Pinned NDA Balance Playtests

The changes listed here are intended to go live with a patch soon to improve the meta in the corrupted dungeons.


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.



Crossbows

• Knockback Shot (all Crossbows)
  
  • Is now a skillshot, instead of a direct enemy targeted cast.
    
  • Range: 8m -> 14m
    
  • Hitdelay: 0.1s -> 0.2s
    
  • Standtime: 0.2s -> 0.4s
    
  • Cooldown: 8s -> 12s
    
• Exploding Shot (Light Crossbow)
  
  • Doesn't count as a DoT anymore, thus it can't be removed by Emergency Heal
    
  • Explosion Damage: 201.96 -> 180.00
    

Daggers

• Deadly Swipe (all Daggers)
  
  • Energycost: 3 -> 6
    
• Shadow Edge (all Daggers)
  
  • Stun Duration: 1.47s -> 1s
    
• Bloodthirsty Blade (one-handed Dagger)
  
  • Additional magic damage vs players: 60 -> 50
    

Armors

• Everlasting Spirit (Cleric Robe)
  
  • The activation phase doesn't count as a buff anymore and thus can't be purged
    
• Purging Shield (Mage Robe)
  
  • The purge now is only activated by direct damage, either by an ability or auto attack. DoTs or Reflected damage do not trigger the purge anymore
    

Helmets

• Emergency Heal (Guardian Helmet)
  
  • The Healing value now doesn't scale with healing modifiers anymore
    
  • Replaced the percentage healing with a flat 150 healing, independent of the caster's max health (this also doesn't scale with healing modifiers)
    
  • Cooldown: 30s -> 40s
    

Offhands

• Taproot
  
  • Max Health and Health Regen Factor: 0.42 -> 0.3
    

Potions

• Healing Potions
  
  • The Healing value now doesn't scale with healing modifiers anymore
    
  • Healing Duration: 15s -> 10s (Heal Value per second stays unchanged, so the total healing output is reduced)
    

Most changes listed here are intended for a bigger combat balance patch to go live in the middle of Seasom 10. Some changes might be patched in earlier. Especially changes that are aiming to adjust new content like the Corrupted Dungeons.

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

• Magic Shock (all Arcane Staffs)
  
  • Range: 12m -> 13m
    
  • Cooldown: 5s -> 3s -> 4s
    
  • Damage: 150 -> 125
    
  • Silence Duration: 1s -> 0.85s
    
• Empowering Beam (all Arcane Staffs)
  
  • Damage Increase per stack: 10% -> 8%
    
• Dark Sphere (Evensong)
  
  • Healing Reduction: 15% - 20%
    
  • Damage Reduction vs Players: 15% -> 20%
    

Axes

• Rending Swing (all Axes)
  
  • The ability is now called Rending Spin and deals more damage to enemies further away
    
  • Damage against Enemies closer than 3m: 50.02 -> 45
    
  • Damage against Enemies 3m+ away: 50.02 -> 75
    
• The new abiltiy Rending Rage will be released in a later patch
  
  • Added a new Q-Slot Ability: Rending Rage (all Axes)
    
    • A series of attacks hitting enemies up to 3 times in in a cone in front of you. Each hit deals 50 physical damage. On the third hit you will leap up to 9m forward and additionally enemies hit will be rooted for 1s. After the third hit the ability will go on cooldown, If you wait for 3s between attacks the Rage times out and begins with the first hit again, in this case the ability doesn't go on cooldown.
      
    • Each hit also inflicts a Rending Bleed. / Cooldown: 7s / Energycost: 2 (per hit)
      
• Rending Bleed Duration: 5s -> 6s
  
• Morgana Raven (Carrioncaller)
  
  • Cooldown: 20s -> 16s
    

Bows

• Multishot (all Bows)
  
  • Casttime: 0s -> 0.3s
    
  • Cooldown: 3s -> 4s
    
  • Damage: 66.30 -> 105 -> 115
    
  • Cone Arc: 55° -> 40°
    
  • The Shot now also knocks enemies 5m -> 4m away
    
• Rain of Arrows (Longbow)
  
  • Delay for each wave of arrows: 0.75s -> 0.5s
    
  • Damage: 46.53 -> 50.00
    
• Undead Arrows (Whispering Bow)
  
  • Is now a Toggle ability, which means it can't be purged anymore
    
  • Now also increases Attack Speed by 20%
    
  • But while active the caster's defense is now reduced by 25%
    
  • Cooldown: 20s -> 12s
    
  • Magic Damage each Auto Attack: 50 -> 45
    
• Demon Arrow (Wailing Bow)
  
  • Projectile Speed: 15m/s -> 21m/s
    
• Lucent Hawk (Mistpiercer)
  
  • Damage per hit: 145 -> 130 -> 145
    
  • The shot now doesn't count as a physical arrow and won't trigger Explosive Arrows anymore
    

Crossbows

• Explosive Bolt (all Crossbows)
  
  • Range: 15m -> 13m
    
• Explosive Mine (Weeping Repeater)
  
  • Damage: 270 -> 230
    

Daggers

• Deadly Swipe (all Daggers)
  
  • You now restore 2 energy, If the ability hits at least one enemy player
    
• Ghost Strike (Deathgivers)
  
  • Invisibility Duration: 2s -> 1s
    

Frost Staffs

• Ice Storm (Glacial Staff)
  
  • The slow is now doesn't ramp up over timem instead all are always slowed by 30% while in the area (ignoring crowd control resistance)
    
  • Damage vs Players: 45 -> 52 -> 60
    
  • Cast Time: 1.5s -> 1s
    
• Frozen Hell (Icicle Staff)
  
  • Hitdelay: 0.7s -> 0.3s -> 0.7s
    
  • Cast Range: 11m -> 14m
    
  • The slow is now applied independent of CC reduction. All enemies stay slowed while in the area
    

Hammers

• Iron Breaker (all Hammers)
  
  • Resistance Reduction: 0.15 -> 0.20
    
  • Debuff Duration: 5s -> 4s
    
  • Damage: 77.08 -> 120.00
    
  • Cooldown: 5s -> 6s
    
  • Hit Delay: 0.35s -> 0.4s
    
  • Standtime: 0.45s -> 0.5s
    
• Slowing Charge (all Hammers)
  
  • Slow Duration: 3s -> 4s
    
• Onslaught (Hand of Justice)
  
  • Cooldown: 40s -> 30s
    

Holy Staffs

• Generous Heal (all Holy Staffs)
  
  • Cast Range: 13m -> 14m
    
  • Cast Time: 1s -> 0.7s
    
  • Heal: 126.69 -> 132.00
    
• Holy Flash (all Holy Staffs)
  
  • Radius: 4m -> 5m
    
  • Heal: 34 -> 40 -> 34
    

Maces

• Defensive Slam (all Maces)
  
  • Buff Radius: 5m -> 8m
    
• Battle Howl (Heavy Mace)
  
  • Radius: 4.5m -> 5m
    
  • Hitdelay: 0.4s -> 0.25s
    
  • Standtime: 0.6s -> 0.35
    

Quarterstaffs

• Hurricane (Iron-Clad Staff)
  
  • The knockback does not scale with Item Power anymore, instead it always knocks enemies 10m -> 12m away.
    
  • Knockback fly speed: 15m/s -> 18m/s
    

Spears

• Lunging Stab (all Spears)
  
  • Damage: 70.61 -> 78.00
    
• Harpoon (now available on all spears)
  
  • Moved to the W-slot
    
  • Removed the purge
    
  • Cooldown: 20s -> 15s
    
  • Energycost: 16 -> 13
    
  • Damage: 92.14 -> 75
    
  • Root Duration 1 stack: 1.39s -> 1.04s
    
  • Root Duration 2 stacks: 2.08s -> 1.55s
    
  • Root Duration 3 stacks: 2.95s -> 2.20s
    
  • Doesn't consume the Spirit Spear stacks anymore
    
  • Projectile Speed: 16.6 m/s -> 20 m/s
    
  • Distance to caster after getting pulled: 2m -> 4m
    
  • Standtime: 0.8s -> 0.6s
    
  • Hitdelay: 0s -> 0.15s
    
  • Range: 22m -> 16m
    
• Removed Harpoon from Spirithunter's E-Slot
  
• Added new E-slot Ability Corrupting Steel to replace it
  
  • Throws your spear which pierces through enemies dealing 80 physical damage and reducing thier resistances by 0.12 for 4s. The thrown spear will leave a trail behind, corrupting the area below it. This area lasts for 4.2s and deals deals 36 magic damage every 0.5s.
    
  • Cooldown: 30s / Energycost: 20
    
  • Fixed a bug with it's AoE Escalation. (The AoE Escalation was not working correctly on the version of staging and would amplify the damage way too much)
    
• Resilience Penetration:
  
  • One-handed Spear: 15% -> 40%
    
  • Pike: 15% -> 30%
    
  • Heron Spear: 15% -> 40%
    
  • Spirithunter: 15% -> 30%
    
  • Trinity Spear: 15% -> 30%
    
  • Daybreaker: 15% -> 40%
    

Swords

• Iron Will (all Swords)
  
  • Duration: 4s -> 3s
    
• Charge (Claymore)
  
  • Range: 15m -> 13m
    
• Soulless Stream (Galatine Pair)
  
  • 0 Stack Damage: 84 -> 75
    
  • 1 Stack Damage: 134 -> 119
    
  • 2 Stack Damage: 201 -> 179
    
  • 3 Stack Damage: 285 -> 254
    

Armors

• Mend Wounds (all armors)
  
  • Healing value is now independet of any heal modifiers
    
  • Heal per tick: 5% -> 6%
    
• Levitate (Cultist Robe)
  
  • Healing value is now independet of any heal modifiers
    
  • Heal per tick: 5% -> 7.5%
    
• Life Steal Aura (Hellion Jacket)
  
  • Now limited to hit a maximum 5 enemies at once per tick
    

Helmets

• Circle of Inspiration (Druid Cowl)
  
  • Cooldown: 45s -> 30s
    
  • Hitdelay: 0.4s -> 0s
    
  • Standtime: 0.4s -> 0s
    
• Purifying Smoke (Helmet of Valor)
  
  • Cooldown: 40s -> 45s
    
  • Cast Range: 12m -> 9m
    

Food

• Roasts (all types)
  
  • Life Steal now has a limit how much it can heal per second
    
  • This limit depends on the strength of the food:
    
    • T3 Roast Pork: Can heal up to 4% of the caster's max health per second
      
    • T7.3 Roast Pork: Can heal up to 14% of the caster's max health per second
      
  • Reflected damage doesn't trigger life steal anymore
    
  • Life Steal value depends on the health a target has: i.e if a mob has only 1 HP, you can steal only 1 HP independent of the strength of your attack
    

Misc

• AoE Escalation
  
  • The Escalation now increases by 8% for each additional target hit and caps at 40% extra damage
    
    • 2 Targets hit = 8%
      
    • 3 Targets hit = 16%
      
    • 4 Targets hit = 24%
      
    • 5 Targets hit = 32%
      
    • 6+ Targets hit = 40%
      
  
  

• Eating Food
  
  • Hitdelay: 0.8s -> 0s
    
  • Standtime: 0.8s -> 0s
    
  • Casttime: 0s -> 0.8
    

The changes listed here will primarily go live for the start of Season 11, so this includes all new abilities, reworks or overhauls of underused abilities / items. Changes that are made to fix more problematic interactions, or what we consider unfun gameplay or things that are straight up way too strong will be patched earlier.

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

• Magic Shock (all Arcane Staffs)
  
  • Damage: 125 -> 150
    
• Mimic (all Arcane Staffs)
  
  • Energycost to mimic the ability: 3 -> 0
    
  • Time Window to cast the mimiced ability: 8s -> 20s
    
  • Casting on self (or Arcane Staff) now mimics the ability Magic Shock on the W-slot (allows to have Magic Shock on Q and W with seperate cooldowns)
    

Axes

• Bearpaws
  
  • Auto Attacks per second: 0.8 -> 1.4
    
  • Damage per Auto Attack: 56 -> 32
    
• Rending Strike (all Axes)
  
  • Hitdelay: 0.2s -> 0.15s
    
  • Standtime: 0.3s -> 0.2s
    
• Rending Spin (all Axes)
  
  • Reworked the animation and visual effect
    
• Added a new Q-Slot Ability: Rending Rage (all Axes)
  
  • A series of attacks hitting enemies up to 3 times in in a cone in front of you. Each hit deals 50 physical damage. On the third hit you will leap up to 9m forward and additionally enemies hit will be rooted for 1s. After the third hit the ability will go on cooldown, If you wait for 3s between attacks the Rage times out and begins with the first hit again, in this case the ability doesn't go on cooldown.
    
  • Each hit also inflicts a Rending Bleed. / Cooldown: 7s / Energycost: 2 (per hit)
    
  • Reduced the width of the cone area of first two hits
    
  • Radius of the last hit: 4m -> 5m
    
• Vampiric Strike (Battleaxe)
  
  • Cooldown: 15s -> 10s
    
  • Hitdelay: 0.4s -> 0.3s
    
  • Standtime: 0.8s -> 0.4s
    
  • Energycost: 18 -> 12
    
  • Damage: 136.01 -> 150
    
• Morgana Raven (Carrioncaller)
  
  • Healing Reduction: 40% -> 30%
    
• Aftershock (Realmbreaker)
  
  • The cone area now doesn't reduce Max Energy anymore
    
  • The cone instead now reduces enemy max health by 20% for 5s
    

Crossbows

• Caltrops (all Crossbows)
  
  • Replaced the DoT (was 4 ticks, each dealing 14.38 damage)
    
  • Instead it now deals instantly 34 physical damage
    

Frost Staffs

• Frozen Crystal (Chillhowl)
  
  • Cast Range: 15m -> 12m
    

Hammers

• Forge Hammers
  
  • Auto Attacks per second: 0.8 -> 1.4
    
  • Damage per Auto Attack: 49 -> 28
    

Holy Staffs

• Sacred Pulse (all Holy Staffs)
  
  • Cooldown: 8s -> 12s
    
  • Heal Value: 56 -> 40
    
• Divine Intervention (Hallowfall)
  
  • Cooldown: 18s -> 25s
    
  • If you heal at least one other ally the cooldown of the ability decreases by 40%
    

Nature Staffs

• Rejuvenating Breeze (all Nature Staffs)
  
  • Cast Range: 12m -> 9m
    

Quarterstaffs

• Seperator (Quarter Staff)
  
  • Root Duration: 3s -> 2.5s
    
  • Mobs in 6m radius around the main target, will now get knocked up for 0.9s
    
  • Removed the aggro switch effect vs mobs
    
• Mystic Rocks (Staff of Balance)
  
  • Heal Reduction: 30% -> 35%
    

Spears

• Spirit Spear Charge (all Spears)
  
  • Auto Attack Damage Increase: 35% -> 40%
    
• Spirit Spear (all Spears)
  
  • Auto Attack Range Increase: 30% -> 35%
    
• Impaler (all Spears)
  
  • Damage: 140 -> 155
    

Swords

• Heroic Stack (all Swords)
  
  • Movement Speed & Attack Speed Increase: 12% -> 9%
    
• Heroic Strike (all Swords)
  
  • Hitdelay: 0.2s -> 0.15s
    
  • Standtime: 0.3s -> 0.2s
    
• Majestic Smash (Kingmaker)
  
  • The initial swing now also deals 44 physical damage
    

Helmets

• Force Field (all cloth helmets)
  
  • The knockback doesn't scale with IP anymore
    
  • The ability now knocks enemies always 16m -> 14m away (ignoring crowd control resistance)
    
  • Knockback distance: 16m -> 14m
    

Armors

• Magic Rune (Royal Robe)
  
  • Cooldown: 60s -> 40s
    
  • Buff Duration after leaving the area: 2s -> 5s
    
  • Hitdelay: 0.4s -> 0s
    
  • Standtime: 0.4s -> 0s
    
• Energy Drain (Royal Armor)
  
  • Cooldown: 60s -> 30s
    
  • Hitdelay: 0.4s -> 0s
    
  • Standtime: 0.6s -> 0s
    
  • Duration: 8s -> 6s
    
  • Enemy Energy loss per second: 3.6 -> 2.5
    
  • Ally Enegy gain per second: 3.6 -> 5
    
  • The stolen energy is now distributed to allies in a 15m radius
    
• Self Igniton (Spectre Jacket)
  
  • True Damage vs Players: 50 -> 45
    

Shoes

• Motivating Pain (Quarrier Workboots)
  
  • Cooldown: 50s -> 150s
    

Misc

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

Hello and Happy New Year, everyone,
we are planning on a balance patch in a couple of weeks with various adjustments to improve the meta in various content. Over the next weeks this thread will fill up with various changes, once we start looking a bit more into the current item meta for various types of content. Some other changes, for instance anything related to Faction Warfare, will be released later together with the next big 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


Axes

• Rending Spin (all Axes)
  
  • Max Damage: 75 -> 68
    
• Morgana Raven (Carrioncaller)
  
  • Cooldown: 16s -> 18s
    
• Razor Cut (Bearpaws)
  
  • Jump Range: 15m -> 10m -> 12m
    
  • Jump Time: 0.83s -> 0.55s
    
  • Instant Damage: 160 -> 140
    
  • If you hit at least one enemy player, this ability's cooldown is decreased by 30% -> 40%
    

Bows

• Lucent Hawk (Mistpiercer)
  
  • Cast Range: 30m -> 24m
    

Frost Staffs

• Frost Nova (all Frost Staffs)
  
  • Damage: 85.80 -> 70
    
  • Stun Duration: 1.26s -> 1s
    
  • Reworked the Frost Nova hit detection, it is now an instant explosion and it won't freeze enemies anymore which touch the area after the intitial teleportation.
    

Hammers

• Iron Breaker (all Hammers)
  
  • Resistance Reduction: 0.2 -> 0.17
    
• Groundbreaker (Polehammer)
  
  • Stun Duration: 2.85s -> 2.5s
    
• Grasp of the Undead (Tombhammer)
  
  • Stun Duration: 2.9s -> 2.48s
    
  • Cast Range: 16m -> 12m
    

Holy Staffs

• Divine Intervention (Hallowfall)
  
  • Resistance Buff Duration: 7s -> 4s
    

Maces

• Removed the Ability Interrupt (all Maces)
  
• Added the new Ability Guard Rune:
  
  • Creates a Guard Rune on the ground. It increases resistances by 0.2 and healing received by 25% for up to 5 allies. The rune has a 5m radius and lasts for 5s.
    
  • Cast Time: 0.4s / Cast Range: 14m
    
  • Healing Received Bonus: 35% -> 25%
    
  • The cast is now interruptible
    
• Snare Charge (all Maces)
  
  • Jump Time: 0.55s -> 0.44s (this means the jump is faster)
    
  • Standtime: 0.5s -> 0.4s
    
• Heavy Slam (all Maces)
  
  • Reworked the ability it is now called Shield Breaker -> Ground Shaker
    
  • Now it also reduces resistances by 0.21 and removes enemy damage shields
    
  • Now knocks enemies into the air
    
  • The area is now a 5m -> 4m circle in front of the caster
    
  • Cooldown: 15s -> 10s
    
  • Damage: 271.95 -> 177 -> 200
    
  • Casttime: 1s -> 0.7s
    
  • Hitdelay: 0.5s -> 0s
    
  • Standtime: 1s -> 0.4s
    
  • Energycost: 14 -> 10
    

Nature Staffs

• Thorns (all Nature Staffs)
  
  • Additional Auto Attack Damage vs Players: 56 -> 40
    
  • Additional Auto Attack Damage vs Mobs: 56 -> 64
    
  • Reflected Damage: 8 -> 6
    
  • Removed the Reflect Damage
    
• Spiritual Seed (Druidic Staff)
  
  • Cooldown: 25s -> 18s -> 20s
    
• Ruthless Nature (Blight Staff)
  
  • Delay before the first tick of the channel: 0.5s -> 0s
    
  • The slow is now applied as long as enemies inside the aura (independent of their CC resistance)
    
  • Heal per Second: 33 -> 39
    

Quarter Staffs

• Mystic Rocks (Staff of Balance)
  
  • Resistance Increase: 0.10 -> 0.20
    
• Soul Shaker (Grailseeker)
  
  • Removed the delay before the rooting effect. The root area is now instantly active after the hit.
    

Swords

• Splitting Slash (all Swords)
  
  • Hitdelay: 0.6s -> 0.3s
    
  • Standtime: 0.8s -> 0.5s
    
• Mighty Blow (Broadsword)
  
  • Standtime: 0.8s -> 0.3s
    
  • Jump Time: 0.43s -> 0.3s (this means the jump is faster)
    
  • Resistance Increase: 0.24 -> 0.12 -> 0.18
    

Armors

• Force Shield (Judicator Armor)
  
  • Resistance increase: 0.32 -> 0.28
    
• Requite (Armor of Valor)
  
  • Reflected Damage: 50 -> 46
    

Helmets

• Energy Shield (Scholar Cowl)
  
  • Duration: 8s -> 5s
    
  • Energy Gain on hit: 13.14 -> 21 -> 16
    
• Emergency Heal (Guardian Helmet)
  
  • Reworked the ability, it is now called Emergency Shield
    
  • Removed the Healing
    
  • Instead it now applies a shield for up to 5 allies that absorbs 400 base damage and lasts for 3s
    
  • It still removes Dots
    
  • Radius: 4m -> 5m
    
  • Cooldown: 40s -> 30s
    

Shoes

• Shield Charge (Knight Boots)
  
  • Doesn't apply a shield in a small AoE radius anymore
    
  • Instead the shield is now applied to the caster and the target (if it is an ally)
    
  • Shield Strength: 200 -> 350
    
  • Dash Speed: 25 m/s -> 35 m/s
    

Capes

• Opening to Hell (Demon Cape)
  
  • Damage vs Players: 60 -> 50
    

Battle Mounts

• Tower Chariot
  
  • Toxic Crystal Waste
    
    • Cooldown: 25s -> 15s
      
• Behemoth
  
  • Artillery Fire
    
    • Cooldown: 3s -> 2s
      
    • Hit Delay: 2s -> 1.5s
      
• Goliath Horseeater
  
  • Spider's Web
    
    • Cooldown: 8s -> 6s
      
    • Energycost: 12 -> 10
      
  
  

The changes in here are intended to go live for the next content update. Some of the changes have been pushed back if we want to further evaluate on them or if they are related to the Faction Warfare Rework. Some of the smaller changes are just QoL improvments, polishing and general improvements in the combat mechanics. But as more time passes we will also make more adjustments to the meta that evloves after patch 13 goes live and improve some items that are underused at the moment. If we find anything too unhealthy in the meta developing in the live game individual changes will be patched in earlier.

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

• Magic Shock
  
  • Cooldown: 4s -> 6s -> 5s
    

Axes

• Rending Strike (all Axes)
  
  • Damage: 60.33 -> 54
    
• Rending Rage (all Axes)
  
  • Time Window until the combo resets: 3s -> 2.5s
    
  • Damage: 50 -> 62
    

Bows

• Magic Arrow (Warbow)
  
  • Reduced the size of the hitbox of the projectile, and adjusted the projectile position better match it's actual hitbox
    
  • Projectile Speed: 16.1 m/s -> 17.7 m/s
    
• Rain of Arrows (Longbow)
  
  • Damage per Tick: 50 -> 60
    

Daggers

• Slit Throat (Dagger Pair)
  
  • Cast Time: 0.4s -> 0.3s
    
  • Standtime: 1s -> 0.4s
    
  • Now also reduces the enemy's Healing Received by 20% while the bleed is active
    

Holy Staffs

• Holy Blessing (all Holy Staffs)
  
  • Physical Resistance: 0.4 -> 0.3
    
• Divine Intervention (Hallowfall)
  
  • Resistance Buff Duration: 4s -> 2s
    
  • Resistance Increase per Stack: 0.18 -> 0.09
    

Nature Staffs

• Ruthless Nature (Blight Staff)
  
  • Caster's move speed is now increased by 15% during the channel
    
  • Max Ticks: 6 -> 8 (Heal value per tick stays unchanged)
    
  • Tick Interval: 1s -> 0.8s
    
  • Total Channel Duration: 6s -> 5.6s
    
  • Max Healing Targets: 5 -> 10
    
• Soul Link (Ironroot Staff)
  
  • Link Duration: 10s -> 7s
    
  • Changed the targeting so it works now with casting on different targets via shortcuts
    

Quarterstaffs

• Vault Leap (new E-slot ability on regular Quarterstaffs)
  
• Vault leap to the targeted position, dealing 175 physical damage in a 5m radius. Throws all enemies for 1s into the air.
  
  • Cast Time: 0.7s (uninterruptible) / Cooldown: 20s / Cast Range: 15m
    
  • Damage: 148 -> 175
    
  • Knocked into air duration: 0.8s -> 1s
    
  • Energycost: 21 -> 15
    
  • Cooldown: 20s -> 15s
    
  • Removed the invincibility buff at the end
    
• Empowered Slam (all Quarterstaffs)
  
  • Now also purges any shields available on the target
    
  • Hitdelay: 0.4s -> 0.2s
    
  • Standtime: 0.4s -> 0.2s
    
• Separator (all Quarterstaffs)
  
  • The ability is moved to the W-slot and now available on all Quarter Staffs
    
  • Cooldown: 15s -> 20s
    
  • Root Duration: 2.5s -> 1.6s
    
  • Damage: 149.18 -> 75
    

Spears

• Reckless Charge (one handed Spear)
  
  • Minimum Jump Distance: 0m -> 9m
    
• Spear Throw (Heron Spear)
  
  • Damage: 148 -> 186
    
  • Energycost: 17 -> 18
    
  • Hitdelay: 0s -> 0.2s
    
  • Standtime: 0.8s -> 0.6s
    
  • Projectile Speed: 16 m/s -> 20 m/s
    

Armors

• Energy Emission (Robe of Purity)
  
  • Cooldown: 30s -> 40s
    
• Self Ignition (Specter Jacket)
  
  • The True damage to enemies now ignores any damage modifiers
    
  • True Damage to enemies: 45 -> 66
    
• Requite (Armor of Valor)
  
  • Channel Duration: 3s -> 2s
    

Helmets

• Emergency Shield (Guardian Helmet)
  
  • Shield Value: 400 -> 300
    
• Motivating Worker's Song (Miner Cap)
  
  • Now also makes immune to silence
    
  • Removed CC Resistance Increase
    

Shoes

• Shield Charge (Knight Boots)
  
  • Shield Value: 350 -> 250
    
• Evasive Jump (Royal Shoes)Range: 9m -> 12m
  
  • Jump Time: 0.9s -> 0.86s
    
• Flee (Miner Workboots)
  
  • The abiltiy will now always silence the caster even if he is immune to silence by another effect
    
  • While silenced from Flee the caster will also be unable to use potions
    
  • Cooldown: 60s -> 120s
    

Potions

• Invisibility Potions
  
  • Invisiblity now ends when changing a cluster
    

Mounts

• Morgana Nightmare
  
  • Flaming Trail
    
    • The fear now doesn't affect enemies on mounts anymore
      
• Saddled Moabird
  
  • Time to Gallopp: 4s -> 2.5s
    
• Saddled Winter Bear
  
  • Direabear skins can be applied now
    
  • Mount Health: 2365 -> 3379
    
  • Armor: 253 -> 304
    
  • Magical Resistance: 253 -> 304
    
  • CC Resistance: 505 -> 404
    
• Saddled Wild Boar
  
  • Direboar skins can be applied now
    
• Saddled Bighorn Ram
  
  • Mount Health: 1352 -> 1689
    
  • Base Move Speed: 45% -> 60%
    
• Saddled Swamp Salamander
  
  • Swamp Dragon skins can be applied now
    
  • Mount Health: 676 -> 1014
    
• Saddled Direwolf
  
  • Mount Health: 405 -> 681
    
  • Gallop Move Speed Bonus: 130% -> 132%
    
• Saddled Swamp Dragon
  
  • Move Speed Bonus: 90% -> 103%
    
• Saddled Direbear
  
  • Mount Health: 2847 -> 3797
    
  • CC Resistance: 394 -> 526
    
• Grizzly Bear
  
  • Mount Health: 2686 -> 3582
    
• Saddled Terrorbird
  
  • Time to Gallopp: 4s -> 2.5s
    
  • Flash
    
    • Movespeed Bonus during Flash: 300% -> 125%
      
  
  
  

Battle Mounts

• Rhino
  
  • Cracked Earth
    
    • Cast Time: 1s -> 0.7s
      
    • Standtime: 0.4s -> 0.2s
      
  • Breakthrough
    
    • Cast Time: 1.2s -> 0.8s
      
    • Cooldown: 50s -> 30s
      
  
  
  

Misc

• Reflected Damage is not affected by any Damage Modifiers anymore
  
  • To accomoadte the changed mechanic the reflect values of individual abilities have no these values:
    
    • Deflecting Spin: 80% -> 100%
      
    • Parry Strike: 100% (unchanged)
      
    • Frost Shield: 10% -> 15%
      
    • Inferno Shield: 30% -> 38%
      
    • Protection of the Fiends: 50% (unchanged)
      
    • Retaliate: 70% (unchanged)
      
• Reflecting True Damage will now cause the reflected damage to also act as true damage
  
• Healing Debuffs can't be stacked to nullify all Healing Output anymore, there is no a cap on the maximum debuff value
  
  • Minimum Value - Healing Recieved Bonus: -70%
    
  • Minimum Value - Cast Bonus: -70%
    

Before Call to Arms hit live we started working on improving and overhauling some older abilities and there will be more changes added over time.These overhauled abilities and improvements of older abilities will be part of a bigger balance patch, which is intended to go live around the middle of Season 12. As soon as Call to Arms hits the live server we will closely observe how the new changes affect the game. If we don't like certain meta-developments after the update, we will release individual adjustments earlier.

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

• Black Hole (Witchwork Staff)
  
  • Cast Range: 11m -> 14m
    
• Dark Sphere (Evensong)
  
  • Max Enemy targets to get an Aura: 5 -> 3
    
  • Healing Received Reduction: 20% -> 25%
    
  • Damage Reduction vs players: 20% -> 25%
    
  • Damage Reduction vs mobs: 8% -> 12%
    

Axes

• Battle Axe Normal Attacks
  
  • Attacks per second: 0.9 -> 1.1
    
  • Damage per attack: 50 -> 41
    
• Rending Spin (all Axes)
  
  • Range: 6m -> 5m
    
  • Minimum distance for max Damage: 3m -> 2.5m
    
  • The Rending Bleed stack is now only applied on the max distance effect (i.e. 2.5m or further away)
    
• Rending Rage (all Axes)
  
  • Damage: 62 -> 50
    
• Rending Bleed Stacks (all Axes)
  
  • Damage per Tick: 5.4 -> 4.2
    
  • Healing Reduction on Max Stacks: 20% -> 12%
    
• Adrenaline Boost (all Axes)
  
  • Movement Speed Bonus: 50% -> 40%
    
  • Now also increases Attack Speed by 40%
    
  • Max Duration: 5s -> 7s
    
  • But if the caster doesn't hit an enemy with a Normal Attack for 2.5s the Adrenaline Boost will now end early
    
  • Energycost: 11 -> 9
    
• Internal Bleeding (all Axes)
  
  • Improved detection of moving and standing still on affected enemies
    
  • Tick Interval: 1s -> 0.5s
    
  • Damage per Tick: 21.97 -> 11
    
• Raging Blades (all Axes)
  
  • Now hits in a ring around the caster, instead of a circle. (Inner Radius: 2.5m / Outer Radius 6m)
    
• Vampiric Strike (Battleaxe)
  
  • Reworked the ability it is now called: Blood Bandit
    
  • Throw your axe in the tagreted direction, deals physical damage to all enemies hit and Slows by 20% for 2s. Steal a percentage of the Health the enemies have lost based on the Rending Bleed Charges on the targets.
    
  • Throw Range: 22m -> 17m
    
• Whirlwind (Great Axe)
  
  • Channeling time: 4.5s -> 2.5s
    
  • Damage per tick vs Players: 50 -> 75 (Damage per tick vs Mobs stays unchanged)
    
  • Cooldown: 20s -> 25s
    
  • The channel is now uninterruptible and immune to slows
    
  • Energycost on activation = 21 -> 0
    
  • Instead the ability no consumes 4 energy per tick while channeling (a total of 24 energy for the full channel duration)
    
• Razor Cut (Bear Paws)
  
  • Standtime: 0s -> 0.3s
    

Bows

• Multishot (all Bows)
  
  • Cooldown: 4s -> 5s
    
• Enchanted Quiver (regular Bows)
  
  • Resistance Reduction on max stacks: 0.15 -> 0.13
    
  • The Resstance Reducetion debuff can't be stacked from multiple sources anymore (so two bows focusing the same target will override each other's debuffs)
    
• Undead Arrows (Whispering Bow)
  
  • Additional Magic Damage: 45 -> 50
    

Crossbows

• Noise Eraser (all Crossbows)
  
  • Reduced the size of the hitbox of the projectile, and adjusted the projectile position better match it's actual hitbox
    
• Knockback Shot (all Crossbows)
  
  • Reduced the size of the hitbox of the projectile, and adjusted the projectile position better match it's actual hitbox
    
  • slightly increased the projectile speed
    

Cursed Staffs

• Vile Curse (all Cursed Staffs)
  
  • Cast Range: 9m -> 11m
    
• Armor Piercer (all Cursed Staffs)
  
  • Resistance Reduction: 0.2 -> 0.17
    
  • Debuff Duration: 5s -> 4s
    
• Cursed Beam (all Cursed Staffs)
  
  • Now consumes Vile Curse stacks for additional AoE damage per tick.
    
  • Every tick a stack is consumed the beam deals 72 magic damage in a 4m radius, (instead of the base tick damage of 36 to only the beam target)
    
  • Tick Interval: 1s -> 0.5s
    
  • Number of total Ticks: 5 -> 10
    
  
  
  • Damage per Tick: 72 -> 36
    
• Dark Matter (all Cursed Staffs)
  
  • Damage vs Players: 65.88 -> 78
    
  • Damage vs Mobs: 32.94 -> 36.7
    
  • Cast Time: 1s -> 0.5s
    
  • Cast Range: 11m -> 13m
    
  • Max Jump Distance to next enemy: 8m -> 9m
    
• Haunting Screams (Cursed Skull)
  
  • The damage can't be reflected anymore
    
  • Magic Damage per tick: 25 -> 33 -> 28
    

Daggers

• Slit Throat (Dagger Pair)
  
  • Cast Time: 0.3s -> 0.4s
    
  • Reduced all direct and bleed damage by 7%
    
• Lunging Stabs (Bloodletter)
  
  • Standtime: 0s -> 0.35s
    

Fire Staffs

• Fire Wave (all Fire Staffs)
  
  • The Cone area is now quickly swiping from left to right, covering more horizontal space
    
  • Enemies hit, now receive an additional 75 magic damage if any Q-Spell DoT is active on the enemy
    

Frost Staffs

• Hoarfrost (all Frost Staffs)
  
  • Cast Time: 2s -> 1.8s
    
  • Damage to the main target: 150
    
  • Splash Damage to other enemies in the AoE 150 -> 110
    
  • Radius: 4m -> 6m
    
  • Cast Range: 14m -> 12m
    
• Freezing Wind (one-handed Frost Staff)
  
  • The area size is increased
    
  • Getting hit by the area doesn't root instantly anymore, but instead applies 3 cc stacks in quick succession.Stacks: 1 / 2 / 3
    
  • Effect: Slows by 15% / Slows by 30% / Roots by 2.5s
    
  • Stack up Interval: 0.2s -> 0.4s
    
  • Area Duration: 1.2s -> 1s
    
  • Area has made a bit slimmer, (it is still bigger than on live)
    

Hammers

• one handed Hammer Normal Attacks per Second: 0.8 -> 1
  
  • Damage per Attack: 49 -> 39
    
• Iron Breaker (all Hammers)
  
  • Resistance Reduction: 0.17 -> 0.14
    
• Heavy Cleave (all Hammers)
  
  • The Area is increased slighty, so it reaches out further, but the cone is also a bit slimmer
    
  • Cast Time: 1s -> 1.4s
    
  • Hitdelay: 0.5s -> 0s
    
  • Standtime: 1s -> 0.5s
    
  • The ability does now more damage directly at the hammer impact area
    
  • Damage at the center of the impact: 271.95 -> 290
    
  • Damage in the rest of the cone: 271.95 -> 266
    
  • The ability is now called Heavy Smash
    
• Ground Pound (Grovekeeper)
  
  • Jump time: 0.5s -> 0.66s
    
  • Radius: 6m -> 5.5m
    
  • Now it displays an indication for the impact area during the jump
    

Holy Staffs

• Holy Explosion (Great Holy Staff)
  
  • Cooldown: 20s -> 15s
    
  • Tick Count: 6 -> 5
    
  • Heal per Tick: 40.67 -> 50
    
  • Energycost: 18 -> 0
    
  • Instead the ability consumes 3.6 energy per tick while channeling (a total of 18 energy for the full channel duration)
    
• Holy Touch (Lifetouch Staff)
  
  • Tick Interval: 0.5s -> 0.6s (the amount of ticks stays the same, so the total channel time increased)
    
• Celestial Sphere (Redemption Staff)
  
  • Cast Time: 1s -> 0.5s
    
  • Hitdelay: 0s -> 0.4s
    
• Divine Intervention (Hallowfall)
  
  • Cooldown Reduction when healing at least one ally: 40% -> 20%
    
  • Removed the Resistance Increase Buff
    
  • Jump Range: 14m -> 11m
    

Maces

• Vendetta (Camlann Mace)
  
  • Projectile Range 26m -> 18m
    
  • Pull Radius: 9m -> 8m
    

Nature Staffs

• Rejuvenation (all Nature Staffs)
  
  • Heal per Tick: 7.6 -> 8.2
    
  • Cooldown: 1.3s -> 1s
    
  • Cast Range: 9m -> 11m
    
• Cleanse Heal (all Nature Staffs)
  
  • Now has an instant heal effect instead of heal over time
    
  • Heal amount is dependent on Rejuvenation Stacks on each target
    
  • Removes one Rejuvenation Stack of each ally healed
    
  • Stacks: 0 / 1 / 2 / 3
    
  • Heal Value: 80 / 100 / 130 / 170
    
• Spiritual Seed (Druidic Staff)
  
  • The spell can now be recast again within 2.5s
    
  • But stacking it twice on the same target will just override the first cast
    
  • Energycost per cast: 18 -> 9
    
• Spirit Animal (Rampant Staff)
  
  • Touching the Spirit Animal itself now instantly heals 30 -> 60
    
  • Base Heal Value of the Area per Tick: 8 -> 12
    
  • Healing Increase per additional Ally: 50% -> 30%
    

Quarter Staffs

• Cartwheel (all Quarterstaffs)
  
  • Move Speed Bonus: 30% -> 20%
    
  • Buff Duration: 5s -> 3s
    
• Heavy Cleave (all Quarterstaffs)
  
  • Adjusted the hit area into a rectangular shape that hits a bit further
    
  • Hitdelay: 0.5s -> 0s
    
  • Standtime: 1s -> 0.5s
    
  • Damage: 271 -> 240
    
• Stun Run (all Quarterstaffs)
  
  • Duration: 5s -> 4s
    
• Vault Attack (regular Quarterstaff)
  
  • Standtime: 0.2s -> 0.6s
    
  • Enemies knocked into air duration: 1s -> 0.7s
    
  • Cast Range: 15m -> 13m
    
  • Jump End Position is now offset by 3 meters
    
  • Visual fixes for the jump animation on high ping
    

Spears

• Corrupting Steel (Spirit Hunter)
  
  • Area Damage per Tick: 36 -> 32
    

Swords

• Broadsword Normal Attacks
  
  • Attacks per Second: 1 -> 1.35
    
  • Damage per Attack: 45 -> 33
    
• Dual Swords Normal Attacks
  
  • Attacks per Second: 1.4 -> 1.5
    
  • Damage per Attack: 32 -> 30
    
• Clarent Blade Normal Attacks
  
  • Normal Attacks per Second: 1 -> 1.35
    
  • Damage per Normal Attack: 45 -> 33
    
• Galatine Pair Normal Attacks
  
  • Attacks per Second: 1.4 -> 1.5
    
  • Damage per Attack: 32 -> 30
    

Offhands

• Sacred Scepter
  
  • Crowd Control Resistance Factor: 2.5 -> 1.2
    
• Astral Aegis
  
  • Defense Factor: 0.25 -> 0.2
    

Helmets

• Energy Shield (Scholar Cowl)
  
  • Duration: 5s -> 4s
    
• Emergency Shield (Guardian Helmet)
  
  • The Shield value now depends on the ally's remaining health
    
  • Health Below 40%: 300 -> 300
    
  • Health Above 40%: 300 -> 150
    

Armors

• Life Steal Aura (Hellion Jacket)
  
  • Hitdelay: 0.2s -> 0s
    
  • Standtime: 0.4s -> 0s
    
• Self Ignition (Specter Jacket)
  
  • The area is now limited to up to 5 enemies
    
  • The area now keeps damaging enemies, even if the caster is invulnerable or shielded
    
  • Burn Damage vs Players: 66 (true damage) 2% of the enemy's max health
    
  • Burn Damage vs mounted players is now the same as against mobs (no % based damage)
    
  • Hitdelay: 0.4s -> 0.3s
    
  • Standtime: 0.6s -> 0.5s
    
• Protection of the Fiends (Demon Armor)
  
  • The effet can't be stacked anymore
    
• Force Shield (Judicator Armor)
  
  • Resistance Increase: 0.28 -> 0.25
    

Mounts

• Toxic Reaction / Toxic Cloud (Pest Lizard):
  
  • Enemies hit by the Toxic Cloud will be 6s immune to Toxic Clouds of the Pest Lizards
    
  • The cloud now affects a maximum of 5 enemy targets
    
  • Becoming feared by the ability now triggers (and is properly reduced by) Diminishing Returns
    

Battle Mounts:

• Pierce Through (Siege Ballista)
  
  • The Damage is not reflectable anymore
    

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)
  

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
    

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
    

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%
    

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 upcoming new War Gloves weapon line we are also reworking the Black Hands to a more fitting item for the Dagger line. The Black Hands always felt a bit out of place in that weapon tree.

• Black Hands will be rewoked into a One-Handed Dagger.
  
  • This weapon provides the same base stats as the regular Dagger
    
  • Since it is one-handed, that means it can also be combined with an offhand
    
• The ability Devastating Strike will be removed
  
• It will be replaced by a new ability: Blood Ritual
  
  • Create a Blade out of your Blood and swing it in front of you, dealing 160 magical damage to all enemies hit. Deals 60 physical damage over 1s to yourself. (self damage stacks up to 3 times). The ability can be recast again within 3s for up to 3 times.Every recast increases it's cooldown by 5s.
    
  • Casts: 1 / 2 / 3
    
  • Cooldown: 10s / 15s / 20s
    
  • Area Damage: 160 -> 170
    

Quarterstaffs
For the next update we overhauled various older animations and visual effects. While we were overhauling Quarterstaff auto attack animations, we also wanted to improve the feeling of the auto attacks by adding more dynamic attack animations, which have a faster hit interval. But the Damage per Second and the time for passives to activate is unchanged. We are also testing to increase the range of some of the base attacks and targeted ability to emphasize the range of a the weapon better. While this affects the gameplay and we are also right now testing how much. The The goal is to make the base actions of the weapon feel better and more interesting.

• 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
    
• 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 currently synergizes extremely well with DoT weapons but not so much with other weapon lines. To change this the max healing now requires less hits. This max healing output stays almost the same. However DoTs will now no longer trigger the healing effect, opening up the ability to work with more weapon combinations. Additionally the buff duration has been shortened, to make countering it by denying the damage a more effective option against it.

• Bloodlust (Mercenary Jacket)
  
  • Now only heals on Direct Damage (Dots don't trigger the healing anymore)
    
  • Max amount of heals: 15 -> 9
    
  • Heal per Hit: 26 -> 42
    
  • Buff Duration: 8s -> 6s
    

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
    
  • Movement Speed Increase per Stack: 8% -> 7%