CoT levels, I'll end up with 65 Discipline, 21Fort, 28Reflex, 18Will save, with an additional +10 vs spells, and divine wraith for a short lasting additional +3save/AB/damage.(sure, these saves aren't as high as paladins, but this is far from bad, especially since I lack any saving throw gear).

Long story short, I feel like spellswords are very overpowered, especially in mid game and late game.

Suggested Nerfs:
- Severely reduce, or restrict the Damage from IntMod.
(This is what lets spellswords effectively be Str based, even if they're dex based. If they're str based, then they get to double up that damage.)
- Reduce imbue damage (1d8 instead of 1d12, 1d6 instead of 1d8, etc)
- Reduce Electric Imbue damage (d3 instead of d4)
- Restrict Double Imbue for highly focused and/or pure spellswords.
- Make Essences not stack with Imbues
- Reduce the Shield AC gain

If all of the above was done, I'd lose around 17 damage per hit, leaving me at 23-33, with crits at 50-70ish. This is far more within the range what is usually seen by dex characters.
This may be lower than dex rogues who are using sneak attack, or dex weapon masters, but Spellsword gains access to 1st through 9th level spells.
This is where their strength is made up, being weaker than a dex weapon master in melee should be expected from someone who can timestop and drop down 240-360 damage in Issacs storms before the other person can even react.


All of that said, I feel the AB is pretty much on point, and the AC is only a little on the high side. (They're in the sweetspot for late game AC right now, even as much as a 2 point reduction would be very noticed when it comes to PvE)
Last edited by Twily on Fri Mar 16, 2018 3:34 pm, edited 2 times in total.

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BegoneThoth
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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by BegoneThoth » Fri Mar 16, 2018 7:23 am

Yeah, it's pretty well established that spellswords are absolutely bonkers despite a long string of nerfs. The min maxed builds can just hang out in the mid 60's ac with no expertise on and still swing at 45 or so AB, while hitting as hard as a strength character with access to nearly every arcane spell.

The answer is just wait, because nerfs should be coming.
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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by Twily » Fri Mar 16, 2018 7:27 am

Nerfs definitely are coming, Kirito has said such, which I'm definitely glad to hear it and looking forward to them.
This thread is mainly just to offer suggestions on what sort of nerfs could be done, and what people feel is in a balanced spot versus too strong.

(IE, I feel damage is the spot they're way overboard, where as AB and AC I don't feel are huge offenders, less than 4 points towards the strong side(at least, for dex based non-monk ones))

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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by Baron Saturday » Fri Mar 16, 2018 9:28 am

If we're just throwing out ideas that aren't gonna be implemented anytime soon, I guess I'll kick some in.

Change Int bonus damage so that SS only uses the higher of Str or Int. Remove Epic Mage Armor and replaced it with increased scaling on regular mage armor, up to +5 at level 28. Increments at 7/14/21/28? Still powerful, but breachable now, and most will cap at +4.
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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by flower » Fri Mar 16, 2018 9:38 am

Baron Saturday wrote:If we're just throwing out ideas that aren't gonna be implemented anytime soon, I guess I'll kick some in.

Change Int bonus damage so that SS only uses the higher of Str or Int. Remove Epic Mage Armor and replaced it with increased scaling on regular mage armor, up to +5 at level 28. Increments at 7/14/21/28? Still powerful, but breachable now, and most will cap at +4.

Not sure if breachable AC will please many people. But it would prefent them to abuse that for multi stacking items like plain armour with three abilities and alike, further nerfing SS. Not sure how big impact would it have.

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Baron Saturday
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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by Baron Saturday » Fri Mar 16, 2018 9:59 am

Mage Armor is waaaaaaaaaay down the breach list, so the chances of it getting breached are honestly pretty slim.
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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by Kirito » Fri Mar 16, 2018 11:34 am

Baron Saturday wrote:Mage Armor is waaaaaaaaaay down the breach list, so the chances of it getting breached are honestly pretty slim.
Honestly, is not slim... it's also dispellable (and now much easier too).

One mord and a breach (so one round when hasted) is probably enough to strip Mage Armour

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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by ForgottenBhaal » Fri Mar 16, 2018 12:36 pm

I was a part of an event recently, where two spellswords were able to wreck all the mobs that were spawned. This lead so that the DM spawned in new mobs, which the others whom were not spell blades could not do alot against.
While the spellblades just hacked away like nothing had really changed, untouchable.
Its not really a good sign if two spellblades can deal with an entire wave of enemies, in one fourth the amount of time, where three other individuals cant even do anything against the enemies, without having to fear for their life.

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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by LichBait » Fri Mar 16, 2018 1:48 pm

Breachable would be a bad choice. There are dungeons where Mords spells are doled out like candy on Halloween.

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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by flower » Fri Mar 16, 2018 1:57 pm

LichBait wrote:Breachable would be a bad choice. There are dungeons where Mords spells are doled out like candy on Halloween.

The issue is there, that SS stacks EMa with common gear and sources of AC others do. Tumble, expertise, armours, shields. And all these items can customize, adding abilities increasing further AC (Dexterity) or allowing them bigger attribute split.

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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by LichBait » Fri Mar 16, 2018 2:04 pm

I understand the issue, just making it breachable is a bad choice to resolve the issue is all I was saying.

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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by Twily » Fri Mar 16, 2018 3:30 pm

I agree that having EMA removed for them, or making all of their AC dispellable could lead to some serious trouble(practically forcing pure spellsword, due to how likely a single dispel would remove almost or completely everything).

I'd rather see the Shield AC they get toned down before Mage Armor or EMA gets messed with, but that's just my opinion. (Perhaps the Shield AC could apply only to pures, or give a majority of it's boost in the higher levels?)

That said, I do feel if their damage gets toned down the AC might not be as much of an issue anymore(as there are plenty of other characters able to achieve equal or higher AC), but we'd have to wait and see. (Mind you, this is coming from someone who has not played a Monk/Spellsword, I have no idea how these perform, but I feel if their AC is too high it's an issue with allowing the full wis bonus from only a tiny dip in the class)

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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by Rags » Fri Mar 16, 2018 3:42 pm

Mestil's needs to be removed from the armor imbue.

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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by Kirito » Fri Mar 16, 2018 4:24 pm

Twily wrote: I'd rather see the Shield AC they get toned down before Mage Armor or EMA gets messed with, but that's just my opinion. (Perhaps the Shield AC could apply only to pures, or give a majority of it's boost in the higher levels?)
The shield AC is, at best, equivalent to just using a shield so somewhat of a poor idea to change.

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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by Scurvy Cur » Fri Mar 16, 2018 5:56 pm

Kirito and I have been in very close communication on this class for a while now. He's heard basically everything I'm about to say. Absolutely nothing you're saying is new, Twily.

Things that probably still need to change:

:arrow: Int damage bonus. Right now it's too front loaded, and too large. Both of these can be changed pretty easily to both reduce it and push its acquisition later in the class progression. The scaling I've floated to Kirito would knock about 6-7 damage off of the most common spellsword builds, and something closer to 3-4 points off of the more wizard-focused builds which don't have epic weapon spec as is.

:arrow: Mestil's Armor Imbue. Currently bugged to make it unbreachable (still dispellable though). This needs to either be fixed, or removed. I'm not sure which. It's not really a PvE issue, but the tempo swing you get off of the mestil imbue in PvP is absolutely huge.

:arrow: Mage armor imbue. Currently also bugged. See above; fix or remove.

Given how bug riddled armor imbues are, they might deserve a suspension until they can be reworked/fixed in general.

:arrow: Disc bonus. There's really no reason for this to exist. Suggested to change to only apply to pure wiz spellswords.

Things that might still need a change:

:arrow: Monk AC bonus/SS synergy. This has been gently tweaked and nerfed, but still allows qstaff monk spellswords to do exceptionally well. I'm not all the way certain that they'll need it if a big chunk of their damage vanishes, but it's worth keeping an eye on.

:arrow: Electric imbue; halve the secondary damage ticks. I'm not certain this is needed, but I feel we still haven't gone far enough on this imbue.

Things that absolutely should not change:

:arrow: EMA made breachable/ converted into a bonus to breachable mage armor. Personal experience on my spellsword prior to getting EMA was that regular mage armor got breached routinely. This is because, while it's
Baron Saturday wrote:waaaaaaaaaay down the breach list
, most of the breach list is stuff you won't be running except situationally on a spellsword. Of the buffs you're likely to try to keep up full time, shadow shield, premon, and some form of elemental resist are the only ones higher than MA on the breach list. Damage shields are higher, but you usually pack 1, maybe 2 of these and drop them only in boss fights/PvP. You most often use an extended lesser mind blank on yourself rather than a regular mind blank, and that spell's lower than MA on the breach priority list. The end result is that by the 2nd or 3rd lesser breach, Mage armor is gone. Disjunction gets it all the time. Greater breach gets it on the first shot a fair bit.

This change would make PvE pretty tedious, and PvP basically non-tenable.

:arrow: AB. Right now, spellswords usually cap out at 44-45 AB, and many will be 1-2 points lower. Dropping this risks pulling the class out of melee viability.

:arrow: Maximum AC for non-monk SS. Decreasing this by too much makes dex spellsword the only worthwhile one. If there are AC changes to be made, they should focus at smoothing out some of the AC spikes, to make leveling a little less effortless. BegoneThoth's numbers are a little disingenuous here. "Just hanging out with mid 60s AC without expertise" is the solitary purview of monk spellswords (see above, I still think monk AC may need to go away for spellswords), people abusing the mage armor imbue bug, or people using shapechange to AC tank for a party. Everyone else needs to cram a haste to break 60 without expertise, and mid/high 60s is the stuff of expertise.


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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by Baron Saturday » Fri Mar 16, 2018 9:19 pm

Ixnay on the breachable-only mage armor, roger that! The idea was to make them a bit more reliant on gear, but I admit I just looked at mage armor's position on the breach list without considering what spells above it would actually be running. That's 3 am logic for you.

Regarding electric imbue, it's often a theme in games that while electric can do a lot of damage, it can also do almost none. Right now your typical 23 SS is going to have electric jumps deal 7d4 damage, averaging at 17.5. What if that was changed to simply 1d8 or 1d10/tier? Average of 13.5 and 16.5 respectively, but generally less reliable damage.

Admittedly this does hit pure SS the hardest, as it drops the max potential of electric imbue down from an average of 22.5, and pure SS doesn't really need to be hit. It also decouples electric from the Xd4 standard used for other imbues, making it a bit... unintuitive, so it's not my favorite idea.
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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by Tarkus the dog » Fri Mar 16, 2018 10:33 pm

Okay, my two cents ( I will be repeating other's people's points, but that has a point of it's own )

Dispel on hit ( which although is a only a 15% it's still a huge deal ). This is what makes them really strong. There is a reason the dispel from warlocks was removed in the first place. Paladins have this issue as well but that's for a different topic. In overall, it beats me that one class be ridden of it's ability to dispel and do damage at the same time, and then give the same ability to two other classes. This is, in my opinion, what makes the class strong.

Undispellable mestil's. I need not elaborate this one as some people above me already have given a good explanation.

Discipline bonus. Why do they have this? The one class that does receive free discipline is the fighter, and now with kensai out of the picture I really doubt anybody will be making a level 30 fighter character. Spellswords get some extra discipline for free, however, to 'make up for their lack of discipline", if I'm not mistaken. Shouldn't that be a weakness in the first place? I don't think this is a loophole that should be filled.

Kirito's script:

With all due respect, with my intention being entirely placed on the script and not the creator, there's a lot of bugs regarding the spellsword class. From AB not hitting the number's it's supposed to hit, to spellswords being able to summon summons anyways ( via scrolls ), to you being able to use scrolls as means to imbue your armor ( and get same CL as your character, not the scroll ), etc., etc. There are a lot of little, some game breaking, bugs like these. Spellsword is sometimes a wonky, unpredictable mess which begs the wrong people to discover as many 'features' as possible to give them an extra edge purely because it was not properly scripted in the first place.

If you do intend to get it up to par with the rest of the classes in the game, I consider their ability to dispel ON HIT the most essential part about the class that should be changed, if not entirely removed or replaced with something more suitable.

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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by flower » Sat Mar 17, 2018 1:55 am

Filler.
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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by BegoneThoth » Sat Mar 17, 2018 5:47 am

Scurvy list of changes is great, and I think everything he listed needs to go in.

Making EMA breachable but locking it to the end of the breach list would be fitting, a class dependent on buffs needs to get those critical buffs dispelled or have a way to 'run out the clock' on them. SS EMA offers neither.

Though I don't really think my numbers were disingenuous, I just assume the best build when i dispense numbers because I don't like balance based on casual or sub-optimal play.
Last edited by BegoneThoth on Sat Mar 17, 2018 3:03 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by Baron Saturday » Sat Mar 17, 2018 7:21 am

BegoneThoth wrote:Scurvy hit the nail on the head, and I think every one of those ideas needs to go in.

Making EMA breachable but locking it to the end of the breach list would be fitting, a class dependent on buffs needs to get those critical buffs dispelled or have a way to 'run out the clock' on them. SS EMA offers neither.

Though I don't really think my numbers were disingenuous, I just assume the best build when i dispense numbers because I don't like balance based on casual or sub-optimal play.
Scurvy actually argued that EMA should absolute NOT be made breachable.
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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by Kirito » Sat Mar 17, 2018 7:56 am

@Tarkus the dog
what's the issue with AB atm?

and which scrolls are still allowing you to summon?

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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by BegoneThoth » Sat Mar 17, 2018 3:02 pm

Baron Saturday wrote: Scurvy actually argued that EMA should absolute NOT be made breachable.
His list of changes was great. All of the changes he listed need to go in, in my opinion. I wasn't clear, and will edit my post.
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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by Hunter548 » Sat Mar 17, 2018 6:36 pm

Tarkus the dog wrote:Okay, my two cents ( I will be repeating other's people's points, but that has a point of it's own )

Dispel on hit ( which although is a only a 15% it's still a huge deal ). This is what makes them really strong. There is a reason the dispel from warlocks was removed in the first place. Paladins have this issue as well but that's for a different topic. In overall, it beats me that one class be ridden of it's ability to dispel and do damage at the same time, and then give the same ability to two other classes. This is, in my opinion, what makes the class strong.
This is wrong, actually. Spellsword magic imbue is without question the weakest of the imbues, largely because the dispel check has a 15% chance to activate per hit, not a 15% chance to dispel an effect per hit. So instead of dropping a dispel check 5 times a round if every attack hits, you're getting 0.75 dispel checks a round.


I will say that, on the subject of paladins, holy sword isn't as overpowered as you think it is, at least in my experience. It's not exactly analogous to warlocka aince warlocks could dispel forever, at range, and for a while at a higher cl than the paladin dispel.
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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by Astral » Sun Mar 18, 2018 3:05 am

Armor imbue needs to go entirely. This is what drove me off playing my spellsword a while ago. Too buggy. I never knew how to do it right or if I might be abusing a bug.
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Re: Spellsword, Overpowered

Post by Twily » Sun Mar 18, 2018 4:57 am

More of a suggestion than a suggested nerf, but maybe it could go alongside a damage reduction.

Adding a way to convert a portion of their Physical damage into an elemental damage.

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