Druid Flying Form

EDIT: Last thread got lost in the crash so I remade it with the input from the last one mind.

I think the energy drain on druid flying form is too steep. Your damage is severely nerfed when in bird form, when you end up in combat the energy drain gets much worse, it requires you to hit level 50 in Druid before you're even allowed to use it. It already has enough restrictions. Also there seems to be something weird about leashing enemies while in the air. If you aggro a monster and start flying away it seems to follow you much further than if you were on the ground.

Constantly you'll end up in a situation where a bunch of low level enemies are banging on you and you have to use your nerfed abilities to slowly kills them, It's incredibly inconvenient when doing surveying because of this. I guess the intended thing is that I set down in a safe area, transform, and then go to the survey point? I honestly don't know.

It's nice for farming in an area where enemies are MUCH lower than you or I guess once you have enough of an energy restore and access to high enough food set that you can power your way through even the combat flight energy drain. Honestly my proposed change is to have bird form lower hit points the same way it lowers damage.

At least in that way you'd be granted the sweet release of death rather than flying up and falling back to the earth as 6 ranalon chase your immortal bird self through Serbule Hills. I realize no one will ever agree the energy drain is excessive or annoying, but probably a few people will agree on making it 'more hardcore'. So yeah just drop our health and armor pools by the same rate you nerf bird form damage, please.

No, I agree that in-combat energy drain can be a little excessive, at least in certain scenarios. Unless I'm mistaken, the depletion rate increases exponentially based on how many abilities you've used in-combat. Flying away without engaging an attacker can usually allow you to salvage most of your power, especially after putting a lot of vertical distance between yourself and the foe. In other cases where you use your combat refresh to heal before escaping or use a recovery ability mid-flight, the power drain is much quicker. Trying to restore power mid-flight has the added drawback of both prolonging your time spent in-combat and hastening the drain-rate of your power.

My suggestion is to lessen how much using healing/support abilities contribute to your in-combat power drain, giving fliers a little more leeway when escaping combat.

I think birds' damage reduction could also stand to be reevaluated, if for no other reason than that direct/indirect damage modifiers' role in determining damage output has changed significantly. The 75% reduction works as intended for unmodded abilities, but fully modded abilties see their damage reduced by around only 50%.

Combat in bird form will feel less like hitting a brick wall and more of a mild inconvenience as your abilities and equipment get stronger. A health/armor reduction for the sake of an easy out from ranalon dogpiles (frogpiles?) seems a little bit drastic

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Originally Posted by Gruffon

No, I agree that in-combat energy drain can be a little excessive, at least in certain scenarios. Unless I'm mistaken, the depletion rate increases exponentially based on how many abilities you've used in-combat. Flying away without engaging an attacker can usually allow you to salvage most of your power, especially after putting a lot of vertical distance between yourself and the foe. In other cases where you use your combat refresh to heal before escaping or use a recovery ability mid-flight, the power drain is much quicker. Trying to restore power mid-flight has the added drawback of both prolonging your time spent in-combat and hastening the drain-rate of your power.

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Maybe it's an issue of the mobs? I had very little trouble escaping mobs in eltibule but then when I tried to escape them in serbule hills it felt like aggro was never ending. Personally the combat energy drain seems pretty linear. I'm not sure if there are logging programs and if there were I don't know if they'd chart energy drain, but every time I'd aggro something it felt like I was losing incredibly amounts of energy while in air. Maybe it has to do with Serbule Hills ranalon areas having so many more mores packed in and energy drain is based on number of mobs engaged?

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Originally Posted by Gruffon

A health/armor reduction for the sake of an easy out from ranalon dogpiles (frogpiles?) seems a little bit drastic

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I'm just being facetious there given the obstinacy I faced about the energy drain amount in my last thread that was lost to server problems. Part of the issue seems to be what exactly is the intent of flying? Is it supposed to make surveying easier, or is it not? Am I supposed to face hard choices while I'm trying to farm oranges and oak or not?

That's my issue, I can't tell what I'm supposed to do with flight form. Obviously it makes all the running around a little easier but sometimes it makes things incredibly more frustrating. Like how much gearing should be needed for flying? It seems like you need Nature Appreciation, a good food buff, energy restoration skills, and gear with mods that improve energy restoration to a point where it's redundant for the rest of the game. It makes me question if we're all just functioning outside the actual intent for this skill. Using flying for gathering or surveying seems like the natural intent of the ability but the passive energy drain and in combat energy drain seem to contradict that.

Honestly in a way this gets to the heart of the kind of weird metagame of stackng various sprint mods and a bunch of people running around like they're the Flash. What really is the core idea here? Is it that running fast is funny and cool or is it that the game is baseline so inconvenient that it's created this need?

Birds are illusions :) yet those same illusions are not only faster then the true flying form animals . those illusions swim faster , And illusions have night vision , Mitigation against cold . Those same illusions are better then most real tangible things .. Having played A true flying skill not a illusion , we all hit that brick wall . Why there is flower power , buffs , food , and many other things . ( the fact that the druid raven form flies faster then the bat form is a travesty ). if those same illusions fly faster means they use less power as they reach their destination faster .

@Worm: The types of mobs you engage while flying can definitely play a part. Fighting fast-moving mobs, ranged-attack users, and getting struck by DOT effects can all prolong the amount of time spent in-combat and quickly drain your power as a result.

Flying works best when used to cover long distances at a moderate pace, and I believe the innate restrictions of bird forms reflect their nature as "Travel Forms". It isn't intended to be able to engage in combat and gather resources with complete impunity, but making use of its advantages can afford some benefits that set it apart from sprinting. Druid's detection-range reducing Trackless Steps can help when trying to land in relatively close proximity to mobs, and mezzes from skills like Psych and Bard can keep a mob from interrupting your foraging as well. Moreover, a lot of sprint-boosts only take effect outside of combat, while movement/flight-speed boosts stay active in-combat as well. I don't think it's really supposed to be "better" or "worse" than sprinting, just different.
@Sheawanna: birds ain't illusions, jack

@Gruffon Respectfully they are , other wise they would beholden to same ruleset as other animals . no woodchopping , no milking , and certain npc's who would not speak with them .

That isn't entirely accurate. The only restriction other beasts have that birds do not is birds' ability to chop wood. Birds cannot milk cows or snails, and most of the NPC's in Serbule and Kur refuse to speak to birds. Birds' other features are somewhat inconsistent with other beasts; they use Beast Speech, but in and of themselves cannot use Survival Instincts (and Warden, I'm assuming. haven't tested it myself). There isn't any substantial reason to consider Druid's bird forms an illusion.

you may be correct as far as milking goes . but druid illusion bird forms are able to speak to to npc that normal animals cannot , same as druid illusion form will not be attacked in animal town ( from guardian scorps ) while humanoids will be . As for the mention or name tag tag illusion .long ago it was said that druids birds forms were illusions . forget when or by whom .. but if they are not illusions , Well then they should be considered animal . and if animal they should conform to same ruleset :)

That's incorrect. Last time I checked, the following NPC's in the overworld won't talk to the conventional beast forms: Joeh, Elahil, Marna, Nelson Ballard, Sir Coth, Rita, Blanche, Yetta, Kalaba, Oritania, Braigon, George Madler, Gretchen Salas, Helena Veilmoor, Thimble Pete, Ukorga, Laura Neth, Janet Lews, Gurki, Lamashu, and the Chemist in Rahu. Of those NPC's, none of them will talk to birds.

Scorpion guardians won't attack any beast, bird included. "Timid" animals such as deer, cows and rabbits consider birds to be "peaceful" animals as well, and won't attack or run away. But I don't see why that justifies calling birds illusions, as the same applies to pigs, cows, deer, and rabbits. Also, humanoid druids won't be attacked by the guardian scorpions either, even outside of beast form.

I believe the similarities birds share with other beasts outweigh the handful of differences between the two groups. I don't consider "someone mentioned this once" to be valid evidence, regardless of when it was said or by whom. If that person doesn't provide their reasoning, why should their word be taken as fact?

. You may be perfectly correct as I no longer play a druid .
Fact is , If they are not illusions as you say .. Then what are they ? they are not human ! if they are animals then why can they chop wood ? I can't nor can you :) .
What Are druid birds forms ? Are they Extraterrestrials ? pigs/deer/cows/lycan/rabits/bats ect all are animals within this game ! really I am not trying to be difficult here but what are druid birds forms if not illusions ? perhaps developer can elaborate on this ?

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Originally Posted by Gruffon

"Timid" animals such as deer, cows and rabbits consider birds to be "peaceful" animals as well

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Do they? I swear I'd always hear a 'feels vulnerable' message while flying over Deer.

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Originally Posted by Sheawanna

. You may be perfectly correct as I no longer play a druid .
Fact is , If they are not illusions as you say .. Then what are they ? they are not human ! if they are animals then why can they chop wood ? I can't nor can you :) .
What Are druid birds forms ? Are they Extraterrestrials ? pigs/deer/cows/lycan/rabits/bats ect all are animals within this game ! really I am not trying to be difficult here but what are druid birds forms if not illusions ? perhaps developer can elaborate on this ?

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What is a druid in deer form? A deer. Therefore a druid in bird form is ... a bird. The wood chopping thing? Honestly who cares? I've only talked about the issue twice and I'd gladly forsake that ability to not hear about it again. Honestly I'd give up my REAL LIFE ability to chop wood to just never hear about it again.

The bird form takes a reasonable hit to it's damage so I feel like any speed it gets over Bats of Fairies makes sense in that regard. But that's really not what I'm focused on here, it's particularly how common it is that you get tapped out when you're using Raven Form. I'm pretty close to getting the flying shamanic leg buff and I'll probably start playing again soon and be able to work on a mentalism set. Though I think it's a worthwhile question as to why so much gearing has to go into flight and if the in combat energy drain or default energy drains are just too steep.