''suffuse'', a damage-focused enthrall redesign

[JohnLemon123]

Hey everyone.

There's been a few heated debates this past week regarding revenant and his overall viability in the game, and most proponents to change (myself included) cited enthrall as his weakest and least relevant ability. So I figured I'd put my (proverbial) money where my mouth is, and come up with a thematically appropriate revamp to this rather divisive ability. I won't cover revenant's other abilities in this, but will detail all of their interactions with this redesigned 1.

Basic mechanics

suffuse : Afflicts a target with raw sentient energy, sending them into a violent frenzy. Afflicted enemies turn on their allies and propagate the blight through damage. On death, they disintegrate into a damaging pillar of energy. The affliction persists until this ability runs out.

Fundamentally, this replaces the pseudo mind control with what is essentially a fancy rad proc, remedying it's previously questionable lore relevance by way of mimicking the same corruption that afflicts the revenant himself. the ''suffused'' effect would be represented by the current ''enthralled'' effect (aka the vomvalyst head). 

• Cap of ''afflicted'' targets is removed, as a rad proc is nowhere near as beneficial to the user as straight-up ''mind control''.
• The duration of the ''suffused'' status is identical to the current enthrall duration, at 30 seconds once max rank is achieved.
• The cast range is, again, identical to the maxed enthrall range, at 25 meters. 
• The ''shared duration'' mechanic is maintained.

There are now 2 different types of pillars, the regular pillars (the one that throws out extra projectiles) and a new ''ascended'' variant. We'll go into details with each one, as they function differently :

Regular variant :

• Pillar damage kept at 1000 / s
• Pillar damage type changed from puncture to ''adaptive'', similarly to danse macabre.
• Pillar status chance increased from 0% to 40% (affected by power strength, and can reach 100% status once over 250%).
• Pillar range increased from 2 meters to 3 meters.
• Projectile damage kept at 1000 
• Projectile damage type changed from impact to ''adaptive''
• Projectile status chance decreased from 100% to 30% (making it nearly harder to achieve 100%)
• Projectile range unchanged, stays at 10 meters.
• Pillar duration kept at 10 seconds
• Pillar cap removed, or drastically increased.

''Ascended'' variant : 

• Visually distinguishable from the regular version, as a sphere of energy hovers above its center (meant to mimic the hydrolyst ''nuke'').
• Pillar damage is of 1500 / s.
• Pillar damage type is ''adaptive''.
• Pillar status chance is of 40%.
• Pillar range is of 4 meters.
• Pillar duration is of 15 seconds.
• Pillar cap is of 3 (cannot be changed in any way). Creating a new ''ascended'' pillar while 3 already exist will result in the first one being downgraded to the regular variant.
• Does not throw out damaging projectiles. Instead, the sphere in its center will accumulate energy throughout the pillar's duration, at a rate of 1500 damage / s. Upon reaching the end of its duration, this sphere will detonate in a 10 meter (affected by range) radius, releasing all of the damage it had stored in a single, powerful burst. Following this burst, a ''blast zone'' of 10 meters (affected by range) will subsist for 15 seconds (affected by duration).
  • With base stats, this would result in a 22500 damage explosion after a buildup time of 15 seconds.
• Explosion damage type is ''adaptive''.
• Explosion status chance is of 50% (affected by strength)
• ''Blast zone'' deals superficial damage, at 100 adaptive damage / s (affected by strength).
• ''Blast zone'' has a 50% status chance (affected by strength).

Synergies involving afflicted enemies :

With itself : 

• Casting 1 on an afflicted enemy will ''purge'' them, rendering them immune to all status effects (suffuse included) for 3 seconds (unaffected by mods). However, surrounding enemies will all be afflicted in a 5 meter radius (affected by range). This action costs 25 energy to perform.

With Mesmer skin : 

• Enemies that hit revenant while Mesmer skin is active will immediately suffer from the ''afflicted'' status effect. The stun is removed, alongside the free cast of 1.

With reave : 

• Afflicted enemies killed by reave will spawn an ''ascended'' pillar instead of a regular one.
• No changes to the rest of its current synergies, as they're already pretty good.

With danse macabre : 

• Afflicted enemies killed by danse macabre spawn a regular pillar. however, those killed by the ability's ''boosted'' variant will spawn an ''ascended'' pillar. The overshield drop is removed, and is replaced by a pickup that gives 10 energy.

Synergies involving the regular pillars :

With itself : 

• Casting ''suffuse'' on a regular pillar will see it explode (the same way it does with the current 1 + 4 synergy). This action costs 25 energy to perform. The damage of the explosion is determined by the remaining duration and the ability's base damage, calculated as such :
  • With a base damage of 1000, if the pillar's remaining duration is of 7 seconds, the explosion's total damage will be 7000. 
  • The base range of this explosion is of 5 meters (affected by range).
  • The explosion deals ''adaptive'' damage.
  • The explosion's status chance is of 40% (affected by strength).

With reave (Mesmer skin has none) : 

• Reaving through a regular pillar will turn it into its ''ascended'' variant, and will reset the duration. 

With Danse macabre :

• When a laser hits a pillar, it will no longer explode. Instead, the interaction will summon a gauntulyst-like sky laser to strike the ground.
• Radius of the laser's impact is identical to the pillar's range, at 3 meters (affected by range).
• The laser does not behave like a beam, and will instead deal a single instance of damage. 
• A pillar can only ''spawn'' a laser once every 3 seconds (unaffected by mods).
• If struck by a ''standard'' laser, this beam will do 5000 adaptive damage (affected by strength) with a status chance of 40% (affected by strength).
• If struck by a ''boosted'' laser, the beam will instead do 10000 adaptive damage (affected by strength) with a status chance of 50% (affected by strength).

Synergies involving the ''ascended'' pillars : 

With itself : 

• Casting ''suffuse'' on an ascended pillar will have it explode prematurely, releasing all the damage it had built up. this action costs 50 energy to perform.
  • As such, with a base damage of 1500, releasing the explosion after 7 seconds of build-up will result in it dealing 10500 damage, as opposed to the 22500 damage it would've dealt with full duration.
  • ''Ascended'' pillars that are destroyed prematurely leave no blast zone.

With reave : 

• Reaving through an ascended pillar will double the damage and halve the duration, essentially reducing the time required for a ''true'' explosion by half. 

With danse macabre :

• Upon a laser hitting the ''ascended'' pillar, it will detonate early, in the exact same way using 1 would. however...
  • Detonating them early with the regular version of the lasers will leave no blast zone.
  • Detonating them early with the ''boosted'' version of the lasers will leave the regular blast zone.

So... that's pretty much it. I'm not sure whether this would be absurdly OP or barely serviceable, but I might not be the best judge of that. And yes, I realize that this is little more than a mix of wishful thinking and ''armchair developer'' mentality, but hey, if nothing else, this might serve to make me seem more than ''just a hater''. Regardless of what I wrote, I sincerely hope that DE takes another look at Rev, as his concept holds an incredible amount of potential, potential that has yet to be tapped into. Thanks for reading all of this (if indeed you have), and have a good one.