Let me start by addressing the elephant in the room: I'd rather run the invoker set than the might of the earth in its' current incarnation. The set is garbage and has no real viable use beyond torment...2. It's a blight on the barbarian's repertoire and needs to either be reworked or removed. My vote is to rework it, and here's how I would do it:
Might of the earth set bonuses:
* 2-piece: Range of ground stomp is increased to 40yds
* 4-piece: Increase damage of Earthquake by 300% to enemies affected by Threatening shout
* 6-piece: Casting Seismic slam on an Earthquake causes it to spread the Earthquake to the areas hit by the Slam. In addition, areas already affected by Earthquake erupt when slammed, doing it's full duration of damage instantly. This does not consume the Earthquake.
**Set item additions:**
* Chest: Heart of the Earth
* Shield: Tower of the Earth
**Legendary item additions:**
* 1h Fury weapon: Seismic slam is cast in full 360 degree wave.
* Mighty belt: Earthquake's cooldown is reduced by 1 second for every 5 fury spent.
* Boots: Ground stomp gains the Wrenching smash rune, also reduces cooldown and stun duration by 75%
* Bracer: Standing inside earthquake-affected ground reduces damage taken by 50%
* Amulet: Sword and Board activation also increases damage by 50% for 5 seconds.
Build theory: The two-piece is probably kind of worthless by itself, but combine it with the boots that grant Wrenching smash, and you can pull in all enemies from up to 40 yards away and pound them with 750% weapon damage every 4 seconds. This alone is incredibly powerful and allows a new Barb to be able to run Torment 2 pretty effectively with a decent weapon. The Four-piece is meant to greatly compliment and accent the use of the ground pounding, and using the Mighty belt and Bracer both will bring your Barb damn close to Torment 4. Lastly, with the Six-piece, and the 1h-fury weapon for seismic slam, you'll be pulling everything on you, slamming them away and bursting them to pieces in one or two slams, then you can step over, pound again, and slam-burst even more. Basically carpet-bombing from below. This is easily a Torment 8-10 setup without overshadowing all other builds' effectiveness.
Coolness factor: Honestly, Imagining the gameplay of a shield-bearing Barbarian stomping the ground, using threatening shout to make enemies target and attack him as he cracks the gates of hell open with an earthquake, and then busting those gates wider and wider with every seismic slam - burning everything to ash - It makes me yearn for this *Unique* gameplay style.
I agree that the set needs some buffing, but the way you modified the set makes so that you are forced to play ( ground stomp, Earthquake, Threatening shout, Seismic slam) which will never EVER happen. At most you may go for 2 skills, but even that's a bit far fetched.
And also "Standing inside earthquake-affected ground reduces damage taken by 50%" that's far too good to be in the game if you ask me.
I also think it's stupid to give names to additional set pieces. They will never take your names and put them into the game. At least you could say these names and values are placeholders. Though as a placeholder you can easily put a "x" value instead.
On a personal level, I like the leaping aspect of the set. I see no reason to change it.
Name a single class set that has three or more variable abilities in their optimum build. The answer is that you can't. All classes have abilities across all builds that are an unwritten rule to have, such as laws, Magic weapon/armor, Companion, gargantuan, mantra, Warcry/battle rage. I like the idea of pushing for Threatening shout because it is never used, and is intended to take the place of an ability that is always used.
I will admit that I had a singular build in mind when constructing the set and associated legendaries, but I cannot stress enough that this is how sets work in the game currently.
I'm not a numbers guy. I don't work for blizz. I don't pretend to believe that I can theorycraft up perfectly balanced and fair numbers at all. These are all ballpark numbers intended to give the reader an idea of what my goals are.
Meh to the names. If by some stroke of ungodly luck that blizz not only reads this, but loves it enough to implement everything but say "fuck your names, i do what i want" and then go make their own - cool. Again, this is all ballparking for the sake of entertaining the idea that this set might not suck ass at some point in time.
On a professional level, the leaping aspect is accomplished for this class via the Rakor's build. Leapquake will never come back because it is entirely too similar to another 6-piece set on the same class. This build/set is entirely designed (in my mind) to be unique in gameplay to the class.
I agree that the set needs some buffing, but the way you modified the set makes so that you are forced to play ( ground stomp, Earthquake, Threatening shout, Seismic slam) which will never EVER happen. At most you may go for 2 skills, but even that's a bit far fetched.
And also "Standing inside earthquake-affected ground reduces damage taken by 50%" that's far too good to be in the game if you ask me.
I also think it's stupid to give names to additional set pieces. They will never take your names and put them into the game. At least you could say these names and values are placeholders. Though as a placeholder you can easily put a "x" value instead.
On a personal level, I like the leaping aspect of the set. I see no reason to change it.
Name a single class set that has three or more variable abilities in their optimum build. The answer is that you can't. All classes have abilities across all builds that are an unwritten rule to have, such as laws, Magic weapon/armor, Companion, gargantuan, mantra, Warcry/battle rage. I like the idea of pushing for Threatening shout because it is never used, and is intended to take the place of an ability that is always used.
I will admit that I had a singular build in mind when constructing the set and associated legendaries, but I cannot stress enough that this is how sets work in the game currently.
I'm not a numbers guy. I don't work for blizz. I don't pretend to believe that I can theorycraft up perfectly balanced and fair numbers at all. These are all ballpark numbers intended to give the reader an idea of what my goals are.
Meh to the names. If by some stroke of ungodly luck that blizz not only reads this, but loves it enough to implement everything but say "fuck your names, i do what i want" and then go make their own - cool. Again, this is all ballparking for the sake of entertaining the idea that this set might not suck ass at some point in time.
On a professional level, the leaping aspect is accomplished for this class via the Rakor's build. Leapquake will never come back because it is entirely too similar to another 6-piece set on the same class. This build/set is entirely designed (in my mind) to be unique in gameplay to the class.
There are more than a few sets which leave a lot up to the player. Sure players end up finding perfect cookie cutter skill choices but nothing's stopping a Zunidoctor from not running gargantuan (note: IIRC currently gargy is inferior to doges due to body blocking), nothing stops a tal wizard from not using an armor (in fact many builds simply drop it altogether in favor of mobility). Yes there are plenty of skills that are "required" but items are changing and "best" options change with them. Locking a set into an excessively narrow skillset is only detrimental to the health of the set (and the game) in the long run.
And FYI: Leapquake should come back. It behaves way differently than raekor's.
I like that you are trying to utilize some skills that aren't always utilized, but I think that limiting it EQ and avalanche might end up being better, at least purely from the set bonuses (remember that there is an item that makes GS cast avalanche). The beauty of using avalanche is that if you decide to put it on your skill bar, and not just use it runeless via GS, it already has a cooldown reducing mechanic with fury spent. For threatening shout, I think that skill needs a bit of a design itself, and then some supporting legendaries that make it useful.
If I had to guess, the current MotE mechanic of leap causing an earthquake will stay (unless they choose to move that to a legendary, which might not be the worst idea). What can change with the new set bonuses is what you do when you aren't leaping. As you said, Raekor (and WotW honestly) takes care of the zoom around doing damage playstyle. If the 6 set bonus increased the damage against enemies affected by EQ for some group of skills (or all of them like IK), then you have a reason to stop leaping around constantly, and use other skills to do damage, while maintaining some mobility.
I do like the legendary that reduces damage while inside of an EQ, since MotE barbs will be squishy once more following the CC nerf.
I like the playstyle you are going for, and I think that MotE can be made to be flexible enough so that a couple of legs can be added to give you nearly that build, while also leaving the door open for other possibilities.
I do like the suggestion, but I'd rather have it benefit stuff more in line with a druidic/mage feel (just for giggles):
2-piece: Reduces the cooldown and mana costs of Avalanche and Earthquake by 35%
4-piece: Increase damage of Avalanche and Earthquake by 300%
6-piece: Enemies affected by Avalanche or Earthquake take 250% more damage from Seismic Slam, Hammer of the Ancients and Ancient Spear for 3 seconds (can be refreshed);
Numbers are just some estimatives. but should be fun though. Leap-Quake was the best on its early days lol.
I like that you are trying to utilize some skills that aren't always utilized, but I think that limiting it EQ and avalanche might end up being better, at least purely from the set bonuses (remember that there is an item that makes GS cast avalanche). The beauty of using avalanche is that if you decide to put it on your skill bar, and not just use it runeless via GS, it already has a cooldown reducing mechanic with fury spent. For threatening shout, I think that skill needs a bit of a design itself, and then some supporting legendaries that make it useful.
If I had to guess, the current MotE mechanic of leap causing an earthquake will stay (unless they choose to move that to a legendary, which might not be the worst idea). What can change with the new set bonuses is what you do when you aren't leaping. As you said, Raekor (and WotW honestly) takes care of the zoom around doing damage playstyle. If the 6 set bonus increased the damage against enemies affected by EQ for some group of skills (or all of them like IK), then you have a reason to stop leaping around constantly, and use other skills to do damage, while maintaining some mobility.
I do like the legendary that reduces damage while inside of an EQ, since MotE barbs will be squishy once more following the CC nerf.
I like the playstyle you are going for, and I think that MotE can be made to be flexible enough so that a couple of legs can be added to give you nearly that build, while also leaving the door open for other possibilities.
Yeah, I think the gameplay mechanic I was going for was like a frantic Street-fight or a Rumble. "RumbleBarb has a nice ring to it, too. Currently, most other builds involve mashing one button constantly and occasionally something else i.e. Raekor, hammerdin/rolanddin/firebird's/etc. Yeah you have free slots to put in skills, but there's always an optimal "unwritten, but implied" perfect set of skills to fill the rest of the slots.
The way I thought about this one was to think about it as a 'progression'. If you started at no gear, as you put pieces on: you start adding those skills to your bar in addition to your current build until it starts taking over. Having no-one piece be the key to unlocking the full potential was the goal because i'm not an enormous fan of 0% to 100% in a single drop. Thinking more of a 0%-10%-25%-40%-60%-75%-100%. That kind of progression feels good because it works with our current and upcoming torment systems.
It's a lot simpler to fix than completely redesign it. Just add another item (belt/bracers) that gives X% dmg reduction every time you leap and expand the set to 6pc with a bonus that increases dmg. Erupting existing earthquakes for full duration dmg every time you leap would be a great way to get better instantaneous dmg. Adding some synergy with avalanche would also fit the theme of the set. With all the power creep it needs way bigger numbers.
I made a big post about it on the Barb forums months ago, I think S1 was just about wrapped up actually. Anyways, to summarize, what I proposed was this:
2p: Increases the damage dealt by Avalanche and Seismic Slam by x% to enemies taking damage from an Earthquake.
4p: Cause an Earthquake when you land after using Leap. (Unchanged)
6p: Causing an Earthquake grants a charge of Avalanche, up to an additional 3.
Since it's 'Might of the EARTH' I figured that Seismic Slam / Earthquake / Avalanche / Ground Stomp are the main candidates for attention in this set. Ground Stomp support could be added via additional legendaries (like Blessed Hammer shield/bracer/flail for the new Crusader set), while the actual set focuses on the damage dealers.
Let me start by addressing the elephant in the room: I'd rather run the invoker set than the might of the earth in its' current incarnation. The set is garbage and has no real viable use beyond torment...2. It's a blight on the barbarian's repertoire and needs to either be reworked or removed. My vote is to rework it, and here's how I would do it:
* 4-piece: Increase damage of Earthquake by 300% to enemies affected by Threatening shout
* 6-piece: Casting Seismic slam on an Earthquake causes it to spread the Earthquake to the areas hit by the Slam. In addition, areas already affected by Earthquake erupt when slammed, doing it's full duration of damage instantly. This does not consume the Earthquake.
* Shield: Tower of the Earth
* Mighty belt: Earthquake's cooldown is reduced by 1 second for every 5 fury spent.
* Boots: Ground stomp gains the Wrenching smash rune, also reduces cooldown and stun duration by 75%
* Bracer: Standing inside earthquake-affected ground reduces damage taken by 50%
* Amulet: Sword and Board activation also increases damage by 50% for 5 seconds.
Build theory: The two-piece is probably kind of worthless by itself, but combine it with the boots that grant Wrenching smash, and you can pull in all enemies from up to 40 yards away and pound them with 750% weapon damage every 4 seconds. This alone is incredibly powerful and allows a new Barb to be able to run Torment 2 pretty effectively with a decent weapon. The Four-piece is meant to greatly compliment and accent the use of the ground pounding, and using the Mighty belt and Bracer both will bring your Barb damn close to Torment 4. Lastly, with the Six-piece, and the 1h-fury weapon for seismic slam, you'll be pulling everything on you, slamming them away and bursting them to pieces in one or two slams, then you can step over, pound again, and slam-burst even more. Basically carpet-bombing from below. This is easily a Torment 8-10 setup without overshadowing all other builds' effectiveness.
Coolness factor: Honestly, Imagining the gameplay of a shield-bearing Barbarian stomping the ground, using threatening shout to make enemies target and attack him as he cracks the gates of hell open with an earthquake, and then busting those gates wider and wider with every seismic slam - burning everything to ash - It makes me yearn for this *Unique* gameplay style.
Name a single class set that has three or more variable abilities in their optimum build. The answer is that you can't. All classes have abilities across all builds that are an unwritten rule to have, such as laws, Magic weapon/armor, Companion, gargantuan, mantra, Warcry/battle rage. I like the idea of pushing for Threatening shout because it is never used, and is intended to take the place of an ability that is always used.
I will admit that I had a singular build in mind when constructing the set and associated legendaries, but I cannot stress enough that this is how sets work in the game currently.
I'm not a numbers guy. I don't work for blizz. I don't pretend to believe that I can theorycraft up perfectly balanced and fair numbers at all. These are all ballpark numbers intended to give the reader an idea of what my goals are.
Meh to the names. If by some stroke of ungodly luck that blizz not only reads this, but loves it enough to implement everything but say "fuck your names, i do what i want" and then go make their own - cool. Again, this is all ballparking for the sake of entertaining the idea that this set might not suck ass at some point in time.
On a professional level, the leaping aspect is accomplished for this class via the Rakor's build. Leapquake will never come back because it is entirely too similar to another 6-piece set on the same class. This build/set is entirely designed (in my mind) to be unique in gameplay to the class.
There are more than a few sets which leave a lot up to the player. Sure players end up finding perfect cookie cutter skill choices but nothing's stopping a Zunidoctor from not running gargantuan (note: IIRC currently gargy is inferior to doges due to body blocking), nothing stops a tal wizard from not using an armor (in fact many builds simply drop it altogether in favor of mobility). Yes there are plenty of skills that are "required" but items are changing and "best" options change with them. Locking a set into an excessively narrow skillset is only detrimental to the health of the set (and the game) in the long run.
And FYI: Leapquake should come back. It behaves way differently than raekor's.
I like that you are trying to utilize some skills that aren't always utilized, but I think that limiting it EQ and avalanche might end up being better, at least purely from the set bonuses (remember that there is an item that makes GS cast avalanche). The beauty of using avalanche is that if you decide to put it on your skill bar, and not just use it runeless via GS, it already has a cooldown reducing mechanic with fury spent. For threatening shout, I think that skill needs a bit of a design itself, and then some supporting legendaries that make it useful.
If I had to guess, the current MotE mechanic of leap causing an earthquake will stay (unless they choose to move that to a legendary, which might not be the worst idea). What can change with the new set bonuses is what you do when you aren't leaping. As you said, Raekor (and WotW honestly) takes care of the zoom around doing damage playstyle. If the 6 set bonus increased the damage against enemies affected by EQ for some group of skills (or all of them like IK), then you have a reason to stop leaping around constantly, and use other skills to do damage, while maintaining some mobility.
I do like the legendary that reduces damage while inside of an EQ, since MotE barbs will be squishy once more following the CC nerf.
I like the playstyle you are going for, and I think that MotE can be made to be flexible enough so that a couple of legs can be added to give you nearly that build, while also leaving the door open for other possibilities.
I do like the suggestion, but I'd rather have it benefit stuff more in line with a druidic/mage feel (just for giggles):
2-piece: Reduces the cooldown and mana costs of Avalanche and Earthquake by 35%
4-piece: Increase damage of Avalanche and Earthquake by 300%
6-piece: Enemies affected by Avalanche or Earthquake take 250% more damage from Seismic Slam, Hammer of the Ancients and Ancient Spear for 3 seconds (can be refreshed);
Numbers are just some estimatives. but should be fun though. Leap-Quake was the best on its early days lol.
Yeah, I think the gameplay mechanic I was going for was like a frantic Street-fight or a Rumble. "RumbleBarb has a nice ring to it, too. Currently, most other builds involve mashing one button constantly and occasionally something else i.e. Raekor, hammerdin/rolanddin/firebird's/etc. Yeah you have free slots to put in skills, but there's always an optimal "unwritten, but implied" perfect set of skills to fill the rest of the slots.
The way I thought about this one was to think about it as a 'progression'. If you started at no gear, as you put pieces on: you start adding those skills to your bar in addition to your current build until it starts taking over. Having no-one piece be the key to unlocking the full potential was the goal because i'm not an enormous fan of 0% to 100% in a single drop. Thinking more of a 0%-10%-25%-40%-60%-75%-100%. That kind of progression feels good because it works with our current and upcoming torment systems.
It's a lot simpler to fix than completely redesign it. Just add another item (belt/bracers) that gives X% dmg reduction every time you leap and expand the set to 6pc with a bonus that increases dmg. Erupting existing earthquakes for full duration dmg every time you leap would be a great way to get better instantaneous dmg. Adding some synergy with avalanche would also fit the theme of the set. With all the power creep it needs way bigger numbers.
I made a big post about it on the Barb forums months ago, I think S1 was just about wrapped up actually. Anyways, to summarize, what I proposed was this:
2p: Increases the damage dealt by Avalanche and Seismic Slam by x% to enemies taking damage from an Earthquake.
4p: Cause an Earthquake when you land after using Leap. (Unchanged)
6p: Causing an Earthquake grants a charge of Avalanche, up to an additional 3.
Since it's 'Might of the EARTH' I figured that Seismic Slam / Earthquake / Avalanche / Ground Stomp are the main candidates for attention in this set. Ground Stomp support could be added via additional legendaries (like Blessed Hammer shield/bracer/flail for the new Crusader set), while the actual set focuses on the damage dealers.