Dragon Ability feedback

[AmonGwareth]

Hey folks, wanted to ask for feedback of Dragon abilities. In particular, the under-used ones such as Snarl, Staggering Howl, Menacing Presence and so forth. Things like, they aren't worth using, they take too long to recycle, they don't work at all, and so forth.

Please note that we are NOT looking for feedback on Gold Rage or Drulkar's Wrath or the Breath Attacks. Thanks!

[Shian]

Looking through my ability list, the ones that never made it to my hot bar are:
Snarl
Staggering Howl
Menacing Prescence
and the combat stances :P

[AmonGwareth]

Looking through my ability list, the ones that never made it to my hot bar are:
Snarl
Staggering Howl
Menacing Prescence
and the combat stances :P

And? Got any feedback? I already know those three. I was hoping for a bit more perhaps.

[Shian]

Lightning breath, but you said you didn't want it :P

The abilities sound useful, just never got around to using them. Kinda like Dragon Fear, they're really only useful in certain situations.

Menacing presence for example, sounds very useful when helping someone on their ROP, but I haven't seen anyone else use it, I jsut figured it didn't work properly.

Staggering howl, I've yet to see recycle really do anything noticable. I've had a full scale set of - to recycle but saw no difference in even a long cool down ability. Bipeds who have epic spells tell me it works for very long cooldowns, but not really for smaller ones. Enemies don't have stupidly long cool downs on their abilities, so no real need to slow it down any.

[Guaran]

Galewind. Very long cast time for only average damage.

Breath attacks. Miss too much once you are in combat with anything over level 100 or so.

Staggering howl I use all the time. Same with Snarl. Menacing Presence only needed on ocassion.

Improvements I can think of are for Menacing Presence and Dragon Fear to have a better liklihood of landing.

[Shian]

Hey, if you're wanting more feedback on broken abilities, go break things :P

Yeah, I second the Galewind. The animation, while pretty, takes too long. If I have good TNC, I can get off three default attacks, so I don't use galewind if I'm fighting creatures above my level.

Granted, I have yet to use any of the new tech kits that might enhance the other attacks like bite, galewind etc.

[velveeta]

i actually use em all! but i do admit the ones mentioned could be tweaked to make them more useful.......
but snarl is quite useful, i think, as is dragon fear and galewind (ah galewind - has saved me long enough to recall many a time.....)

[Raeshlavik]

I use all of the debuffs in every fight - I can say what they do, exactly, but things do seem easier with them versus without them.

If I could change anything, it'd be to shorten the refresh on Dragon's Reach so it was usable once each fight and get rid of the delay after it is used. It's not like it hits super hard, has better range than a range teched prime bolt, or does anything game breaking. It's just convenient to be able to use it to pull each fight.

[Dragonboy]

I read many people saying that the Galewind animation takes to long to complete… I am sorry to say, but the same and maybe even worse can be said for the 4 Breath attacks I currently have at my disposal. (haven’t got myself the newest Breath attack yet).
So Galewind is actually not really bothering me… Although it would be nice to have slightly more damage or slightly shorter timer.

Dragons Fear I have so far never used so I cannot really comment on this. Although 1500 hoard might be a bit much for a stun attack.

Personally I would also like to see a slightly more different dragons gift. From the moment the dragon is an adult let the buff be more according to “faction” instead of evenly spread. (Only TnC or only Primal). An added alacrity buff would also be appreciated.

Menacing presence is the most useless ability I have been able to determine so far…
The only time I use it is to agro closely packed mobs on mass due to the “area” effect it has. If other people know a good way of using it let me know…

Staggering Howl is an at best average damage dealer which I only use instead of the standard claw attack when no other bigger damage dealers are available. Damage is higher then standard claw, but lower then the remaining no hoard using attack abilities..

Snarl is an average ranged method for agro if you don’t have dragon’s reach available or a range teched prime bolt, but other then that I don’t really use it.

Ravage does in fact average damage although it does go on a quite long timer in my opinion even though it has multiple strikes from which at least 1 or 2 don't hit.

Spiked Scales for me as lvl 100 ancient melee dragon does a low amount of damage in comparison to lower tiered Cloak of Thorns which sometimes get cast on me while the latter goes on a considerable longer active timer. Don’t care so much about the low damage, but more about the ridiculously low active time and equally ridiculous recharging time.

No comments on Shield of Gold or Primal Rebirth. Lowered hoard cost or lowered recharge timers combined with increased hoard cost could be discussed, but not necessary.

However the biggest annoyance for me actually is the time it takes before you can continuo buffing after I use Determination (it takes at least 2-3 seconds after the buff is active before you can actually continuo buffing. This could actually be more, but would have to check). Right now I buff myself in such a fashion that determination always comes last, but it would be nice if some tweaking is done.

Would love to see Breath of Fire get area damage like the other breath abilities.
Tailwhip would love to be able to have a chance of stunning not only the target, but also other mobs nearby. The range determined by the size of the dragon. Ancient would have a slightly larger range and a bigger chance of hitting multiple mobs then a hatchling.

I understand that this is a lot of writing, but these are my honest opinions for the abilities that I have received during my travels through Istaria.

[Dhalin]

Here are my opinions of the attacks. You said not to comment on Breath of Fire, but honestly, I think it is way too weak for a melee dragon, at least the pre-specialty breaths. But......

Galewind: Too long of a Cooldown for Too Mediocre of damage. It, like many other attacks (Again, Breath of Fire. Seriously, 70 dmg with a 50% hit chance at Lv62? weak, weak, weak...) are ONLY usable to those who put lots of points into Primal (IE, Dragon Casters). Dragon Melee have little to no use for this. If it doesn't miss (and it misses very often), it hits for a measly 100 damage at Lv62. My regular auto-attacks hit for that.

Snarl: Increase the Range on this please. I use it mainly as a pulling means, because Dragon's Reach has a FAR, FAR, FAR too long of a cooldown. Either that, or...

Dragon's Reach: Reduce the Cooldown on this, please. You can even reduce the damage. The whole point of this ability is to pull a mob, right? This is the only long-range ability a dragon has, but the 5minute cooldown makes it useless. If I'm only pulling 1 mob per 5 minutes, then I am doing a very poor leveling session. I'd say, a 60 second cooldown, and cut the damage in half.

Staggering Howl: What exactly is the point of this ability? I only used it for an extra Melee attack. I couldn't see where it really does much of anything other than give you another instant attack.

Menacing Presence: I've tried to play with this ability, but I never really noticed it really working, or making any kind of noticeable change in battle.

Breeze Spells: Too much is reliant upon Primal. Breeze is 1 of only 3 healing sources dragons get. We cannot multiclass. Breezes are far too weak if you're a pure Melee dragon. Also, I'd like to see them lasting longer, instead of having to recast every 30 seconds. Maybe make them 5 minute duration, 4 minute recast (to give you a small grace window to recast it)? Nothing sucks worse than to be trying to cycle through your cooldowns and it is "Oh crap, breeze is down!" and you have to fumble around for your breeze hotkey, etc...

[Darkwing_Duck]

Here`s what I think personaly.

all the malee attacks are good, but Galewind, and Ravage`s cooldown times I feel could be tweaked, they take far too long to recycle, same with dragons reach. the first couple teirs seem to recycle quickly enough, but after TII, is slows down drastically.
Menacing Presence I have yet to see it even work. snarl is eh.. fair.
staggering howl is nice.
primal rebirth, does it really have to take an hour to cool down? there have been times when I`m stressed for time and could have really used it sooner, like helping another player on their ARoP for example. sure the no death point thing is nice, but a shorter cooldown time would be nicer.

the breath abilities are sweet! I use em all. but yes the animation could be shortened. I`ve noticed while I`m still casting it, I`m being hit several times. >.>

some of the spells don`t seem to do much damage or effect either to me like the winds, unrelenting, and grazing, and gust, barage.
as my main is helian he uses range spells quite frequently.

[Tarida]

My personal opinion as a little dragon is that those attacks are, like the others said, far too weak in comparison to their cooldown. I haven't used Galewind since level 20 or so, just because of this. Currently, one Galewind attack does as much damage as a normal hit with my claws.

These Debuffs you were speaking of are, to my mind, also too weak. When I was doing my level 40 adventure quests, where I had to kill about fifty mobs of a kind, I tested around with Snarl etc. and found no diffrence at all. Maybe I had just bad luck, but that's my feeling as little dragon.

And I really have to support Dhalin's idea of reducing the Dragon's Reach cooldown. In fact, this attack is my only chance to pull only one mob, and a cooldown of one minute or so is really ... nasty.

Happy New Year,

Tari

[LOVWYRM]

galewind, ravage- my favorite ones, faster recycle pls
reach-faster recycle pls
staggering howl-I use it regulary-pls pimp it a bit
snarl- only for pulling, not satisfying all in all
manacing presence- could live without it
fear- I like and use it- could be more effective, I do not mind hoard costs
(well, just wishing^^)
primal rebirth- all fine with that

[Dhalin]

On the subject of Primal Rebirth, I propose giving dragons a second Resurrection spell.

This spell would NOT avoid death points, cost 2500 Hoard and have a 10 minute or so recycle. Maybe name it "Primal Revive" or something, I dunno. Heck, make it quested or something if you feel the need to, and have it bring the person back with a very minimal amount of HP, maybe like 25% of their max or something, who knows... but dragons could use a Rez that doesn't take a full hour to cool down. That's basically saying "Bring a Biped if you want resses!" but then things like ARoP, you can't exactly do that, and deaths do happen.

[rizo/nawkia]

Dragon Reach- faster cool down would be nice
Galewind- higher damage
snarl -eh works alright not my best ability
tail whip- the stun is over by the time the animation is finished,could use a rework
staggering howl- doesnt work if gold rage debuff is already active(I think)
Menacing presence- works only with large groups that ive noticed, it says 50% but it doesnt seem like 50% :/

To dragonboy: The tier of Cloak of Thorns doesnt matter. Its the nature skill of the caster that determines the damage.I can cast I and still get the same damage as V. I and imm sure others have tested this quite a few times.

[Dragonboy]

To dragonboy: The tier of Cloak of Thorns doesnt matter. Its the nature skill of the caster that determines the damage.I can cast I and still get the same damage as V. I and imm sure others have tested this quite a few times.

Whatever you say about Cloak of Thorn I will take as true... I do not have enough experience with this Druid ability to know it exactly, all I know is that it does the same thing as spiked scales and most importantly has a longer active time and this is actually the thing I prefer changed (Spiked Scales increased, not Cloak of Thorns shortened !!) as well as the Spiked Scales recharge timer shortened.

At this particular moment it isn't even clear to me which skill actually increases the damage for Spiked Scales. Rumors that I hear would make it more of a Spellcasters ability, while any dragon finds itself in a possition were this ability is usefull.

[Aywren]

I'll put another vote in to shorten the recast time on Dragon's Reach. It's such a very valuable skill to have... but all too often, I have to wait for it to recycle.

Snarl - I use to pull when Dragon's Reach is on cool down. I don't really know what sort of effect it has, though I throw it in at the beginning of a fight most of the time.

Staggering Howl / Menacing Presence- I throw these in the mix from time to time when other things are up for cooldown... figure it can't hurt, though I don't see what these actually help.

Galewind- One of the last skills that I pop off during a battle. It's got too long a cooldown for so little damage.

Bite - Not sure if there is a reason for the loooooong recharge on this skill. I'd like to use it more, it seems useful. But I'm lucky to get it off once every three or so fights due to the downtime on it. I was really surprised at this because (if memory serves me right), this used to be a skill that I'd pop off every fight, when I used to play years ago. If there is a reason for it, I apologize for bringing it up... but since you were asking...

I have to echo things that I've read above - it's very confusing to know what attributes actually affect which skills for Dragons. I understand about Tooth and Claw, but when hatchlings start asking about building caster-based dragons, it's very difficult to give them suggestions on where to put training points.

It's also very difficult to play a full-on caster dragon, from what I hear as well. There is little option for them but to become some sort of a hybrid if they wish to progress effectively. While it's true I have to put some points in Primal in order to cast spells, as a melee dragon, I certainly am never forced to cast a dragon spell to take down an enemy (besides healing, of course) if I don't choose to do so.

I'm not sure if that's off topic, but dragon spells may be something to look at somewhere down the line. As I'm not a caster, I can't offer specifics on these -- maybe another could.

[Vaz]

I always use Snarl and Staggering Howl as debuffs at the beginning of a fight unless they're on cooldown, though I don't know whether they actually help.

On the few occasions I've had use for Menacing Presence, it has failed to attract the target's attention. As a dragon's sole taunt ability, it should be a powerful panic button...

[Guaran]

...Personally I would also like to see a slightly more different dragons gift. From the moment the dragon is an adult let the buff be more according to “faction� instead of evenly spread. (Only TnC or only Primal). An added alacrity buff would also be appreciated.

If they go messing with Dragon's gift I'll have someones head on a pike.. *leers at Dragonboy**

Menacing presence is the most useless ability I have been able to determine so far…
The only time I use it is to agro closely packed mobs on mass due to the “area� effect it has. If other people know a good way of using it let me know…

It's purpose isn't pulling mobs exactly.. It's to get their attention to focus on yourself vs other players.. 50% chance I think. It could be improved for sure, if the chance to get attention was higher, and it didn't "miss"

Staggering Howl is an at best average damage dealer...

Staggering Howl is a delay modifier on the target. It debuffs them and makes it take them longer to use each attack.. It isn't really meant to be a damaging ability. That it does damage at all it just a side effect.

Snarl is an average ranged method for agro if you don’t have dragon’s reach available or a range teched prime bolt, but other then that I don’t really use it.

Snarl is an attack skill debuff on the target. It's beginning to look like you need to study your abilities more closely. Go to Character - Abilities and review the effects for those in question in this thread. Be a good idea to study the others as well.

Would love to see Breath of Fire get area damage like the other breath abilities.

Breath of Fire actually used to be Area Effect. It was changed I believe when Breath of Flame Burst was added or shortly thereafter, which is area effect. I would rather it simply hit alot more often, and the observation about a long cast time is accurate. So more Damage would be welcomed as well to balance the really long cast time on the breath attacks.

Tailwhip would love to be able to have a chance of stunning not only the target, but also other mobs nearby. The range determined by the size of the dragon. Ancient would have a slightly larger range and a bigger chance of hitting multiple mobs then a hatchling.

Thats a great idea.

An alternate idea would be a new, "Dragon Stomp" attack, which would be a pbaoe chance to stun mobs in say an area of 5, for a few seconds.

The tailwhip, while the animation is simply a twist-spin thing, which leads to your suggestion since it seems to make sense, I believe to be more like an actual "whip strike" (think Indiana Jones), which is a precise hit on a single target. Picture a tail lashing outward very quickly and precisely. The spin style animation doesn't get the right idea across.

[Dragonboy]

If they go messing with Dragon's gift I'll have someones head on a pike.. *leers at Dragonboy**


It's purpose isn't pulling mobs exactly.. It's to get their attention to focus on yourself vs other players.. 50% chance I think. It could be improved for sure, if the chance to get attention was higher, and it didn't "miss"


Staggering Howl is a delay modifier on the target. It debuffs them and makes it take them longer to use each attack.. It isn't really meant to be a damaging ability. That it does damage at all it just a side effect.


Snarl is an attack skill debuff on the target. It's beginning to look like you need to study your abilities more closely. Go to Character - Abilities and review the effects for those in question in this thread. Be a good idea to study the others as well.

Breath of Fire actually used to be Area Effect. It was changed I believe when Breath of Flame Burst was added or shortly thereafter, which is area effect. I would rather it simply hit alot more often, and the observation about a long cast time is accurate. So more Damage would be welcomed as well to balance the really long cast time on the breath attacks.

The tailwhip, while the animation is simply a twist-spin thing, which leads to your suggestion since it seems to make sense, I believe to be more like an actual "whip strike" (think Indiana Jones), which is a precise hit on a single target. Picture a tail lashing outward very quickly and precisely. The spin style animation doesn't get the right idea across.

Dragons Gift :
The first part was actually an idea I had, the second part is what I am hoping for.
Besides why is Dragon’s Gift so holy that it is worthy of actually starting a lynching mob…? What is so bad about potentially improving a gift? I would like to hear your input about this.

Menacing Presence :
So it is usefull during group fights…
Only during solo fights it remains without any real use then and considering that this is like I prefer it I wont be using it a lot.

Staggering Howl :
If it didn’t do any damage I wouldn’t have used it considering that of all the times that I used it during fights there had not been a considerable change in the opponents attack rate. At least none that I noticed.

Snarl :
The reason I wrote this was to state what I use the ability for. Taking into account that I do not notice any significant differences between the fights when I use it or when I do not use it. My comment was supposed to be interpreted as such, however if you didn’t others might not as well and for this reason it is good that this issue is now clarified.

Breath of Fire :
Actually from the moment I was a hatchling nearly 2000 days ago on Wind server I have never noticed BoF having an Area Effect. It could be possible that I have advanced from lvl 1 to lvl 100 adventure mostly fighting 1on1 against mobs in the period prior to the change. However I truly never noticed the Area Effect except on Breath of Lightning since during the Unity time I only had this one. I also wasn’t someone who found pleasure in the mass farming of any mob for coin/forms/tech/insert any farmable item, at least not until my character was transferred to Chaos and I suddenly needed more then twice the amount of coin for my lair that I needed on Unity.
I wouldn’t mind if they decreased damage done by BoF when returning the Area Effect or give only 50% damage to other mobs that get hit by the blast. I would never want it to do damage comparable to Flame Burst, for high damage we indeed have Flame Burst and this shouldn’t change.

Tail Whip :
I have to agree with you on this, I definitly understand that this is the intention of the attack ability hence the name tail Whip. Only the animation looks more like a Tail Sweep that is actually why I made the suggestion.
A more logical animation would be to have the dragon (stand on hind legs or stay on all fours) turn to get at about a 45-90 degree angle of the targeted mob and stay stationairy while the tail lashes out and immediately after the tail hit target (and while the tail returns, not after) return to face the mob.
However I don’t think I want to know how hard it would be to actually finish such an animation.
An idea would be to give the current Tail whip the potential of hitting other mobs as well, but possibly removing the stun. While giving a new ability a new and fitting animation which does stun only 1 target like tail whip does now.