Nerf (Hellfire) Warlock

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Shadowspinner70
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Re: Nerf Warlock

Unread post by Shadowspinner70 »

Since my warning, things got so borderline I don't even know where to start.

Please, do not make me pick where to start. I'm going to pick if I have to. If you received a warning in PMs, that if your official warning. If you have not, this is a general and quite official warning.

Let's bring this back to why and why not warlocks should be nerfed, and how or how not. If we can't do that, I'm going to avoid locking the thread but other measures will be taken.

Let's avoid old drama, new drama, or what have you. Anything that shouldn't be aired out on this thread can be aired out elsewhere. When we consider the decorum of the forums, we are more likely to change minds and hearts.
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EasternCheesE
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Re: Nerf Warlock

Unread post by EasternCheesE »

A Hateful Drow wrote: Thu Jul 01, 2021 12:28 pm I'll go back to the main thing:

2) The first thing is they have a Ranged Touch Attack that deals a lot of damage and that also has a variation that has no SR and no save involved. Being this, vitriolic I think it's called in english.

4) Retributive invisibility is just like greater invisibility but permanent. 50% concealment is too much.
As most things you say are quite constructive (thanks) and sum up things good, i won't agree or disagree with them. I will point at two things that i consider just being wrong from mechanical perspective.

2) I would like just point at one thing many people somehow keep ignoring. Dedicated blaster warlock deals ~100 dmg/round against single target. If that is considered huge damage, what do you say about pure rogues who can deal 300 from first flurry and 600 from 2 flurries with 20d6 SA dice? Or rangers, who deal 60*3 manyshot damage and can kite enemies infinitely?? Or STR builds that deal 40 dmg a hit? Or weaponsmasters that crit for 300 and that always feel like they do it every other round?
Warlocks don't have lot of damage. Warlock is discounted ranger in terms of damage dealing when it doesn't come to AoE. In fact, warlock is only damage dealer when they fight 5+ mobs at the same time and they still trade it that they hit every enemy equally without being able to kill one fast, thus, get hit less often.
Sorry, but if your PC is dedicated for adventuring and you don't have 100 dmg/round, or high AC or UMD usage of wands of displacement/mirror image (which is possible for everyone), while wanting to solo things, i'd say the problem is not in warlock. In other words, if you don't have enough AC to allow for lower damage or higher damage to kill quick or spells/abilities to conceal or wands to emulate spells, it's totally your PC not adjusted for adventuring in solo. True, warlocks give many of those options out of the box, but, it's totally possible to achieve same dmg and same AC and same 50% concealment with almost any class if you think about it for few minutes.
Warlock is only easy mode, because it just progress it's blast and warlock user don't need to think where they get X and Y. It's a very noob-friendly class with good QoL features, many other classes require more skill in building to achieve the same. But, for them, it's not rocket science either considering the amount of builds already existing on nwn2DB and the fact all dmg/ab/ac sources are already documented. But can other classes achieve what warlock does with just a bit of planning and UMD? Most totally can.

4) Okay, say, we remove this completely. For invis, warlocks still have walk unseen. For displacement, displacement wands/scrolls/potions, items with displacement N times/day exist too if they don't want to burn gold every time. Thing is, warlock don't need displacement all the time. It only needs it where any PC with similar AC actually needs it. So, displacement is already available to anyone who can just go and buy that cloak/armor or anything. Just check the shops. And before you say it costs gold, displacement (9) scroll is available in CK for 280 gold without appraisal check kicking in. Quite cheap if used wisely and not spammed randomly.
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Rad-Icarus
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Re: Nerf Warlock

Unread post by Rad-Icarus »

cosmic ray wrote: Wed Jun 30, 2021 8:00 am Instead of making bad classes good, we should make all good classes bad. Only when everything is totally unplayable will we all achieve our perfect forms as roleplayers.

This is reductive and unhelpful.
c2k
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Re: Nerf Warlock

Unread post by c2k »

When playing a blaster-oriented warlock, nothing is more deflating than seeing "Ranged Touch attack: **..." in the combat bar. :lol:

If you want to nerf Con-lock, implement 0 Attribute death. In PnP, when you hit 0 attribute due to penalties, you get instant KO'd in some form, (I think Str and Dex is Incapacitation, Int/Wis/Cha is unconsciousness, and Con is straight death). The problem with Con Lock is if you build it right, you can go to 0 CON and not care about it.
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mrm3ntalist
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Re: Nerf Warlock

Unread post by mrm3ntalist »

Rad-Icarus wrote: Sat Jul 03, 2021 1:11 pm
cosmic ray wrote: Wed Jun 30, 2021 8:00 am Instead of making bad classes good, we should make all good classes bad. Only when everything is totally unplayable will we all achieve our perfect forms as roleplayers.

This is reductive and unhelpful.
It is not actually. It expresses an opinion using sarcasm, that instead of focusing so much on nerfs, focus to improve any classes that needs it and QoL changes. Especially focus on fixing things that have been broken for years.
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Progressive-Psy
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Re: Nerf Warlock

Unread post by Progressive-Psy »

mrm3ntalist wrote: Mon Jul 05, 2021 12:25 pm
Rad-Icarus wrote: Sat Jul 03, 2021 1:11 pm
cosmic ray wrote: Wed Jun 30, 2021 8:00 am Instead of making bad classes good, we should make all good classes bad. Only when everything is totally unplayable will we all achieve our perfect forms as roleplayers.

This is reductive and unhelpful.
It is not actually. It expresses an opinion using sarcasm, that instead of focusing so much on nerfs, focus to improve any classes that needs it and QoL changes. Especially focus on fixing things that have been broken for years.
Crazy that Mentalist has to point out that its sarcasm :lol: What's even more crazy is that the focus is to bring down power of classes instead of increasing it of the weaker ones..

A: Upset/annoy people.
B: Make people happy and excited.

I will never understand why A is even a thought.
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Tanlaus
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Re: Nerf Warlock

Unread post by Tanlaus »

Progressive-Psy wrote: Mon Jul 05, 2021 5:23 pm
mrm3ntalist wrote: Mon Jul 05, 2021 12:25 pm
Rad-Icarus wrote: Sat Jul 03, 2021 1:11 pm


This is reductive and unhelpful.
It is not actually. It expresses an opinion using sarcasm, that instead of focusing so much on nerfs, focus to improve any classes that needs it and QoL changes. Especially focus on fixing things that have been broken for years.
Crazy that Mentalist has to point out that its sarcasm :lol: What's even more crazy is that the focus is to bring down power of classes instead of increasing it of the weaker ones..

A: Upset/annoy people.
B: Make people happy and excited.

I will never understand why A is even a thought.
The problem with ‘just buff everyone else,’ is two fold.

1st is trivializes pve content. If everyone can blow through every epic map solo it trivializes the entire server’s content. This also makes it difficult for builders who spend a lot of time trying to balance content in their dungeons for appropriate level ranges. So either they make everything too easy and just assume players will blow through it, or make it so hard only a group of power builds has a chance. Part of the enjoyment for builders- who are entirely volunteer- is creating challenges that can be enjoyed by the player base, not as a minor impediment to get to the next loot box. This kind of attitude under appreciates both their work and the value it adds to the server.

2nd it creates a problem in DM events. It a couple warlocks can just AoE everything DMs throw at a group of players it creates balance issues for how they run their events. If you balance for that what does everyone else do? Besides relegating themselves to the roll of henchmen. If everyone is buffed up what happens? The only challenge DMs will then be able to throw at players is hordes of legendary creatures. Suddenly all fights have to be super epic because nothing else is a challenge.

Lastly the argument that only nerfs happen really undermines the efforts of the dev team. Crusader just got a nice bump, shadow dancers got a bump, several other classes have bumps incoming. A new shifter class- long requested- is incoming. New gear has been added for long under represented weapons. More stuff has been added to the loot table. There has been weekly bug fixes to make the split run smoother… the split itself allows builders to add more high level content that has been lacking but we didn’t have the space for before. That in and of itself was a huge effort.

The only real ‘nerf’ was Monk of the long death. Which was not a nerf. If you read the thread it was granting things it was never supposed to grant, coupled with an AC stacking bug. Every other kit in the game makes you give up something to get something in return. MoLTD gave you a everything a full monk had on top of their bonuses with some beneficial bugs thrown in.

Is it too weak now? Maybe. Maybe it needs to be rebalanced. That’s what testing is for. But that testing itself could never happen until the kit was working as intended in the first place.
IDrinkAndIKnowThings
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Re: Nerf Warlock

Unread post by IDrinkAndIKnowThings »

Hey all, just wanted to pitch in as a newer player with my experience as a warlock. I'm playing a CONlock with 4 levels dip in rogue, for that sweet sweet evasion and background reasons. I can say that while I enjoy playing my warlock because I love the flavour I don't feel like it being an "easy" class to play is due to it being disgustingly OP, rather because as a warlock you only have literally 12 tools(invocations) and it's easy to know your way around them and blast, or shapeshift and melee, so it's hard to go wrong.

I feel it's worth mentioning I have eaten absolute (#2) from the PvE environment, and I've seen maybe half of the surface realm, as I'm only level 28 and have yet to face many of the epic bosses. Speaking of bosses, I would never dream of facing them alone, or even tank them for a group, even though my AC is 54 in human form with UMD use and can get to 62 if others buff me AND I shapeshift. Why? Because my damage, while relatively reliable, is low. I hit reliably for 50-70 damage on bosses, and that's a 13d6 blast with Eldritch Master, so i really don't think this damage is OP considering I need to invest Epic Feats to get it.
I think Hellfire Warlocks can, as of now, cheese the mechanics and get insane damage out, that outshines all but the most dedicated builds, which in turn don't get the other goodies that all warlocks do, and that might skew the perspective, suggesting all warlocks are that powerful, which as far as I can say, they're not.

I also want to point out that from a Roleplay perspective, I have to justify my powers, I've had characters ignore me, scoff at me, act hostile or try to redeem me even though I'm not "evil", which is great for my experience, but it's really not something I've seen any other class have to do in my limited time on the server, so that's a part of how warlocks "pay" for their powers I guess.

Kaedrin's blasts are too large in size, and should be reduced.
Warlocks can't really dispel a full caster, which is a bummer.
Hellfire Warlocks are a different breed, and should be scrutinised as such, their inclusion in a build is an obvious power-grab, though the same can be said for HipS-giving classes, but I feel if you really want to build for that and either blast away or hide-and-shoot at dragons it's not like you're ruining anyone's fun right?

In conclusion, a regular warlock is an endurance class, given a few tools to work with, good defensive abilities and reliable (though not stellar) damage. It's good but not godlike, and like most classes it can be built to be broken, but it's not OP per se.

Also, screw Xvart shamans, hate those guys.
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Re: Nerf Warlock

Unread post by edmaster »

This is some crazy mental gymnastics
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Re: Nerf Warlock

Unread post by Kanada »

I have probably played more warlocks on BGTSCC than anyone. Been here since 2011 (off and on) with over 4200 hours on just 2 PWs. Warlocks are very strong, but they aren't at the same time. They have a low skill ceiling and a lot of tools but you will never exceed 120dmg per round. Yeah they can sit there and blast all day, but that's /all/ they can do. Most of the tools that let warlocks do things differently (glaive, guttural) are not implemented here, leaving warlocks with about 3 viable builds.

If people want to have a problem with HFW I get it, but trying to nerf the base class is just sour grapes. Also the fact that warlocks cannot play controllers, and that everything has high saves and evasion means that half of the very limited amount of invocations are useless.
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Re: Nerf Warlock

Unread post by Steve »

mrm3ntalist wrote: Mon Jul 05, 2021 12:25 pm Especially focus on fixing things that have been broken for years.
Like some attitudes towards others, and ideas?

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Lockonnow
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Re: Nerf Warlock

Unread post by Lockonnow »

many forgot that a warlock can miss his target and whan that happen he get hit so he need to have a high ac to to stand to the blow that comes in he's way so how power is he then if you need lots of ac feat then you blast is not that strong if you go on solo on the high epic areas
Terankar
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Re: Nerf Warlock

Unread post by Terankar »

I think that the biggest thing is Warlocks have an incredibly straightforward process. As mentioned before, making a pure warlock doesn't really require many things. You can basically pick skill focus feats all the way to lvl 30. You will still work, you will still be viable and you can still perform well.

I would compare it with a monk. They grow in the same as a pure class character and grow in strength in a similar fashion.

They both have very specific strong builds. A Conlock and a pure Wis monk. Both super strong as a pure class and it is pretty simple to build.

The same goes for casters. It is straightforward as a pure class, BUT they have sooo many options to build in a different path. A warlock doesn't, monk as a majority monk classed character doesn't have many options as well.

TL;DR - Warlock is simple to level and build - Many other classes have a lot of options - The Warlock has potentially 3-5 mechnically great options with Conlock being S tier in mechnical power. Other classes can achieve this too, but utilizes their options to do that. The Warlock is basic and in some sense casual to build.
c2k
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Re: Nerf Warlock

Unread post by c2k »

mrm3ntalist wrote: Mon Jul 05, 2021 12:25 pm It is not actually. It expresses an opinion using sarcasm, that instead of focusing so much on nerfs, focus to improve any classes that needs it and QoL changes. Especially focus on fixing things that have been broken for years.
Like the game's AI. Make the AI keep up with the Joneses. :lol:
EasternCheesE
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Re: Nerf Warlock

Unread post by EasternCheesE »

c2k wrote: Tue Jul 06, 2021 12:17 pm
mrm3ntalist wrote: Mon Jul 05, 2021 12:25 pm It is not actually. It expresses an opinion using sarcasm, that instead of focusing so much on nerfs, focus to improve any classes that needs it and QoL changes. Especially focus on fixing things that have been broken for years.
Like the game's AI. Make the AI keep up with the Joneses. :lol:
Well, fixing AI would require a very skilled dev in this particular field and then rewriting half of game cause most of this stuff is blackboxed.
With rewriting core blackboxed mechanics, it's just easier to make Bgtscc on Unreal engine or whatever :)
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