Talking with Draconis in teamspeak as he suggested these, I'm certain it would be a huge buff to the Samurai gameplay, without necessarily affecting the balance.
For starters, the Samurai class is currently a decent class in terms of gameplay, however it becomes too repetitive. Altering the bleeds to do the same amount of overall damage, but stacking the initial damage to be desirably larger than the following damages would give the Samurai two bonuses: 1) Dispels (I think adding bandage to one of the dispelling skills for all bleeds, including mortal wound which I'll return to later, is an excellent idea both in lore and balance) will become slightly less effective and 2) The skill would start to become ever so much more realistic, as it makes sense that a severe wound would slowly stop bleeding so badly, as blood pressure drops and clotting begins. Whoo, platelet action.
Secondly are the slows. While I'm not certain as to whether or not it is possible to code a weaker slow than icy aura or ice bolt currently inflict, I believe that the first tick should inflict a slow for 5ish seconds. If others believe this to unbalance the class, allocating the slow to Mortal Wound exclusively would be acceptable as well. In addition to this, only the first tick of damage, or I suppose in the case of mortal wound the strike that is inflicted, should cause a slow for so long unlike icy aura which slows every tick of damage. This would allow Samurai to catch up to a fleeing foe temporarily, but later allowing the opponent yet another chance to flee.
On the topic of draconis' suggested skill, essentially a charge, I think would make an excellent replacement for berserk. My take on the skill is this-
The player uses the skill, allowing them to charge forward 5-7 blocks. All foes between the user and the destination (as well as one block to the right of the player, as though the sword had been sweeping off to the side) take 90 damage as well as being critically wounded, inflicting a bleed that does 5 ticks of 15-25 damage over 15 seconds and inflicting a slow on the first tick of damage. The skill ideally would take between 4-6 stamina and could take mana as well, however that seems strange for the class. I suggest the skill be named Banzai, to match with the Samurai class lore.
Marginally off-topic: Mortal Wound currently does physical type damage, understandable because of the first hit but the proceeding bleed does little to no damage because of armor mitigation. This effectively makes mortal wound useless against all warriors, and select healers/rogues (ie bard and cleric). My suggestion is to reduce the initial strike by 25-35% (in order to balance out the damage against armored foes) and leave the bleed damage unchanged, while switching the skill's damage type to magic rather than physical, as having a skill name mortal wound would imply that the wound inflicted is one such that all armor has been by-passed and the attack had inflicted a severe wound that opened the victim to extreme blood loss.
So, quick recap (tl:dr)
-Samurai DoTs (bleed, mortal wound, banzai if it is implemented) should start at a higher damage and decrease per tick, but keeping the overall damage the same. This is merely in attempts to imitate realism, while slightly affecting dispelling skills.
-Skills, such as bleed and mortal wound, should inflict a slow on the first tick, and only the first tick. If it becomes too much of a problem, apply this only to mortal wound and possibly banzai.
-Mortal wound currently inflicts physical type damage, this means the skill is only effective against unarmored foes. Without changing the damage type to magic from physical, the skill becomes more cumbersome than productive in combat against a majority of classes.
-Replace the skill berserk with the suggested banzai. The idea of banzai shortened is you charge forward, striking everyone in the way and inflicting a bleed, similar to a weak mortal wound without the healing nerf.
I do ask that you please read the entire post before replying to/rating it. Suggestions for stamina, damage, duration, and basically anything else would be appreciated- as a Samurai since the start of heroes, I'd love to see some new moves added to the class, though I would not like to unbalance the class in favor of it. Though not necessarily a rebalance, it is a retooling as the latest skill-berserk- is almost useless due to several flaws. Similarly, the loss of inversion hurt the Samurai class a lot. Although One is an extremely nice skill, it was also the planned 60, but replacing inversion with berserk was not favorable to the class at all.
