Doctor Archive

Hello,

Well, I know that it's already been discussed that Combat Medics, because of area mind poisons and diseases, can far out-poison doc's ability to heal. But, in the context that mind damage can't be healed, mind poison is especially troublesome, because I can get hit with a mind poison, cure myself - but I've still lost like 200 mind (I don't know exactly how much it is, but something of that order) just to use the cure. Then I can immediately be hit with the mind poison again. A combat medic can literally force a Doc to exhaust their entire mind pool EVEN IF the doc can cure themselves every time before the poison hits. In light of this, I think if it costs a Doc like 200 mind to cure themselves, it should cost the CM like 300 mind to use the poison. Something like that. Anyone know what the actual costs are?

Not positive, but similar I believe. Personally I don't have much of a problem with this, because posions do not do any damage until they tick. As such if I got into a straight posion war with a CM they would hit me with a no-damage poison that I would heal and we would go back and forth until they ran out of mind first (because they threw the poison first), leaving me with that list bit of 200 mind. (well, more actually, but that's a different story) requiring us to change our tactics.

And that, to me, is an elegant counter.

The problem right now, though, is that CMs got a needed increase in power on their poisons in the last publish. Docs did not get a comparable increase in their cures, though. So the situation above actually works out (this is assuming packs made with similar quality resources) where the CM toses the disease, then I use a cure, but don't completely cure to poison, so the CM then gets an action, while my next action will be to cure poison a total of 2 or 3 times.

Now lets add in AoE into the mix. I've got a croup of, say, 3 friends with me and we all get an AoE posion. I can get off a cure on myself and maybe a cure on one or two of the others before the posion will tick, BUT I've also given time to the CM to toss out another AoE poison to that I will have to work off all over again while they are getting free actions over my having to constantly cure.

So, I would say that I think (I'll have to check) that the mind costs for using or curing a poison are the same and that i think it should be that way.

Bt I think there is currently a problem with Cure Poison effectiveness -v- the current CM poisons, and not having at least a Point-Blank (Doctor-Centered)AoE Cure is also a problem.

With my Combat meds it takes me about 70 mind to use one of them, think its more for the area mind poisons, and area desease is buged atm

Master Doctor

Master Combat Medic

Gorath server

Rebel

Hmmm, well I posted a thread a few days back to go along with this. I don't think a Doc should get an AoE cure poison/disease, because AoE medicines just don't seem to be our thing. If you give us an AoE cure, then it logically follows that we should be able to use AoE damage stims. . . which is the CM domain. I think the solution would be to have the Doc cures be more effective, as you say, so that it will almost always cure with one use, and then give the recipient of the cure a poison immunity for like 1-3 minutes (logically the poison/disease antidote is still in their body at nearly full strength, instantly neutralizing the poison should that person get hit with it again). That immunity means that a Master Doc doesn't have to 'lose actions' curing the same people (like him/her-self) repeatedly, but can instead move on to the next person, and the next, etc.

I'm thinking more about this solution, and I realize it has the downside of making a Combat Medic almost useless against groups with good Doctors. . . but then, Doctor's aren't *that* common as far as I can tell. And there is no *guarantee* that the doc will even have a good cure poison medpak with them. I dunno - what do you guys think?

Well, I peraonally don't like to think in terms of "AoE" is CM. I prefer thinking in terms of where the game balance lies. Besides AoE for a CM actually means, to me, a Ranged AoE. An AoE cure for a Doc would be Point-Blank only, meaning a Doc couldn't throw it, the effect would just be centered on the Doc. Besides we are talking about a Cure here, which CMs do not get at all.

So to me Ranged & Ranged AoEStims, Poisons and Disease are CM.Cures and Wound Healing=Doc.

So a PB AoE would more Logically fit for a Doc, since Ranged is not part of the equation and Cures are a Docs domain, not to mention that in pretty much all respects Docs are the Game Balance counter to CMs. Puling in the idea that AoE or somethjing else is some other profession exclusive isn't realy the way to go about looking at the concept, IMHO, as the game balance designs should probably be considered before that.

As for the Immunity shots idea... I agree that it does have some merit, but it could give the Doc an advantage in some situations (like hitting everyone with it before even getting into a fight.) So the timer has to be worked out pretty tightly and would probably have to be fairly short. But if it is fairly short then you have to deal with the fact that a Doc will still need to heal up to X number of people to begin with, which will cost him the Heal Cost * X in Mind Damage. While the CM only used up enough mind to toss a single heal. The Doc would also be unable to be doing anything but cure, while the CM would get X number of actions more than the Doc because the Doc was running around trying to apply a cure in the amount of Time it took the CM to only do 1 thing.

Seems to me that even with immuity the overall advantage would go to the CM and you would no longer have even a close balance between the two classes. I do think a CM should havethe slightest edge over Doc, but that could conceivably be a HUGE edge for the CM. (If a good CM with a Good AoE poison hist, say, 10 people including the Doc the Doc can counter by healing themself, then the CM is free to do what they want while the Doc tends to the next 9 losing mind the whole way through.)

The problem with your line of thinking in your group vs combat medic thing is that the rest of your group is doing nothing while you heal.

Now I know you should know by now that to use a poison you have to close with your target, no CM's are shooting poisons at 64m, so what are you/your group doing while that CM closes to range? And do you really think that CM is going to last long enough to actually throw a second poison? One on one you will most likely have a problem, and the question then becomes..why shouldnt you?

Actually my assumption is that the CM also has a group with them and all of those folks are keepeing everyone buys and tactics are being employed that will allow a CM to get into range.

And there are ways of making a 64m (or longer I have heard from some other CMs) poison. They just won't be as effective or potent, but ifit's enough to keepan opposingDoc busyfor a minutes worth of combat, that's a lot.

So the comparison still stands, IMHO.

Yes, but if you get that range the potency will not be high enough to affect at most 1 or 2 people if the CM is lucky, people must simply understand that unlike ranged combat we cant do full damage at full range, it's one or the other or a mix that makes neither very effective.

So now we have a poison thrown from 64m, but now it lacks potency so it affect few, or lacks effectiveness and takes even longer to incap one person. Or we have a poison thrown from 40-50 meters, which means the CM is now out in front of his group trying tho poison you, and making himself a very good target.
While we are postulating, what happens if your group has an SL with Volleyfire? That CM becomes a big paper target with 6 peoples guns shooting him at once, if he manages to survive he can toss that poison.
And why is your group clustered all together? This seems to be a simple yet efective strategy that people simply dont want to utilize. Rather that use a bit of intelligence they want the counter handed to them on a plate.

I'm curious as to what tactic will allow a CM to sneak up on you unnoticed, since that big red dot on the radar pretty much lets you know where people are. Anyone that is closing is doing so for a reason, melee's will kill your ranged group if they get close and CM's to throw their poison. Seems simple to blast anything that gets even remotely within threat range.
Then as well, while that CM is setting up to throw, who is healing his group? Who is rezzing those that have been DB'd? No one because the CM is busy and he lacks the skills to rez.

I wont get accusatory, but until you play the class and fight in real battles, not this TEF revenge crap, then how can you be sure how really effective it all is? This whole argument sounds like the Devs "metrics", they rarely reflect the real state of the game.

I do play the class. I'm a Master CM and I'm fully aware of the trials and tribulations of being a CM. Please do not make any improper assumptions to the contrary. I am, in fact, fully qualified to stand on both sides of this discussion if that is what your are trying to question by asserting that I have not played the class. And I absolutely refuse to exploit the TEF revenge bug.

Yes, there are tradeoffs to range. I only suggested it was possible to get that range when you had suggested that it was not possible. I made no suggestion that it would be highly effective at that range.

If the CM is in front of the group at 40-50m, then he's not taking advantage of the group tactics that would have a group zerg rush to confuse the enemy and prevent them for singling out a target before the throw.

As for clumping together, if the Docs group isn't clumped together than how is an AoE cure overpowering to the CM that couldn't get a clump to poison in the first place?

There are reasons to clump and reasons not to clump. If they aren't clumped, as a CM I would use a longer range but more pwoerful Single Poison. I they are clumped I AoE. As a Doc I could then counter, properly, with a single cure or a PB AoE cure. Point-Counterpoint, that, to me, is the role of Doc and CM.

The assertion I am making here is not to postulate how or why a particular group is doing anything. It is to isolate out the role and balance of the CM and the Doc. Period. Who is doing what anywhere else in a group should simply be made with an assumption of balance. Both sides are otherwise equal and would employ equally effective or ineffectivetactics. Without reduction of those kinds of variables the balance question between these two classes would be irrelavent. So let's not bother with the what ifs of anyone else in the the group and the whats, hows and whys of what they are doing. It is easier in such a situation as this to simply reduce the variables and say the groups are in all other ways exactly the same. I would also take this a step further and state that we should also make the assumption that the Doc is a Master Doc with no other skill points spent, and the CM is a Master CM with no other skill points spent. This already gives the CM a weapons boost, mind you, over the Doc.

The assertion here is that Docs do have a counter to CM singular poison and disease and that there is a proper balance. Docs (and CMs) are actually unbalanced, as they should be since it takes a lot more points to get there, against most other combat professions in that those professions must perform multiple attacks compared to a Doc's (or CM's) single action of healing (and thereby curing) that damage. CMs, however, have a far greater advantage in AoE DoT use that Docs do not provide a proper counter-balance for.

The only difference between the two professions that I think should be acknowledged is the added requirement and skill point cost of attaining Marksman and the Ranged Weapons Support line for CM and the additional resource requirements needed for ranged and AoE DoTs. In this respect I think it would be fair to give the CM a slight boost. Perhaps it should cost slightly less mind to toss the poison than it does to cure it, or a poison made with the same quality resources as it's cure, should be just effective enough that it requires 2 cures to remove, or something along those lines.

The original poster questioned the difference in mind costs between these two actions, and determning that or certain may well add some additional relavence to this discussion.

Now I'm sorry if you think this sounds too much like "Dev metrics" to you, but rarely are any group battles ever properly balanced in any kind of manner to properly test these situations. So the best we can do is try to even them out as best we can and work from these basic assumptions of removing or at least equalizing external variables, or else the arguments simply have no relavance.