Reworking Chronomancy ver 2

[Parcae2]

Also, I think that both TWs and PMs could use another round of defensive nerfing. It's not so much that their defensive talents are too strong individually as that they have a lot of them:

Fateweaving
Clone damage splitting
Phase shift
Preserve Pattern
Contingency
Summons

[jaumito]

One thing I'd really like to see: change Redux's implementation please.

Having Redux depend on mastery means you can't use it (even maxed) anymore on talents for which mastery has been boosted by PM-specific items, which is really a shame. For instance, maxed Redux won't let you fire dual maxed Echoes from the Past if you've put Exiler, or the fez, or the Rod of Sarrilon (which all boost Time Travel mastery) on.

This doesn't make any sense (or if it does, it at least sucks a whole lot.) Why not use raw talent level instead, or have the 5th point invested in Redux let it ignore the mastery cap? Both ways would work.

[Isotope-X]

I wonder if changing the "scaling" of Redux altogether might make more sense. I'm thinking that it could be used on any talent, but make the Paradox cost depend on some combination of the talent level and the "tier" of the talent. By this I mean that Reduxing, say, Turn Back the Clock would have relatively low Paradox cost, but Reduxing Body Reversion would be significantly harder. The question then isn't "can I Redux this?" but rather "should I Redux this?"

[jaumito]

The question then isn't "can I Redux this?" but rather "should I Redux this?"

This is an ultracool idea! (mostly because it fits the "Paradox way of thinking" nicely.) I have a feeling it will be hard to balance, though.

You could also give Redux a slight chance to loop on itself if your Paradox level is in the "danger zone" (x% risk of failure = x% chance Redux will fire an extra spell), paying the full Paradox cost each time with everything (good or bad) that entails, including an increased chance of failure for the next step. Stop the loop when you roll more than the failure chance or when an actual failure/anomaly/backfire occurs.

[Shesh]

Also, I think that both TWs and PMs could use another round of defensive nerfing. It's not so much that their defensive talents are too strong individually as that they have a lot of them:

Fateweaving
Clone damage splitting
Phase shift
Preserve Pattern
Contingency
Summons

^^ this.
Admittedly I've only read the talents' code and haven't even ran it. But from what I could see, 8(?) rounds of 67% damage reduction? And further 30% from fateweaver? And essentially a sustained damage shield of 500 from contingency?

Please don't get too carried away with the reactive management of buffing and nerfing
Look what overbuffing did to marauder. It used to be weak and somewhat versatile, the change did address the class' problems, but now it's all about unstoppable+timeless.
I'm afraid the temporal fugue could be the unstoppable of PM's.

[Razakai]

Pmage felt incredibly tanky (although I still died to room of death on Nightmare), but single target damage also felt very low. Maybe that was due to some terrible luck in drops, but that seemed to balance it out well enough. Might have been build choices too, I didn't invest in Gravity and was lazy about using fugue/cease.

[Doctornull]

Hey Edge.

I was kicking around the new TW / PM stuff. Is this the best place for feedback, or should I lurk for you on IRC like many people around here seem to prefer?

Thanks!

[A Meat]

Not sure this is the right place to vocalize this, but does 'braided' damage count as its own element, or does it convey the element of the damage that was transferred? Would Braided damage trigger damage-type specific procs on skills? (i.e. braided blight damage proccing Epidemic disease spread)

I'm going to assume it doesn't convey any of the secondary properties damage can have (e.g. Temporal (warp)).

Also, I feel like Bias Weave should probably display what bias is currently active and maybe have an option to have it not be biased towards any type of anomaly.

[Doctornull]

Messing around with the new TW, I gotta say how much I dislike how everything is a spell and there are no Stamina talents any more.

Previously it was a neat balance between familiar Stamina talents and cool new Chronomancer tricks, now it's just a bunch of spells which have awful range limits because they rely on melee or bow distance, and which can miss, but which retain all the disadvantages of being spells: vulnerable to silence, feedback, etc.

I like a lot of the new effects and new mechanics, but I don't think it's worth throwing out everything that came before.

[Razakai]

I'm not sure what you'd do with all the new talents if we brought back the old DW/Bow trees. They're a lot more interesting than anything the Stamina versions had, and I imagine certain talents like Weapon Folding would need to be kept in some form. It'd be a shame to lose things like the synergy between Temporal Assault and Dimensional Shift/Phase Pulse or on-hit effects and Arrow Stitching.

[Doctornull]

I'm not sure what you'd do with all the new talents if we brought back the old DW/Bow trees.

Not keep them in their current form, obviously.

They're a lot more interesting than anything the Stamina versions had, and I imagine certain talents like Weapon Folding would need to be kept in some form. It'd be a shame to lose things like the synergy between Temporal Assault and Dimensional Shift/Phase Pulse or on-hit effects and Arrow Stitching.

The old TW had plenty of on-hit effects, so I'm not sure why you think those would go away. My own addon talents added even more. Maybe you're confusing my proposal with someone else from up thread? I dunno.

[Razakai]

I can't see how they'd be kept remotely in any form if the old stuff was reintroduced though. The melee tree is pretty much a straight Chronomancy replacement for DW - Warp Blade is Dual Strike with the stun replaced with the warp effect, Braided Blade is Sweep with the bleed swapped for braid lifelines, Temporal Assault is Flurry but with teleports. Even Whirlwind has a counterpart in Thread the Needle, albeit in a different tree. So you'd either have to rework those talents to be something totally different, or you'd just have 2 different sets of near-identical abilities taking up space.

Bow is a little different, but that has the problem of Archery - Bow overlapping with Strength of Purpose, so you'd either have to rework that talent or figure out what other archery trees would work for them.

[cctobias]

I can't see how they'd be kept remotely in any form if the old stuff was reintroduced though. The melee tree is pretty much a straight Chronomancy replacement for DW - Warp Blade is Dual Strike with the stun replaced with the warp effect, Braided Blade is Sweep with the bleed swapped for braid lifelines, Temporal Assault is Flurry but with teleports. Even Whirlwind has a counterpart in Thread the Needle, albeit in a different tree. So you'd either have to rework those talents to be something totally different, or you'd just have 2 different sets of near-identical abilities taking up space.

Bow is a little different, but that has the problem of Archery - Bow overlapping with Strength of Purpose, so you'd either have to rework that talent or figure out what other archery trees would work for them.

I was thinking about this in the general sense of a lot of classes kind of have repeat variation of things (look at cursed tree) that may add some class theme specific things.

The only thing I could come up with to avoid talent bloat, would be to have some sort talent creation system and that classes could make certain "additive effect" things available. In other words there could be a base Flurry ability, TW could add teleports/warps, Rogues can add poison, and Reavers add some vim or disease thing.

This doesn't fit with the current talent system very well, but basically the reason there is class bloat right now is the granularity of talents works that way. Some things are shared across possibly anything and other things are class specific.

Dual wielding is possibly the largest contributor in this. We have DW in: Rogues, SB, Marauders, Arcane Blade, TW, and Reaver (somewhat special). But two handed and shields has similar things, especially with sun pallys.

So I would suggest something more "general" (although its a class ability(s)) like DW should have a sort of lower granularity and then the role of class would be as a "meta" enhancer on the "base" ability, possibly with some various choice in a class. For example maybe a TW could enhance base flurry with teleport or warp but not both.

Anyway I am just spitballing that and using words kind of not accurately so don't hold me to anything there. But I think it may also make an interesting sort of mechanic/guidance for people to make class addons that are meant to be variations on things (i.e. an arcane bowperson might be smoother to make, or a psionic blade variation of arcane blade or whatever).

[Doctornull]

I was thinking about this in the general sense of a lot of classes kind of have repeat variation of things (look at cursed tree) that may add some class theme specific things.

The only thing I could come up with to avoid talent bloat, would be to have some sort talent creation system and that classes could make certain "additive effect" things available. In other words there could be a base Flurry ability, TW could add teleports/warps, Rogues can add poison, and Reavers add some vim or disease thing.

Yep, exactly.

There are several ways to go about this: modifying the on-hit damage effects provided by Weapon Folding, so e.g. if you have Haste active then your Weapon Folding imposes Slow, and so on, is one way. Another is adding some callback hooks to common talents so e.g. Sweep and Penetrating Arrow might applies Braid Damage to all targets along with their usual effects, according to how much you've invested in the Braided Attacks talent. Then with one talent you're good at Braiding both melee and ranged, which means you're rewarded extra if you do the un-optimal thing and actually buy talents in both kinds of combat.

Is Edge supposed to be back soon? If not, maybe I'll write this up as a replacement class.

[Razakai]

No idea when Edge will be back, but he mentioned that he's unlikely to make any major changes to the TW design at this point, so an addon would probably be best. And it'd satisfy both sides by giving the option between the current design and traditional stamina talents. Myself, I really like the current design so I'd prefer to play with the class as-is.