Zealot Antisynergy

so ive been playing a career that isnt in the focus of the BBB(zealot), and i noticed that the playstyle where you’re effectively only using temporary HP is really unfun to play in Quickplay/random Queue due to the abundance of healing effects you have no control of, namely:

Kerillian waystalker Healing passive
Grailknight Grimoire pickup health regen
and AoE Healshare on first Perk or Necklace

this is so anoying to the point that if a team contains either of those careers i avoid that lobby.

and i think there is a easy Win/win solution to this without touching any other zealot playstyles:
put a additional effect on “Castigate” talent that prevents Health regen to aply to Viktor
Castigate already favors the low HP playstyle and this change would rarely affect any non “low hp playstyles” since they would rarely chose castigate

i really think this is one of the biggest oversights in the interplay of the careers since its one of the few things that makes players of one specific career avoid other specific careers enitrely and i dont think that should be the case all careers should function to their fullest with all other careers in the game (some teamcombinations might not be optimal or even good but at least they should not sabotage each other)

what do you think about this? are there more antisynergies in the game that im missing?
(edit: added poll for easier acess)

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Or just you know use teamwork. And zealot thing is pain so it must be painfull to play him :wink:

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if we can agree on:

a) health lets you stay alive

b) and staying alive is one of the most vital things in the game

then i dont understand how health = bad, even for the zealot where it means a small loss in damage

extra health could serve as a buffer for mistakes or when sh*t hits the fan

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You want anti-synergy try unchained at high heat with some idiot pummeling you with Hagbane and being forced into blowing up and losing your power stacks. Should we therefore allow Unchained to ignore FF?

I think it’s just one of those things Zealots need to come to terms with.

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No, not ignore, but would it not be reasonable that Blood Magic doesn’t apply to it? Ie you take full damage from FF but it doesn’t affect your heat bar. I’m genuinely curious if you’d be against such a change.

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good point, but theres a huge difference in FF that is specific to that player doing the FF and a perk that is literally 100% out of control for both careers with the grailknight and zealot exept not picking up the Grimoire in the first place wouldn’t you agree?

sure its probably even more anoying but its a direct result of the players actions contrary to health regen passives.

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A) yes health lets you stay alive
B) yes staying alive is the most vital part
C) no health is not really an buffer, you see i was directly talking about Green health and assumed that people wouldnt think it as literally playing at 1hp all the time, what i actually mean is that an well played zealot will have lots of Temp HP instead of Green HP and regen abilties will always heal Green HP, I guess Catigate having a passive converting Health regen effects to Temp HP regen effects would be even better but i felt that would overbuff the career so i went with denying it entirely

hope i could clear things up.

Zealot does have some problems for sure

namely he’s also arguably too strong at full power, a lot of his talents are absolutely worthless, his passive still isn’t consistent even after all this time and yes, he has anti-synergy issues

Honestly at this point I’d just rework the class entirely

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I would actually make temp hp decay much faster on him by default. Finally a risky career with a real use for his second life passive

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Ignoring FF would encourage me to Fireball spam things within one foot of me to stagger the chaff., lose my health and then use her HP > Overcharge skill to repeat. Sienna is another thread I think though :slight_smile:


Managing your overcharge bar (even FF) is a great part of the skill challenge for Sienna. I suppose my main point was that there are all kinds of things that one class does that annoys another class.

Waystalker Ult spanking you in the head beyond anyone’s control for example, and of course slayer spending 60% of the match blinded by Sienna Firewalk/Fireball/Flamestaff etc. IB firethrower irritating everyone and (going back a while) simply the noise of the drakefire pistols shooting is enough to make me shudder. And of course Knife Ears disappearing into the distance, triggering a patrol and dying XD

@Incandescent has the best suggestion. Simply rebuild the Zealot removing his buffs transferring to ranged and build him with the newer health buffs and regens in mind. Hopefully he’s part of phase 2 of the class reworks and he needs something to make him different from Slayer.

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Since it’s relevant I’m linking the post I made in another thread.

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it took me a lot longer than I’m willing to admit that those arrows are drop-downs

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No kidding. This is “Turn off healing so I can be perma OP Zealot.” thread no. 999654

Class needs to be remade. Basing a class’s strength off of lack of health and then straight up giving them max health, highest health regen, highest character power in game just doesn’t work. Good thing his utility isn’t anywhere in the same universe of good as WHC or Cata would be a sea of bald headed sckuf reeeing about heals every game :stuck_out_tongue:

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The high health pool still makes sense as the bonuses are gained per 25 health lost, and it makes sense thematically. The only issue is how easily he can generate THP because Zealots aren’t complaining about healing, they’re complaining about Green HP.

I would remove the extra healing talent, rework the class and possibly include temp health in the missing health (ie you can’t have 1 green health and 179 temp health and get 30% power). Maybe make the damage reduction talent innate to compensate so he gets up to 30% power and 30% damage reduction at low health.

That’s the thing that makes the least amount of sense. Like, why? Because of how the passive works, Zealot has to have the 20% HP boost in order to hit the 30% power bonus. Why wasn’t that changed to be percentage based in any of the 1.0+ patches? Why wasn’t it changed in the 2.0 patches? If Fiery Fiath was percentage based the Zealot meta would be slightly different and more streamlined. Heck, I’d actually like a class that gave me the excuse to not take extra health, block angle or extra stamina would be nifty as heck to pair with BCR.

Alright, so, in order for current Zealot to work at all, his passive has to ignore Temp Health. That’s why he sucks. Take it away and he’s just a basic Saltzpyre who sometimes does extra dps if he plays terribly. We’ve been through patch 1.0 Zealot, it was a terrible class. The amount of management required to maintain high power with 20 total HP is really miserable and makes no sense when you can just be any other class and be better for the team.

Hard no on that. Zealot can already talent into that, and even then, Zealot shouldn’t have one of the highest melee, high health, high ranged damage, a fantastic dash ult, and high attack speed while also being passively tankier than Footknight. The only reason more Zealots in QP aren’t using Armor of Faith is because Holy Fortitude is slightly better.

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I think that’s all spot on. Removing the buff if you have 1 green HP and a full bar of temp health would completely gut the character, and there’d be no arguments to pick him anymore. I once saw @Adelion suggest each point of THP counts as half a point of green HP for the purposes of fiery faith, and I’m coming around to it as a middle ground. Ideally he got a full rework (I rather like @Velsix idea involving a self flagellation special), but I think that’s a little unrealistic considering how many things FS already has on their plate at the moment.

I have a strong feeling once Chaos Wastes and the other new classes are released that’ll mostly be it for V2’s development, so the simpler and less work a solution for this issue is the better chance it actually happens, I’d say.

Thanks. I copied ideas that several indivduals smarter than myself have made on the forums/subreddit over the years.

It could possibly be too much work, but I think the bulk of the work would be a flagellation animation. I’m no coder but I imagine Fatshark likes to reuse effects a lot, so most of the buffs could basically be Have At Thee with a different condition and on Zealot. Then some text changes and it’s good to go. Fortunately most of the effects would be the same.

I think Zealot could be effective on low green health and no temp hp if their self-buffs were stronger, but then they could easily be a broken career. The numbers would have to be pretty high to justify being one shottable by basic infantry when Heart of Iron is recharging. They would have to do more damage than WHC, or pretty much any career in the game does, which would be terrifying.

Some less work intensive options that would all be passive. Some of these options could be combined.
  1. Make Zealot immune to receiving healing from allies (including Handmaiden’s dash) and items. Healing items still reset downs, or alternatively Heart of Iron resets their down count every time it recharges.
  2. Zealot passively receives temp hp from healing items and from auras, but the amount received is unaffected by Healing Fortitude.
  3. Change Healing Fortitude to only apply to temp hp.
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Zealot needs a complete rework on how he gets stacks of power. The whole idea of giving stacks based on % of health (or health missing) doesn’t suit this game.

Self-flaggelate is a cool concept, but as an only source of stacks will be too distracting from game itself.


My idea is this:

The power stacks should come from taking hits and be time limited.
For example, taking a hit that deals 25 or lower gives 1 stack for 15s. Taking a hit with 25-50 damage gives 2 stacks, and so on. When you take a new hit, the decay timer (15s) is refreshed. Self flagellate could be an alternative way to keep stacks going.

Friendly fire should be exempt from this mechanic. Damage lower than 15 (chip damage, burning) shouldn’t give stacks, but could refresh the timer. Each stack should reward 15% power and the overall number of stacks is capped at 3 (it’s a higher risk - higher reward playstyle than before).
I really like this concept.


Or something more advanced - having a pain-meter, which increases when taking hits (more damage from a hit = higher increase), but decays over time. The number of stacks depends on the meter, much like Unchained.

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Merc has 40% power if there are 5 enemies around (almost always on Legend and always on cata) and he hit 3 at once (doable even against pure SW) AND he has ranged weapon, 25% dmg reduction, 10% AS, 5% crit, more cleave and VERY good ult
Slayer has THE highest power increase of possible 55%! with using 2HW, or Stupid amnounts of AS with One handers. Both require no ingame setup, no low HP just 3 hits on enemies which is insta. Yes he lacks range BUT he gains SUPERB melee with Anti horde/Ani armor best in slots
Handmainden can have prety much perma 25% power / 15% power 15%AS / 20% power 30% AS (doding and being good are requirements) , no need for low hp, VERY good low CD ult that has gr8 upgrades
Zealot has 30% power, 20% AS, 90%! increased healing (this is the imporatnt part), AS Ult, Immortality, MS when hit without interruptions
Didnt it occur to people that his low hp gameplay is balanced around him running on ~20hp risking being gibbed by a no sound backstab by a SINGLE skavenslave for 50dmg While being a monster in fights?
Yes being healed by X during maps ‘‘sucks’’ for having all green circles BUT it also prevents you wasting immortality cuz enemy hit you through a wall.
Zealot needs no rework - lowhp gameplay is high risk outside of fights - high reward during frantic melee
IF zealot is countered by healing, then Slayer is countered by ranged, Kruber is countered by enemies going one by/one, HM is countered by no space to dodge

I think one thing that’s easy to change is his power affecting ranged. Doesn’t make sense how a melee brawler gets this much passive power on his ranged weapons when he in no way specializes in that, apart from the meme volley smite build.

But you don’t run around with 20 hp on Zealot, you run around with full 1 hp and 179 thp, while also having a get-out-of-jail card with his passive resist death every so often and 90% extra healing. That’s double the tHP generation.

Now I don’t actually think Zealot is that strong in high-tier content compared to other careers, but in places like Legend he has enough power to mulch anything the game throws at him and not even think about dying. He’s disproportionately strong in lower difficulties. He’s undeniably a beast in melee combat, maybe too much so, while also being really survivable and tanky.

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