Nerf Smite ; Buff Spirit.

[heady jay]

So with the new Virtue system, I feel like Spirit as a whole is underwhelming and Smite is overwhelming.

To resume :

Smite does damage, heals, interacts with equipped totems, activates your runes, and grant one spell instant cooldown reduction (%?)

Spirit grants 1,5% cooldown reduction per point.

I understand Smite is supposed to be Soulframe's bread and butter ; but it currently does too much overall and shadows the whole point of Spirit's cooldown reduction. With enough Smite procc chance, playing Courage (with more health, better armor, better weapons) or playing Grace (with more health and damage, better armor, better weapons), you still can have enough cooldown reduction by spamming Smite-pull and its innate effect reducing one spell cooldown ; without even the need to rely on Spirit or even Totem synergy.

Proposed changes :

-Smite innate cooldown reduction should be either completely removed ; or added as a new node in the Pact's tree, like the damage and the healing portion it can provide, while also reducing its potency to be a fixed amount of seconds reduced. Changing it so would ask player to invest more into Smite and/or use the synergy with Totems, and would give more chances for Spirit's passive cooldown reduction to be relevant.

-Add another bonus to Spirit points as a Virtue ; if Smite is some kind of soul magic, why not allow Spirit to increase chances of Smite for weapons and spells by 1,5% for every 10 Spirit, for example ? It would give an edge to Spirit weapons and Spell casters to benefit from, empowering the whole package with all the Smite-pull effects, and incentivising people to invest a bit more into this Virtue, even if they play mainly Courage or Grace.

-The most radical change would be to remove the Spirit's passive, remove all Smite's bonus in Pact's tree, and from a blank slate, tie Spirit and Smite together ; making Smite's healing, damage, and Cooldown reduction tied to the amount of Spirit points.

[trail goblet]

Smite is currently being reworked, you will see changes in p15. You can look at other recent post for more info

[heady jay]

I don't know what posts you are refering to. I don't really know what has been the conversation about Smite. I do know Runes are going to be reworked to be charged by a certain amount of Smites and triggered by a heavy attack ; but this isn't what I'm focusing on in this post.

Here, I'm talking about Spirit's passive cooldown reduction compared to other means of cooldown reduction (mainly pull-Smite's passive cooldown reduction and its synergy with Totem, but we could also talk about Mockeries kills) ; and compared to other bonuses from Grace and Courage ; contenders which are overshadowing the point of min-maxing Spirit for its passive, which is the only thing Spirit is bringing to the table except attunement with what I consider sub-tier arsenal ; while you have many reasons to min-max Courage for tankyness or Grace for a greater damage output.

And while I don't think we really need to buff Spirit much further, I do really think it's necessary to nerf what's overshadowing it.

Spirit builds focusing on staves and robes are here to cosplay a Wizard ; but you have extremely little synergies with your spell kit with Spirit except buffing one single spell by your Virtue (and Courage and Grace do that as well), but have the **supposed **advantage to have more cooldown reduction than other Virtues in order to use more spells, to have a broader range of combos and that more consistently, to have more persistent utility from your Pact's kit ; but it isn't really the case as anyone can refresh their spells in the right setup (Smite procc festival).

So Spirit end up being the worst Virtue, by far - and of course you will always have a better and worst Virtue in any given system - but Spirit doesn't bring anything to the table.

Another option would be to swap some spells around in Pacts to have logically powerful spells in the Spirit slot, and not melee triggers like Ode Tempest and Mora's Hand which are completely contradictory to the nature of a caster.

[trail goblet]

Ah i misunderstood original intent; they are TRYING to balance the builds, in p12 it was mostly courage builds. Now grace builds are becoming popular.

However sadly spirit is currently lackluster

I would like to see more spirit based pacts

[clever karma]

Tying Smite to any of the three virtues would create another "Courage Meta" situation. Smite is the ultimate win button, so anything affecting it will be meta.

[heady jay]

Edit :

"-The most radical change would be to remove the Spirit's passive, remove all Smite's bonus in Pact's tree, and from a blank slate, tie Spirit and Smite together ; making Smite's healing, damage, and Cooldown reduction tied to the amount of Spirit points."

By doing so, you'd have a much stronger benefit for Spirit users for pulling-Smite, using it for damage, healing, and cooldown reduction, complementing your caster aspect. But it would also benefit dual-stats users like Paladins (Courage+Spirit) and Occultists (Grace+Spirit) being able to also heal themselves, damage, and reduce their cooldown to some extent ; while the dominant Warrior (Courage only) and Assasins (Grace only) builds would find most of their power elsewhere, in resisting/avoiding damage (armor, block, stealth and instant kills) and healing through potions.

Adding the bonuses of Smite to Spirit wouldn't stop Courage and Grace builds from easily triggering and pulling-Smite ; it would only reduce the heal, damage, and cooldown reduction pull-Smite offers ; so they would still be able to benefit from Totems synergies and Runes effects, and to some extremely little but still existing heal, damage and cooldown reduction according to the amount of Spirit they have from Talisman and Pact's tree.

[heady jay]

I would find it healthier for the game overall if "the ultimate win button" was tied to the weakest healthpool, weakest armor, and weakest weapons ; that's a good trade off. If spamming pull-smite is the go-to strategy, then i'd find it fine if it forces one to wear clothes and play with staves, ditching armor, parry, stealth, in the process ; for some healing, damage, and cooldown reduction.

[clever karma]

This only keeps in mind the current game, and not the future plans. Right now, Spirit happens to have the least armor and weapons available to it, but that won't always be the case. As Spirit is provided more gear variety, it'll become more desirable as a Virtue. It's also worth mentioning that at the moment, Spirit's gear options are pretty bad. That can change, and when it does, having advantages with Smite may make it the premier choice.

I just don't think we know enough about their plans with Spirit going forward to slap Smite benefits onto it.

[trail goblet]

Duelo seems like a grace type, so im hoping the ram is a spirit build

[clever karma]

I'm keeping my hopes up for the Ram as well

[last falcon]

Just know that this is wishful thinking

As of right now we have no evidence suggesting spirit will get new weapon types, especially those that play different enough to make a meaningful difference in how that archetype feels

[last falcon]

Honestly at this point in time if a pact caters to one specific virtue, something went wrong in its design

[trail goblet]

Proir to prisms pacts granted 5 points to a specific virtue with wyld's granting 9

[last falcon]

Prior to prisms

Before pacts were virtue defining, now arcanics are virtue dependant, hence why a pact shouldn't cater to a specific virtue

Catering to a specific virtue harms 2/3 of a pact's kit

[trail goblet]

Courage is more health, grace will help kill enemies faster, spirit use abilities faster.... oh wait faster to recharge with pull smite

[trail goblet]

With the new pact, gunshot looks to be its most attractive. I want to finish the enemy with one shot = grace pact

[last falcon]

I dont even know what to say to you at this point

[clever karma]

New Weapon types? What do you mean?

I think it's very likely that we'll get more bows, swords, or other weapons with Spirit scaling.

[last falcon]

The we're just going back to the old system

Then*

[last falcon]

Cause like, identity wise, if an archetype relies on traits of another to work properly, then it is not working at all

You shouldn't expect a bow or a sword to fix the mage archetype
You should advocate for better casters

[clever karma]

So, this post is about buffing Spirit and making it the premier Smite focused virtue.

Though Spirit may be the main node for mages, it does mean that you have to play as a mage if you spec into that virtue. If your problem is with casting as a whole, you should be advocating for a rework to weapon mechanics (which we will be getting with the Combat Arts overhaul) and Pacts, which is unrelated to OP's post. Spirit can be used outside of just being a mage.

[trail goblet]

@last falcon
" Smite currently overshadows the whole point of Spirit's cooldown reduction.

With enough Smite procc chance, playing
Courage (with
... more health,
... better armor,
... better weapons) or

Grace (with
... more health,
... more damage,
... better armor,
... better weapons),

You still can have enough ability cooldown reduction by spamming Smite-pull and its innate effect reducing one spell cooldown ; without even the need to rely on Spirit or even Totem synergy."

👆from OP post;
The benefit users get from Spirit can easily be replicated with pull smite(soulsteal).
OP points out benefits of using other virtues over Spirit.

Currently Spirit =
... less health
... less damage
... less armour

[last falcon]

Why are you tagging me on this?

[elder cedar]

+1

The rune recharge per smite made this problem even worse.
Tying spirit value and smite effects is much needed.