Direct answer from chris wilson to my email about PVP

Hey it's still very good... to trigger stuff

Every time I see a kid blue-cyclone-discharging I die a little lol

Hmmmm might put my eq bounty back up

thanks haunt!

Looking forward

CANT FRIGGING SLEEP.....

WHERE IS MA FRIGGING PATCH!!WHERE IS MA FRIGGING PATCH!! WHERE IS MA FRIGGING PATCH!!

05:18 here, they're 4 hours off news schedule.

It's only a spark nerf.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank all of the Leo levelers for being so salty toward my no pants hobo sparker. Your collective outrage made a difference.

I'm not sure what minimal gear cost option the masses have to counter the 3+ screen distance 1-shots from gg wands/bows anymore, but at least spark is fixed.

"

Vhlad wrote:

It's only a spark nerf.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank all of the Leo levelers for being so salty toward my no pants hobo sparker. Your collective outrage made a difference.

I'm not sure what minimal gear cost option the masses have to counter the 3+ screen distance 1-shots from gg wands/bows anymore, but at least spark is fixed.

Not good enough, nor the core of the problem, the damage of spark means very little to nothing. a crit spark Templar will still hit for 6k + just be ignoring res. Even from 100% ignore res to 33% ignore res it'll still be broken. (which won't happen, EVER)

¯\(°_°)/¯ Its a start I guess. 30% of 6k is 1.8k (ik maths doesn't work like this), but its barely half a gem slot from 6 links.

"

Not good enough, nor the core of the problem, the damage of spark means very little to nothing. a crit spark Templar will still hit for 6k + just be ignoring res. Even from 100% ignore res to 33% ignore res it'll still be broken. (which won't happen, EVER)

¯\(°_°)/¯ Its a start I guess. 30% of 6k is 1.8k (ik maths doesn't work like this), but its barely half a gem slot from 6 links.

Reducing the dmg is always a solution cause if you take no dmg why would someone complain about the mechanic of the skill (just as an extreme example). But yeah the question is if it will be enough. I think yes in terms of nerfing spark dmg itself. Unfortunately there are other mechanics that lead to the high dmg output rather than just the gem itself.

"

IceDeal wrote:

it's probably the Sparks Fix Dan and Nick were talking about a few weeks ago., hopefully some tweaking on the Inquisitor sub as well.

Told ya, to be honest it probably won't change anything without adjusting the Inquisitor Sub but I'm sur our Lord And Savior Vhlad will test that once the patch is out.

My spark is the extreme case, with essentially 0 gear or passive investment in health, resist, mitigation. Maybe 30% damage nerf won't be enough in the extreme case. I can test it but it's not particularly fun to play and people get really mad at me. There's lots of bullying and swearing, and in some cases the anger carriers over outside of the arena (had someone reply FU sparker! when I asked to pay their buyout on something).

But if it's still deemed a "problem", I presume it would be because it could kill the mirror wand Kinetic Blast or mirror bow Lightning Arrow or supertank shotgun Explosive Arrow builds that are used to facerolling everyone from many screens away. So what, spark can faceroll them from more screens away - it's a bit of a wealth equalizer. Other builds completely counter hobo spark so there's still a paper/rock/scissors dynamic. When you have such an extreme focus on offense in some cases it's countered with very simple things.

For the "properly built" sparkers (i.e. pve viable, with things like 75% elemental resist instead of -60 and a healthy effective life pool), a 30% damage nerf may be enough.

If some of the wealthier guys made a wealthy version of hobo spark maybe it would be a problem still. There's already a GG tri resist +2 spark projectiles 500+ ES helm floating around. Just the ES from that alone is double the effective life pool of hobo spark, which uses rat's nest for moar damage. Those wealthier guys can probably cap crit without rat's nest.