WARNING: BIG WALL OF TEXT INCOMING!!!
Also, english is not my native language, sorry for any grammar mistakes
Since I begin playing TOS, i had huge interest in Scout class, and now it’s my favorite class!
The concepts of stealth, support and combat skills are amazing, but only the stealth part is noticed and also the only one working well.
Another thing that makes me sad about the scout class is the
“Pick Scout C1 for almost 100% uptime cloaking"
or
"Pick Scout C3 for Split Arrow for grind”
Ok, there are the combat and stealth concept, but where is the support part? It should come from Camouflage, Flu Flu, Perspective Distortion and Scan, but these three skills are the most underused of the entire class.
So my intention is to make Scout C2 / C3 viable not for Split Arrow only, but also offer something great in return like most of other classes on archer tree and open more ways of playing as a Scout.
I’m only suggesting changes on current skills, not new ones.
So here it is:
Camouflage
Current
Hide on a barrel to protect yourself from physical attacks
Max lv: 5
Block Count: 5 * Skill lv [25 at max lv]
Move speed: (10 * Skill lv)% [50% at max lv]
Cooldown: 76
No attributes
Suggestion
Hide on a barrel to protect yourself from physical attacks, you may attack while hidden
Max lv: 15
Block Count: 3 * Skill lv [45 at max lv]
Move speed: (6 * Skill lv)% [90% at max lv]
Cooldown: 80
Attributes
C2:
Camouflage: Magic block
Max level: 10
Blocks magic attacks at 10% chance per attribute level, blocked magic will impact on block count.
C3:
Camouflage: Stealth
Max level: 1
When exiting the barrel, automatically casts a lv.1 Cloaking without attributes
A few changes on Camouflage to make it more appealing.
Nerfing the base stats while buffing the scale, it nerfs the Scout C1 while buffing Scout C2 / C3.
The “attack while hidden” part would work like Rogue’s Burrow, where you can still use some skills beside Perspective Distortion while hidden, so it compensates the nerf on move speed and block count by increasing the combat power.
On Scout C2, it’s possible to block magic attacks (after some investment) making it way more interesting for self defense and tank some magic mobs or magic attacks on pvp.
On Scout C3, you become a master of stealth, you can get in and out of your barrel without being seen, allowing lots of playmaking in grind, Earth Tower and pvp.
What would Scouts gain from this?
With a high level Camouflage, Scouts can become supports on grind by holding the aggro from both physical and magic mobs while at same time being mobile and deal damage with a few restrictions.
Flu Flu
Current
Fires a musical arrow, enemies nearby will be afflicted with [Fear]
Max lv: 15
Attack: 112 + (37 * skill lv) [666 at lv 15]
Attacked Targets: [Fear]+[Confusion]
Number of targets: 5
Duration: 8 + (skill lv / 5) [11 at lv 15]
Cooldown: 61
Attributes
C1
Enhance and increse debuff count
Suggestion
Fires a musical arrow, enemies nearby will be afflicted with [Stun]
Max lv: 15
Attack: 80 + (25 * skill lv) [455 at lv 15]
Attacked Targets: [Stun]
Number of targets: (skill lv) [15 at lv 15]
Duration: 1 + (skill lv * 0.4) [7 at lv 15] (halved on PvP)
Overheat: 2
Cooldown: 80
Attributes
C1
Enhance
C2
Flu Flu: Duration
Max lv: 5
Increses the stun duration by 0.2 per attribute level
C3
Flu Flu: Decrease defense
Max lv: 10
Decreases the physical and magic defense of enemies afflicted by Flu Flu by 12%, increases the effect by 2% after lv 2.
With these changes, I want to make Flu Flu a viable pick, not only the lv.1 just for the ignored debuff and terrible scaling. By changing the debuff from fear and confusion to stun (which is way more reliable), nerfing the damage, increasing cooldown while increasing the scaling on the debuff duration and count, support Scouts will have more options to help your allies while also adding it’s combat power not on damage, but on utility (which Scout is lacking now).
It’s about nerfing damage and buffing utility.
The attributes on C2 and C3 is to encourage Scouts who want utility to keep going on further circles of Scout while leveling Flu Flu.
Flare Shot
Current
Max lv: 15
Attack: 118 + (34 * skill lv) [628 at lv 15]
Duration: 10 + (skill lv) [25 at lv 15]
Cooldown: 41
Hits 2 times per second
Attributes
C1
Enhance
Suggestion
Max lv: 15
Attack: 106 + (30 * skill lv) [556 at lv 15]
Duration: 5 + (skill lv * 2) [35 at lv 15]
Cooldown: 35
Hits 2 times per second
Attributes
C1
Enhance
C3
Flare Shot: Damage Interval
Max lv: 1
Decreases the damage interval of Flare Shot by 0.2 seconds
With these small tweaks on the numbers it makes Flare Shot a great stationary damage skill, rewarding the higher circles of Scout with damage power. The cooldown reduction rewards those who level flare shot to lv 15 with 100% uptime DPS, also the attribute of damage interval allows Flare Shot to deal 3 hits per second while being another strong reason to level Scouts up to circle 3.
Cloaking
Current
Hide from enemy’s vision, become exposed when you jump or attack
Duration: 20 + (3 * Skill lv) seconds [65 at lv 15]
Cooldown: 35
Attributes
C1
Physical damage and Move speed
Suggestion
Hide from enemy’s vision, become exposed when you jump, attack or get attacked
Duration: 3.5 + (3.5 * skill lv) seconds [21 at lv 5] [38.5 at lv 10] [56 at lv 15]
Cooldown: 35
Attributes:
C1
Physical damage (unchanged)
C2
Move speed (unchanged)
Cloaking: Including Pary Members
Max lv: 1
Applies the effects of Cloaking without attributes on your party members (Only applies if the attribute is ON)
C3
Cloaking: Invisible Danger
Requires Cloaking lv 15
Max lv: 1
You don’t become exposed when attacking or getting attacked, but all damaging skills costs 5 times more SP (Only applies if the attribute is ON)
Ah, Cloaking… The signature and trademark of Scouts.
It’s an excellent skill with an amazing scaling (waaaay too good IMO) and also balanced due limitation of being exposed on attack, get attacked or jump.
But also it’s quite overpower on Scout C1 due the insane utility for just one rank, making Scout C1 just enough to be completed with more damage classes.
My idea here is:
“If you want utility, you have to focus on Scout path”
By nerfing the base duration and adding a bit of scaling and moving the move speed attribute to C2, it removes the OPness of Scout C1 and balance it on C2 and C3, specially with the new attributes.
On C2 you can have 100% uptime of Cloaking and also you gain an attribute that casts cloaking on your party members, giving a lot more utility to the forgotten C2 and making it viable to support.
As Scout Master say:
“Scouts aren’t only about stealth and infiltration, you must have some combat skills”
On C3 you’ll become the stealth master and an amazing fighter!
The idea behind the C3 attribute is to give more combat, stealth and support power to scouts at cost of extreme consume of SP, so Scouts that use this attribute must use it’s skills with care, or else it will run out of SP easily
Perspective Distortion
Current
Distort the sence of distance to make attacks from allies possible outside their range.
Max lv: 10
Duration: 10 + (Skill lv) [20 at lv 10]
Consumes 32 SP per second (not 3 as tooltip says)
Cooldown: 40
Attributes
C2
Physical damage
Suggestion
Distort the sence of distance to increase the attack range of allies.
Max lv: 10
Duration: 5 + (Skill lv * 2) [25 at lv 10]
Consumes 10 SP per second
Range: 30
Cooldown: 30
Attributes
C2
Physical damage (unchanged)
Perspective Distortion: Magic damage
Max lv: 5
Increases the magic attack of allies within the range of Perspective Distortion by 5% per attribute level
C3
Pespective distortion: Increased Range
Increases the range of Perspective distortion to 75
Okay, Perspective Distortion is quite bugged, but I loved it’s concept.
Also I don’t know how it works now, but the idea of this suggestion is to increase the attack range of allies near the Scout, making them have a bigger hitbox (the range around the caster).
By adding the magic damage attribute on C2, it makes a great support for both physical and magic damage, and the attribute on C3 makes an excellent support by increasing the range of all attacks of allies to 75 on a radius around the caster.
This will make support Scouts a thing, also if paired with Falconer, Perspective Distortion and Circling would make all attacks AoE on the circling range. It would be awesome!
If you think this would substitute Linker, it won’t. Linker can just link enemies, CC’em and do damage, while Scout will only help the allies do the damage
Scan
Current
Show hidden enemies within range
Max lv: 5
Duration 8 + (Skill lv * 2) [18 at lv 5]
Cooldown: 58
Attributes
C3
Confusion
Suggestion
Reveal hidden enemies within range
Max lv: 5
Duration (Skill lv * 5) [25 at lv 5]
Cooldown: 40
Attributes
C3
Confusion (unchanged)
Scan: Stun
Max Lv: 5
Revealed enemies will be stunned for 0.4 seconds per attribute level
Scan is good, but it could be better. By removing the base duration and buffing the scale and the cooldown and adding the stun attribute, C3 Scouts will be an important team member on PvP to neutralize other lower rank Scouts.
Scan currently shows hidden enemies on the area, my suggestion is to truly reveal them.
Split Arrow
Current
Max lv: 5
Fires an arrow that, upon hitting a target, bounces to hit two nearby enemies.
Attack: 257 + (75 * skill lv) [631 at lv 5]
Bounced Arrow Attack: 200%
Cooldown: 0s
Attributes
C3
Enhance
Suggestion
Max lv: 5
Fires an arrow that, upon hitting a target, bounces to hit nearby enemies.
Attack: 145 + (53 * Skill lv) [410 at lv 5]
Bounced Arrow Attack: (Skill lv * 60)% [300% at lv 5]
Targets: 1 + (Skill lv/2) [3 at lv 5]
Cooldown: 0s
Attributes
C3
Enhance (unchanged)
Split Arrow: Critical Chance
Max lv: 3
Increases the critical chance of Split Arrow by 10% per attribute level
The reason why people go C3 at the moment. It’s fashion is on increased bounced attack and 0s CD. I like it and I want it to stay this way.
My suggestion is to nerf the base and scaling damage a bit, also the bounced damage at earlier levels, but at later levels it will become stronger than it is. It will also increase the value of Split Arrow Gem (almost to level of Deadborn Scar Archer gem, if there’s any gem of Split Arrow).
Phew… That’s it, that’s my suggestions about Scout class, tell me what you think about it and your opinion about the state of Scout class at the moment!