Fero changes?

[Khauruk]

yes what I meant was, that for non tank classes, the higher AC gets the less effective it is. wich isnt true for true tanks, and yet.. ferocity loses effectiveness for ALLLLLLL classes see where i'm goin with that?

I see, but it's either not true, or very arguable.

Attack gains post softcap do add very little, I agree.  This needs to change via one mechanism or another, and boosting mob AC follows the KISS method - already in place mechanisms that have been ignored.  Other possibilities exist, I'm sure, but would possibly require far more coding/resources/complexity.

AC though is another matter.  A - all classes have softcap, so any AC past softcap is less effective per raw AC gain.  B - all mobs have an attack rating, which puts a sort of secondary softcap in place.  Gains decrease once you've passed the mob's attack point.  There is a point that raiders start to see pretty quickly in group content where mob damage is minimal, and the more AC you throw on, that doesn't really change.

The results from piling on more AC are there, but debateable for many as to their worth.  At the extreme high end AC (reaching 4k+ unbuffed for warrior), there is a level of upper dI "obsoletion," (and you can read lots of parses and statistical analyses regarding that at thesteelwarrior.org), and a tending of raid boss (pre-solteris) damage profiles to start to resemble xp mobs...a very cool thing.  Overall aDPS taken though hardly changes at all.

All classes still gain from the AC, though for bst/druid, silks and arguably rogues, it's just not worth attempting to get.  Even some rangers/monks find it worth equipping AC augs if they're often tanking/melee soloing, as their return is still reasonable (amazing really, for monks).

(derail)
I'm convinced that there's something entirely screwball with beastlord mitigation though, and I'd love to gather a series of parses once I'm able to get back in game (and finish damn mitigation AAs...cost so much for so little gain), and get a few people to agree on a solo spot/mob type to parse at different raw AC values.  I'd love to see the hit spreads even on green/grey mobs a la Grieg's end...it's going to be sad, imo. (/derail)

So yeah...I see where you're coming from, and where you're going to (I think).  I just don't agree with your path, I guess.  You can't just recalculate or change the attack 'softcap' without entirely changing core EQ functionality.  There is no attack softcap, it's just NPC AC stagnation  (would still love to see attack 'softcap' tests in VT...probably seriously higher, proving my point even more).

[hokarz]

It would be a melee nerf of extreme proportions. right now, caster and melee dps is somewhat balanced. If Mobs AC were raised enough to shift the attack softcap upward so increased attack would actually mean something, everything below that would be shifted back downward, too. Am I correct in that? It would affect groupers at a much harsher rate of return than it would raiders, who are already so far ahead of the atk softcap. Everyone would shelve thier melee and roll wizards and druids again.

[Khauruk]

It would be a melee nerf of extreme proportions. right now, caster and melee dps is somewhat balanced. If Mobs AC were raised enough to shift the attack softcap upward so increased attack would actually mean something, everything below that would be shifted back downward, too. Am I correct in that? It would affect groupers at a much harsher rate of return than it would raiders, who are already so far ahead of the atk softcap. Everyone would shelve thier melee and roll wizards and druids again.

For this to be an effective fix, it needs to affect more than just SoF group/raid content.  For it to be done right, there'll be an insane amount of reitemization/content retuning.  A very sticky wicket.  What you said is also part of my replies to Rashere.

[Sikkem]

From todays Dev Chat

[10:50] <@Brannoc> *Kernos* Any hope of a group version of the beastlord ferocity spell and any plans to make it useful again?
[10:53] <@Prathun> Because of the diminishing returns on offense, and the fact that most other melee increase effects are capped, don't work for all classes, or don't stack, it is difficult to improve upon Ferocity (or similar spells).
[10:53] <@Prathun> I can look into introducing a group version of previously single target spells, as I did with the beastlord mini-focus in Serpent's Spine.

So dont hold your breath for improvents I take that to mean.

[hokarz]

I thought we re-hashed the group ferocity question to death? If it's not mana effecient to cast it on one player, it's not going to be mana efficient to cast it on a group, at least one of whom will be a healer of somekind. That's not fixing the spell at all :(

[Khauruk]

Rashere's planned changes (raising mob AC) will certainly (if extreme enough) make Ferocity desireable again.  If done right, a group version could be very nice then, as well.  But, we'll see if they don't inadvertently break all melee dps, or make it desireable only for high end raiders at the same time. Here's to hoping!

[Sikkem]

I thought we re-hashed the group ferocity question to death? If it's not mana effecient to cast it on one player, it's not going to be mana efficient to cast it on a group, at least one of whom will be a healer of somekind. That's not fixing the spell at all :(

It was hashed to death like every other discussion on Fero has been. The trouble is some beastlords like to buff others state they will never buff anyone and most sit somewhere in between.

Prathun has said twice now that Fero's usefulness has decayed over time due to the caps, he has also said that it is difficult to make Fero any better than it is due to various reasons. Yet even after Tastion pointed this out to him god knows how many expansions ago he continues to give us new versions of the Ferocity line.

Comparing Champion with Ruthless Ferocity I believe we have a case to have it made into a group spell with at worst costing no more mana than Champion.

Champion gives 140 to attack whilst R. Fero gives 224, most of which is wasted because of the caps.
Champion gives 140 to str, dex and agil whilst R. Fero gives 62 to stam, melee are more likely to have stam capped than the other 3 stats.
Champion gives 10% damage bonus whilst R. Fero gives 67 to resists, its a melee buff whislt resists are nice both spells are meant to be short duration dps increasers.
Champion has a duration of 6 1/2 minutes and a 1 min recast time whilst R. Fero has the same duration but a 2 min recast time.

Champion costs 1500 mana R. Fero costs 900. Or look at it this way a shaman can keep Champion on 2 groups for 3000 mana whilst for 2700 mana a beastlord can keep R. Fero on 3 people. If you add in a shamans greater buff extension ability and mana savings from specialisation they can probably keep it on 2 groups for the same as it costs us to keep it on 3 people.

Then you add in the royal pain in the arse it is to actually buff rogues these days, for me a group version for when these AC changes go in would be a god send.

But maybe thats just me. Either way from what hes said I cant see them adding a mod2 to it.

[Urim]

Group Fero .... seriously!? This crap is still being brought up?

[Khauruk]

*IIIIIFFFFFF* mob AC goes up high enough, it could be worthwhile.  Especially if implemented w/ Fero as rank 1, group Fero as rank 2

If it removes single target fero upgrades, it's junk
If it's added and nothing else happens to change viability of attack buffs, it's junk
But, since devs aren't interested atm at adding mod2s to Ferocity, and are rather looking at 'fixing' the system that's making it suck....if they succeed, a group Ferocity could be useful.

[hokarz]

I can't imagine the devs going back and changing AC values on all the present mobs, so that leaves future mobs with the higher AC values requiring more attack. So, in the present form Ferocity sucks. In the future it may be useful. I can't recall if fero and champion stack now. I hope in the future that they will and add a sv vs corruption to ferocity of xx. I wouldn't mind a group version if it was more mana efficient that what we have now. And by mana efficient, I mean it would cost the same to cast single target 2 times or group version, once.

[recoil silverclaws]

Today i went on a hunt for information for a way to try and find something that would improve/fix fero my first thought was to maybe add a hundread hands effect to it but at a small modifier bass of 1 rather then 5 (what the zerker ancent cry is) i had high hopes but the more info i found the less the idea seemed like one we could get away with. I ran the idea by a good friend of mine bouncing the idea off him and he pointed out that while it might be good now upgrading the spell from 1 to 2 later on would be very problematic so i scratched that.

While bouncing ideas off him he brought something up that could be a good way to go. Adding a accuracy % to fero something around 5% would be a good starting number and as the spell gets upgraded later on it could move up 1% at a time. Now 5% isent huge think if you have a accuracy of a flate number like 70% with fero on at a 5% accuracy mod your accuracy would come out at about 73ish% he is a very big numbers guy and knows eq's system better then anyone i know probly as well as the devs and said it is doable. The only thing in the game atm that i know of is the sk epic click

http://lucy.allakhazam.com/item.html?id=48136

I like the idea mostly because it isent stepping on anyones toes it has room to improve upon later on with out causing huge problems and it stacks with everything in the game and most of all while it is a descent amount of an improvement its far from game breaking. 

So what do you guys think i know it was something brought up earlier but i now know it is possible to do if people like the idea i could bring it up to prath or at the least send him the info as best i can to at least let him know of the idea. And im a firm believer that group fero is the devil and wont solve anything = )

[Grbage]

Accuracy would be a good idea but one quick question, does +accuracy have a cap? This is an important one because if there is even this can be quickly outdated.

[Khauruk]

+accuracy is capped at 150 as a worn effect.  It would need to be coded like some of the ranger AAs, or apparently the SK epic click (link please).  Right now the devs seem to be not noticing when we say accuracy not affected by the worn item cap, as they are thinking of the mod2 suggestions as being worthless in high end raiding for just that purpose.

[recoil silverclaws]

Aye i don't mean the mod accuracy i mean a set % i did link the sk 2.0 the click it self adds 40% that stacks with everything. Here is a direct link to the click it self.

http://lucy.allakhazam.com/spell.html?id=6268

[Urim]

The +% accuracy is the exact thing i've posted before and it is what i sent Prathun during the TBS beta along with other changes to the spell. I received no acknowledgement that he even received it or looked at it and the fact he is talking about increasing mob AC to improve Fero instead shows he doesn't want to change anything about the spell.

Fero is pretty much dead and nothing short of revamp of combat code or complete revamp of spell will fix it and it appears that it wont happen anytime soon.