Development Cycle Archive
Thread: IT 7-2 Preliminary Combat Balance Changes
Maskius wrote:
Demane,
Look at the servers, what are people playing or at least dabbling in?
TK has almost become a requirement for PvP templates, because the power it provides comes so extremely cheap and I am not just talking pure offensive power, defensive and diversity (as in state-hits, meditation etc.). TK is the cheap and easy way topower and that is a flaw.
Sure you can build other good PvP templates without TK, but none will be so easy and cheap. I mean, there must be some sort of reason why it is so popular, don't you think?
I hate to have to say it, but I totally agree with you Snake it has gotten to the point now that rather than looking forward to the next "big patch" I dread it because instead of doing the right thing and adding new things to counter the old, the devs. have started taking away things from the old and saying that its an "improvement" now I know its hard to program things into a game this size, real hard, but I have seen some of the best games go down the tubes due to the fact that the people running them didn't take the time to add enough new things in to make the game go. Now I see the droid improvments, and I wont go into it on this thread, and I say WOW that’s cool. Then I see all the things that they have decided need to be "balanced" it just takes that good feeling I had and throws it on the ground to be stomped on.
I think that what this thread has turned into isn't just what we think of the new combat changes but what we are all starting to think of the way the devs are running this game. Now I love this game and I thank the devs each day for giving it life, but in my opinion they are now taking that very life out of the game by forcing in patches and "fixes" that the players themselves don't want in. PLEASE DEVS. listen to us, the whole of us, not just the ones that rant and rage about how the game is unfair. In a game like this it takes the whole community to decide what is fair or not by what we ALL think. Now if the devs have a plan for the future of how these changes are going to work with other ones, I want to hear it. Communication like that might actually give me a reason to trust them and go along with what I think is a bad idea, but if I have to base my decision purely by what I see here and now there is no reason for me to go along with their plans.
I remember this site back before the launch, it was full of brilliant philosophy and heated debates about how the classes should work and what type of combat system we should have. I miss those days, the days when the devs valued our opinions and cherished our advice because they were trying to make the game the best that they could ever make and please us all. Where has that listening spirit gone devs? Where?
Maskius wrote:
Demane,
Look at the servers, what are people playing or at least dabbling in?
TK has almost become a requirement for PvP templates, because the power it provides comes so extremely cheap and I am not just talking pure offensive power, defensive and diversity (as in state-hits, meditation etc.). TK is the cheap and easy way topower and that is a flaw.
Sure you can build other good PvP templates without TK, but none will be so easy and cheap. I mean, there must be some sort of reason why it is so popular, don't you think?
So TKA is overpowered because players dabble in it to get powerboost, force of will and wound healing? Or is it because SOE was so short sighted to put such powerfull abilities outside of the master skill? My vote is on the second answer. If force of will and wound healing were not available until master then nobody other than TKM's would have them. This means spending 29 more points to obtain them. That is a hefty price tag for simple 'dabblers'.
We all know that a dabbler who spends points in tka is not considered a tka. No self-respecting TKM would admit that and no other class would as well for dabblers in their profession. Mastering a profession is, often, a mark of pride because so many are broken and often justa waste of points to bother to achieve mastery. With tkm we are simply talking about a profession that does not class breaking skills and, therefore, is very effective with what they have. Unfortunately, tka has far too powerful abilities in areas that are too easy for dabblers to get. This is the problem more than anything else.
I would like to see force of will put into master levelas well aswound/poison/disease/bleed heal. We would see a hell of a lot less dabblers in tka. In my oppinion the worse offence madein dabbling is from pistol and fencing min/maxers. You get far more out of those professions than from tka (other than wound/disease/poison healing). Dabbling in tka means you might not die after a combat medic poisons you but dabbling in pistol/fencer makes you a god nobody can touch. This problem alone is what brought the defense cap in. If nobody could get meditation powers then where do you think they will go? Yup,,,more points into pistol(0044) and enough pionts now to get fencer 4440 (have you seen the insane bonuses with this??). Hell through in pikeman/swordman and/or carbineer/rifleman defense lines so you get nearly maxed counter/block/dodge and maxed defense vs xxx. Even with a cap these characters will be nearly unstoppable. Taking points in TKA (4004) is almost a ballance to stop players taking far higher bonuses from other professions. Take away top meditation abilities from dabblers and you have nother more than a huge waste of points spent because tka defenses pale in comparison to other professions.
The next step is to make dabbling for the insane defenses in other professions harder to do. This will stop tkm's from stacking and EVERY tkm knows that a pure tkm, without stacking, is hellishly vulnerable to state changing and ranged attacks. A pure, non-dabblingtkm is a wonder of ballance in my oppinion. A stacked TKM is far too powerful and that is where the problem is, not within the idealistic tkm template.
James_T_Stryker wrote:
I hate to have to say it, but I totally agree with you Snake it has gotten to the point now that rather than looking forward to the next "big patch" I dread it because instead of doing the right thing and adding new things to counter the old, the devs. have started taking away things from the old and saying that its an "improvement" now I know its hard to program things into a game this size, real hard, but I have seen some of the best games go down the tubes due to the fact that the people running them didn't take the time to add enough new things in to make the game go. Now I see the droid improvments, and I wont go into it on this thread, and I say WOW that’s cool. Then I see all the things that they have decided need to be "balanced" it just takes that good feeling I had and throws it on the ground to be stomped on.
I think that what this thread has turned into isn't just what we think of the new combat changes but what we are all starting to think of the way the devs are running this game. Now I love this game and I thank the devs each day for giving it life, but in my opinion they are now taking that very life out of the game by forcing in patches and "fixes" that the players themselves don't want in. PLEASE DEVS. listen to us, the whole of us, not just the ones that rant and rage about how the game is unfair. In a game like this it takes the whole community to decide what is fair or not by what we ALL think. Now if the devs have a plan for the future of how these changes are going to work with other ones, I want to hear it. Communication like that might actually give me a reason to trust them and go along with what I think is a bad idea, but if I have to base my decision purely by what I see here and now there is no reason for me to go along with their plans.
I remember this site back before the launch, it was full of brilliant philosophy and heated debates about how the classes should work and what type of combat system we should have. I miss those days, the days when the devs valued our opinions and cherished our advice because they were trying to make the game the best that they could ever make and please us all. Where has that listening spirit gone devs? Where?
RedMike512 wrote:
It seems to me like TKA is already extremely powerful. Why are you making it better by increasing damage against ranged opponents? Are there any plans to"adjust" a profession that can already deal 2k damamge every 2 seconds?
Wow am I ever tired of people like this. Tka overpowered? Maybe so if you are an idiot and wearing no armor. If you are wearing 80% kinetic comp like real pvp's and you have 80+ stacked kd and dizzy protection then, no, they are not over-powered...they are justwhiffle bats making wind.So I take it you want tka's damaged nerfed to a point where they do even less damage to the highest resisted damage in the game. If tka can't do 2000 damage per second (let's see.....2000 in pvp, after pvp reduction=800...guessing on this...if lucky, after psg=480, after 80% resist comp=96, after food reduction=57) then they may as well just punch the ground for all the good it will do.
PVE..hell ya effective..until you run into a 100% kinetic resist mob and then you are s.o.l. No other class has that weakness.
TKA has no targeted HAM attack that does anywhere near that damage and is so little it is not even worth using in pvp unless finishing off a sliver ofa bar that is remaining.
You are complaining about one attack and the one attack that a TKA will use 99% of their entire existance because no other skill is worth using. Maybe address that one attack (again with consideration that kinetic is their ONLY choice) but make the other skills they get worth using.
I agree there needs to be tweeking if other classes continue to sit broken and who knows what the combat ballances will bring but I don't understand why you have issues with tka hitting ranged opponants more (I thought this is a melee d penalty NOT a damage multiplier in next patch). Stacked melee d for ranged users is an easy thing to do and without sticky melee, melee users need some advantage in hitting something that can simply run away from them. If you have a hard time swallowing this then you should see what sticky melee is like...ranged fighters DO NOT want that but if nothing is done then melee is useless in pvp even if you hit for 10,000 every second.
So lets try something new here: Yap your mouth off to the devs to make them fix all the professions so they actually work in every area THEN start bitching about who is too powerful. As it stands few professions can truely be judged on how effective they are because they are so broken. Also be aware that some classes are made to be one on one damage kings. If you are pistol and want to do rifle damage then you need your head adjusted because pistol does not play that role...the fact that pistol plays no other role is another story all together, but at least they dodge a lot and that is a start. Pikemen need better bonuses and defences but their crowd control abilities make tka look sad in groups and, for this reason alone, pikemen should not do the one on one damage tka does. They have a role....again, an ass poor role at this time, but a role never the less.
TKA should always be feared by all classes withing 3m. That is their role and if this is ever challenged by a ranged class then the devs would have failed entirely in their jobs and may as well quit. Even now a propperly prepaired ranged fighter has little to fear if they use a few, intelligent, choices when deciding how to fight a TKA.
SWG-Runesabre wrote:
We are still evaluating our position with Panic Shot. The changes to Panic Shot will probably stand with Publish 7 until we see how everything balances out with the upcoming Combat Balance changes when we have most everything adjusted we need to adjust. I am still discussing the changes with my combat balance designer and will be able to give you a final answer in the upcoming week.
