Pub 103 Combat Update Feedback
Feedback for the Combat Update:
Playtest Questions:
General PvP Questions:
- Magic fish pies no longer soak player vs player damage.
- The weapon hit property splintering no longer triggers on Disarm, Infectious Strike, or Injected Strike.
- On a successful hit, the player victim will now have immunity to the splintering bleed effect for 16 seconds. Any additional hits will still slow the victim.
- Discordance Rework (PvP Only). There is no change in how Discordance works versus non-players.
- Bards can now use Discordance on player targets. This rework only allows Bards to remove all item skill bonuses from a target player.
- Discordance will last up to 4 seconds or 6 seconds if the Bard is Focused Spec on players.
- A Bard can only discord one player target at a time.
- Discord will also be removed when:
- The target is dead.
- The bard is dead.
- The target is out of range.
- The target is hidden.
- The bard is hidden.
Playtest Questions:
- How does the new splintering update affect dexer templates?
- What effect will discordance have on the current meta?
General PvP Questions:
- Do you feel that the current meta is balanced 1 versus 1?
- What templates do you feel currently are viable in a team setting and why?
- Which templates do you feel provide the most burst damage to a target 1 v 1 on average and why?
- Do you feel that the Parry skill is balanced in 1 versus 1 fights and why?
Comments
1v1 I believe is pretty damn balanced with the exception that it is too hard to kill each other much of the time. A lot of that is Parry/Evasion related, and other small things like remove curse being fast, protection-cleansing winds being untouchable, etc. The trouble is touching parry hurts team usage.
You almost need something with bushido/parry. Mainly because if the other team has it, you should have it too. Outside of that team pvp is where template variety shines, dexers have a large usage, archers can be effective, mages do their thing and in large varieties, necros, mystics, hybrids, spellweavers you name it. Dexer wise, you don't see many 1 tile dexers that aren't parry-evasion. I think many users annoyance is just the heavy usage of bushido/parry because it is an effective means to defense and survivability with 1-handed parry, evasion (basically 6 seconds evade almost everything, 14 seconds not, then use your apples/pots/etc in ur evasion down timer).
Anything with high burst damage involves a mage, but huge burst damage requires slow casting-hard hitting spells and those aren’t as simple to get off in a 1v1. Many tank mage varieties and mystics offer the most burst, and a necro can as well with the right combinations. But as i already said in previous comment, i think 1v1 is pretty well balanced now with the removal of fish pies. Parry causes 1v1 dexer vs dexer or dexer vs parry mage, or parry vs archer to be a bit unbalanced however. I think mages in all varieties including mystics, hybrids, necros, etc are all in a good place when it comes to this. Archers can be as well because of their ranged output, just parry diminishes them alot. It's 1 tile dexers that have trouble creating alot of burst because they have to depend on splintering or para shot, nerve strike, etc to be able to chain multiple hits together. Staying right on top of someone is difficult.
1v1? No, not really. I think 2 parry characters or 2 evasion characters going at each other is horrendous. But again, feels almost necessary in group pvp. I don’t know how you can pick which one makes the most sense to balance around. I thought reducing parry effectiveness by some % across the board was a fair solution to that and increasing the time to evade timer, or allowing more player damage to get through evade.
ICQ# 478 633 659
1. The current meta is basically magery plus parry. Whether they run it with bushido or wrestle and shield bash. Other templates like DP nerve strike/ deathstrike and 4/6 bushido nerve strike/ weaving. That's about the only viable options in which case the magery plus parry will win majority of fights. the 4/6 template has survivablitity but low chance of success to kill 1v1. The DP deathstriker has to get incredibly lucky with rng to have a chance 1v1. So to answer this question its NO, due to everything tips in favor of any form of parry mages.
2. This is tougher to answer due to what constitutes a team, is it 3, 6, 10, 20, 30? Is the other team equal to them or less? If its 25v 6 then the team with more people can play anything they want just about. I feel in teams mages get the top notch position which they always have, but things like necro, weaving, ability to dismount via any weapon class, disarm, and all come in to play with a good team setup. As far as team pvp goes its not that bad cept for maybe the evasion mages, they can have high burst damage and tough to take down due to damage mitigation. But as I said it also matters on size of teams and where the fight is taking place.
3. This is easy one, the tank mages have the highest potential burst damage. Its either nerve strike mages or mages with AI weapons or bows. Nothing else comes close.
4. This is another one where is it parry mage versus parry dexxer? Or parry mage vs parry mage? Obviously the parry mage will always have the upper hand vs a parry dexxer. The parry mage vs parry mage depends on other skills used. Probably be tougher for a straight wrestle parry mage to beat a bushido parry mage due to evasion. In terms of parry plus ranged (magery) and parry 1-tiler its not even close to being balanced.
On a side note, a lot of these issues can to be due to power creep of global loot and things like non medable 55 lmc suits with refined higher resists. Setting up super high stat suits in combination with higher resists versus damage being done and the high skill bonus of items is almost to oeasy nowadays. This is causing a good amount of the imbalances we see today. Before if you wanted to play a Nerve mage you couldn't fit both resist spells and parry, now its easy when you can add an entire extra skill. I would like to see the lmc bonuses either come down or go away, it just isn't needed anymore with todays gear.
One other note on burst damage. Yes it is highly variable, though the best burst damages today pale in comparison to burst damage of old.
Parry is so hard tbh. The previous example of a parry dexer vs a parry mage, I agree the mage probably wins the majority by far. But a no parry dexer vs a no parry mage? I think the dexer wins the majority. And a Bushido dexer vs a Bushido mage is almost a statement without some good or bad rng one way or the other.
Like minded player/skill sets in all cases.
I would dlike to see parry reduced in a slight way, to reduce it's effectiveness without diminishing it's usefulness. Without a modification to parry and evasion I don't think any changes here meet any goals of players besides the fish pie removal and a long requested modification to splinter.
I don't think debuffing it by 5 or 10% is a bad thing, even in pvm. It's so hard to die in pvm. That resolves some of the dexer vs parry mage connundrum. Fixing or altering evasion alters alot of the group vs group issues. Allot of the reason group PvP became much more popular than 1v1 is because it was so hard to kill someone 1v1 through evade, firepie, refinement. At least refinements had the dci Lessing debuff
Archers have a special move on the elven composit bow that can debuff a players defense chance, does good damage, and can interrupt a mage in protection.
What if a special move that isn't widely used was given the same ability? Say crushing blow for indtsnce, what if crushing did that? You'd open up a good alternative for dexers to combat parry mages, and another option to deal with a mage in protection .
All the sudden it wouldn't just be so much reliance on nerve strike and armor ignore, another special would become very useful that isn't very used
Either it debuffs dci or debuffs parry chance. Either way I think I love that idea lol, when I play my archer that is the the go to move, maybe all dexers should have. It checks a lot of boxes and puts the power in the players hands to deal with it. And really it wouldn't be that effective in group fights, but very effective 1v1.
ICQ# 478 633 659
ICQ# 478 633 659
Oh right... Why in the world was dismount left off.
As for lower mana cost armour, it would be fair if every player was aware of the lower mana cost bonus of studded/bone/hide, rather than just us elites who’ve been playing for 20 years.
On the other hand having 75 fire resist is a huge benefit, especially against big spells such as explosion and flamestrike.
-If you are going to keep poisoning so absurdly strong, can we at least get a cooldown in between lethal doses? Id like to be able to play the game for 10 seconds in between cures.
BUT, with that said, prior to patch we could hit the macro and it would automatically put us in war mode and attack. Now we have to manually go into war, then attack with macros. Can that be remedied without losing what we have gained?
General PvP Questions:
Playtest questions.
1. Not been on test, I almost never do test, don't have the time or patience, so my real feedback can only really come when it gets ingame. In theory, it has to have a small effect, both mages and dexxer victims will be able to get a spell heal, or a bandage heal in after the 1st effect, which is only fair.
2. I don't think this Discordance change will have any effect, I think it is too minimal for anyone to actually consider using it. It would actually be nice, to see some overgimped suits take a skillpoints hit a little in battle, could really mess them up for a short time. I'd like to see the duration increased, and I don't know the range, but I'd like to see a decent range also. It will never have a 1v1 impact, but it could have a team impact which could be nice.
General PvP questions.
1. No I don't feel it is balanced towards 1v1. This is the territory of weapon users, mainly splintering, mortal, deathstrike, dismount templates. These guys own anywhere where they have space to run. They have huge damage output and are impossible to harm without them running off, and coming back full health.
2. All templates are viable in a team setting, but it massively depends on the setting.
- In an enclosed area, dungeon spawn tunnels, mages take over, fields, summons, cross healing, targeted ranged attacks, ability to hide behind fields and make time and space, not get hit, get spells off.
- In a running 1v1, or any sort of running battle with space, the team with the most dexxers will usually win. If damaged they run out of casting range, come back, then have so many abilities to slow/hit/prevent healing, and can kill extremely fast.
99% of battles, usually become a running battle...
3. Dexxers with splinter, lethal poison, mortal, deathstrike, dismount. They just hit you with so much, you can't heal enough to respond. Thing is, I'm speaking as a pure mage, so a lot of this is about perspective. A parry mage would find that burst easier to deal with. But a parry mage wouldn't have the mana to actually kill that dexxer who will just run away at any sign of trouble, or pot forever.
4. A pure mage v a parry mage, the pure will win easily, parry mage has sacrificed too many points. Any caster will beat a parry mage. Most pure casters will beat a bushido parry mage also, as they have sacrificed a ton of points into parry/evasion/confidence/shield bash, these are easy templates to beat.
It gets harder when they weaponise, turn into dexxers, and suddenly have bokuto's with nerve strike or use shield bash also - at that point, its the fact they can stop you, and get in some free hits that can kill you. Basically anything that can stop you, can kill you, dismount, shield bash, nerve strike, splinter (slows), deathstrike (don't dare to run) - wrestle special never seems to work anymore. The point is, it's dexxers who have all the stopping moves on their weapons - and the huge burst damage - mages don't really have any stopping moves - para can always be broken by a trapped box, or resisted.
But whilst all of the above is true, the current meta seems to be the bokuto/parry/bushido mage (for confidence/evasion/nervestrike/shield bash) - according to everyone else, I rarely have any issues with these. These are out there, because they team up very well against dexxers, or are a very well rounded team character against other mages (evasion against dumps for example). They are basically the cookie cutter team template - added to some dubious targeting measures is what makes these unstoppable.
My personal experience, is I run into dexxers everywhere I go. Unless I'm in our guild team, and we've set up for a spawn to fight in dungeons where we can use mages.
So my perspective is different to the dexxers, but recognisable to the mages I know, parry mages sacrifice a lot v other casters, but are a requirement v dexxers. I do feel it is balanced v dexxers.
The problem for me maybe, is the volume of stopping moves dexxers have and the weaponised mages,(who have 2 stopping moves themselves) and the dodgy synchronised targeting. It is notable, non parry/non weapon users, are pretty much unable to slow or stop anything).
Parry in itself - I feel is ok. It's what is combined with parry that is causing issues. But I feel parry in itself, is being used, just to survive the weapon user onslaught.
The issues for me are;
Dexxers with too much mana, able to chain too many specials, and instant swap weapons to use all specials.
Mages with too much dex, able to use parry, bushido and weaponise.
Also, monsters you’re able to keep in range, try keeping someone playing EC in range for 4 seconds anyway. Totally useless, but still better than nothing.