Dark Rune & Death Rune

[Aryse Andenter]

Now that people are beginning to get these and take a look at them, I think its time to take a look at the rumors zipping around about them and isolate what are the real bugs and problems with them. Let's see if we can get some real incidences of some of this stuff happening posted - and feel free to add what you have heard about the spells as well as stuff you have seen yourself.

First of all, the spell description for Death Rune is wrong. This is misleading a lot of people and we should get the word out fast so that necros know what spell they have. Since we don't have a solid time or even a solid answer that Death Rune will one day have this effect, it should be changed ASAP to reflect what it really is.

- resist rates... how often are the spells landing and on what type of mobs
- does it really kill mounts? is this on zek only? is this a good thing?
- we have difficulty knowing if it is even doing any damage since the damage is not attributed to us.
- if this dot kills a mob.... does it leave a corpse? (this would be due to it not attributing damage to us I think)
- how easy is it to get a mob to path over it? what is the current range on it? Lucy says 200.
- is the dot definately staying on the mob when it leaves range of the trap? (this was broken on beta)
- is it hitting one mob and disappearing or staying around to hit a few?
- is it agroing extra mobs?
- has anyone crashed when a mob hit their rune (I think this bug was fixed but jic... be aware that it used to happen and watch for it)
- is the damage done too small?

[Dranul]

Originally posted by Aryse Andenter@Feb 25 2006, 03:13 PM
- does it really kill mounts? is this on zek only? is this a good thing?
A patch message not too long ago said that traps would no longer kill mounts, don't know if this applies to our spell though.

[sauruman]

Good thread... On to the questions:

I have one question to add:
- A Death Rune has died message spam.

I've noticed that like 25% of the time, when the death rune casts on something, it says a death rune has died. It will usually say that it casts on the creature as well (forget the text for it). Sometimes it even says this message twice. Does this indicate something like a resist, is it random, or what?

- resist rates... how often are the spells landing and on what type of mobs

I am going to need actual testers for this. I.E. you get something thats red con, yellow, white, blue, and green to run over these traps WITHOUT casting anything else. How often (if ever) does this spell do no damage? I did a TON of testing with blue mobs in the deep working on tinkering on Thurs night, and I didn't see a single resist, at least.

- does it really kill mounts? is this on zek only? is this a good thing?

This issue was fixed with the patch. I tested it personally quite a bit, its no longer an issue.

- we have difficulty knowing if it is even doing any damage since the damage is not attributed to us.

This is my main grief with this spell. Ya, its underpowered... but if we don't know even know if its working and properly, then we have no way to know anything about the spell.

- if this dot kills a mob.... does it leave a corpse? (this would be due to it not attributing damage to us I think)

Yes, it does leave a corpse. They changed coding a bit to fix this. Let me know if anyone sees anything that says otherwise, or experiences otherwise first-hand.

- how easy is it to get a mob to path over it? what is the current range on it? Lucy says 200.

The range is set to 0 on accident. The range was "supposedly" changed to 200. But this is NOT the case. I have hundreds of tests in this week, and am certain.

- is the dot definately staying on the mob when it leaves range of the trap? (this was broken on beta)

Yes, from what I have seen this issue is at least resolved. Again, if I'm wrong, tell me.

- is it hitting one mob and disappearing or staying around to hit a few?

It poofs immediately after it dots something (instantly).

- is it agroing extra mobs?

Since the range is so small (way too small obviously) its never caused an aggro issue. In fact, the one positive of this spell is the aggro from the dot is NOT generated to us, it is generated to a third party.

- has anyone crashed when a mob hit their rune (I think this bug was fixed but jic... be aware that it used to happen and watch for it)

No crashes or anything so far...

- is the damage done too small?

The most important question for sure. I don't know anyone that is happy with this spell.
I need the every poster of each communities feedback on WHAT they want to replace this spell. Last night Aryse responded to my comment in one of the chats I was in (too many I cannot remember).
Sauruman "so guys lets get these spells changed yada yada"
Aryse "Sauruman where do you see Rytan talking about changing this spell"?
Sauruman "Rytan said post release he would change our trap to an aura that would give 5% increase to all dots in group, however a hard coding change would be needed. I'm hoping for a higher %, but I think that would be favorable to the trap and we should push for it."
Aryse "Hard coding change means it probably won't happen."

So... basically Aryse might be right there. I asked Rytan last night if a change to the aura he talked about is feasible at all (waiting response). If NOT we need new ideas for a spell, or changing of the trap we have, because he did offer post release modifications on this spell (as a maybe). And it needs to be something reasonable and something the community at large could agree with.

Here are my personal ideas (won't be reflected as the correspondent's view until we come to consensus, these are just ideas...)
If the trap is what we have:
-Up the damage, a lot (double it), make it last more then 4 ticks
-Make the damage visible to the caster
-Make resists visible
-Increase the range. 200 is too much IMO (would cause trains and all kinds of hell on raids), 50 or 100 would be ideal.
-Reduce the loadtime and half the recast time
-Reduce the cast time, 6secs is wayyyy toooooooo long
-I'd pay more mana happilly for the changes above.

If another spell takes its place:
Something that increases our damaging bottom line. Something that modifies our damage. Something that is a trap/aura is a must due to this is how the expansion is marketed... Hopefully something that comes sooner rather then later....
THIS IS THE PART I NEED YOUR HELP ON!!!!

Soul Rune I guess is out. Rytan won't even entertain it, even though its apparent thats what we all want.

As a final note, I'm aware of the Dark Rune/ Death Rune mana usage inequity and have forwarded that issue.

[Jebasiz]

Are you really as stupid as you come off? Inbetween reciting 'breathe in, breathe out' so you don't fucking suffocate...PAY ATTENTION to what's on the SOE boards.

People are saying, and *ALMOST* rightly so...that we do enough dmg. Our dps output is fine! We're not over powered, we're not under powered (often). There are areas where resists can be an issue..but it's not that often either.

You're freaking retarded if you're going to push a dps issue now. Put your efforts into mother fucking willfull death. There's way to many fucking ae's in PoR to accept a 10% success rate(and I really don't even think it's that good) on willfull death firing when every single fucking mob in several zones has an ae that are spammed faster then rabbits fuck.

Read this again, our dps situation is FINE. Work on willfull death and other areas of our class.

[Xislaben]

"So... basically Aryse might be right there. I asked Rytan last night if a change to the aura he talked about is feasible at all (waiting response). If NOT we need new ideas for a spell, or changing of the trap we have, because he did offer post release modifications on this spell (as a maybe). And it needs to be something reasonable and something the community at large could agree with."

1) it needs to be something reasonable [to Rytan the dev]
2) and something the community at large could agree with

Here's a problem.
First there's very little the community at large could agree with.
Second, even if we could come to some sort of general rumbling direction towards an agreement on something, having that be in the ballpark of what whichever Dev is designing necromancer spells believes is reasonable (considering what we got in PoR) is frankly a bit unrealistic. Not that it's not a goal worth striving for, perhaps, just that I don't think this union will exist.

Why not get a list of potention 'reasonable' replacements from Devs and then let the community argue about which one sucks the least?

Things we ask for may have a tendency to be altered and relased and come out not exactly resembling what we wanted in the first place to being outright fuckign useless (willfull death, MW upgrade etc...).

As for the trap spells:
More damage, either higher dmg/tick (prefered) or longer duration
The ability to see its damage and/or resists
Allow up to say 3 to exist at the same time
150 range to 200 range
shorter load time (this is the same as recast time cause soe didn't want yet another database field I believe)
shorter cast time
longer on-the-ground duration, maybe 10 minutes
the ability to remove it once placed (you could move your camp/whatever)

Without the above, I'm not sure why I'd use either.
Given the above is unlikely, feel free to have it changed to something, I won't be holding my breath in anticipation of something wonderous. I cannot imagine I'll really like anything dempt 'reasonable'...

-----
To disagree with Jeb, our DPS is not fine. The fact that others think our DPS is too good or whatever only shows their ignorance of our class, some strong epinix envy, and the poor job we as a class have been doing keeping them informed.

Much of that is due to the fact that they cannot parse us without our logs, and we tend to only ever post the really good ones (or exceptional ticks, or lie about it, or talk withotu knowing what the fuck we're talking about), those ideal mobs in order to look and see how well that latest upgrade really affected our dps output.

Those of us who can push good dps over time should go and parse the every day targets and see what our DPS is over time on the non-ideal candidates. Me I parsed out at about 550 DPS on Rikkukin the other day, that's abotu 50% of what I'm capable of more or less on ideal targets, and that's a straight DPS fight.

Another thing we could do is ask SOE to to the following:
1) Allow other classes to see our dot damage (and all other classes dot dmg)
2) Allow everybody to filter dot damage to off/own/group/all
3) Set default dot filtering to own

That would shatter a few illusions, and pretty much end the DPS speculation in our favor.

[Xelgadis]

Originally posted by sauruman@Feb 25 2006, 07:55 PM
- if this dot kills a mob.... does it leave a corpse? (this would be due to it not attributing damage to us I think)

Yes, it does leave a corpse.* They changed coding a bit to fix this.* Let me know if anyone sees anything that says otherwise, or experiences otherwise first-hand.
Mobs still poof upon dying to the trap. Seen it happen on anything from green to blue cons in the last 24 hours. I personally haven't tested it on even, yellow, and red con mobs, but one can logically conclude that similar results will occur.

And this:
http://img162.imageshack.us/img162/563/deathrune7qq.png
is a problem that needs to be fixed.

Personally, I'd just say fuck the "trap" altogether and make it an aura that increases dot damage by 5-10%. And while we're at it, make it stack with bard amp songs too.

[Xislaben]

Originally posted by Xelgadis@Feb 27 2006, 07:09 AM
Personally, I'd just say fuck the "trap" altogether and make it an aura that increases dot damage by 5-10%. And while we're at it, make it stack with bard amp songs too.
^ What he said!

[Jebasiz]

Originally posted by Xelgadis+Feb 27 2006, 02:09 AM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (Xelgadis @ Feb 27 2006, 02:09 AM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> <!--QuoteBegin-sauruman@Feb 25 2006, 07:55 PM
- if this dot kills a mob.... does it leave a corpse? (this would be due to it not attributing damage to us I think)

Yes, it does leave a corpse.* They changed coding a bit to fix this.* Let me know if anyone sees anything that says otherwise, or experiences otherwise first-hand.
Mobs still poof upon dying to the trap. Seen it happen on anything from green to blue cons in the last 24 hours. I personally haven't tested it on even, yellow, and red con mobs, but one can logically conclude that similar results will occur.

And this:
http://img162.imageshack.us/img162/563/deathrune7qq.png
is a problem that needs to be fixed.

Personally, I'd just say fuck the "trap" altogether and make it an aura that increases dot damage by 5-10%. And while we're at it, make it stack with bard amp songs too. [/b][/quote]
I doubt a dps increase is in our immediate future. I like the idea though(kinda). Perhaps if they could be stacked in inventory beforehand and 'thrown' on the ground while fighting, instead of taking a spell slot(refresh time is pretty poor).

That or you could say fuck it altogether and make willfull death good, and shadow orbs stackable to 20.

[sauruman]

I agree with you 100% Jeb, however we are talking spells here. I seriously doubt now would be a time they would take a new spell as a bargaining chip for a fix on willful death.

[UsulDaNeriak]

we dont need more dps
we dont need more mana
we dont need adjustments to mob resists such badly
all we need, is mostly written down in the "necromancers issue list" sauruman has collected. and this is, even if some necs do disagree, the list we agreed upon. period.

well, if we just could all together stick to that list, including our class correspondent, of course, things might become better)

and yes, we never asked for this fucking "death rune". make it a pink cute little dragon just usable in guildhall, like in "kindergarden" eq2. it wouldnt hurt.

and we all should stop posting shit on veterans. we necs dont need audience. we dont need feedback from other classes. we shit on them since years actually. with success, btw. so STFU necs. and to the class correspondent:
1. stick to our list, which is the agreement of the community with you
2. use your direct channel as a CC to the devs. avoid sony open forums!
3. regarding anything else beside nec forums: PLEASE STFU!

thats how your precedessor did his job. pretty succesful!
remember the rules, before you ruin your beloved class finally.

and if i hear you talking about resists or necs dps anymore in the next 12 month, i will vote on eqnecro for your resignement in this damn poll i moved to rants. and i will do that very loud. you know.
actually in this case, i would actively work, to get rid of you.

i guess you still got a chance to become a good CC. and we necs should give you another chance. BUT: the patience of the necromancer community is not endless. think about this.


Usul

PS: sorry sauruman, i avoided to make that statement pretty long.

PSS: some dr00d on veterans said that the necs have been working on taking over Norrath with slowly increasing power for their class, since years. silently. since they have been nerfed nearly to death as a class with kunark by "The Vision", Brad Mc Qaid, who is now lauching Vanguard. damn, that was exactly what we have been working on since about years.

and a nec class correspondent did unhide this approach. finally at the top of our power, we asked ourselve very loudly this fully clueless provider sony for the big bad nerfbat. any other class around, stupid enough to do so?

/shakes head

[Xislaben]

Originally posted by UsulDaNeriak@Feb 27 2006, 11:35 PM
we dont need more dps
we dont need more mana
we dont need adjustments to mob resists such badly
all we need, is mostly written down in the "necromancers issue list" sauruman has collected. and this is, even if some necs do disagree, the list we agreed upon. period.
But DPS and Resists are in the top 10.

Resists specifically "3", and DPS indirectly via better resists "3" and directly through lifeburn uprgades "6", longer pet buffs "5", and more dot crits "8". Almost half our list deals directly or indirectly with DPS increases. Granted the pet buff is more for convenience than DPS, so it's a stretch.

Or are you talking about some other necromancer issue list?

[Xheng]

Personally, I'd like it changed to an aura that boosts DoT damage 5%. With all due respect to others positions, I don't believe it's possible to have "enough" DPS. And that sort of effect would seem to be in line with what other classes have gotten. Or if 5% is too high, make it whatever percentage SoE can stomach.

Alternately, some trap ideas that might actually be worth memming:
. Soul Curse - debuffs mob to MAGIC, and maybe other stuff.
. Mori's Affliction - significant stat debuffs to mob, asystole/claudition kind of thing.
. Mind Trap - taps portion of incoming mob's mana and feeds it to group in one shot.

I can't see wasting a spell slot for an unreliable DoT damage trap, like we've currently got.

[UsulDaNeriak]

Originally posted by Xislaben@Feb 28 2006, 04:02 AM
Almost half our list deals directly or indirectly with DPS increases. Granted the pet buff is more for convenience than DPS, so it's a stretch.

Or are you talking about some other necromancer issue list?
well we do perhaps have a different view to the same list)

from my point of view, we didnt ask actively for more dps, because wie think that we are lacking in this department.

if we ask for a revamp of lifeburn, like the changes to manaburn, or to adjust our dot crit rate to wizzards nuke crit rate, this is more a question of fairness. it is just annoying to see us dotters all the time as a "2nd class dmg dealer".

of course, this will lead to a slightly increased dps. i also like the idea that death rune does a dot dmg increase for the entire group, or all other dotters nearby. but not due to the increased dmg. more important for me is, that this makes us even more groupfriendly. i would not ask for a higher dmg per tick. what we need is something totally different than this damn mine.

and yes. resist is on our list. but it is not the one and only one.

Usul

[Zaxlothon]

Originally posted by Xheng@Feb 28 2006, 12:33 PM
Personally, I'd like it changed to an aura that boosts DoT damage 5%. ... Or if 5% is too high, make it whatever percentage SoE can stomach.
Mages get an aura that adds +5% to the damage of all pets in the area. Enchanters get an aura that adds 6 mana / tick for all group members. I don't think a +5% to DoT damage aura is too much to ask for. Oh and BTW, the two auras I just gave as examples are both 55th level.

[Jebasiz]

Originally posted by Zaxlothon+Feb 28 2006, 09:32 AM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (Zaxlothon @ Feb 28 2006, 09:32 AM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> <!--QuoteBegin-Xheng@Feb 28 2006, 12:33 PM
Personally, I'd like it changed to an aura that boosts DoT damage 5%. ... Or if 5% is too high, make it whatever percentage SoE can stomach.
Mages get an aura that adds +5% to the damage of all pets in the area. Enchanters get an aura that adds 6 mana / tick for all group members. I don't think a +5% to DoT damage aura is too much to ask for. Oh and BTW, the two auras I just gave as examples are both 55th level. [/b][/quote]
Mages are pretty shitty. I'm glad they got *something*. They're "ok" nukers, pets are pretty much relegated to group or soloing uses. They're just "gimp" wizards on raids, and have been for a while. It's a high price to pay, for malosinia and mod rods heh.

[UsulDaNeriak]

my guild got just 1 wizz and no rog or berzerker. so our 4 mages, 8 !!! rangers, 2 necs and our little killer dr00d are the main source of dmg. dont underestimate mages.
i also like mage wtd pets. they can do nothing harmful. just dmg). and they die sufficently often. my position on raids is directly behind a mage)

Usul

[Jebasiz]

Heh, it always seems(to me at least) if a mage crits for 7-8k..a wizard is critting for 10-14k. If a mage posts 600dps, wizards are around 800dps..I won't say nec in this instance :P. That gap may be corrected IF the mages pet was attacking and surviving the length of the fight..but that's hardly ever happening.

Just the constant "after-thought" feeling I get when I see mages. Even "good" mages, just seem to live longer, but not do that much differently is what leads me to believe that they're the step-child of the intelligence caster archetype. There's no doubt, we once were..but not-so-much now. Maybe their best days are ahead of them, vice behind them. They're "ok" I guess..but never really "inspiring" or anything.

[Meph]

5-10% dmg dot aura would be hellova lot better than this. I memed and tryed it once when i got it and that's it. And i don't plan to touch if it's not changed EVER again.

[Jebasiz]

Originally posted by Meph@Mar 1 2006, 07:09 AM
5-10% dmg dot aura would be hellova lot better than this. I memed and tryed it once when i got it and that's it. And i don't plan to touch if it's not changed EVER again.
I find it very interesting that they made spell acquisition part of the entrance to ToB quest.

I guess it's the only way to ensure people will go get these spells at all. I memmed it once, and casted it..but I didn't see any dmg ticks, just something to clutter up my screen a little.

[Felicite]

Originally posted by Jebasiz@Mar 1 2006, 02:49 PM
I memmed it once, and casted it..but I didn't see any dmg ticks, just something to clutter up my screen a little.
No.. no.. you put it on the "silent, autocasting, second spell bar" for spells you want to autocast on each mob without the need to mem, cast or see any messages.

*nods*

[sauruman]

Lets get a little more back on track here. New spell dev will be along shortly, it would be great to have something constructive for him.

1) What issues, like the ones Aryse outlined, are you experiencing with death rune?

2) If your not happy with it, what would you suggest in its place or to fix it?

And ya, the poofing corpse / no xp thing is being looked into from several angles right now. Its a minor part of the spell right now, but it is getting looked at....

One final thought, when it says "a death rune has been slain by a death rune!" Sometimes it dots the mob too. So I'm unclear if thats a resist message, or what?

[Xelgadis]

Originally posted by sauruman@Mar 2 2006, 01:27 AM
2) If your not happy with it, what would you suggest in its place or to fix it?
Simply changing it from being a trap to being an aura would please most of the community, as well as alleviate most of the current issues we're seeing with it.

While the trap is, theoretically, our most mana efficient dot... there's just too many outside factors that limit both the usefulness and desirability of the spell. The only real issue there would be with changing it to be an aura would be particle lag issues, which are currently an issue on raids to some extent. A 5% aura would be very useful and desirable to the community, not to mention that there would be less backend coding involved in making that change versus making the trap work as originally intended. The aura would still benefit all affliction casters in our groups, and we don't need to hassle with fighting pathing to make use of the traps (in addition to the other issues with traps in general).

Rather than try to fix glaring issues with a spell that the community has already decided that it isn't going to use much, why don't we push to get this changed to an aura. Given the vision of how the trap was supposed to be, it would make more sense if it were an aura in that form. Altogether, this solution would be less of a headache for Rytan to implement as well.