What's up with Stalker Claws Eviscerate?

[Ynaught]

I'm somewhat confused about this power. On Tanks, Brutes and Scrappers, this is a cone but for stalkers it became a single target attack. Now, I could understand this if the damage, cast time, end cost or recharge were adjusted to account for this, but none of those things happened. Same cast, end and recharge as the scrapper version, but the damage is LOWER than the Scrapper version. That doesn't seem right at all.

 

Looking at Ripper from the Spines set, it stayed a cone for Stalkers and does slightly less damage than the Scrapper version. Perhaps the lower damage is intended due to the "guaranteed" Crit from Hide, I can live with that being the reasoning and have no issues. But Eviscerate should either be changed into a cone for Stalkers, or have its damage greatly increased because it seems from my perspective a complete waste of a power as it currently is.

 

In talking with someone who has a LOT of expertise with Claws, he is under the same impression that the math simply doesn't hold up.

 

Is it possible to get this looked at and if not changed in some way, could an explanation be given as to why it is the way it is?

[Shockacon]

I agree with wanting it changed. Even the Arachnos Widow version is PBAoE just to add to the irritation of the Stalker version. Why they did this I never understood. Plus, you get all flippity-floppy jazz hands with the jump and all you do is hit one bloody target? Oy vey...

[Eldyem]

The lower damage has to do with Stalkers and Scrappers having different damage scales - I actually think that the Stalker Eviscerate does more base damage before scale gets involved, as does Swipe. The problem is that a fairly AoE light primary loses out on two AoEs for single target damage, something that it is hard to claim any given Stalker primary lacks, and its almost impossible for a single target gain to outperform the possibility of hitting two targets in terms of mob-clearing utility, which is a very substantial portion of the game.

[crkohl]

I did not realize they made Eviscerate single target for Stalkers. So not only do you lose Follow Up and Spin, you now lose another AoE option? Yikes. 
 

Hard to warrant going Stalker over Scrapper for Claws...

[Sif]

10 hours ago, Eldyem said:

I actually think that the Stalker Eviscerate does more base damage before scale gets involved

Yup, Stalker Eviscerate has a scale 2.23 while Scrapper is only 1.99.

 

Interestingly enough, because of how damage scales are actually level dependent, Eviscerate at level 1 does more damage on a Stalker, by 1.9 damage (ignoring all crits), but by the time you can actually pick it up at 26, the Scrapper has pulled ahead by 0.31, and is ahead by 0.49 damage at level 50.

12 hours ago, Ynaught said:

could an explanation be given as to why it is the way it is?

Purely conjecture, but it probably has to do with the design philosophy that Stalkers should get their AoEs mostly stripped out when Scrapper sets were ported over, and they were just slightly more aggressive with Claws.

 

Why didn't Ripper get the same treatment? 🤷‍♀️ Probably nobody thought about it when converting Spines, there's tons of inconsistency in the powers like that.