We have to talk about the Balancing..
I played DAOC right from the beginning in 2001 beta phase.
Now i just reactivated my accound after years and i am really wondering what the new dev team was even thinking about at some points..
I played Molvik for several weeks now and what i experienced extremly for example that many classes seem to have stun styles now which they haven't before. Assassins for example seem to be really out of place balance wise.
Assassins & stuns:
Many stealthers don't even bother stealthing because they easily can apply sidestyle stuns (with instant mezz or without) and this way can pown people very easily in 1vs1 with no need to go into stealth before. Additionally the resist timer against stun styles has been lowered from 1 minute to 20 seconds it seems? (!!!) This way i had many situations were assassins were able to 'exploit' their win in combat. They have now the opportunity to apply several poisons throughout the whole fight, so even if they are about to lose they just can reapply an instant snare to their targets and run back into stealth. And even if you make use of this awkward poison mechanics: 7 seconds re-use timer on poisons wtf? Then a skald may also have an instant snare on 7 recast timer?!
There was a reason why assassins weren't able to reapply different poisons during combat!!! This is why i think assassins feel really out of place today.. their core mechanic to stealth in order to assassinate isn't even necessary anymore, the abillity to apply multiple poisons through the whole combat like snare, mezz etc. and to stun every 20 seconds makes it even worse.
This is really a point where i question myself what the hell the devs of Broadsword were even thinking?!
Not to talk about skalds who also received stun styles now... Can every melee class stun nowdays that easy?
Next one: embrace vampire
They shifted over the fumble debuff into the ,,shadow mastery'' line (for whatever reason) instead the embrace spec line has now THREE buffs (which he can cast every 30 secs). The balance between the lines is pretty 'strange' now, whereas the embrace line has 3 buffs and the shadow spec only 1 self-buff now it feels very out of place, too... the fumble debuff was something that added up pretty well in the embrace spec line, since the re-use timer between fumble DEBUFF and Evade BUFF wasn't shared.. now the embrace vamp ends up casting one buff every 30 seconds (you know how usefull that is in 90% of very short fights!!) .. The embrace vamp was used to be an anti melee / anti-stealth character due to stealth lore and good melee defense (obviously the Broadsword dev team didn't understand that) which he now isnt anymore!! The changes here are utter bullshit, since the imbalance (1 buff in shadow mastery vs 3 buffs in embrace mastery) is pretty huge and utter nonsense, since you can cast only 1 buff per 30 seconds which last 1 minute (which means you won't make use of all 3 buffs for 100% anyways).
Valewalker + Heretic instant DoT > turned into instand DD:
The instant DoT of the heretic reflected the concept of his damage attacks pretty well. it was a DoT that pulsed just like his direct damage spells, the damage of the DoT increased slowly over time - just like his regular pulse dd spells! (and probably made much more damage than the current instand dd)
It was also helpful (same for the valewalker) to apply the instant DoTs on stealthers or regular enemies to prevent speed songs on them for a certain amount of time! Since this was what the valewalkers instant spells were good for, slowering targets down (instant snare) and preventing others from speed and stealth.
So there is my question: why in the world was it changed for both into a simple instant dd?!!!!
Besides that why was the heretic given a simple direct damage spell which is totally against his overall concept? Since it even makes mostly the same damage if i spam the pulse dds over and over it would maybe made more sense to give him for example an instant root to better walk out of range and cast his pulse spells.
DoTs seem to interrupt (for whatever reason) the pulse dd spells of heretics per each tick.
Necromancer:
Completely screwed the overall idea about the necs unique system to seperate its ghost from the body in order to be unable to get hit by opponents directly and cast non interuptable spells. Instead he feels like a regular pet summoner for most of the specs (wondering why the death sight line has no AF buff to it...)
My 2 cents
Now i just reactivated my accound after years and i am really wondering what the new dev team was even thinking about at some points..
I played Molvik for several weeks now and what i experienced extremly for example that many classes seem to have stun styles now which they haven't before. Assassins for example seem to be really out of place balance wise.
Assassins & stuns:
Many stealthers don't even bother stealthing because they easily can apply sidestyle stuns (with instant mezz or without) and this way can pown people very easily in 1vs1 with no need to go into stealth before. Additionally the resist timer against stun styles has been lowered from 1 minute to 20 seconds it seems? (!!!) This way i had many situations were assassins were able to 'exploit' their win in combat. They have now the opportunity to apply several poisons throughout the whole fight, so even if they are about to lose they just can reapply an instant snare to their targets and run back into stealth. And even if you make use of this awkward poison mechanics: 7 seconds re-use timer on poisons wtf? Then a skald may also have an instant snare on 7 recast timer?!
There was a reason why assassins weren't able to reapply different poisons during combat!!! This is why i think assassins feel really out of place today.. their core mechanic to stealth in order to assassinate isn't even necessary anymore, the abillity to apply multiple poisons through the whole combat like snare, mezz etc. and to stun every 20 seconds makes it even worse.
This is really a point where i question myself what the hell the devs of Broadsword were even thinking?!
Not to talk about skalds who also received stun styles now... Can every melee class stun nowdays that easy?
Next one: embrace vampire
They shifted over the fumble debuff into the ,,shadow mastery'' line (for whatever reason) instead the embrace spec line has now THREE buffs (which he can cast every 30 secs). The balance between the lines is pretty 'strange' now, whereas the embrace line has 3 buffs and the shadow spec only 1 self-buff now it feels very out of place, too... the fumble debuff was something that added up pretty well in the embrace spec line, since the re-use timer between fumble DEBUFF and Evade BUFF wasn't shared.. now the embrace vamp ends up casting one buff every 30 seconds (you know how usefull that is in 90% of very short fights!!) .. The embrace vamp was used to be an anti melee / anti-stealth character due to stealth lore and good melee defense (obviously the Broadsword dev team didn't understand that) which he now isnt anymore!! The changes here are utter bullshit, since the imbalance (1 buff in shadow mastery vs 3 buffs in embrace mastery) is pretty huge and utter nonsense, since you can cast only 1 buff per 30 seconds which last 1 minute (which means you won't make use of all 3 buffs for 100% anyways).
Valewalker + Heretic instant DoT > turned into instand DD:
The instant DoT of the heretic reflected the concept of his damage attacks pretty well. it was a DoT that pulsed just like his direct damage spells, the damage of the DoT increased slowly over time - just like his regular pulse dd spells! (and probably made much more damage than the current instand dd)
It was also helpful (same for the valewalker) to apply the instant DoTs on stealthers or regular enemies to prevent speed songs on them for a certain amount of time! Since this was what the valewalkers instant spells were good for, slowering targets down (instant snare) and preventing others from speed and stealth.
So there is my question: why in the world was it changed for both into a simple instant dd?!!!!
Besides that why was the heretic given a simple direct damage spell which is totally against his overall concept? Since it even makes mostly the same damage if i spam the pulse dds over and over it would maybe made more sense to give him for example an instant root to better walk out of range and cast his pulse spells.
DoTs seem to interrupt (for whatever reason) the pulse dd spells of heretics per each tick.
Necromancer:
Completely screwed the overall idea about the necs unique system to seperate its ghost from the body in order to be unable to get hit by opponents directly and cast non interuptable spells. Instead he feels like a regular pet summoner for most of the specs (wondering why the death sight line has no AF buff to it...)
My 2 cents
Post edited by Bothka on
Comments
Envenom has been nerfed three times in recent memory?
<"Next one: embrace vampire
They shifted over the fumble debuff into the ,,shadow mastery'' line (for whatever reason) instead the embrace spec line has now THREE buffs (which he can cast every 30 secs). The balance between the lines is pretty 'strange' now, whereas the embrace line has 3 buffs and the shadow spec only 1 self-buff now it feels very out of place, too... the fumble debuff was something that added up pretty well in the embrace spec line, since the re-use timer between fumble DEBUFF and Evade BUFF wasn't shared.. now the embrace vamp ends up casting one buff every 30 seconds (you know how usefull that is in 90% of very short fights!!) .. The embrace vamp was used to be an anti melee / anti-stealth character due to stealth lore and good melee defense (obviously the Broadsword dev team didn't understand that) which he now isnt anymore!!">
Most Vamp's are dementia for the op'd melee + magic resist
<"Besides that why was the heretic given a simple direct damage spell which is totally against his overall concept? Since it even makes mostly the same damage if i spam the pulse dds over and over it would maybe made more sense to give him for example an instant root to better walk out of range and cast his pulse spells.
DoTs seem to interrupt (for whatever reason) the pulse dd spells of heretics per each tick.">
Tics get an instant slow, duration was nerfed due to be op'd.
<"Necromancer:
Completely screwed the overall idea about the necs unique system to separate its ghost from the body in order to be unable to get hit by opponents directly and cast non interuptable spells. Instead he feels like a regular pet summoner for most of the specs (wondering why the death sight line has no AF buff to it">
AF buffs are automatic via the shape changes. Necro's where op'd for at least 2+ years that I can remember before finally PW was adjusted and the rr5 nerfed to take +% increase more melee dmg.
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How is that even an argument? 'Chose Dementia' instead of Shadow Mastery and Embrace spec because they screwed the others by shifting the fumble debuff (for no reason) to SM?
And sorry no.. Dementia never was, and is OP... Embrace was always the better spec against melees (and stealthers). 50% Fumble Debuff + high evasion (avoiding all damage instead of reduced damage being taken) was always better than some percentages in Melee resistance buffs ..
Secondly: since when the instant DoT of heretic and vw was OP?!
Is this post because your main is an assassin and you didn't read carefully? Since 3 classes i mentioned are the ones i play myself.. and not the ones where i 'have been killed in molvik' for several times... i played DAOC for 8+ years, dude.
And it is ridiculous if first: an assassin doesn't need to assassinate in stealth anymore because they got instant mezz and sidestyle stuns (which aren't connected to the stealth mechanic). And also being able to reapply new poisons every 7 seconds. Which is a great deal breaker since it wasn't possible to reapply poisons in combat for about 10 years for a reason.. same for stun immunity timer which was 1 minute and not 20 seconds!!
(BTW THIS EFFECTS >ALL< CLASSES and not just ,,some that killed me in molvik'') so stop that
secondly classes i play myself... for example as mentioned above the pure imbalance of vampiir specs where they shifted 3 buffs into embrace spec and just 1 buff into shadow mastery.. its just an imbalance.. and there was a reason why embrace had fumble debuff ... just because it adds up perfectly to the 2 buffs this spec line had before (different recast timers).
Its just common sense and logic that 3 vs 1 buff is a huge imbalance when you consider the mechanics of how vamp works.
Clearly shows that they didn't understood many of the classes how they were supposed to be. And why did they change instant DoTs of VW and heretic to an instant dd? It seems just so random with no legit reason behind it...
instant DoT was a very nice mechanic in order to prevent stealthers from stealthing and players from speed for a certain amount of time.. they just got rid of it... just because they wanted to..
And even SIMPLE LORE details like the fire PBAOE of cabalist spec.. why the hell is the cabalist inflicting fire damage though he clearly is NOT an ELEMENTALIST??! Cabalists are inflicting organic 'poisonous' and dark magic (life tap) and not fire like a fire wizzard! Common sense if you know what DAOC is about..
Though the idea of the PBAOE for the cabalist is nice, but the excecution ... and also one line seems to 'have it all'.
It has a single DoT, it has a spec nuke, it has an AoE DoT, Nearsight, and a PBAOE now.. you can't 'just' add a spell to a spec line and think 'It'll' be fine, thats not how balancing is working.
Compare this spec now against an enchanter and other PBAOE Specs ... and other spec lines of the cabalist.. the cab PBAEO spec line is clearly overloaded with skills compared to others.
All of these changes feel so damn random and it hurts. My cabalist became an elemental fire wizzard obviously (visually).
After reading, So you play Hib and Alb.
I assure you that Mids have the same gripes on different classes. (Some of the same classes that you cited as having trouble on). Vamps, VW, Necro's and Tics dominate in solo/small man, especially in the BG's.
Also skalds have always had the side stun in hammer.
The instant DDs vs DoTs are not really different in terms of how they're used.
Styles were reworked across the board prior to Broadsword (see patch 1.9x era).
There are worse class balance issues that plague the game than those you listed. VW blizzard blade still hits too hard and the Heretic instant snare is still ridiculous. But none of that matters as Broadsword has their own idea(s) of what they want the game to be regardless of what the playerbase thinks.
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All your mentioned class balance changes were utterly ridiculous and I'm just so happy there is someone else out there who recognizes all these stupid little changes to classes for no apparent reason. I loved that VW dot and heretic dot.. and old assassin system...
One thing ill add, though, since you've last played every melee class receives a stun of some sort. Most dual wield classes will have a side stun for 4-5 seconds so you will have to adjust to that, but I really like the idea of positional stuns and styles, it makes for a more challenging 1v1
Funny how they nerfed the Astral cloak because of its /use but then turn around and give it as a class ability.
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Did you even read my post? Or did you stop at that point and wrote your answer?
Skald does fine. not sure why but my armsman sucks vs sins and me pally agoin is fine.
yes i get the pont with mezz posion , been like this for last few years. Pretty dumb and pretty overpowered. Mind you I never liked the fumble cloak.
So you manage to win fights vs. Assassins on the class that is strongest vs. Assassins, unless they just vanish and run off, which they do most of the time. Yeah that sounds pretty ok to me, too.
The whole concept of the class is the problem. Assassins are supposed to win fights by killing the opponent so fast that the opponent can't even defend himself, because if they can defend, the Assassin dies as of the lack of defensive skills. With the ability to choose the fights, Assassins are however in a difficult position: either certain classes are completely helpless against Assassins and therefore get ganked by them all the time, or no class is helpless against Assassins and therefore no one plays Assassins.
They nerfed Envenom yet again for what the 3rd time since the stealther revamp patch?
Time to remove Archer access to free remedy. Archers should never have been given access to remedy PERIOD let alone free remedy it's time for another rollback. Especially since they have essentially rolled back all of the other revamp changes. @John_Broadsword
GL
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jfc...constantly crying about remedy. Just an fyi...good sins can still kill archers. l2p
I do solo in the mornings when I get the chance.
Introduction of mythical stat caps was originally cool when you would have a few stats break 110s, but now many tank templates can get 127/127 con with 600 hits. On top of that, every class has: 1-3 item /use HoTs in every template, 180 heal procs on 4+/6 armor pieces in templates, chest heal proc HoT on EVERY temp'd lvl 50, Variations of Harbinger gem that will fit perfectly into ANY template with Arrogance /use, IP charge on gloves, Lesser Empowering Elixirs healing for 600 hp every 1:30.....
All of this was the death of DAoC. I feel terrible for 'sins right now. Everyone is talking about stealth zergs still killing soloers at duel towns and I have yet to see ANY stealth zergs there. I've seen ONE assassin at duel towns since returning to game a month ago, nobody plays them now.
I loved the old assassin class, but sadly they are in a limbo of being OP and totally useless right now because of all the new things that have come into play in the last three years combined with the roller coaster of buffs and nerfs for the class..
Then added 35 new heals that were even worse then ablative stacking. And still are pretty ridiculous.
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As I said: you can't balance a class if the whole concept is the problem. The only counter to Assassins that exists is having high enough stat values permanently so they loose the fight. On that basis the class is either OP or a joke with a one-in-a-million chance in between for someone who actually have just the right stat values for a fair fight. And no amount of balancing will be able to fix that unless core concepts of the class and counters against that class are fixed first.
Not really surprising coming from an Archer who made the majority of your rps after the op'd stealther revamp @Kat.
I guess you didn't personally benefit from 100% free Remedy and it didn't help you to make rr12...
That said it's time to remove the Archer access to Remedy period. All in the name of balance, since majority of the stealther revamp patch has already been rolled back.
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I like the way you totally ignore the fact if there was a complete roll back, rr5 would revert. I would be happy to give up remedy for the old rr5
did i mention pbaoe ?
why is midgard left with their prime pbaoe class left with with a 325 delve pbaoe and every other pbaoe class with a 425 delve pbaoe ?
why is midgard at such a disadvantage ?
i have enough excperience at leading a bg to defend keeps and we simply can't defend keeps .
if irc doesn't show up to help defend and 15 minutes later stabs us in the back, midgard can't defend keeps..
Mid prime pbae class is the spiritmaster not the warlock. If Broadsword believed Warlocks were a prime pbae class then they would have given them the higher delve.
If PBAOE is the only tactical option you can come up with and use the wrong class for that and can only see the problem on the other side, then you are just bad at leading BGs.
Realm Balancing and Class balancing are two different things, have always been
i dare say class balancing is now better than ever (has been terrible at times ...)
Realm balancing is an issue currently (for everyone in the long run), but please dont justify it with supposedly unbalanced classes
Literally no one complains about the rr5 changes except for you and the granny. The Scout's rr5 ability wouldn't even fire for about a year prior to rr5 changes... News flash the world doesn't revolve around Hunter's the argument is about "stealther balance" as a whole, not a very very narrow minded point of view *cough*.
Moving on, Remedy should be 100% completely removed from Archers. Not spec'd 50 stealth for free Remedy, actually removed. It was a NS ability that was turned into an Assassin RA, then given out for free for some reason that will never be known.
The DAOC population dropped significantly after the stealth patch was forced onto Live. I think it's time for Remedy to go.
GL
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Wrong (again) I had many tells in game and on postcount complaining about it..I have read complaints even on this new board. lol - had it brought up just today by someone. But..just to be clear. I am not complaining about the rr5, I am pointing out what a role back would mean. You want hunters to be ez to kill....no old rr5 and no remedy. That's just funny.
Has there been a Broadsword patch that hasn't caused a significant drop in population other than EC?
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I did complain about it, and still would prefer to have the old RR5, but ive adapted. I don't disagree with the remedy change recommendation, but i think they (BS) are very skeptical about another drastic change that is going to affect a large majority of their paying clientele. I shelved my hunter for 6 or 8 months after the RR5 change. He would not be my main now if the meta was a bit different, but i adjust to the environment, and hunter fits that currently. Another change of that magnitude and i can foresee another hiatus or who knows, i might follow suit of a friend who recently sold out.
in the end, you have to accept this. BS has a ball (DAoC). They say here, you can play with our ball, but this is how you're gonna do it, this is what we offer you, these are the changes we make, we don't have to explain it, or tell you our plan. If you don't like it, f*** off. Oh and by the way, keep paying us $14.95 a month
honestly prefer you in ur newfound duos bc at least you stay and fight now rather than us stalemating out when i dont chase you endlessly into the open field / water
which again, still not sure how or why you'd complain about the rr5 on a friar/ non pet scare class as it works quite well if you ever actually engage in combat like its designed to be used........ but at least now i understand ur complaints seeing your playstyle, it makes more sense
but if we're gonna nitpick like that, i'd love the friar rr5 to be a total 6 second silence instead of just melee............
Stop running away hiding behind walls.
Again..I was not complaining about the rr5. I was pointing out the reality of what a true roll out would include. And, I stated....I have no problem with a pet scare. It is a pet attack that is OP
stop kiting
kiting class needs to stop kiting. Makes sense.
As much as I wanted to pet Kat, she was always very elusive. I got to pet her puppy a couple times though.
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