New Class: Pariah

Taryius

Bear gives 50 bleeding right away, so even if extract isn't enough to scourge on its own, combo it with bear (which you have to for haemo) and you get 200.

Bear + another bear is also 200, but much harder to get to as you have to loop around. I think that is the more intended bleed path, or using flushings shenanigans.

Scourge is pretty crazy right now, even with a haemophilia swap built in, you can sometimes RNG it with the 1.45s trace, or stick addiction on the same cycle to 50/50 it.

Amranu

Removing the bleeding from bear and sticking that on sting would probably work, but would devalue flushings. Hmm.

Shirszae

So. I don't know how many of you use epitaph focus and advance. I like it a lot because it makes things easier to handle. 

However, I realized today that if you focus on, for example, nest, scales, skein, sun, serpent, nest, bear, when I advance after the second nest will instead double back to scales because that's what follows the first nest appearance on the chain.

It's not a huge deal, but I wanted to discuss the possibility of making advance follow the focused epitaph as long as it doesn't break chain. 

Farrah

So, it's not about what follows nest in your order. It's basically a trace priority list. With your focus list above, it will always go to nest whenever possible, and if that's not possible, always go to scales whenever possible and so on. 

But that doesn't really help you. Just thought I'd clarify since it helps in some circumstances.

Shirszae

Thank you. I appreciate the explanation nonetheless 

Dochitha

Personally I think reducing extract bleeding to 100, but also give burrow 50 bleeding, will help give flexibility for this kill to require one more balance, but not requiring a full epitaph cycle to get to the bleeding threshold which gives way too much warning. Also, the choice to burrow with haemophilia being present also slows down affliction pressure in the presence of heartbeat, will make this a strategic choice rather than brute force whack.

Amranu

@Makarios Are you considering adding 50 bleeding anywhere else in the kit? Extract looks odd from my point of view now. It only pressures a 50/50 for scourge when you stick flushings and addiction on top of haemo and they eat ginseng, which means we can only really punish not prioing haemo by going all the way back to bear, or losing momentum to burrow for extract again. Considering scourge is designed to punish a lack of ginseng prio, the fact that it now takes 2-3 extra balances to even threaten scourge against bad prios seems a bit heavyhanded, and would be alleviated by for instance adding 50 bleeding to burrow or sting (which would make it so we need an additional balance after haemophilia to threaten, not the 2-3 balances we need now).

Shirszae

Small qol suggestion: Could the swarm burrow line be made to include the name of the swarm you are using?

You direct your name swarm to burrow into target. 

Amranu

Nevermind, it might not need this. Perhaps I had a bit of a kneejerk reaction.

Saonji

Shirszae said:

Small qol suggestion: Could the swarm burrow line be made to include the name of the swarm you are using?

You direct your name swarm to burrow into target. 

Would like this for all swarm attacks, to be honest. Currently I have to parse the queueing line to see what swarm's attacking, which is kinda awkward.

Carbine

Saonji said:

Shecks said:

To reiterate, I was just sharing a commentary and some thoughts with my notes above.  Some things could be incorrect, or purely subjective opinion.  Even if I'm wrong about something, please bear in mind that I've spent nearly every waking moment working with this class, since release - so I'd say that if I have a misunderstanding about how something works at this point, it's probably an indication that it could use better explanation in AB files or something like that.

Just because you supposedly spent more time on something, doesn't inherently mean you know more about it than anyone else. I spent close to twelve hours working out the basics of the class, so that I could give my guide out to the entire game. Before moving on to ironing things out further for myself. I've also actually used the class in real fights.

And while some forum warriors probably don't understand or accept this, I know more about combat than the vast majority of the of the Achaea playerbase - so if I'm struggling to understand something, it can be assumed most other people picking up the class would too.   From a game design perspective, seeing thing that someone like me is misunderstanding or failing to use correctly at this stage is still very valuable information, even if I'm wrong about it.  That said, I don't think I'm wrong about most of it, after reading the comments.  Most of it is just kneejerk automatic "you're wrong about everything" nonsense that doesn't match actual experience with the class.

You don't know more than the vast majority. You first tried arguing that a classless person with a handaxe, is more scarier than Pariah. Then you backpedaled and said the class is amazing and "can't wait to abuse it" even though your history of combat in the game, is painfully average at your very best. Now you're coming to this thread, backpedaling again in some weak attempt to try say the class is bad.

-->continuing outside of quote box.

You tried to argue that Pariah doesn't get access to weaponry, because of torso breaks/salve locks, which is frankly absurd. If they did have access to weaponry, that isn't even going to be a consideration considering you'd lose both your epitaph chain as well as your expose timing. They don't get access to weaponry explictly because of slickness/anorexia throws (there's a reason those are tied specifically to Virulence). Torso breaks and salve locks literally weren't even a consideration.

That said, I don't think I'm wrong about most of it, after reading the comments.  Most of it is just kneejerk automatic "you're wrong about everything" nonsense that doesn't match actual experience with the class.

Just because you think you're not wrong about it, doesn't mean you're not.

- You tried saying they can't attack with 1 arm broken, which was wrong.

- You tried saying Pariah -requires- coding and tracking to play, which is wrong.

- You tried saying Pariah has awful bashing, which is wrong.

- You tried arguing they need prone to stop earring. Which they should have some access to prone, but because of actives that require prone to block. Not to stop earring. That was just another one of your absurd arguments related to your failed earring thread.

- The majority of your points were non-factors at best and, at worst, simply proving your lack of actual experience with using the class. So far I haven't seen you kill anyone whatsoever with it, or even come close to it. Literally all you've done is show some absurd, context-less log to show they can do 11 affs 'at once' (even though in practice, that isn't going to even remotely happen).

The fact you scream and whine like a petulant fucking child and call anyone who disagrees with you a 'forum warrior' just shows how you really are, Shecks. You don't want to debate, or discuss anything, you want to try and throw out your irrelevant and useless, baseless knowledge as fact, even though you have no experience whatsoever. You need to stop posting, then do some self-reflection to consider that maybe, just maybe, you're not nearly as good or knowledgeable as you think you are.

Dochitha said:

You can wield shield knife and trace while hunting, my dear.

Fair enough, you couldn't when I first tested it, that's good to know. The condescension was a bit weird, though.

@Saonji Is this your off week? Did you miss a coffee? 

Sure, there is ALWAYS at least one person that is disappointed their class doesn't auto behead and do the dishes at the same time.

I was expecting; 127) Whilst in scorpion at my local, I didn't score a free shot nor pull a root. Pariah needs a buff.

But if you wouldn't mind, please pull your head in. We're ALL allowed to post here (except for maybe 'jovolo the sketchy'), and we're ALL allowed to have an opinion, albeit as wrong as it may be.

Maybe it's you that needs to look into the mirror - and then say letum ;-) 

Saonji

@Carbine tl;dr

Archaeon

Good  

Dochitha

After a number of theory crafting and testing, extract is at a weird spot, it can't add up the bleeding, and when we loop one more time, extract is redundant, feels like extract is at an odd place now except for sanguinehand. So it's not 1-2 more balances, it's an entire epitaph loop. I still think giving burrow 50 bleed is going to see good strategies used, also achieving the 1-2 extra balances to scourge after a bear.

Eryl

Being able to extract while they are shielded is a massive boon.  If they shield but are exposed, and you don't have blood, you can just extract/fissure and keep on going, for instance.  It feels like extract was meant as a utility tool, not as a buffer for a kill method.

Amranu

So I've given it a day, tried to figure out what if anything we can do with extract. But there is nothing, and on top of this, the extract change obliterated the latency/scourge fork where you scorpion and based on whether they cure plagues or scytherus, you go for scourge or latency. This wasn't overpowered at all and without it people can just ignore scytherus for EIGHT balances after scorpion if they didn't have haemo already. That's a rather ridiculous amount of time before scourge becomes a threat.

I don't think I need to expand any further that we need another source of bleeding so we can threaten scourge outside of opening cheese, because right now it's not an option if you're on the wrong part of the graph prior to scorpion to go latency, and we simply do not have an option to punish ignoring ginseng to cure plagues after the opener.

Shecks

Amranu said:

So I've given it a day, tried to figure out what if anything we can do with extract. But there is nothing, and on top of this, the extract change obliterated the latency/scourge fork where you scorpion and based on whether they cure plagues or scytherus, you go for scourge or latency. This wasn't overpowered at all and without it people can just ignore scytherus for EIGHT balances after scorpion if they didn't have haemo already. That's a rather ridiculous amount of time before scourge becomes a threat.

I don't think I need to expand any further that we need another source of bleeding so we can threaten scourge outside of opening cheese, because right now it's not an option if you're on the wrong part of the graph prior to scorpion to go latency, and we simply do not have an option to punish ignoring ginseng to cure plagues after the opener.

IMO scourge is just dead now.  The only way it works is if they just flat out don't cure correctly multiple times over a long period of time, and even then it's only possible if they don't hinder you, run, or shield.  Also, having a 20s kill path on a class with no HP sustain or active cures doesn't do much when we die in 10 to almost everything.

Latency seems like the only realistic path we have against a competent opponent.

Amranu

It's not completely dead if you are on the weariness-> haemo->asthma->para epitaph. But that's it, if you're elsewhere on the graph and they don't have haemo, it will take way, way too many balances to pressure it. From a balance standpoint, one could maybe argue this is desirable. From a design standpoint though, without bleeding being added elsewhere, it really genuinely makes the class significantly less interesting to theorycraft about, from either a defensive or offensive standpoint.

Taryius

I'm in disagreement, the ability to force any non-plague eat is pretty solid when it comes to latency -or- lock. I've only been having issues against what I consider some hard outlier classes, and even then I think I could perform pretty solidly with more practice and refinement. 

For my first dabble into affliction classes, I have to say Pariah is feeling pretty good.

Amranu

Yeah, as I said this isn't a matter of whether or not the class is still strong or not. It needs to have slower balance times at the balance cap and perhaps other nerfs. My problem is with the fact that scourge has been made very 1-dimensional, in that it can't fit into any strategies involving the part of the graph that has impatience/clumsiness/epilepsy/addiction, because you need to cycle the same part of the graph twice to threaten it. It's boring.

The class was fascinating from a theoretical standpoint and this change has gutpunched that potential just to stop some cheese, because the bleeding wasn't made available in other, slower ways anywhere else.

Eryl

Amranu said:

Yeah, as I said this isn't a matter of whether or not the class is still strong or not. It needs to have slower balance times at the balance cap and perhaps other nerfs. My problem is with the fact that scourge has been made very 1-dimensional, in that it can't fit into any strategies involving the part of the graph that has impatience/clumsiness/epilepsy/addiction, because you need to cycle the same part of the graph twice to threaten it. It's boring.

The class was fascinating from a theoretical standpoint and this change has gutpunched that potential just to stop some cheese, because the bleeding wasn't made available in other, slower ways anywhere else.

I definitely like the extract change, but I really do agree with you that we need bleed somewhere else.

Maybe we could add bleeding to infest?  That would require you to still pre-stick haemophilia, and it doesn't pair the bleeding with an aff like extract did, but it still gives you some really strong power in that you're either going to force a haemo swap soon after your infest or you're going to hone in on scourge.

Shirszae

Apparently the scorpion logograph also doesnt work with epitaph focus. Even if your chain is longer than four and you place it at the end of your line you still get the message about being unable to divine a path forward. 

Atalkez

Balance time still needs to be fixed. 1.5s beating herb balance is entirely unwarranted.

I also think heartbeat needs to not constantly be in play, but would like to see the above changed before I really push this.

Shecks

@Shirszae that's 100% by design.  

Shirszae

I question the point of epitaph focus existing  at all if it is meant to not interact properly with scorpion logograph.

That being said, the chart hardly proves anything about the design principle behind EPITAPH FOCUS/ADVANCE. If the chain is four logographs long or more then it should absolutely be able to recognize scorpion as valid, much as if you were entering it manually. 

Otherwise the whole ability becomes pointless as a convenience tool that it is meant to be as it forces you to rely half on it and half on either always being prepared to manually pick that one logograph or script around it to make up for the one glaring flaw. At that point it is simply easier to not use it at all, and I imagine that is not the point. 

Shecks

Scorpion exists, and is coded the way it is, purely to both require and to consume balance on Scourge.

Without this you could haemo + extract combo which would be super broken.

I will find some obscure way to actually use it as relapsing but I am pretty sure it's not designed to use the actual affliction effect or as a stacking tool.  Literally just there to make Scourge weaker.

Saonji

Shirszae said:

<snip>

So there's a couple of misconceptions with this post, and possibly a misunderstanding about how Epitaph works in general.

Firstly, the point of focus/advance is that of convenience. It quite openly says that in AB EPITAPH, it's not something experienced people are going to rely upon at all.

Secondly, if you look at epitaph and scorpion, you'd see that it does interact 'properly' with epitaph. Though not exactly for the reason Shecks says... The purpose of epitaph advance, is to find the closest trace that will keep your epitaph chaining, so that you keep the speed bonus/expose windows rolling... Scorpion rather directly works against this, because scorpion ends an epitaph chain. Advance will continue to work again after Scorpion (it'll choose Serpent).

Thirdly, it's not pointless. It allows less-experienced people form an idea as to how they whole process works. You can still combo swarm stuff with 'epitaph advance' just fine. You can also simplify bashing with it, by focusing and then using epitaph advance rather than working out swarm sequences manually... Once you get more experienced, the 'convenience' is going to be outweighed by being locked into a sequence of traces, as opposed to manually choosing what aff you wanna give next.

Shecks

I am an experienced person and rely heavily on Focus because it helps significantly fighting into hindrance heavy classes with high ping (200ms).  It's not absolutely necessary of course but it does help.

Afaik you can't use heartbeat with it though, which kind of kills it.  Could be wrong on that but I haven't found a way to make it work.

Shirszae

You can epitaph advance target 5 hearbeats 

Farrah

I personally like focus even on the experienced end, as well. I agree you have to divert from it sometimes but nothing stops you from primarily leaning focus to reduce typing burden. I hate having to type a larger number of different aliases and when you focus, you only need to account for plagues in your alias, not plague + trace in each one. So it's kind of like how most classes can primarily lean curare + X. This class can primarily lean focus +X.

That being said, I don't see any need for scorpion in focus because scorpion isn't really part of your normal chains. It ends your chain and is usually just done to lead into a finisher. So you only really need a scorpion/scourge alias and a latency/scorpion alias usually.