Slay Undead Poll: Dev requested feedback

[Lisene]

[Remdayen]

I have to agree with most of the posting so far. No deal for nerfing our Slay Undead. Slay Undead is one of our class defining abilites. I am fearfull that once we give an inch with something that is part of something who we are that it will get nerfed all to heck. I for one will leave the game if they end up nerfing our Slay Undead. Yes our dps needs to get fixed however I think maybe they might come up with some other soloution that would be better. How about a boost in dps just because we suck and have gotten any help out there in last few expansion anyways. I am willing to listen to suggestions they might have , hoever not touchy the slay undead.

[Pethdor]

why is it always take something to get something ?

[Nodyin]

Let's restate the problem with some psuedo math, and then maybe restart the discussion...

Current Paladin base DPS is fairly low. Not as low as a Cleric or a Wizard, but it's pretty low. But when you add in Slay Undead you get something like this:

BasePaladinMeleeDPS * SlayUndeadBonus = SomewhatDecentDPS

If the DPS result wasn't pretty good, overall, you wouldn't care. If Slay didn't change the picture enough to matter then you all would have responded "Eh, it's not that great anyway, sure, take it and give us more DPS!" I mean if I asked if you wanted to trade Act of Valor for DPS...well never mind.

Back to math. If we change the first part of that equation, however, the Slay situation changes too. So look at this version:

(SomeMeleeBonus) * (BasePaladinMeleeDPS) * (SlayUndeadBonus) = MuchBetterDPS

Depending on how large (SomeMeleeBonus) ended up being the resulting Slay DPS could be huge. Slay undead is a multiplier to DPS, and it doesn't decay. If you get a bigger sword, Slay does more damage. If you get a bigger damage aug, Slay does more damage. If I stagnate Slay (and I have) it doesn't really matter - normal power increases continue to translate into larger and larger Slay undead DPS values.

So if you're looking to have your base, works on any content, melee DPS to get any sort of viable increase, then we need to deal with the Elephant in the room and take a hard look at Slay undead. It's an AA that, due to a math error, is currently producing far more of a bonus than intended, and it's a multiplier, which means it's something that has to be considered at all times. During SoD beta we decided we wanted to give you some extra DPS, but we had to do it via spells and not base melee because of just this issue. We're going to continue to be limited in this manner if we don't modify how Slay undead works.

[Cactuszach]

You make that sounds like we would be dumb not to want it.

Still no. Faulty logic fails. You want to nerf slay undead, to give us better slay undead dps?

[Nyterose]

Nodyin with all due respect... I see your issue but here is the thing. SU is stagnating. SOD and likely future expansion will not have near the undead that the expansions prior did. SKs in my guild when I mentioned this issue... they want a weak SU. They have their niche, ae aggro and yet they want anything WE have. You see where I am going with this?

You all proposed a conical AE during beta for Paladins that got shot down by the SKs. They screamed how it was class defining. Well frankly SU *is* class defining for the Paladins. If it was not tied to the range I would agree 100% with your statement about how it is producing more than you want it do. We have *no* SU button to push. It is 100% determined by range. There are times I get zip nada on undead then next time I can get 3 to 5 in a row. That is some bell curve.

Now, my basic fear here is with no more undead like previous expansions, no more AA increasing it and depending solely on weapons to increase it AND then you want to boost our live dps, the SKs are going to come out of the woodwork wanting a weak SU. They should NEVER EVER get anything along those lines. And I don't see how you are going to rein them in when you propose near their live dps.

I do not want to see my SU nerfed. Its one of the fun things left in EQ which is a aging game as I am sure you are fully aware. I would be willing to consider a 5% less in damage or change it so we actually HAVE a SU button and its not tied to the range and has a decent timer length AND recast when its available. By that I mean it would last 15 minutes and be down for 45 minutes. Something like that but no way will I approve or endorse something that nerfs it into the ground and totally useless to gain a meager % of live dps.

And frankly I would want an assurance that the SKs would not gain anything we have in recompense for us being near them in live dps. SU is our class defining item, AE aggro is theirs. I would also be willing to bet I am not the only one that feels this way either.

This is just how I feel about this subject.

[Brohg]

Pardon an outsider's voice, but how about the same solution that was applied to Harmtouch and Lay On Hands? Burn the current Slay Undead to the ground and rebuild a working model. Like make it 28 ranks of added undead bane damage to Bash. Good knights spam Bash anyhow, right? So if you're fighting undead, instead of Bash being a hit of base 100 dmg (or whatever it is), it's a hit of base 100+1200 dmg. "Holy blade" message would have to stay, obv

Using Nody's terminology...

Undead model, old way:
Dps*Slay=dps

New undead model
Dps+Slay=dps

[Hulkling]

I think we need real math to truely consider this.

example:
If we remove the last 3 ranks of SU (with refund!), would we get Opportunists Strike clone in its place?

Something along those lines

[Grungloe]

These are the terms to which I'd agree to a Slay Undead change.

Change Slay to be a triggered ability
((level^3)/3000) endurance per use:
(roughly: 200 endurance @ 85, 170 endurance @ 80, 140 @ 75, 115 @ 70, 90 endurance @ 65, 70 endurance @ 60).
That should give the average player roughly 100 slays before running out of endurance.
This would also limit a paladin in choosing between slay undead and defensive skills that require endurance.
Same timer as Bash (either use one or the other).
Can miss, but cannot double, triple, or flurry with it. Single attack only.
Slay function only on undead (including vampires), however can be used on live mobs for an additional attack.
Add a separate damage listing on weapons appropriate for slay, as they have done with piercing weapons for backstab.
This gives us an ability that does not hinder our itemization and should be roughly similar to our current dps, yet provides flexibility for scaling. (also it would be nice to see paladin class gear with +slay damage on it up to say 50).

Give knights: 2 expansions worth of flurry AAs and boost our triple attack cap to be on par with warriors 10 levels beneath us (eg. level 85 knight has the same triple attack cap as a level 75 warrior).

We compete with warriors for melee dps. We should have parity in dps with them on live mobs assuming our 2h vs their 2h.

I do not compete with SKs for dps. Shadow Knights have offensive spells that function well against live mobs and paladins have corresponding defensive spells.

[Gilthanos]

No offense Nodyin, but the devs have already silenty nerfed Slay Undead anyway. There are zero "undead" xp camps in SoD. So, you offer us the chance to up our live DPS, in the same general time frame that you stagnate DPS classes, and boost non-DPS classes dps. This all screams of blurring the class lines. You can't keep things like AE agro class specific, which has FAR FAR more use and demand on it, and tell us that SU has to be reduced in order to boost us up. I am sure you have log after log of arena test dummy dps showing you paladin undead output. Maybe SU is way and far above where devs first intended it to be, but you boost other non-dps classes dps anyway why is it a big deal? I am sure you either have the numbers, or can find them, of the undead population percentage in XP zones per expansion and per level range. The reduction of the undead in SoD based on level range has significantly nerfed the value of SU for paladins that approach level and AA max. The way EQ is layed out in terms of "progression" and mob dispersion makes having SU a moot point for both raiding and grouping paradigms.

How does being able to slay for 50k on blue and light blue mobs that garner lower xp values then you can get in a group (on live mobs) and yield 0 gear or spell progression items cause imbalance?

Gilthanos <Triality>

[shiftie]

all math aside...

If our dps is increased, what then becomes of our healing abilities? While I agree that we need to see an increase and I'm all for an increase in dps -don't get me wrong... I hate to be skeptical like this and only see the glass as half empty but the devs have not done right by us over the years when it comes to certain things. Unfortunately, this is the scenario I forsee.

1. Decrease slay.
2. Increase overall dps to an inflated % to soften the blow of the SU nerf and to make the paladin community salivate for 2 months or so.
3. After careful consideration and much sk whining - Retune overall dps to be more in line with what was intended, because afterall "there is no statute of limitations on fixing a bug"
4. Other classes mostly dps complain about paladins being over powered.
5. Paladin healing gets nerfed to be more in line with other hybrid dps classes.
6. Other classes complain further still.
7. Decrease overall dps to appease class balance and to circumvent the further nerfing of paladin abilities.
8. Paladins fall behind on tanking because our healing took a hit to allow for the improved dps.
9. Paladins complain begging for our heals to be restored, the devs grant our wishes and we see some sort of modified ward of tunare scenario.
10. Our healing is revamped to its original state prior to the dps increase we were offered but it now costs us 36 more aa to be at or near where we once were.
11. Our once offered dps "boost" is reduced to something silly like a 2.5% increase in dps.
12. Slay remains nerfed and fades into bedtime stories of expansions past, and the elder paladin community will speak about it like al bundy did about highschool football.
13. Our healing stagnates, our Slay Undead is gone, our dps is still well behind sk's, we still don't have ae aggro.
14. "class defining" is periodically used when the scenario benefits the devs.

Personally, I think the devs need to stop trying to get out of the box and try to work inside of it. Slay exists... there is no reason in the confines of game lore why our dps shouldn't rival that of rogues, zerkers and wizards when it comes to undead content. Increasing our base dps vs live mobs isn't going to break the game. What the devs need to come forward and say is that they mistakenly created a gap between sk and paladin dps by giving into the SK's every whim. Boost our dps against all content- if it has to come through spell damage so be it. Unless you have some sort of work around for the slay damage formula, such that you can detach it from base dps then leave it be and get inventive with ideas to allow us more dps.

I know a large percentage of the paladin community who would love to see a paladin pet be introduced. We should have a swarm pet at the very least - while this isn't a new idea - it is certainly one way of increasing our overall burn dps, and it can be controlled through aa.

Beware the Trojan horse
shiftie

[frocus]

Nodyin Live Dps increases can be made that have no effect on slay dps. Veteran's wrath is a melee dps increaser but has no effect on slay's something similar to Vet's wrath but on all hit on non undead mobs can increase our live melee dps without breaking slays.

[Maglor]

Ok. First, from what I have been told, Sony has long been concerned about the power of the Paladin. The reason for this is that we are a tank class that can heal ourselves. Not surprising, there. So, we were always more defensive in nature than the other tanks, which is perfectly ok with me.

However, Shadow Knights, our arch nemises, had the ability to heal themselves as well. True, it was not the overall ability that Paladins had, but it had the effect of making Shadowknight much more defensive than intended. And, with their spells and leach ability, they actually were about as strong defensively as Paladins, with an increased offensive ability due to their spells and their harm touch.

It is true that Paladins get stuns, which does limit the amount of damage a paladin receives. However, there are level limits to the stun ability. There is no level limit to the leach, spell and Harm Touch ability. This means that Shadow Knights become better tanks against most mobs.

The Paladin ability against the undead balances this to a very large degree. Against the undead, and only against the undead, we become very powerful dps machines. True, it is humungous, but it is also chancy. We can outdps a wizard, or give out less dps than a slug. And this, I know because I did once out dps a wizard. Then, another fight against undead, I could not get the proc to happen once, and I was low dps, much to the amusement of some.

it must be pointed out that the ability against undead starts at very low levels. It is not an aa, but spells that gave us an edge then. At high levels, we can get our aa's against the undead, making us, not supreme, but the best tanks when dealing with the undead.

The Dev's want to nerf our ability to deal out damage to the undead and raise our overall DPS. In my opinion, what would be the net result of this? Not good for the Paladin. Yes, our DPS may increase by 20%, let us say. But our slay undead would decrease by 40% or so. Our dps against the living comes mainly in the form of weapon useage, which I believe is granted to both knights. But the spells of Paladins are defensive in nature, while those of the Shadow Knight are offensive in nature. What would happen is that we would not catch up to the overall DPS of the Shadow Knight against living mobs. The cost for this would be a larger, corresponding decrease in dps against the undead, giving the Shadow Knight the power to kill the undead faster than Paladins do.

I must reject this solution at attempts to balance. Yes, it is inherently unbalanced. But then, the game was best served when there was diversity in abilities. Balance has only caused problems.

If the Dev's do worry about Paladins, let them put more undead for us to tank. Secrets of Faydwar was a marvelous expansion for Paladins. Not only was there undead in several zones, there was one zone (Hills of Shade) where the undead was the focal point of the zone. Awsome. Seeds of Distruction, however, is Pally unfriendly. There is only undead in one zone, Field of Scale, and then they are usually grouped together with other undead, and with living mobs.

Up the undead content so Paladins have something to tank. No, do not nerf our abilities. Simply give us something to use our abilities on.

However, if you want to balance things, give us back some of our devensive abilities. Just somewhat, mind you. We should be more defensive in nature. That would mean that we should have the ability to resist damage better than Shadow Knights. Shadow Knights dish it out. Paladins take it. That is the way Sony intended it to be, that is the way it should be. We would therefore be easier to heal, a fact balanced by the fact that our fights tend to be longer because our dps is less. This should be an aa given to paladins only, to counter the spells, leaches and Harm Touch that Shadow Knights have, and allow us to tank some pretty awsome mobs, successfully. If you worry about the warriors, let their disciplines be improved somewhat (by an AA).

Yes, Paladins have their stuns. But a paladin can only stun a mob up to level 85. Shadowknights can DOT, Leach and HT a mob up to 90, or higher, meaning that they have better defensives on the higher mobs, which is the target of most groups anyway. Keep that in mind.

As I see it, Shadowknights are way overpowered when compared to the other two tank classes, especially the Paladin. Giving us back the ability to take it, without nerfing our one dps area, the undead, would help to restore the balance.

[Genadinee]

A compromise could be;

Make Holyforge what SU is right now, so we have a 72 Min refresh 5 min Disc that puts out decent DPS on undead.

Upgrade non undead mellee to a respectable level.

What we end up with is 95% of the time Paladins would do useful dps and then for 5 mins on an undead mob we would benifit from upgraded mellee dps + SU = eye candy dps.

Undead boss mobs are totally under the control of SoE so unless they drop the ball and make another FC, Guilds would see maybe 1 undead boss per expn and Paladins would be a high dps class for this one fight, this in itself could be mitigated with adds, AE keeping us otherwise busy.

Something along these lines I would sign up for.

Genadine RF AB

[varutia]

It seems to me that increased dps from slay is already balanced by a large margin using content.

Liked I said before, I am not totally againist this, wanted to see some ideas how this can be implemented. As long as we are not losing overall undead dps, but gain increased live dps, then I am open to changes.

[Cactuszach]

If there were some assurance that our undead and live dps would increase with a change then Im sure many would be willing to reconsider.

But really, phasing out slay undead by making fewer undead mobs is a bit silly. Not like EQ is packed with them really. And there arent many bosses in the entire eq world that are undead. Even necros and clerics can and do outparse us on undead, so pallys being the reason for this is a bit off. Heck even if there were loads of undead in SoD I can bet we wouldnt be able to solo them nearly as fast as the other dps classes mentioned.

Btw, doesnt SU predate everyone on the dev team?

[ZsaZsa Vavoom]

Lots of discussion here, so I'll try to stay focused. I'm sure Nodyin has lots to do and read.

So it sounds like the concern is the one I (and others) mentioned earlier: it isn't that you have a problem increasing our live dps, and don't necessarily have a problem leaving our undead dps where it is, you just feel it would be unbalancing to increase our undead dps further in the course of updating our live dps. Is that correct?

I'll burn a sentence or two to say that I still don't see why this is such a concern, given the dearth of undead and the fact that (in your words) slay still only gives us somewhat decent dps. I'm also puzzled by the assertion that even this is only due to a math error, so presumably it was never meant to give us somewhat decent dps heh... But I don't think any of us are clamoring for more undead dps, so let's take that as a given. The problem is the multiplier. Is this impossible:

Current:
Against live mobs
BasePaladinMeleeDPS = ClownDPS

Against undead mobs
BasePaladinMeleeDPS * SlayUndeadBonus = SomewhatDecentDPS

Could you do:
Against live mobs
BasePaladinMeleeDPS * MuchSmallerLiveBonus = FeebleButBetterDPS

Against undead mobs
BasePaladinMeleeDPS * SlayUndeadBonus = SomewhatDecentDPS

Effectively give us "Slay Live" for free with no accompanying messages and a multiplier of 1.x (to whatever level of increased live dps you deem appropriate)?

The only other thing I'd reiterate is that slay is fun, and that really is part of the appeal for most of us. You started with a comment which suggested we wouldn't care about slay unless it was a real dps impact. I wouldn't overstate that. Sure, if you weaken it enough it ceases to be fun and then nobody cares. But comparing it to Act of Valor isn't a fair comparison. Dying on purpose isn't fun, and some would say it is insulting. Getting some big eye candy numbers, even if they don't make much practical different in a fight, is fun. This is also why Brohg's suggestion, while well meaning, isn't very appealing. If you take my slay dps and spread it out over bashes into smaller slays (making me mash a button for good measure), even if my dps stays constant, you've taken much of the fun out of it. Unless the suggestion was to somehow get the same big ole slays out of bash, which would be weird but worth discussion. Finally, along the same line, if we did end up going down a path where we had to limit slay to throttle undead dps, I think most would agree that we'd rather see the frequency of slays reduced rather than the size of slays, again for the fun reason. Nerf it enough and people will understandably be upset however you do it. But a subtle change to rate is not necessarily visible. But if you yank down the top end of my eye candy number, I'll notice. Less fun = less good.

[Imrahil]

[Normy]

I know this wouldn't be popular, but the easiest way to keep undead DPS from climbing into the heavens while at the same time being able to increase our live DPS to whatever you feel like would be a cap the damage of slay undead. It would have to be high though, my suggestion would be 35-40k since most don't see those numbers without alot of luck anyway. But for a hefty price, I would expect a VERY reasonable increase in normal DPS.

Personally I like an idea mentioned earlier in this thread, give us a nuke that will make a mob undead for a short period of time, like 18 seconds, recast of 30 seconds. Make it a quested spell, it would become popular immediately. Then our slay would play more of a role in our total DPS. We wouldn't complain about crappy DPS, no tweaks would be needed to our current formulas. Paladins could have a group role when not required to tank, which would make us really happy, and you could make most raid targets immune to it so the DPS don't have their panties in a twist over paladin DPS on raids.

[Nodyin]

[knytul]

hey Nodyin, i got an idea. Try putting a 50% Base dps boost on paladins and leaving SU alone and try that on test for 2 months. Compare sk's and pallies then in both group and raid environments, bring us some results THEN ask us ur question

[Nodyin]

[Hulkling]

[ZsaZsa Vavoom]

[Saintsaens]

Well, first I want to say wow, it's nice to see an actual dev posting on our boards. I don't think I've actually seen that happen in 8 years of being a regular visitor to all 3 incarnations of PoN. Wish this would happen more...

Second, I'm of the opinion that I'd want to see what it is that you actually have planned, Nodyin, before saying anything. One question I have for you is, what sort of role are paladins supposed to be playing? I think over the years, we've been sent so many mixed messages by the devs in terms of what spells/abilities we were given (Burst line, Crush line) and what spells/abilities we were almost given but not (frontal AE aggro), that this is the cause of so many people wanting the one true thing we have that we can call our own, SU, taken away from us. Do you have a goal in mind with an ability? Not hypothetical numbers like you've been using, but what are you planning to give us? AAs? Spells? Some sort of boost to skills? A combination of all these? Some form of an actual idea probably would go a long way to convincing the majority of the community that this is something that's good for the class and the overall state of the game.

Finally, I started playing a paladin because I wanted to be a tank that heals myself fairly well, and that's what a paladin has basically become, not because I wanted to become the best DPS class against undead mobs. I also thought that whereas SKs were the offensive-minded tanks, with their HT, taps, etc., paladins were supposed to be the defensive tanks, using their heals and stuns to mitigate damage, and warriors were supposed to be the best of both worlds. Why is this not the case? Our heals have gotten better with the burst line, but our stuns are still capped, as someone above said, which limits our ability to mitigate well, and I love the crush lines, using them almost all the time now... But considering our negligible DPS output, it's hard as hell trying to hold aggro off the dotting classes and high end DPS classes in both groups and raids, when we put out under 1/3 the DPS they put out. In order for us to do our job of holding aggro and tanking well, we have to be able to keep up with the DPS that other classes put out. This is why we would want the same level of DPS that these classes put out, Nodyin (the 2500 DPS comment).

[Cactuszach]

Nodyin, thank you for taking the time to talk with us and we all appriciate the effort you are making to improve our paltry dps. I have nothing at this moment to add to the conversation, but I am debating it and will like to add more to the conversation at a later time.

One quick question, if my high slay were say 25k right now, with your proposed change will I see a higher max slay? And would that slay come at the same frequency as it does currently?

[Peaky]

[Occam]

My only question is, what's the bottom line? What is the proposed % decrease to Slay, and the proposed % increase to regular melee?

I see your point that increasing melee without nerfing slay in some way would boost slay much higher, but I think my main issue (and probably that of many here) is that I am loath to agree to a nerf without knowing what I'm getting back. If Slay is going to go from 75% to 10% and base melee is going to be boosted by 10%...then no thanks.

The other thing I wonder about is what's so bad about slay now? As you said in your first post, it's only "decent." Would it be such a problem for it to be "great?" As it stands, I regularly get beaten by rogues, zerkers, wizards, mages, rangers, necros, beastlords, and monks on undead raid mobs where I am able to sit there and melee the whole fight, and that's including undead nukes, second spire, intensity of the resolute, holyforge, all the best buffs, etc. I thought the whole point of Slay Undead was to make us masters of killing undead...not rocket us to middle of the pack.

Maybe leaving slay how it is plus adding the new bonus would be too much, I can see that. I'm just concerned that SU will get trashed and we'll have gained only a slight improvement. We likes us some eye candy, even if we know that's all it is.

[Gilthanos]

If you were to take Slay Undead and turn it into a proc that had the same system of calculating dmg done you would be able to create innate mitigations on certain undead mobs. This way if you did have an expansion with 85% undead on the horizon you would be able to tag boss mobs less vulnerable to slay undead. You would then also be able to add more AA to slay undead making the proc have a more difficult resist check. Make undead nearly immune to cold (they should be immune to cold anyway) and put a huge negative cold check on slay undead that penetrates their resistance. On some undead you would just make them completely immune to it. We would still see our huge crits, we would still have them land on many undead in xp situations, and you would have a much easier pathway to controlling SU on a larger scale. Obviously this is a dangerous path to take on SU. I do not want to see the immunity put on larger numbers at all. However, I do think that some undead should have that immunity, and its only wise to have a system in place that would allow that.

Speaking about rogues, I have xp'd with a fellow guildmate rogue for countless hours on live and undead. Beating her in dps or even tieing her in dps was very rare indeed. The very nature of SU is so random that it causes vast peaks and valleys in output. That alone is the biggest issue with SU. Sometimes I will not slay anything for mob after mob, then i will string together a staggering number of slays. All the while she would plod along and do steady output of dps that was very easy to quantify. If SU had a button just like backstab would we be having this conversation?

[Abazzagorath]

Let me introduce you to something:

Damage bonus

You want to increase paladin live dps without a multiplicative effect on undead dps? Give paladins a modified damage bonus.

You could tweek it to exactly what you wanted it to be, and it would be fundamentally a static increase that wouldn't balloon upwards every time levels were added, gear got better, etc.

Just one of the many ways you could increase our live dps without really increasing our undead dps.

Oh, and the very idea of a paladin against undead doing similar sustained dps to a rogue is a flat out joke.

[Brohg]

It's not a joke, it's a number. Paladin here said 2500ish, rogue there said 2500ish. Is that not your number? Get figures to back it up.

[knytul]

[Gilthanos]

Nodyin, just give us a DD that undead are immune to and leave the rest alone.

[Maasq]

[Abazzagorath]

[shiftie]

In your example you bring the raid paladin and group paladin to the same level by eliminating weapon distinctions. Maxing slay based on aa and ignoring weapons is a bad idea. The rest of your idea sounded "ok". The game revolves around progression and the strength of a character centers around the point in progression that toon is. The raid weapons keep the raid paladin further in progression than the group paladin - they should not slay for the same values. From a pure dps stand point the raid paladin would still hold the edge, but we are talking about slay. You'd be hard pressed to see a 7th yr vet burning paladin doing 50k dmg in a hurry to see his max slay reduced to 25k - unless I misunderstand your meaning.

Spell dps
Pet
Swarm Pet

all of those increase paladin dps without touching melee and without reducing slay.

Again I propose to have a "banishment of soul" aa or spell with the chance to turn a mob undead for a period of time. It utilizes our already popular form of dps without a sacrifice to slay undead. We'd then also be able to cast our undead nukes with armor cleave etc. It would improve live dps without breaking the game and as there are already trigger spells present it shouldn't be hard to code.

I know I'd love to have a lion pet or something equally "Valiant" and "knight" like to improve my dps and make up for the lack of pegasus (which we should still get an option of)and the less than manly unicorn =/

When you improved SK dps there was no need to nerf HT... you actually boosted their existing skills while adding new ones to achieve this. I think we should see something similar.

cheers,
shiftie

[boukk]

[Abazzagorath]

Paladin Class AA:

Viscious Attack - 5 ranks, first rank may be purchased at level 81, one additional rank may be trained from levels 82 to 85. Adds 10 damage bonus to every melee hit (does not affect bash). 8 aa per rank

Change the DB additive value to whatever testing shows is appropriate. Next expansion, if you want to increase live paladin dps more, without really increasing slay power, add more ranks.

Gives us a good aa to buy, lets us gain some live dps, doesn't affect slay.

[boukk]

I dont think fixing a class via AA is a good option.

If our dps need fixing it s must be done as a whole, not as an option, ie disc, dmg base change,spell (big nuke, pet,etc).

[Maasq]