Friar Style Changes - Phoenix Freeshard

Hello, to address the new style review wrt. Friars melee Staff line.

CURRENT SPECC
Good bits
1. great anytime
2. great snare styles (after evade, back and side)
Bad bits
1. no useable after parry (currently at 50staff)
2. no useable long stuns (currrently at 44staff in a 3part chain)
3. two sets of after evade chains
4. a set of defunct anytimes

NEW CHANGES
Good bits
1. sidestun and sideDD added.
2. After parry ASR and then 8s stun, two-part chain.
Meh bits
1. The backsnare lowered to 18Staff
2. A two-part Low damage anytime-chain with 75 DD was added at 50style (seems too unattractive to lose red-buffs over)
Bad bits
1. The great anytime is gone (bad for melee-Friar)
2. The evadesnare is gone (Bad for all Friar).
3. The lvl 15 sidesnare is gone. (Bad for heal-friar).

SUMMARY

These changes do not really improve the Friar whilst sticking to it's current playstyle, as you lose a good anytime and great snares for a good parry chain and a good Dmg sidechain.
The melee Friar now will play considerably more like a VW... and this encourages them to the strafelag-exploit sidestyle abuse mechanic.

(i would add the current blank lvl 6 style to a front positional (20healproc) style akin to the live figure eight. to at least give melee Friars back a decent 1v1 anytime)

Thu 27 May 2021 10:24 AM by DJ2000

The back snare is now a whopping 27 sec. long, thats nothing to sneeze at.
34-50 anytime chain is really not worth the points you have to spent for it.
To use the 34 as a backup style is also barely worth it, 10-Taunt is damage wise the same with +10Hit/-10Def, 12-detaunt offers a Def bonus but no damage or toHit. Only the fact that it's there anyway, when you go 39 Staff, is the sole reason why it would be used at all.

You are correct though, the friar, just like almost everyone else, better put on some dancing shoes when this goes live. As all those enemies have their damage chains behind a side chain as well, so they will have to do it too.

Thu 27 May 2021 12:06 PM by Blitze

Yea, I haven’t checked other classes much, but No amount of increase in balance and utility would be good enough to counter how much I would hate having more people doing the lagsidestyle exploit, VWs n BMs n Rangers is way too many already!

Thu 27 May 2021 12:26 PM by Sepplord

Blitze wrote: ↑
Thu 27 May 2021 12:06 PM
Yea, I haven’t checked other classes much, but No amount of increase in balance and utility would be good enough to counter how much I would hate having more people doing the lagsidestyle exploit, VWs n BMs n Rangers is way too many already!

i feel like that is a battle you would have to fight in general though, not regarding specific classes
While i haven't looked into every single class myself it seems like every single melee class is getting side- and backstyles

It makes sense in groupcombat, but you are also correct, it will lead to everyone being rewarded for sidestyling/backstyling in 1vs1 which is only possible because of the underlying faulty gamemechanics

Thu 27 May 2021 3:09 PM by Blitze

Its the sidestun that's the annoying thing bit i guess, and with that then setting up a big DD on the second style (akin to the VW DD) it will make the 1v1 Friar playstyle a constant strafe dance to get that style off... not my bag really, some Friars will enjoy it, especially if you already like soloing on a VW.

I would change the current suggestions to something slightly different.

Anytime
lvl1-bleed
lvl 10-taunt
lvl 12-detaunt

Frontal
Lvl 4-tinyheal
followup lvl 6-tinyheal

After evade
lvl 25-snare
followup lvl 44-150DD

After parry
lvl 8 - ASR
followup lvl 39 - stun

Side
lvl 15-Snare
followup lvl 18- stun (or medium heal)
altern followup lvl 29-75 DDstyle

Back
lvl 34-snare
followup lvl 50 - good Dmg/DD __AND__ AbsDebuff (or tiny 10s celerity)*

These suggestions keep Friars with their good anytime replaced with a minor healing frontal combo.. It keeps the good snares and adds in the ASR/stun parry chain.
It does not fall into the trap of the stun/DD sidelagexploit [as the stun element is removed and the DD reduced to 75]. Giving the 50 style a cool effect like Abs debuff or celerity would make PvE friars or 8v8 friars on an assist train speccing 50staff to feel helpful, As currently PvE friars and 8v8 friars are stuck as only healer spec...

Sun 30 May 2021 5:09 PM by Islandsbrygge

I would love to see melee friars being viable in group after the changes.

Wed 2 Jun 2021 12:43 AM by Hattrick

Islandsbrygge wrote: ↑
Sun 30 May 2021 5:09 PM
I would love to see melee friars being viable in group after the changes.

Me too. Friars used to be truly fearsome melee opponents way back in the day. I remember they used to be regularly targeted with calls to be nerfed. Here they are pretty much relegated to playing the role of 2nd tier healer if you want to get groups and that sucks.

Sun 20 Jun 2021 4:35 PM by Xalaron

New player and nearly 50 friar looking for build advice. With the new changes to style What would be a solid solo spec, and what would be a solid grp spec? I found some old threads that suggested 25 rejuv, 49 enh, 34 staff, 12 parry for grp spec which still seems okay, but solo spec was 16 rejuv, 45 enh, 39 staff, 23 parry. The solo spec going 39 staff seems pointless after style changes. Any advice here would be appreciated.

Mon 21 Jun 2021 9:58 AM by Blitze

Speccing a melee Friar now is difficult cos you have to choose to get the red self buffs or the lvl 50 style.

I have tried the 50staff 35enhance specc but have not tried a new 39staff 45enhance specc yet.
(I am not finding the new 50staff specc any better than the 44staff 45enhance specc prior to the style changes in 1v1s at least).

So wrt. to the 50staff specc in only 1v1s
1. Damage is slightly higher than before (using Holy Staff > Excom compared to just Friar's Boon)
2. Endurance is stupidly higher. (i had to buy instant end pots, yuck)
3. Defence is noticeably lower with lower AF, 5% less absorb and ~20 less Dex and Qui.
4. The sidestyle is big damage and therefore, massively rewards side-strafe lag-styling and playing melee exactly like a VW.
5. Assassins seem to be hitting harder

So wrt. to the 39staff specc in only 1v1s, i havent tried yet but I expect it to be....
1. Damage slightly lower than before (using new taunt over old Friar's Boon)
2. Endurance will still be waaay higher.
3. Defence is the same (as 45enhance)
4. The sidestyle will still be king therefore, massively rewards side-strafe lag-styling and playing melee exactly like a VW.
5. Assassins will still be hitting harder.

Overall, I would say thus far, the style change is a big blow to the melee Friar in both the feel of the class (feels like a VW now) and in your chances of winning 1v1s

By feel of the class... i mean these things:
1. Before the Friar had very meh positionals now they are good
2. Friar's had a good anytime and now they are ok for 50staff specc but at the cost of huge defence penalty.
3. Friar had great snares (positional & reactionary), & now have poor snares.
4. Friar's had poor stuns now have decent stuns
3. Previously a Friar could style forever and now they glug through endurance potions.
-----This adds up to a completely different experience playing a melee Friar----------

Wed 23 Jun 2021 1:41 PM by inoeth

on paper the 39 staff spec looks to me like:

-low endu anytimer
-high parry skill (27)
-after parry stun chain 8s
-massive dmg side chain
-high melee absorb

all in all not too bad, not sure why you think side strafe is a must, i dont see that. you can use your after parry chain stun to get off positionals.