dont-nerf-me-bro
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Behind the Mask: Ritual pets don't suck
Way back in Champions Online's beta, I looked on at the Sorcery pets with a little bit of disdain. They didn't do as much DPS as a pair of Munitions Bots, and many of them were tied up in annoying ritual circles that you had to constantly stand in. Being required to stand still isn't a huge problem in many MMOs, but Champions has a very fast-paced, mobility-intensive combat system. Melee heroes need to move quickly from enemy to enemy and often have to chase down runners. Ranged characters are best served by kiting during battle to elude melee foes. In this kind of fast-paced world, who has time for a pet that forces you to stick around? Naturally, I ate my own words a month or two ago when I discovered the Primal ritual. Originally I chose the Primal ritual because his huge AoE Snow Storm was pretty darn good at thinning mobs and gathering aggro. I also really liked that he had a travel-disabling lunge. After my crazy PvP antics at the anniversary event, I also noticed a lot of other goofy things about him. I asked myself the question: Are the other rituals this good? The answer is no, but for the most part, all of them are worth taking. Unlike most pets in CO, rituals are pretty strong. I'll be pretty sad if the devs change them too much.
Forum Post of the Day: Angry title and coffee with gin
I don't know why I laughed out loud when I read the following quote from Ghostcrawler on a trollish forum post, but I did: DESPERATE ATTEMPT TO EXERT A CALMING INFLUENCE WHILE NOT ACCIDENTALLY INSULTING ANYONE AND/OR SHOUTING EXPLITIVES AND/OR REVEALING THAT I HAVE GIN IN MY COFFEE MUG.Yup. Just like that. Caps spam and all. Throw in a "Don't nerf me, bro!" or "To the ground, baby!" at the end of that and you have yourself a real Ghostcrawler statement.Now this might be some unabashed fanboi-ism on my part, but the question I have after reading that is "What kind of gin do you drink?" I have to imagine Ghostcrawler is the kind of guy who enjoys some top shelf liquor. I'm sure he's making enough at Blizzard to afford it. Perhaps some Tanqueray Rangpur? Or some Anchor Junipero?Personally I enjoy Bombay Sapphire and the Rangpur, though I've been known to grab some Beefeater if that's all that's available. If Ghostcrawler is reading this, we'd love to know what kind of gin you drink. Feel free to drop us a note on our tip line and we'll update this post.
Paladins nerfed on the beta
MMO-Champion is showing a good run down of the recent paladin changes. We knew these were coming. While many of the changes don't seem like they're nerfing the Paladin class to the ground, the changes are definitely a nerf.Most of the changes are centering around the Retribution tree. Some are pretty crazy, like Seal of Corruption dealing holy damage, and Divine Storm dealing physical damage. There is no indication if these changes will make it into patch 3.0.3 or arrive in a later update.There's a couple of other changes that stick out for me. Seal of Command lost about 20% of it's overall damage Most other seals were reduced by around 13% to 21% Judgement of the Wise grants 15% of base mana instead of 33% Most other judgement effects are reduced by about 15% Art of War was retooled to increase damage of Judgement, Crusader Strike, and Divine Storm instead of increasing critical strike damage In the glyph department, the Glyph of Crusader Strike now reduces the mana cost of Crusader Strike by 20%, instead of increasing the damage dealt by 20%.And finally, Blessing of Might now increases AP by 306. It used to be 305. So it's not a total nerf...
