Commando Archive
Thread: Balancing is a stupid concept, life is unfair, deal with it.
O.K. guys, I'm tired of hearing that we are PvP gods and all that crap and dont want to start fights with other professions but was wondering if anyone feels the same way. In no way do I say I'm right but this is how I feel and would like very much to hear other views on this with good reasons to support your reasoning in a calm manner. Just think of it like we are coming to an understanding of each other, not trying to force our beliefs and this is not going to be reflected in the game Im sure, its more philosophical.
RANKS of ELITE and HYBRID PROFESSIONS
I'll talk about ranged and hybrid elite professions since I dont know what I think about where melee combat should be ranked. I wont talk about smuglers either since, while they havegood supporting attaks, they are meant to just get out of trouble. This is the way I feel and balancing should not cross levels
TOP ELITEHYBRIDS: BH first then Commando as long as we are talking about that being the only professions the character has then CM but they should be more focused on healing. I do feel however since we commandos can take a lot more skills, if we take the right ones we should be more than a match for a BH.
Another thing about BH is I only feel BHs should be tougher than a commando is because of the games way of requiring more skills as a pre-requisite which is totally wrong. A BH should only need one fighting skill, and hunting/trapping so then they shouldnt be a mega killer and should be able to take out an individual target no prob, but not mobs, by using tricks and knokouts to capture or kill if necessary,not by over powering. The reason I say that is, Im sure everyones probably seen the movie, well you know that rodian Solo killed in the first movie? Thats a standard BH right there. Whats that you say? What about Jenga Fet and Boba Fet?(spelling?) They took out jedis. Yes, I saw that but what they dont tell you is that those BH's in particular, are FORCE SENSITIVE! Do something other than watch the movies and play video games, read the books, they are really good. Fortunately for you BHs out there, the game is seemingly modeled after Jenga and Boba instead of Greeto(again spelling?) and I by no means think they should change it on you now that your there.
The reason I put commandos with BH when I base most of my theory on pre-req is that we have one more combat skill instead of 4 tracking/trapping type skills. Notice I still put BH in the front of the line based on having only the fore-mentioned skills. I put CMs last but up here on my list cause they got mostly all medic and one combat skill which is only a support skill and think any field medic should be allowed to run with the best of em to survive in order to heal others. A win in a PvP fight between these proffessions one on one should be very close and decided based off tactics and supporting skills.
Bottom SIMPLY ELITE:
This is where I think I'll here the most gripes but again this is based a lot off of if its the only profession taken and a supporting skill can aid them to be level with the above. You got plenty of skill pool left over here so dont start crying if you take one of these and decide you want to be a master weaponsmith along with it. You got a chice and you culd have focused more on battle instead of credits.
Rifleman
Pistoleer
Carbineer
Supporting skills you could have taken instead of artisan based that would level the playing field for you?
Well, you can master anything else you wanted after just one of those top professions. CH is a popular one. Medic so you can buff yourself heal anything like that. Heck you can even do one of these and maste commando or a browler class, whatever you want to. So you cant complain if you are just a pistoleer taht a commando or a BH wooped up on you when you have almost endless options on what to do. If you didnt chhose a supprt profession that would help you in combat so you can make creds or just have fun doing stuff other than combat thats your problem.
This lower level alone without support skills should not beat the top level or stand much of a chance one on one without great luck.
The important thing to remember here, and perhaps my point, is that in real life nothing is balanced. Life is unfair. You deal with what you got and cant change it most of the time, but in this game you have a choice. If you want to be a great fighter, you can take the skills necessary. If you want to be rich, you can take artisan skills but stop crying when the guy who wanted to be a fighter beats the guy who wnated to be rich.
/sigh
Gonna 1 star me without response?
Im just giving my view, let me hear yours. Maybe I'll see things your way, maybe not.
I would just love to hear someones thinking of why a straight line profession should be equal to someone who dedicated so much more to combat. Im trying to understand the other side.
Well, the thing is that this is run by a coproration with the soul purpose of making as much money as possible without having to deal with floods of complaints. So they try to keep everything fair and balanced. I don't agree with it but thats the way it is.
I personally think that each profession should have it's well defined strong points with mad crazy coolness in those areas so people can choose which profession they want based on their prefered style of fighting etc..
Just my two cents.
Man Technohic i agree with u almost 100%. I am tired of peps whining cause this class is better than theres. IF u dont like it switch classes. I dont care if there area million BH or commandos running around as long as people some bitching about whos more UBER and why they should be nerfed. If a BH has the element of surprise they should be able to take out there target. If not o well prob is how do u make it so if they do have element of surprise they win. I really dont konw what to say about the Elite combat professions other than they need to find a way to make them UBER in there own way which i think they are very close to figuring out.
PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD PEOPLE LET DEVS DO THERE THING WITHOUT ALLTHE WHINING.
Be contructive!
Balacing is needed otherwise you could end up with a novice brawler causing more damage than a master commando, so right from the start your wrong on that account with the title. The point isthat Hybirds need to have more power than a normal elite and currently they do, a BH and commando have a minimum of 3 difference weapons at their disposal. The power we have is diversity not just raw power output. Point for point some elites can do more damage, however once you take resistances and armor into consideration a commando still comes out on top cause they have many weapons with different damage types at their disposal.
The problem here is that the classes that require the most skill points do not return conmesurate performance when compared to classes that require less.
Commando and BH.They are hybrid proffessions. Require mastery of one or 2 other proffessions as prereq.
Pistoleer/Rifleman/Carbineer. They are Elite proffessions. Require no mastery of anyproffession as prereq.
The Hybrids specialize in frontloaded damage (Commando) and in capability (BH). The Elites specialize in damage in a specific HAM bar and accuracy in their chosen weapon.
Commando frontloaded damage is equal to the elite's damage over time..but they have area of effect specials (flame cone, grenade, acid cone, heavy weapons broken blast area radius). BH's damage is commonly considered higher per shot than that of an elite proffession, has excellent mobility (master scout), and specials which are considered slightly better than the elite proffession's damage (LLC being rifleman-like damage) due to their effects and damage.... but the accuracy the BH has with such weapons is lower than the elites.
With this in mind, you can see that, damage wise, the elites and hybrids are literally at parity. The BH having the advantage due to mobility and better special effects. On the other hand, the elites have the damage of the hybrids, but also have the extra points to take up more skills...like medic, CH, etc etc...which all things considered, make the elite outperform the hybrids by a rather large margin.
Case in point, master CH, master pistoleer, novice medic. This beats master commando and master BH with ease.
In my opinion, the hybrids should have something that gives them an edge in certain things OVER an elite & his lots of extra skillpoints.
For example, the Commando should have the capability of being THE best combatSUPPORT class...and the BEST anti-vehicle SOLO class.. this doesnt mean he should hit for 20k, fart lightning and chew bubblegum... but rather that his weapons should be able to effectively make a group be much more powerful than it would be without him. This could be achieved by giving grenades state effects like repeatable knockdown, stun, warcry, blind, etc effects.. make the commando be the 'debuffer' for a group. Commando now already is able to assist a group to take down multiple attackers with their flamecone, so for now this job is partly well done. For anti vehicle, the Commando NEEDS to be able to hit a specific HAM bar with his shoulder mounted weapons. It is ridiculous to shoot 3 rockets at an ATST and see them hit the health, then the action, then the mind bar. Not a terribly effective anti vehicle combatant..the moron cant even aim the thing.
The BH oth, is a solo class. And, as it now, barring the horrendous investigation xp grind and the really imbalancing eyeshot (which i heard is going into master box, which is good), is a-ok.
Tal, once again you are right that balancing is necessary and my title maybe wasnt the best of one. Im just trying to say the way people are looking at what balance is needed. IMO balancing should only happen within the ranks I stated above. Commandos balanced with BH's or Rifleman and pistoleer balanced with carbineer, not pistoleer balanced with commando or rifleman balanced with BH.
The 2.5 damage modifier that we got stealth nerfed to us came when I was a novice to flame 1 commando and trust me, I thought long and hard about maybe going BH but feared I'd just be throwing away the time I invested in unarmed 4 and picking up extra scout skills only to maybe find myself nerfed again in another profession so I just stuck around hoping that this one gets fixed and not just the damage mod but the weapons other than the FT need to be made more usefull. Unfortunately, I feel if we ever get a good fix we will have more whining about us and another nerf and it will be called balancing and probably balanced in the way I've been talking about it. have taken long enough as it is and not mastered to bother trying to change so I ill just have to deal with it cause balancing is a big thing that Sony has done in EQ and thats why I found I liked Ultima a lot better but I stick with SWG cause it is Star Wars. I love the sounds of blasters and AT-STs plodding around.
I would like to see more people focus on their own profesion gettting needed fixes and not complaining about others and I am sure their is much broken, but when everything is said and done it is necessary to know your place in the ranks of combat based on what you've invested into it.
If im a master Chef.... does that mean i should be able to take down a pistoleer? since im in an elite class? maybe that will take a bit to sink in 
*oh.... maybe you didnt see Under Siege (thats one bad a@@ cookie!!!)
-Targus- wrote:
OK..... since i am myself a Master of a hybrid (and soon to be elite) class... I feel i can put my 2cents in on this one.... i only really have one complaint...
Ok I was a bit wordy but didnt I talk about this?
I said that the combat skills required is taken into consideration (i.e. commando vs BH) AND that a pistoleer that takes professions that supprt their fighting like CH or medic can be raised up to match the top levels since even though they are not taking a larger combat necesary pre req they are still dedicating their skill pool to combat. Also I said a pistoleer who takes just that and an artisan skill should not.
SO, I was talking a lot about combat skills being able to beat non combat types.
One of the most frustrating parts of SWG is the obvious imbalances between combat classes. The most glaring is how in many instances the Master Commando ( Elite Hybrid) can get "owned" by lower level player classes including in some cases even novice (TK).
The intent of the devs at least as articulated by TH seems to be that the combat classes should always rule over other "dabbled" and lower combat classes:
Thunderheart said:
I've seen some really interesting character templates, but ultimately a dedicated crafter is always going to produce goods better than a combat oriented character and a combat dedicated character will always fight better then any of the possible hybrid templates
If this is actually the case does it not logically follow that the Master Commando should by virtue of it's Elite Hybrid combat class rule over all except perhaps a mid to high level Jedi?
As far as your points about the BH as compared to the Commando TechnoHic:
TechnoHic said:
Another thing about BH is I only feel BHs should be tougher than a commando is because of the games way of requiring more skills as a pre-requisite which is totally wrong. A BH should only need one fighting skill, and hunting/trapping so then they shouldnt be a mega killer and should be able to take out an individual target no prob, but not mobs, by using tricks and knokouts to capture or kill if necessary,not by over powering.
I agree completely. The fact is if you look at the skill trees of the BH and that of the Commando the assumtion could very easily be made that the Commando is the true serious killer and the BH is a Private Detective who is very capable of taking most down one on one as long as the mark was alone and suprised by the BH. The BH needs scouting skills, the commando needs brawler. The BH has the LLC, the Commando has a list of Hvy Weapons as long as your arm (granted most are either broken or not as effective as the $ value would indicate) and would indicate the Commando as the combat class second to none except perhaps the Jedi.
The problem isn't so much a lack of balance (since you CAN switch professions, if you feel yours is totally FUBAR) as much as a lack of vision on what each profession is supposed to do. I'll give a few examples, one from crafting, and one from combat...
Droid Engineer... Thier best attack pet, very simply is not even in the same league as a Rock Beetle that you can find wondering all over Tatooine, and costs considerably more. While the "extra's" they can get on thier creations are nice, they simply don't add enough overall value to the end product, for a person to need more than "one" and that "one" will be with them permanentally. Solutions to this problem are almost infinate, the developers can either add more uses to the droids, and keep them "not combat worthy", or add fighting bots that get destroyed over time (unrepairable damage works well for this), but in anycase, the developers need to come up with a "vision" of what DE should be, and then implement it. This vision needs to focus on longterm viability of this class by providing an essential function to the game. This same thing can be said of every other crafting class in this game, the only two that deserve an exemption are Weaponsmith and Armorsmith, since both of those do currently provide an essential game function, and since the items wear out, have long term viability. The Dev's need to come up with a "vision" for all the other crafting classes, that works as well as WS and AS do currently, insuring that thier products will always be needed, and that the product wears out over time.
Squad Leader.. This is another great idea, that is yet to be fully implemented correctly. If your doing a group, with more than 5 people in it, a SL "should" be someone you want in your group badly. If the SL was skilled, your group should become at least 50% more effective than it would be without one, which would lead to a high demand for having a SL leading you into combat. The game that perhaps best exemplify's what a skilled Leader is capable of doing for a team situation is probably Allegiance from MicroSoft. If you've ever played that, you'd agree with me, that a team with a skilled Leader could easily crush any team without one, in fact, a highly skilled Leader with a mediocre team, was more than a match for a superb team with a mediocre Leader. If the Dev's can incorporate even a fraction of the sort of benefits haveing a skilled Leader gave you in Allegiance to this game, SL will will become a very viable profession.
The point of both of my examples is this... If a SL couldn't fight it's way past a gnort, but made a group twice as effective in combat, we'd all want one to group with us. If DE could crank out the armies seen in Episodes one and two, we would again be able to find plenty ofreasons to have them on our "side", it's just that the Dev's need to come up with the completed "visions" for many professions, and implement them. Balance should be determined by how much the profession cost in skill points, and how "effective" it is in getting the job done, in various situations. If they decide that Commando is "only" the anti vehicle profession, thats fine, but then we need a lot more situations where an 'anti vehicle professional' is put to good use.
For myself, I could care less about balance, I just want to do whatever professions fit my mood at the time, and KNOW that I provide a valuable service when doing them. IMO this is what the Dev team needs to fix first, they can get the skill points versus power thing balanced after this is accomplished.
Vorgus