6 replies to this topic

[Neryth]

Cloaking Exceed has had two issues that have been bugging me since way back, when I started playing here 8~9 months ago.

 

1) Cloaking Exceed currently costs 45 SP to cast, regardless of whether you're using it to enter Cloaking Exceed or to end Cloaking Exceed. I compared this to other Thief stealth skills other than Invisibility (I don't have a leveled chaser to go and test that) and it looks like this is the only one to do that. Basically, Cloaking/Hiding/Chase Walk don't behave anything like this. Using Cloaking Exceed a second time to drop out of it costs you another 45 SP (for 90 total). 

 

2) It puts you on a 2 second aftercast delay where you can't use any other skills. This is for a good reason, obviously. The issue is that this also takes place when you use Cloaking Exceed while already in Cloaking Exceed to drop out of it. What this means is that it's better to use any other skill to leave Cloaking Exceed. Some people put First Aid on their hotkeys for that purpose, which translates to one less space available (also randomly popping out and shouting First Aid !! is neither intimidating nor stealthy). If possible, using Cloaking Exceed a second time to leave Cloaking Exceed shouldn't incur the aftercast delay.

 

tl;dr -- using Cloaking Exceed twice puts you on a 4 second total aftercast delay and drains 90 SP. The SP consumption at the very least makes no sense and is inconsistent with other stealth abilities (other than Ranger Camouflage).

[Terpsichore]

Will be changed to not consume sp or trigger acd when used to uncloak with the next reboot.

[Scias]

The cooldown never bothered me. The only time you ever really need to uncloak is when you're casting another skill, attacking with melee, or taking damage, none of which cause any skill cooldown. The only other time is for buffs when you're usually with your party anyway. The sp cost was a little much on servers without cola though. But even then variants solve the problem easily. I'm not sure about buffing the GXs SP to the point where variants and SP pots have little necessity or are rarely a good strategy choice. Cloaking exceed is easy to get used to and eventually you know when and when not to use it every time without any problems.

Removing the cooldown only serves to make it easier for you to reveal yourself right before you attack or cast anyway just like normal cloaking so I don't see the reasoning here. You always have the option to switch to normal cloaking if you're worried about SP or cooldown and buffing Cloaking Exceed would make normal cloaking redundant and not have any viable use. I was under the impression the drawbacks of Cloaking Exceed were to vary the gameplay and give the GX a learning curve where you learn when to use normal cloaking and Cloaking Exceed.

Edited by Scias, 22 January 2016 - 10:50 PM.

[Neryth]

@Scias,

1) Aftercast delay and skill cooldown are two different things.

2) The aftercast delay is only being removed from using it to uncloak, which makes plenty of sense. If somebody is knocking you out of it, you still can't re-enter Cloaking Exceed. The only difference is that now if you choose to drop out of Cloaking Exceed by reactivating it, you don't have to use some other skill (giving it a slightly higher overall SP cost and detracting from the "stealth" part of the skill).

3) SP consumption for GX is primarily from maintaining and using other skills and the SP upkeep portion of Cloaking Exceed (which isn't affected by this change at all). This change really has a negligible impact in terms of SP and is more about adding back some consistency to the class.

 

Cloaking Exceed has NO skill cooldown, whatsoever. That means it's 100% ASPD spammable in Bragi.

 

What I would actually recommend is giving it an ACTUAL 2 second skill cooldown in exchange for these buffs, because that's where the "skill" involved in using it comes from. The fact that Bragi makes it spammable actually detracts from any skill or decision-making involved as long as you have that song buff. This part is just my opinion, but it's also thematically inappropriate. Assassin and Assassin Cross have always had very limited advantages (other than Soul Breaker) from hugging and mooching buffs off of their allies. Currently, Bragi gives much higher overall DPS from Rolling Cutter, Cross Ripper Slasher, and a bump in utility from Cloaking Exceed as well. Honestly that just feels kind of shitty to me; if I wanted to power spike off of Bragi, I would be playing a different class entirely.

[Scias]

1} Sorry I got the names mixed up

2) I misread your first comment then. If replacing the delay with a real cooldown doesn't necessarily buff the skill but make it more consistent, then I'll take your word for it. What I still don't really understand is why you would want to use some other skill to prematurely reveal yourself before you go in and actually start to attack people, when you can just go in cloaked and immediately start attacking from the shadows. But even though it's something I'd never do, I think I understand how it doesn't make sense.

3) SP I don't really care as much about, but I would like to keep the dynamic where you have a real decision to make between thorny boots, variants etc. But just disregard this. GX has plenty consumables to use already without sp pots.

While I'm an extremely rusty player now, I did spend many years getting used to the quirks and nuances of how the GX handles so forgive me if it comes across as a personal preference. I just don't want the GX to get unnecessary buffs (other than the buffs it was due damage/aspd wise, which this server did a good job at) taking away some of that learning curve and dynamic of the GX. But your recommendation of replacing it with an actual 2 second cooldown, should not only be a recommendation but a strong suggestion. If that isn't implemented and the acd is simply removed letting people flash out then back into cloaking exceed, I will be making a suggestion thread for that myself if you don't get there first. Because I don't think that suggestion was in your original post.

[Neryth]

TBH, I didn't even expect the 2 second aftercast from using it to decloak to be removed. My biggest complaint here was just the fact that there is an SP cost associated with reactivating it to leave it, as that created an enormous inconsistency with the other stealths that GX has access to. 

 

The way it currently works, if you Cloaking Exceed and someone immediately knocks you out with a detection skill, you will still have to wait before activating Cloaking Exceed again (or using any skills at all) because of the 2 second aftercast delay. It will still work like that with this change. The way it works currently is like if Stalkers+Shadow Chasers had a cast time for dropping out of Chase Walk.

 

On this server, Ranger Camouflage was customized to have a 2 second cooldown when you're revealed/end the stealth by any means. I just think that dropping out of Cloaking Exceed by re-using it shouldn't incur a penalty--it doesn't seem logical to me.

 

I think GX has quite a few realistic options available for footgear and will still have that.

 

The 2 second cooldown makes sense to me but I could see that some people might disagree with it/having some valid counterarguments, which is why it's only a recommendation at this point.

Edited by Neryth, 23 January 2016 - 04:25 AM.

[FWQ943W09J5G0KERI]

I'm so happy. Now Gio can hide from the Woe players that she can't kill.