Fan of Knives spec is RUINING 5v5

#0 - June 11, 2009, 7:39 a.m.

Can something seriously be done about this? Rogues are running around with that 33/38/0 spec that combines overkill, ARush and throwing specialization. What this means is they can literally SPAM fan of knives with blade flurry active as well. There are a list of problems with this spec that seriously deteriorates the fun in 5s.

-AOE MS effect makes the damage from FoK ridiculously hard to heal through
-AOE crippling poison makes it very hard to get away once the rogue gets in range of a few members
-The FoK spam with a bladeflurry rogue attacking a target does amazing aoe and single target damage.

I'm fine with the above three. The map usually decides the impact of the FoK spam because the larger the map, the easier it is to spread out and avoid the aoe cleave of the rogue. There are PvE implications of FoK spreading poisons as well. The most disruptive part of FoK spam is the talent throwing specialization.

How is a 100% chance to range interrupt all the casters on a 5s team balanced? A rogue running with sprint positioning himself around the healers or the casters basically aoe cleaves and shuts down all opposing casting in a 10 yard range. The energy regen of overkill and arush allows the rogue to keep up a ridiculous amount of pressure and disruption as his team mates unload on the targets that are MS'd, slowed and can't cast.

PLEASE change throwing specialization to work for deadly throw only! The AOE ms and crippling need to be addressed as well but t hey aren't as game changing as an aoe interrupt on no cooldown. Casters have a hard enough time as it is against pummels and melee, this part of the talent does not need to be in the game.

Ghostcrawler

#3 - June 11, 2009, 7:47 a.m.

So, last I looked today, rogues were represented in really low numbers in 5s among high rated teams (particularly considering they are over represented in 2s and 3s). So "Mortal FoK" doesn't seem to be winning them too many matches, at least not yet, though it could be one of those things that is annoying even if not overpowered.

Ghostcrawler

#18 - June 11, 2009, 8:08 p.m.

Q u o t e:
Its been my perception lately that there's a policy by the designers to allow overpowered abilities to stay in the game on the basis that a class or certain spec has low representation in arena. Is this something that will continue in the future because I'm sure I've seen correspondence posted that has said otherwise in the past.

No, not at all. I've always maintained that things can be unbalanced even if they don't affect the rarefied air of the best Arena players. But at the same time, if something is really overpowered (as opposed to just annoying) you might expect it to have a significant effect on the outcome. But there can be a lag in things like this sometimes before everyone catches on.