Change Request Series: Berserk Mode

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

Hey, @Cal Cohen.2358/ @Cal Cohen.3527, bet you thought I almost forget the next in the series huh? Relax. I didn't forget. Now take a sip of Deer Park and have a listen.

Berserker has several very big problems with it. There are several VERY good ideas floating about the warrior subforum on how to address this, but you can only change the existing numbers, so lets look into that together shall we?

 

Problem: Berserker over penalizes itself. There I said it. Here is what I mean by that. All of it's usefulness is locked behind a mode that we cannot freely enter or leave. Beast Mode? Free to enter or leave. Shroud? Free  to enter or  leave provided a sufficient minimum Life Force. Photon Forge? Free to enter or leave. Celestial Avatar? Free to enter with enough  energy and free to leave whenever. All of these are subject to CDs of course. Berserk Mode? Requires a minimum of 30 adrenaline to enter, and cannot be exited once there.

And on top of that you take a toughness penalty for being there. AND you lose core burst to gain this functionality. No. Bueno. To top it off once you leave you have a 15 (12s traited) CD, which is longer than the aforementioned Modes.

Solution: Honestly it is to give it a way to exit Berserk Mode but you cannot do that.

Here is what you CAN do.

1) Berserk Mode: Reduce the CD to 8s.

Why? It is a forced T3 burst. Treat it like other T3 bursts and have the CD be 8s. This would be 6s traited, and is in line with Photon Forge, and would still have no way to exit. But this would reduce the downtime during which the Berserker is worse than a core warrior.

2) Fatal Frenzy: Reduce the toughness penalty to -150. I realize this was to 'mimic' being a light armor class, but the light armor classes have numerous ways to offset their low armor  values that Berserker just does not have. Anet could provide those defense in the trait line to justify the -300 toughness, like having Savage Instinct give 1s of Feel No Pain when you hit with a Primal Burst. But you can't do that. You can however reduce the toughness penalty until Berserker is given the proper tools to survive with -300 toughness penalty.

 

These two changes would not create OP Berserkers in competitive play, it would merely allow them to become more playable.

 

Edit:

Warrior brethren I forgot to add this before, but I'll say it again, please do not bombard this thread or follow up threads with your own suggestions. If you have commentary to add, keep it to the topic discussed directly in the thread. Remember, this is a convo with Cal, and he can ONLY change existing numbers. While there are several GREAT suggestions on what to rework popping up in this thread, this is not the place for it. Thank you though. I know we all have a plethora of ideas, and the majority of them all are very good ideas, but these series posts are narrowly focused, and geared towards what Cal can do balance wise rather than what needs to be completely reworked.

Edited September 3, 2021 by Lan Deathrider.5910
Forgotten plea to my brethren.

[Grand Marshal.4098]

Preach. This would be the first step to a better Zerker experience.

 

And if -150 toughness doesn't suit you, make it at least -180 so it can justify slotting a Dolyak Signet instead of picking Eternal Champion.

[kmark.8519]

But why do we have penalties in our game modes anyway? Recently with the 3 EoD elites, the largest complaint about them was that "why do we have to suffer penalties to do X", other classes don't even know whats a penalty to offset your powerful skills, they didnt even hear about this thing... yet warriors have to live with such stupid penalties all the time (and then suddenly some of our skills nerfed, but the penalties stay... wtf really)

[CalmTheStorm.2364]

1 hour ago, Lan Deathrider.5910 said:

Hey, @Cal Cohen.2358/ @Cal Cohen.3527, bet you thought I almost forget the next in the series huh? Relax. I didn't forget. Now take a sip of Deer Park and have a listen.

Berserker has several very big problems with it. There are several VERY good ideas floating about the warrior subforum on how to address this, but you can only change the existing numbers, so lets look into that together shall we?

 

Problem: Berserker over penalizes itself. There I said it. Here is what I mean by that. All of it's usefulness is locked behind a mode that we cannot freely enter or leave. Beast Mode? Free to enter or leave. Shroud? Free  to enter or  leave provided a sufficient minimum Life Force. Photon Forge? Free to enter or leave. Celestial Avatar? Free to enter with enough  energy and free to leave whenever. All of these are subject to CDs of course. Berserk Mode? Requires a minimum of 30 adrenaline to enter, and cannot be exited once there.

And on top of that you take a toughness penalty for being there. AND you lose core burst to gain this functionality. No. Bueno. To top it off once you leave you have a 15 (12s traited) CD, which is longer than the aforementioned Modes.

Solution: Honestly it is to give it a way to exit Berserk Mode but you cannot do that.

Here is what you CAN do.

1) Berserk Mode: Reduce the CD to 8s.

Why? It is a forced T3 burst. Treat it like other T3 bursts and have the CD be 8s. This would be 6s traited, and is in line with Photon Forge, and would still have no way to exit. But this would reduce the downtime during which the Berserker is worse than a core warrior.

2) Fatal Frenzy: Reduce the toughness penalty to -150. I realize this was to 'mimic' being a light armor class, but the light armor classes have numerous ways to offset their low armor  values that Berserker just does not have. Anet could provide those defense in the trait line to justify the -300 toughness, like having Savage Instinct give 1s of Feel No Pain when you hit with a Primal Burst. But you can't do that. You can however reduce the toughness penalty until Berserker is given the proper tools to survive with -300 toughness penalty.

 

These two changes would not create OP Berserkers in competitive play, it would merely allow them to become more playable.

*Standing ovation*

100% agree

[Infusion.7149]

I don't think Berserk Mode needs a massive recharge drop really so long as it is 12.75s traited with Strength. For example Death Shroud on Reaper is 10s cooldown, soulbeast beast mode is 10s cooldown, CA on druid has 20s cooldown in PVP and 10s in PVE/WVW, DH spear of justice is 20s cooldown, etc. It shouldn't be balanced around Photon Forge which is universally regarded as overperforming ever since holo went from 33K average DPS to 38K after the explosives rework.

In the snowcrows bench, Berserker actually has 72.7% to 89.6% berserk mode uptime depending on if you run banners. (see https://dps.report/sSdR-20210514-153504_golem and https://dps.report/4YSY-20210521-132629_golem)
In comparison the power reaper is only able to maintain 56% shroud uptime with no incoming damage or added mobs (37% for condi reaper). Condi holo has ~20% PF uptime, power holo sword has ~43% PF uptime, power soulbeast has ~45% Sic em uptime , FA hybrid weaver has ~48% FA uptime.
 

Blood Reaction has a decent bonus even outside of Berserk mode (~11% crit), so if Berserk mode increased attack speed by more percentage-wise (currently 15%) it would be an improvement when you are solo. Ability to manually drop Berserk mode would allow for more depth than just "go Berserk and hope they don't focus you".  It would enable a counterplay similar to dropping shroud or dropping out of photon forge to stop from overheating. The issues with Berserker are mainly in competitive modes IMO : Pure strike + magebane makes Berserk mode look bad ; core warrior can get 3 stacks of Berserker's Power (so the 14% offsets the entire Berserk mode 15% bonus in competitive modes from Bloody Roar). Maybe entering berserk mode could be made easier by generating adrenaline when you are hit by specific types of attacks as well (such as burning , chill, cripple, or weakness ... see Cleansing Ire which already has something like this) and the counterplay to Berserk mode could also be lessened by maintaining adrenaline regardless of in combat or not while in Berserk for Berserker spec.

Edited September 2, 2021 by Infusion.7149

[Broxxgar.6801]

The Destroyer gear give you exactly 600 of armor, corvering any problems with Berserk Mode penalty of armor.

 

I just want to found a Way in pvp to have this Berserker mode Uptime  would be insanely good. I dont wan't my berserker mode to ends 😭 @Infusion.7149

Edited September 2, 2021 by Broxxgar.6801

[Infusion.7149]

14 minutes ago, Broxxgar.6801 said:

The Destroyer gear give you exactly 600 of armor, corvering any problems with Berserk Mode penalty of armor.

 

I just want to found a Way in pvp to have this Berserker mode Uptime  would be insanely good. I dont wan't my berserker mode to ends 😭 @Infusion.7149

That's still a massive tradeoff. I don't see why you would run Destroyer amulet over a Berserker amulet + Fighter rune Spellbreaker for example. Just being able to rip protection or resolution is already a 33% damage boost and that's teamwide.

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

54 minutes ago, CalmTheStorm.2364 said:

*Standing ovation*

100% agree

/Bow

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

5 minutes ago, Infusion.7149 said:

That's still a massive tradeoff. I don't see why you would run Destroyer amulet over a Berserker amulet + Fighter rune Spellbreaker for example. Just being able to rip protection or resolution is already a 33% damage boost and that's teamwide.

This. It's several tradeoffs at once. Other especs do not have deal with this.

[WUROCKET.5182]

I 100% agree with lowering the CD of berserk mode, but I would not get rid of berserkers toughness debuff to preserve the classes extremely aggresive "berserk" flavor. 

 

Everyone talks about giving warrior some trait to combat the weakness condition, I think that would be a great addition to Berserker mode. Either outright making berserker mode immune to weakness or making weakness less effective.

[CalmTheStorm.2364]

14 minutes ago, WUROCKET.5182 said:

I 100% agree with lowering the CD of berserk mode, but I would not get rid of berserkers toughness debuff to preserve the classes extremely aggresive "berserk" flavor. 

 

Everyone talks about giving warrior some trait to combat the weakness condition, I think that would be a great addition to Berserker mode. Either outright making berserker mode immune to weakness or making weakness less effective.

Pushing back on this a little:

 

I personally agree with you; I think Berserker has the "correct" design in terms of getting big damage at the cost of having big vulnerability.  The problem is that so many other classes are capable of big damage without Berserker-style trade-offs.  For instance, how on earth do people think it's "balanced" for Reaper to do Berserker-level damage but actually get TOUGHER while doing it (and, up until a few days ago, were damage immune for a few seconds apparently xD)??

 

If classes like reaper are going to exist, Berserker needs to drop its toughness penalty--even though, in reality, Reapers (and classes like them) should be made more like Berserker and not the other way around.  That would be healthier for the game overall.  But it's easier to rework one class than it is to rework several, so removing Berserker's toughness penalty is a reasonable change.

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

32 minutes ago, WUROCKET.5182 said:

I 100% agree with lowering the CD of berserk mode, but I would not get rid of berserkers toughness debuff to preserve the classes extremely aggresive "berserk" flavor. 

 

Everyone talks about giving warrior some trait to combat the weakness condition, I think that would be a great addition to Berserker mode. Either outright making berserker mode immune to weakness or making weakness less effective.

That is fine and all, but Cal can ONLY adjust existing numbers. If the Dev team came out with a rework that beefed up the defensive portion of Berserk, great. Then keep the toughness penalty. But until that happens, Berserker does not have the tools to 'mimic' a cloth class tier of defense.

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

14 minutes ago, CalmTheStorm.2364 said:

Pushing back on this a little:

 

I personally agree with you; I think Berserker has the "correct" design in terms of getting big damage at the cost of having big vulnerability.  The problem is that so many other classes are capable of big damage without Berserker-style trade-offs.  For instance, how on earth do people think it's "balanced" for Reaper to do Berserker-level damage but actually get TOUGHER while doing it (and, up until a few days ago, were damage immune for a few seconds apparently xD)??

 

If classes like reaper are going to exist, Berserker needs to drop its toughness penalty--even though, in reality, Reapers (and classes like them) should be made more like Berserker and not the other way around.  That would be healthier for the game overall.  But it's easier to rework one class than it is to rework several, so removing Berserker's toughness penalty is a reasonable change.

Thank you. This is a very important balance point to consider @Cal Cohen.2358/ @Cal Cohen.3527. I'd personally not prefer not to nerf other classes because of deficiencies of warrior, specifically berserker in this case.

Please strongly consider reducing the toughness penalty on Fatal Frenzy.

[Broxxgar.6801]

1 hour ago, Infusion.7149 said:

That's still a massive tradeoff. I don't see why you would run Destroyer amulet over a Berserker amulet + Fighter rune Spellbreaker for example. Just being able to rip protection or resolution is already a 33% damage boost and that's teamwide.

When you are playing Berserker with Berserker Gear you are open to receive a high dmg too. The fighter rune can cover the armor penalty of Berserker mode. But Spellbreaker rune not. So as your dmg increase the enemy dmg increase it too on you.

Destroyer Gear give a little bit of sustain in your build, you trade off 200  of power and 400 of ferocity for 600 of toughness. So in a off mode you have more toughness than anyone on the battle and on Berseker you would still have more Toughness than anyone.

You have 3 gears to use with Berserk : Marauder, Berserker and Destroyer. Depends on the game and on the enemy composition.

 

 

46 minutes ago, Lan Deathrider.5910 said:

That is fine and all, but Cal can ONLY adjust existing numbers. If the Dev team came out with a rework that beefed up the defensive portion of Berserk, great. Then keep the toughness penalty. But until that happens, Berserker does not have the tools to 'mimic' a cloth class tier of defense.

The problem if I'm not wrong is the base stat of Armor for every profession be 2k. Should it be differente for each profession : Light, Medium and Heavy.

@Infusion.7149 I can say to you that on a Match I did 14k of critic dmg on a Spellbreaker  as Berserker.

Edited September 3, 2021 by Broxxgar.6801

[Infusion.7149]

11 minutes ago, Broxxgar.6801 said:

When you are playing Berserker with Berserker Gear you are open to receive a high dmg too. The fighter rune can cover the armor penalty of Berserker mode. But Spellbreaker rune not. So as your dmg increase the enemy dmg increase it too on you.

Destroyer Gear give a little bit of sustain in your build, you trade off 200  of power and 400 of ferocity for 600 of toughness. So in a off mode you have more toughness than anyone on the battle and on Berseker you would still have more Toughness than anyone.

You have 3 gears to use with Berserk : Marauder, Berserker and Destroyer. Depends on the game and on the enemy composition.

 

 

The problem if I'm not wrong is the base stat of Armor for every profession be 2k. Should it be differente for each profession : Light, Medium and Heavy.

@Infusion.7149 I can say to you that on a Match I did 14k of critic dmg on a Spellbreaker  as Berserker.

Read it again.

Spellbreaker SPEC not spellbreaker RUNE.

400 ferocity is ~27% crit damage. That's more than the entire bonus of Berserker's Bloody Roar (15% damage bonus) and Blood Reaction (8% crit on Berserker amulet , 9% or so on Destroyer amulet) combined .

Edited September 3, 2021 by Infusion.7149

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

15 minutes ago, Broxxgar.6801 said:

When you are playing Berserker with Berserker Gear you are open to receive a high dmg too. The fighter rune can cover the armor penalty of Berserker mode. But Spellbreaker rune not. So as your dmg increase the enemy dmg increase it too on you.

Destroyer Gear give a little bit of sustain in your build, you trade off 200  of power and 400 of ferocity for 600 of toughness. So in a off mode you have more toughness than anyone on the battle and on Berseker you would still have more Toughness than anyone.

You have 3 gears to use with Berserk : Marauder, Berserker and Destroyer. Depends on the game and on the enemy composition.

 

 

The problem if I'm not wrong is the base stat of Armor for every profession be 2k. Should it be differente for each profession : Light, Medium and Heavy.

@Infusion.7149 I can say to you that on a Match I did 14k of critic dmg on a Spellbreaker  as Berserker.

The base armor for each class is not 2k...

[Broxxgar.6801]

52 minutes ago, Infusion.7149 said:

Read it again.

Spellbreaker SPEC not spellbreaker RUNE.

400 ferocity is ~27% crit damage. That's more than the entire bonus of Berserker's Bloody Roar (15% damage bonus) and Blood Reaction (8% crit on Berserker amulet , 9% or so on Destroyer amulet) combined .

Still today I never received more than 8k or 10k from a Spellbreaker. 

 @Infusion.7149 In my tesxt I said that you need to choose between those amor gears. And thanks to bring data.
Its up to you to decide between a Arc Slice lvl 1(SB) or a Arc Divider(Berserker) that has 3 waves and has more range than a Arc Slice.

 

 

53 minutes ago, Lan Deathrider.5910 said:

The base armor for each class is not 2k...

@Lan Deathrider.5910 Thanks to correct me, isn't that I don't know, I'm more focused on my war than on my other classes now.

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

Just now, Broxxgar.6801 said:

@Lan Deathrider.5910 Thanks to correct me, isn't that I don't know, I'm more focused on my war than on my other classes now.

That's fine, we all don't know everything. It happens. No worries.

For your reading pleasure:
The various defense ratings

and

The HP pool difference between the classes

You'll notice that Warrior has the highest BASE defenses. But that means that Anet in 2012 gave us fewer means of active damage mitigation/kite potential than other classes, which the -300 toughness from Berserker REALLY  shows clearly.

 

We don't have things like 7-8 potential evades on any given weapon/skill combination, stealth, ports, blind spam, weakness spam, or even a FULL damage immunity (ours is all physical immunity only).

We get small frequent heals, cc, and meager shout heals. Most of all that is shut down by blinds, blocks, and evades since most of our useful self sustain requires to actively hit a target.

[Infusion.7149]

21 minutes ago, Broxxgar.6801 said:

Still today I never received more than 8k or 10k from a Spellbreaker. 

 @Infusion.7149 In my tesxt I said that you need to choose between those amor gears. And thanks to bring data.
Its up to you to decide between a Arc Slice lvl 1(SB) or a Arc Divider(Berserker) that has 3 waves and has more range than a Arc Slice.

 

 

@Lan Deathrider.5910 Thanks to correct me, isn't that I don't know, I'm more focused on my war than on my other classes now.

Arcing Slice doesn't have a wind up.

Also you need to build adrenaline to get into Berserk Mode, not get counterbursted, and then hit a Arc Divider. That's more or less only possible against terrible players or in WVW where your 1.75s animation is masked by skill spam.

[Broxxgar.6801]

30 minutes ago, Lan Deathrider.5910 said:

That's fine, we all don't know everything. It happens. No worries.

For your reading pleasure:
The various defense ratings

and

The HP pool difference between the classes

You'll notice that Warrior has the highest BASE defenses. But that means that Anet in 2012 gave us fewer means of active damage mitigation/kite potential than other classes, which the -300 toughness from Berserker REALLY  shows clearly.

 

We don't have things like 7-8 potential evades on any given weapon/skill combination, stealth, ports, blind spam, weakness spam, or even a FULL damage immunity (ours is all physical immunity only).

We get small frequent heals, cc, and meager shout heals. Most of all that is shut down by blinds, blocks, and evades since most of our useful self sustain requires to actively hit a target.

Thanks about the differecen of HP I knew it, but not at all.  I had pointed out of our high Toughness and HP pool on other thread. About 2k of armor I checked  it now  on build editor and almost every class has 2k or near it on PvP  : 1.8k for light, Medium and Heavy has 2k also. I'm more aware of PvP than PvE or WvW. PvP everything seem to be nearly equal and this affect the specs.



About the other things  you said, I know about it, that why I proposed the Disarm Skill to be there and about 'weakness 'this should not be able to affect if we are on frenzy, Berserk or any of this stance. Look on Last Stand trait it give you vigor boon when use stance, so understand vigor as it really is, it  should completely denie the weakness effect on my point of view, but I know that the game don't work as I'm saying.

 

Edited September 3, 2021 by Broxxgar.6801

[The Boz.2038]

Crazy, utterly insane idea, lifted shamelessly from the Reaper: Bloody Roar - Gain 3s Quickness and Swiftness every 3s while in berserk mode.

Base berserk mode should have a tiny bit lower cooldown. 12s base? 10? Not under 10.
Also, an *inversion* of default Rage functionality for the heal (it *ends* berserk, instead of extends, with extra +7% healing per second of berserk removed).

[anbujackson.9564]

2 hours ago, The Boz.2038 said:

Crazy, utterly insane idea, lifted shamelessly from the Reaper: Bloody Roar - Gain 3s Quickness and Swiftness every 3s while in berserk mode.

Base berserk mode should have a tiny bit lower cooldown. 12s base? 10? Not under 10.
Also, an *inversion* of default Rage functionality for the heal (it *ends* berserk, instead of extends, with extra +7% healing per second of berserk removed).

True the reaper grandmaster just gives you constant quickness for just being in shroud. Thats lazy though.

 

One of many suggestions was the application of quickness on primal bursts on burst of frenzy. But thats a little more than just number tweeking I guess.

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

26 minutes ago, anbujackson.9564 said:

True the reaper grandmaster just gives you constant quickness for just being in shroud. Thats lazy though.

 

One of many suggestions was the application of quickness on primal bursts on burst of frenzy. But thats a little more than just number tweeking I guess.

This. The better path would be to reward good gameplay, i.e. refresh on hitting with a primal burst. And yes, that is more than just number tweaking. 

[DKRathalos.9625]

Lan, where is the Burst of Aggression suggestion? XD

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

4 minutes ago, DKRathalos.9625 said:

Lan, where is the Burst of Aggression suggestion? XD

DK, the change request series is focused on the things that CMC can touch, which is the existing numbers. BoA needs to refresh when hitting with a Primal Burst, full stop. But, CMC can't make that change.