The current state of Templar in this game is severely discouraging and anyone paying attention on these forums can see the impact of this imbalance on player morale. I’m feeling extremely negative about the future of the game, but I want to turn it into something positive and tell you how to fix it. If even a handful of these suggestions are followed, it will open up some options and contribute to build diversity. If they’re all followed, it will brighten the game for the entire class and all of the players who dabble in the divine. Let’s get to it:
ACTIVE ABILITIES
Piercing Javelin
This ability makes absolutely no sense in the Templar toolkit. The Templar’s main DPS ability is a close range channeled attack. No Templar needs a javelin to knock enemies away from us. What we need is a chain to pull enemies closer to us. Change the Javelin to a Harpoon that functions just like DK chains. Maintain one magicka and one stamina morph.
Focused Charge
On the surface, this ability seems useful. The problem is it’s really buggy. Using this ability sends us flying off the map and into the abyss. No other charge ability seems to be quite as buggy as this one. Take a look at the code and what functions differently with this charge and see if you can figure out what’s wrong.
Sun Shield
Make the Radiant Ward morph scale with Max Magicka. Also, Templars lack a class speed buff so Radiant Ward should give Major Expedition for the duration of the shield. Thematically, a sun-based skill like Sun Shield belongs in the Dawn’s Wrath skill line, not the skill line with magic spears. Move it. (The next two points are also related to moving Sun Shield:)
Spear-Based Crowd Control
Since you took the stun away from Spear Shards, Templar tanks need a reliable way to CC mobs, so in the place of Sun Shield, give us a spear-themed AOE CC ability. (Something like DK Talons.) One morph should increase the initial burst damage when the ability is used, and the other should be a thorns-based morph that returns damage to enemies in the AOE attacking the Templar.
Eclipse
Just give up. Stop beating a dead horse. You clearly don’t know how to fix this ability, so get rid of it. Literally nobody even wants it anymore. Put Sun Shield in its place and create a new proper CC ability in the Aedric Spear line, as described above.
Sun Fire
Unlike every other Templar ability, this ability does Fire damage. Change it to Magic damage! Yes, I know it says “fire” in the name, but Radiant, Nova, Dark Flare, etc all do Magic damage despite having fire-related flavor text. Changing this to Magic Damage would allow Templars to make effective use of the War Maiden set. Alternatively, change ALL of the other sun/holy fire-based abilities (including Sun Shield and the DoT component of Blazing Spear) to Fire damage so we can use Burning Spellweave or Silks of the Sun.
Solar Flare / Solar Barrage
Nobody asked for or wants this change adding yet another cast time to our toolkit. But you seem insistent on keeping the cast time, so you might as well improve the ability and make it worth using. Here’s how: the long cast time absolutely requires a sufficiently long duration so that it doesn’t have to be recast too frequently throughout battle. 8 seconds is the minimum starting point, raising up to 12 sec when maxed out at level 4, AND make it benefit from the Enduring Rays passive for an extra 30%. Also, and this is important, GET RID OF EMPOWER. I cannot stress this enough: you MUST replace Empower on this ability if you expect anyone to slot it. Replace Empower with Major/Minor Berserk instead (8 sec on Flare, during the whole duration for Barrage). Obviously I’d prefer Major Berserk since Templar is grossly underperforming in DPS, but even Minor would be better than the useless Empower.
Healing Ritual
The purpose of a large burst heal is to save someone in an emergency, and a cast time is logically antithetical to that purpose. Absolutely nobody who knows how to play this game uses this ability, and a cast time reduction won’t change that. If you keep the cast time, this ability must become a HoT rather than a burst heal. Two ways to do that: (1) Make the heal channeled with multiple ticks DURING the cast rather than burst at the end, or (2) Change it to Healing Aura, a HoT centered on the Templar (12 sec duration, 8m AOE. One morph to increase duration to 18 sec and the other to increase range to 12m.). You should also attach Major Mending to this ability to replace what you took from us and gave to the Warden in Morrowind. Locking Major Mending behind a cast time is fair, but completely removing it from our class is not.
Rushed Ceremony
The only time Honor the Dead is useful is a solo activity like Maelstrom Arena. We Magplars can afford to give up this morph to Stamplars. Stamplar has the absolute worst stam-based class healing in the game. Stamsorc has Surge, Stamblade has Killer’s Blade, StamDK has Dragon Blood, and Stam Warden has the most options of all. Stamplar only has Repentance, a highly situational heal that can be consumed by others. Let them have Honor the Dead as a Stam heal.
Cleansing Ritual
Templar is in dire need of BUFFS, not nerfs. You just increased the cost on one of our primary abilities for what?! You claim it is to make purging more expensive. Ok, fair enough. If your reasoning is to make the purge more expensive, then the changes you implement should have a neutral impact on the other effects of the skill. If you insist on a 14% increase in cost, you owe us a proportional 14% increase in the damage and healing done to compensate. Then you get what you want (more expensive purges) and we get what we deserve (a DPS buff). Fair trade.
Restoring/Radiant Aura
This ability alerts enemies, pulling aggro from distant mobs. This can be a strategic nightmare in boss fights with nearby mobs, especially when there are mechanics like the trio of atronachs in Spindleclutch that have to be killed simultaneously. I learned that this ability would pull distant mobs in that fight, accidentally pulling a ton of trash from around the corner that messed up our even burn on the trio. Stop the ability from alerting enemies!
PASSIVE ABILITIES
Templar is lacking some of the global damage passives that other classes enjoy. Balanced Warrior is a perfect target for fixing this problem. This passive should increase BOTH Weapon and Spell Damage by 6%. It would also be cool to split the 2640 Spell Resistance into 1320 Physical and 1320 Spell Resistance. Then the passive will TRULY be worthy of its name “Balanced Warrior”. (Note that while the resistance can be split if it goes to both Physical and Spell, the damage boost should not be reduced because each individual character only actually uses one or the other.)
OTHER
Sorc has shock, DK has fire, Warden has ice. Templar and NB have Magic damage. You should take note that Magic Damage abilities do not inflict a status effect. Consequently, they should all be buffed to do a bit more damage. Nothing crazy, but a modest 2% increase across the board would go a long way to closing the DPS gap.
I really hope someone on the dev team takes note and realizes that these fixes, or something like them, are badly needed to balance Templar's place in this game. It is getting increasingly discouraging to continue playing a character that seems destined for endless nerfs despite already seriously underperforming. Players who have already invested hundreds of hours into their main character don't want to have to do it again to remain competitive and gain entry to endgame group content. Calling for fair balance in this game is not just some trivial complaint; it should be a serious business concern for the company.
I digress, this needs addressing please, it’s unfair legit and straight up discriminating. With a side note on text chat- could we pleaseeeeeee get our guild chats colored so it’s not all 5 different guilds text chatting going off in all 1 color. It’s impossible to read efficiently. Sighs, I hope others sharing my plight or their ‘voices’ out there too.
I'd really like 2 Stalhrim Frostcaster items because I really like the style and couldn't afford the motif last year. If you are playing on PC EU, feel free to whisper me if you can craft it, userID is same as forum one
