[Autumn]

Its no surprise that currently in the new turn order system that dodge is left kind of weak, the main benefit of Celerity before was that you moved faster than tanks did which was important in assuring your survival as a whole, this is not the case anymore really for a lot of reasons, mostly in that if you're not first in the turn order, your Celerity is practically useless right now.

You can make the argument that dodge is a lesser, more risky DR with the higher reward being that you can often times dodge basic attacks with, and while this is important in keeping things such as Narcus in check, it fails in the current team scenarios given the presence of basic attackers is at an all time low, and magic is VERY strong. As with this most dodgies end up turning towards Cobra Stance's Snake Dancer for added protection vs mages, and it functions as excessive protection as mages actually often struggle vs Cobra, and its really unfair in a lot of cases.

I think maybe a raw numbers buff to Evasion is perhaps in order, we learned from Verglas' ice point guard that a larger evasion number is not the end of the world, and with initiative's current state as a stat, Celerity/Dodge characters REALLY need some hard number tweaks to at least make them more viable feeling, a drastic evasion tweak while nipping at Cobra's Snake Dancer would probably be perfect.

A lot of people feel as though evasion cannot be used by classes that aren't a select few, its not entirely wrong to think that as currently the kings of dodge are the only ones using it.


One last thing, knockdown is simply too good of a counter to Evasion, I'm not going to argue evasion ignoring attacks as that are what they are supposed to be good versus (as such they have lower damage or restrictions currently.) So I think that Knockdown versus Evasion should also be looked at.

TL;DR: Celerity as a stat is not overly powerful given the initiative changes, and may need some number/usage buffs to make up for it currently.

Anyways, heres some ideas to consider:


--Knockdown no longer removes the ability to proc evasion, instead it HALVES Evasion's DR. (Quick Rise from Rogue would make you completely ignore knockdown's evasion penalty)
Reason: Knockdown already removes a portion of your evade, making it easier not to trigger evasion already, in an organized team effort, you can burst down a dodgy in so little time that they REALLY need this lifeline. Without it they will easily perish.

I want to note that the knockdown change is the least that should be considered potentially, this would easily circumvent a lot of issues dodgies have in team fights currently, but I would also consider:

1) Increasing Evasion's DR baseline from 30/15% to 40/25%, this would come along with a nerf to Cobra's Snake Dancer, giving it only 1 charge instead of 2, as well as slightly changing Ice Point Guard, making it grant 10% Evasion DR instead of 15%.

2) Giving evasion DR increasing effects to other classes, but not allowing them to stack, such as:
-Rogue's "Evasion" skill increasing its DR by 3/6/9/12/15%
-Ranger's Light Armor Mastery increasing Evasion DR by 3/6/9/12/15%
-New Kensei Skill that increases Evasion's DR, currently they are a high DPS class with absolutely no staying power in a fight, they, like verglas did once could definitely use better ways to stay in a fight.