while I get the idea - and agree it’s not a bad idea - of Flagellation being a way to give him his buffs, in the current Twitterverse and wider world a video-game that promotes “self harm” would make a name for itself for all the wrong reasons. whether it’s lore friendly or not I could see FS being left wide open to criticism for having something that promotes self harm when the Twitter Loons get hold of it.
I think there needs to be a way to build up something like a Zealous fury that relies on methods other than getting hit. Maybe some kind of visual overlay that shows Vicky Saltz being in a blinding rage (like the khorne berzerk overlay?) and it gives faster swings, higher damage but the longer he’s swinging and hitting things the more wild and less accurate his hits become.
IT might become a balancing act of being angry enough to cause damage in a controlled manner, but not in such a rage that he’s windmilling around but causing a little less damage. Maybe less chance of a crit or losing a stamina shield at maximum rage or something. And of course, a Melee-centric character should not have his buffs transfer to his ranged weapons.
I’m just typing what’s happening in my brain this minute rather than thinking it through completely so it’ll probably fall apart under the slightest scrutiny, but I’m trying to think of a way to harness his ZEAL rather than the current leaning toward being a Flaggellant.
No but in the uk dozens of people were arguing with Yorkshire Tea on twitter, to the point the social media manager had to put out a tweet saying something like ‘Karen, you’re shouting at tea.’
My point being that people will rage about anything, and self harm in a video game will just be ‘THINK OF THE CHLIDREN WHO WILL CUT THEMSELVES ES BECAUSE OF THIS!!! 111’ whether it’s remotely sensible or not.
Twitter is a hellscape if you do anything other than follow pages that post cute animals and scenic landscapes.
Anyway as for Zealot maybe something that encourages him to actively make trade offs would be ideal; something that isn’t ruined by health regen…Not sure what that would entail or look like though
Killing an enemy increases power by 10% but increases the damage you take by 10% for 7 seconds. Stacks up to 5 times.
Focused Murder: Hitting an enemy increases your damage and attack speed by 7%, but deceases your cleave by 7%. Stacks up to 6 times and lasts for 7 seconds (would be too powerful with Axe/Rapier unfortunately).
Zealot can move through enemies, but doing so slowly drains their health.
Zealot takes 30% less damage when attacking, but 30% more when blocking, using a range weapon or otherwise not attacking with a melee weapon.
Hitting an enemy in melee increases the melee damage you deal to that enemy by 10% for 7 seconds, but your initial melee damage is 15% weaker than normal. Stacks up to 5 times.
I’m stealing from Argonaut14 with this one:
Hitting enemies builds stacks of Fiery Faith. At 0 hits Zealot has 35% more power. At 10 hits they have 35% increased attack speed but no increase in power. At 5 hits they have 30% more power and 30% more attack speed. Hits last for 3 seconds.
i find it intresting that a post specificly about zealot anti-synergy ended up as a big Thinktank about how to rework him, with political/Twitter discussions mixxed in. like wth lol
and while i agree that he overperforms, thats was never the point of this thread.
nerf him in some ways or overhaul him completly thats a different subject entirely tho.
Fact is that the way he is meant to be played right now on live or BBB is unfun and irritating due to the healthregen interactions of other careers.
“unfun and irritating”:: a player might be more concerned about loosing the regenerated life back to his threshhold of 5-6stacks rather than actually focusing on fighting enemys
you might say that with the health pool/gain he currently has, HP Green or not is never an issue and i agree, he is too tanky, but i tried to seperate balancing from my “Anti Synergy” post because speculating about possible balance changes and overhauls, to actual change takes a lot of time and originally i thought about a quick fix to an obvious oversight that doesnt take developers too long to acomplish…
so in order to fix this problem i suggested a ""EASY (and fast implementable) change that will help zealot players to play him in among any teamcomposition without having to avoid certain other careers
And which official source told you that this is the way Zealot is “meant” to play? That is purely your assumption as other people make other assumptions. But if you look at most of the talent designs you will see that usually with higher reward comes a higher risk either directly incorporated into the talent/passive itself or because you have to forfeit another talent in the same row. However, the base premise of Zealot breaks this design as he gets the higher reward with zero risk because he literally hides behind a white wall AND a “You shall not die” card. While there are a few other examples (like Abandon) which have a similar problematic it is easy to tell that they are an exception and should be removed from the game and certainly are not the way how it was “meant” to be played.
IF anything, health regeneration by Waystalker or Grail Knight are a way to correct the problem of having no risk while keeping maximum stacks because you have to constantly drop the health again. So you have to take a risk getting actually low on health and not hide behind the white wall. For that the health regeneration is not antisynergy to the Zealot design, it is only antisynergy to powerdrooling. Also, it finally enables or highlights an additional playstyle for Zealot which has been ignored largely until now with one of the strongest defense builds in the game.
So or so, in the longer run a change is necessary for the situation which is why people made suggestions. Your easy solution to put an additional effect on the strongest talent in the row is not a solution, it is just a way out to keep the powerdrooling while keeping the strongest offense buff on the career.
If anything the solution should go more towards this direction:
It should be in competition with Castigate, NOT in addition. And while they are at it, they should remove Heart of Iron as passive and make it another talent in replacement for Smite. Then level 10 would be a choice between a 20 % attack speed bonus which needs some management, constant stack bonus which needs no management but has less offense power or an actual defense choice where you increase survivability. You know, actual difficult choice. Instead of dumping your desired effect on your desired talent.
Zealot can be played anyway someone likes. I don’t see why other players should be capable of hindering this. Frankly I don’t understand the sheer hostility a lot of players have towards Zealot at this point. It’s just a game, and that’s coming from me of all people.
Zealot can be easy to play but the Heart of Iron passive is a very thematic one, while Smite being a passive is kind of random (ha) afaik. Heart of Iron as a talent would be a bit odd because Zealot could make up for not having it with Feel Nothing. They can be good defensively but they still have lower dps than dps careers and even Unchained, while also not having a single party buff of any kind. And what does the Zealot pick when the regen isn’t there? Castigate of course, which just means individually Zealot is more efficient and effective when a certain duty doesn’t pop up and Waystalker isn’t using Healing Locus. That’s illogical design.
Zealot’s advantage is dps uptime. Heart of Iron ties into that in a burst-dps kind of way. Zealot’s all about killing and ignoring or pushing through anything that would stop them. They do it in a boring way but removing that characteristic is weird.
I agree that changes need to be made, but nothing short of a rework will make Zealot interesting mechanically.
while i agree with you that choices should matter in the skill tree and not a single talent should be the topdog no brainer pick, I BELIVE the ideal way to present 3 rows of talents is to allow players with 3 different playstyles. for example: row 1 ->playstyle A, row 2 → playstyle B, row 3 → playsyle C and therefore i put a complimenting effect on a talent that is already in that playstyle, (without buffing him therefore i can’t agree with your frustration)
IF you think that allied playercareers should “correct” “hinder” the strenght of other careers, i seriously doubt that you understand the premise of Coop and team based gameplay.
even if your sentiment is correct that he is overpowered and needs to be held back other !!non mandatory!! careers are an awful way to archieve that.
@anon75893681
i only suggested a solution to something that i subjectivly found problematic, and get people to talk about it and if they agree with me or not.
thats what these forum threads are about, talking about potential problems and if something should be done. if you disagree with potential changes be welcomed to oppose.
I don’t have any solution that takes into account everything. I’m just trying to ask questions to get a better insight on your proposed solution and try to challenge you with them.
Also i thought you didn’t like people suggesting reworks or ideas in your thread? Or did i missunderstand this.
Also i don’t agree with your solution. It’s a good bandaid but that’s it.