In this thread I would appreciate to hear your opinions on the shields we can get as a class. How good they are, if you think they are good as they are now or if you would like them improved.
I will try to list our available shields, please correct and/or add if I miss something.
Spell Magic Weapon Deflect
Passive Galvanizing Ward
Passive Dominance
Passive Unstable Anomaly
Magic Weapon Deflect and Dominance create a shield that lasts 3 seconds
Galvanizing Ward offers a large shield as long as you have avoided damage for 5 seconds.
Unstable Anomaly is instant, our cheat death 400% life shield. Not sure the duration this shield has.
In combat the first three are what we have to work with (our goal is to avoid the fourth to trigger).
Galvanizing Ward disappears if damage is taken. If someone can clarify whether the shield stays if the damage is absorbed by the shields or if it drops no matter.
Dominance stacks ten times, ok for trash but since it creates a shield kill it is not available at boss fights after the duration.
So that leaves us with Deflection Magic Weapon. Especially here I would like your opinions as to effective you find it and if you would like any improvement.
My personal experience is that it seems to work best with a channeling spell. TinneOnnMuin has pointed out how attack speed interacts with it on a previous thread. In my testing/playing I haven’t raised the attack speed just used spells. My feeling is that while channeling it seemed to work opposed to signature and arcane spenders.
Personally I am not too happy with them and would like to see an improvement. During this season I played my demon hunter I tested the:
Fortress Ballista, Legendary Hand Crossbow
Attacks grant you an absorb shield for 2.0% of your maximum Life. Stacks up to 10 times.
This felt much more reliable and stable, first of all like Dominance it told you the stacks and the duration is amazing. A move towards this direction would be appreciated by me at least.
So your opinions on the matter, thanks in advance 
The biggest improvement I would like to see is a shield indicator. It is extremely annoying that there is no way to know the current state of your shields unless you hover over the health globe.
7 Likes
Agree on a visual indicator just like the one dominance gives.
As I understand it the rest is ok with you?
Thanks for the answer.
Almost never use Unstable Anomaly. Never use Dominance because if you can face roll everything you don’t need a shield. Just like Prodigy a never used passive skill. In my opinion Weapon Deflect is good as is. Dominance could be like increases the duration of your shields by xxx% and potency by xxx% or Your resource cost and cooldowns are reduced by xx%, while you have a shield active, but your maximum health is xx% reduced.
Unstable Anomaly is bad because it has no imunity when it triggers. It’s usable but only because there’s few alternatives.
Dominance is the most moronic and useless passive wizards have. I hate this abomination because it replaced Critical Mass, the best passive we had. Never used it, never will.
Galvanizing Ward is okay, especially if paired with ABB and MW Deflection.
MW Deflection is okay as well. Could have a longer duration and a little more power, but essentially it’s good. I wouldn’t mind if it changed to work more like Fortress Ballista.
It would also be nice if shields could gain some sort of regenerative effect derived from your AP regeneration or life per second.
Thank for your input @Gegeforce and @Lexa.
I tried to list all available shields, I forgot the Tal Rasha set but let’s leave those for the ones available to all.
So far only two have answered plus Oblivions heart.
It seems magic weapon deflect is predominant and that it more or less is ok as is.
Like Lexa said I too would prefer if it worked more alike the ballista fortress. Personally the removal of the 3s duration would be a huge improvement.
I am aware of balance issues that could occur, I don’t ask for god mode. Just a way to build up and be able to rebuild shields.
The problem is that Deflection already is the strongest rune for Magic Weapon. If they increase the power further all others become pretty much worthless. So, maybe the whole skill needs a do-over. Personally I would like to see it behaving like this:
Magic Weapon [Conjuration] - requires Weapon
Cost: 25 Arcane Power
Imbues your weapon with magical energy, granting it 10 20% increased damage. Allies within 15 yards gain half this bonus. This area can be increased by your pickup radius.
Lasts 10 minutes.
- Electrify [Level 27] [LIGHTNING]
Increases your attack speed by 15%. The extra damage is dealt as lightning and can arc to three nearby enemies around the target.
- Force Weapon [Level 35] [ARCANE]
Removes the extra damage but your projectile attacks now pierce and have a 10% higher chance cause critical hits.
- Conduit [Level 38] [ARCANE]
Reduces all resource costs by 25% and enemies hit by your attacks restore up to 3 Arcane Power. The extra damage is dealt as Arcane.
- Ignite [Level 46] [FIRE]
Attacks have a chance to burn enemies, dealing 30% extra damage as Fire over 3 seconds.
- Deflection [Level 55] [COLD]
Halves the damage bonus but deals it as cold to enemies near you whenever you attack. Performing an attack also grants a protective shield that absorbs 4% 3% of your Life in damage. This effect may stack up to 60% of your Maximum Health.
Something like that.
1 Like
I like it, just a clarification the 4% is stroked over and reduced to 3%? Had a hard time to see it. All in all just fine, if it had been 3 stacks I would prefer an increase to 5-6%, but that’s just something that can be polished.
Very nice and of course an icon that let’s you know that the shields are active.
Cheers bud.
Yes, it goes down 1% but now stacks for a total of 9%… or 18% with ABB. And the shield won’t expire. Having such a mechanic at 5-6% seems a bit too much to ask for. Even at 4% it might be overdoing it.
I should also clarify that the extra damage is calculated from what you actually deal, so it’s a seperate multiplier. As for the “allies gain half benefit…” it should be noted that my intention is to not let your allies benefit from the rune effects other than damage. Other players will gain a 10% damage buff from being close to the wizard, but neither will this damage become lightning through Electrify nor will it increase the attack speed. Same for piercing projectiles and extra crit chance from Force Weapon, RCR from Conduit, fire DOT from Ignite and obviously they won’t gain shields or cold damage aura from Deflection.
Whether these effects should work with wizard’s pets and follower attacks can be discussed. but if you ask me - I would allow it for some fun gameplay, where it makes sense (like extra APS for Hydra or the Follower)
1 Like
Lexa I had to revisit your idea,
No duration? So we cast and the buff stays until logout or death?
No problem with me tbh.
Now besides hoping for such a change I’ll keep fingers crossed for an item granting all runes 
Also the change to deflection might be more balanced as you suggested when I reread.
Since three casts will create a three stack shield granting 9%/ (18% with Asnagar’s) while it can deflect damage it is also replenished and without duration. So more might be OP.
Haha, were you typing this just now?
Yes agree, ah yes that part 15 yard radius or even 20 is really close so I don’t worry about.
Like I said a solid proposal.
The skill itself? You won’t ever cast it, that’s why I also removed the cast cost. There’s just no point casting something if it has no effect other than granting a long lasting passive buff. It’s not an active/passive mechanic like with sader’s laws. So it should be treated as such, like a permanent aura you don’t have to bother maintaining. UI wise the skill would be greyed out and always on.
Now that’s some serious greed right there, haha…
1 Like
That’s… actually a big nerf. Even with it never expiring.
Right now it scales with attack speed. At the 1.54 APS (1.4 weapon with 10% IAS from paragon), you can stack up to 4-5 stacks, so 16-20% (or 32-40% with ABB) shields. If you have higher IAS, e.g. maybe for a hydra build, you can maybe get 5-6 stacks, so 20-24% (or 40-48% with ABB). And with Vyr’s at 5 APS, you can stack up to 15 stacks, so 60% (or 120% with ABB).
Capping it at 3 stacks is a big nerf. And reduced shield % on top of that? You’d have less than half the shields at 1.54 APS and 1/6 of the shields with Vyr’s at 5 APS. Big nerf.
Seriously? I wasn’t aware of that… damn misleading, but that’s to be expected when you can’t see your actually shield values. Okay, then…
let me re-do that!
Hmmm, @TinneOnnMuin that’s why I first suggested a bigger value but since it will be replenished constantly on cast won’t it be enough?
Can the use of energy armor force armor create an unintentional god mode?
Secondly as it is without a duration won’t it be less dependent on IAS? Of course higher attack speed will be beneficial since you will stack up faster.
As an idea it seems solid the rest is number tweaking, this functionality seems more natural and effective.
@Lexa, what do you think about changing the rune suggestion towards a passive. More specifically to replace dominion with that and allow the deflect rune interact with the passive buffing it.
And yes the part were I asked for an item giving all runes IS beyond greed, it’s going from old fart to bouncing 5year old it was meant as a joke
So it will be akin to an aura in effect? We equip in skill bar and it’s active? No objection from me on that either.
This is not so relevant when you are at a lower attack speeds but especially for Vyr builds this MW shield replenishes super fast and since it also stacks without saying so (which I wasn’t aware) it allows you to mitigate a lot of damage that way. It’s especially helpful when mitigating dot effects that drain your shields constantly. The more and faster you can replenish, the lower the risk of the damage going through the shield.
I changed it now to a stack size based on [Max Health] as the cap. It’s 60% now, or 120% with ABB. The effect won’t scale with aps but you will still benefit from high aps in the way that it will allow you to reach the cap very fast.
Exactly so.
1 Like
Looks good, if only this got implemented we would get an improvement. Nice work.
I like the idea of primarily using shields as a form of Defense to distinguish the class, I would like to see them lean into that fantasy a bit more,
Revisit Diamons Skin, increasing the duration or give some perk like CC immunity while it’s shield holds to make it more competitive or complementary with Magic Weapon.
Some more legendary support would be nice too, like damage done to shields reduced by 50%.
1 Like