FalsePromises.6398

Oh yeah, also, when I mentioned splitting barrier in half and applying the second half after a 3 second delay, I forgot to mention I wanted that to synergize with abrasive grit to grant the extra might and second cleanse in order to up the scourge's defensive and buffing capabilities. I do know scourge has strong capabilities in such fields, but I feel that's largely at the feet of transfusion, which, although I do love transfusion with all my heart, I must admit is a little overtuned on scourge, and should have its support pulled back a little (akin to how the curses corruption on F2 was nerfed) to allow other scourge mechanics to shine with unique support and consistent healing.

We all know that with the rework, scourge has become a little bit clunky, not just in playstyle but also in the traits. I want to propose a few fixes of my own idea that would help to not only make traits synergize better with the new shade style (note, change from shades being placed area denial to a "tradeoff" of whether to place or not) but also help put more direction back into classic shades and sand savant shades. I'll begin with some proposals for traits, because I want those to be the forefront of my proposition, but then place some other ideas into play that may help fix scourge's awkwardness not just with classic shades and the new tradeoff, but also with target numbers and radii. I will bold the key phrases that I want to be taken away from each change, but encourage you to read through the entire explanation of each one. Without further ado, the traits: When considering the new "tradeoff" idea of considering whether or not to place shades at the cost of personal retaliatory damage and defense, a few traits seem a little awkward in application, traits that revolve around having shades, or placing shades, eventually become a little clunky when you can't always rely on such mechanic to activate their benefits, or else you risk losing other mechanics. These traits include: Sand Sage, Blood As Sand, Sadistic Searing, and Desert Empowerment. Below, I will explain what these traits used to do, and what I believe would make them better and more streamlined with scourge's style: Sand Sage: This trait used to give extra concentration and expertise per shade out, and would grant all benefits from having one sand savant shade out. What I propose is to not just change how the effects apply, but also what they grant. I suggest a new style, where instead of granting benefits for having shades out, Sand Sage would instead grant benefits for casting shade skills, such as the F2-F5 abilities. The benefits would be long lasting, but would have long duration and stack, so as to benefit long duration fights without instantly buffing or benefitting scourge for spamming. Furthermore, I propose the removal of the concentration to instead grant condition damage. My proposal: make casting a shade skill grant a +30 condition damage and +30 expertise benefit that stacks up to 10 times, stronger than the previous possible total of +225 stat increase, so as to increase shade damage for raid environments. Such an effect would last maybe 30 seconds to a minute, depending on how one wishes to implement it into the game: it's ultimately not my decision.Blood As Sand: Blood as sand used to grant an incoming damage decrease per shade out, 5% per, for a total of 15% damage reduction. Instead, what I propose is to rework the function of this skill. A few ideas come to mind, one being to rework it in the same method as Sand Sage and grant a stacking damage reduction benefit each time a shade skill is casted. However, I feel like scourge should have a more active trait: I propose that casting a shade skill grants a unique weak, stacking regeneration effect, akin to adrenal health on warrior, perhaps to all affected allies of the shade skill, or only to the scourge itself (or just grant regen, since after focus changes, scourge has a dire lack of such boon). Such an idea would be difficult to implement, but I feel would benefit support scourge to be more than simply barriers and revives, seeing as their mainstay is literally gimmick damage sponging or picking up downed players, even when geared like a true support. Perhaps this could (and if implemented, should) come at a cost to transfusion (seeing as scourge transfusion is a VERY strong revive/heal skill that gains a much lower cooldown than the core life transfer when taking scourge) or maybe at a cost to barrier. The idea is up in the air, but that's what I feel would benefit scourge as a support and defensive playstyle, seeing as gaining the shade tradeoff reduced its offensive adaptability. Sadistic Searing: This trait used to grant a buff that would apply burning the next time a shade was cast after using a punishment skill. It was rather clunky from the start, in my opinion. and I feel like an easy fix to it is to simply move the burning from placement to the next shade skill cast. It would allow a little more streamlining of offensive buffs into offensive playstyles, instead of having to revolve a damage increase around a placement ability that near every player knows to dodge out of and stay away from, or any monster that ends up inside a cast already dies rather quickly.Desert Empowerment: This trait used to grant barrier at the location where a shade was placed. Obviously, this trait has been overshadowed by Harbinger Shroud as a barrier applying ability, and seeing the tradeoff of placing shades has made this trait a little less favorable for mobile fights. I propose, since Harbinger Shroud seems to be more an offensive functionality rework instead of what would be considered a raw barrier benefitting skill, I see a new idea for this trait that would put a little bit more shine towards it against Harbinger Shroud. I propose this skill should split all barrier gained by 50%, half applied immediately, and the second half applied after a three second delay, akin to scrapper's Damage Dampener, and then increase all barrier applied to allies (but not to scourge) by a small static amount, perhaps 10-20%. Such a change would greatly change barrier's functionality to scourge, seeing as most of their barrier is instant, hard numbers instead of gradual stacking numbers, and would offer more barrier viability not only in PvP, but would also strengthen barrier in PvE content during prolonged fights with consistent, medium damage or the likes. Here's where I move to some ideas for scourge shade changes. The trait changes alone would, in my opinion, do scourge very well, but some shade mechanics could benefit. These are largely suggestions, but I believe they'd benefit scourge greatly towards adaptability and combat relocation. Return point blank AoE effects to ONLY the classic shade skills, and ONLY when less than 3 shades were cast. Returning the point blank benefits to classic shades only would make a proper tradeoff in Sand Savant, making a legitimate choice between the large, focused area denial of a single upscaled shade, or the personal defense and adaptability of multiple smaller shades and personal effects. Increase the radius of all shades (Sand Savant and classic) by 60 each. We all knew from the start that the classic shades were rather awkwardly small, especially in PvP content, which funneled scourges into picking Sand Savant. Sand Savant will remain larger, at 360 radius, but the classic shades will increase to 240 radius (AKA about the size of a necromancer staff mark (not the explosion/blast radius though)). Such a change would help make a little more sense of the scourge's target limit increases despite lack of radius increase. For comparison, a Sand Savant shade would become the size of a renegade spirit aura, and a classic shade would become the size of a necromancer staff mark. Sand Savant would still be better in area denial, but classic shades would benefit in holding multiple strategic points at once without being near completely avoidable given their small size. This one's a little bit rough in my eyes, but adding a threshold to the shades where they would despawn when out of a given radius at the benefit of slightly recharging shade cooldowns would likely benefit scourge's ability to roam a map, especially with the classic shades. If they perhaps recharged 3 seconds of shade cooldown when the scourge is longer than 1800 radius from their shade (given shade skills only work at 900 radius), it would allow better combat cooldown recovery of a scourge in consistent mobile combat.tl;dr - rework old scourge traits to remove emphasis from casting/having shades out, and possibly rework shade area, mechanics, and despawning to better streamline scourges in prolonged combatThanks for reading all that if you actually did read it! If you have any ideas or contributions, feel free to add on. I know a few other scourge traits are rather lackluster, like Nourishing Ashes, so if you have any ideas, add away!