Skills: Heroine

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Skills: Heroine

Post by mouse » Sun Mar 28, 2004 8:55 pm

Ok, I'll try and keep this up-to-date. Here are the current skills with explanations where need me. Discuss & comment if desired. No skills are 100% final. I will be working to further differentiate the hero/heroine.

Tier 1 Skills:

* Werewolf: Change into wereform
* Howl: Scare away enemies
* Bash: A strong attack that knocks enemies back
* Dodge: Chance to dodge a melee attack while standing still
* Staff Mastery: do extra damage and get extra attack rating when using a staff

Tier 2 Skills:

* Summon Spirit Wolf: Summon wolf companions to aide you in battle
* Shape Shifting: increase effectiveness of wereform
* Holy Fire: Flaming aura that adds fire damage to attack and burns nearby enemies
* Avoid: chance to avoid a missile attack when stationary
* Increased Stamina: adds extra stamina and stamina recovery speed (with archetype)
* Sword Mastery: do extra damage and get extra attack rating when using a sword

Tier 3 Skills:

* Feral Rage: Go into a frenzy that allows you to move faster and steal life from enemies
* Roar [Battle Cry]: A fearsome roar which scares enemies, causing them to do less damage and have lower defenes
* Battle Command: Increased the skill levels of yourself and party members
* Fend: Attack multiple adjacent targets
* Increased Speed: Increased run speed and slower stamina drain (with archetype)
* Mace Mastery: do extra damage and get extra attack rating when using a mace

Tier 4 Skills:

* Summon Dire Wolf: Summon a stronger type of wolf to aide you
* Battle Orders: Increased life, stamina, and mana of yourself and party members
* Ignition: Light an enemy on fire
* Undead Slayer [Salvation]: Aura which causes heroine to do extra damage to undead, and knocks back nearby undead
* Evade: Chance to dodge missile or melee attacks when moving
* Ki Strike: Chance for attack to be a crushing blow

Tier 5 Skills:

* Pack Bond: Increases wolf damage and defense in wereform
* Rabies: A poison attack that can spread from one enemy to another
* Fire Claws: Causes claw attacks to do a large amount of fire damage
* Endurance: Aura that gives a stamina bonus and heals in exchange for mana
* Fade: Temporarily increase all resistances

Tier 6 Skills:

* Fury: A powerful attack that can hit one enemy multiple times or multiple enemies
* Battle Fury [~Fanaticism]: Shout that increases attack speed and damage
* Flamestrike: A powerful weapon attack that sears the bedrock with a blast of fire
* Heroine Archetype: Passive that increases fire/magic resists, attack speed, and recovery rate.

[EDIT2:
OK, here's the changes to the heroine for 1.45:

Code: Select all


OLD:
1:Martial......................|2:Combat...................|3:Were-Clan...................|
-------------------------------|---------------------------|------------------------------|
...............................|...........................|..............................|
-------------------------------|---------------------------|------------------------------|
1...StfMst...-----....Dodge....|-----.....Bash....-----....|Howl.....WearWolf...-----.....|
2...SwrdMst..EnhStam..Avoid....|HolyFire..-----...-----....|-----....Lycanthr...SprtWolf..|
3...MaceMst..EnhSped..-----....|-----.....Fend....BtlCmnd..|Roar.....FrlRage....-----.....|
4...-----....KiStrk...Avade....|UndSlyr...Ignit...BtlOrd...|-----....-----......DireWolf..|
5...-----....-----....Fade.....|Endurnc...-----...-----....|FireClw..Rabies.....PackBond..|
6...-----....Archtype.-----....|-----.....Flmstk..BtlFury..|Fury.....-----......------....|



NEW:
1:Martial......................|2:Combat...................|3:Were-Clan...................|
-------------------------------|---------------------------|------------------------------|
...............................|...........................|..............................|
-------------------------------|---------------------------|------------------------------|
1...StfMst...-----....Dodge....|[Bash]....-----...-----....|Howl.....WearWolf...-----.....|
2...SwrdMst..EnhStam..Avoid....|[-----]...[HolyF].-----....|[Lycan]..-----......SprtWolf..|
3...MaceMst..EnhSped..-----....|[Fend]....-----...[Endurnc]|.........FrlRage....-----.....|
4...-----....[-----]..Evade....|[LeapAtk].Ignit...[BtlCmd].|[Roar]...[StrClw]...DireWolf..|
5...-----....[KiStrk].[-----]..|[Concen]..-----...[UndSlyr]|[Rabies].[FireClw]..PackBond..|
6...-----....Archtype.-----....|[-----]...Flmstk..[BtlFury]|-----....[Fury].....------....|

-battle orders went away, its now hero only
-fade went away, it didn't really fit the class concept, and gave her more resists than needed
+concentrate - like the old barb skill
+storm claw - a claw attack that does lightning damage and can affect multiple targets
+leap attack
=moved lots of skills around, changed some levels - ki strike his higher reqs, undead slayer has higher reqs, endurance has lower reqs, lycanthropy is now level 8, etc.

/END EDIT2]

Last edited by mouse on Wed Apr 14, 2004 11:39 pm, edited 2 times in total.

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Re: Skills: Heroine

Post by Xcolibri » Wed Apr 07, 2004 1:06 am

Removing battle orders is quite harsh, I think but I haven't advanced in the game too far so I can't really say.

But Infected Claws, in my opinion, isn't really worth it as a new skill. See, one issue for the heroine is that she is limited in terms of damage elements. She got several fire melee skills (btw, holy fire is great now, very clever with the synergy to flamestrike as well as adding the damage to flamestrike when using it). And she got rabies. Now I haven't tried rabies but if it's useful in terms of damage it is a great and fun skill. And it target's multiple enemies. Which Infected Claw does not (if it does, then it is even more redundant). I still like the name & idea of Infected Claws but poison alone won't cut it, I think. Either really up the damage in comparison to Rabies. Or, maybe better, add slow target, reduce target's defense or blind to it.

BTW, I think at least one fire skill is unneccessary, too. I would remove fire claws, Ignition has nicer effects (I can't say which is better in terms of damage).
The heroine lacks a stunning skill, which could get inserted instead. Short Area of Effect stunning would be nice...

And, since I'm now into discussion anyway: Endurance is lame for that tier if it only gives stamina bonuses (note the 'if', I haven't tried it yet). Every other aura of the heroine (or any other character) is better because the effect won't help you in battle. It's just a skill making the time in-between more convenient, but it's not necessary at all. Plus, it costs mana, even worse. Heck, even in D2 people used Vigor mostly because it adds run/walk speed for Charge or running long distances (e.g. after dying) and it didn't cost mana then.
Give it a %max hp boost, that will make it nice and actually a reason to level. Also you get rid of the problem that might cut heroine builds relying on battle orders.

Just my two cents. I really like your mod and will continue playing it however you change it.
When I get farer, I tell you more ;)

Oh yes, and the golem summoner poison ball damage is tiny. While the Treants' one is huge. Wouldn't it make more sense to swap it?

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Re: Skills: Heroine

Post by potemon(tt) » Wed Apr 07, 2004 1:25 am

The heroine lacks a stunning skill, which could get inserted instead. Short Area of Effect stunning would be nice...
shockwave maybe? -.-

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Re: Skills: Heroine

Post by Xcolibri » Wed Apr 07, 2004 10:05 am

while shockwave is a nice skill, there are two aspects speaking against it:
1) the hero has it already
2) having same skills as in D2 is kind of boring

I thought more of a melee skill, like zeal + stun
Ideally, something like leap but with stun instead of knockback. For a jump skill would be greatly appreciated (by me), sometimes it's dull not to be able to cross rivers etc.

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Re: Skills: Heroine

Post by mouse » Wed Apr 07, 2004 5:24 pm

coupla points:

-i agree about endurance, i'll do what i can when i can. it was next on my list of skills to get rid of or boost ;). that being said, right now it also heals every tick like prayer. thats the reason for the mana cost - i think with syns you can get the healing pretty high. but again, its going to change so don't worry too much.
-werewolf/non-wolf skills will be exclusive at some point i think, so it will be handy to have a fire skill in the wolf tree
-immolation will be stronger than flamestrike against single targets
-i agree, having the same skills is boring, which is why i'm slowly differentiating the hero & heroine as i go along (originally they were just opposite sex mirror classes, so you can tell how far we've come since then)
-just because a given class lacks something doesn't mean they will get it. ie the hero/heroine (ok, well the bear has an enhanced shockwave) don't have stun (the heroine doesn't have blind, etc) but they make up for that with other things. heroine has a knockback attack (bash) which no one else has. hero has the blinding attack, which no one else has. i forget who has stun, viking i think :P.
-the goal behind Infected was to provide a form of elemental damage to shifters at high levels. ideally, IC would always be stronger (ie after a few points invested in it and synergies) single target than rabies, but rabies of course can affect multiple targets. that being said..i'll will probably shift it over to something else, perhaps adding a small amount of magic or lightning damage instead - but i did want to give the heroine another poison skill to flesh out her poison options.
Last edited by mouse on Wed Apr 07, 2004 5:26 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Skills: Heroine

Post by Xcolibri » Thu Apr 08, 2004 1:48 am

Having lvled my heroine up to lvl 54 at the realms, i got some more 'insights' to share ;)

1) Endurance wasn't soo bad as I thought since I could help allies with low stamina and the healing tick was quicker than expected. It didn't do much for me but there is potential, I think. Giving +% stamina is worse though than giving %reduce stamina drain because you it didn't get you much when you turn it on while already almost out of stamina.
-werewolf/non-wolf skills will be exclusive at some point i think, so it will be handy to have a fire skill in the wolf tree
But the werewolf can still access the other three fire skills, so it's not really exclusive.
I still would suggest a kind of leap attack with small area stun or the original knockback. And if it's only for the leap. A werewolf should be able to jump, also making this skill werewolf exclusive, it would be a reason to choose werewolf form. (I'm not saying that wolf form is bad but I don't use it and leaping would be a reason for at least a temporal wolf-shift)
-immolation will be stronger than flamestrike against single targets
Not! Flamestrike is an uberkiller at the moment. I love this skill and put alot of points into it but it's too good at the moment, I think.
20 points in holy fire
20 points in Immolation
~5 points in Flame Strike
~5 points in Fire Claws
I rather put the points in synergies because then the mana cost wouldn't go up too high. I don't know real numbers but with three players in one game one or two flame strikes roast a pack boss in 1-2 seconds. One reason for that is holy fire, which gives synergy, but also adds like 900 damage as well. I really like that system and holy fire is really useful, very different than in D2. But the damage is too high. Immolation is too expensive to use it that often and the area of effect for flamestrike is sooo much better. Usually I don't even go melee but just shift-cast flamestrike. It is big fun, but needs a little nerf, though.
Maybe hell will teach me different.
BTW, I'm pretty sure that chimera used flamestrike, knowing how it looks and its damage potential.

Funny sidenote: The heroine's bash still use the barb's voice ;) So do the warcries
One kind of bo staff use wrong inv space but I forgot which one :(

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Re: Skills: Heroine

Post by mouse » Thu Apr 08, 2004 3:41 am

Xcolibri";p="166043" wrote:
But the werewolf can still access the other three fire skills, so it's not really exclusive.

the operative word here is CAN. WONT is the target. as in when i update it, she will NO LONGER be able to ;)
I still would suggest a kind of leap attack with small area stun or the original knockback. And if it's only for the leap. A werewolf should be able to jump, also making this skill werewolf exclusive, it would be a reason to choose werewolf form. (I'm not saying that wolf form is bad but I don't use it and leaping would be a reason for at least a temporal wolf-shift)

the leaping idea is a decent one, but it all depends on if there is already an animation there, i'll check it out.

Not! Flamestrike is an uberkiller at the moment. I love this skill and put alot of points into it but it's too good at the moment, I think.

again, operative words being AT THE MOMENT ;). i don't like 'uberkiller' skills. i'm shooting for balance here, not 1.07ish firewall.
Funny sidenote: The heroine's bash still use the barb's voice ;) So do the warcries
One kind of bo staff use wrong inv space but I forgot which one :(

yeah, there are no 'sorceress screaming' sounds that i know of. let me know which staff that is and i'll fix it.
Last edited by mouse on Thu Apr 08, 2004 3:41 am, edited 2 times in total.

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Re: Skills: Heroine

Post by potemon(tt) » Sun Apr 11, 2004 8:21 pm

i think firestrike needs a nerf.
first of all it uses both physical and fire dmg which is insanely good because immune monsters are always np. and the physical dmg in the fire is insane, say u have something that causes volcano on strike - then when u hit a bunch of monsters there are suddenly 1000 volcanos. and the pyshical dmg in the fire leeches life and mana for you too(if u have items that gives that) which makes you almost invulnerable..
by faaar the best spell in the game imo.
Last edited by potemon(tt) on Sun Apr 11, 2004 8:22 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Skills: Heroine

Post by Xcolibri » Mon Apr 12, 2004 1:05 pm

Agreed about Flamestrike. I'm aware that you, mouse, already know that it's overpowered. But it's not (only) the damage, it's really that physical damage get's applied, too. So Flamestrike kills like everything around. If the physcial damage would be converted into fire damage, it made more sense, really. I actually had to fear fire immunes then.

About leeching: I heard that it works but I don't think it does, unless you hit in melee with it. I need alot of mana per kill items (ca. 15-20 per kill) to maintain my mana with about 125 energy. So I think that mana cost is balanced when the damage will be lowered and it only did fire damage.
Note that I have not maxed FS yet, it's about 10-12 with items on. I maxed Holy Fire and Ignition work synergies and have a low fire claws for same reason, so there is still potential in my killing power which already is uber.

Some other effects work with FS, like knockback. Not all, though, I couldn't get blind to work, for example.
With 'cast on striking' this is like potemon says, too. At least on heroine only items the chance should be lowered.
Can you lower the hit frequency for Flamestrike in general, maybe? Another, better, solution is to make the flames last shorter, which I think is a good nerf, too, also graphical-wise (aka lag-wise). If they are shorter, ignition had more uses, too, because it burns longer at one place. By now, ignition is redundant and it's mana cost insane.

Note that I try to be constructive. Actually, instead of criticism, I need to say, that this character build is the only one I played in multiplayer till hell in any mod and I played alot of mods for years now. Flamestrike is one of the stylishest (if that exist?) and most fun to play skills I ever used. Great job!

Also sorry for repeating some of potemons stuff but playing the heroine myself I felt like saying something to the issue, too ;)

Mouse, do you want to know about some skill balancement? I have about 40-50 skills points left to try out what needs to be tried. Alternatively, i would give you my account password, if you like to test yourself, also regarding FS maybe.

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Re: Skills: Heroine

Post by mouse » Mon Apr 12, 2004 5:16 pm

yes, flamestrike is being 'struck' with the nerf bat. smaapp!

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Re: Skills: Heroine

Post by dikwhit » Mon Apr 12, 2004 9:23 pm

BAT BAT HERE COMES THE BAT. 8-O

My opinion is... good. I know i kill fairly quick, but a certain flamestriker who shall remain nameless ;) , joins a game and makes my vike who is fairly well equipped, and my windforce wielding( woot baal last night) multishot merc look like a couple of naked corpse runs. Its just scary the damge this spell does, and the resulting lag is awful.

Kind of made me feel like vanilla d2 with casters making tanks useless except as meat shield.

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Re: Skills: Heroine

Post by Xcolibri » Mon Apr 12, 2004 10:28 pm

Kind of made me feel like vanilla d2 with casters making tanks useless except as meat shield.
It's worse here: heroines are meat shield theirselves, too...

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Re: Skills: Heroine

Post by F8cker » Mon Apr 26, 2004 8:37 pm

@Xcolibri

i have an heroine in hc on the server she is lvl 94 atm ;) and she kills verry well with her flamestrike because i read her dmg only 5,2k but the leech she get because the physical dmg which is in the strike and she do 5,2k dmg per milisec i think because she leech ONLY all the time if one monster is hit the leech colour goes to purp sometimes... the leech is extreme overpowert...
kA 8]

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Re: Skills: Heroine

Post by Xcolibri » Wed Apr 28, 2004 10:27 am

Okay, than I was wrong with my assumption that it doesn't leech. Probably due to my rather low physical damage.
Well, since it won't do phys. damage anymore, this won't be an issue anymore.

PS: Wow, lvl 94 hc! Congrats :)

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Re: Skills: Heroine

Post by gandalf{xan} » Thu Apr 29, 2004 7:21 am

[quote=F8cker";p="170308"]@Xcolibri
i the leech colour goes to purp sometimes... the leech is extreme overpowert...[/quote]

this is because your leeching life (red) and mana (blue) at the same time & both anims are shown -> purple

greetings :)
life´s too short. . .

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Re: Skills: Heroine

Post by MrSwinger » Fri Apr 30, 2004 4:40 pm

hey mouse ive been play a heroine and got her quite far (lvl 89) and she does very well but theres a few things that bug me.

1) Rabies is a great skill and the dmg is perfect which is surprising for a poison skill but the mana cost is huge and u lose mana even if u dont hit.

2) dodge/avoid/avade are all worthless i think, ive put 1 point in each and with + skills i have 66%/66%/63% D/A/E respectivly, with this amount of dodging i i find it near impossible to use rabies or fury while beeing attacked by more then about 6 monsters as im constnatly dodging, id much rather take the extra dmg and leech it back then spend all the time dodging.

i dont know whether this is an ama skill to sorc char to druid skill problem (I.E. using amazon skills on a sorc while shifted) or whether this is just something else. if it cant be sorted i think these need changing because when the next patch comes onto the realms im not even going to put 1 point into any of those skills as they are no more then a hindrance IMO.

3) i beleive there may be some kind of bug/feature with rabies id like some insight on, when using rabies i notice that it doesnt always use the mana as listed, ive noted rabies taking around 150 mana per bite in some cases with a lvl 37 rabies (47 something listed mana cost).

(EDIT)

the problems with dodge seem to be sorted somewhat, if thats odwn to u i thank u.

1 thing surprises me with the 1.45c patch, u nerfed rabies by a huge about (all synergies half) which would have been bad enough let alone the new difficulty?
im aware you can get the listed dmg up to 100k but pls look beyond numbers, that 100k is over about 20 seconds with maxed synergies and a high lvl rabies, IMO the dmg was perfect as it was never overkilling nor underkilling.

something else that seemed odd, as my heroine got reset i decided to try firelcaws + fury, fury was fine as i expected though fireclaws was slightly disspointing with its huge mana cost and not so impressive dmg, the same goes for flamestrike and ignition.
Trying a lvl 31 ignition and flamestrike in normal with 2 other people took 2 attacks to kill act5 normal monsters...along with the 35+ mana per attack it seem underwhelming.

im aware that you've already sent out the patch and u might not like to have to rebalanced some skills again but could these things be aknowledged pls because IMO unnessecary nerfing and huge mana cost/low dmg skills dont put a good face on heroines.
Last edited by MrSwinger on Sat May 08, 2004 4:45 am, edited 1 time in total.

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