It's time to improve Broadsword

Some good stuff here.

I like two things.

One, broadsword already has a +damage mechanism, bleeding. Simply apply it to more attacks. Voila, Broadsword is teh better.

However, the 'burst damage set' idea has merits. Fiery embrace is a proven mechanism, so steal it whole-cloth, changing only the added damage to be smashing. I've even got a great name for it, lifted from Lichtenauer School sword-fighting: Mordstreich. Voila, broadsword is teh better.


However, I sincerely believe that all of the 'heavy weapon' damage sets need a re-look. Mace seems pretty good after it's revamp a few years back, except maybe raise the stun/kd percentages a few points on the lower attacks. Ax needs a damage boost...maybe add bleeding there.

Ehn. We'll see if anything happens.

How about, when you hit Broadsword Build Up, your next hit is a critical hit.
No exceptions. No duration limit. This in addition to the normal Build Up effects.

Straightforward Use:
Build Up -> Critical Hit

Tricky Use:
Build Up -> Wait around outside combat -> Critical Hit -> Build Up -> Critical Hit


This:
- Makes Build Up attractive to Brutes, where it's usually less awesome due to Fury stealing its thunder.
- Lets Stalkers guarantee their Headsplitter-from-Hide (or Slice, I guess) being critical against everyone hit, giving the set some slightly better AoE power.
- Makes Scrappers happy with big orange numbers.

Ok then Berserk would be a decaying damage buff, so as to provide immediate burst damage with additional damage for a short period of time.

Throwing out immune to rechage buff issues, Werner is right, the design would need to consider:
Duration of the buff / Base Recharge: too long and non-high end recharge builds may suffer in the long run, too short and BS out performs Katana

Amount of buff and rate of decay: Is a + to-hit, + damage should be what we're looking for here, or is it a proc effect that would work better?

I'd say that if Berserk were made to copy something like Fiery Embrace with a 20 second duration and 180 second recharge. Very difficult to perma, it might be possible with an extreme high end recharge build with a set like /SR or /EnA. The endurance usage would definitely be an issue with /SR though, and there may be sacrifices for /EnA to drop some defense IO bonuses in favor of recharge bonuses. EnA would probably be able to mitigate the endurance issue better, but in turn that would lower a constant attack chain.

Otherwise the only way I could think of to make sure the damage buff is balanced against Katana is to add a penalty after Berserk wears off, like I suggested before.

Or add a penalty while it is running; "Berserk" type abilities in many games penalize Defense or the equivalent. Then you make it perma at your own peril.

A penalty to Recovery while it is running would also be appropriate.

I'd also like to see a bonus to Recharge and possibly movespeed while the power is running; that would also be thematic.

Maybe give BS buildup Double Crits for 2.5 seconds, or automatic crits for 10s. Doing the math over 30 seconds, that puts BS almost dead even with Katana. I'd go for that. You could just as easily boost the +damage on BU, but I like the Crits idea. The first one or two attacks out of BU really really hurt. Orange Numbers FTW!

The best possible change that could be made to Broadsword is to have its secondary effect be changed from Defense Debuff to being Resistance Debuff. And given the "fact" that 1 Defense = 2 Resistance ... all the Powers Team would need to do is take the Defense Debuff values, double them, and change them to being Resistance Debuff instead.

DONE.

Broadsword ought to be the Resistance Piercing powerset ... while Katana/Ninja Blade acts as the Defense Piercing powerset. I mean, conceptually speaking, you'd expect to want to be using Broadsword against an ARMORED or otherwise "invulnerable" target, which this game models as being Resistances ... while using Katana/Ninja Blade against a "nimble and unHITable" target, which this game models as being Defenses.

Simply changing Broadsword to being Resistance Debuff, instead of Defense Debuff, would be enough to differentiate the powerset away from Katana/Ninja Blade into being its own (unique) thing ... rather than a "copy" of anything else.

It's the end. But the moment has been prepared for ...

I have not seen this anywhere else, so I think there is some new info out on the new Titan Weapon and Staff Fighting sets.

Type the following in-game for details. Just in case it's all sekrit.

Just to see what the design space is looking like, for 'old set' improvements.


Titan Weapons:
[Arc of Destruction]
[Follow Through]
[Defensive Sweep]


Staff Fighting:
[Sky Splitter]
[Eye of the storm]
[Guarded Spin]
[Shatter Armor]


Put that in yer number cruncher and smoke it.

Titan Weapon has Momentum, Staff Fighting looks like there are 'forms' and 'perfection'.

Innnteresting.

Looking that over, I'm thinking the 'broadsword gets changes to Build Up' camp has a little room to run, as does the 'broadsword gets -res debuffs' school of thought.

Doooo it devs! DOOOO EEEETT!!

Nice!

Also looks like there are powers that both benefit and penalize the player: interesting.

I agree that Broadsword needs changes. Badly, in fact. I've been saying this since launch. I started by saying Broadsword and Katana shouldn't be the same thing. Then the game advanced, Katana got changes, and Broadsword ended up lagging behind. As it stands right now, concept is the only reason to take Broadsword over Katana. Something needs to happen to fix that. Especially with the new melee sets that are coming out. The concern here isn't that Broadsword doesn't play well. The concern is that other things play better, and pretty soon, nobody will be playing Broadsword.

I've read a lot of interesting solutions in this thread. However, some just don't seem like they have much chance of being implemented. Of what I read, I like two ideas the most. That's why those ideas are what I'm using to form this one.

First, take Build Up and replace it with a power like the new Peacebringer Inner Light power. It starts as a large damage bonus that slowly decays over time. This is more effective for a Scrapper than a clone of Rage, and requires little work on the part of the devs as it is essentially a clone of an existing power.

Second, add a chance for -Res to the AoEs. These powers emphasize the wild swings one would make with a broadsword, and also wouldn't take any new animation or art. It's just numbers. From what I understand, the art department at Paragon Studios is currently swamped and that was a part of the reason why the recent Kheldian changes did not include such things as faster form changes, which a dev (I forget which) posted and said they did in fact want to include in some future update. That means that any change which includes new animations isn't going to happen for any other AT/power sets either.

I think this would give Broadsword what it needs - damage more on par with Katana and something that makes it mechanically appealing as an alternative choice.

@Rorn ---- Blue Baron ---- Guardian

You can have the primary effect, if it hits, place a 'state' on the target, then have the secondary effect 100% do something IF it detects the prerequisite state.

Thanks for the clarification.

The only concern I would have with that is that assuming the set kept its -defense and accuracy bonus they would always be working against that effect.