The Spirit Realm

Besides the poll being hopelessly biased I don't see a point to it. As several people have pointed out 75% slow DOES NOT WORK in the way the game is designed today. If bosses or even exp mobs did the same dps fully slowed as they do partially slowed now they would be so amazingly bad when unslowed. Not only that they would either be hitting really fast or really hard to maintain the same dps when fully slowed. Pretty much fully slowable mobs just are not really possible with the way the game is setup now.

To show a simple example.

If something is immune to slow and does 1000 dps it may be a tough boss mob or an easy boss depending on the level of play but thats doesn't really matter. For it to do 1000dps once fully slowed it would need to do 4000dps when unslowed. That is substantially more difficult. Making it only slightly slowable lets them make the unslowed dps only 1250 dps and then slow it by 25% for example and make it 1000dps when slowed. This is practical.

Basically once they moved to the PoP mechanic where mobs where hard because they did a fair bit of dps and not just because they had more and more hps and took longer and longer to kill a 75% slow was no longer possible. This was an issue even before then but was limited to a few select bosses and used MR immune, completely slow immune or mr immune and disease slowable because those were the only mechanics they had at the time.

If I don't get a mitigation message I assume something happened like an interrupt, etc. Then I cast again.

mitigating slow annoys me more than unslowable, its an unknown amount of mitigation. Shaman should be able to know aprox how succesful their slow was at a bare minimum, and I mean beyond slightly, partially, mostly. For example.. "Your slow was 75% effective", would be better but it still sucks. Mitigating abilities just suck, similar to how melees dislike when mobs mitigate their hits to 1 dmg b/c they are using the "wrong" weapon on that mob, nobody likes it.

As far as balance I think the mitigation thing shows a lack of imagination honestly. You can do other things like say that the mobs slower attacks allow him to aim better and he gets and accuracy boost to account for that. Thats just one thing I thought of in 10 seconds, try thinking of something other then the obvious (thats called using your imagination).

In addition I honestly don't see any problem with upping the haste of creatures a SMALL amount to account for slow, most xp mobs only hit for 1300ish atm anyways and I can easily tank a slowed one while I heal myself. I run out of mana eventually and I need a corner but they are already gimp for a tank who will have better AC, HP, shielding, avoidance, dodge, block, riposte, etc... than me. People fighting above their gear level will encounter the problems you mentioned when they don't have a slower...

But when was the last time anyone had a group without a slower? I mean really it does't happen often, and when it does a ranger could bust out his epic 1.0 or the war a truncheon of doom (both very unreliable). The point is with a BST, ENC, SHM slow being max effective and BRD being partially effective behind them it should not be too tough to find someone to slow for you.

Ability to slow has always been a key desirability factor for SHM and ENC (more recently BST) and I don't see how improving that desireble-"ness" really impacts the game much when practically every group looks for a slower to begin with.. The only people without a slower couldn't find one or they have a gimped group b/c they wanted friends instead, and thats just a price you have to pay for gimping your group to have friends with you..

Heh, was doing some fabled in ST with a few groups of guildies last night. All the named there we did were "slightly" slowable. Had the raid leader (also cleric leader) say several times to slow the mob even though it already was /sigh.

Mitigation was necessary, but lately they've really been overdoing it.