Harm Touch should have been a lifetap

[Ennewi]

Originally Posted by Crede [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Sks just got shafted on spells. Fd for sure has its uses but for the most part I’ll take calm/root over that anyday.

Agreed. The good spells that SKs have are incredibly useful and do make up for the spells that aren't so good, those being almost useless in a lot of cases given their cast times and/or resist rates. Still, it's frustrating to have whole pages of a spell book that rarely make it onto the spell bar. The SK epic was designed well at least, though a minor improvement would have been to allow the proc to stack, thereby discouraging players from swapping it out after the fact.

Hybrids improved quite a bit once their spell books started having distinction from those of pure casters or priests; if only they were designed that way from the very beginning, who knows what SKs would have received in lieu of Necromancer spells.

Most noticeable are the resist buffs and protective skin runes, which look out of place next to dots, debuffs, and lifetaps. Single target spells to tap resists would have fit better, fleshing out the self-only design more, requiring that the class have an opponent for their spells to benefit them. Lowering resists would have also provided the class with an additional role on raids, as seen with Bard's OOS and Shaman's Malo.

Instead of Banshee Aura, a damage shield that incorporated life steal would have helped compensate for a lack of defensive/evasive disciplines.

An Imbue Lifetap Proc (vampiric embrace/shroud of death) upgrade, AoE(4), would have allowed for more strategy/survivability when clumping mobs. ToV chickens, PoH imps, Ring War waves, etc.

No undead DDs or IVU. Instead, SKs could have been nonkos to a majority of undead by default, along with Necromancers (similar to Druids/Rangers and animals).

No vision enhancement spells (deadeye/shadow sight). Instead, having spells that stole ultra/infravision and seeinvis from a target. It would have further enhanced the ghetto Rogue aspect of SKs who, instead of disarming traps, would have disabled seeinvis, clearing the way for the group/raid to navigate unimpeded. Cast steal seeinvis/truesight, feign death, stand/cos, continue through the area undetected. The buff/debuff could have been short duration and faded once/if the SK died or zoned.

Still, all things considered, it's hard to be critical about a tank class that can play dead and go invisible at a moment's notice.