 | Fixing The Crusader (Warning: Lengthy)(1) | Category: CrusaderApril-29-2014 11:07 AM PDT (10 years ago)  |
| Not going to bury the lead. In my honest opinion, this is how to fix almost every issue that currently exists with the crusader class, while only changing passive skills. Heavenly Strength You can wield a two-handed weapon in your main hand while bearing a shield in your off hand. Your movement speed is reduced by 12%. Some argue that this should be baseline. I used to think so too, but that logic is wrong. The reason many want to see this baseline is because when compared to one-handers, a two-hander simply does more damage. (Outside of very few legendary one-handers.) If Crusaders had another way to boost one-handed damage, that two-handed had no access too, then having Heavenly Strength as a passive is mostly fine, with one problem. Reduced movement speed CAP has to go. That said, this ability still needs a drawback. A well rolled two-hander vs a well rolled one-hander is about a 20% increase in DPS, which is massive. Compared to "most" other passive skills that increase damage, you usually have a drawback attached to them to counteract such a huge leap in damage. Glass Cannon reduces wizards survivability for the exchange, Pierce the Veil increased Witch Doctor mana costs, Heavenly Strength should reduce movement speed. But by reducing your current movement speed by 12%, your movement cap potential remains intact. You will have to use 50 primary paragon points to gain 25% movement speed, and get a perfect movement speed roll on another item to reach the cap that others reach purely through paragon points. This is still a drawback in that you either move 12% slower still, or sacrifice a primary slot on your gear that other classes wouldn't to regain that movement. This makes all the movement speed items in the game interesting to Crusaders, as well as keeps the flavor of this passive intact. After all, you are carrying a gigantic weapon in one hand and a massive shield in the other. Why wouldn't you be weighted down? Fervor While using a one-handed weapon, you gain 20% increased damage. While using a two-handed weapon, all Wrath generation is increased by 35%. Fervors current incarnation is pretty much garbage tier. Some one-handed Crusaders use it as a replacement to Heavenly Strength as a DPS increase. But thats mostly because there simply is no other options in terms of DPS increases from passives. To keep this useful for those that use it in this way, and to give a true passive skill option for one-handed weapons to compete with two-handed, this should become a weapon master style passive. By tying a damage increase to one-handed, two-handed simply cannot benefit from it. But to be a true weapon master style passive, two-handed need to gain something from this passive, and this could be used to fill two-handed's biggest problem. Wrath consistency issues. Lets say you have a two-handed at 1.0 speed, and a one-handed at 1.5 speed. Using a 30 cost spender, at 100 wrath. Two-hander's spend 3 seconds to burn through 90 wrath before they cant cast that spender. One-Handers spend 2 seconds to do the same. So they both expend wrath in nearly the same time. But when it comes to wrath generation, all skills gain 5 wrath per activation. Using the same 1.0 speed two-hander and 1.5 speed one-hander, a two-hander needs 18 seconds to generate 90 wrath, while a one-hander needs 12 seconds to generate the same 90 wrath. Thats 6 seconds more that a two-hander spends building his mana back up. In many cases, this is even more challenging because of two-handed's lack of mobility due to Heavenly Strength, you burn your Wrath on one pack, then arrive late to the next pack, only to auto attack a few times before its dead, then arrive late to the next pack, still needing to auto attack to generate. And so on and so fourth. Giving two-handed a 35% boost in all Wrath generation means they only need 13.333 seconds to generate that 90 wrath. Putting them more in line with one-handed builds. As well, that 35% would increase two-handed's passive wrath regen, which would greatly mitigate the problems of two-handed builds lagging behind when going from pack to pack in group play. Vigilant Increase Life regeneration by 25%. Reduce all non-Physical damage taken by 10%. It's hard not to compare this passive to Barbarian's Superstition. Only Barbarian's get to reduce all non-Physical damage by 20%! Vigilant's current 5% looks pretty laughable by comparison. And in terms of an overall survivability increase, 2063 life per second is also a joke. Considering most if not all other classes got some form of scaling on there healing passive skills, I purpose this life per second increase be made into a modifier, so that obtaining life per second on gear would become more attractive, and promote build diversity. Couple that with a bump in the damage reduction and you have yourself a viable defensive passive skill. [Post edited one time, last edit by BulKathos#1158 at May-6-2014 4:48 PM PDT (10 years ago)] | ||
 | Fixing The Crusader (Warning: Lengthy)(70) | May-6-2014 12:42 PM PDT (10 years ago) |
| Hello, Crusaders Thanks for taking the time to put this thread together, and for the well thought out responses. I've been reading a lot of the discussion going on here, and was sure to take some notes. Just dropping by to say that I'll be sure to pass this along, and that I'm looking forward to reading more! | ||
