Brawler Archive
Thread: possible pvp ranged vs melee fix
i was thinking about this while mowing my lawn today... so pardon me if its a little odd.
1. make it impossible to attack while burst-running: just think about it if your running your A** off is it really possible to bust shots off at the guy chasing you.
2. reduce the movement penaltys for melee weapons to a reasonable level, after all if you ever watch a martial arts fight or a fencing match how often to the combantants just stand there and trade blows.
I think this would help a little and would really not be a *nerf* for the ranged fighters.
Don't think they ever tried to reallybalance range vs. melee.
Look at this link to a post from Holocron on another site. http://www.kanga.nu/archives/MUD-Dev-L/2001Q4/msg01048.php
Here is the whole post,
" >>> Is it possible that a smart game designer could obviate that
>>> entire problem by eliminating the player-versus-player race that
>>> forms the absolute backbone of games of this genre?
>> I am not sure you can without also removing all forms of
>> feedback. People simply like to compare themselves to
>> others. "Keeping up with the Joneses."
> I don't doubt that this phenomenon will remain intact to some
> degree, and we can argue the degree forever I'm sure. Can it be
> reduced in the near future to the point of being a sidelight -
> such that min/max fears and 'balance' are no longer a significant
> concern of system designers? Can designers cease fearing the use
> of continuous functions, and to cease fearing the use of other
> mechanics/mechanisms that 'give up control' to the players?
I am not not entirely following the logical leap you made there to
the "give up control" issue, but that's OK.
There's a philosophical question to ask ourselves, one alluded to in
that Shannon Appelcline essay that Michael Tresca just
referenced. To what degree is "balance" something that we as
designers desperately pursue, as opposed to the "balance" that
players pursue?
After all, if there's an overpowered class according to player
perception, they seek and find equilibrium. The correct proportion
of each class naturally emerges, as players who are too invested in
particular character archetypes refuse to change, and those who are
min-maxers pursue the class or profession du jour. Often a
designer's "fix to balance" doesn't come along until well after this
new equilibrium has been reaches, so all it does is upset players,
rather than aid in this mythical "game balance" anyway.
So the philosophical question is, if something is out of whack,
should we as designers care? Do we need to always have everything in
mathematical perfection?
As an example of where we are wrestling with this in Star Wars
Galaxies--we have several very large overlapping constituencies of
likely players. One, for example, is all those players who want to
be Jedi. And Jedi, frankly, crush everything else in the
setting. Then there's all these players who want to be melee
fighters. All those who want to be Rebels and Imperials.
In the movies, the Rebels win by luck and pluck. It's not surprising
that many players want to play Rebels. They are also all continuity
fanatics, and keep insisting that everything be as like the movies
as possible. If it were, the Rebels would wink out of existence in
the first week the servers went live. We as designers feel an
imperative to supply balance there simply because otehrwise, a major
attractant to the game goes away.
On the other hand, we're just plain giving up on the issue of melee
combat. A good ranged guy is always gonna take a good close
quarters guy, and there's no getting past that. Yes, we've innvested
a fair amount of time in vibroblades and stun poles and what have
you, and there's skills to learn for melee, motioan captured moves,
and all sorts of goodness. But really, we already know the
min-maxers won't use that stuff. So it's there for those whose
self-image really calls for it.
Lastly, there's those pesky Jedi. They're barely balanceable. So
we're making them extremely rare (and no, I'm not going to say how,
not even here. 
and we're going ahead and giving them the
power. They're gonna be superbeings, and if you see one, run.
Mathematically elegant? No, not really. But frankly, I'm going to
sacrifice the "balance" for the sake of the players'
wish-fulfillment.
We're getting asked whether the crafters and the peaceful people
will get equal access to the goodies as the people who are declared
Rebels and Imperials. Well, the answer is yes and no. There's perks
on both sides. Are they "balanced"? I don't know. My main concern is
whether the two playstyl;es each have fulfilling gameplay that they
find fun. They're not even advancing on the same scales, so that
they do not feel like they have to compare themselves. Nonetheless,
they already do, and I don't doubt they always will.
-Raph "
So that pretty much ends any hope for "balance in the ranged vs. melee combat in this game, for me.
Though that post was from a few years ago but it shows that they gave up on melee sometime ago.
Hello all,
From the above post, quoting;
"On the other hand, we're just plain giving up on the issue of melee
combat. A good ranged guy is always gonna take a good close
quarters guy, and there's no getting past that. "
This is truly sad to see. In fact, I can't understand how they can say "we're just plain giving up" when melee is both a necessary consideration (for the simple fact that Jedi themselves are melee based) and that they have created an entire tree of elite and hybrid professions based solely on melee itself. Can they reasonably continue with this poor andnegative attitude of "we're just plain giving up"? That's disheartening enough for me to reconsider Star War Galaxies at all--any developer that approaches what constitutes a large portion of their offered game using that mindset has to be seriously questioned.
After all, what is to stop them from saying, "Well, we're just plain giving up on scouts" or "It's just to much for us to consider medics anymore, we're giving up on them." There are simply to many games in the pipeline for which the dev's don't carry such a lousy mindframe. Disheartening indeed.
Quote continued;
"Mathematically elegant? No, not really. But frankly, I'm going to
sacrifice the "balance" for the sake of the players'
wish-fulfillment."
Well bravo. I've been waiting quite some time for a developer to say that. Not all things should be balanced. Some things should have specific utility in a game and should not be considered balanced in other arenas that players often like to compare regardless. But all the same, it's hard to ignore that the combat design within the game can neither ignore the melee element nor the ranged alike.There should be little question that you don't bring a knife to a gunfight--unless of course your CLOSE enough to rip the other fella's gun out of his hand or bloody his nose so badly that he can't see you to aim with it.
The real problem here is that their stated intentions for "melee vs. ranged" wasn't implemented well. Melee fighters are given the shaft in that, if they can actually manage to close ranks they can't actually force anotherplayer to feel the pressures of close-rank fighting. There is a reason that bayonets are issued to soldiers after all. At the same time, if someone wants to be a Teras Kasi master, but they refuse to pick up a CDEF when they are 50m out from an opponent, they outta get their ass handed to them. Simple as that. People seem to ignore the fact that YES, SOE has and does intend for ranged combat to have a significant advantage simply because it is ranged. If you don't want to go ranged at some (even many)points, don't expect to have a compassionate ear lent to you when you find things tough.
All the same, SOE should focus on making the imbalances "balanced". That is, if you bring a knife to a ranged gun fight, you should find things extremely tough. On the opposite, if you are touting a rifle when the guy holding a vibroaxe is looming over you, you ought to find things extremely tough as well. The imbalance should be expected based on the that very premise. I don't think anyone would argue that it shouldn't be. When in ranged, fight ranged...when in melee, fight melee. Implement that, SOE, and you'll find an agreeable and understanding player base who will no longer finds the need to compare melee vs. ranged the way they have. Instead, they will begin to discuss tactics based on an understandable game mechanic rather than complain because the game mechanic offered is flawed as such.
Thanks for your time
Brawlers / melees are currently outclassed by ANY ranged attacker, especially in PvP. With lag issues and the extremely small atack window for unarmed / melee fighters, an opponent only needs to run away and keep weaving and changing directions to win any fight. Even if you can manuslly stick to them pretty well, the lag will getthem some distanceeventually. If you try to run away, they just auto-follow you and shoot until you are dead.
Personally, I will be missing a signficant portion of the game if they don't do something to balance this inequity.
I have 2 suggestions:
/stick command that auto-follows a target at a melee attackable range.
&
A faster base movement speed that increases based upon skill levels (maybe in the elite professions?). Since melees always have to close with an opponent it would stand to reason that they might be better runners than the sniper who lies hidden in the distance.
Right now as it stands, all a ranged attacker has to do is snipe you from a distance and then run away if you give chase and auto-follow if you run away. Does it sound reasonable for ranged attackers to effectively be immune to melees unless surprised or AFK?
This is especially pertinent since ranged attackers can currently shoot THROUGH buildings, trees, houses, terrain and even small mountains! Even if they couldn't however, there shouldn't be this much disparity.
If the argument is going to be that its this way because ranged attackers should always have the advantage, thenit is highly adviseable that melee classes avoid any and all PvP or that you avoid melee classes if you want to PvP since they are inherently disadvantaged.
Can someone tell me why thereshouldn'tbe an expectation of some degree of balance between combat classes?
- Kalen