Pinned NDA Balance Playtests

Like you all know from our latest Dev Talk, we are currently busy working on various new items and other changes. However we still want to make a couple of adjustments in the next patch to improve some items & spells that are currently not used a lot and toning down some items that currently provide too much value. And we are also removing the ability to mount up in 5v5 Crystal League & Crystal Arena, to make it less safe to backcap the enemy team.

All these changes are still in testing and may vastly differ in the final patch.

Fire Staffs

• Pyroblast (one-handed Fire Staff)
  
  • Removed the aim-rotation mechanic
    
  • Now it is a targeted ability that always shoots the projectile towards the targeted enemy. (The projectile can still be body-blocked or dodged with a blink)
    
  • Targeting Range: 15m
    
  • Increased Projectile Speed and hitbox
    
  • 0.4s channel duration damage: 240 -> 300
    
  • 0.8s channel duration damage: 300 (unchanged)
    
  • 1.2s channel duration damage: 360 (unchanged)
    
• Combustion (Infernal Staff)
  
  • After cast the targeted enemy gets now feared for 1.5s (but is immune to the fear after catching fire once)
    
  • Removed the silence effect of the Flame Trail
    
  • Instead the Flame Trail now fears enemies for 1.5s
    
  • Improved Hit Detection of the Flame Trail on the ground
    

Frost Staffs

• Frost Lance (all Frost Staffs)
  
  • Cast Time: 0.35s -> 0s
    

Hammers

• Giant Steps (Forge Hammers)
  
  • Slow Strength: 50% -> 30%
    

Maces

• Defensive Slam (all Maces)
  
  • Now also increases Crowd Control Resistances by 0.2 (for reference Displacement Immunity currently increases CCR by 0.3)
    
• Sacred Ground (all Maces)
  
  • Area Duration: 6s -> 5s
    

Helmets

• Displacement Immunity (Knight Helmet)
  
  • Does not increase Crowd Control Resistance anymore
    
• Hellion Hood
  
  • Cooldown: 60s -> 40s
    

Armors

• Mist Cloud (Mistwalker Jacket)
  
  • Caster is now slowed by 20% while turned into Mist Cloud
    
  • Energy Cost: 9 -> 16%
    

Capes

• Sandstorm (Bridgewatch Cape)
  
• Reworked the ability:
  
  • Condition: Activates when you cast an E-slot Ability
    
  • Effect: Creates a 5m sandstorm aura surrounding the caster for 5s.
    
  • Slows unmounted enemies around the caster by 20%
    
  • Reduces Crowd Control Resistances by 0.2.
    

Crystal League

• 5v5 Crystal League and Crystal Arena matches
  
  • Players can’t use mounts anymore
    
• Claiming an Runestone will now be canceled if the caster is in one of the following states:
  
  • Invisible
    
  • Invincible
    
  • Not Targetable
    

Next patch focuses mainly on improving various underused and outdated abilities. Additionally we overhaul the Quarterstaff PvE experience for new players, as well as more visual overhauls, to further improve the game-feel and readability. We also tone down some items that have been too oppressive in certain content types.

All these changes are still in testing and may vastly differ in the final patch.

Arcane Staffs
Chain Missile still puts out a lot of sustain damage in 5v5 Crystal League. To make other DPS options in this content more attractive we are reducing the group damage output of Chain Missile, but increase it’s damage on the primary target. Making this ability better for 1v1s and small scale fights. The Dark Sphere debuff is also very oppressive in Crystal League. To make it less devastating for the enemies we are reducing the debuff duration.

• Chain Missile (all Arcane Staffs)
  
  • First Target Damage: 121 -> 132
    
  • Projectile Bounce Damage: 60 -> 25
    
  • Arcane Charge Damage: 61 -> 55
    
• Dark Sphere (Evensong)
  
  • Debuff Duration: 7s -> 5s
    

Axes
Realmbreaker is a very strong enabler in one-shot comps in 10v10 Hell Gates and other similar size group fights. The Aftershock Hit Points Reduction debuff is not affected by the armor reduction caps, but effectively also increases the damage taken of the target. To reduce the impact of this additional damage increase we are lowering this debuff value.

• Aftershock (Realmbreaker)
  
  • Hitpoints Reduction: 20% -> 15%
    

Bows
Enchanted Quiver is overhauled into an ability that keeps the auto attack playstyle theme, but is a bit more interactive. The low cooldown makes it less about single target burs and makes it less susceptible to purges. Instead the play style should feel more similar to playing an ADC in a MOBA. Mistpiercer has also dropped in usage, to make it more impactful in large scale fights, we are increasing the damage.

• Enchanted Quiver (Regular Bow)
  
  • Reworked the ability:
    
    • Enchant 6 of your arrows for the next 8s.
      
    • While you hold enchanted arrows, your attack speed is increased by 50% and your normal attack damage is increased by 240%.
      
    • Auto-Attacks consume 1 Enchanted Arrow.
      
    • Recast the ability within 8s to sidestep into target direction and enchant 4 more arrows. (cannot exceed 6 arrows)
      
    • Cooldown 12s / 15s (after multicast)
      
    • Enchanted Arrows on Activation: 5 -> 6
      
    • Enchanted Arrows on Multicast: 3 -> 4
      
    • Max Enchanted Arrows: 5 -> 6
      
    • Second Activation Cooldown: 15s -> 12s
      
• Lucent Hawk (Mispiercer)
  
  • Damage: 145 -> 160
    

Daggers
Deathgivers are currently very oppressive in Solo Mists. We want to nerf the item primarily in the Mists without affecting it too much in other content types. Therefore we are increasing the cooldown of Shadow Edge. The high mob density inside the Mists allows Shadow Edge much more mobility options than in other situations. To affect Shadow Edge not too much in situations with less mobs, hitting an enemy player will reduce the cooldown back to the current value.

• Shadow Edge (all Daggers)
  
  • Cooldown: 15s -> 20s
    
  • Hitting an enemy player reduces this ability’s cooldown by 25%
    

Fire Staffs
Fire Staffs struggle in solo and small-scale fights. Since Fire Staffs lack mobility, we want them to be a bit more dangerous in open fights, that is why we are increasing the damage output of Searing Flame.

• Searing Flame (all Fire Staffs)
  
  • Searing Flame Projectile Damage: 94 -> 99
    
  • Furious Flame Projectile Damage: 182 -> 191
    

Frost Staffs
Great Frost is currently struggling to find its place. To make it more viable as a damage dealer for small and medium sized group fights we are increasing the damage of Hail. Additionally we are also increasing Frost Lance damage output, which is currently underused. The higher damage output should make it more attractive to also be used in small and medium group fights.

• Frost Lance (all Frost Staffs)
  
  • Damage: 145 -> 160
    
• Hail (Great Frost Staff)
  
  • Damage: 130 -> 142
    

Hammers
We are increasing the sleep duration of Knockout, the least used Hammer ability. The longer sleep duration should make it more attractive in certain situations to take an enemy temporarily out of the fight.

• Knockout (all Hammers)
  
  • Sleep Duration vs Players: 4.36s -> 5s
    
  • Sleep Duration vs Mobs: 8.72s -> 10s
    
  • Hit delay: 0.4s -> 0.25s
    
  • Standtime: 1s -> 0.5s
    

Quarter Staffs
Adding two new abilities to improve early PvE experience and allow for more options with damage dealing bruisers playstyles for Quarterstaffs. Additionally we are buffing Separator, an ability that is rarely used. We are increasing its root duration and the cast-range, this makes it easier to reach the target and also works against enemies with Robe of Purity active.

• Added new Q-Ability: Whirling Strikes
  
  • Whirl your staff around, dealing 38 physical damage every 0.25s in a 5m radius while channeling for up to 0.6s (can move while channeling).
    
  • Hitting at least one enemy will reduce this ability’s cooldown by 0.5s for 5s (stacks up to 3 times)
    
  • Cooldown 4s / Channel Duration 0.6s
    
• Added new W-Ability: Gale Dance
  
  • Swing your weapon up to 3 times into the target direction, dealing 80 physical damage each hit.
    
  • Hitting an enemy with all three swings increases your Move Speed by 30% and Normal Attack Damage by 50% for 4s
    
  • Cooldown: 12s / Channel Duration: 1s
    
• Concussive Combo (all Quarter Staffs)
  
  • Improved Hit Detection of the first two hits
    
• Separator (all Quarter Staffs)
  
  • Cast Range: 3m -> 5m
    
  • Root Duration: 1.6s -> 2.5s
    
  • Removed the Slow on knocked back enemies
    
• Removed the Ability: Empowered Slam
  
• Removed the Ability: Heavy Cleave
  
• Adjusted Ability Unlock Order:
  
  • Always Unlocked:
    
    • Concussive Combo
      
    • Whirling Strikes
      
    • Gale Dance
      
  • Level 3: Stun Run
    
  • Level 15: Forceful Swing
    
  • Level 40: Cartwheel
    
  • Level 70: Rising Blow
    
  • Level 85: Separator
    

Swords
While it is nice to finally see Dual Swords successfully being played across the game. The recent buffs also made it very hard to fight against, especially in solo and small-scale fights. The combination of the uninterruptible jump and the knock up afterwards reduces counterplay options. Since Dual Swords was struggling a lot with the interruptible jump, we keep that part but will take away the knock-up. This gives the enemy more options to react.

• Spinning Blades (Dual Swords)
  
  • Doesn't knock enemies into the air anymore
    

Helmets
Mage Cowl was a very widely used ability in the game, but its core design didn’t allow for much interaction or outplay options. That is why reworked the Poison ability into a cone Firebreath, which applies a DoT. This can now be missed or dodged, but can hit multiple targets at once or invisible targets. Additionally we are buffing Immortal and Spider’s Thread which are still seeing little usage across the game.

• Poison (Mage Cowl)
  
  • Reworked into the new ability: Firebreath
    
    • Breathe fire in a 13m cone in front of you. Any enemy hit catches fire and takes 160 magical damage over 3s.
      
    • (For reference DoT Damage of the old Poison was 180)
      
• Immortal (Mistwalker Hood)
  
  • Cooldown: 45s -> 30s
    
• Spider's Thread (Duskweaver Helmet)
  
  • Standtime: 0.1s -> 0s
    
  • Thread Projectile Range: 15m -> 17m
    

Shoes
To indirectly buff tanks in group fights we are increasing the cooldown of Break Free. This extended down time between self cleanses, allows tanks to get more value of big CC effects in longer group fights, like Crystal League.

• Break Free (Mercenary Shoes)
  
  • Cooldown: 25s -> 30s
    

Visual Improvements
Improved visuals and audio for these abilities to make them more satisfying to use and easier to read.

• Quarter Staffs
  
  • Stun Run (all Quarter Staffs)
    
• Swords
  
  • Interrupt (all Swords)
    
• Armors
  
  • Speed Caster (Scholar Robe)
    
  • Electric Field (Stalker Jacket)
    
• Shoes
  
  • Energetic Sprint (all Cloth Sandals)
    
  • Rotten Ground (Cultist Sandals)
    
  • Mark of Sacrifice (Hellion Shoes)
    
  • Rejuvenating Sprint (all Plate Boots)
    

Crystal League
For the next season we are changing the Crystal League match rules. The Runestones will now score much less frequently. But the scoring Runestones will then reset back to neutral each round. This means the leading team can’t just get the Runestone advantage and play defensively and win over time. To make up for the longer scoring rounds the point value per rotation has been increased accordingly to keep the whole match duration roughly the same.

• 5v5 Crystal League & Crystal Arena
  
  • At the end of each Round, all scoring Runestones reset. Meaning the team that holds more Runestones at the end of each Round loses their Runestones.
    
  • Scoring Round: 60s -> 150s
    
  • Scoring Changed:
    
    • 1 Runestone advantage 10 -> 25
      
    • 2 Runestones advantage 10 -> 35
      
    • 3 Runestones advantage 20 -> 50
      
  • Runestone Channel Range: 4m -> 8m
    
  • Changed Map: Cross → Spade
    
• 20v20 Crystal League
  
  • At the end of each Round, all scoring Runestones reset. Meaning the team that holds more Runestones at the end of each Round loses their Runestones.
    
  • Scoring Round: 120s -> 180s
    
  • Scoring Changed:
    
    • 1 Runestone advantage 10 -> 30
      
    • 2 Runestones advantage 10 -> 45
      
    • 3 Runestones advantage 20 -> 60
      
    • 4 Runestones advantage 20 -> 75
      
    • 5 Runestones advantage 60 -> 90
      
  • Runestone Channel Range: 4m -> 8m
    

In the next patch we mainly focus on improving the feeling and audio- / visual feedback of many early game items. To improve the first impression of the game and bring some older items up to our modern standards. So many changes are not primarily intended to address the current end game meta, but rather meant to improve the foundation of our gameplay.

All these changes are still in testing and may vastly differ in the final patch.


Arcane Staffs
Time Freeze was a very dominant item across mid- and large scale fights. It was especially very decisive as a defensive tool to save allies. While it was great for the Arcane player to have that much impact on the fight, it essentially was too strong as a tool to make up for any positioning mistakes and most importantly helped larger groups more than smaller groups. To help smaller groups to capitalize on positioning mistakes of larger forces we will remove the ability to Freeze allies. Instead Great Arcane will now solely be used to stop enemies. To allow it to have more impact in this new role we buff it's player freezing capabilities, while taking its defensive option away.

• Time Freeze (Great Arcane)
  
  • Is now limited to affect maximum 5 enemy players and 5 ally players at once (mob target is still unlimited)
    
  • Can't freeze allies anymore
    
  • Base Cooldown: 60s -> 45s (Cooldown scaling stays the same, so it has 25s cooldown on 2000 IP)
    
  • Cast Time: 0.6s -> 0s
    
  • Hit Delay: 0s -> 0.5s
    
  • Enemy Player Freeze Duration: 2s -> 3s
    
  • Player Immunity after a Player Freeze: 15s -> 5s
    

Bows
Most changes are intended to make Bows feel better and more responsive to play. Ray of Light’s cooldown is further decreased but we also reduce the root duration. This way we want Ray of Light to be the more damage oriented kiting option on W. We are also making Ray of Light to be the first W spell, to make the early PvE experience more interesting, because right now player’s start with two self buffs in their kit (Explosive Arrows and Enchanted Quiver), which makes Bows feel not very dynamic in the early game.

• Auto Attacks
  
  • Standtime after each attack: 0.4s -> 0.3s
    
• Poisoned Arrow (all Bows)
  
  • Hit Delay: 0.2s -> 0.1s
    
• Ray of Light (all Bows)
  
  • Cooldown: 12s -> 10s
    
  • Root Duration: 1.99s -> 1.8s
    
• Adjusted Spell Unlock Order:
  
  • Level 3: Explosive Arrows -> Ray of Light
    
  • Level 70: Ray of Light -> Explosive Arrows
    

Crossbows
We are adjusting the auto attack timing for Crossbows to make the weapon line feel more responsive.

• Auto Attacks
  
  • Standtime after each attack: 0.4s -> 0.3s
    

Cursed Staffs
Demonic Staff has been a very dominant item across various content types. Its combination of high damage potential and a Fear allows for combo setups with too much burst damage and limited counter play. For example following up with Cursed Beam after the Fear, while the enemy has four Vile Curse Charges on them. To reduce the follow up damage potential, while the target is feared, the Anguished Soul will now consume the Vile Curse Charges on the enemy.

• Anguished Soul (Demonic Staff)
  
  • Now consumes all Vile Curse Charges on the enemy
    
  • Fear Duration is not fixed anymore, instead it scales with item power, bonus cc duration factors and target CC resistance
    

Hammers
Forge Hammers has recently been buffed to have more impact on its attacks, which made it very powerful in Crystal League and Hell Gates. The combination of a frontline Bruiser with good damage and disruption and the very high tankiness makes it too hard to counter. We want to keep the high impact of Forge Hammers in the front, but reduce their survivability, so they don’t outperform other weapons in this role.

• Giant Steps (Forge Hammers)
  
  • Armor Factor: 0.35 -> 0.2
    
  • Magic Resistance Factor: 0.59 -> 0.35
    

Quarter Staffs
Concussive Blow is reworked into a multicast ability that plays very similar to the current iteration but feels much better to use and communicates what is happening more clearly. Additionally we reduce the Standtime after Vault Leap, allowing the caster to combo while the enemy is still in the air at the cost of some of the cast range.

• Concussive Blow (all Quarterstaffs)
  
  • Reworked into a Multicast ability
    
  • Combine up to two abilities. The combo resets after 6s
    
  • 1st and 2nd: Flowing Blow
    
    • Land a Flowing Blow on the targeted enemy, dealing physical damage in a cone in front of you.
      
  • 3rd Concussive Blow
    
    • Land an overhead Concussive Blow on the target, dealing physical damage and stuns.
      
  • 1st and 2nd Hit Damage: 80 -> 75
    
  • 3rd Hit Damage: 125 -> 120
    
  • Renamed to Concussive Combo
    
• Vault Leap (regular Quarterstaff)
  
  • Standtime: 0.6s -> 0.25s
    
  • Range 15m -> 12m
    

Swords
We are adding the new W-ability Blade Cyclone. An fun and engaging ability, which deals damage and also offers some mobility and repositioning. Since Swords already have a lot of mobility in their kit, we wanted to keep the additional move speed it offers under control by limiting its distance and move speed. And as an additional check it also always consumes a Heroic Charge. For pure unconditional mobility Iron Will will still be the superior choice. Blade will now become the Swords first W ability, to vastly improve the first experience with the weapon tree. We also improved various Sword ability visual effects to make them more satisfying to use.

• Added new W-ability: Blade Cyclone
  
  • Swirl into target direction, dealing 40 physical damage up to 3 times.
    
    • Move Speed: 11m/s
      
    • Range: 7m
      
    • Standtime: 0.25s
      
  • If you have at least 1 Heroic Charge active, it will be consumed and enemies take 60 physical damage every hit instead.
    
• Crescent Slash (Clarent Blade)
  
  • Projectile Speed: 28m/s -> 29.3m/s
    
  • Improved Projectile Hit Detection
    
• Adjusted Spell Unlock Order:
  
  • Always Unlocked:
    
    • Heroic Strike
      
    • Heroic Cleave
      
    • Blade Cyclone
      
  • Level 3: Interrupt
    
  • Level 15: Splitting Slash
    
  • Level 40: Hamstring
    
  • Level 70: Parry Strike
    
  • Level 85: Iron Will
    

Shoes
Ethereal Form’s downsides are currently making it not used much. To make it more reliable to use we make the channel at the start uninterruptible. Additionally we are also removing the self damage reduction effect to open the ability up to be more useful in various content types.

• Ethereal Form (Feyscale Sandals)
  
  • Delay to turn into Ethereal Form: 1s -> 0.5s
    
  • The channel is now uninterruptible
    
  • Removed the self damage reduction
    

Visual Improvements
Overhauled visuals and audio for these abilities to make them more satisfying to use and improve readability

• Bows
  
  • Auto Attacks
    
  • Poisoned Arrow (all Bows)
    
  • Enchanted Quiver (Regular Bow)
    
  • Undead Arrows (Whispering Bow)
    
• Crossbows
  
  • Auto Attacks (including Energy Shaper)
    
• Quarter Staffs
  
  • Concussive Blow (all Quarter Staffs)
    
• Maces
  
  • Sacred Ground (all Maces)
    
• Swords
  
  • Splitting Slash (all Swords)
    
  • Mighty Blow (Broadsword)
    
  • Charge (Claymore)
    
  • Spinning Blades (Dual Swords)
    
  • Crescent Slash (Clarent Blade)
    
• Armors
  
  • Speed Caster (Scholar Robe)
    

In the next patch we will improve some of the currently underperforming items and abilities like Dual Swords or Dagger Pair. And other adjustments aimed at the 5v5 Crystal League meta. Improving options to potentially break through very defensive strategies like Iron Breaker being able to break shields and blinks protecting against purges to pair with offensive builds like regular bows. While toning down some of the strongest defensive options like Iron-clads and Druid Staffs. In the next patch we will also change the map back to “5v5 Crystal Realm - Cross” for Crystal League and Crystal Arena for the duration of Season 18.

All these changes are still in testing and may vastly differ in the final patch.

Axes

• Raging Blades (all Axes)
  
  • Vastly Improved Hit Detection to be more reliable
    
  • Added an additional hit directly on activation
    
  • Inner Ring Radius: 2.5m -> 2m
    

Daggers

• Shadow Edge (all Daggers)
  
  • Improved Hit Detection at max range
    
• Slit Throat (Dagger Pair)
  
  • The cast is now uninterruptible
    
  • Cast Time: 0.4s -> 0.6s
    
  • Cast Range: 2m -> 3m
    
  • Castrange Tolerance: 5m -> 7m (the cast won’t be canceled as easily by running away anymore)
    

Hammers

• Iron Breaker (all Hammers)
  
  • Now also removes shields on enemies
    

Nature Staffs

• Rejuvenating Flower (all Nature Staffs)
  
  • The Flower on the ground is now activated by any ally stepping on it.
    
  • Flower Area Radius: 3m -> 5m
    
  • Max Targets: 5 -> 10
    
  • Standtime: 0.4s -> 0s
    
• Spiritual Seed (Druid Staff)
  
  • Cooldown after Recast: 20s -> 30s (Casting once still has 20s cooldown)
    
• Spirit Animal (Rampant Staff)
  
  • Max Targets: 15 -> 20
    
  • Healing Increased per Ally: 30% -> 20%
    
  • Maximum Targets for Heal Increase: 10 -> 20
    

Quarter Staffs

• Hurricane (Iron-clad Staff)
  
  • Channel Duration: 3s -> 2s
    

Spears

• Breakthrough (Daybreaker)
  
  • Cast Time: 0.5s -> 0.35s
    
  • Dash Speed: 20m/s -> 24m/s
    

Swords

• Spinning Blades (Dual Swords)
  
  • The Caster is now immune all CC Effects during the Jump
    
  • Damage is now independent of Heroic Charges (it always does 2 Heroic Charges damage now)
    
  • Enemies are knocked up for 0.6s on impact
    
  • Auto Attack Buff Duration: 5s -> 3s
    
  • Auto Attack Buff Damage Increase: 50% -> 100%
    

Shoes

• Blink (Cleric Sandals)
  
  • Caster is now also immune to purges for 0.2s
    
• Raging Blink (Stalker Shoes)
  
  • Caster is now also immune to purges for 0.2s
    
• Evasive Jump (Royal Shoes)
  
  • Caster is now immune to purges during the jump
    

Mists

• Long Hostile Dismount
  
  • Ability Cooldown: 12s -> 15s
    

We are working right now on balance changes which are intended to go live in the the Off Season after the CLC, between S17 and S18. The aim is to tone a few items down that are very dominant in certain content types, like Great Arcane. Further tone down some mobility outliers in the Mists, Royal Jacket and Claymore. While bringing some new options for the meta, like a new Holy Staff passive and a new effect for Gigantify Potions and some improvements for items that are currently underused or outshined by other items. The changes for the Long Hostile Dismount Cooldown are intended to already go live with Patch 1.

All these changes are still in testing and may vastly differ in the final patch.

Arcane Staffs

• Time Freeze (Great Arcane Staff)
  
  • Hit Delay: 0.5s -> 0s
    
  • Cast Time: 0s -> 0.6s
    
  • Standtime: 0.6s -> 0s
    

Axes

• Bloody Reap (Infernal Scythe)
  
  • Damage above 40%: 108 -> 126
    

Crossbows

• Sweeping Bolt (Heavy Crossbow)
  
  • Damage: 178.13 -> 192
    

Daggers

• Blood Ritual (Demonfang)
  
  • Damage: 112 -> 106
    

Fire Staffs

• Flame Tornado (Blazing Staff)
  
  • The Damage is not reflectable anymore
    

Holy Staffs

• Removed the Passive Aggressive Caster
  
• Added New Passive: Ascended
  
  • Condition: Activates when you cast your weapon's second-slot ability
    
  • Effect: Makes all your casts and channels uninterruptible for 1.5s
    

Maces

• Oathkeepers Base Stats
  
  • Additional Health Factor: 200 -> 150
    
  • Additional Ability Power Factor: 1.2 -> 1.05
    
  • Additional Auto Attack Factor: 1.2 -> 1.05
    

Spears

• Spear Throw (Heron Spear)
  
  • Cooldown: 25s -> 20s
    

Swords

• Iron Will (all Swords)
  
  • Move speed Increase: 20% -> 10%
    
• Splitting Slash (all Swords)
  
  • Hitdelay: 0.3s -> 0.2s
    
  • Standtime: 0.5s -> 0.3s
    
• Charge (Claymore)
  
  • Range: 13m -> 11m
    
• Crescent Slash (Clarent Blade)
  
  • Projectile Range: 18m -> 21m
    
  • Projectile Speed: 22m/s -> 28m/s
    

Helmets

• Spider's Thread (Duskweaver Helmet)
  
  • Hit Delay: 0.2s -> 0s
    
  • Standtime: 0.5s -> 0.1s
    

Armors

• Purging Shield (Mage Robe)
  
  • Increased Resistances: 0.24 -> 0.28
    
• Royal Banner (Royal Jacket)
  
  • Cooldown Rate for the Caster: 50% -> 30% (allies Cooldown Rate stays at 50%
    
  • Max Targets: 5 -> 10
    
• Mythical Web (Duskweaver Armor)
  
  • Casttime: 0.6s -> 0.4s
    
  • Other Webs Removal Radius: 20m -> 16m
    

Capes

• Mark of the Raven (Morgana Cape)
  
  • Base Cooldown: 140.3s -> 120s
    

Potions

• Gigantify Potions
  
  • Now also makes immune to Forced Movement Effects
    

Mists

• Long Hostile Dismount
  
  • Ability Cooldown: 10s -> 12s
    
  
  
  • Also fixed a bug where the Long Hostile Dismount would not apply anymore if a fighting player died
    

These changes are intended to go live with the first patch of Beyond the Veil. This will not be a big balance patch but a couple of adjustments to react to the current meta on the game. The main goal is to tone down the biggest mobility outliers and have a few adjustments and buffs for currently underused abilities.

All these changes are still in testing and may vastly differ in the final patch.

Axes

• Razor Cut (Bearpaws)
  
  • Range: 12m -> 10m
    
  • Energycost: 20 -> 16
    

Bows

• Frost Shot (all Bows)
  
  • Cooldown: 15s -> 18s
    
• Ray of Light (all Bows)
  
  • Cooldown: 14s -> 12s
    
  • Hit Delay: 0.8s -> 0.6s
    
  • Standtime: 0.4s -> 0.3s
    

Crossbows

• Caltrops (all Crossbows)
  
  • Move Speed Increase: 20% -> 30%
    
  • Move Speed Duration: 2s -> 3s
    
  • Slow Strength: 40% -> 30%
    

Daggers

• Lunging Stabs (Bloodletter)
  
  • Hitting a player below 40% Health doesn't increase the cooldown rate anymore.
    
  • Instead hitting a player below 40% now reduces the ability cooldown by 40%. (other slot cooldowns are not affected anymore)
    

Wargloves

• Triple Kick (all War Gloves)
  
  • Cooldown: 15s -> 18s
    
• Falcon Smash (Battle Bracers)
  
  • Range: 15m -> 13m
    

Armors

• Bloodlust (Mercenary Jacket)
  
  • Heal per Tick: 42 -> 54
    
  • Number of Ticks: 9 -> 7
    

Helmets

• Force Field (all Cloth Helmets)
  
  • Knockback Distance: 12m -> 9m
    
• Poison (Mage Cowl)
  
  • First Damage Tick: 1s -> 0s
    
  • Total Ticks: 5 -> 3
    
  • Damage per Tick: 39.93 -> 60
    
• Retaliate (Hunter Hood)
  
  • Reflected Damage: 70% -> 100%
    

Mounts

• All non Battle Mounts now take 3s to mount up
  
  • Saddled Greywolf: 2s -> 3s
    
  • Elite Terrorbird: 2s -> 3s
    
  • Elite Winter Bear: 2s -> 3s
    
  • Elite Wild Boar: 2s -> 3s
    
  • Elite Bighorn Ram: 2s -> 3s
    
  • Elite Swamp Salamander: 2s -> 3s
    
  • Elite Greywolf: 2s -> 3s
    
  • Spring Cotton Tail: 2s -> 3s
    
• All Battle Mounts now take 10s to mount up
  
  • Siege Ballista: 15s -> 10s
    
  • Venom Basilisk: 15s -> 10s
    
  • Flame Basilisk: 15s -> 10s
    
  • Elder's Command Mammoth: 25s -> 10s
    
• increased the IP of the Avalonian Basilisk to 1000 to match other T7 mount
  
  • Mount Health: 1239 → 1254
    

Mists
In the Solo Mists staying on a mount next to players is currently very safe. This enables the strategy to stay close to two players in combat with each other. Then dismount once a player is low and get potentially a third party kill. Inside this environment it is a strategy with not much commitment upfront, but high reward potential.

To make it harder to engage players which are already in a PvP fight, we will extend the dismount cooldown IF you dismount next to a player that is currently fighting another player.

• Long Hostile Dismount
  
  • If you dismount next to a hostile player that attacked or has been attacked by another player in the last 20s, you get the long Hostile Dismount Cooldown
    
  • The Long Hostile Dismount cooldown is 10s instead of 5s. (this is displayed with a different color !-mark over your head)
    
  • Applies only in Solo Mists
    
• Mount Health Cap in Solo Mists: 1200 -> 900 (Health Cap in greater Mists stays unchanged)
  

We have been very busy working on the next update. But apart from all the new content we have also tried to get some balance adjustments into the works to tone down and change some items and abiliteis that are too good in certain situations and also giving some improvements to a few skills, which are currently under performing. As a bigger meta shift we intend to make Cleanses in the game more broadly available for players to have more possible options to defend against CC.

All these changes are still in testing and may vastly differ in the final patch.

Arcane Staffs
Arcane Staffs are still very strong in the Crystal League meta and Enigma Blade also outshines other W abilities in most situations. To tone the ability down we are increasing the cooldown when using Flicker. This also adds more depth as the cast can choose between lower cast by only using the Blade or activating the extra mobility at the cost of a higher cooldown. Additionally to make Frazzle more useful again, we are changing it back to a damage taken increase on the target, which is a damage amplification independent of the target’s resistances. This allows for a more unique damage amplifying role.

• Enigma Blade (all Arcane Staffs)
  
  • Flicker Cooldown: 15s -> 20s
    
• Frazzle (all Arcane Staffs)
  
  • Energy cost: 9 -> 7% Max energy
    
  • Now reduces Bonus Defense vs players and mobs by 30%
    
  • Removed the Resistance Reduction
    

Crossbows
Due to its slow application of damage the Siegebow has been falling off the ZvZ meta. To make the weapon more competitive in modern Albion again we are shortening the channel time, but keep the same total damage output.

• Sweeping Bolt (Heavy Crossbow)
  
  • Cooldown: 18s -> 15s
    
  • Standtime: 0.7s -> 0.4s
    
• Vicious Barrage (Siegebow)
  
  • Cast Time: 1s -> 0.5s
    
  • Channel Ticks: 5 -> 4
    
  • Base Damage per Tick: 97.26 -> 126
    
  • % Damage per Tick: 2% -> 2.5%
    

Daggers
Demon Fang is in group fights still too oppressive, it just out-damages most similar options. To bring it more in line with other AoE burst damage weapons we are reducing the Resilience Penetration.

• Demon Fang
  
  • Resilience Penetration: 75% -> 50%
    

Fire Staffs
The reworked Pyroblast hasn’t been very popular, although it has a high potential damage it is very situational to make it hit. To make the ability more effective we are reducing the max channel time and the projectile range.

• Pyroblast (one-handed Staff)
  
  • Projectile Range: 20m -> 24m
    
  • Max Channel time: 2s -> 1.2s
    
  • Minimum Damage & Maximum Damage stays the same
    

Frost Staffs
Since the damage of Ice Crystal is very delayed it can be easily reflected on reaction, which makes it too risky to use in large scale fights. Therefore the damage will become un-reflectable. Hoarfrost Staff has not seen much usage after its latest rework. The cooldown is very high for the effect it provides, that is why we are significantly decreasing the cooldown. Additionally we are also increasing the Damage Increase duration of Frostbite, so the buff doesn’t fall off that easily anymore.

• Frostbite (all Frost Staffs):
  
  • Damage Increase Duration: 2.5s -> 4
    
    
• Avalanche (Hoarfrost Staff):
  
  • Cooldown 30s -> 20s
    
• Ice Crystal (Permafrost)
  
  • Damage can't be reflected anymore
    

Holy Staffs
We are increasing the hit delay after the Smite cast slightly, to make it a bit more likely to dodge the ability in 1v1 PvP situations.

• Smite (all Holy Staffs)
  
  • Hit Delay: 0.15s -> 0.25s
    

Nature Staffs
To give more meaning to interrupting Revitalize after a few ticks, a lot of the needed energy for the full channels is paid upfront on channel start. Getting the whole channel through leaves the Nature staff user in the same energy level, but interrupting it early now has a strong energy penalty to it. Fighting with DoT weapons against a Great Nature Staff is too punishing, because Living Armor gets the Healing ticks almost guaranteed with little counter play. To give Cursed Staffs and axes a better chance, Living Armor now only heals on direct damage.

• Revitalize (all Nature Staffs)
  
  • Energy cost at Channel Start: 0 -> 20
    
  • Energy cost per Channel Tick: 9 -> 4
    
• Living Armor (Great Nature Staff)
  
  • Now only Heals when receiving Direct Damage (DoTs don't count anymore)
    

Swords
We are reverting the movement speed from Heroic Charges back to 9%. Because the provided mobility in Corrupted Dungeons is just too much of an advantage, even with the introduction of the Mephits. Additionally for Corrupted Dungeons we are reducing the range of Mighty Blow to give better counterplay options. Due to the low cooldown, long range and fast speed it can be very difficult to defend against it for many match-ups.

• Heroic Charge (all Swords)
  
  • Movement Speed Increase: 12% -> 9%
    
• Iron Will (all Swords)
  
  • Can't be purged by movement removing effects like Cripple anymore
    
• Mighty Blow (One Handed Sword)
  
  • Castrange: 10m -> 8m
    
  • Distance to the enemy after the Leap: 1m -> 3m
    
• Charge (Claymore)
  
  • 0 Charges Damage: 86.00 -> 81
    
  • 1 Charge Damage: 137.61 -> 130
    
  • 2 Charges Damage: 206.41 -> 195
    
  • 3 Charges Damage: 292.41 -> 276
    

War Gloves
To make Backhand Strike more reliable to use, it will now knock all enemies hit into the cast direction away. Which should make the ability way more useful, as enemies won’t randomly scatter around anymore.

• Backhand Strike (all War Gloves)
  
  • Enemies are now all knocked into the same cast-direction
    

Helmets
To make Cleanses more widely available, Cleanse will now be on every Leather Hood. Giving more players the choice to change to Cleanse as an off spell if they want to react to their situation. Further we are improving the helmet abilities Energy Regain and Howl, which are a bit undertuned in comparison to other helmet abilites.

• Energy Regain (all Helmets)
  
  • Channel Duration: 9s -> 4s
    
  • Tick Interval: every 1s -> every 0.5s (Energy gain per tick is still the same)
    
• Howl (all Leather Hoods -> Mercenary Hood)
  
  • Cooldown: 30s -> 20s
    
  • Howl is now moved to Mercenary Hood
    
• Cleanse (Mercenary Hood -> all Leather Hoods)
  
  • Cleanse is now moved to all Leather Hoods
    

Armors
Stalker Jacket is outshined in most situations by Hellion jacket. To give Stalker Jacket more clear advantages we are making the cooldown shorter and increasing the damage, to make it the more desirable choice for consistent AoE damage output and keep Hellion Jackets focus more on sustain.

• Electric Field (Stalker Jacket)
  
  • Cooldown: 45s -> 30s
    
  • Damage per Tick: 26.70 -> 28
    

Shoes
We further want to add another Cleanse option on the shoe slot and add the new Ability Break Free for that. It will replace the ability Invisibility, which has already been outshined by other invisibility options in the shoe slot and felt a bit obsolete.

• Mercenary Shoes
  
• Removed the Ability Invisibility
  
• Added the new Ability: Break Free
  
  • Cleanses all Crowd Control Effects on Dash towards the targeted position
    
  • (can be used while stunned or silenced).
    
  • Cooldown: 25s / Range: 12m
    

Diminishing Returns
Reworked Diminishing Returns for Knockbacks and Knocking enemies into the air, to prevent player getting basically stun locked by repeated knock ups.

• Knocking enemies into the air is now affected by Diminishing Returns
  
• Knocking enemies into the air now counts as knockback for DR
  
• Various individual adjustments to how knocking enemies up translates into knockback DR
  
• Knockback DR Factor: 0.04 -> 0.15
  
• Knockback DR Time: 15s -> 10s
  

Misc
To offer a more enjoyable experience when playing dungeons we will reduce the cooldown after entering a dungeon or changing floors inside the dungeon. We keep the high cooldown in the Open World to not give more power to gank groups splitting up on two sides of an exit.

• Ability Cooldown when entering a dungeon or changing floors inside a dungeon: 15s -> 7s
  

Just as a heads up for everyone waiting for the next round of adjustments. The next Patch with Balance Changes will be Patch 7. Since Patch 6 has a lot of changes to a wide range of features in the game, we will first focus on finsihing patch 6. Among various other changes, you can also expect changes to Evensong and Chain Missile's total damage output in group fights.


Arcane Staffs
Arcane Staffs have become very popular after the latest reworks, but also introduced a few problems that we want to address. First the damage output in 5v5 fights became too high, to tone it down consecutive jumps of Chain Missile now do significantly less damage, this reduces damage in group fights and also offers more counter play, by body blocking the projectile to reduce the damage output on the backline. But the damage for 1v1s stays unchanged. Great Arcane provides a lot of utility in ZvZs and is especially very strong as a defensive. The main intended counter is to bait the Time Freeze out before committing fully on an attack, however the currently short invulnerability window allows it to chain Time Freeze quite frequently in a large-scale fight. To make a baited Time Freeze more impactful players will now be invulnerable to another Time Freeze for a significantly longer time. And finally Dark Sphere’s recent buffs made it much more reliable to hit, but this reliability made the strong slow too oppressive, that is why the slow strength will be reduced. Enigma Blade provides still a bit too much value on a W-slot ability, that is why we also tone down the damage output a bit.

• Chain Missile (all Arcane Staffs)
  
  • Arcane Charge Duration: 6s -> 3s
    
  • Projectile Bounce Range: 8m -> 7m
    
  • Damage for each consecutive bounce: 121 -> 60 (The first target hit still takes the 121 damage)
    
• Enigma Blade (all Arcane Staffs)
  
  • Damage: 180 -> 165
    
• Time Freeze (Great Arcane)
  
  • Cooldown increased by 10s
    
  • Player Immunity after a Player Freeze: 5s -> 15s
    
• Dark Sphere (Evensong)
  
  • Slow Strength: 25% -> 15%
    

Cursed Staffs
Now that players have adapted to the new playstyle of the reworked Grudge, the damage output they achieve with it is a bit too high and will be toned down. And the damage Output of the Anguished Soul is also a bit high, considering its utility with the fear effect.

• Grudge (all Cursed Staffs)
  
  • 0 Stack Damage: 20 -> 18
    
  • 1 Stack Damage: 25 -> 22.5
    
  • 2 Stack Damage: 60 -> 54
    
  • 3 Stack Damage: 100 -> 90
    
  • 4 Stack Damage: 150 -> 135
    
• Anguished Soul (Demonic Staff)
  
  • Damage: 175 -> 160
    

Daggers
The Damage Increase stacking of Throwing Blades makes it very powerful in large scale fights where it is easy to reach max stacks. To reduce the possible synergies with stacking too much damage buffs for one-shotting builds the Damage Increase will be reduced. But the raw damage of the Throwing Blade itself is a bit increased to soften the damage reduction by that change in small scale a bit.

• Throwing Blades (all Daggers)
  
  • Damage Increase per Stack: 15%- 10%
    
  • Damage per Hit: 35 -> 45
    

Fire Staffs
Fire Bolt can put out damage too fast in 2v2 Hell Gates, to make it less oppressive we increase the cast time, but to also make the ability more attractive in other content we increase the cast range. Additionally we reduce the damage of Flame Pillar a bit, which still has a very high burst damage potential, on a potential very low cooldown.

• Fire Bolt (all Fire Staffs)
  
  • Cast time: 0.7s -> 0.8s
    
  • Cast Range: 11m -> 12m
    
• Flame Pillar (Great Fire Staff)
  
  • Damage: 200 -> 190
    

Frost Staffs
Frozen Surge is still very underused after the recent rework. This Q was meant to sacrifice some damage output for its kiting and slowing potential, however the current damage is probably just too low to make it work, that is why we are increasing the damage a bit and see if it gets played more.

• Frozen Surge (all Frost Staffs)
  
  • Damage: 80 -> 90
    

Holy Staffs
Generous Heal is outshined by Holy Flash in most situations in PvP. To make it a bit more competitive choice we are reducing the cast time and making it a bit more energy efficient. Great Holy is very strong and offers too much utility and sustain in 2v2 Hell Gates, to give more other healing staffs a chance to shine in this content we are reducing the sustain of Holy Explosion. One of the staffs we are currently not seeing often in 2v2 Hell gates is Lifetouch, that is why we are also improving it’s healing output to make it more competitive in this content. Another staff that is currently a bit underrepresented is Redemption Staff, to make it a bit more attractive to use we are reducing the energy cost a bit.

• Generous Heal (all Holy Staffs)
  
  • Cast Time: 0.7s -> 0.5s -> 0.6s
    
  • Energycost: 7 -> 6.2
    
• Holy Explosion (Great Holy Staff)
  
  • Resistance Increase: 0.2 -> 0.16 -> 0.12
    
• Holy Touch (Lifetouch Staff)
  
  • Heal per Tick: 59 -> 64
    
• Celestial Sphere (Redemption Staff)
  
  • Energycost: 20 -> 16
    

Quarter Staffs
Mystic Rocks is a strong heal denial that has the downside of the caster themself not being able to get healed. However pre-applied HoTs kinda circumvents this downside, that is why now activating the ability will remove all HoTs on the caster. The regular Quarterstaff is currently not used much, so we are improving its range and cast time, this should make it a bit more reliable to hit enemies and provide more utility with the increased range.

• Vault Leap (Regular Quarterstaff)
  
  • Cast Range: 13m -> 15m
    
  • Cast Time: 0.7s -> 0.6s
    

• Mystic Rocks (Staff of Balance)
  
  • Activating the ability now removes all HoTs on the caster
    

Nature Staffs
Cleanse Heal is still an extremely powerful ability and was widely used in the CLC even when facing tanks without big CCs that can be cleansed, it is still chosen for its raw healing output. Since the Cleanse already provides a lot of value, we will reduce the healing output of Cleanse Heal.

• Cleanse Heal (all Nature Staffs)
  
  • 0 stack Heal: 70 -> 55
    
  • 1 stack Heal: 90 -> 70
    
  • 2 stack Heal: 115 -> 90
    
  • 3 stack Heal: 150 -> 120
    

Helmets
With so many kidnap and knock up abilities in the game we are improving Knight Helmet as a counter. Higher range and max targets makes it easier to apply and large groups need less Knight Helmets allowing some player to free up the helmet slot for something else.

• Displacement Immunity (Knight Helmet)
  
  • Max Targets: 5 -> 10
    
  • Radius: 4m -> 5m
    

Armors
Everlasting Spirit is an extremely powerful ability that is very commonly used on a lot of builds. To make other Robe abilities more attractive in comparison we add a stronger downside to using this ability by increasing the energy cost on activation.

• Everlasting Spirit (Cleric Robe)
  
  • Energycost : 15 -> 20% Max energy
    

Shoes
We are improving a couple of currently underused shoe abilities, which core design and identity is actually an interesting choice, but currently still does not see much play. So we are increasing their value a bit more.

• Battle Frenzy (Graveguard Boots)
  
  • Movementspeed Increase: 40% -> 55%
    
  • Duration: 6s -> 5s
    
• Energetic Sprint (all Cloth Sandals)
  
  • Energy per Tick: 4 -> 5
    
• Frost Walk (Druid Sandals)
  
  • Movespeed Increase: 45% -> 55%
    
• Premonition (Boots of Valor)
  
  • First Buff Duration: 2s -> 3s
    
  • Movement Speed Increase: 20% -> 45%
    

Food
With the change to Everlasting Spirit we are also improving Crab Omelettes as a potential choice to deal with the higher energy cost for very energy dependent builds.

• Crab Omelettes
  
  • Energycost Reduction Factor: 0.05 -> 0.06
    
  • (example T7 Crab Omelette 9.5% -> 11.3%
    

Diminishing Returns
With the latest changes we made Diminishing Returns ramp up faster and make the mechanic much more effective in disincentivizing trying to stun-lock enemies. However with the long duration it currently also punishes tanks for using their large stun off cooldown, by diminishing their own stun. To have less negative impact on solo tanks we are reducing the max duration of Diminishing Returns, so it falls off a bit faster.

• Max Diminishing Return Duration: 20s -> 15s
  

Misc
In 2v2 Hell Gates teams with a Healer currently have very high chances at winning against any team without a Healer. But having 2v2 Hell Gates being so reliant on Healers is limiting the amount of players that can enjoy this content. So, to open up the possibilities of more comps without healers we are reducing the general Healing Output in 2v2 Gates. Important to note that shields also scale with Healing, so this change also reduces the impact of other sustain comps that rely on shielding.

• 2v2 Hell Gates
  
  • Healing Reduction: 10% -> 20%
    

Siince the last patches had a short turn around for the balance changes and the chages directly went to the staging server, there was no need for a NDA change because it was public information at that point. However since many players seem to use this thread as a quick reference for the latest Balance Changes. I also added the latest changes for Patch 5 in here.


Arcane Staffs

• Enigma Blade (all Arcane Staffs)
  
  • Damage: 200 → 180
    
• Dark Sphere (Evensong)
  
  • Base Cooldown: 48s → 42s
    
  • Cooldown Reduction per 100 IP: 1.5s → 1s
    

Daggers

• Blood Ritual (Demonfang)
  
  • Enemy Damage: 126 → 112
    

Fire Staffs

• Flame Pillar (Great Fire Staff)
  
  • Damage: 218 → 200
    

Frost Staffs

• Frostbite (all Frost Staffs):
  
  • Size of the projectile hitbox has been increased
    
  • Cast Time: 0.4s → 0.3s
    
  • Cooldown: 1s → 1.2s
    
  • Damage: 128 → 102
    
• Frost Nova (all Frost Staffs)
  
  • Range: 9m → 11m
    
• Frost Lance (all Frost Staffs)
  
  • Resistance Reduction: 0.16 → 0.12
    
  • Resistance Reduction Duration: 4s → 3s
    
• Freezing Wind (one-handed Frost Staff)
  
  • Standtime: 0.4s → 0.2s
    
• Hail (Great Frost Staff)
  
  • Hit Delay: 0.2s → 0.4s
    
  • Recast Cooldown: 0s → 1s
    
  • Damage: 150 → 130
    

Mounts

• Flicker (Spectral Bat)
  
  • Added 0.2s of Damage immunity
    

The listed changes are intended to go live with Into The Fray Patch 2. The focus of the changes is to improve some of the reworked Magic Staff abilities and improve the Corrupted Dungeons meta by making the reset bats more effective at punishing enemies for kiting too much, as well as toning down some of the most successful items in this content


This post gets regularly updated with the latest changes of our internal playtests.

Very Important:
All these changes are still in testing and may vastly differ in the final patch. Sometimes we just try out various things, which may get reverted. Also the balance changes are not neccessarily all complete. Just because a certain item is not adjusted in the changelogs so far, doesn't mean it isn't on our 'need to be adjusted'-list. These changes are simply a snapshot of the current development and everything in there needs to be taken with a grain of salt.

This thread is not meant to discuss these unfinished changes. It is just to give all players the same chance of guessing the direction of the next balance patch

Cursed Staffs

• Curse Tar (all Cursed Staffs)
  
  • Hit Delay: 0.5s -> 0.35s
    
• Grudge (all Cursed Staffs)
  
  • Damage after 0.0s: 10 -> 20
    
  • Damage after 0.5s: 20 -> 25
    
  • Damage after 1.0s: 40 -> 60
    
  • Damage after 1.5s: 70 -> 100
    
  • Damage after 2.0s: 120 -> 150
    

Nature Staffs

• Thorns (all Nature Staffs)
  
  • Area Damage vs players: 20 -> 25
    
• Rejuvenating Flower (all Nature Staffs)
  
  • Grow Interval: 2.5s -> 2s
    
• Brambleseed (all Nature Staffs)
  
  • Second Hit Damage: 162 -> 178 -> 162
    
  • Delay until Brambles Growth: 1s -> 0.7s
    
• Revitalize (all Nature Staffs)
  
  • Energycost at Channel Start: 0 -> 20
    
  • Energycost per Channel Tick: 9 -> 4
    

Spears

• Spirit Spear Charge (all Spears)
  
  • Normal Attack Damage Increase: 32% -> 28%
    

Swords

• Mighty Blow (one-handed Sword)
  
  • 0 Charge Damage: 84 -> 80
    
  • 1 Charge Damage: 135 -> 128
    
  • 2 Charge Damage: 203 -> 192
    
  • 3 Charge Damage: 287 -> 271
    
• Crescent Slash (Clarent Blade)
  
  • Base Damage: 172 -> 182
    
  • The projectile damage is now affected by AoE escalation
    

War Gloves

• Fleet Footwork (all War Gloves)
  
  • Using the Dash Follow Up now costs 4 energy
    

Helmets

• Force Field (all Cloth Cowls)
  
  • Knockback Distance: 14m -> 12m
    

Shoes

• Rejuvenating Sprint (all Plate Boots)
  
  • Heal per Tick: 20 -> 18
    

Taproot

• Max Health Increase Factor: 0.3 -> 0.25
  
  • Healing Reduction Factor: 0.12 -> 0.08
    

Corrupted Dungeons

• Bat Debuff
  
  • Movements Speed Reduction per Stack: 1% -> 1.5%
    
  • Debuff Max Stacks: 25 -> 30
    
• Bats will be non-targetable and not attackable (like the traps) This prevents interactions like Swords getting stacks from bats.
  
• Bats don’t spawn if a player is in close proximity anymore (to make sure bats don't spawn between 2 players in a chase)
  

These are the changes for the next content update, Into the Fray. This includes the new and overhauled abilities for Fire, Holy, Cursed and Nature Staffs. Other balance changes focus primarily on improving recently reworked abilities, which are still not performing well enough.


This post gets regularly updated with the latest changes of our internal playtests.

Very Important:
All these changes are still in testing and may vastly differ in the final patch. Sometimes we just try out various things, which may get reverted. Also the balance changes are not neccessarily all complete. Just because a certain item is not adjusted in the changelogs so far, doesn't mean it isn't on our 'need to be adjusted'-list. These changes are simply a snapshot of the current development and everything in there needs to be taken with a grain of salt.

This thread is not meant to discuss these unfinished changes. It is just to give all players the same chance of guessing the direction of the next balance patch

Bows
To make Lucent Hawk feel more fluid to use, we are eliminating the first activation of the buff. Instead it is now possible to directly shoot the first arrow.

• Lucent Hawk (Mistpiercer)
  
  • Doesn't require a buff activation as a first step anymore, instead activating the ability will now directly shoot the first arrow
    

Cursed Staffs
We added two new abilities: Anguished Soul and Cursed Tar. For Demonic Staffs, Field of Death has been replaced with Anguished Soul, which summons a ghostly creature that fears enemies. Cursed Tar is a new Q-slot ability which places cursed areas on the ground applying Vile Curse Charges. Cursed Beam has been improved to make it more threatening in PvP scenarios by making it consume Vile Curse charges at a slower pace and increasing the guaranteed base damage. Grudge now deals different damage depending on how fast the ally attacks, so it now works with every auto attack speed and adds a bit more depth to the ability. And various other improvements and adjustments to make the staffs feel more polished.

• Hit and Run - Passive (all Cursed Staffs)
  
  • activates after every 4 -> 6 Casts
    
• Vile Curse (all Cursed Staffs)
  
  • Hitdelay 0.2s -> 0.4s
    
• New Q-slot Ability: Cursed Tar (all Cursed Staffs)
  
  • Create a Cursed Tar puddle with a 2.5m radius at target location lasting 4s.
    
  • Slows all enemies in the puddle by 10%.
    
  • Applies one Vile Curse Charge every 1s.
    
  • Cooldown 3s
    
• Cursed Beam (all Cursed Staffs)
  
  • Vile Curse Stacks are now removed every second tick
    
  • Channel Duration: 4.5s -> 3s
    
  • Damage with 0 stacks: 36 -> 48
    
  • Damage with 1+ stacks: 72 -> 68
    
  • Castrange: 11m -> 13m
    
• Grudge (all Cursed Staffs)
  
  • Grudge hit effect delay: 1s -> 0s
    
  • The Grudge effect now stacks up on the ally every 0.5s
    
  • Each Auto Attack consumes all stacks
    
  • Grudge Stacks 0 / 1 / 2 / 3 / 4
    
  • Damage 10 / 20 / 40 / 70 /120
    
  • This way Grudge triggers with all Attack Speed builds, but the damage is diminished if the attack interval is too fast.
    
• Death Curse (one-handed Cursed Staff)
  
  • The Death Curse Debuff can’t be cleansed anymore
    
  • Hit Delay for the Projectile: 0.4s -> 0.15s
    
• Removed the ability Field of Death (Demonic Staff)
  
• Added a new E-slot Ability: Anguished Soul (Demonic Staff)
  
  • Send an Anguished Soul in targeted direction, passing through all enemies.
    
  • Deals 175 magical damage.
    
  • Any enemy hit will be feared for a duration based on the amount of Vile Curse Charges on them.
    
  • Vile Curse Charges: 0 / 1 / 2 /3 / 4
    
  • Fear Duration: 0.4s / 0.8s / 1.2s / 1.6s / 2s
    

Daggers
Even after the latest buff, Demonfang still has difficulties competing with other weapons. To help it work better as an assassin weapon, we removed the DoTs on enemies and instead the damage is now applied instantly. The self Bleed is now also only triggered on the 3rd activation, which increases the incentive to just go for one or two hits and allows the caster to use this ability for two activations even when low on health. We also made various improvements to make aiming and hitting opponents more reliable.

• Blood Ritual (Demonfang)
  
  • Hit Delay: 0.3s -> 0.15s
    
  • Instant Damage: 100 -> 140
    
  • Fixed AoE Escalation
    
  • Removed the DoT Damage on enemies
    
  • The Self Damage is now only applied after the 3rd cast
    
  • Self DoT Base Damage: 12 -> 60
    

Fire Staffs
Pyroblast is now a channeled skillshot that rewards positioning and timing. Ignite has been replaced with a new ability: Flame Blast. And Infernal Staff's Contagious Fire has been replaced with Combustion, which ignites an enemy leaving a flaming trail behind that silences. The Burn effect of Fire Bolt now triggers earlier, increasing the damage output if the same target is hit multiple times. Flame Pillar now has significantly more damage, on a higher 15s cooldown. But if at least one enemy is hit, the cooldown gets reduced back to 10s. And various other improvements and adjustments to make the staffs feel more polished.

• Fire Bolt (all Fire Staffs)
  
  • Burn Damage over Time Delay: 1s -> 0.3s
    
  • Hit Delay: 0.2s -> 0.12s
    
• Burning Field (all Fire Staffs)
  
  • Hit Delay: 0.1s -> 0.15s
    
• Removed the ability Ignite (all Fire Staffs)
  
• Added a new W-Slot ability Flame Blast (all Fire Staffs)
  
  • Select a target (Ally, Enemy, Self), after 1.6s an explosion occurs around the target, deals 150 magical damage to all enemies in a 5m radius.
    
  • If the main target is an enemy they also take an additional 45 magical damage immediately.
    
• Wall of Flames (all Fire Staffs)
  
  • Standtime: 0.6s -> 0.4s
    
• Fire Wave (all Fire Staffs)
  
  • Fire Wave area Duration: 0.8s -> 1s
    
• Fire Ball (all Fire Staffs)
  
  • Cast Range: 18m -> 22m
    
  • Instant Damage: 124.63 -> 135
    
  • Projectile Speed increased by 10%
    
• Fire Artillery (all Fire Staffs)
  
  • Hitdelay: 0.1s -> 0s
    
  • Projectile Hitdelay: 0.5s -> 0.2s
    
• Pyroblast (one-handed Fire Staff)
  
• Completely reworked the Ability:
  
  • Charge up a Pyroblast, while channeling for up to 2s (You can aim while channeling).
    
  • Deals magical damage in a 4m radius upon impact with an enemy based on how long you have channeled.
    
  • Charge Up: 0.5s / 1s / 1.5s / 2s
    
  • Damage: 240 / 280 / 320 / 360
    
  • Pyroblast instant Damage before the Rework: 300
    
  • If you channel for the full duration the Pyroblast will also knock back 2.5m.
    
  • Increased Projectile Speed
    
• Flame Pillar (Great Fire Staff)
  
  • Damage: 184 -> 218
    
  • Cooldown: 10s -> 15s
    
  • If at least one enemy is hit the cooldown is reduced by 5s
    
  • Energy Cost: 13 -> 9
    
  • Hit Delay: 1s -> 0.8s
    
• Removed the ability Contagious Fire (Infernal Staff)
  
• Added a new E-slot Ability: Combustion (Infernal Staff)
  
  • Inflame the targeted enemy dealing 143 magical damage over 5s.
    
  • After a short delay, the burning enemy keeps leaving a fiery trail that lasts 4.4s.
    
  • Deals 28 magical damage (vs. players) / 26 magical damage (vs. mobs) every 0.5s
    
  • Enemy players on the trail are silenced.
    
  • Cooldown: 30s -> 20s
    
  • Energycost: 15 -> 12
    
  • Area Damage vs Players: 45 -> 28
    
  • Area Damage is not reflectable anymore
    

Hammers
Forge Hammers are currently underrepresented. The low cooldown and moderate damage on each hit in giant form made it too easy for enemies to just move out of the effect area. Giant Smash now also knocks enemies into the air and deals more damage. This makes the ability more threatening and makes it easier to stick to targets. To offset this buff we increased the cooldown between each Smash.

• Threatening Strike (all Hammers)
  
  • Hit Delay: 0.4s -> 0.1s
    
  • Standtime: 0.4s -> 0.1s
    
  • Cooldown: 3s -> 2s
    
• Giant Steps (Forge Hammers)
  
  • Giant Smash
    
    • Cooldown: 1.2s -> 3s
      
    • Now knocks players up for 0.6s
      
    • Damage: 75 -> 100
      
  
  
  

Holy Staffs
Healing Staffs don’t have the 50% damage reduction on the staff anymore. Smite has been reworked to make a more enjoyable solo PvE & PvP experience, and it is now possible to move while channeling Holy Beam, albeit at a reduced movement speed to allow for enough counter play. Desperate Prayer's Healing Output is increased and if used above the 40% health threshold it now gives the caster a buff that increases Healing Output. Creating an incentive to use the ability above the threshold. And various other improvements and adjustments to make the staffs feel more polished.

• Base Stats (all Holy Staffs)
  
  • Removed the 50% damage Reduction
    
• Smite (all Holy Staffs)
  
• Completely reworked the Ability:
  
  • Smite all enemies at the targeted location, dealing 100 magical damage in a 2.5m radius.
    
  • The next time any enemy hit takes damage within the next 3s, they will take an additional 30 magical damage.
    
  • Hitting at least one enemy will reduce this ability cooldown by 50%.
    
  • Cast Time: 0.6s -> 0.5s
    
  • Hitdelay: 0.2s -> 0s
    
  • Standtime: 0.2s -> 0s
    
  • Cooldown: 3s -> 2s
    
  • Instant Damage: 120 -> 100
    
  • Mark Damage: 40 -> 30
    
  • Mark Duration: 5s -> 3s
    
• Sacred Pulse (all Holy Staffs)
  
  • When used vs mobs, they are now knocked into the air, instead of knocked back
    
• Holy Beam (all Holy Staffs)
  
  • The caster can now move while channeling, with 30% reduced movement speed
    
• Desperate Prayer (one-handed Holy Staff)
  
  • Heal Value below 40%: 200 -> 220
    
  • Heal Value above 40%: 82 -> 100
    
  • Additionally if Desperate Prayer is cast on a target above 40% the caster receives a buff which increases Healing Cast by 5% for 15s. (stacks up to 3 times)
    
  • Energy Cost: 15 -> 12
    
  • Buff Duration: 12s -> 15s
    
• Holy Touch
  
  • Heal per Tick: 55 -> 59
    
• Celestial Sphere:
  
  • Base Heal: 60 -> 86
    
  • Healing the same target twice doesn't increase the Healing Output anymore
    
  • Initial Hitdelay: 0.4s -> 0.15s
    

Nature Staffs
Healing Staffs don’t have the 50% damage reduction on the staff anymore. Improved solo PvE & PvP experience, with a reworked Thorns spell and a new Brambleseed spell that knocks enemies airborne. Rejuvenating Mushroom has been replaced with the new Rejuvenating Flower multi-part spell: Grow multiple flowers on the ground that can be picked up and thrown to a specific spot to provide instant healing and Rejuvenation stacks. Revitalize is now on a much shorter cooldown, and is more limited by energy cost than cooldown, to make it more useful in PvP and provide higher single target healing output to compete with Holy in group PvE. And various other improvements and adjustments to make the staffs feel more polished.

• Base Stats (all Nature Staffs)
  
  • Removed the 50% damage Reduction
    
• Thorns (all Nature Staffs)
  
• Completely Reworked the Ability:
  
  • Conjure Thorns with a 3m radius at the targeted area, lasting 4s.
    
  • Deals magical damage and applies one Thorns Charge to all enemies within the area every 0.5s. (stacks up to 5 times).
    
  • Slows by 25%.
    
  • The ability goes on cooldown if you either cast it the maximum of 3 times or don't recast it for 3s.
    
  • Thorns Charges can be consumed by your normal attacks and deal additional magical damage.
    
  • Area Damage vs Players: 40 -> 20
    
  • Area Damage vs Mobs: 40 -> 30
    
  • Consumed Thorn Stack Damage: 30 -> 35
    
• Removed the ability Rejuvenating Mushroom (all Nature Staffs)
  Added new Q-slot Ability: Rejuvenating Flower (all Nature Staffs)
  
  • Plant a magical flower at the targeted position, lasting 20s. The flower grows stronger over time.
    
  • Collecting the flower gives you the ability to throw it at a targeted location. On impact it heals and applies Rejuvenation Charges on up to 5 allies within a 3m radius based. (only you can collect the flower).
    
  • Grow Time: 0s / 2.s / 5s
    
  • Heal: 17 / 41 / 70
    
  • Rejuvenation Charges: 1 / 2 / 3
    
• Added a new W-slot Ability: Brambleseed (all Nature Staffs)
  
  • Throw seeds along a 16m line in targeted direction, dealing 54 magical damage.
    
  • After a 1s delay brambles will grow along the line, dealing 162 magical damage.
    
  • Throws all enemies hit in the air for 0.71s.
    
• Revitalize
  
  • Cooldown: 15s -> 7s
    
  • Channel Duration: 4.5s -> 3s
    
  • Energy Cost per Tick: 6 -> 9
    
• Living Armor (Great Nature Staff)
  
  • Cast Time: 1s -> 0s
    
  • Cooldown: 25s -> 15s
    
  • Duration: 8s -> 4s
    
  • Heal Value on each hit: 27 -> 40
    
  • Can’t be stacked from multiple casters anymore
    

Spears
Glaive has been consistently very strong in 5v5 Crystal League, due to its threatening kidnap potential and high sustain damage. To make it less oppressive we adjust the Fling distance. And because this alone won’t be enough we are also increasing the cooldown of Harpoon. This is a change on the Q and W abilities that doesn’t affect other spear lines base gameplay as much as other changes would (like reducing Q damage for instance).

• Harpoon (all Spears)
  
  • Cooldown: 15s -> 20s
    
• Fling (Glaive)
  
  • Pull Distance: 10m -> 7m
    

Swords
Dual Swords still are still underperforming after the latest rework. To improve the abilities utility and damage output players won’t use the stacks after using it. The stacks helps to keep up with the target because of the move speed and the increased auto attack speed synergizes with attack damage buff at the end of the Spinning Blades.

• Spinning Blades (Dual Swords)
  
  • Doesn't consume Heroic Charges anymore
    

War Gloves
Fleet Footwork's second ability was too situational to be reliably useful and the reduced damage output for using it once was a big drawback. To make it more useful and fun to use, it is now a ground target dash that provides an auto-attack damage buff. This buff makes sure that the damage output doesn’t drop too much when using the second ability. Spiked Gauntlets in large scale fights have become too oppressive when stacked. To make it less desirable to stack Spiked Gauntlets, enemies can only be hit once per second by the effect. Ravenstrike Cestus is also very dominant in large scale fights, that is why we have reduced the damage output, to offset the fact that one usually gets high AoE Escalation due to the large radius.

• Fleet Footwork (all War Gloves)
  
  • Kick:
    
    • Damage: 50 -> 64
      
    • Slightly increased Hitbox
      
    • Step can now be used even without hitting an enemy during the kick
      
  • Step:
    
    • Range: 5m -> 7m
      
    • Doesn’t require a target anymore, it is instead a ground target Dash
      
    • Increases Attack Damage by 100% for 5s
      
    • Removed the Damage Reduction during the quick Step animation
      
• Gravitational Collapse (Spiked Gauntlets)
  
  • Enemies hit become immune to getting hit by another Gravitational Collapse for 1s
    
• Earth Crusher (Ravenstrike Cestus)
  
  • 0 Charge Damage: 188 -> 160
    
  • 1 Charge Damage: 200 -> 170
    
  • 2 Charge Damage: 212 -> 180
    
  • 3 Charge Damage: 224 -> 190
    

Misc:

• Self Healing Sickness Duration: 60s -> 120s
  

Corrupted Dungeons
With the overhauled Magic Staffs, we want to make solo Healers feel more powerful again. But we also don’t want out sustaining strategies to dominate Corrupted Dungeons.

• Healing Reduction inside Corrupted Dungeons: 20% -> 30%
  
• Casting any Holy- or Nature Q-slot Healing spell inside a corrupted dungeons, reduces the caster's damage by 50% for 60s
  

We are currently working on another balance patch that is intended to go live somewhere around the middle of this season. From our latest Dev Talk you probably know that we have been primarily working on the Magic Staff Rework. But we still want to bring you a balance patch, before the Rework hits live. However since our resources are mainly occupied with the rework we will focus on a smaller amount of changes and try to avoid changes to the magic staffs in the balance patch. And instead do bigger changes only together with the rework.

This post gets regularly updated with the latest changes of our internal playtests.

Very Important:
All these changes are still in testing and may vastly differ in the final patch. Sometimes we just try out various things, which may get reverted. Also the balance changes are not neccessarily all complete. Just because a certain item is not adjusted in the changelogs so far, doesn't mean it isn't on our 'need to be adjusted'-list. These changes are simply a snapshot of the current development and everything in there needs to be taken with a grain of salt.

This thread is not meant to discuss these unfinished changes. It is just to give all players the same chance of guessing the direction of the next balance patch

Axes
We increased the Resilience Penetration for Halberd and Carrion Caller to increase their damage output in group fights. This makes these Halberds more effective in large scale fights. Carrion Caller will also have higher sustain damage in group fights, which should also increase their sustain damage in Crystal League scenarios.

• Halberd
  
  • Resilience Penetration: 30% -> 50%
    
• Carrion Caller
  
  • Resilience Penetration: 30% -> 50%
    

Bows
With the last changes to Enchanted Quiver, we made the stacks fall off easier and have a slower ramp up time to allow for more counter play. Since these changes regular Bows have been quite underrepresented. For this reason, we revert the change to the stack duration. But reduced the damage burst potential to offset this consistency. That is why we revert the ramp up time back to it’s old values and only keep the shortened stack duration to keep the weapon in check.

• Enchanted Quiver (regular Bows)
  
  • Attack Damage Increase per Stack: 30% -> 35% -> 25%
    
  • Attack Speed Increase per Stack: 13% -> 15% -> 10%
    
  • Max Attack Buff Stack: 7 -> 6 -> 7
    
  • Attack Buff Duration: 3.5s -> 5s
    

Daggers
Blood Ritual now has more damage front loaded on the moment of each hit. This makes casting it in quick succession more viable. The ability still leaves a DoT that is overwritten each hit, which means for max damage there still is a reason to space the three activations apart. But utilizing Blood Ritual primarily for burst damage should still do a signifant amount of damage. The maximum damage output of this ability stays unchanged.

• Blood Ritual (Demonfang)
  
  • Now applies an instant 100 damage each hit
    
  • DoT damage: 50 -> 25
    
  • Number of DoT Ticks: 3 -> 2
    
  • Enemy Bleed Duration stays the same
    

Frost Staffs
Frost Staffs have been very dominant in various parts of the game. With their peak damage output when stacking multiple cast time modifiers, they outshine most other ranged DPS. While we want to keep the playstyle in general intact, we are reducing the damage output of Ice Shard slightly, to reduce the peak DPS that Frost Staffs can reach. Additionally we increase the cooldown of Freezing Wind, which offered a large area CC on a quiet low cooldown.

• Ice Shard (all Frost Staffs)
  
  • Damage vs players: 125 -> 118
    
• Freezing Wind (one-handed Frost Staff)
  
  • Cooldown: 15s -> 18s
    

Hammers
The recent changes to Crowd Control Duration scaling and Diminishing Returns have hit Great Hammers and made them less effective, since their role was dependent on a singular long lasting stun. So, we are increasing the Tackle stun duration, to make them more impactful in team fights again.

• Tackle (Great Hammer)
  
  • Stun Duration: 2.10s -> 2.35s
    

Holy Staffs
Great Holy is a very impactful weapon in the Holy line, which can make it very hard for melee opponents to get in. The enemy knockback is a bit too punishing for enemies, due to the long airborne time. To make Great Holy less oppressive for enemy melees, we are increasing the enemy knockback speed, which means they are shorter airborne.

• Holy Explosion (Great Holy Staff)
  
  • Enemy Knockback speed: 10m/s -> 20m/s
    

Maces
Heavy maces are currently underrepresented, although their silence and purge should be a good counter to Nature Staff sustain builds, like currently meta in the 5v5 Crystal League. To make them more attractive in their role we are increasing the radius of Battle Howl, so Heavy Maces are more effective in fulfilling their role.

• Battle Howl (Heavy Mace)
  
  • Radius: 5m -> 6m
    

Nature Staffs
Nature Staffs are currently very strong in sustaining enemy pressure in 5v5 Crystal League matches. Since we don’t want to reduce their healing output in other content too much, we want to make them more susceptible to being pressured by tanks. Therefore we are increasing the cooldown of Cleanse Heal and the additional heal. So if the enemy team pressures a Nature Staff player to use Cleanse Heal it will reduce the player’s healing output.
To further reduce the potential sustain of double healer teams we reduced the duration of Protection of Nature. Additionally we added a direct heal effect which makes it sure it also triggers Healing Sickness, but to offset this direct heal we slightly reduced the increased healing effect.

• Protection of Nature (all Nature Staffs):
  
  • Duration: 8s -> 6s
    
  • Now directly Heals the target for 40
    
  • Healing Increased: 40% -> 35%
    
  • This effect can't be stacked from multiple players on the same target anymore
    

• Cleanse Heal (all Nature Staffs)
  
  • Cooldown: 18s -> 20s
    
  • Heal Value - 0 Charges: 80 -> 70
    
  • Heal Value - 1 Charge: 100 -> 90
    
  • Heal Value - 2 Charges: 130 -> 115
    
  • Heal Value - 3 Charges: 170 -> 150
    

Spears
We reduced the Resilience Penetration of the Glaive to reduce it’s sustain damage in group fights. This should also reduce the sustain damage in 5v5 Crystal League, without any impact on damage output in solo play.

• Glaive
  
  • Resilience Penetration: 50% -> 30%
    

Swords
Currently Dual Swords are very similar to many other sword abilities, which leaves not much room to make the weapon strong in a unique role without outshining the other swords. That is why we are testing an attack speed and attack damage buff to the E ability, to make Dual Swords a strong auto attack bruiser. We are also improving the Passive Weaking on Swords as a way to impact enemy damage output more significantly, to give another option for useful passives. We have also reworked the hit detection of Mighty Blow (Broadsword) to only deal the damage if the caster lands close to the target, to improve counterplay interactions against it.

• Weakening (Passive - all Swords)
  
  • Max Stack: 1 -> 5
    
  • Damage Reduction per stack: 4% -> 2%
    
  • Removed the Healing Reduction Effect
    
• Mighty Blow (Broadsword)
  
  • Reworked hit detection so that the ability only deals damage if it lands in close proximity of the target
    
• Spinning Blades (Dual Swords)
  
  • When hitting at least one enemy the player now gets an additional buff, which increases Attack Speed by 50% and Attack Damage by 50% for 5s.
    
  • Removed the additional percentage damage vs players
    

War Gloves
Fists of Avalon has been struggling to find its place in the game. Therefore we have adjusted the ability. We removed the first part, the Roundhouse Kick, instead the ability start now with the Dive Kick. The Kick has less cooldown and keeps the enemy longer airborne to make it easier to follow up with the Purifying Fist. To further make the full combo more impactful the last hit now also purges enemy buffs on hit. (Removing defensive buffs before the damage is dealt)

Cross Step is another ability in the War Glove kit that has been struggling to find its place, that is why it has been reworked into a new ability called Fleet Footwork. The new ability starts with the Roundhouse kick that was previously the first ability in the Purifying Combination, but doing only damage without the knockback. After hitting an enemy with the Kick the ability can immediately be recast to do the Cross Step dodge as a follow up. The Cross Step now doesn’t grant a buff to Auto Attacks anymore, but instead the caster takes less damage during the animation, so it is used purely as a dodge or reposition. Additionally we increased the range of Shock Wave, to make it stronger in the intended role of catching up to a ranged opponent.

• Cross Step (all War Gloves)
  
• Reworked the ability to Fleet Footwork
  
  • Kick enemies in a cone in front of you, dealing 50 physical damage
    
  • Cooldown: 3s -> 2s
    
  • If the kick hits an enemy the ability can be re-activated for 3s -> 2s to use the Cross Step
    
  • Cross Step dodges behind the enemy
    
  • During the dodge animation all damage received is reduced by 40%
    
  • Cross Step Cooldown: 4s -> 3s
    
• Shock Wave (all War Gloves)
  
  • Range: 11m -> 13m
    
• Purifying Combo (Fists of Avalon)
  
  • Removed the Roundhouse Kick (The ability now starts with the Dive Kick)
    
  • Dive Kick:
    
    • Knocked in air duration: 0.86s -> 1s
      
    • Cooldown: 20s -> 15s
      
  • Purifying Punch
    
    • Now also purges enemies before the hit
      
  
  
  
  
  
  

Helmets



The Avalonian plate and cloth helmets have become less relevant in the meta. Purifying Smoke used to be a strong utility slot with offensive and defensive application. But it currently doesn’t seem to offer enough consistency for its high cooldown. To make it more consistent we are reducing the hit delay and increasing the range. Avalonian Beam’s cooldown will be reduced to make it a more attractive option, as it is currently also underrepresented.

• Avalonian Beam (Cowl of Purity)
  
  • Cooldown: 45s -> 40s -> 30s
    
• Purifying Smoke (Helmet of Valor)
  
  • Hit Delay: 0.7s -> 0.5s
    
  • Cast Range: 9m -> 11m
    

Shoes
The damage buff from Hellion Shoes could be used to increase damage beyond the damage buff cap. This was due to Mark of Sacrifice increasing Bonus Damage vs Players. To prevent further damage spikes we exchange this buff with a regular damage increase. To provide tanks with another option for a strong engage-tool we are lowering the cooldown of Elbow Smash.

• Mark of Sacrifice (Hellion Shoes)
  
  • Now increases Damage instead of Bonus vs Mobs / Players
    
• Elbow Smash (Judicator Shoes)
  
  • Cooldown: 30s -> 25s
    

5v5 Crystal League Match
Since it is very difficult to hold a 3 cap on the new map, the matches last much longer on average. To offset this slower point reduction we are increasing the point reduction per kill. This change also rewards killing players more and diminishes and diminishes the effectiveness of jsut out-sustaining the enemy team.

• Points Reduction per Kill: 4 -> 6
  

Healing Sickness (already live)
To broaden the range of possible team and item compositions, Healing Sickness is now only triggered by Nature and Holy Staffs. Healing performed by any other item (like Rejuvenating Sprint, Blood Bandit, Bloodlust, Blessed Aurora, or even when an Arcane Staff uses Holy Orb via Mimic) no longer triggers Healing Sickness.

For the start of Season 15 we are working on a patch with improvements for the next season. This is not intended as the next big balance patch, but instead will focus on some adjustments and imrpovements on currently underused abilities and items. This patch will go live after the CLC, but before the start of Season 15.

This post gets regularly updated with the latest changes of our internal playtests.

Very Important:
All these changes are still in testing and may vastly differ in the final patch. Sometimes we just try out various things, which may get reverted. Also the balance changes are not neccessarily all complete. Just because a certain item is not adjusted in the changelogs so far, doesn't mean it isn't on our 'need to be adjusted'-list. These changes are simply a snapshot of the current development and everything in there needs to be taken with a grain of salt.

This thread is not meant to discuss these unfinished changes. It is just to give all players the same chance of guessing the direction of the next balance patch

Arcane Staffs
Currently stealing an ability with Mimic and then not using it triggers the full 20s cooldown. To make Mimic more flexible and less punishing, this cooldown is completely removed.

• Mimic (all Arcane Staffs):
  
  • Timeout Cooldown 20s → 0s
    

Axes
Blood Bandit offered too much sustain in solo PvE, making it possible to reliably solo a lot of content that was not intended for solo players. To reduce the self sustain the Life Steal effect is now limited to one target and can be triggered less often. But to improve the damage and utility the ability can now be cast twice in a row. But Blood Bandit (Battleaxe):

• Blood Bandit (Battleaxe)
  
  • Can now be used twice in a row
    
  • First use deals physical damage depending on the Rending Bleed Charges on the target and immediately resets the cooldown.
    
    • Stacks: 0/1/2/3
      
    • Damage: 175/200/225/250
      
  • Second use deals 110 physical damage and heals the caster based on the Rending Bleed Charges of the first enemy hit (This heal only applies for the first enemy hit; consecutive hits do not grant additional healing).
    
    • Stacks: 0/1/2/3
      
    • Self-Heal: 50/80/110/150
      
  • Time Window for the second activation 10s
    
  • Cooldown: 10s → 20s
    

Hammers
Forge Hammers have been struggling to find their spot in the combat meta. So we are reworking Giant Steps to not revolve around an auto attack buff anymore. Instead the caster now gets access to a new ability while in giant form, where the caster can repeatedly slam the hammers on the ground in front of him dealing constantly physical damage in an AoE radius.

• Giant Steps (Forge Hammers):Removed Attack Damage Buff
  
  • While Giant Steps is active, the caster gains access to the ability “Giant Smash”:Effect: Slams the hammers on the ground, dealing 75 physical damage in a 4m radius
    
  • Cooldown: 1.2s
    
  • Range: 4m
    
  • Energy Cost: 0
    
  • The ability can be used repeatedly, as long as Giant Steps is active
    

Holy Staffs
Holy Touch is currently slightly underrepresented across the game. To bring it back as a force to be reckoned with in 2v2 Hellgates, its Healing Output has been slightly increased.

• Holy Touch (Lifetouch Staff):
  
  • Heal per tick 50 → 55
    

Nature Staffs
Spirit Animal has not seen much play in large group scenarios lately, instead players often rely on Wild Staff instead. To make it more attractive in its intended field, the group size it can affect, as well as its immediate heal, have both been increased.

• Spirit Animal (Rampant Staff):
  
  • Max targets affected 10 → 15
    
  • Instant Healing by the Elk: 60 → 110
    

Shoes
Run and the Sprint abilities fill currently a similar role. To offer more flexibility on the shoe slot Run has been replaced with Dodge on all shoes. This allows all Shoes to swap to an ability with invulnerability. The Sprint abilities on all shoes have been changed to fill the mobility role of Run. Assassin Shoes get the new Ability Swift Cut, which provides additional damage from the shoe-slot at the cost of limited mobility.

• Run (all Shoes):
  
  • The ability is removed
    
  • Instead all Shoes now can use Dodge
    
• All Gathering Workboots:
  
  • Added Rejuvenating Sprint as an additional ability choice (this change gives all gathering boots 4 abilities)
    
• Energetic Sprint (all Cloth Sandals):
  
  • Duration: 3s → 5s
    
  • Move Speed bonus: 100% → 80%
    
  • Energy per second 3.92 → 4
    
  • Total Energy gained: 11.76 → 16
    
• Refreshing Sprint (Leather Shoes):
  
  • Duration: 3s → 5s
    
  • Move Speed bonus: 100% → 80%
    
  • Cooldown: 30s → 32.5s
    
  • Cooldown Reduction: 49% → 25% → 33.33%
    
• Rejuvenating Sprint (Plate Boots):
  
  • Duration: 3s → 5s
    
  • Move Speed bonus: 100% → 80%
    
  • Health per second 20.48 → 20
    
  • Total Health gained 61.44 → 80
    

• Assassin Shoes
  
• Removed Dodge
  
• Added the new ability, Swift Cut:
  
  • Dash behind a targeted enemy and deal 111 physical damage
    
  • Cooldown: 12s
    
  • Range: 7m -> 11m
    
  • Energy Cost: 0
    
  • Damage: 111 -> 102
    

Mounts
With the recent changes that increased survivability of mounts, Pest Lizards became quite oppressive in an offensive role. In situations where they are used to follow large hostile armies into the battlefield to sneak away with the loot of players dying in large fights, the Pest Lizard was providing too much value with too little risk. In addition to the changes on the Pest Lizard, the Looting Dismount Changes introduced with this patch (see section above) will increase the risk of such tactics.

• Pest Lizard:
  
  • Move Speed Bonus: 110% -> 103%
    
  • Toxic Reaction:
    
    • Area Radius: 6m → 5m
      
    • Area Duration: 3s → 2.75s
      
    • Cooldown: 60s → 150s → 90s
      
    • Fear Duration: 3s → 2s
      
      
  • Toxic Cloud:
    
    • Area Radius: 6m → 5m
      
    • Area Duration: 3s → 2.75s
      
    • Fear Duration: 3s → 2s
      
  
  
  

Looting Dismount Changes

Hostile Dismount status now prevents looting of killed hostile players. Additionally players must now dismount before looting a killed player. This change was made for two reasons:

• To require a greater commitment to potential PvP while looting in combat situations, bringing greater risk to a previously easy reward
  
• To prevent players from accidentally losing their shield bubble when clicking on a corpse, which is often used to bait less experienced players into being easily attackable
  

Hideouts
The short-range protection bubble makes it very difficult to defend a Hideout that is currently under attack. The original reason why the bubble has such a short range was to prevent hopping safely between Hideouts. Since entering Hideouts (not set as Home) requires a channel nowadays, the protection bubble doesn’t need to be limited to the short range anymore. So we are increasing the Protection Bubble range.

• Max distance that can be traveled while keeping invulnerability bubble: 15m → 50m
  

We are currently working on another bigger balance patch. One of the main topics is the rework of CC Duration scaling and how Diminishing Returns affect the game. We also want to improve the open world experience for small to mid-scale fights, putting more emphasis on survival chances when smaller groups encounter a bigger group. We will also keep working on the War Gloves and make them more attractive to use in different types of content, as well as other general adjustments for various content types. However since the majority of our staff is now going into their christmas break and the patch contains a lot of changes, you can expect these changes to hit Staging early / mid January, which means the changes hit the live server probably late January. I already wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

This post gets regularly updated with the latest changes of our internal playtests.

Very Important:
All these changes are still in testing and may vastly differ in the final patch. Sometimes we just try out various things, which may get reverted. Also the balance changes are not neccessarily all complete. Just because a certain item is not adjusted in the changelogs so far, doesn't mean it isn't on our 'need to be adjusted'-list. These changes are simply a snapshot of the current development and everything in there needs to be taken with a grain of salt.

This thread is not meant to discuss these unfinished changes. It is just to give all players the same chance of guessing the direction of the next balance patch

Axes
Great Axe's E ability is an uninterruptible moving channel, which also has very high damage output. Which can make this ability a bit overwhelming. To offer more counterplay options we will change the ability, so that the damage on each enemy ramps up over time. So if the enemy can get out of the channel before it ends the damage won't be as devastating anymore. This change also reduces the overall damage output against players which was a bit too high. But the damage output in PvE is improved with this change, since Great Axe now deals the same damage against mobs and players

• Whirlwind (Great Axe)
  
  • The damage now keeps increasing each tick if the same target is hit repeatedly
    
  • First Tick Damage: 76 -> 56
    
  • Each consecutive tick increases the damage by 4 (6 ticks in total)
    
  • Now deals the same damage vs mobs and players
    

Bows
Rain of Arrows channel duration was taking too long andt doesn't fit that much anymore with the general increased pacing of combat over the last years. To make it more useful in modern Albion we reduce the channel duration and increase the damage per tick. Making it less dependent on the Explosive Arrows buff to deal damage.

• Rain of Arrows (Longbow)
  
  • Max Channel Duration: 2.5s -> 1.5s
    
  • Damage per Tick: 60 -> 90
    
  • Total Damage Ticks: 6 -> 4
    

Crossbows
To improve survival chances of Crossbows in Open world situations, we are improving Caltrops. Now when an enemy activates the trap the caster gets an additional movement speed buff, to better create distances against enemies. This should help especially in outnumbered situations.

• Caltrops (all Crossbows)
  
  • Standtime: 0.5s -> 0.2s
    
  • Hit Delay: 0.5s -> 0.2s
    
  • If an enemy activates the trap the caster's move speed is increased by 20% for 2s
    
  • Slow Strength: 50% -> 40%
    
  • Cooldown: 4s -> 5s
    

Cursed Staffs
Enfeeble Blades have recently been reworked to take over the offensive purging rule in large scale fights. However the tick interval in the small radius makes it a bit unreliable at that role. That is why it now completely nullifies all enemy buffs for the whole duration. Additionally since it has a smaller radius than the Void, we also reduced the cooldown and made it a bit faster to cast to make it easier to utilize the purge in large scale battles. Since we increase the effectiveness of AoE Escalation we are also reducing the base armor shred of Cataclysm. Because with it’s big radius it is likely to hit a large number of players. And the escalated debuff strength would amplify the damage too much with the new escalation.

• Enfeeble Blades (Lifecurse Staff)
  
  • Enemies are now immune to any type of buffs, for the whole duration while they are in the area
    
  • Cooldown decreased by 5s (across all Item Power)
    
  • Cast Time: 0.6s -> 0.4s
    
• Cataclysm (Damnation Staff)
  
  • Armor Reduction: 0.24 -> 0.18
    

Daggers
We are reducing the maximum damage of Bridled Fury a bit to make one-shots less likely with the new AoE Escalation. To further increase counter play options the caster won't be immune to damage during the backleap, so reflecting the damage is a threat to the caster.

• Merciless Finish (Bridled Fury)
  
  • The Backleap is not immune to damage anymore (only immune to CC)
    
  • 3 Stack Damage: 267 -> 250
    

Fire Staffs
Wildfire staff is still a very strong weapon across multiple types of content. The burst damage is still extremely high and the low cast time makes it really hard to dodge. We will increase the cast time back to 0.6s. This should make it possible to react if a Magma Sphere is directly cast into an enemy's face. Additionally we reduce the base damage on the first impact. The true damage DoT will keep it’s strong impact against tanks and high HP builds. But it doesn't melt cloth users as fast anymore.
We are reducing the range of Searing Flame a bit, since the cast range off-screen was a little too much on this low cooldown and high damaging Q ability.
Since Dawnsong is more likely to hit the enemy frontline it is difficult to utilize the Healing Cast debuff because the enemy Healer is in the backline. To make the value of the debuff more reliable it will now reduce Healing Received instead. And the cooldown will be adjusted to 30s to make it more possible to be better synced up with the other forces in a ZvZ.

• Searing Flame (all Fire Staffs)
  
  • Range: 20m -> 18m
    
  • Projectile Speed: 25m/s -> 21.6m/s
    
• Magma Sphere (Wildfire Staff)
  
  • Cast Time: 0.4s -> 0.6s
    
  • Instant Damage: 296 -> 240
    
• Flaming Phoenix (Dawnsong)
  
  • The debuff now reduces Healing Received, instead of Healing Cast
    
  • Cooldown: 40s -> 30s
    
  • Cast Time: 1s -> 0.6s
    

Holy Staffs
Redemption Staff has been dominating the Crystal League 5v5 scene after the latest rework. The bouncing mechanic was originally intended to make it hard to focus the healing on specific targets, however current teams have become very effective at keeping the Sphere on exactly the targets that need the healing. And with the high healing output per bounce the counter play for the enemy team is also very limited. To make this ability more interesting we reduce the base healing. But if the Sphere keeps healing the same two targets, each consecutive bounce heals for more. Interrupting this charge up mechanic also allows for more counterplay on the enemy team. Great Holy Staff provides high utility with it's AoE knockback and strong Heal, this can be used offensively and defensively and encourages good decision making from the user. But with it's low cooldown and high utility it currently outperforms other healing staffs in 2v2 Hell Gats, that is why we are increasing it's cooldown a bit so it has less up-time.

• Celestial Sphere (Redemption Staff)
  
  • Heal per bounce: 90 -> 60
    
  • Reduced base healing, But every time the Sphere keeps healing the same target within 1.5s, the healing output increases by 25%. (stacks up to 4 times)
    
• Holy Explosion (Great Holy Staff)
  
  • Cooldown: 15s -> 18s
    

Nature Staffs
One-handed Nature Staff struggles to find its place in the meta currently. The long cast time makes it easy to interrupt the E-ability and deny the healing completely. Since Circle of Life is already dependent on the Rejuvenation stacks on allies, we are reducing the cast time to make it easier to get the cast through.

• Circle of Life (one-handed Nature Staff)
  
  • Cast Time: 0.7s -> 0.5s
    

Spears
Glaive has been a very dominant item in the 5v5 Crystal League for a while now. To make it a bit less oppressive and more telegraphed we are reducing the cast range.

• Fling (Glaive)
  
  • Castrange: 5m -> 3m
    

Swords
Clarent Blade is still a bit underperforming since it's last rework. To make the unique feature of the weapon more attractive we are improving the strength of these additional effects. This also increases the maximum damage potential. Hamstring is meant to provide a Brawler type of playstyle. that is very sticky to the target and deals constant damage. To make the ability more useful in this role we are improving it's damage output.

• Hamstring (all Swords)
  
  • Damage 66 -> 78
    
• Crescent Slash (Clarent Blade)
  
  • 1 Stack Slow Strength: 20% -> 30%
    
  • 2 Stack Silence Duration: 1.4s -> 2s
    
  • 3 Stack Additional Damage: 94 -> 120 -> 130
    

War Gloves
Ater the last patch the gameplay of the new weapon line was improved, but in terms of effectiveness they are not quite where they need to be. So we are improving various aspects. For the Q abilities with more utility like Dragon Leap and Shock Wave, we want to incentivize players to use only the first part of the ability for constant damage on a low cooldown. And deliberately use the second part of the ability, to commit to the utility at the cost of a higher cooldown. Additionally we are improving various E-abilities. Spiked Gloves are intended to be working as a threat to enemy tanks, but the damage they currently provide is not threatening enough for plate tanks yet. That is why we are specifically increasing the damage vs plate significantly, so they can excel as a tank buster. For Infernal Boulder the secondary effect will be changed to a DoT that reduces Healing Received, which can be stacked up. To make this more useful as an ability to delete a target without a direct one shot and the debuff stacking should also help to communicate to new players that the boulder can hit the same target multiple times. We are also reworking the Aggressive Rush passive, with a damage buff that slowly ramps up with every normal attack, to have every single auto attacks have a bit more impact.

• Resilience Penetration (all War Gloves)
  
  • 40% -> 60%
    
• Dragon Leap (all War Gloves)
  
  • Cooldown when missing the first hit: 7s -> 4s
    
  • Time Window to activate the Uppercut: 3s -> 2s (this makes it more attractive to keep using the first hit to increase damage and only have a long cooldown when committing to the Uppercut for the additional CC)
    
  • Energycost: 4 -> 3
    
• Shock Wave (all War Gloves)
  
  • Cooldown for the first attack: 6s -> 4s (using the dash still triggers a 6s cooldown)
    
  • Enegycost: 5 -> 4
    
• Counter (all War Gloves)
  
  • The hit after the Counterl now knocks enemies into the air for 0.76s, instead of knocking them 3m away
    
• Falcon Smash (Battle Bracers)
  
  • Close Range Damage Radius: 3m -> 4m
    
  • Max Range Damage Radius: 5.5m -> 6m
    
• Gravitational Collapse (Spiked Gauntlets)
  
  • Damage vs Plate: 300 -> 450
    
• Hundred Striking Fists (Ursine Maulers)
  
  • The delayed Damage can't be reflected anymore
    
• Infernal Boulder (Hellfire Hands)
  
  • Doesn't apply a slow anymore
    
  • Instead each hit applies a DoT that ticks for 4s
    
  • Deals magic damage over time and Reduces Healing Recieved by 20%. (stacks up to 3 times)
    
  • DoT Ticks: 4 -> 3
    
  • DoT Damage per Tick: 5.6 -> 14
    
• Earth Crusher (Ravenstrike Cestus)
  
  • Knocking an enemy into the air, will now make the enemy immune to getting knocked into the air by another Earth Crusher for 1.5s.
    
    
• Aggressive Rush (Passive)
  
• Reworked the Passive it is now called Fatal Fury
  
  • 3 Hit Attack Chain: Every normal Attack increases your Damage by 2% for 3s (stacks up to 9 times)
    
  • 2 Hit Attack Chain: Every normal Attack increases your Damage by 1.5% for 3s (stacks up to 12 times)
    
  • On max stacks the buff can't be refreshed and will run out.
    

Helmets

• Growing Rage (Royal Hood)
  
  • Damage Increase per Stack: 5% -> 4%
    
• Mortal Agony (Stalker Hood)
  
  • Damage Increase: 20% -> 15%
    

Armors

Since we are buffng AoE Escalation we are reducing the damage buff from various armor slot items to make one-shots less likely. Everlasting Spirit specifically is already a pretty strong armor slot ability already. Jacket of Tenacity is currently quite underused, so we are improving Dynamic Defense, to have a shorter cooldown and generally a more reactive gameplay. Additioanally to make it easier and more reliable to get a specific buff, the ability can now also used on allies.

• Everlasting Spirit (Cleric Robe)
  
  • Damage & Healing Increase: 30% -> 20%
    
• Dynamic Defense (Jacket of Tenacity)
  
  • Can now also be cast on allies
    
  • Cooldown: 30s -> 20s
    
  • Buff Duration: 5s -> 4s
    

Shoes

• Defenseless Rush (Royal Sandals)
  
  • Damage Increase: 20% -> 15%
    

Misc
Resilience (also known as Focus Fire Protection)
To increase surival chances of solo players and small groups vs bigger groups we are increasing the Resilience ramp-up curve. The strength of this increase depends on the group size, the more attackers a target has the higher is the impact of this adjustment. If 6-7 players attack a player, this player now lives for around 10% longer than before.

• Melee Damage Reduction Factor: 40 -> 50
  
  • This increases survivability by 5.1% vs 3 players, by 12,8% vs 10 players (compared to live)
    
• Ranged Damage Reduction Factor: 20 -> 25
  
  • This increases survivability by 3.5% vs 3 players, by 15,1% vs 10 players (compared to live)
    

AoE Escalation
Additionally we increase the AoE Escalation to have more impact again, even for smaller clumps. This change favors smaller groups, since large enemy forces are more likely to overlap. The increased AoE Escalation Damage in large scale fights will be offset to a certain degree by the higher Resilience values. We will have to test if this change is enough to keep one-shots in check for large scale fight, but we might have to readjust some big damaing AoE abiltiies accordingly for this change.

• 2 Targets: 5% -> 8%
  
• 3 Targets: 10% -> 16%
  
• 4 Targets: 15% -> 24%
  
• 5 Targets: 20% -> 32%
  
• 6 Targets: 25% -> 40%
  
• 7 Targets: 30% -> 48%
  
• 8 Targets: 35% -> 56%
  
• 9+ Targets: 40% -> 56%
  

Crowd Control Duration
We reworked how our CC effects scale with ability power, so that they allign with the scaling of CC resistance in the game. This means CC effects will be weaker on high Item Power items. Despite fixing a bug, we also want to generally reduce cases of very long lasting crowd control effects in the game.

• CC Power now scales slower with Item Power. (This includes all types of CC Duration and Knockback distance)
  
• To make up for this change we incresed the base CC Duration values by 40%
  
• With this new progression curve CC Power will stay the same on roughly 1000 IP.
  
  • Below 1000IP CC effects will be stronger than they are on live
    
  • Above 1000 IP CC effects will be weaker than they are on live
    

Diminishing Returns
We want to disincentive stacking of long lasting hard CCs, therefore we are drastically increasing the effectiveness of Diminishing Returns. To avoid situations where players can get stun locked for an extended time period.

• Max DR Reduction of CC effects: 75% -> 80%
  
• Stun Factor: 0.1 -> 0.3
  
• Root Factor: 0.05 -> 0.3
  
• Silence Factor: 0.05 -> 0.3
  
• Forced Movement: 0.1 -> 0.3
  
• Slow Factor : 0.08 -> 0.3
  

These changes are planned for the first patch of the new update. Making some adjustments to a few weapons which are out of line. And making sure the new content is in a good state.

This post gets regularly updated with the latest changes of our internal playtests.

Very Important:
All these changes are still in testing and may vastly differ in the final patch. Sometimes we just try out various things, which may get reverted. Also the balance changes are not neccessarily all complete. Just because a certain item is not adjusted in the changelogs so far, doesn't mean it isn't on our 'need to be adjusted'-list. These changes are simply a snapshot of the current development and everything in there needs to be taken with a grain of salt.

This thread is not meant to discuss these unfinished changes. It is just to give all players the same chance of guessing the direction of the next balance patch

Axes
Since the Whirlwind channel can’t be interrupted anymore, the counter play options are rooting or slowing the Great Axe player, or creating enough distance. However with the movement speed increase built into the ability, it was very difficult to escape the Whirlwind damage. So we will remove the movement speed increase from the ability.

• Whirlwind (Great Axe)
  
  • Removed the movement speed increase
    

Daggers
To make Blood Ritual less dependent on blocking the self damage with an additional defensive like Cleric Robe, we are reducing the self damage.

• Blood Ritual (Demonfang)
  
  • Self Damage per Tick: 20 -> 12
    

Holy Staffs
Holy Flash has taken over the healing meta. With its high energy efficiency and Heal per Second it is currently outperforming all other Healing options on the Q-slot. Which is why we drastically increase the energy cost and also slightly up the cooldown to reduce the overall healing output per second and make it a bit less spamable.
Planned for Patch 2, to not delay patch 1 release.

• Holy Flash (all Holy Staffs)
  
  • Energycost: 4.2 -> 8
    
  • Cooldown: 3s -> 3.5s
    

Maces
The one-handed Mace has been very strong in a variety of content types and the combination. With the combination of high damage, stun and mobility they outperform many similar weapons, making is very strong, therefore we are reducing the damage output and the mobility of Deep Leap.

• Threatening Smash (all Maces)
  
  • Damage 157 -> 146
    

• Deep Leap (one-handed Mace)
  
  • Damage: 203 -> 156
    
  • Range: 14m -> 11m
    

Swords
Mighty Blow offers a lot of constant value on a low cooldown E-ability. It is intended to be played as a bruiser that can stay very sticky on a target with constant pressure, however currently the ability is a bit overloaded with effects on such a low cooldown ability. That is why we are removing the Damage Resistance Buff.
Planned for Patch 2, to not delay patch 1 release.

• Mighty Blow (Broadsword)
  
  • Removed the Damage Resistances Buff
    

War Gloves
Since War Gloves are an entirely new line that offers a lot of utility, outplay potential and combo setup, we wanted to make sure they don’t dominate the meta at launch and made sure that the kit has enough drawbacks. However it seems we have been a bit overcautious and while they seemed in a good place in test cases, they seem to underperform in various areas in the Albion live world out there Therefore we are currently looking for various improvements to get them in a better place in patch 1.

• Base Stats (all Wargloves)
  
  • Now increase Max health by 50 (base value) - For reference that is the same amount of Max Health Swords or Axes give.
    
• War Glove Auto Attacks - 3 Hit Attack Chains
  
  • Timefactor of the third hit 3 -> 2 (this makes the third attack faster, but overall DPS stays the same)
    
  • Canceling the third auto attack is now possible earlier, to enable more responsive repositioning and ability usage between attacks
    
• Create Opening (all War Gloves)
  
  • Cooldown when using the second hit: 4s -> 3s
    
• Dragon Leap (all War Gloves)
  
  • Cooldown: 8s -> 7s
    
  • Time Window to activate the Uppercut: 4s -> 3s
    
  • Removed the delay until the 2nd activation can be used. (this means you can instantly recast it, after the first hit)
    
• Cross Step (all War Gloves)
  
  • Buff Duration: 6s -> 8s
    
• Shock Wave (all War Gloves)
  
  • Range: 10m -> 11m
    
• Triple Kick (all War Gloves)
  
  • Damage vs Players per hit: 30 -> 37
    
• Backhand Strike (all War Gloves)
  
  • The ability doesn't require an enemy target anymore.
    
  • Instead it can now be used by casting in a direction.
    
  • The Strike then hits all enemies in a 6m range in the cast direction. Knocking them back and applying the knockback effect & damage to all targets hit by the Strike.
    
• Blazing Geyser (Brawler Gloves)
  
  • Cooldown: 20s -> 15s
    
• Falcon Smash (Battle Bracers)
  
  • Inner Circle Damage: 242 -> 264
    
  • Cast Range: 12m -> 15m
    
• Gravitational Collapse (Spiked Gauntlets)
  
  • Cooldown: 25s -> 20s
    
  • Damage vs Cloth Armor: 100 -> 140
    
  • Damage vs Leather Armor: 200 -> 240
    
• Infernal Boulder (Hellfire Hands)
  
  • Bugfix: Damage was not affected by AoE Escalation
    
• Earth Crusher (Ravenstrike Cestus)
  
  • Bugfix: Damage was not affected by AoE Escalation
    
• Purifying Combination (Fist of Avalon)
  
  • First Attack Damage: 35 -> 78
    
  • Second Attack: Bugfix: Damage was not affected by AoE Escalation
    
  • Third Attack Damage: 215 -> 235
    
• Aggressive Burst (Passive)
  
  • Normal Attacks needed to Activate: 16 -> 11 (for 2 hit auto attack chain War Gloves)
    
  • 3 hit auto attack chain War Gloves is unchanged, becasue the 3 hit attack chain is now faster
    
• Rushdown (Passive on all War Gloves)
  
  • Movement Speed Increase Duration: 1s -> 2s
    

Misc
With the dismounting changes introduced in the new content update, it became now very difficult to prevent a player from entering a hideout. Because enemy players can’t be attacked for 5s now. Therefore we increase the channel time to enter hideouts (without home setting).

• Hideout Enter - Channel Time: 3s -> 4s
  

Most changes in listed here are intended for a mid- Energy Surge Season Balance Patch. There will be more changes appearing here in the next 1-2 weeks. In the Mid-Season patch we want to improve various underused items / weapons. While also making changes to items and abilities, that are either too dominant in it's role and hurting overall variety by it or if they have playstyles that are not very fun to fight against. Big reworks, like the Black Hands, will go live with the next content update.

This post gets regularly updated with the latest changes of our internal playtests.

Very Important:
All these changes are still in testing and may vastly differ in the final patch. Sometimes we just try out various things, which may get reverted. Also the balance changes are not neccessarily all complete. Just because a certain item is not adjusted in the changelogs so far, doesn't mean it isn't on our 'need to be adjusted'-list. These changes are simply a snapshot of the current development and everything in there needs to be taken with a grain of salt.

This thread is not meant to discuss these unfinished changes. It is just to give all players the same chance of guessing the direction of the next balance patch

Already Live:

Arcane Staffs
The Locus is a very strong support weapon in ZvZs. At the moment it allows for a dual role whenever the frontline engages or is engaged, whereby it both removes the enemy’s buffs and cleanses all allies, thus fulfilling the role of offensive and defensive support whenever the frontlines clash. So that more considered decisions have to be made in these situations, the purge effect of the Void has been removed. This will open the ZvZ meta up to other support weapons, with less focus on this single item. Additionally, the max target count for Motivating Cleanse has been increased to make it more useful in large-scale fights.

• Motivanting Cleanse (all Arcane Staffs)
  
  • Max affected targets: 5 -> 10
    
• Void (Malevolent Locus)
  
  • Doesn't Purge enemies anymore
    

Crossbows
Explosive Mine damage had been lowered in the past to reduce the one-shot heavy meta in previous patches. However, since AoE Escalation has been reduced since then, we’ve reverted the damage nerf here in order to make the Explosive Mine a ZvZ force to be reckoned with once again.

• Explosive Mine (Weeping Repeater)
  
  • Damage: 230 -> 270
    

Cursed Staffs
Enfeeble Blades is currently a very underrepresented ability in game. To give it a more useful role, it has been reworked into a ground target area which purges each enemy hit. Since the Locus is now limited to cleanse only, Lifecurse Staff can take over the role of AoE purging in large-scale fights.

• Enfeeble Blades (Lifecurse Staff)
  
  • The ability can now be cast at the ground and doesn't require an ally target anymore. The Blades will then stay on the ground area instead.
    
  • It is now a channeled ability and the Blade area lasts for the channel duration
    
  • The cast and channel is now uninterruptible
    
  • Enfeeble Blades now keeps purging enemy buffs on every hit. (It doesn't purge enemy HoTs)
    
  • Cast Range: 11m -> 15m
    
  • Cast Time: 1s -> 0.6s
    
  • Area Radius: 6m → 5m
    
  • Area Duration: 5s → 4s
    
  • Damage Debuff per Stack: 5% → 4%
    
  • Debuff Max Stacks: 10 → 5
    
  • The cooldown now scales with Item Power:
    
    • 900 Item Power: 50s
      
    • 1700 Item Power: 34s
      
  
  
  

Fire Staffs
Wildfire Staff has been struggling to find a valuable spot in group compositions. Its core mechanic means that it is not very suitable for small-scale fights, while in large-scale combat it is outshone by other DPS options. To give it a specific DPS sub-role that is specifically suited to punishing the enemy frontline, the burning effect will now ignore armor and deal 3.75% of the player's max health per tick. This will make it more desirable against tanks and heavily-armored players. This fits the ability design better, as the rolling Magma Sphere is quite difficult to land on the enemy’s backline but much better suited to punishing an overextended frontline.

• Searing Flame (all Fire Staffs)
  
  • Fixd a bug with the collision detection at max range. This means that it's effective range is now increased.
    
• Magma Sphere (Wildfire Staff)
  
  • Projectile Speed: 7.67m/s -> 11.5m/s
    
  • Cast Speed: 0.6s -> 0.4s
    
  • Instant Damage: 267.43 -> 296
    
  • Ignite Damage per tick: 20.06 -> 3.75% of the targets Max Health
    

Hammers
Hammers have been the main tank in 5v5 Crystal League play for a while. To make them somewhat less powerful, the damage and armor reduction of Iron Breaker, which could generate heavy pressure over the course of a fight, has been reduced. In addition, the cooldown of Power Geyser has been increased by 2 seconds to reduce the up-time of this ranged displacement. Furthermore, the stun duration of Tackle has also been reduced slightly as this, along with its mobility on a rather low cooldown, made it more valuable than other Hammer E-abilities.

• Iron Breaker (all Hammers)
  
  • Resistance Reduction: 0.14 -> 0.12
    
  • Damage vs Playes: 120 -> 90 (Damage vs Mobs stays unchanged)
    
• Power Geyser (all Hammers)
  
  • Cooldown: 8s -> 10s
    
• Tackle (Great Hammer)
  
  • Stun Duration: 2.35s -> 2.10s
    

Holy Staffs
Healers in Albion offer a very strong sustain, meaning they have the tools to prevent their group members from simply being burst down in group fights. As a result, Healers are usually designed without a lot of damage in their kit, and are thus encouraged to use their Q-slot either for full sustain or additional damage. However, there is also the option to go full sustain and get damage from other sources such as potions, capes, or armor. To balance this approach, base damage output has been reduced when equipping any healing staff. Healers can negate this penalty by using the damage ability on the Q-slot. This change should reinforce the original intention: that Healers choose between sustain and damage.
Flash Heal is currently rarely used and has thus been reworked. Instead of a spammable heal without cooldown, a 3s cooldown has been added for a rebalanced high-impact heal, meaning Healers don’t have to remain still to get the maximum healing output of this ability. Cast Time has also been reduced to make it less susceptible to interrupts, but the hit delay has been kept in order to use the same telegraphing on the ground for allies and enemies to react to.
Additionally, some E abilities of the Holy Line have been adjusted: Holy Explosion has high healing output and good defensive utility with its knockback - to reduce the self-sustaining quality of this ability, the energy cost per tick has been increased; Celestial Sphere is now an uninterruptible cast so that it can't be fully denied as it often is in the competitive 5v5 scene - the ability also allows for counterplay after the cast, while the sphere is still bouncing between targets; lastly, Hallowfall's cooldown Reduction now receives a slight buff when hitting an ally - this change is meant to alleviate somewhat the downside of its very long base cooldown.

• Equipping any holy staff reduces all damage output by 50%
  
• Smite (all Holy Staffs)
  
  • Now increases the caster's damage by 50% for 8s
    
• Flash Heal (all Holy Staffs)
  
  • Cooldown: 0s -> 3s
    
  • Cast Time: 0.8s -> 0.4s
    
  • Hit Delay: 0s -> 0.4s
    
  • Heal: 34 -> 130
    
  • Removed the additional 10% Healing per target effect
    
• Holy Explosion (Great Holy Staff)
  
  • Energycost per tick: 3.6 -> 4.0
    
• Celestial Sphere (Redemption Staff)
  
  • The cast is now uninterruptible
    
• Divine Intervention (Hallowfall)
  
  • Cooldown Reduction when Healing an ally: 35% -> 40%
    

Maces
Maces have been out of the Crystal League 5v5 meta for a while now, so to give them a potential unique tank role Guard Rune has received an overhaul to make allies immune to knockbacks and stuns. This could be used to support a caster backline like Holy, Frost or Fire, protecting them from displacement and stun-heavy enemy front lines (Casters currently have difficulty getting into the meta because of this type of frontline). To further increase the attractiveness of Mace tanks, the value of Sacred Ground has been increased with a slow effect added to it, to offer some value in reducing enemy movement too. Furthermore, Battle Howl's cooldown has been reduced so that it better fits into the faster meta that has developed over the years. The ability to remove HoTs on this item is now on a lower cooldown than the Nature Cleanse and could create a lot more value against Nature Healer comps.

• Sacred Ground (all Maces)
  
  • Cast Time: 0.8s -> 0.6s
    
  • Enemies inside the area are now slowed by 20%
    
• Guard Rune (all Maces)
  
  • Now allies inside the area are immune to forced movement and stun
    
  • Resistance Increase: 0.20 -> 0.25
    
  • Removed the Healing Increased bonus
    
• Battle Howl (Heavy Mace)
  
  • Cooldown: 20s -> 15s
    

Nature Staffs
As noted above (under Holy Staffs), base damage output when equipping healing staffs has been reduced. This is to counter a workaround whereby Healers could go full sustain on the Q-slot and get damage from other sources. Now they would have to use the Q-slot damage ability to counter the reduced base damage output, in line with the original intention that they choose between sustain and damage.
Spirit Animal is currently underrepresented in large scale fights, although it is in precisely these situations that it is meant to shine. To increase its impact, cast range has been adjusted and the cast direction can now be chosen independently. This allows the Healer to better support his army from the back line.

• Equipping any nature staff reduces all damage output by 50%
  
• Thorns (all Nature Staffs)
  
  • Now increases the caster's damage by 10% for 10s (stacks up to 5 times)
    
• Spirit Animal (Rampant Staff)
  
  • Cast Range: at caster -> 12m
    
  • Now cast direction can be selected independent from the cast position
    
  • Base Heal per tick: 12 -> 13.5
    

Spears
Spears are a highly versatile weapon, offering a lot of utility and different options for different situations. This high utility, paired with its strong sustain damage, makes it difficult for weapons that are focused on pure damage and less utility to compete with spears. For this reason we have reduced the sustain damage of the Auto Attack Buff.

• Spririt Spear Charge (all Spears)
  
  • Normal Attack Damage Increase: 40% -> 32%
    

Swords
As with the Weeping Repeater, Galatine Pairs were nerfed before to mitigate the one-shot heavy meta, but this has now been reverted to make them a notable force in ZvZ again.
Crescent Slash has also not yet found widespread use since the recent rework. Since it had so many different effect possibilities per stack, the additional value of each effect was balanced very low to make up for this added utility. This was probably too low, however, so the value of 2-stack and 3-stack effects has now been increased.

• Crescent Slash (Clarent Blade)
  
  • 2 stacks - Silence Duration: 0.8s -> 1.4s
    
  • 3 stacks - Additional Damage: 48 -> 94
    
• Soulless Stream (Galatine Pair)
  
  • 0 Stack Damage: 75 -> 84
    
  • 1 Stack Damage: 119 -> 134
    
  • 2 Stack Damage: 179 -> 201
    
  • 3 Stack Damage: 254 -> 285
    

Shoes
Druid Sandals have been out of the meta for a while now. The slowing effect they provide is very strong, which is why move speed gain was limited. But the current low move speed seems too much of a disadvantage, meaning the ability is hardly used. For this reason mobility has been slightly increased, while still having something like Run provide much higher mobility.

• Frost Walk (Druid Sandals)
  
  • Move Speed Increase: 30% -> 45%
    

Mounts
The Tower Chariot is currently one of the weaker Battle Mounts in the game. Since the Tower Chariot will be returning as a reward for the Energy Surge season, it has received a slight overhaul to make it a potential useful support in the modern ZvZ meta.

• Tower Chariot
  
  • Health Factor: 3.6 -> 5.3
    
• Energy Cloud (Tower Chariot)
  
  • Standtime: 0.3s -> 0s
    
  • Removed the reduces Energy Cost
    
  • Instead it restores now 3 energy per second (stacks up to 2 times)
    
• Toxic Crystal Waste (Tower Chariot)
  
  • Standtime: 1s -> 0.6s
    
• Tower Shield (Tower Chariot)
  
  • The shield doesn't restore energy anymore
    
  • The shield now also affects mounts
    

Planned for next Content Update:

Bows
The recent change to bows allowes for more counter play on the enemies. However the short buff duration has been a bit too strict, making it now too easy to keep a bow player in check and denying the burst damage from Enchanted Quiver.

• Enchanted Quiver (Regular Bow)
  
  • Attack Buff Duration: 2.5s -> 3.5s
    

Daggers
With the introduction of War Gloves, Black Hands have also been reworked into a more fitting item for the Dagger line. Black Hands previously felt somewhat out of place in that weapon tree, so a new dagger has been added that is better suited to the assassin theme. Additionally, it is now less effective to chain Disembowel into itself with multiple players, improving its burst damage but making it less useful for simply holding enemies in place.

• Black Hands have been replaced by a one-handed dagger: Demonfang
  
• Devastating Strike (E-slot) removed
  
• Demonfang has a new E-slot ability, Blood Ritual:
  
  • Infuse your blade with blood magic and swing it in front of you, dealing magical damage to all enemies hit but also applying Damage over Time to yourself. (Self-damage stacks up to 3 times). Can be recast again a maximum of 3 times; each recast increases cooldown.
    

• Disembowel (Claws)
  
  • Channel Duration: 2.8s → 1.9s
    
  • Number of Hits: 10 → 7
    
  • Damage per Hit: 31.26 → 45
    
  • The root effect is now heavily affected by Diminishing Returns, so players hit by Disembowel twice in a row are not rooted for the full channel the second time
    

Fire Staffs
With the last patch's overhaul, we saw Wildfire Staff finally come back as a deadly force to be reckoned with. However, the burst damage potential made it a bit too deadly, so we have toned down the true damage part.

• Magma Sphere (Wildfire Staff):
  
  • Total Max Health Damage: 15% → 12%
    

Quarterstaffs
This update improves the general feel of auto-attacks for Quarterstaffs. Attack animations have been overhauled to make them more dynamic with a faster average hit interval. Damage-per-second and the time for passives to activate remain unchanged. Additionally, the range of auto-attacks and some targeted abilities were increased to emphasize the weapon's range. These changes are primarily intended to make Quarterstaffs more enjoyable. However, since Grailseeker is already very strong in various content types and will benefit from the range increase, the duration of its wall and root effects has been reduced.

• Auto Attacks:
  
  • Auto Attack Range: 3m -> 4m
    
  • Auto Attack Speed: every 1s -> every 0.5s (on average)
    
  • Auto Attack damage per hit is halfed.
    
• New Auto Attack Animations and timings for blunt Quarterstaffs:
  
  • 3 Hit Combo with varied attack speed and damage:
    
    • Quarterstaffs
      
    • Iron-Clad Staff
      
    • Staff of Balance
      
    • Grailseeker
      
• New Auto Attack Animations and timings for bladed Quarterstaffs:
  
  • Constant quick 2 Hit attacks:
    
    • Double Bladed Staff
      
    • Black Monk Staff
      
    • Soulscythe
      
• Concussive Blow (all Quarter Staffs)
  
  • Range: 3m -> 4m
    
• Empowered Slam (all Quarter Staffs)
  
  • Range: 3m -> 4m
    
• Soul Shaker (Grailseeker)
  
  • Wall Duration: 4s → 3.5s
    
  • Root Duration: 3.5s → 3s
    
• Stunning Strikes (Passive on all Quarterstaffs)
  
  • # of needed Auto Attacks: 5 -> 10
    
• Ebergetic (Passive on all Quarterstaffs)
  
  • Energy per hit: 1.24 -> 0.62
    
• Dreadladen Fighting (Passive on all Quarterstaffs)
  
  • # of needed Auto Attacks: 4 -> 8
    

Armors
Mercenary Jacket formerly synergized extremely well with DoT weapons but less so with other weapon lines. To change this, max healing now requires fewer hits. Max healing output will remain almost the same. However, DoTs now no longer trigger the healing effect, opening up the ability to work with more weapon combinations. Additionally, the buff duration has been reduced, so countering it by denying the damage is a more effective option against it. We've also ensured that Fiend Robe and Graveguard Armor can’t be used to chain-CC enemies by multiple players using the same abilities.

• Fear Aura (Fiend Robe):
  
  • Reworked the Fear Aura immunity effect:
    
    • If an enemy gets hit by Fear Aura, after 3s that enemy becomes immune to Fear Auras for 5s
      
• Bloodlust (Mercenary Jacket):
  
  • Now only heals on Direct Damage (DoTs don't trigger healing anymore)
    
  • Max amount of heals: 15 → 9
    
  • Heal per Hit: 26 → 42
    
  • Buff Duration: 8s → 6s
    
• Soul Chain (Graveguard Armor):
  
  • Enemies pulled by the chain are immune to another Soul Chain for 10s
    

Helmets
Howl has been overhauled to feel more modern with no standtime and better application of its debuff. Additionally it can now be used as an ranged interrupt. So it can also be used on leather helmets as an additional utility spell to swap to. We added a small cast time to Flash of Insight to allow better counter play against builds that use double Mercenary Jacket. It also adds another layer of decision making on when to best use the ability instead of just using it everytime after using an armor ability. To make interrupts not completely devastating the cooldown when the cast is interrupted is halved.

• Howl (all Leather Helmets)
  
  • Standtime: 0.6s -> 0s
    
  • Now also interrupts enemy spell casting
    
  • Range: 10m -> 12m
    
  • Attack Speed Reduction: 15% -> 40%
    
  • Attack Speed Reduction Duration: 8s -> 5s
    
  • Slow Strength: 30% -> 35%
    
  • Slow Duration: 8s -> 5s
    
• Flash of Insight (Specter Hood)
  
  • Added a 0.5s cast time
    
  • Hitdelay: 0.4s -> 0s
    
  • Interrupting the cast will cause the ability to go on a 30s cooldown.
    

Shoes
Royal March is still dominating the shoe-meta in Corrupted Dungeons. The general playstyle of this item is good for the feature, because it is better at chasing than at escaping, However it is also not healthy if it completely outshines every other shoe item in this content and limits build variety. Therefore we keep the strong chase potential but remove the additional combat buff in terms of resistances it provided. So the item is specialized only in it's strong chase ability and no extra value in the actual fight.

• Royal Boots
  
  • Removed the Bonus Defense buff
    

Potions
Poison potions have been pretty strong in a vast range of activities including PvE, ganking, and small-scale PvP. Particularly in ganking groups, poison potions bring too much value, where getting close enough to throw a poison once at the target is enough to keep them out of gallop for a fatal duration. This strategy doesn’t offer much interaction for the chased player on the mount, and as such the throw range and poison duration have been reduced to make it less easy to apply and allow mounts to regain gallop faster. This also reduces the overall damage output of poisons, which were already a very strong option for a lot of content and should still see plenty of use.

• Poison Potions
  
  • Range: 11m → 9m
    
  • Number of Ticks: 7 → 5
    
  • Poison Duration: 6s → 3s
    

Mount Changes
To encourage players to explore the open world and actively fight mobs, dismounting rules have been changed. If a player dismounts with no enemy player within 40m, the player can instantly use their three weapon abilities (Q, W, and E). However, the other ability slots (head, armor, shoe, potion and food) will retain a 5s cooldown after dismounting.
In addition, mount health for most mounts used for travel, gathering, and small-scale transport has been increased, to better their chances of surviving being hit by fully charged mobs. Mount health had generally fallen behind in relation to players’ damage potential over the years, as mounts remained with much the same health pools while that of players increased. Health for these mounts has increased by roughly 25-50%, making them better equipped to survive the new challenges introduced in this update.

• Q, W, and E ability slots now have a 0s cooldown when no enemy player is within a 40m range
  
• Unable to auto-attack players after dismount: 3s → 5s
  
• Mounting up on a mount with abilities (e.g. Elite Faction Mounts) no longer places mount ability slots on a 10s cooldown
  
• Time-until-gallop stat on mounts: previously, the time it took to get back into gallop was always a fixed 8s regardless of the mount. Now, the time it takes to get back into gallop after taking damage varies by mount (this is the "time-to-gallop" stat on the mount). This makes it easier to escape ganks while mounted and encourages more players to venture into the Outlands to take part in the new content added with this update. At the same time, gankers stand to benefit from this elevated overall activity, which should more than offset the fact that individual ganks might become somewhat harder.
  
• Mount Base Health Factor:
  
  • Riding Horses: +50%
    
  • Armored Horses: +60%
    
  • Oxen: +20%
    
  • Rams (transport): +20%
    
  • Direwolves: +26%
    
  • Cougars: +25%
    
  • Direboars: +30%
    
  • Stags: +50%
    
  • Lizards: +28%
    

We are currently working on a combat balance patch with various tweaks to go live shortly after the Crystal League Championship. Mainly toning down some abilities / items that have been very dominant in certain content types. A later patch afterwards will then focus again more to overhaul some underused items and abilities.

This post gets regularly updated with the latest changes of our internal playtests.

Very Important:
All these changes are still in testing and may vastly differ in the final patch. Sometimes we just try out various things, which may get reverted. Also the balance changes are not neccessarily all complete. Just because a certain item is not adjusted in the changelogs so far, doesn't mean it isn't on our 'need to be adjusted'-list. These changes are simply a snapshot of the current development and everything in there needs to be taken with a grain of salt.

This thread is not meant to discuss these unfinished changes. It is just to give all players the same chance of guessing the direction of the next balance patch


Bows
Regular Bows is still a very strong pick in 5v5 Crystal League. Tp make make the damage output a bit less explosive the ramp up to the max stack buff takes now a little longer. Ontop of this change the attack buff stacks now fall faster off if the bow is unable to keep attacking. These changes should offer more counter play and a bigger reaction windows for the enemy team, while still keeping the general bow playstyle in tact, where it can focus single enemies down really fast, once max attack buff stacks are reached.

• Enchanted Quiver (Regular Bow):
  
  • Attack Damage Increase per Stack: 35% -> 30%
    
  • Attack Speed Increase per Stack: 15% -> 13%
    
  • Max Attack Buff Stack: 6 -> 7
    
  • Attack Buff Duration: 5s -> 2.5s
    

Cursed Staffs
Cursed Staffs are another top pick for 5v5 Crystal League. With the last buffs to Dark Matter, the ability has become a very dominant pick for 5v5s. While we are happy to see this ability back in the meta, it currently gives Cursed Staffs a little too much burst damage, which will be toned down a bit.

• Dark Matter (all Cursed Staffs)
  
  • Damage vs Players: 78 -> 73
    

Holy Staffs
The combination of sustain and mobility makes Hallowfall too strong in Corrupted Dungeons. By increasing the Cooldown of Divine Intervention, while also increasing the Cooldown Reduction when at least an ally is healed, the mobility and sustain for solo Hallowfall players is reduced, without impacting it's effectiveness when used to heal allies in group fights.

• Divine Intervention (Hallowfall)
  
  • Cooldown: 25s -> 30s
    
  • Cooldown Reduction when hitting an ally: 20% -> 35%
    

Nature Staffs
Nature Staffs have also become very dominant healers in the 5v5 Crystal League. Similiar to Cursed Staffs the buffed ability Cleanse Heal was introduced to help with Natures's weakpoint, dealing with burst damage. This makes Holy Staffs less attractive, whose main purpose is to be very good at dealing with burst damage.That's why we increase cooldown of Cleanse Heal, to make the burst heal and cleanse less often available and increase the potential for Nature Staff teams to be bursted down. The Blight Staff change is mainly intended too tone down it's combination of mobility and sustain in Corrupted Dungeons, where the slow also helps to create distance or can be used to catch up to enemies. To make up for the slow effect removal in group fights, Ruthless Nature now heals more when allies are around and less when used alone.

• Cleanse Heal (all Nature Staffs)
  
  • Cooldown: 15s -> 18s
    
• Ruthless Nature (Blight Staff)
  
  • Doesn't slow enemies anymore
    
  • Healing Output is now lower when used alone and higher when an ally is affected
    
    • Healing (alone): 39 → 36
      
    • Healing (at least another ally): 39 → 42
      
  
  
  

Spears
Glaive has now been a very strong frontline melee DPS in the 5v5 Crystal League. Especially the short cooldown of Fling gives the weapon a lot of control, we will increase the cooldown of Fling to make the control less oppresive.

• Fling (Glaive)
  
  • Cooldown: 15s -> 20s
    

Swords
With the buffs to Heroic Charges in the last patch, the Broasword particularly became a very straight forward weapon with high constant damage output from a very low cooldown E-ability, which can be hard to counter. To make it less oppressive we are increasing the Cooldown of Mighty Blow. This will increase the gaps between the damage spikes and resistance increases.

• Mighty Blow (Broadsword)
  
  • Cooldown: 10s -> 12s
    

Shoes
The buff from the latest patch made Royal Boots a top choice in Corrupted Dungeons. They offer a very strong shoe ability to chase down oponents, if they are not interrupted or purged. Which makes the ability very risky to use for disengagements. In this way they work as intended. However the max moevement speed they currently provide is just a little too high. They are also very good to suddenly rush to an enemy off-screen, hit that enemy player once to prevent the player from changing abilities. That is why we are reducing the max speed, to give more time to react to a player rushing in with max Royal March stacks.

• Royal March (Royal Boots)
  
  • Movement Speed Increase per Stack: 9% -> 8%
    

We are currently started working on another patch with changes to some currently under utilized weapons. The bigger changes will be released in a later patch, but some of the smaller adjustments will go live earlier. You can expect more changes to be listed here in the next weeks.

This post gets regularly updated with the latest changes of our internal playtests.

Very Important:
All these changes are still in testing and may vastly differ in the final patch. Sometimes we just try out various things, which may get reverted. Also the balance changes are not neccessarily all complete. Just because a certain item is not adjusted in the changelogs so far, doesn't mean it isn't on our 'need to be adjusted'-list. These changes are simply a snapshot of the current development and everything in there needs to be taken with a grain of salt.

This thread is not meant to discuss these unfinished changes. It is just to give all players the same chance of guessing the direction of the next balance patch

Already Live:

Axes
The requirement of maintaining Adrenaline Boost with autoattacks made it too difficult to use this ability to chase enemies. In order give Axes a better chance at staying on enemies (without allowing Adrenaline Boost for free disengages), this ability will now stay active with any direct ability damage (e.g. Rending Spin, Whirlwind).

• Adrenaline Boost (all Axes):
  
  • Ability damage (i.e. a successful hit with Whirlwind) has been added as a condition to keep the buff active
    

Maces
One-handed Maces are intended to be the damage-oriented "bruiser" of their weapon tree. But their current combination of damage, CC and mobility makes them too strong of an all-rounder in many fields. Hence the stun duration is shortened. Additionally, there is a bugfix for the invulnerability duration to better match the time in the air.

• Deep Leap (One-handed Mace):
  
  • Stun Duration: 2.2s → 1.8s
    
  • The invulnerability is now lasting only during the jump animation. (on live it currently lasts a little longer than the actual animation)
    

Planned for the next Patch:

Axes
Overhauled the Bloody Reap, it is now more of an AoE execution tool, instad of strong AoE sustain damage. To make it more distinct from the Halberd playstyle, which already focuses on AoE sustain damage. Additionally we reduced the standtime of the first two hits for Rending Rage, to make it easier to keep up with your enemies.

• Rending Rage (all Axes)
  
  • 1st and 2nd Hit Standtime: 0.3s -> 0.2s -> 0.16s
    
  • Cooldown between Hits: 1s -> 0s (Now only limited by GCD)
    
    
• Adrenaline Boost (all Axes)
  
  • Time Window for the direct damage conditon: 2.5s -> 3.5s
    
• Battle Rush (all Axes)
  
  • Doesn't require a target anymore. It is instead a ground target dash with the AoE Effect.
    
• Bloody Reap (Infernal Scythe)
  
  • First Hit Damage: 74.45 -> 108
    
  • Second Hit doesn't apply the DoT anymore
    
  • Second Hit does now extra damage if the enemy has below 40% health
    
  • Damage above 40% Health: 74.45 -> 108
    
  • Damage below 40% Health: 74.45 -> 240
    

Daggers
Deadly Swipe now consumes more energy when it is used purely for mobility, but it is now more energy efficient when it is used to fight another player. Currently Daggers Chain Slash has too much value making it in many situations the clear best choice, so we are reducing the damage output of it. Ontop we are overhauling Dash to ture it into a quick repositioning tool and damage buff, to make the playstyle more interesting. Forbidden Stab can now completely negate any healing and interrupts spell casting. With this new strong, but short debuff we want to put more emphasis on the timing of the ability activation.

• Deadly Swipe (all Daggers)
  
  • Energycost: 6 -> 7
    
  • Energy Regain on hit: 2 ->4
    
  • Energy is now also regained when hitting mobs (not limited to enemy players anymore)
    
• Forbidden Stab (all Daggers)
  
  • Hitdelay: 0.1s -> 0s
    
  • Standtime: 0.2s -> 0.1s
    
  • Removed the Healing Received and Healing Cast Debuff.
    
  • Instead the target won't be able to receive any healing for 1.5s. (this debuff is cleanseable)
    
  • The Abillity now also interrupts enemy spell casts.
    
• Chain Slash (all Daggers)
  
  • Now deals more damage with each consecutive hit
    
    • 1st Hit Damage: 120 -> 90
      
    • 2nd Hit Damage: 120 -> 110
      
    • 3rd Hit Damage: 120 -> 130
      
    • 4th Hit Damage: 120 -> 150
      
  
  
  
  

Fire Staffs


Fire Staffs are currently a bit underrepresented in many types of PvP content and often outclassed by Frost Staffs in group PvP. To make Fire Staffs more attractive in groups fights we are adding a new Q-ability: Searing Flame. This ability is a skillshot on the Q-Slot, which allows dealing constant damage from the backline. The damage of each individual hit is moderate, but if the caster lands 4 hits in a row, the next projectile will turn in the Furious Flame, which then deals a big chunk of damage.

• Added a new Q-slot Ability: Searing Flame
  
  • Overhauled the first prototype
    
  • Fire a Searing Flame in the target direction. The first enemy hit receives 94 magical damage and starts burning. Each time you hit an enemy with a Searing Flame you get a Searing Flame Charge. If you have 3 Searing Flame Charges, your next Searing Flame cast will be a Furious Flame instead, dealing 182 magical damage on impact. Burning enemies take 11 magical damage every 1s for 4s.
    Cast Time: 0.3s / Cooldown: 1.5s / Energycost 5
    
    • Projectile Speed: 26m/s -> 32.5m/s
      
    • Cast Time: 0.4s -> 0.3s
      
    • Cooldown: 2s -> 1.5s
      
    • Searing Flame Charge Duration: 8s -> 5s
      
  
  
  
  

Frost Staffs


Once one of the fearsome weapons in large scale fights, the Glacial Staff has unfortunatelly fallen off the meta quite a bit. To help this unique playstyle come back we increased the damage output and made some utility improvements with increased cast range and allowing to select the cast direction independently from the cast position.

• Ice Storm (Glacial Staff)
  
  • The cast direction can now be chosen after the cast position
    
  • Castrange: 5m -> 10m
    
  • Ice Storm travel distance: 23m -> 18m
    
  • Damage per Tick (vs players) 60 -> 72
    
  • Damage per Tick (vs mobs) 20 -> 25
    

Maces
The Oathkeepers are still a very niche weapon, so far. To open up more possibilities, we increased the amount of allies it can buff, to also potentially be used in large scale fights.

• Blessed Aurora (Oathkeepers)
  
  • Max affected Allies: 10 -> 20
    

Nature Staffs
We are reducing the cooldown of the Rampant Staff to 30s to be more in line with many other E cooldowns. So it can be better synchronized with the rotation of other ZvZ weapons.

• Spirit Animal (Rampant Staff)
  
  • Cooldown reduced 45s -> 30s
    

Swords
Overhauling various older and rarily used abilities in the weapon line, to bring this weapon line back to the spotlight. We also gave Swords the old mobility increase back on it's Heroic Charges, to help staying on targets. While also reducing some of the E ability cooldowns to emphasize a more dynamic playstyle.

• Heroic Charge (all Swords)
  
  • Movement Speed & Attack Speed Increase: 9% -> 12%
    
• Interrupt (all Swords)
  
  • Standtime: 0.4s -> 0.3s
    
  • Energycost: 10 -> 7
    
• Hamstring (all Swords)
  
  • if you have a heroic charge when casting, you can now cast a follow up attack for 3s
    
  • The follow up consumes 1 Heroic Charge and is a ground target 7m distance leap, which hits enemies in a 3m radius with another hamstring effect.
    
  • Slow Strength: 38% -> 25% (But the slow now stacks up to 2 times)
    
  
  
  • First Attack Standtime: 0.4s -> 0.2s
    
  • Follow Up Attack Range: 5m -> 7m
    
  • Follow Up Attack Standtime: 0.1s -> 0.2s
    
  • Slow Duration: 5s -> 3s
    
  • Damage: 60.15 -> 66
    
  • Energycost: 10 -> 5
    
  • Jump Speed: 12.5m/s -> 16m/s
    
• Spinning Blades (Dual Swords)
  
  • Jump End Position is now offset by 3 meters. (this means the max range can cover less distance for the caster, but it also makes it easier to space the impact to be able to an enemy, without that enemy interrupting you mid-air.)
    
  • Cooldown: 20s -> 15s
    
  • Max Health Damage vs Players: 6% -> 4%
    
• Mighty Swing (Clarent Blade)
  
  • Reworked the ability, it is now called Crescent Slash:
    
    • Slice the air to shoot a demonic wave in the targeted direction, piercing through all enemies and dealing 172 magical damage. Consumes all Heroic Charges for an secondary effect when the projectile hits an enemy. (You can only get one of the effects, depending on the amount of Heroic Charges, not multiple)
      
    • Cast Range: 18m / Cooldown: 15s / Energycost: 14
      
  
  
  • Base Damage: 212 -> 172
    
  • 1 Heroic Charge effect: slows for 20%
    
  • 2 Heroic Charges effect: silences for 0.8s
    
  • 3 Heroic Charges effect: applies a Bleed, which deals 24 physical damage per s for 2s.
    
• Majestic Smash (Kingmaker)
  
  • Widened the hitbox of the Smash to make the follow up attack hit more reliable.
    
  • Cooldown: 25s -> 20s
    

Armors
Reworked the Royal Armor ability Energy Drain. While energy management should be an important part of the game, we feel that fighing enemy comps are not that much fun for the receiving end. Instead the new ability on it is a toggle ability that serves more like a soft silence. Where using abilities close to the tank gives him access to an aoe slow or root.

• Energy Drain (Royal Armor)
  
  • Doesn't drain enemy energy anymore.
    
  • It still generates energy for the caster and allies out of the enemy's presence. But doesn't drain the enemy's energy anymore
    

Helmets
Since we are reworking Royal Armor, we also buffed the currently underused Circle of Inspiration to be used as a strong alternative to support your team with energy.

• Circle of Inspiration (Druid Cowl)
  
  • Tick Interval: every 1s -> every 0.5s (The energy gain per tick stays the same, so total energy output is doubled)
    

Shoes
We are improving one of the least used shoe abilities: Royal March. First by making it easier to get the channel through and second increasing the reward, once the channel has finished. With the higher movement speed boost, it is now easier to catch up on enemies who just disengage during the channel.

• Royal March (Royal Boots)
  
  • Is now immune to slow and root during the channel
    
  • Movement Speed per Stack: 6% -> 9%
    
• Battle Frenzy (Graveguard Boots)
  
  • Buff Duration: 5s -> 6s
    
• Premonition (Boots of Valor)
  
  • Cooldown: 25s -> 20s
    

Corrupted Dungeon Changes
To improve the Reset Meta in Corrupted Dungeons we will introduce a new mechanic for Corrupted Dungeons. The goal is to allow for a few disengages to change abilties, adjust tactics and not have the fight narrowed to one single engage. But also add a penalty if players keep continiously resetting the fight, without the need to dramatically reduce the escape chances of items / spells for the open world.

Now during an invasion a new mob type spawns in every corridor, which applies a stacking debuff to the first player passing it. Punishing players for resetting the fight too often.

• Mob Spawn Condition:
  
  • 180s have passed after Invasion start.
    
  • AND a player damages another player
    
• Mob Behavior:
  
  • These Mobs are placed in every corridor
    
  • When a player enters it's aggro range the mob applied a stack of Corruption Debuff
    
  • The Mob can see invsible players
    
  • There should be no way to dodge the debuff with an i-frame
    
  • After the debuff is applied the mob vanishes. (so, the next player can pass without getting the debuff
    
  • After 30s the Mob respawns
    
  • If a mob respawns, they immediately can aggro the closest player. (to prevent players getting past a mob om respawn without getting the debuff)
    
  • IF both players don't damage each other for 45s all of these mobs will temporarily despawn.
    
  • But if a player damages another player again later, they will keep respawning again.
    
• Corruption Debuff:
  
  • Reduces Max Health by 1% per stack
    
  • On 6 or more stacks it additionally slows by 1% per stack
    
  • Max Stacks: 25
    
  • Duration: The entire Invasion
    
• Other corrupted dungeon changes:
  
  • All Cooldowns (including capes) are now reset at the start of an invasion.
    
  • All Healing Cast inside the Corrupted Dungeon is now reduced more (10% -> 20%)
    
  • Spike Traps: Hit area improved to fit the visuals more closely allowing now to move exactly between two traps without getting hit
    
  • Demented Heretic Thief: Now acts more consistently on the start of combat always trying to slow
    
  • Slag Spewer: Now casts more frequently (Cooldown 5s -> 3s) and the Magma Ball moves faster while dealing less damage 900 -> 750 and reduced knock back 5m -> 2.5m
    
  • Incendiary Fissure and Magma Mephit: The damage effect can no longer be cleansed when inside the affected area
    

The next patch will also include a few improvements to the corrupted dungeon meta, including the rework of Wind Wall. This patch is scheduled to be released in the Off-Season after the Crystal League Championship.

This post gets regularly updated with the latest changes of our internal playtests.

Very Important:
All these changes are still in testing and may vastly differ in the final patch. Sometimes we just try out various things, which may get reverted. Also the balance changes are not neccessarily all complete. Just because a certain item is not adjusted in the changelogs so far, doesn't mean it isn't on our 'need to be adjusted'-list. These changes are simply a snapshot of the current development and everything in there needs to be taken with a grain of salt.

This thread is not meant to discuss these unfinished changes. It is just to give all players the same chance of guessing the direction of the next balance patch

Frost Staffs
Just a bugfix, but it impacts the effectiveness of Freezing wind, which currently roots enemies faster than intended on live.

• Freezing Wind (one-handed Frost Staff)
  
  • Bugfix: Freezing Wind (Frost Staffs) now requires 3 stacks to root enemies, as intended.
    

Helmets
Cultist Cowl is meant as an item to counter fast hitting or fast casting builds, like Bow or Frost Staffs. However the long up-time of this debuff makes it currently too strong in Corrupted Dungeons, where it also incentivices gameplay styles too stall the fight until the 7s are over. Therefore the duration will be shortened to 4s an the damage per tick increased. So it can still be used too counter fast attacking builds, but the ability to stall the fight has been reduced a lot.

• Inner Corruption (Cultist Cowl)
  
  • Debuff Duration: 7s -> 4s
    
  • Damage per Tick: 61.43 -> 67
    

Armors
Reworked Wind Wall. Because in it's current state it was too strong as a tool that would create a lot of distance between the caster and the enemy player in Corrupted Dungeons, making it too strong in it's capability to reset the fight. The new Rework is a channel where the caster has commit, to a position, but it also increases the caster defenses, too keep it as an effective item for a support tank in group fights.

• Wind Wall (Knight Armor)
  
  • The ability is now a 6-second uninterruptible channel
    
  • Additionally, each time an enemy player enters the Wind Wall, the caster gets a buff that increases own resistances by 0.2 and Crowd Control Resistance by 0.3 for 6 seconds (stacks up to 5 times)
    

Misc - Self Healing Sickness
To reduce the impact of Healers winning 1v1 fights by just outsustaining the opponent, we are increasing the up time of Self Healing Sickness. This also means that the game now "remembers" when you last healed yourself with a Q-Ability for 60s. The Self Healing Sickness is entirely tied to the Q-Abilities of Healers, to not impact solo healers who are playing a damage Q. If the healer heals Instead it should only be a detriment to solo healers who try to win a 1v1 by purely outlasting the opponent. If the healer heals another ally with a Q (if an ally is around) the Self Healing Sickness will be removed.

• Holy Staffs
  
  • Self Healing Sickness Duration: 20s -> 60s
    
• Nature Staffs
  
  • Self Healing Sickness Duration: 18s -> 60s
    

The changes listed here are intended to improve the corrupted dungeon meta. These changes will probably be released in Call to Arms - Patch 6.

This post gets regularly updated with the latest changes of our internal playtests.

Very Important:
All these changes are still in testing and may vastly differ in the final patch. Sometimes we just try out various things, which may get reverted. Also the balance changes are not neccessarily all complete. Just because a certain item is not adjusted in the changelogs so far, doesn't mean it isn't on our 'need to be adjusted'-list. These changes are simply a snapshot of the current development and everything in there needs to be taken with a grain of salt.

This thread is not meant to discuss these unfinished changes. It is just to give all players the same chance of guessing the direction of the next balance patch

Quarter Staffs
Since Soul Shaker was too strong of a tool to stop any enemy engages, it's root duration is now not a fixed duration anymore, but can instead be shorted by diminishing returns and the target's crowd control resistance. The root duration now scales with Item Power and CC modifier, BUT it can never exceed the area duration.

• Soul Shaker (Grailseeker):
  
  • The Root Duration can now be shorter than the area duration
    
  • Entering the area now applies a 3.5 second root which scales with Item Power and Duration Modifiers, but is reduced by CC Resistance and Diminishing Returns
    
  • The root effect is still removed when the area ends or the player leaves the area
    

Armors
Normalized all Out of Combat Regenration for all armors, so that resetting a fight for a short duration doesn't favor any armor type. Reduced the Wind Wall duration, to reduce it's possibility to reset fights in Corrupted Dungeons. It can still be used to create space, but with the shorter up-time the enemy has a better chance at chasing the target. The Wind Wall change is postponed to a later patch and will likely be a rework into a channeled ability wiht a longer duration, AND each enemy player that hits the wall will stack up a buff that increases the caster's resistances and CCR. This way it will be not a strong tool for running away, but still have the potential to work as a support tank in group fights.

• Wind Wall (Knight Armor)
  
  • Wind Wall Duration: 4s -> 2s
    
• All Combat Armors now have the same Health Regeneration Bonus: 150%
  
  • Scholar Robe, Royal Robe, Druid Robe: 80% -> 150%
    
  • Cleric Robe, Fiend Robe: 70% -> 150%
    
  • Mage Robe, Cultist Robe, Robe of Purity: 60% -> 150%
    
  • Mercenary Jacket, Royal Jacket, Stalker Jacket: 150% -> 150%
    
  • Hunter Jacket, Hellion Jacket: 140% -> 150%
    
  • Assassin Jacket, Specter Jacket, Jacket of Tenacity: 130% -> 150%
    
  • Soldier Armor, Royal Armor, Graveguard Armor : 200% -> 150%
    
  • Knight Armor, Demon Armor: 210% -> 150%
    
  • Guardian Armor, Judicator Armor, Armor of Valor: 220% -> 150%
    

Corrupted Dungeons
All Healing Cast inside Corrupted Dungeons will now be reduced by 10%. This change should give healer builds less sustain in a 1v1, if Healers decide to fight we would rather encourage them to go for a DPS Q, then a full outsustaining build in 1v1. Life Steal abilities are not affected by this. However this Healding Debuff does weaken zhe Mercenary Jacket / Specter Hood combo, because Bloodlust is a Heal and not a Life Steal.

• Inside Corrupted Dungeons all Healing Cast is reduced by 10%
  

Misc
Currently DoTs do only put the caster in combat at the point, when the DoT is applied on an enemy, but doesn't refresh the combat timer on each tick for the aggressor. But since the enemy takes damage, the enemy's in combat passive timer is refreshed on each tick. This leads to the caster of the DoT getting out of combat before the player that got hit by the DoT. This will be changed so both players will stay for the same time in combat

• Each tick of a DoT now puts the original caster into combat again (currently they only get into combat on the first application of the DoT)