DRK Fix Salted Earth Please

I know there are lots of issues with DRK atm, and they are all valid, but what i'm not seeing are posts about salted earth.

Making it appear at your feet was a bad change, added nothing to the class, and was pointless (if you were going to do that, just turn it into an AoE DoT and be done with it). Please change it back to a targeted ability, thank you.

While they're at it, they should make Salt and Darkness also teleport you into the center of Salted Earth from within a range of 20y or so.

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Originally Posted by fallynnknivez

I know there are lots of issues with DRK atm, and they are all valid, but what i'm not seeing are posts about salted earth.

Making it appear at your feet was a bad change, added nothing to the class, and was pointless (if you were going to do that, just turn it into an AoE DoT and be done with it). Please change it back to a targeted ability, thank you.

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Ehm i actually like it better that way, also used a macro to drop it under me all the time.

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Originally Posted by Arohk

Ehm i actually like it better that way, also used a macro to drop it under me all the time.

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Same, couldn't use it without a targetting macro.

I agree with the OP; Salted Earth was a really fun skill when you could drop it at range. There was a small but satisfying skill differential between players who would just automatically drop it underneath themselves or the boss (and miss damage whenever the boss had to be moved during its duration) and people who would place it to anticipate movement, add spawns, etc such that they could move the boss without taking them out of the ground effect, or to catch extra enemies. It's not really practical/possible to do that now that it just drops at your feet like a fart.

The ground-target interface also just made it feel like a unique input that set it apart from all the other skills that are just a simple button-press, and removing that is one more small step into degrading the actual gameplay feel of the class.

Agreed - Crater already explained it very well.

While I understand that there were people who had issues with the skill before and had to macro it, I don't think this would still be an issue with all the changes to ground targeted abilities which we got in 6.0. You can just pre-place your cursor and then double-tap the hotkey for easy manual placement.

Although it would also be nice to have Salted Earth's uptime increased back to something closer to what it was prior to SHB, so that those good placement moments can really shine like in some Stromblood encounters.

I prefer the drop at feet.
I'm on console so when it activates the cursor is always close or really far away.
If I want to position it for future movements I'll just go there and drop it.

I definetly consider it worse in the current state, i undertand that some don't wanted to think much about it and place it on his feet and if the boss leave well to bad but what about those who preffer to place the aoe under the target feet or just freely place it in a more optimal way like before? both options have been removed for no reason by locking the aoe under your feet when using macros for that or on target feet worked perfectly fine, it's basically a steep back but im actually mre surprised the skill has survive despite how bad and boring is when all the other ground dots of the game has been basically obliterated or reduced to aoe situations.

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Originally Posted by Satarn

Agreed - Crater already explained it very well.

While I understand that there were people who had issues with the skill before and had to macro it, I don't think this would still be an issue with all the changes to ground targeted abilities which we got in 6.0. You can just pre-place your cursor and then double-tap the hotkey for easy manual placement.

Although it would also be nice to have Salted Earth's uptime increased back to something closer to what it was prior to SHB, so that those good placement moments can really shine like in some Stromblood encounters.

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Unfortunately this alienates all console users.

You can still anticipate movement and stand where you want to drop it.

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Originally Posted by Seraphor

Unfortunately this alienates all console users.

You can still anticipate movement and stand where you want to drop it.

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This would work on a ranged dps/caster, but it's not really an option when tanking, or even just fighting as melee in some cases.

Gamepad users can still use a macro for either character or enemy-based placement, depending on preference.

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Originally Posted by Seraphor

Unfortunately this alienates all console users.

You can still anticipate movement and stand where you want to drop it.

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I have to say i always been playing with a gamepad and never have issues with placing salted earth, the skill places where the virtual mouse is, so if you activate it and place it on the middle of the screen and deactivate it, salted earth and any skill of the same design will alwais apear in a perfect position to aim with it with your right jostick easily.
But at the end of the day is mostly about we haved 3 ways to place the aoe before, all of them perfectly viable and offering no problems whatsoever, and reduce it to 1 alineating all players who preffer any the other 2 for no reason since you can't macro it on target foot or have any control of his placement without move your character wich reduce a lot his versatility.

Just get rid of it in the DRK rework unless you are going to do something cool with it - not salt and darkness. Like a defense up or a self-buff, self-sustain hot dot… almost anything but the current.

The only way it should stay is if they can have it out for 10 or so seconds and if an enemy goes through it then they get a defuff that gives them a dot for x seconds. It’s a pain to use in its current state. It’s even more of a pain when you factor in the weakness of the dot itself…

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Unfortunately this alienates all console users.

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I have played with a controller with no issues before, and still prefer it. I get how some people could see it as a pain, but again, if its just going to drop at your feet, just turn it into an AoE DoT and negate the placement issue all together. My point is, with things you place on the ground, you SHOULD be able to place them, not just hope their in the right place. This is especially true in things like savage where every little bit counts sometimes.

Circle of Scorn is better by virtue of being a DoT and not requiring to stay in one place. As well as being used up to 3x as much. In multiple mob packs making it do more overall damage and has no damage falloff.

Meanwhile mobs need to stay in the circle for a full 15 seconds for the full 250 from Salted Earth and only the first enemy gets a 500 potency attack and then has 50% falloff on the rest so arguably 750 potency on one enemy and 500 on everyone else but can only be used once every 90 seconds. Given all enemies within the circle are there for the full duration.

So PLD overall has more damage through multiple packs through sustained damage while DRK has more burst but can only use it I wanna say every other pull in a dungeon. And once every 1.5 minutes on a boss.

You can argue that Salt and Pepper is more powerful but it is more restrictive in it's use. And it shows up at 86 meanwhile you can ideally use Circle of Scorn and get your overall 750 potency every 90 seconds from lvl 50 up to 90.

Salted Earth is a very unique and iconic DRK skill, and one of the precious few last surviving elements of the 3.0 kit - I can't fathom why people are demanding it get removed or homogenized to function like Bowshock or Circle of Scorn. Is Salted Earth perfect? Absolutely not, but the developers adding Salt and Pepper to the kit shows that they value refining the skill over deleting it.

I personally want SaE to have a shorter CD for more frequent use, even if that means SaD needs to have its potency adjusted to compensate. I also wouldn't be opposed to giving the DRK a small defensive boon while they stand within their SaE (like an HP leech with each tick).

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Originally Posted by Garlan

Salted Earth is a very unique and iconic DRK skill, and one of the precious few last surviving elements of the 3.0 kit - I can't fathom why people are demanding it get removed or homogenized to function like Bowshock or Circle of Scorn.

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to be completely honest, i would prefer it stayed, but just return to targeted. when i was running trash dungeons i loved using it for trash aggro. drop it in one corner on some mobs while i grabbed another and ran into it, was also good for letting people know where i was fittin to be. obviously you wouldnt want to do this in progression, but when you run the antitower for the 800th time, it was fun, and unique to dark, and i miss it. truthfully, it was the straw that broke the camels back this expansion that has me playing warrior instead of toughing it out like i had planned.

I have no issue with ground targeting on controller the place marker always followed my camera so i just look down quickly and it dropped salted earth at me
bit funny they added a huge QoL to ground targeting but then changed salted earth to always be under you

just DRK things i guess

I have been saying this since the start. salted earth was made worst for no reason. If possible just do both. Button hold Places it at your feet and the regular press lets you place it. IDK if a system like that exists in the game but if not then make it.

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Originally Posted by Garlan

Salted Earth is a very unique and iconic DRK skill, and one of the precious few last surviving elements of the 3.0 kit - I can't fathom why people are demanding it get removed or homogenized to function like Bowshock or Circle of Scorn. Is Salted Earth perfect? Absolutely not, but the developers adding Salt and Pepper to the kit shows that they value refining the skill over deleting it.

I personally want SaE to have a shorter CD for more frequent use, even if that means SaD needs to have its potency adjusted to compensate. I also wouldn't be opposed to giving the DRK a small defensive boon while they stand within their SaE (like an HP leech with each tick).

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salted earth if far from being an unique and a iconic DRK skill, Shadow flare and Doton existed before DRK was a thing in the game, from all the unique mechanics and skill they could choose to keep and upgrade they choosed the one that ppl have most problem with and the most generic one so it's normal ppl want it go, Salted earth is just to poor and for that they should have keep scourge instead.

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Originally Posted by shao32

salted earth if far from being an unique and a iconic DRK skill, Shadow flare and Doton existed before DRK was a thing in the game, from all the unique mechanics and skill they could choose to keep and upgrade they choosed the one that ppl have most problem with and the most generic one so it's normal ppl want it go, Salted earth is just to poor and for that they should have keep scourge instead.

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I never said Salted Earth was unique as an overall concept, just unique for DRK when its kit is compared to other tanks. No other tank has a static AoE they have to place to output additional DPS. Also, comparing Salted Earth and Scourge is not really a fair comparison - one is an AoE oGCD with a CD and the other is a spammable ST GCD weaponskill. The fact both happen to be DoT's is irrelevant.

People are crying for DRK to gain an identity, and I firmly believe Salted Earth can be a powerful tool in accomplishing this. Square could pivot into adding enhanced defensive utility to a DRK who happens to stand within their own patch of Salted Earth during the duration - a small HP/MP leech for each target damaged per tick, a minor 5-10% damage reduction, increased healing from healing actions, ect. For all the WoW veterans, a good example of what I hope could happen with DRK and Salted Earth would be how Blood Death Knight gains defensive benefits from their Heart Strike/Blood Boil abilities while they stand within their Death and Decay.

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Originally Posted by Garlan

I never said Salted Earth was unique as an overall concept, just unique for DRK when its kit is compared to other tanks. No other tank has a static AoE they have to place to output additional DPS. Also, comparing Salted Earth and Scourge is not really a fair comparison - one is an AoE oGCD with a CD and the other is a spammable ST GCD weaponskill. The fact both happen to be DoT's is irrelevant.

People are crying for DRK to gain an identity, and I firmly believe Salted Earth can be a powerful tool in accomplishing this. Square could pivot into adding enhanced defensive utility to a DRK who happens to stand within their own patch of Salted Earth during the duration - a small HP/MP leech for each target damaged per tick, a minor 5-10% damage reduction, increased healing from healing actions, ect. For all the WoW veterans, a good example of what I hope could happen with DRK and Salted Earth would be how Blood Death Knight gains defensive benefits from their Heart Strike/Blood Boil abilities while they stand within their Death and Decay.

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The keyword is iconic, Dark arts was an iconic skill and mechanic, Darkside was an iconic skill and mechanic, Salted earth is just a generic skill placed on one of the tanks, being difereciated in the role for a generic skill present on other roles is not what i personally consider ideal to make DRK get a proper identity again specially when DRK complains about identity are based on DRK being just a bunch of copy pasted skills from other jobs and a absurd amount of fluff so it's normal why ppl think it should be no more.

semantics aside yeah Salted earth could be better but considering we are craving for unique skills and mechanics no present on any job in the game modifing Salted earth would archive nothing at all or to be fair very little at least and is better take it away and bring other old skills that did way more that this round ground aoe.