Sustain is the Issue / Soul Split Rework

I'm open to back and forth, please give this a thought!

First of all... Here me out here guys. Before we start...

Wars Retreat - Many pvm enthusiasts use Wars Retreat where you can quickly heal and restore prayer and go right back into battle.

Thesis: I believe our ability to sustain via dealing massive damage is one of the greatest issues of PVM affecting how bosses are designed.

We have reached a point nowadays where many bosses are mechanically driven.

Which is cool. However...

Because we have so many options to sustain our hitpoints the developers were left with no choice to essentially make failing mechanics or blocking damage an instant kill or near instant kill because anything less would just be restored and healed right away or they had to rapidly damage the player very quickly.

In order to kill a player they basically have to deal so much damage you cannot out heal it.

This creates the situation where novice players just instantly die all the time to never dying merely by just memorizing what to do. It ends up frustrating but the way it is now that's how it needs to be.

SOUL SPLIT • While not the only healing we have soul split is unparalleled it changed how the game is played for many. From soul split flicking to using it to afk slayer. I believe I found a good work around.

CHANGE

• Soul Split could be changed to heal (10%?) of the slain enemies max hitpoints on death while the prayer is active.

(The numbers can be tweaked.)

This would allow the player to use it for slayer as the constant kills would keep them afloat. They could also turn on the prayer right before killing a boss or a minion for a massive health recovery. Possibly even getting a full heal AFTER the boss is dead. This would also allow for long stays while removing Soul Split flicking for bosses. Still would be possible for slayer.

BUT WAIT

You say what about all that damage we get? Well, with the change to SS the bosses can have their damage tuned down (remember they are really high to try to overcome soul split healing!) for the giant mechanical instant kill shots to something more reasonable. Since you aren't constantly healing they can chip away at you more throughout the fight. Punishing the mistakes more without the fight being over.

You can still consume healing items and food, but that is a limiting factor. This will cause more mindful inventories and remember you can always bank at wars retreat if you need and as you get better you won't need to bank as often!

CONSIDERATIONS

• Soul Split is more effective with higher DPS currently. We get the best healing by doing more damage. This further reduces the need for defense because we can heal more than the damage we would block with better armor. Having it on kill would significantly change the dynamic. More defense would actually mean less damage so less need for soul split.

REWARD SPACE This also opens up reward space for a 120 prayer expansion where we can have Greater Soul Split that heals (15%?)

This would only be a step but reducing the damage of bosses and lowering our healing ability during the encounter only would give people more time inside of the fight to learn and get better. Having the boss drain your life when you make mistakes slowly causes more tension as you aren't killed immediately for mistakes and you can always save yourself by doing better for the rest of the fight. When the fights over you can top back up easily.

FURTHER CHANGES

• Further changes could be made to armor and shields to increase damage absorbtion.

• With sustain lowered we can focus more on mechanics and positioning and having our health chipped away instead of dropped to 0 instantly.

SHIELD ABILITIES (Idea?)

• Focused Protection [While wearing a shield divine energy channels into it offering 10% more protection from prayer. While the shield is equipped] you would still need to prayer swap but you are rewarded with more damage blocked. Also remember that I suggested lowering the bosses damage output since our healing would be nerfed but this could create a better back and forth battle where you aren't sure you are going to win.

Summary

My aim is to lower the reliance on high dps for healing and sustain. Instead making it on kill. This would let us focus on protection prayers abilities and movement and allow bosses to hit us less hard. Allowing for more experimentation and hopefully some heart pounding moments of being low HP. Knowing a few more mistakes could be the end. As you get better you would need less food and healing potions.

I think it would make learning bosses a lot more enjoyable.

I'm open to ideas and thoughts on this.

Thank you to anyone who contributes or reads this with an open mind.

(In my dabbling on PVM my experience has been. I'm doing good. Oh God what's happening oh I'm dead. This would make it so mistakes still matter since I cannot really heal easily but I'm not instantly killed either.

New: "Oh I messed up. Ouch he did like 2k damage a few more of those and I'm done for. I only have a few blubbers left. I hope I can get the hang of this. I see what I did wrong..."

I hope someone else can see where I'm coming from.)

(Getting better would be faster kills, not needing the shield or tank armor and saving money on potions and food )