[2021] [6. May 2021] Call to Arms Patch 4

Call to Arms Patch 4 (Balance Patch) - Version 18.040.1 - May 6, 2021

Hellgate Changes

Hellgate rewards have been greatly increased, and Infamy for Hellgates has been adjusted to scale more quickly, as well as to max out at 50%. Nearly all players will also see an even greater bonus. A very small number of the highest Infamy players may see their bonus percentages slightly decrease, but even in these cases, overall loot will go up significantly.

• Significantly increased rewards across all non-lethal and lethal Hellgate modes
  
• A chest will now always appear at the portal after any Hellgate is completed, either by killing the opposing team or collecting sufficient Infamy from killing mobs
  
  • These chests can be Common, Uncommon, Rare or Legendary
    
• Increased the value of Uncommon, Rare, and Legendary chests in Hellgates
  
• Contents of PvP reward chests are now boosted by Infamy, as well as containing the value the non-PvP chest would have contained
  
• All Cooldowns (including capes) now reset instantly for both teams when a Hellgate is invaded, and Health and energy are replenished as well
  
• Removed delay in matchmaking for chained Hellgates to remove any benefit from waiting in a Hellgate instead of progressing for more loot
  
• Knocked-down players on a winning team now get up immediately when the losing team is eliminated
  
• Knocked-down players on a losing team are now shielded and get up immediately when removed from a Hellgate
  
• Added additional bigger entrance to final combat area in "The Ritual" map to make it more challenging to defend
  

Faction Warfare Changes

• Faction Warfare respawns now occur in batches to help rally respawning forces
  
  • As respawning now waits for the next available timeslot, base respawn times have been reduced from 24s to 16s, leaving average base times relatively unchanged
    
• The Bandit Assault in the red zones now occurs more frequently, as well as more unpredictably, and no longer starts between 08:30 and 09:00 UTC
  
• Added new Hotkey to open Faction Warfare UI (Default: Shift + F)
  
• Faction Standing Upkeep is now shown in the Weekly Report
  

20v20 Crystal League Changes

• Dramatically improved the value of artifacts in reward chests after matches. The amount of artifacts has not been reduced, increasing overall chest values drastically. Chests now contain artifacts of the following tiers exclusively:
  
  • Rune Artifacts: T7 or higher
    
  • Soul Artifacts: T6 or higher
    
  • Relic Artifacts: T5 or higher
    
  • Avalonian Artifacts: all tiers
    
• Reduced Season Points for winning Level 1 matches, to make it more worthwhile to participate in Levels 2+ in comparison:
  
  • Season Points for winning Level 1 20v20 match: 5 → 2
    
• Reduced starting points for each team to lower the overall gear cost per match, as shorter matches also means fewer casualties on both sides:
  
  • Starting Points per Team: 250 → 200
    

Changes to Black Zone Elite/Veteran Fame Buff

• Buff now persists when moving between black-zone regions
  
• Overall duration reduced to 10 minutes (900s → 600s)
  
• Buff is removed if leaving the black zone, with the following rules:
  
  • For this buff, Randomized and Static Dungeons entered via black zone entrances are considered black zones
    
  • The buff will thus not be removed when entering these dungeons, though it will drop off naturally after 10 minutes
    
  • For this buff, Roads of Avalon, Hellgates, and Corrupted Dungeons are not considered black zones, even if entered from a black zone, and will thus cancel the buff immediately
    

Mobile Changes

• Optimizations to region loading (should result in faster loading times for various devices)
  
• Characters under effects ended by interactions must now pick up Silver manually, to correct an issue where auto-pickup could end buffs unintentionally
  
• Various additional UI optimizations
  

Duel Changes

• Shrines can no longer be used during duels
  
• Leaving the duel area during the countdown is now considered a Draw (previously a Loss)
  
• Duels can no longer be initiated with opponents at different height levels
  

Other Changes and Improvements

• Reduced loading times when transitioning between zones on all platforms
  
• Reworked visual effects of dropped Silver and Loot Bags for improved visibility
  

Combat Balance Changes

Arcane Staffs
While Black Hole finds its uses in PvE, its cast range has been increased to make it more attractive in PvP. The adjustment to Dark Sphere is primarily for server performance, as reducing it from 5 to 3 auras ensures better performance in large fights.

• Black Hole (Witchwork Staff):
  
  • Cast Range: 11m → 14m
    
• Dark Sphere (Evensong):
  
  • Max Enemy targets to get an Aura: 5 → 3
    
  • Healing Received Reduction: 20% → 25%
    
  • Damage Reduction vs players: 20% → 25%
    
  • Damage Reduction vs mobs: 8% → 12%
    

Axes
Axes have been overrepresented in a variety of content types. While the constant sustain damage and healing reduction is part of the weapon’s identity, the value axe weapons get from their Q abilities was a bit too overwhelming, making it hard for other melee weapon trees to compete. Additionally, the options of counterplay and skill expression for Rending Spin and Raging Blades have been improved with a sweet-spot damage ring to increase the importance of player positioning. The readability of visual effects was also improved for various axe abilities.

Adrenaline Boost was changed to improve its ability to chase down a target offensively, while also reducing its use as an easy disengage. And a standtime was added to Razor Cut to add a bit more commitment to the ability and weaken its easy disengage potential.

Vampiric Strike was reworked to the new ability Blood Bandit to make this weapon more dynamic and allow more skill expression during fights.

Greataxes are now non-interruptible and have more upfront damage versus players, giving them a substantial buff in PvP. At the same time, their PvE damage has been toned down to bring it more in line with other weapons.

• Battleaxe Normal Attacks:
  
  • Attacks per second: 0.9 → 1.1
    
  • Damage per attack: 50 → 41
    
• Rending Spin (all Axes):
  
  • Range: 6m → 5m
    
  • Minimum distance for max Damage: 3m → 2.5m
    
  • Rending Bleed stacks: now only applied via max distance effect (i.e. 2.5m or further away)
    
• Rending Rage (all Axes):
  
  • Damage: 62 → 50
    
• Rending Bleed Stacks (all Axes):
  
  • Damage per Tick: 5.4 → 4.2
    
  • Healing Reduction on Max Stacks: 20% → 12%
    
• Adrenaline Boost (all Axes):
  
  • Movement Speed Bonus: 50% → 40%
    
  • Now also increases Attack Speed by 40%
    
  • Max Duration: 5s → 7s
    
  • However, if the caster doesn't hit an enemy with a Normal Attack for 2.5s, the Adrenaline Boost now ends early
    
  • Energy Cost: 11 → 9
    
• Internal Bleeding (all Axes):
  
  • Improved detection of moving versus standing still on affected enemies
    
  • Tick Interval: 1s → 0.5s
    
  • Damage per Tick: 21.97 → 11
    
• Raging Blades (all Axes):
  
  • Now hits in a ring around the caster, instead of a solid circle (Inner Radius: 2.5m / Outer Radius: 6m)
    
• Vampiric Strike (Battleaxe) - reworked the ability; now called "Blood Bandit":
  
  • Throw your axe in the targeted direction. Deals physical damage to all enemies hit and slows by 20% for 2s. Steal a percentage of the Health enemies lose based on Rending Bleed Charges on the targets.
    
  • Throw Range: 22m → 17m
    
• Whirlwind (Greataxe):
  
  • Channeling time: 4.5s → 2.5s
    
  • Damage per tick vs Players: 50 → 75 (Damage per tick vs Mobs unchanged)
    
  • Cooldown: 20s → 25s
    
  • Channel is now uninterruptible
    
  • Energy Cost on activation: 21 → 0
    
  • Instead the ability now consumes 4 energy per tick while channeling (total of 24 energy for full channel duration)
    
• Razor Cut (Bear Paws):
  
  • Standtime: 0s → 0.3s
    

Bows
Multishot cooldown was increased to make it less strong in kiting and "keep-away" playstyles.

Since Whispering Bow is still used very rarely, and as such has received a damage buff.

• Multishot (all Bows):
  
  • Cooldown: 4s → 5s
    
• Undead Arrows (Whispering Bow):
  
  • Additional Magic Damage: 45 → 50
    

Crossbows
The projectiles of Noise Eraser and Knockback Shot had misleading hitboxes. Noise Eraser in particular would hit even when it appeared to be dodged, due to a too-wide hitbox. Both projectiles can now be tracked more reliably.

• Noise Eraser (all Crossbows):
  
  • Reduced size of projectile hitbox; adjusted projectile position to better match it
    
• Knockback Shot (all Crossbows):
  
  • Reduced size of projectile hitbox; adjusted projectile position to better match it
    
  • Slightly increased projectile speed
    

Cursed Staffs
Various underused Cursed Staff abilities were buffed, like Dark Matter and Cursed Beam. The range of Vile Curse was increased to make it more attractive in group PvP, where currently Cursed Sickle is the go-to choice.

Armor Piercer is a staple of Cursed Staffs, but the armor shred was a bit too strong, and added too much of a damage spike to fights alongside its long range and short cooldown.

• Vile Curse (all Cursed Staffs):
  
  • Cast Range: 9m → 11m
    
• Armor Piercer (all Cursed Staffs):
  
  • Resistance Reduction: 0.2 → 0.17
    
  • Debuff Duration: 5s → 4s
    
• Cursed Beam (all Cursed Staffs):
  
  • Now consumes Vile Curse stacks for additional AoE damage per tick
    
  • For each tick that consumes a stack, the beam deals 72 magic damage in a 4m radius (instead of the base tick damage of 36 to only the beam target)
    
  • Tick Interval: 1s → 0.5s
    
  • Total Ticks: 5 → 10
    
  • Damage per Tick: 72 → 36
    
• Dark Matter (all Cursed Staffs):
  
  • Damage vs Players: 65.88 → 78
    
  • Damage vs Mobs: 32.94 → 36.7
    
  • Cast Time: 1s → 0.5s
    
  • Cast Range: 11m → 13m
    
  • Max Jump Distance to next enemy: 8m → 9m
    
• Haunting Screams (Cursed Skull):
  
  • Damage can no longer be reflected
    
  • Magic Damage per tick: 25 → 33
    

Daggers
Dagger Pair has been very strong in the new 2v2 Hellgates. The shortened cast time made it impossible to react to in certain situations, so the cast time has been reverted to its longer duration from before the last update. Its damage has also been reduced, as with the recently reduced standtime, players could directly follow Slit Throat with more damage, e.g. Chain Slash. Together these abilities had an extremely high damage burst. With the reduced damage of Slit Throat, the oneshot potential is reduced, but the overall damage output still stays very high.

A standtime was also added to Bloodletters, so players have to commit more to the action and allow for more room to punish it if spammed for disengagements.

• Slit Throat (Dagger Pair):
  
  • Cast Time: 0.3s → 0.4s
    
  • Reduced all direct and bleed damage by 7%
    
• Lunging Stabs (Bloodletter):
  
  • Standtime: 0s → 0.35s
    

Fire Staffs
Fire Wave is now easier to hit with and deals more damage. Fire Wall, with its lasting area, still has more utility, but Fire Wave is an alternative (with more damage plus knockback) in smaller or 1v1 fights.

• Fire Wave (all Fire Staffs):
  
  • Cone area now quickly swipes from left to right, covering more horizontal space
    
  • Enemies hit now receive an additional 75 magic damage if any Q-slot DoT is active on them
    

Frost Staffs
Freezing Wind has a much larger area that also stays on the ground briefly, making it easier to hit enemies or block choke points. To offset this significant buff and allow for more counterplay, the root will now not instantly affect the target, but instead stacks up quickly, so it is possible to blink out before getting rooted.

Hoarfrost has struggled with its unique identity among the other Q abilities. With this patch it now has a 6m AoE radius, making it the best Q ability to spread damage among multiple enemies. This makes it less powerful in focusing down one target, but adds constant pressure to enemy healers as it hits multiple targets repeatedly.

• Hoarfrost (all Frost Staffs):
  
  • Cast Time: 2s → 1.8s
    
  • Damage to main target: 150
    
  • Splash Damage to other enemies in the AoE 150 → 110
    
  • Radius: 4m → 6m
    
  • Cast Range: 14m → 12m
    
• Freezing Wind (One-handed Frost Staff):
  
  • Area size and duration increased
    
  • Area no longer roots instantly - instead applies 3 cc stacks in quick succession:
    
    • Stacks: 1 / 2 / 3 → Effect: Slows 15% / Slows 30% / Roots for 2.5s
      
  
  
  
  
  

Hammers

Ground Pound made it fairly easy to hit enemy clumps in large fights. It has been toned down in various ways to make it more reactable for enemies, especially in smaller group sizes, while staying incredibly strong in large fights.
Iron Breaker offered too much armor shred for its low cooldown, and has been reduced slightly.

Heavy Cleave is now called Heavy Smash. The area was improved to make it easier to land, and a sweet spot was added in the center that deals extra damage. This makes interactions with this ability a bit more interesting and increases the potential maximum damage slightly. Additionally, the entire cast time now also reflects until the weapon hits the ground, making this interaction more consistent. Finally, as a small quality-of-life improvement, normal attacks of One-handed Hammers have received a minor buff.

• One-handed Hammer Normal Attacks:
  
  • Attacks per Second: 0.8 → 1
    
  • Damage per Attack: 49 → 39
    
• Iron Breaker (all Hammers):
  
  • Resistance Reduction: 0.17 → 0.14
    
• Heavy Cleave (all Hammers) - ability is now called "Heavy Smash":
  
  • Area increased slightly; it now extends further, but the cone is also slightly slimmer
    
  • Cast Time: 1s → 1.4s
    
  • Hit Delay: 0.5s → 0s
    
  • Standtime: 1s → 0.5s
    
  • Now deals more damage directly at the Hammer impact spot:
    
    • Damage at the center of the impact: 271.95 → 290
      
    • Damage in the rest of the cone: 271.95 → 266
      
• Ground Pound (Grovekeeper):
  
  • Jump time: 0.5s → 0.66s
    
  • Radius: 6m → 5.5m
    
  • Now indicates impact area during the jump
    

Holy Staffs
Holy Explosion was very underused in the Holy Staff line and has been improved significantly. First, the ability now has a shorter cooldown and channel duration with more burst heal, guaranteeing more heal value even when the channel is interrupted. Also, the first Explosion now adds a resistance buff to allies, to help offset the increased risk of this E-ability’s positioning, which requires healers to stay close to allies instead of safe in the backline.
Celestial Sphere’s cast time was also reduced, as it was too easy to interrupt in 5v5 fights.

Holy Touch is very strong in 2v2 Hellgates. To give other Healing Staffs a better chance in this content, the tick interval was increased. It is now a bit slower to heal, requiring a greater time commitment from the healer.
Divine Intervention’s jump range was reduced, as it provided too much mobility even after various recent downgrades.

• Holy Explosion (Great Holy Staff):
  
  • Cooldown: 20s → 15s
    
  • Tick Count: 6 → 5
    
  • Heal per Tick: 40.67 → 50
    
  • The first Explosion now also gives a resistance buff to allies, increasing resistances by 0.2 for 3s
    
  • Energy Cost: 18 → 0
    
  • Instead the ability consumes 3.6 energy per tick while channeling (total of 18 energy for the full channel)
    
• Holy Touch (Lifetouch Staff):
  
  • Tick Interval: 0.5s → 0.6s (amount of ticks stays the same, so total channel time increases)
    
• Celestial Sphere (Redemption Staff):
  
  • Cast Time: 1s → 0.5s
    
  • Hit Delay: 0s → 0.4s
    
• Divine Intervention (Hallowfall):
  
  • Jump Range: 14m → 11m
    

Maces
Camlann Mace was a bit too effective for striking big enemy clumps from the safety of the backline. The projectile range was thus reduced somewhat, so players need to get a bit closer to enemy groups and expose themselves to potential retaliation.

• Vendetta (Camlann Mace):
  
  • Projectile Range 26m → 18m
    
  • Pull Radius: 9m → 8m
    

Nature Staffs
Nature Staffs have been outperformed by Holy Staffs for a while. To bring Nature back into the PvP scene, Rejuvenation has been improved significantly with higher healing output, more range, and shorter cast time. It is now easier to stack on group members, while also providing more healing value.

Additionally, Cleanse Heal now offers a burst heal W-slot ability, giving Nature more options when pressured. It also allows for interesting interactions with stack management, and adds a layer of decision-making for healers, who must consider whether to use the cleanse or save it for a burst heal.

Spirit Seed can now be cast twice, but cannot heal the same target twice. This doesn’t make it stronger in 1v1 situations, but improves it significantly in potential healing output in group fights, where it was previously underrepresented.

Spirit Animal was also improved by adding an instant heal when allies first touch it. The escalation curve of healing per ally was also flattened, meaning it now has better healing numbers on medium-sized groups.

• Rejuvenation (all Nature Staffs):
  
  • Heal per Tick: 7.6 → 8.2
    
  • Cooldown: 1.3s → 1s
    
  • Cast Range: 9m → 11m
    
• Cleanse Heal (all Nature Staffs):
  
  • Now has an instant heal effect instead of heal over time
    
  • Heal amount is dependent on Rejuvenation Stacks on each target
    
  • Removes one Rejuvenation Stack of each ally healed
    
  • Stacks: 0 / 1 / 2 / 3
    
  • Heal Value: 80 / 100 / 130 / 170
    
• Spiritual Seed (Druidic Staff):
  
  • The spell can now be recast again within 2.5s, but stacking it twice on the same target will override the first cast
    
  • Energy Cost per cast: 18 → 9
    
• Spirit Animal (Rampant Staff):
  
  • Touching the Spirit Animal itself now instantly heals 60
    
  • Base Heal Value of the Area per Tick: 8 → 12
    
  • Healing Increase per additional Ally: 50% → 30%
    

Quarterstaffs
The hit-and-run playstyle of Quarterstaffs in Corrupted Dungeons has been toned down, while also trying to retain their playstyles in other content. This change alone will not entirely eliminate the strategy of resetting fights in Corrupted Dungeons, but should help balance the success of Quarterstaffs in this regard. Additional further changes will be made in a future patch to address the reset meta in Corrupted Dungeons.

Heavy Cleave's area was improved, making it easier to hit enemies and giving it a more unique feel. The hit delay has also been removed, making the ability strike much faster.

• Cartwheel (all Quarterstaffs):
  
  • Move Speed Bonus: 30% → 20%
    
  • Buff Duration: 5s → 3s
    
• Stun Run (all Quarterstaffs):
  
  • Buff Duration: 5s → 4s
    
• Heavy Cleave (all Quarterstaffs):
  
  • Adjusted the hit area into a rectangular shape that extends further
    
  • Hit Delay: 0.5s → 0s
    
  • Standtime: 1s → 0.5s
    
  • Damage: 271 → 240
    
• Vault Leap (regular Quarterstaff):
  
  • Standtime: 0.2s → 0.6s
    
  • Enemy Knockup Duration: 1s → 0.7s
    
  • Cast Range: 15m → 13m
    
  • Jump End Position now offset by 3m
    
  • Visual fixes for jump animation on high ping
    

Spears
The subsequent tick damage of Corrupting Steel was a bit too high while combined with the initial armor shred, especially if paired with a hard CC that traps the enemy for the whole duration. The tick damage was thus slightly reduced.

• Corrupting Steel (Spirit Hunter):
  
  • Area Damage per Tick: 36 → 32
    

Swords
These changes are intended to make Swords feel more fluid, and to give Sword-tree weapons good synergy with abilities that trigger on hit, along with their own passives.

• Broadsword Normal Attacks:
  
  • Attacks per Second: 1 → 1.35
    
  • Damage per Attack: 45 → 33
    
• Dual Swords Normal Attacks:
  
  • Attacks per Second: 1.4 → 1.5
    
  • Damage per Attack: 32 → 30
    
• Clarent Blade Normal Attacks:
  
  • Attacks per Second: 1 → 1.35
    
  • Damage per Attack: 45 → 33
    
• Galatine Pair Normal Attacks:
  
  • Attacks per Second: 1.4 → 1.5
    
  • Damage per Attack: 32 → 30
    

Offhands
Several Avalonian offhands were providing one-handed weapons too much survivability. Sacred Scepters, in particular, made even Cloth Armor users extremely resistant to Crowd Control.

• Sacred Scepter:
  
  • Crowd Control Resistance Factor: 2.5 → 1.2
    
• Astral Aegis:
  
  • Defense Factor: 0.25 → 0.2
    

Helmets
Emergency Shield is still one of the most used helmet abilities in the game. It can be used through entire fights, providing huge sustain. To make using it more strategic, the shield is now only at full strength for targets below 40% health. This reduces its average strength, while keeping it as a strong save for low-health allies.

Energy Shield's combination of survivability and energy sustain was excessive. Its duration has been reduced, making activation timing more important.

• Energy Shield (Scholar Cowl):
  
  • Duration: 5s → 4s
    
• Emergency Shield (Guardian Helmet):
  
  • Shield value now depends on an ally's remaining health:
    
  • Health below 40%: 300 → 300 (unchanged)
    
  • Health above 40%: 300 → 150
    

Armors
Self Ignition's spell logic was reworked to improve server performance, which also limited the number of enemies it could hit. As a result, it now deals damage even when the caster is shielded or invulnerable. The general damage was thus reduced. Additionally, to make it more effective in Item Power-dependent settings, it now uses a percent of the enemy’s max health to determine damage instead of a flat value.

Force Shield was very strong for tanks in 5v5, which also gave frontlines too much survivability. The resistances from the area were thus slightly reduced.

Life Steal Aura is another Quality of Life change to make the ability feel more fluid.

• Life Steal Aura (Hellion Jacket):
  
  • Hit Delay: 0.2s → 0s
    
  • Standtime: 0.4s → 0s
    
• Self Ignition (Specter Jacket):
  
  • Area now affects up to 5 enemies
    
  • Area now keeps damaging enemies even if the caster is invulnerable or shielded
    
  • Burn Damage vs Players: 66 true damage → 2% of enemy's max health
    
  • Burn Damage vs mounted players is now the same as against mobs (no percent-based damage)
    
  • Hit Delay: 0.4s → 0.3s
    
  • Standtime: 0.6s → 0.5s
    
• Force Shield (Judicator Armor):
  
  • Resistance Increase: 0.28 → 0.25
    

Mounts / Battle Mounts
To make sure Pest Lizards can't chain-CC targets, enemies now have a full 6s immunity to a subsequent Toxic Cloud.

Pierce Through (Ballista) is no longer reflectable as it deals percent damage, which can lead to very high reflected damage when focusing targets with large health pools (e.g. Command Mammoths).

• Toxic Reaction / Toxic Cloud (Pest Lizard):
  
  • Enemies hit by one Toxic Cloud will be immune to another for 6s
    
• Pierce Through (Siege Ballista):
  
  • Damage is no longer reflectable
    

Fixes

• Fixed an issue where Hellgate chest colors did not match their actual rarities
  
• Arena stats are now displayed in the Stats UI as intended
  
• Fixed an issue where galloping sound would disappear while still galloping
  
• Fixed an issue where a Faction Campaign started the previous month would not progress on the first day of a new month
  
• T4 Avalonian Cloth Shoes are now part of the T4 Avalonian Artifact Loot list at the Artifact Foundry
  
• Spectral Trident (Trinity Spear) tooltip updated to show correct number of possible affected allies (previously 5, now 10)
  
• Fixed a visual issue where the red indicator of Vendetta (Camlann Mace) would change depending on player size
  
• Fixed an issue where Separator (Quarterstaffs) could be used without the Destiny Board unlock
  
• Fixed an issue where Divine Intervention (Hallowfall) could heal healing-immune targets
  
• Added missing localization strings for farmable Moose and Moose Calf
  
• Additional graphical, audio, animation, terrain, UI, and localization fixes