[quoteDisclaimer
Everything seen on the preview server, Lamannia, is not final and is subject to change or removal before live release.

This is the BALANCE CHANGES: SPELLS portion of the release notes.

Preface
Nukers are fairly strong right now overall, but we've identified two particular outliers: Alchemists and Fire Sorcerers. There are several factors involved in why they're ahead of others, but one of the largest factors in both are their top-end spells. Multivial and Meteor Swarm are significantly ahead of their fellow top-end-nuker spells, largely due to good damage dice, below-average cooldowns, and significant boosts to caster levels. As a result, we've brought those spells down to be much closer to Acid Well, Iceberg, and Thunderstroke - and met in the middle on cooldowns, buffing those three spells in the process. While this won't solve all disparities between nukers and other kinds of characters, we believe this brings them a little closer together, makes other kinds of wizards and sorcerers a little more viable, and makes partying with these nukers less one-sided.

On the other side of the spectrum, a lot of offensive spellcasters that don't have access to the Wizard and Sorcerer spell list needed a boost. This patch targets offensive spells across a wide variety of builds and aims to bring up the floor of the spellcaster spectrum considerably. We have also fixed key bugs with Druid to allow its premier CC ability, Earthquake, to correctly scale its Duration in Reaper Mode. We have also made a special effort to target underused spellbooks, such as Artificer, by giving them access to key offensive spells to round out their repertoire. Finally, we have additional plans in certain enhancement trees in a later post that address some remaining concerns with Spellsinger and Arcanotechnician specifically. We expect these changes to significantly boost the viability of Divine, Druid, Bardic, and Artificer offensive spellcasters across all levels of play.

Alchemist, Sorcerer, and Wizard Spells
Iceberg's cooldown has been reduced to 6 seconds for Sorcerers, 9 seconds for Wizards.
Thunderstroke's cooldown has been reduced to 6 seconds for Sorcerers, 9 seconds for Wizards.
Acid Well's cooldown has been reduced to 6 seconds for Sorcerers, 9 seconds for Wizards.
Meteor Swarm's cooldown has been raised to 6 seconds for Sorcerers, 9 seconds for Wizards.
Multivial's cooldown has been raised to 9 seconds.
Multivial's damage dice has changed to 1d4+3 (Element) per caster level per projectile.
Master of Spellvials no longer applies to Multivial.
Multivial spells now cost 40 SP for both the core spell and the Bombardier SLA versions.
Fixed Multivial's tooltip to show the correct Max Caster Level (20).
Meteor Swarm's Max Caster Level has been reduced from 30 to 20 to match Iceberg, Thunderstroke, Acid Well, and Multivial.


Artificer Spells
The spell Static Shock has had its damage dice changed to 1d6 per caster level.
The spell Lightning Sphere has had its damage dice changed to 1d6 per caster level.
The spell Elemental prod has has been reworked:
Touch Range. Target enemy takes 1d6 per caster level in two of three elements (Fire, Force, or Electric) chosen randomly each time. Elementals are also Dazed.
The spell Blast Rod has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+3 per caster level.
The spell Lightning Motes has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+2 per caster level.
The spell Prismatic Strike has been reworked:
Ray spell. Enemy takes 1d6 per caster level in two of three elements (Fire, Force, or Electric) chosen randomly each time. The enemy is also subject to 2 of 3 CC effects (from the original Prismatic Strike) chosen randomly each time.
The spell Tactical Detonation has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+3 per caster level for both Fire and Force damage.


Bard Spells
The spell Sonic Blast has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+1 per caster level.
The spell Soundburst has had tis damage dice changed to 1d6+1 per caster level, and now has a Max Caster Level of 15.
The spell Shout has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+3 per caster level.
The spell Greater Shout has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+3 per caster level.
The spell Horn of Thunder has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+3 Sonic and Electric per caster level.


Cleric/Favored Soul Spells
The spell Nimbus of Light has had its damage dice changed to 1d6 per caster level, and now has a Max Caster Level of 15.
The spell Inflict Light Wounds has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+2 per caster level.
The spell Chill Touch has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+2 per caster level.
The spell Deific Vengeance has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+4 per caster level.
The spell Inflict Moderate Wounds has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+4 per caster level.
The spell Searing Light has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+6 per caster level.
The spell Inflict Serious Wounds has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+6 per caster level.
The spell Sun Bolt has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+3 per caster level.
The spells Chaos Hammer/Holy Smite/Order's Wrath/Unholy Blight have had their damage dice changed to 1d6+8 per caster level.
The spell Inflict Critical Wounds has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+10 per caster level.
The spell Flame Strike has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+5 per caster level.
The spell Slay Living has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+10 per caster level.
The spell Cometfall has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+3 per caster level.
The spell Destruction has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+10 per caster level and now has a Max Caster Level of 20.
The spell Fire Storm has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+8 per caster level.


Druid Spells
The spell Produce Flame has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+1 per caster level.
The spell Splinterbolt has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+4 per caster level.
The spell Salt Ray has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+6 per caster level.
The spell Call Lightning has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+6 per caster level.
The spell Fire Seeds has had its damage dice changed to 1d6 per caster level (per PROJECTILE).
The spell Word of Balance has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+12 per caster level.
The spell Sunbeam has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+7 per caster level (no max caster level, so it's lower than other spells of this type/level).
The spell Sunburst has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+4 damage per caster level.
The spell Ice Flowers has had its damage dice changed to 1d6+8 Piercing and 1d6+8 Cold damage per caster level.


Additional Spell-Related Changes/Clarifications
The Inflict Wounds, Mass spells will now use the new versions of their dice as per above.
Additionally, the Inflict Wounds spells will only use this new dice against enemies. This will not adjust potential self-healing for Undead players.
The Druid spells Call Lightning Storm and Storm of Vengeance will now use the new Call Lightning damage dice.
Artificer now has access to the level 1 Sor/Wiz spells Fire Bolt and Shocking Bolt.
Artificer now has access to Chain Lightning at spell level level 6.
Admixture spells are now properly restricted with Epic Defensive Fighting.
All lingering spells (such as Web, Otto's Sphere of Dancing, and Evards) now correctly calculate their duration in Reaper and obey the 6 second floor. This means that spells such as Earthquake will now function even in Reaper 10, where previously they ended almost as soon as they were cast. [/quote]
[quoteDisclaimer
Everything seen on the preview server, Lamannia, is not final and is subject to change or removal before live release.

This is the BALANCE CHANGES: COMBAT STYLES portion of the release notes.

Preface
When looking at the spread, popularity, and usability of combat styles, we came up with a few concrete goals. We wanted to boost the DPS and versatility of SWF, expanding its usage outwards to better cater to hybrid builds. We also wanted to tone down the DPS of THF slightly while leaving the AoE capabilities top-tier, as that niche is part of what makes THF so compelling. We also looked at the DPS of TWF, and found that while we think it's in a balanced place offensively, the companion feats for TWF needed a lot of help to become more compelling defensive options. We ran through several iterations of Two Weapon Blocking before we decided to simply remove it entirely, merging it with Two Weapon Defense, and we also wanted to further incentivize it by adding a MRR cap boost. Natural Fighting needed adjusting to match THF, but it also needed some extra special incentives at the top so that both Bears and Wolves would be happy switching their feats to the new Perfect combat style feat. Finally, we wanted to add more compelling combat options for Shield Fighting. Its Perfect combat style feat is very defensive, but that's Shield's niche, and we wanted the style to retain its defensive elements at the top end. These are also coupled with some buffs to the Vanguard tree's T5 options, to help make that tree more of a competitive choice versus Kensei or Knight of the Chalice, and you can see those in the Balance Changes: Enhancement Trees/Misc Post.

Single Weapon Fighting
New Feat: Offhand Versatility
Req: BaB 8, Single Weapon Fighting
Your offhand item modifies your main hand:
Runearms and Orbs now grant: when you vorpal strike, your next spell automatically crits. This has an internal cooldown of 20 seconds (lasts for 20 seconds).
Nothing in your offhand increases your ability score modifier to damage by 25%.
Fighters may select this feat as one of their Fighter Bonus Feats.


Perfect Single Weapon Fighting
Now also increases your ability score modifier to damage by 25%.
Now also grants an additional +10 combat style bonus to Melee Power.


Two Handed Fighting
The Two Handed Fighting, Improved Two Handed Fighting, and Greater Two Handed Fighting feats now increase your ability score modifier to damage by 25%.

Perfect Two Handed Fighting
Now also increases your ability score modifier to damage by 25%.


Natural Fighting
The Natural Fighting feat now increases your ability score modifier to damage by 25% while in Bear or Dire Bear form.

New Feat: Perfect Natural Fighting
Req: Level 26, maximum experience in one Primal sphere Epic Destiny, at least one copy of Natural Fighting.
If in Bear form, your Two-Handed ability mod increases by .25, and your Bear form's bonus to Armor Class is increased by 5%.
If in Wolf form, +15% competence bonus to maximum hit points, and you gain +2d6 sneak attack dice.


Shield Mastery
New Feat: Greater Shield Mastery
Req: BaB 13, Improved Shield Mastery
You are exceptionally skilled with the use of a shield, and your physical resistance is increased by 10 when using a buckler or small shield, 15 when using a large shield, or 20 when using a tower shield. Your doublestrike chance while using a shield is increased by 2% to 10%. Your Combat Style bonus to Melee Power is increased by 4 to 10.
(These bonuses do not stack with previous feats, so this is a net gain of 5 PRR with each type of shield (5 -> 10 for buckler/small shield, 10 -> 15 for large shield, 15 -> 20 for tower), 2% doublestrike, and 4 Melee Power.).
Fighters may select this feat as one of their Fighter Bonus Feats.


New Feat: Perfect Shield Mastery
Req: Level 26, maximum experience in one Divine sphere Epic Destiny (same as other Perfect Combat Style Feats), and Shield Mastery.
You are the paragon of shield usage, able to effectively leverage all types of shields in close combat. Your shield gains +1W, and you gain +20% Shield Armor Class and +5 PRR.


Two Weapon Fighting
Two Weapon Defense
Now grants everything that Two Weapon Blocking did, as well as its original +1 AC and +5 PRR.
Now also grants +10 MRR Cap.


Two Weapon Blocking
No longer a feat! Should no longer be trainable!


Misc Combat Style Changes
Shield Mastery feats now contribute to Epic Defensive Fighting (including the new ones). [/quote]
Quote:

Good, I always hated when other players litter the marketplace.
I want the complete single player experience.

I hope this shit of a game goes into maintenance mode sooner than later.

Notanarc wrote on Feb 9^th, 2021 at 8:59pm:



Yes. That's a significant nerf.

Head-Meat wrote on Feb 9^th, 2021 at 9:12pm:


Ferd wrote on Feb 9^th, 2021 at 7:28pm:



Wait, this is legit and not just another troll like that fake producers letter a few days ago?

Fuck me then. Finally found a character I actually liked.

As sure as night follows day! I guess it's time to TR and play with more than two buttons again.

kum-gulp wrote on Feb 10^th, 2021 at 6:38am:


It kills the stacking Enhanced spell power from RL belts and also the same spell power bonus you could get from Greensteel off-hand Ash weapon.

Yeah, the RL belts.

shocking and unpredictable changes amirite they have never released power creep for money as the newest flavor and then nerfed it once sales drop off could this be the beginning of a new trend

Edrein wrote on Feb 10^th, 2021 at 12:29am:

It does NOT help handwrap monks. I know someone who tested on Lam.

noamineo wrote on Feb 10^th, 2021 at 2:19pm:

You obviously never tried to cancel AOL in the 90's.

Quote:


Mattyo wrote on Feb 10^th, 2021 at 2:55pm:


LOL!!!!

Quote:





Remember all the sample CDs they sent out to people? Like 10 free days or something. You could get a long time for free by collecting those.  Ha!

Technomage wrote on Feb 10^th, 2021 at 1:38pm:


So a buff literally only to rangers then. Since practically every other TWFer aint going to have the free feat slot to piss away.