- Consolidation: Seigan temporarily replaces Third Eye after proc.
- Consolidation: Merciful Eyes is now simply a proc-effect. While Eyes Opened is active, you gain a shield equal to 400 potency of healing which will only affect attacks which would reduce you below 20% HP. Can prevent fatal damage if the 400 potency would save you. Shield consumed upon use of Seigan. If not consumed by the time Eyes Opened ends, heals for the remaining shield amount.
- Consolidation: When Guren would strike only one target, Senei is used instead. (Appears as a dynamic key based on number of enemies in front of you.) May be decoupled by manually adding Senei to your hotbar while Guren is already present.
- Shoha increased to 120 potency per stack, to a maximum of 960 potency at 8 stacks. This extra margin has been added to ensure that one does not waste existing stacks when entering a long jump phase. Thus, a full Meditation at level 80 exactly doubles its effect from 600 at level 70 to 1200 potency at level 80. Simple, but also gives Meditation a little extra oomph.
- Meditate decoupled from the server tick. Now grants Kenki and Meditation instantly and then once per GCD until having reached a maximum of 5 ticks. This guarantees that each woven use will be worth 240 potency, and held use tapers to 240 ppgcd. Animation gains an initial flourish that lets it better fit woven use aesthetically. Now has 2 charges, so that you always have 1 to use for a period of downtime.
- Tsubame-Gaeshi now has an 8-second grace period (i.e. holds onto your most recent Iaijutsu for 8 seconds). Now scales with SkS.
- Tsubame-Gaeshi now applies a GCD equal to that of your other weaponskills, rather than a fixed 2.5-second GCD. This better maintains CD-sync and conserves at least 15% of a GCD's uptime (worth roughly 63+ potency).
- Hagakure returned. Gives 15 Kenki per use on a 30-second CD, scaling with SkS. 2 charges. With no other changes, this would be worth a mere 32 potency. With the changes listed further below, it neither grants nor costs potency (neutral-potency). Hagakure now introduced earlier, at level 58. Swaps places with Merciful Eyes.
- Shinten again gives only 300 potency (efficiency 12, down from 12.8), returning Samurai's positionals to a smooth potency value of 60. This will be a running theme.
- 20 potency from each finisher shuffled instead to Hakaze. This does not change combo potency or ppm (except faintly during MKSS), but means that Kaiten on Gekko/Kasha does not simply replace Shinten at 12 potency per kenki). This reduces the net potency value of Hagakure from 32 to 0; it is now purely a QoL tool. It also puts SAM at a simple 420 ppgcd outside of TG/MKSS.
- Seigan buffed to 240 (efficiency 16), giving it a potency bonus over Shinten of 60 (4x15). More noticeably worth using.
- Guren smoothed back to 800 potency. Senei smoothed to 1000. This gives Guren the same efficiency as Seigan and Senei the same efficiency increase over Seigan as Seigan gives over Shinten. Efficiencies: 12->16->20.
- Iaijutsu now uses a cast time of 60% of GCD from the start (1.5 base, 1.35 under Shifu and 1.3 after level 78). Enhanced Iaijutsu changed to Flash of Steel, which gives Gyoten and Yaten a second charge each and allows Iaijutsu and Tsubame-Gaeshi a 20-yalm range when carrying at least 10 additional Kenki and a charge of Gyoten, causing it to use Gyoten to immediately reach the target to deliver the Iaijutsu attack. This takes up no additional animation lock and Gyoten will go off slightly before the cast would otherwise complete such that the travel time does not delay the GCD. This better allows for SAM's mobility to be used without issues of desync or uptime loss.
- Balancing/Sums: Assuming one could already perfectly match Tsubame-Gaeshi, completely avoid Hagakure, and would never miss nor delay a Meditate weave, the above following changes would cost SAM roughly 80 ppm. However, such is almost absurdly unlikely. If one had to use even a single-Sen Hagakure per minute, as typically the case in the leading E2S SAM parses, each use would have cost a minimum of 108 potency (or 217 for 2 Sen, 326 for 3 Sen). A single missed Meditate weave would previously have cost 220 potency. Holding onto Meditate for an upcoming period of downtime would have cost 220*minutes_held.
Thus, while the theoretical maximum has decreased minutely, SAM should be far more consistent in its output across varying fights, all while feeling smoother to play (i.e. no longer having to follow one and only one 1sen-Haga-per-TG rotation to feel fluid and tightly designed).
What I'd have preferred for 5.1 Samurai
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10-20-2019, 03:54 AMShurrikhanWhat I'd have preferred for 5.1 Samurai
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10-20-2019, 03:56 AMShurrikhan
Reserved for notes and responses.
Why the Nerfs?
Merciful Eyes and TE-Seigan ConsolidationRead the "Balancing/Sums" section.
Guren-Senei ConsolidationI chose not to consolidate ME with TE and Seigan with Shinten because leaving Shinten and Seigan separate allows one to bank Seigan for later use to perfectly max gauge before raid buffs. They have distinct Kenki costs, after all, and I prefer it that way. I like the 10/15/20/25/50 cost range.
Moreover, I saw no reason to make ME an active skill. It is only ever useful when it prevents death, but that can be handled passively with just as much interaction as it has now. In all other cases, it merely overheals you in light of AoE healing. By simply using it as passive last-ditch healing that can be granted at end of effect if it doesn't prevent death in the meantime it maintains the exact same use without cluttering the bar.
Finally, I buffed ME from 200 to 400 because a mere 200 potency is outright insignificant, hard even to notice in its effect on one's health bar. If I could fix Second Wind as well (say, to 1200 potency instead of the mere 6% or so of HP it currently grants at level 80), I'd likely buff ME further to 600 potency.Yes, this would inadvertantly make it so you could never mistakenly hit Guren in single-target. I honestly believe these single-alternatives to be merely bloat, as there is not a single ST situation in which we'd use the AoE variant, nor a single AoE situation (even with only 2 targets) in which we'd use the single-target version, and so I am okay with that.
You can still reposition around the target to get other enemies out of your line of attack in order to use Senei specifically, just as you would have done when you only had Guren in order to avoid, say, hitting CCed, damage-reflecting, or explode-on-death mobs. -
10-20-2019, 05:43 AMEndariel
Of anything, just replace shinten with seigan whenever the latter is available
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10-21-2019, 12:17 AMShurrikhanAnd throw off your TA window maximization? Keep in mind one costs 67% more gauge than the other. They're not mere potency-variants of each other.Quote:
Originally Posted by Endariel
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10-22-2019, 04:20 PMShurrikhan
Edits:
- Spaced out the bullets.
- Shrunk down the explanations a bit.
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10-23-2019, 03:07 AMDeithwen
I personally just wish they would remove that server tick thing from meditation. In its current state, it will force us to fish for server ticks, and that is terrible.
This made me switch from monk to sam, and now both have to fish for it. On top of that, ps4 players can't even do that effectively, I just can't understand how the dev team can be so clueless. -
10-23-2019, 07:47 AMShurrikhanSadly, that seems like it'll just get more vital, as it'll now provide a third of a Shoha atop its 128+ potency of Kenki value. Just as awkward to fish, and even more depends on it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Deithwen
Wouldn't want to allow for more than one fluid rotation anything, nah -- let's just make one of the three most awkward mechanics even more prominent and call it a day... -
10-23-2019, 07:52 AMDeithwenAgreed, they could have taken time to fix the rotation and making more fluid instead of forcing samurais to have a filler combo, this doesn't make sense at all.Quote:
Originally Posted by Shurrikhan
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10-23-2019, 07:56 AMShurrikhanI think it largely has most to do with the 1-Sen-Haga-per-TG rotation. It's honestly quite smooth. ...It's just that if a single part gets messed up, things quickly fall apart. Haga's too big a potency trap to use except to perfect TG, and TG's too difficult to perfect without Haga and its potency trap.Quote:
Originally Posted by Deithwen
We'll have to see what the SkS scaling does for our viable breakpoints, but I'm not expecting any significant increase in our number of options (which together are what give the toolkit's impression, rather than just one particular macrorotation's impression, of fluidity). -
10-23-2019, 08:18 AMAllooutrick
Just a request, could you link where you found this?
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10-23-2019, 09:47 AMShurrikhanFound what? These aren't patch notes. These are, as per the title, what I'd have preferred.Quote:
Originally Posted by Allooutrick
We're getting a 3-stacks Shoha with stack generation from IJ, TG, and Medi, and TG scaling with SkS (making Medi more powerful without making it more reliable, making Hagakure even more punishing, and making it very possible to waste Shoha damage from generating stacks before a long jump).
These are what I'd rather have.
As for the 1-Sen-Haga rotation, just... try it for yourself. You can also quickly see how it's used in top SAM parses via fflogs. -
10-26-2019, 12:54 AMAllooutrickOh ok. I derped pretty hard just then. I tend to avoid parsers so I'll trust you on these statements. It'll, also be interesting to keep these things in mind as I get my samurai into the 70s (currently low 60s).Quote:
Originally Posted by Shurrikhan
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10-26-2019, 07:13 AMDeithwen
Great news, seems like Meditation is now GCD based, so no server tick fishing !
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10-26-2019, 11:21 AMShurrikhanI'd have preferred to still have it be weavable, but reliable. This is a second best outcome, though, albeit out of really only the three (balanced around Meditation weaves and those weaves are reliable, balanced around them and they're not reliable, or not balanced around them at all)?Quote:
Originally Posted by Deithwen
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10-26-2019, 07:38 PMRyazYeah, looks like it'll strictly be used during downtime now, which I'm fine with. From some napkin math on The Balance discord, Sam is supposedly getting a decent buff from this patch, despite the nerf to combo potencies.Quote:
Originally Posted by Deithwen
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10-26-2019, 11:05 PMLiam_Harper
I'm ok with the Meditate change, it'll be a downtime tool now. We could have done much worse.
However, I notice Meditate has a max stack of 3 now. Does this mean if you unavoidably have 1-2 stacks going into a downtime phase that you cap at 3 and "lose" the excess? I'm not a fan of that if that's the case. -
10-27-2019, 01:50 AMShurrikhanIf it works like any other stack system currently in the game... yes, sadly.Quote:
Originally Posted by Liam_Harper
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10-27-2019, 05:38 AMRyazYes... but you should still be able to get the Kenki for the full duration, which is what Meditate will be used for mostly. Even if you go into downtime with or without stacks, you're only going to have 1 Shoha available by the end either way.Quote:
Originally Posted by Liam_Harper
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10-28-2019, 12:08 AMLiam_HarperBut if you go into the downtime phase with 2 stacks, you only "gain" 1 from Meditate. Whereas if the fight timing favored Sam and you'd just used Shoha and went in with 0, you'd gain 3 and another Shoha as you come out. Which means we're at the mercy of how Shoha lines with downtime unless I'm missing something?Quote:
Originally Posted by Ryaz
If (example) Meditate gained 3 stacks for a full duration but had a cap of 5, we could bank the excess 2 and lose nothing regardless. -
10-28-2019, 07:17 AMShurrikhanFrom the wording, it might have been reduced to giving one stack regardless, a hard nerf to Meditate, but avoiding that particular issue. Guess we'll see.Quote:
Originally Posted by Liam_Harper