Quality of Life Shifts for L. Thrust and Defense Mastery

[Lans]

Presently as it stands these are two on paper fantastically designed abilities that I love, and would love to get more usage out of, especially defense mastery itself, but lets talk about the real math going on and how it often just doesn't work as it presently is, this is talking from tons and tons of usage of it, what little I can get out of these two is far and few.

PRESENTLY [L.Thrust]: For less than 10 seconds or so you have an increased tile for striking, as well as reduced damage for the initial strike.

ISSUE: Real talk, only slow weapons tend to have this ability, this means unless you happen to be rocking 150 Dexterity, you are not likely managed even 2 hits with this. And that hinges on anyone letting you position ideally to achieve this, as amazing as the server is there is never a reason any option is less than useful, L.Thrust is definitely one of those make-or-break tactical options if it worked differently but as it stands using it is a nightmare. [[No offense intended to anyone, at the least this needs 40ish second duration to see truly viable usage.]]

PROPOSED: [Leveraging Thrusts] Shift into a stance that emphasizes the full reach of ones' weapon, but at a 25% damage penalty per strike. Though a 10% penalty to HCI/DCI while in the stance would hurt more than a dmg reduction. Though if we went with a lengthened stance, we could even consider HCI/DCI/Speed as the better to penalize fields given the timed nature of this sort of stance combat.

PRESENTLY [D.Mastery]: This skill raises physical defense [Slashing?] by 50, and reduces damage by 50% for roughly 4 or so seconds.

ISSUE: The ability over-emphasizes one defense that doesn't even cover the actual realm of what is physical by game play standard or narrative, the timing is so brief you'd be forgiven if the enemy were slow enough it wore off before they swung at you once. [This has happened.] Likewise D.Masterys' buff/debuff are so brief and focused on the older format of what it did that it isn't aging into the newer direction of Requiem I feel, and it gives the staff an optimal thing to re-evaluate given that much like the above skill if as a Stance can add many more options within Enemies, Players, and Situations -- while as it presently is its harder than the worst Dark souls Skill Roll to survive I have ever tried to time, I do not mean that in any scathing way, its just hard to use.

PROPOSED: [Defensive Stance] Shift into a stance that emphasizes defense and survival. The +50% in a resist is hefty and bulky, over-emphasizing a singular area; I propose they can a boost of 1-12% to resists based on the respective tactics and a increase to DCI; with a penalty to DMG [30%] and HCI [-15%].

NOTES: I realize I often over evaluate the mechanics, but I like to use that too to look at things and try to help all of us towards a position that would truly compliment and benefit everyone.

Stances could be toggled in and out of, and shifting a stance neutralizes any benefits another stance held. Stances could also be neutralized upon disarm or removal of weapon. though even if these abilities just had much longer times it would be very nice, as it stands they are very difficult to use practically.