Voice of Kaez Timer (Hijacked: Terror of Kaezul)

A monk or rogue or ranger at your tier should always be able to out aggro you if they wish too. They'll out aggro a warrior or paladin sooner, but if they are not working with you, there is nothing you can do about it, and never really has been. I never understood the belief that aggro management shouldn't be part of the game.

Too soon for changes in any case. These were major changes, and it will take some time for you guys to figure out what's optimal again. All I can provide is that on paper, you're way better off than you were. Are you using all the tricks in your bag properly? For instance, are you using the veils in conjunction with this? That's a huge amount of aggro and a crazy increase in the threat ceiling that you're throwing away if not.

I suppose I can share the 'phase III' change that I've been hinting at for the last couple weeks. It is by far the iffiest change of them all. While not my brain child, it would certainly address this problem, and was conceived around the same time we started talking about Veil of Marlow and the Terror Changes...

:psyduck::tinfoil::tinfoil:THIS CHANGE MAY NEVER SEE THE LIGHT OF DAY. IT QUITE POSSIBLY WON'T HAPPEN:tinfoil::tinfoil::psyduck:

That being said, the proposed change was to remove Assault of Shadows as you know it AND remove Vortex of Death. Assault of Shadows would become a lesser, faster, mana free version of the Vortex. No concrete numbers were discussed, and no replacement for Vortex of Death was planned.

With such a change you'd lose your mana free aggro tool (which in truth we aren't all that crazy about anyway), would likely gain a spell gem and utility, and would end up far more mana positive at a personal level.
 
I can't say I like the idea, but I'll reserve judgement until you can come up with numbers and such.

Can I ask why you aren't thrilled about Assault of Shadows as a mana free hate ability, given all of its limitations?
 
Well might as well add my 2cp.

I like the changes. OMG no more spamming that key from target to target over and over again. That is a plus.

On the minus side, I too am running out of mana very quickly. Right now I'm making out the aggro difference from the previous way by casting lifetaps while the terror ticks. I'm sure the healer appreciates it, however this drains my mana rather quickly. Now I could just not spam lifetaps as much, however I find that if I just rely on the terror and cast it whenever the old one wears off I will lose aggro to dps even though I'm not switching up targets. Previously, if I was on a single target I basically owned that target aggro wise.

Now I don't think this is a bad thing, I should have to work for aggro, and I think others should be careful not to overaggro, I'm just thinking there should be a slight reduction in mana use for things like lifetaps, that way I wouldn't be oom so quick... just saying that it maybe should be tweaked slightly.

As far as assault of shadows goes. I like it as is, I actually have it on the same hotkey as my terror spell (/alt activate 85). With like a /pause 70 on it. It seems to work rather well and I still have time to switch targets on multiples.

ps, I also use veil of marlow.. I like it as well. I'm not casting it when I have singles.. but maybe I should try it for a bit.
 
I dont have any issues with agro as it is working now, I do go oom a lot though, and would love if manacost for sublimate soul (which is the biggest thief) could be looked at.

As for the proposed change. At the moment I do not use vortex, it's such a small effect per tick that its usually not worth the bother to cast, unless for some reason you end up in caster group during raid, then you might consider it. A smaller version would be even worse, and losing our good tool for making pulls for that doesnt strike me as an improvement, but rather a big step backwards.

if the agro generation of the aa is a problem, then I would love to see it become a lifetap - weakening dot type of debuff instead. Result: small small agro (enough for a tag), lowers/removes the targets resists for all lifetap type of spells during its tick and increases their effect by some percentage.

vortex in its current form really gives too small a yield per tick. The total effect for the mana spent is ok, but simply spread over so many ticks that most people wont think it worth a buffslot. This is especially true if youre in the tankgroup in a raid.
 
Glamrin said:
I dont have any issues with agro as it is working now, I do go oom a lot though, and would love if manacost for sublimate soul (which is the biggest thief) could be looked at.

As for the proposed change. At the moment I do not use vortex, it's such a small effect per tick that its usually not worth the bother to cast, unless for some reason you end up in caster group during raid, then you might consider it. A smaller version would be even worse, and losing our good tool for making pulls for that doesnt strike me as an improvement, but rather a big step backwards.

if the agro generation of the aa is a problem, then I would love to see it become a lifetap - weakening dot type of debuff instead. Result: small small agro (enough for a tag), lowers/removes the targets resists for all lifetap type of spells during its tick and increases their effect by some percentage.

vortex in its current form really gives too small a yield per tick. The total effect for the mana spent is ok, but simply spread over so many ticks that most people wont think it worth a buffslot. This is especially true if youre in the tankgroup in a raid.
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1. Sublimate soul is actually above deflux in mana per health(not that they aren't both incredibly inefficient)
2. Vortex of death is the best spell shadowknights get, you are insane, if you are not casting it on all three groups in the raid you are being a wasted slot.

Vortex gives you all of its mana back +15 points, it gives everyone in the group free mana, you are constantly funneling mana to the entire raid. How you think 15 over cap ft every tick is bad is beyond me.
 
Big shadowknight content spoilers: swap target when casting recourse hit another group.
 
Pretty sad that I will no longer be able to keep up the ruse that you get a tome that makes it hit the entire raid.
 
Wiz said:
Personal Attacks
Personal attacks of any kind will not be tolerated. There are forums where we turn a blind eye to that, this is not one of them.
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That's a warning Xach (and everyone else). You aren't there yet, but you're getting close.
 
How about a tome or something that makes our mana drain aa give us mana leech thus giving shadowknights a reason to use the tomes of power besides spell damage and all of that jazz like critical strike/atk/dps stats outside of 200dps.

Edit: if your bad and confused I am referring to vorpal strikes or whatever the mana drain on melee damage one is.
 
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The question becomes, if this is a problem before 250 AA's. A tome doesn't really solve that sorta problem.
 
Minlas, i dont have problem with agro as well, when i say i have trouble holding the agro, i mean that i am tring to conserv the most mana i can, while tanking and keeping my agro, wich sometimes makes me loose it.

And Vortex of Death is nice indeed, wish it would last longer, and be raid-wide right from the start, cuz casting it 3x, in 3 diff mob, is kinda meh as well.

I like our Assault of Shadow AA, as a tagger, and a multi target/while the terror gem is repopin, casting stuff. But, i also think maybe it could get a beef up.
 
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I'd say mana should be a bigger issue for everyone with less mana than me, ie a tome as a magical fix seems that it wouldnt target everyone who needs it.
 
Cyzaine said:
The question becomes, if this is a problem before 250 AA's. A tome doesn't really solve that sorta problem.
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It has been a long time and I no longer have info to alot of bottom of the bucket crappy knights but I imagine by using the lower end terrors and assault of shadows liberally you should be able to hold aggro fine in the very low end of the 65 spectrum, mana never was an issue as I recall outside of multiple pulls and those are not very common until you decide to pull fanatically. Flowing thought gear is not super abundant either. Until you get supreme items like the warden ring and other clutch ft pieces I can imagine it becoming progressively worse.

Easy tmap rats would be a nightmarr.
 
Bastion of the Vahir

Can we get the graphics for Bastion of the Vahir changed. It bugs out with new graphic models and cuts into the shoulder. Would be an awesome sk change! Thanks!
 
Here are my observations after a few days playing with the new changes as a mid Tier SK.

I run out of mana quite a bit faster than I used to. I never did the 5 pulls others are talking about while grinding. My typical pull was 2-3. With one of the old terrors, assault of shadows and lifetap/dots/melee I could hold agro on a those 2-3 mobs quite easy. With the increased mana cost I can't afford using lifetaps/spear near as much as I used to.

Veil of Marlow is a nice spell that lets me get agro easier when I do have multiple mobs incoming. It's definitely not aoe agro like the paladins have so I still have to switch targets and get spells/hits on all of them. Very happy with the way the spell works.

I can see how the new terror changes help the folk that pull groups of mobs and are grouped with top tier dps classes. It hasn't helped me an awful lot, maybe even limited me more. I only have to push terror once but I only really pushed it once anyways before and could use the rest of my mana for other things to keep agro.

To echo some of the previous SK posters, a slight decrease in mana would be most welcome.
 
Cambrai said:
It hasn't helped me an awful lot, maybe even limited me more. I only have to push terror once but I only really pushed it once anyways before and could use the rest of my mana for other things to keep agro.
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If you pushed it once before than swap down to a lower level version of the spell maybe? Not saying the mana isn't an issue but really. It seems the reason your going out of mana is casting too much shit instead of the terror perhaps?
 
In my group last night I don't even cast much anymore besides the terror. Maybe a blazen bull on the mob we aren't killing first and a Veil of Marlow in 3 pulls but no lifetaps. That kept my mana pretty constant with JB and I could go for a while without having to stop to med. I'll start using WoN and see how that helps.

It just seems like going down to Costo and buying the economy size terror but you don't get any discount for it. Good idea on going meming a lower terror since the other one is overkill a lot of the time for me. Thanks. I'll see how that goes.
 
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I did even more messing around with terrors etc since I am baffled at how players are claiming they are using more mana, and basically I keep showing the same results. I always use a Thaz BP and a wrist with the same proc (I am not sure these items make any difference worth consideration) and frequently use a weapon with an AE aggro proc on it. Casting one terror and one assault per mob is more than enough to hold aggro throughout an entire fight.

As far as mana goes, I am staying above where I used to be considering Terror of Kaezul basically gives a free terror for your mana vs the old terror system and even on the old system I rarely used four terrors per mob (if you need to, consider asking your groupmates to use their jolts, aggro is their responsibility too). Of course if Deflux or Sublimate gets spammed mana goes down rapidly, but these spells shouldnt be necessary for survival if doing on tier content. I still don't use spears regularly though because they seem incredibly inefficient.

I typically run WoN in groups as well and only use focus for raids, I don't know how big of a difference that makes in mana either, and as Otcho said, Vortex is constantly running no matter if it is a group or a raid.

Can a few other people post a run down of their typical spell usage? I want to try some out of the box (for me) spell sets to try and see what makes the best balance of damage/aggro and mana.
 
Terror
Assault
bash
vortex maybe

mob dies, I was in shar vahl today on stever and one terror+assault basically let cinn dps it until 50% without a flop.

If the mob is hard and or deserves a reason to be burned lifetaplifetaplifetap.

never use spear ever because of the resist adjust and cooldown and rather just use sublimate for that mana.
 
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