Skill Balance And Diversity of Playstyle

PC General Discussion
1

I don’t think the topic in the title is being discussed enough and in depth, so here it is.

I’ll start by saying I’m enjoying the game very much and I appreciate the effort it takes to making the items, skills, gems, overall class damage, aspects and everything balanced and fun.
This is a huge task that I believe could never have been finished before release, only estimated. By now Blizzard must have a lot more data to work with and hopefully we can add our individual experiences here.

I am still far from reaching end game, so I cannot speak for balance including legendary affixes, nor in the higher levels. I hope skill balance takes mainly the base skill into consideration, with synergies, but not including aspects and legendary effects.
I enjoy testing and playing different builds, so it hurts my fun that there are several weak skills I cannot use effectively. It makes the game less diverse and more repetitive.

Sorcerer:

  • Fire Bolt - 8 seconds is too long to do its total 50% damage, not enough to compensate the lack of direct damage. While the burning effect is useful for synergy, it feels weak and unimpactful compared to any other of the basic skills.
    Suggestion: reduce the burning time to 6s, maintaining the damage, increase the direct damage to 15%.
  • Frozen Orb - Also feels weak and unresponsive, considering the high mana cost. As it is, Ice shards is a far better option in any real scenario, since it can ricochet, it costs less and does a lot more damage.
    Suggestion: increase explosion damage and chill and make it explode where the mouse indicates.
  • Charged Bolts - I don’t understand why a spell with random pathing and low range causes less overall damage than Chain Lightning, which has long range and is more reliable. Charged bolts, being such close range, should have its damage increased.
  • Ice Blades - It used to have some utility reducing cooldowns. After being nerfed, it now does negligible damage and is not worth the skill slot for the other effects.
    Suggestion: greatly increase its damage or add some bonus effects to justify its use.
  • Ball Lightning - Needs a major buff. It costs half the mana pool and a mastery level skill to do less than most core skills do.

Druid:

  • Wind Shear - its animation takes too long to fire.
  • Landslide - even though it deals decent damage, it feels awkward to use, since the positions of the pillars cannot be controled. The aoe area is small, so it usually hits 2 enemies only and when they are moving, it appears only half the damage is applied. I felt it to be the wors druid core skill.
    Suggestion: lock it on the target so it always deals full damage, even when the target is moving; increase the area of effect to make it worth the cost.

Edit:
Overall, I dislike skills with low chance effects, as they can’t be relied upon.
E.g. spending a skill point for a 8% chance to immobilize (Lightning Storm) or 10% chance to apply vulnerability (Tornado). It’s a point usually best spent elsewhere.

This is all I have for now.
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Or comment below.

1 Like
2

The game is just overall way too slow.
30sec cool down on a skill in a Diablo game… wtf is that crap.

There is no build diversity because all you can do is play the FOTM build and progress; otherwise, you cant compete. The balance will never happen in this game, and honestly, it shouldn’t try too for PVE.

3

Huh? Ice blades semi-passively apply vulnerable. Is there another build people are playing with Sorc? I run barrier, nova, blades, freeze, ice bolt, and shards. Enchantments are blades and ice bolt. Blades allow you to maintain uptime on vulnerable for a lot of vuln synergies. Is there a different suggested build?

Like, you are regularly getting multiple blades at a time it would probably be nuts if these pumped damage on their own. :man_shrugging:

1 Like
4

I actually enjoy the game being slower than other ARPGs, because you feel each enemy is different. They are not just a box full of hp that you have to deplete.
What does feel boring sometimes is having to fire those basic skills multiple times every few seconds.

1 Like
5

The gain/spend mechanic needs a lot of work in this game. The builders are mostly crap and I feel like they make no impact on the game play. its just literally pressed because you have too

6

You are asking for buffs. They just nerfed the sorc. Multiple times. Its working as intended.

7

Lol most ults are 60 sec

8

New suggestion for the Druid:
Make Rabies useful! As it is, there is no reason to use it.
Compared to Poison Creeper, Rabies is much worse in every sense:

  • Rabies does 20% of the damage Poison Creeper does;
  • Rabies has zero utility in itself, other than triggering buffs against poisoned enemies;
  • Poison Creeper, besides poisoning, immobilizes, which also adds damage buffs;
  • Poison Creeper looks better.

The only real disavantage of Poison Creeper is the 67% longer cooldown.

Editing to add one more skill comparison:

I’m trying a bear build now and I was hoping to fit Hurricane in it, since it should synergize well with the bear. Then I compared it with Ravens and found that Ravens do more damage, have lower cooldown and add a guaranteed vulnerability, while having a smaller and stationary aoe.
The choice for Ravens was clear to me. I feel that with a little tweak to the Hurricane bonuses, maybe a little higher chance to apply vulnerability(?), things would become more even.