Test Discussion Episode 45: Artifact - Ebon's Untethered shadow

This artifact seems problematic for celestial. Stacking this with amulet would probably get me killed on the 3rd stack because celestial has a high power cost already. I think the power cost should be reduce to 5 at all ranks.

Youre right. I didnt take that increase in power cost into account.

Even with the damage mitigation, its more damage taken than before. Right now the power cost increase doesnt apply. The dmg reduction from what i tested is 43% after burning max stacks (10). The reduction should be 3%/stack if going by the description for Rank 200.
It lasts ~12 seconds, which is not enough to mitigate all 10 dmg procs for lernaea unless you use clips.

Based on that info, i would suggest to apply the increased power cost as described but then increase the damage mitigation gained by 5%/stack and also increasing the damage mitigation duration by ~2 seconds. That way we are encouraged to use our finishers frequently and still not bring the healer in trouble to keep up our health all the time.

The 50% power cost increase seemed a bit harsh for 30% might at 10 stacks. Especially compared to say, Venom Wrist Dispenser, which I believe is now an up to 18% buff for precision with only a 10% power cost increase and does not need to be stacked up. For this new artifact at max level, 2-3% increased power cost per stack may make more sense.

Otherwise, it would be nice if there was some sort of a heal added with each stack, that would actually create a lot better synergy with Lernaea's Amulet. Also, any new artifact for might DPS or might based battle roles that provides healing would be helpful, as there seems to currently be no might based equivalent to anything like the precision based healing artifacts.

If trying to make this work and not hammer trolls, which is already a role that sorta is scarce. I would make the choice to change claw from 0% power heals to instead you dump power at 15-20% of ur vit. Nobody will complain about a buff like this, and it would fix just about any problem seen with this artifact.

Exactly way better options for finisher builds Lernae, Trans, Lamort 80+ Damage Ally Superman, Support 1 Ally BMWL finisher passive, Cyborg for power or use Black Adam for his finisher passive but that ally almost entirely useless besides his damage but Incase you want to build entirely around your finisher he is a must that setup work around any power you shouldn't have any problems staying alive i have finisher like almost every few seconds compared to most people even able tank with it on my sorcery finisher alt planning to buy extra power tokens to test something i seen recently for pvp but I'm out seeya

The new artifact gives a damage mitigation buff after you consume the stacks with a finisher. So first rotation, you will take heavy damage, any rotation after that the damage will be mitigated by 30% at max stacks, if I remember correctly.

Hey Ranmaru, trying to test the artifact since last night but I neither see the might increases nor the increased power cost associated.

On a side note , the amulet’s animation was being displayed at the same time with no effect

I really like the idea of an artifact that works together with amulet to give might dps smth new and maybe situationally better than our normal card+card+solar/quislet/eog builds. But i dont think, that this is the right approach.

The whole damage red plus power cost increase thing seems odd to me. Healers who are already struggling with the amulet self damage are put in a even worse spot than before (atleast until you use your finisher). You also now pose a problem for trolls. The damage red is nice and all at reducing amulet damage after the first finisher, but it seems sorta wasted as a stat on dds.
Why not let it simply reduce the power cost of your abillities? That way you dont get as much selfdamage from amulet right from the start and dont hurt your support roles as much.I know that this would sorta make omega even more useless, but this whole stressing out support roles thing just doesnt sit right with me.

The second problem i have is that its to close to amulet in how stacks are created, how they are removed and the rewards they are giving. Having them both being removed by finisher usage is really unfortunate bc using a finisher would now make both buffs irrelevant, leaving you for the time being with only one art and destroying your damage in the process. If you dont use your finisher tho you are just draining your supports out of every last bit of power. Both of them simply stacking might is also meh and it really doesnt address amulets problems. In my opinion smth aoe heavy that scales with might would have been great, maybe even completly without stacks. Sure both of their effects should be up at the same time, but maybe the remove part could have been different or simply shadow not having a stacking mechanic at all.

Overall i still like the idea of trying to make amulet work tho.

What are the intended values for might increase per stack? There is a discrepancy between what you've written here (1/2/2/3) and what is indicated on test (0.5/1/1/1.5).

If this is meant to be the power bar version of lernaea's amulet, it seems odd to cut the might buff in half.

The strings on test are inaccurate, I was doing testing earlier with QA and they found that those lower numbers were not worth the investment of use so it was adjusted upwards.

1. You don't give up anything and you have damage reduction on top of rage crash canceler.
2. The might buff is just an extra, the main thing is damage reduction, not so many tank artifacts give that kind of buff.
3. Only if you use them at 10 stacks, in normal scenarios, you can get at least 15% DR (5+ powers use), combine that with superman, you now have 50%+ DR.

Understood.

Also, am I mistaken in saying that neither lernaea's nor ebon's apply the percentage of might that they claim? Lernaea's, for instance, only applies 21.8% extra might at max stacks (tested out of combat to avoid escalating might proc) instead of the 30% indicated.

It's 30% of your base might, the high percentage you have, the less you will get from them. Some sources that give you the bonus:

. Skill points / Artifacts / etc

This is correct, all might bonuses are stacking atop eachother which can cause misleading representation of the data.

Anyone who knows me or runs with me knows I am a HEAVY user of Laerna's Amulet. I have it on 100% of the time as a dps. If I see my health drop below 50% after using 1 superpower I hit my finisher. I normally don't get any complaints from healers with this system.

Once I heard there was an artifact that would synchronize with it I was excited. But now not so much.

I use amulet mostly to keep up with the prec dps's who get all the benefits with none of the reproductions. This new artifact will only cripple you more as a might dps if you use it with amulet. So now not only do I have to watch my health bar, now I have to manage my power???

The only way I could see that being worth it is if I'm hitting adds and bosses like a TRUCK with damage in between stacks. I highly doubt in its current state that is the case.

I believe this artifact can have that synchronization with amulet if you change it to reduce the amount of power used OR keep the power increase BUT when we use a finisher it DOES NOT remove any amulet stacks.

Or even a better suggestion, change it to "When using a finisher you apply AOE damage up to 8 targets".

Except that there isn’t a prec artifact that’s even good? Every prec dps uses prec/might arts like trans strat and quislet. How many times do you see prec dps running pure prec dps arts (that are good dps)?

One thing you have to account for is most artifacts are for both might & prec (BUT) they always work better on prec for all the advantages I already listed. Again prec doesn't deal with this give & take mentality that might does (again not a bad thing just saying might shouldn't have to either). At the end of the day this is just a buffing artifact that basically steals power from the healer that was in intended to be paired with an artifact that makes you ko yourself (now done faster by amplifying power costs) effectively stealing heals from the tank. If you compare might buff artifacts to prec buff artifacts its an imbalance b/c we are creating weakness on one side for artifacts in the same category.

Also a good prec player using the pure prec buff artifacts can out preform any might using pure might buff arts b/c prec never has to relinquish it's multiple buffs just to stay alive or in this case, stay powered. (Again this isn't a remark to nerf prec) just saying we need to stop limiting might so heavily.

Going back at least as far as the Clarion, the new and updated artifacts have been really fun and interesting, as well as added a good amount of utility. There does still seem to potentially be some biased toward precision compared to might though.

Like with Lernaea's Amulet, the new artifact has cool risk versus reward mechanics, but the drawbacks seem to be too significant even at max level. Those who may still be able to make it somewhat worthwhile, likely by quickly reaching max stacks, could become a liability or drag on their group's support roles by doing so, and that does not exactly make for a fun dynamic or play style in many cases.

It is also more of a non-bo than a combo with Lernaea's Amulet in its current state. If the power cost increase would be reduced to about 3% per stack at max level, then at least the mitigation stacks would be closer to equaling things out as far as the extra damage taken.

The power cost increase could be scaled to something like 20/10/5/2.5 and maintaining a lot of play-from-the-tray rotations would still be challenging at max stacks. It also would allow might based players to still potentially take more advantage of controller power out though, which may make sense since weapon based DPS already can get a significant 20% precision buff from controllers.

Just to be clear, you are aware that the actual buff isnt 3%/stack on test, right? (not sure if by strings you only meant the text that isnt identical)