An SF Balance that makes sense

Okay, so, everyone boohoos about sf, yes, I agree it's rather broken, could use a balance, but not obliteration, I see the potential of balancing it as a golden opportunity for something new in the game!

See it from this perspective, in this game, everything has a guaranteed counter, conditions have removals, same with hexes, there's even skills that prevent them, Spells being cast upon you have counters aswell the list goes:

SB SF OF VoS

Okay, Sf, obviously broken because it also fits into this category, Prevents all attacks from striking:

SF (mist form is KIIIINNNDA here, but attacks still hit)

So here's my suggestion, remove the anti spell aspect of SF, just leave it as a constant block of attacks. WE DON'T HAVE THIS IN THE GAME YET!

I already know what you're going to say "we'll all he needs then is an SB monk to constantly SB him" EXACTLY!!!! Two people with bars completely geared towards keeping a tank alive is so much closer to being balanced, a majority of speed clears would no longer function, and would no longer be very "speedy" as they'd require so many monks to keep all the sins up, destroying that meta, but at the same time, it could still be used for tank and spank builds and niche farming spots, keeping everyone happy, it's not nerfed into the ground, but it also no longer owns everything ever, gg.

*Tears eyes out*

Stopped reading.

FTFY.

Balance is appropriate, not obliteration, unless you think the change to smiter's boon was an intelligent well thought out and perfectly balanced one, in which case, you really don't want a balanced game do you? you're just citing "balance" in your arguments against SF as an idea, but not one you want to be fulfilled, just a pretty idea.

So you'd like another skill added to the list of functionally useless skills that already exists.

To quote a great bunch of hippies: "No one's right when everyone is wrong" Buffalo Springfield.

Balance does not equal invulnerability, in any sense. If you want to include Mist Form, Spell Shield, Obsidian Flesh, Spell Breaker in the category of what should be destroyed, that's fine with me too.

I was thinking that it might be interesting to toy with completely removing the ability to deal damage while under it.

There is no guaranteed invulnerability in any of those skills, they are all working in combination with others to achieve a closeness to invulnerability. And even then, the 600 monk with SB or spell shield can meet interrupts, and knock downs, the obsidian flesh can do meet the same fate, as can mist form hardly invulnerable, hard ot kill, yes, invulnerable, no. SF is the only one that avoids these things, so yes, sf in it's current state should be retooled so this is no longer possible.


That in combination with my suggestion would be brilliant. Then it would be useful only for what it was originally intended for, tanking.

Everyone claims to want it "balanced" when all they truly want is for it to be effed into the ground, and whine, and complain, and do nothing about it, at least I'm making suggestions that would lead to the "balance" people so claim to desire.

People would just go back to OF. DoASC wouldn't be much slower if at all with RR Candy.

You can't really do a simple Obsi vs. SB vs. Mist vs. SF comparison.
You also need to look at what line that skill is in, what other conditions one must fulfil to get the full advantage of the skill, ...
I am actually for keeping the whole "every attack and spell fails". It just that by doing so, you'd need to be effectively removed out of the game. It's insane defence should be countered by it's lack of offence.

I'd say keep it for running, but completely trash it for any kind of damage dealing.

(But then again, I might be partial because I like running with SF while I do not care about killing with it. )

My point still sort of stands though, think about how many people in the party contribute to keeping the tank alive and how many skills and skill bars are built just for that..... then look at the one skill bar needed or sf.

If it takes a group effort to keep someone alive to tank, it's more understandable.

set atk modifier to 0% (no dmg dealt as upier said) + some health/e degen, so that shadow form can be maintained a long time, but not infinitely without any secondary support.

droks run can be done with a dervish, so that one of the underpowered classes gets some pros, while sf still can be used to tank, just not to be out there solo / with other sins.

Zealous scythe, shadow refuge.

For limiting energy you could make it set you energy regen to +2 or something. To stop zealous scythes make it so you cannot attack/all attacks miss.

I like the idea of having a skill that allows another class to tank, however being invincible and still being able to deal damage is extremely OP.

I'm not sure if it's just the way I've played DoA, but the perma tanks cannot keep SF up indefinitely, meaning they must ball the group quickly, and the team must be fast in killing before SF drops. Something like this would be a good nerf for SF, however something different may be required, otherwise the game will just end up being spikeways, in fact it pretty much is.

Without some invincibility for extended (varying definition on the word extended) periods of time from a tank, pressure is phased out and spike meta is in, then rename the name to spike wars, so like you said, tanking and dealing damage at same time is op, that's the op part of sf.

Make it an Assassin Form, like dervs have. Make it a form that gives you ims and ias. No THEY CAN'T ATTACK YOU LOL bullshit.
If you want to balance something you might want to address the problem and make it balanced, not nerfed into oblivion. We have enough useless skills as it is.

Make it like a shadow. For Z seconds You deal X% less damage , recieve Y less damage , cant be target of foe spells , enchants and you recieve -75% less healing. Could be mantained ? maybe yes , or no , thats another question ofc .

PS: X Y Z depend of shadow arts ofc .

if you can use spells against shadow form, and not taking away the health loss, any foe with an enchant remover will get you down to 50 health and spank you... making it usless for 95% of the game.

you need to touch the skills around it, like deadly paradox, so that it cant be kept up constantly, hit glyph of swiftness needing points in air magic, or reduce movement speed while under shadow form so you cant 'speedclear'.

<--- Pretty much.
Skills that shouldn't be in the game should be effectively removed from the game.

Your trying to nerf a skill that it used by people who dont run UWSC though, its a catch 22, you nerf it for one group who exploit its power, and screw over the honest group who dont.

They should just add random traps around the underworld that spike for 400 damage and remove all enchantments from target who triggered them. That'd make balanced teams a must.

it was mentioned in another thread that since the addition of deaths charge to the UW, the old mechanic of keeping core only skills in the UW has been thrown out the window. This now allows for any skill in the game to be added to UW. Such as Sig of Disenchantment. Add this to a few areas thru out the UW, and SCs will be killed without upsetting the SF build as a whole. Since it is obvious that Anet doesnt want to piss off all those using SF, making them leave to play another game, and that redesigning the area to slow SCs down is the answer, then let them change the area with a few more extra wild cards.