Simple DPS Fix for Barbs and Monks

Alternatively for barbs and monk, Blizzard could treat it like patch 2.6.5 and tweak the 6 piece class set bonuses with the “right math.”

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There’s a pretty comprehensive website for buffing just the barb alone, monk needs a similar treatment. barbarianbuffproposals.mystrikingly

It is pretty comprehensive on why barb is behind, why it can feel bad to play, etc. and offers workable solutions to all of these. This website has existed for quite some time, unfortunately nothing has happened. Does not inspire confidence and I can tell you a buff to a bracer which can hardly fit into builds because it is already a contentious slot does not help all too much. There are very core problems with the class and sets on both monk and barb that run deep.

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If you check out my post that is about 5 above this one, it provides a possible explanation where comprehensive may not be realistic in light of the changes Blizzard has done with the number of passive skills and items being buffed.

For ease, I quoted myself:

Barbs should be buffed; however, perfect buffing to get inter and intra class parity is unrealistic in my mind given where we are in the life cycle in this game. I think that it is critical to remember the magnitude of the proposed comprehensive changes and whether it is reasonable. It seems like this comprehensive proposal is like drafting architectural renderings for a mansion on 150 acres while the home owners budget is a 3 bedroom house in the suburbs.

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You could also go the other way and lower the damage of the classes that are ahead of the lowest and balance it that way
Yeah I know that’s a bad idea because it is cutting power to the most powerful and under NO circumstances is that even to be entertained

I’m in favor of nerfing wizards by 3 greater rifts in combination of buffing barbs and monks. If this happened the current 12 grift difference in solo would be ~4. This is not perfect but seems pretty reasonable.

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I feel a little silly having to make the argument about reigning in expectations in light of the resources available. Nev has made this clear.

See:

Pay particular attention to her posts in response to Free and vice versa.

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You don’t feel silly about having such strong feelings regarding a class with which you’re unfamiliar?

My opinion, at least as it relates to barbs, is that the devs don’t want them to have even remotely close to the same power as other classes. It would be trivial to balance every class in the game. The easiest way that comes to mind off the top of my head would be to just increase a few numbers here or there, using the top 100, top 10, top 1000, whatever number they wanted, from each class. It wouldn’t take a huge team, it would literally take one person with a calculator 5 minutes to figure out the new values needed, then maybe one programmer some time to go make a few changes to some numbers in the code.

The fact that this has not happened in the past 5 years ran most of us off. I’m happy to see that some are still here fighting the good fight, but they simply don’t want the same thing that we want.

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Uliana EP = 128 (Lemma 5k para asia)
R6/Shenlong = 133 (RXT 8k para EU)
WoL LoN = 132 (Jebaited 7k para EU, don’t play anymore)

Most monk builds use Epiphany and unity, as 99% of the community hates this item, so it is likely that it should be replaced with a matching item.

In an ideal world, we could create a ring such as “Ring of Ytar” with Legendary Power: “” "Add 35-45% dodge chance + 50-65% CDR to Epiphany. While Epiphany is active, all your damage is increased by 100% (or any required value).

Benefits:
Major builds will benefit equally, and will keep the balance between the class.
It will kill the hated unit once and for all.
Monks will finally have Perma Epiphany and CC Immunity in Gen.

Or …
Simply buff sets again.
But LoN WoL will be dead and we will have Sunwuko in his place again.

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I think monk need for options like tempest rush, then more power.

How many times can you play wave of light.

Also double the buff of primary strength gem, will open up many generator builds.

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This is awesome… +1

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I have come up with a different idea that better balances all classes relative to solo greater rifts. It does not involve making changes to any skill or item. It is based on a “simple” mathematical formula.

See:

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PROPOSAL LIST 1 WRITTEN IN THE PROPOSAL.
This info is in the proposal, I take no credit for it. Just a simple copy pasta.

Wrath of the Wastes and Whirlwind:
Skull Grasp bonus increased from 300-400% to 1000-1300%.

Wrath of the Wastes (4) mitigation increased from 50% to 60%

Might of the Earth:
Girdle of Giants bonus increased from 200-250% to 700-900%.

Fury of the Vanished Peak bonus increased from 400-500% to 1000-1300%.

R6/IK HOTA
Gavel of Judgment bonus increased from 600-800% to 1300-1700%.

Vile Charge
Standoff bonus increased from 400-500% to 850-1100%.

Frenzy Thorns:
Bastion’s Revered bonus increased from 10 stacks to 20

Primary Skill Builds:
Oathkeeper bonus increased from 150-200% to 3000-4000%.

Dishonored Legacy bonus increased from 300-400% to 3000-4000%.

Blade of the Warlord bonus increased from 400-500% to 3000-4000%.

Arreat’s Law extra Fury generated increased from 20 to 30

Weapon Throw and Boulder Toss:
The Three Hundredth Spear bonus increased from 45-60% to 2000-2600%.​

Skular’s Salvation bonus increased from +100% / +150% to +150% / +275%

@Micro. Simple number changes to existing items. Looks pretty simple to me.

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Yes, It would seem that a simple number buff would be easy; however, I will refer you to Patch 2.6.5 and Nevs recent response to Free. All classes to differing extents have issues for parity within class builds (see DMO for bazooka or VYR-Chantodo).

I am giving my own prior suggestions in this thread the Spock eyeroll treatment.

In a new thread, I have proposed a solution for ALL CLASSES relative to class parity for top builds that does not require any buff to items or skills. It would simply be a DPS modifier. It would also buff all builds within a class relatively equally.

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i’d prefer the ring to be as follows: epi runs all time long and has the effect of every rune abd the fire rune will be replaced by dmg buff of x% multiplicative where x is what you need. this would mean 50% dmg reduction on r6 gen and on wol builds orotz wouldn’t be mandatory.
i play wol builds a real long time even when r6 was way stronger and i feel like it is a 2h build so this needs a good amount of buff. the problem is you need three wpns (torch, kyo and rabid / vangeful depending on your set of choice). additional you would miss one caldesan, 13/12 dmg for lon and all the buffs you can get (usually you would like to run with ad and cdr on both wpns and rcr or loh and you never get those numbers with a 2h wpn).
ltk needs a huge buff though, removing the 5-7 monster get add dmg would be only one peace needed. ltk and gen are similar and both squishy as hell. you would need a def buff for both (which you’d only get for gen with above ring since ltk uses epi all time long with orotz right now). it crys for another wpn that replaces fd dng wise but it is not easy. and another thing why sorc (chant vyr) is so strong is the buff possibility with bh and archon stacks + massive amounts of striken stacks. seems like epi also would need some buff per strike which would be awesome for ltk but not for wol (esp. not for 2h version).
tr is a build i only used to play t13/16 speed sage. for pushing gr the swk set simply is to weak. dmg wise an other buff item is needed but hell why not increase the number of that daibo and adding more runes to it.
u6 i did try in grps, it does nice amount of dmg but without unity it is too bad def wise and dmg on a boss is just a joke.

Sorry not gonna happen although I wish it could.

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Ehh, I think you’re reading into things a bit too much. Consider what has happened this patch:

  • New affixes added to existing items
  • New item created

What does this entail?

Additional coding and new art assets. This indicates it’s very realistic to think they will continue taking old items and putting new affixes on them. It also indicates that entirely new items with brand new (or new to us) art assets and affixes are not out of the question.

In other words, it’s very realistic to think Barbs will get some of what we want from the proposal, including List 2 items.

It’s not, however, realistic to think we’ll get all of them, or maybe even most of them. That is how I read Nev’s statements, and I hope her upcoming blog post will clarify things.

It’s important to note that since D3 is in the hands of the CG team, it’s likely that patches are planned months and months in advance to expedite workflow. I would be willing to bet that by the time we went live with our proposal, 2.6.6 had already been planned and was put into action. In fact, Rage and I discussed this when trying to decide when to release the proposal, but it seems we misjudged and should have released it earlier.

Either way, 2.6.6 is, if disappointing to Barbs, a good sign in terms of development. You don’t whip up whole new code strings and art assets for items if the game is shelved. Just my speculation.

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I hope you are right. My interpretation was more cynical. I can envision 3 scenarios:

  1. The developers invest more in the game. I figure that this could be justified if they realized that the time to develop and announce D4 is longer than expected and they want to keep people playing until that time.

  2. Status quo.

  3. The game is moving more towards maintenance mode as development for D4 is progressing and D4 will be announced soon. Needless to say, Nev won’t announce D4 but this is part of the reason besides the game being many years old.

Of these possibilities, I think that option 3 is most likely. If it was option 2, there would be little need for a blog post. If you moderate your expectations, you are less likely to be disappointed. I may be wrong about Nev’s future post.

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Thing is, if they were done developing content from D3, Nev would never have been cleared to say, “We aren’t done yet.” They wouldn’t create the Dreams gem and new affixes for a game that’s done.

And considering this patch’s content, I think it’s more than fair to say that there’s going to be additional D3 content coming–potentially quite a bit. I wouldn’t be surprised if Barbs do get some buffed items in the next patch or the one after that.

Of course, it’s important to remember that the CG team works on multiple games at once, so I suspect that going forward, each patch will dole out a handful of items akin to what we saw with 2.6.6,

They are not going to say that they are done. Also, Nev admitted that she needs to get a lot of approvals for the blog post. Presumably, they are massaging her words for corporate speak.

Some facts should not be ignored.

  1. We had 3 season that were essentially identical in content.
  2. They have started to recycle seasonal rewards
  3. They do not have the manpower to recolor wings that are preexisting including possible ones from China
  4. Etc…

I know that they did introduce new items this patch and that CG has taken over. If the introduction of a few items is representative of upcoming patches, at most there will be 1 or 2 class-specific items per patch.

This thread is getting wearisome to me. I can’t convince you or others nor can you convince me that your suggestions will happen en masse in a timely manner. Frankly, there are issues with my solution as pointed out. Because of feedback, I have created a new thread with what I perceive as a better solution.

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Monk hit the GR100 limit solo with the zdps EP monk, before it got a slap down. I’d say which ever class hits the GR 150 limit solo, will proably be next. Most likely a wiz. Zdps wiz anyone?