Latest Death's Judgment change is actually a nerf

[Antycypator.9874]

Quote

Malicious Death's Judgment: Increased power coefficient from 1.65 to 2.67 in PvE and from 1.11 to 1.339 in PvP and WvW. Reduced damage bonus per malice to 10% in all game modes

I have done some tests and it seems like DJ is hitting much less that before.

Who the hell thought that Deadeye need more unreasonable nerfs?

 

[Doggie.3184]

Looks like they tried to make Rifle less reliant on Malice so Daredevil can use it and did the math wrong? Still a bad weapon though, damage alone can't make it fun. It also still has the same gameplay Dual Pistols offers, one of the sets needs vastly redesigned.

[FrancisN.9276]

They can nerf all they want, since after the previous unwarranted changes, they have already lost the trust and financial support from thief community. Recession is going to hit hard next year and someone at Anet is going to lose their job. With the current balance team's popularity and their favoritism reputation, it is not hard to guess who.

[Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497]

Good god. They practically gutted Deadeye.

[KrHome.1920]

Patch Note:

• Reduced damage bonus per malice to 10% in all game modes.

According to:

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Malice

Death's Judgement had a 25% mutiplier per stack before. This was one of the key reasons why deadeye was broken in smallscale wvw (7x 25% = busted). This nerf might actually have fixed it as even with the base multiplier buff

• Death's Judgment: Increased power coefficient from 1.65 to 2.67 in PvE and from 1.11 to 1.339 in PvP and WvW

the maximum damage potential should be lower than before - especially in the competitive modes.

Edited August 23, 2023 by KrHome.1920

[Antrix.4512]

ANet, what's wrong with you? If this nerf is related to weapon specializations, then my respect to you for the work done (no). Deadeye is already an awkward spec with many limitations and bugs:

• Our rotation and DPS suffer if a random mob appears on the line of fire.
• Our rotation and DPS suffer due to Deadeye's Mark not activating because its ability priority is lower than weapon skills.
• Overall, the ability queue after pressing a button several times in a row is weird, often leading to more activations than needed, ruining the rotation and consuming more initiative.
• Deadeye's Mark is not applicable to many game objects that should be damaged/attacked, meaning almost no damage, and initiative is wasted.
• If we want to deal damage, we become a static object on the scene due to Kneel.
• Numerous bugs related to stealth shots, from random auto-attacks to getting pulled out of stealth.
• We are probably the only class that has to turn off many game settings because the spec is unplayable with them.
• We can almost correctly enter stealth through CnD only on a golem, it almost never works in combat conditions.
• If we somehow enter stealth in melee combat, the effect ends before our attack (1) hits the target, often making it impossible to discharge the malice bar, resulting in DPS and rotation loss.
• Should I list other flaws and bugs of this spec? And believe me, I can find a ton of bugs in the game like no one else; I don't know why I'm so "lucky" in that regard (check my thread)

I can understand someone from your so-called "balance team" disliking Deadeye in PvP, but why are you touching it in PvE? Let's put aside PvP - what is the rationale for this nerf in PvE? Our damage is primarily single-target, meaning in fractals, we hardly deal damage when moving between bosses. But never mind, let's move on, or some "very smart" people will tell me "nobody uses this spec in fractals, blah blah blah" (where else to use it?). I'll just say I often use the Daredevil build between bosses, switching between specs, but that's beside the point. 

Now let's look at bosses - we can only use Kneel on a VERY small number of them because we must constantly move. This spec has more limitations in the game, most of which are artificially created by the developers. But never mind, that's not so critical (but annoying, the essence of the spec is lost)... but if we often have to change targets between boss phases (Mai Trin and so on) - let's say goodbye to DPS, rotation, and cruel world.

Oh well, you're probably not even reading this, time to look for a class to reroll... just need to study the patch history to see who's your favorite that you never touch. 

Edited August 23, 2023 by Antrix.4512

[Sootser.9541]

Seems like they tried to change it so that other specs can use the rifle without being too reliant on malice, but the change is a definitive nerf.

If you have 7 malice the damage difference is 33% less damage now than before. That is huge for something that was lackluster already.

[SehferViega.8725]

They wanted to make Rifle playable on Daredevil (because on Core and Specter it has no sense) so they nerfed Malice bonus damage and they increased base damage.

They reduced Malice bonus damage from 25% per Malice stack to 10% in PvE and from 15% per Malice stack to 10% in PvP/WvW, increasing base damage by 60% in PvE and  20% in PvP/WvW.

The damage lost in PvE, if you have Maleficent Seven is huge..

[SehferViega.8725]

On 8/23/2023 at 8:32 AM, KrHome.1920 said:

Patch Note:

• Reduced damage bonus per malice to 10% in all game modes.

According to:

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Malice

Death's Judgement had a 25% mutiplier per stack before. This was one of the key reasons why deadeye was broken in smallscale wvw (7x 25% = busted). This nerf might actually have fixed it as even with the base multiplier buff

• Death's Judgment: Increased power coefficient from 1.65 to 2.67 in PvE and from 1.11 to 1.339 in PvP and WvW

the maximum damage potential should be lower than before - especially in the competitive modes.

In competitive modes the bonus damage per Malice stack was 15%, not 25%. 

Edited September 3, 2023 by SehferViega.8725

[Jijimuge.4675]

1 hour ago, SehferViega.8725 said:

They wanted to make Rifle playable on Daredevil (because on Core and Specter it has no sense) so they nerfed Malice bonus damage and they increased base damage.

They reduced Malice bonus damage from 25% per Malice stack to 10% in PvE and from 15% per Malice stack to 10% in PvP/WvW, increasing base damage by 60% in PvE and  20% in PvP/WvW.

The damage lost in PvE, if you have Maleficent Seven is huge..

1 hour ago, SehferViega.8725 said:

They wanted to make Rifle playable on Daredevil (because on Core and Specter it has no sense) so they nerfed Malice bonus damage and they increased base damage.

They reduced Malice bonus damage from 25% per Malice stack to 10% in PvE and from 15% per Malice stack to 10% in PvP/WvW, increasing base damage by 60% in PvE and  20% in PvP/WvW.

The damage lost in PvE, if you have Maleficent Seven is huge..

How so, with Maleficent Seven in PvE?

As far as I'm aware (correct me if I'm wrong) the effect of Malice is multiplicative - the below assumes that this is the case.

Prior to this change, the power coefficient of DJ was 1.65.  7 stacks of M7 ups the damage by 7x25% = 175%.  An increase of 175% is a mult of 2.75.  This equates to a final power coefficient of 4.5925 (=2.75x1.65)

After this change, the power coefficient is 2.67.  7 stacks of M7 ups damage by 7x10% = 70%, which is a mult of 1.7.  The final power coefficient in that case is 4.539 (=1.7x2.67)

That's not exactly a huge downgrade...

Also, if one were using other feats than M7 (and so, 5 stacks), the numbers work out that the new setup is very slightly better (3.71 past, now 4.005).  IMO, the main effect of this change in PvE is to make the total damage output of DJ less sensitive to how many malice stacks one has - one gets rewarded less for maxxing malice (apart from the boons granted of course)

As for PvP/WvW, M7 results in a coeff of 2.2763 (=1.7x1.339) now vs an old value of 2.2755 (=2.05x1.11)

As far as I can see, the numbers are pretty comparable, according to the details of the patch notes.  If anything, it looks to me like Anet have tried to get the numbers roughly the same as they were before when firing with 7 stacks of malice.

If DJ is hitting for significantly less than it used to, that could be a bug, or at least might mean that the in-game values don't match the patch notes

[Strutter.2719]

Okay maths wizards, I'm not gonna weigh in on deadeye but please answer me this:

With the latest change, how does rifle now stack up to pistols on daredevil?

Edit: actual numbers please, not soapbox time 🙂

Edited August 23, 2023 by Strutter.2719

[Doggie.3184]

1 hour ago, Strutter.2719 said:

Okay maths wizards, I'm not gonna weigh in on deadeye but please answer me this:

With the latest change, how does rifle now stack up to pistols on daredevil?

Neither of them are great. Rifle and Dual Pistols are the same exact weaponset except Pistols are more fun, due to speed, not having to kneel and fast breakbar, but cursed to do low damage and have a trait to reduce damage even more for inferior-to-ricochet-pierce for no reason (but even then it has pierce at all on all skills while Rifle only has it on #2) and black powder > bound combo is still bugged for all eternity making Condi PP unplayable in groups or any stealth related support, which also ruins scepter/pistol DD. Sad times. For example it ruins using the new 'Relic of Unseen Invasion' with such P/P and Sc/P builds cuz I can't dodge into stealth to give allies super speed cuz there will be fields everywhere overriding it.

Still wish they'd of just fixed Dual Pistols instead of designing Rifle at all. Complete waste of a weapon slot. Just think; Deadeye could have been something that gave us a new offhand instead, many years ago, and we'd of been much better off in the current state of Thief. I'd honestly rather do less damage with buggy Dual Pistols in all content than equip the Rifle.

 

Edited August 23, 2023 by Doggie.3184

[TheThief.8475]

On 8/23/2023 at 9:50 AM, Antrix.4512 said:

ANet, what's wrong with you? If this nerf is related to weapon specializations, then my respect to you for the work done (no). Deadeye is already an awkward spec with many limitations and bugs:

• Our rotation and DPS suffer if a random mob appears on the line of fire.
• Our rotation and DPS suffer due to Deadeye's Mark not activating because its ability priority is lower than weapon skills.
• Overall, the ability queue after pressing a button several times in a row is weird, often leading to more activations than needed, ruining the rotation and consuming more initiative.
• Deadeye's Mark is not applicable to many game objects that should be damaged/attacked, meaning almost no damage, and initiative is wasted.
• If we want to deal damage, we become a static object on the scene due to Kneel.
• Numerous bugs related to stealth shots, from random auto-attacks to getting pulled out of stealth.
• We are probably the only class that has to turn off many game settings because the spec is unplayable with them.
• We can almost correctly enter stealth through CnD only on a golem, it almost never works in combat conditions.
• If we somehow enter stealth in melee combat, the effect ends before our attack (1) hits the target, often making it impossible to discharge the malice bar, resulting in DPS and rotation loss.
• Should I list other flaws and bugs of this spec? And believe me, I can find a ton of bugs in the game like no one else; I don't know why I'm so "lucky" in that regard (check my thread)

I can understand someone from your so-called "balance team" disliking Deadeye in PvP, but why are you touching it in PvE? Let's put aside PvP - what is the rationale for this nerf in PvE? Our damage is primarily single-target, meaning in fractals, we hardly deal damage when moving between bosses. But never mind, let's move on, or some "very smart" people will tell me "nobody uses this spec in fractals, blah blah blah" (where else to use it?). I'll just say I often use the Daredevil build between bosses, switching between specs, but that's beside the point. 

Now let's look at bosses - we can only use Kneel on a VERY small number of them because we must constantly move. This spec has more limitations in the game, most of which are artificially created by the developers. But never mind, that's not so critical (but annoying, the essence of the spec is lost)... but if we often have to change targets between boss phases (Mai Trin and so on) - let's say goodbye to DPS, rotation, and cruel world.

Oh well, you're probably not even reading this, time to look for a class to reroll... just need to study the patch history to see who's your favorite that you never touch. 

They should just make malice generation and consumption independent from marked target, like combo points work in other games for Rogue.

Idgaf about lore and roleplay kitten, this spec is unplayable in too many scenarios.

Edited August 24, 2023 by TheThief.8475

[Doggie.3184]

1 hour ago, TheThief.8475 said:

They should just make malice generation and consumption independent from marked target, like combo points work in other games for Rogue.

Idgaf about lore and roleplay kitten, this spec is unplayable in too many scenarios.

I been trying Staff on Deadeye and noticed if I use my Stolen skill at full Malice while auto attack is toggled my melee strikes actually reveal me and cause me to FAIL to use the staff stealth attack and my malice remains unused. It's bad enough the Malicious Stealth Attack on staff does no damage but it's clunky to use on top of it. This happens more often with Quickness on me~ another of the many reasons I wish they'd just delete Quickness and Alacrity and have some static balanced animations and timers. And ofc projectile weapons have always had this issue with auto attacks.

I also run into the same kinda problem if there's more than one enemy and my staff stealth bonk accidentally hits an enemy next to them which is a universal problem, especially for Shortbow which does a useless AoE around marked target that will likely never land because it's meant to be used on large groups but large groups will likely make you fail to hit marked target because of body block, thus never triggering it.

Edited August 24, 2023 by Doggie.3184

[UNOwen.7132]

On 8/23/2023 at 2:32 PM, Jijimuge.4675 said:

How so, with Maleficent Seven in PvE?

As far as I'm aware (correct me if I'm wrong) the effect of Malice is multiplicative - the below assumes that this is the case.

Prior to this change, the power coefficient of DJ was 1.65.  7 stacks of M7 ups the damage by 7x25% = 175%.  An increase of 175% is a mult of 2.75.  This equates to a final power coefficient of 4.5925 (=2.75x1.65)

After this change, the power coefficient is 2.67.  7 stacks of M7 ups damage by 7x10% = 70%, which is a mult of 1.7.  The final power coefficient in that case is 4.539 (=1.7x2.67)

That's not exactly a huge downgrade...

Also, if one were using other feats than M7 (and so, 5 stacks), the numbers work out that the new setup is very slightly better (3.71 past, now 4.005).  IMO, the main effect of this change in PvE is to make the total damage output of DJ less sensitive to how many malice stacks one has - one gets rewarded less for maxxing malice (apart from the boons granted of course)

As for PvP/WvW, M7 results in a coeff of 2.2763 (=1.7x1.339) now vs an old value of 2.2755 (=2.05x1.11)

As far as I can see, the numbers are pretty comparable, according to the details of the patch notes.  If anything, it looks to me like Anet have tried to get the numbers roughly the same as they were before when firing with 7 stacks of malice.

If DJ is hitting for significantly less than it used to, that could be a bug, or at least might mean that the in-game values don't match the patch notes

If it is hitting for less, then my guess is that the malice stacks themselves were multiplicative. I.e. rather than it being 1+7*0.25=175%, it was 1.25^7=470%. But that doesnt really line up with the damage it was doing?

[Zacchary.6183]

To math the Death's Judgement changes:

• (2.67 / 1.65) = 1.618 (62% baseline damage increase)
• 50 / 125 = .4 (40% of the original, so a 60% nerf to malice scaling)
• 70 / 175 = .4 (same thing but with M7 factored in)

Arguably this is a buff to the rifle and a nerf to M7.

[draxynnic.3719]

Something just struck me: OP, if you're feeling like Death's Judgement is doing less damage, were you playing Deadeye in in the period since the July 18 patch? There was a nerf to DE damage there in order to get quickness deadeye under control, and instead of targeting the nerf to quickness deadeye alone, they slapped regular deadeye as collateral damage. That might be the reason you feel like you're doing less damage even though the maths suggests that the changes made on SotO's release were actually a buff.

Edited August 26, 2023 by draxynnic.3719

[SehferViega.8725]

On 8/23/2023 at 2:32 PM, Jijimuge.4675 said:

How so, with Maleficent Seven in PvE?

As far as I'm aware (correct me if I'm wrong) the effect of Malice is multiplicative - the below assumes that this is the case.

Prior to this change, the power coefficient of DJ was 1.65.  7 stacks of M7 ups the damage by 7x25% = 175%.  An increase of 175% is a mult of 2.75.  This equates to a final power coefficient of 4.5925 (=2.75x1.65)

After this change, the power coefficient is 2.67.  7 stacks of M7 ups damage by 7x10% = 70%, which is a mult of 1.7.  The final power coefficient in that case is 4.539 (=1.7x2.67)

That's not exactly a huge downgrade...

If DJ is hitting for significantly less than it used to, that could be a bug, or at least might mean that the in-game values don't match the patch notes

Yeah, my fault:  in PvE base damage got upgrade by 61,8%  (2.67 / 1.65= 1.618), while Malice bonus damage got nerfed from +175% to +70%, that means (2.75 / 1,7 = 1,617 = 61,7%).

[itspomf.9523]

Kind of feels like this entire thread boils down to:  Weapon Mastery was a terrible decision and has only made everything worse.

[cjttruelife.9172]

On 8/22/2023 at 2:47 PM, Antycypator.9874 said:

I have done some tests and it seems like DJ is hitting much less that before.

Who the hell thought that Deadeye need more unreasonable nerfs?

 

you did tests when it blatantly said 10% damage per malice stack instead , across all game modes. ..power coefficients increasing have nothing to with flat modifiers so the new damage just scales better off of power and might stacks than it did before.  just use Relic of Mabon to see 25% bonus scaling , shouldn't be hard with a deadeye. 

Edited September 20, 2023 by cjttruelife.9172

[Antycypator.9874]

On 9/20/2023 at 5:32 AM, cjttruelife.9172 said:

you did tests when it blatantly said 10% damage per malice stack instead , across all game modes. ..power coefficients increasing have nothing to with flat modifiers so the new damage just scales better off of power and might stacks than it did before.  just use Relic of Mabon to see 25% bonus scaling , shouldn't be hard with a deadeye. 

Relic of Mabon won't make it better. For every 10 stacks of might generated by yourself you get 1 stack of Mabon Strenght (cooldown: 3 sec). At 10 stacks of Mabon Strenght you get a damage boost. It takes at least 30 seconds (because there's CD between Mabon Strenght stacks).

Now — what's better? Perma 5% damage boost, or 187 power for 8 seconds every half a minute?