Fencer Archive
Thread: Inquiry on The Patch’s Changes To Your Skills (Knockdown and Posture
Hi guys. I'm nota normal dweller on your board, so thanks in advance for tolerating this post. 
I want to write a reasonably comprehensive post for the Developer's attention dealing with this last patch's disproportional alterations to Knockdowns (melee AND ranged) Posture Changes, and Status Effects. I only have the most general of ideas on how it's affected classes other than mine, and I want to get the classes affected, and which skills have been rendered irrelevant and/or highly ineffective giving the 30 second timer.
As a ranged combatant, I have noticed thatknockdowns, posture change via suppression, and the confusion/dizzy status effect have been affected in4 ways:
1) Significantly lowered % chance to HIT with these specials
2) When the special DOES hit, a significantly lowered % chance to LAND that special successfully
3) Decreased duration/effect of confusion/dizzy
4) Decreased duration of the knockdown and posture change - approximately 2-4 seconds (that's 1 - possibly 2 player moves, essentially)
I truly want this post to remain as informative and cordial as possible, and would like to request the following:
1) Name of special(s) affected by the last patch
2) Way in which the special has been affected, either anecdotally, with a combat log, etc.
Post to this thread or feel free to email me.
Such changes, although they might fall within the "Grand Design" of SOE, are taking away far more than is being left behind. Although such changes might ultimately work to prevent us from taking on reds, yellows, and whites (as per Holocron's own words), is it truly fair to cripple and gut any number of class's lines in such a disproportional manner? Ultimately, if these changes stay as they are, I'd prefer to have the skills taken away, rather than have something that sounds nice... but does nothing.
Hope you can help me with this, folks. It affects MANY combat classes across the board, and that's how it should be represented.
Thanks in advance,
Kathul, Eclipse Server
I know this is not EXACTLY what you are looking for but without the game running I cannot remember the exact move names that are affected. But basically your summary hits the key points. Here I will give you a "Fencer's Eye for the Non-Fencer Guy" and maybe you can gain something useful from it.
Fencers do not have a knockdown, we have a combination attack that allows us to achieve a knockdown... sometimes. It's player preference which comes first but it's the combination of a lunge attack anda dizzy attack (or dizzyand lunge) that gives us KD ability.There are multiple "levels" of those attacks such as lunge1 and lunge2 but the basic idea is to make your opponent change posture "down" and make them dizzy. This way when they try to change posture "up" they have a chance of falling flat on their back.
To put a Fencer spin on this (and I will do my best not to sound whiney but with you not being a Fencer this may help you understand the impact the recent changes had on us):
Fencers have low damage output, mostly that is by design. Low damage output over time means fights for Fencers tend to last longer. We have to go toe-to-toe with everything we fight over a longer period of time meaning wetake more damage. We are supposed to have a parry and dodge that are quite effective but if you ask any Fencer around they will tell you it is doing well to dodge or parry 1 blow a week, or in some cases a month - literally. So without any innate defenses, and because armor does more harm than good to us (since we have to spam specials to generate decent damage output) our only means of lowering the amount of damage done to us was to use our KD combo. This was the one equalizer we had againstwhite (roughly even) cons and up.
For a Fencer to achieve a knockdown we must be successful on5 separate conditions -4 attack basedand one status effect "roll". We must first hit with our lunge attack (again lunge/dizzy order does not really matter),if we hit we must also hope for the status effect of a posture change tobe applied- that's the first 2 conditions. Next we must hit with our dizzy attack,if we hit me must also hope for the dizzy status effect to be applied- the next 2 conditions. Then when our target changes posture we must hope they fail their "roll" and fall prey to the effects of the dizzy. So not only do we have to burn HAM on 2 sperate attacks there are 5 points of failure that can prevent a KD from happening.
Pre-patch I would say we had almost a 90% chance of this combination working. And when it didn't, we could at least try again before our target had beaten the snot out of us. Mind you thattrying again meant we had spent 4 special moves worth of HAM without any serious attempt at inflicting damage on our opponent- just trying to neutralize their own damage output. Why is not a serious attampt to inflict damage? We're using 2specials afterall, right? Our lunge lands for about 1-3pts of damage, rendering that round of combat for us essientially useless. So over the course of 2 rounds of combat we spend HAM for 2 attacks but only do meaningful damage in 1 of those rounds and if you average the damage done across the 2 rounds it's no better (or in some cases it'sworse) than just doing 2 basic attacks in that same duration - which would have cost us no HAM. But we accept this because we are setting our target up, we are burning HAM to achieve an advantadge that will allow us to make up our damage deficit since we get a bonus to prone targets. Since I know someone will point this out - In all fairness in the above example if you landed your dizzy but did not land your lunge you could try to just lunge again while the dizzy effect was still on your target which would drop the cost to 3 moves - butafter the patch dizzy does not last long enough now to count on it still being there when you lunge again - so I am taking a "worst case" approach pre and post patch.
Post-patch I don't even try knockdowns anymore. Even when both attacks land it seems the posture change and dizzy effects only "stick" about 30% of the time and that 30% rarely occurs at the same time (within the same combo). Then we must wait 30 seconds to try again- which means essientally we're going to lose that fight. Even when everything goes right It seems the duration of the status effects was shortened so as to make them useless in our application. This means that when we change our target's posture and then dizzy them, by the time they are attempting to posture "up" the dizzy effect has worn off. It lasts maybe 5 seconds now. So after burning 2 specials to achieve a KD, and successfully landing both moves and applying status effects... post-patch you will not get a KD or if you do it lasts maybe 1 "round" of combat - 1 blow from your target.
Pardon my ignorance of other professions but I believe in their cases it is a 1 for 1 deal. They have a special that causes a knockdown. 1 attack, 1 chance of failure or success. I could be wrong, it may be possible for them to land the attack (for damage) but not have the effect applied, I have never played a profession other than Fencer so I do not know but even in that case they have less than half of the preconditions we require to achieve a KD. They could attempt a knockdown 4 times for our 2 times and possibly at a lower total overall HAM cost depending on weapon choices.
I hope this information helps you with your post. The recent patch has been devastating to our profession.
Greetings,
Let me begin by saying I do not have logs of the following. I have, however, used these moves, and combos of these moves, for thousands of fights, and as such can relate them to you fairly accurately. At least from my point of view. 
Lunge duration has decreased dramatically. Before the patch, I could lunge, then just fit in 3 body hit 2s, and most creatures would just be standing back up to hit me after my 3rd style. Now, I lunge, and the mob is standing up to hit me between my 1st and 2nd style. In effect it seems to be reduced to saving us from 1 hit, or one combat round from the mob's point of view. I don't use lunge anymore, as it does nothing but help kill me.
Dizzy has changed. The duration of the effect is much more random, and seemingly much shorter. It is also much harder to land than before. Before patch, I would rarely fail to land a dizzy. Now, it seems to me my dizzy chances varied from mob to mob.. Some I would land right away, some, it'd take 3-5 tries to land one. On top of this, dizzy is only worthwhile when combo'd with the lunge. Other than that combo, I can see no gain from using a dizzy. It doesn't seem to make them hit for less, or miss more. I don't use dizzy anymore, as I don't use lunge.
Blind seems to have the same, or roughly the same, duration. However the chance to land it has gotten much worse as well. Whereas before patch I rarely failed to land a blind, now it usually takes me at least 2 tries, generally more like 3-4 to land the effect. While in pvp blind seems to have good effect on players, it can range from good to non-noticeable on mobs.
As far as I can tell, in relation to your question, any move that has a status effect has been altered. The chance to land such a hit remains the same, yet the chance of the effect landing has been reduced by anywhere from 20-50 percent. And on top of that, the durations of these status effects aren't living up to pre-patch numbers.
I have altered my combat style drastically. This is for pve, btw. Now I have 2 primary schemes. One is to pull, lay on a bleed and blind with a vibro blade, then swap to a curved sword, and swing freely. The other is to pull, land a blind, use the brawler skill intimidate, and style out with the vibro blade. This tactic works generally better, and more often, as long as intimidate lands..
A bit sad that my best solo combat move is the brawler intimidate skill.
-Onei Linn
Rex and Legacy, thanks, this is what I'm looking for. Now, pardon my ignorance, but I have a couple questions that hopefully your community can fill me in on.
Lunge: This is obviously your "primary" posture change move. Does it knock a person to kneeling or prone? Or both?
Status effects: One thing that I've noticed and also some other classes have mentioned is that a status effect like dizzy will "stick" to a target for a longer time if no other move that has a status effect is performed subsequent to the dizzy. Is this the case with y'all?
Can I assume that it is the lunge effect and dizzy effect that are the primary moves that have been altered for fencers? Also, can I have the specific names of those moves? Thanks so much, guys.
Lunge does 1 posture down from their current state. I.e., from standing to kneeling,or kneeling to prone.
I cannot comment on that for sure. I know that when I initially used dizzy along with blind, it didn't seem to last at all. Pre-patch, they both would stay on just fine, if I recall. I stopped using dizzy after having poor results with it staying on, and since I couldn't combo it with a lunge with any certainty. I can say that using the blind effect stays on just fine when i use Intimidate, so those two stack fine. When I can land them. 
Hehe, thisquestion struck me as a touch funny, I apologize.Other fencers might find it the same, but you wouldn't know since you are not a fencer. The moves are called as follows:
One Handed Blind - blinds
One Handed Dizzy - dizzy
OneHanded Lunge - posture change
Intimidate - Brawler skill, lowers damageand pos.ups to-hit on target
Note that there are 2 versions of the One Hand moves. When I speak, I speak of the first, i.e. 1hBlind1, as opposed to the advanced version.
You would have to get a vote from the community to see what the main moves altered are, I can't speak for everyone, but IMO, I'd say that's correct. The 30 second immunity timer, again IMO, is not the issue. The issue is the short, almost worthlessly short, time that the posture change(Lunge) is in effect. That coupled with the time it takes to combo that with Dizzy, renders that combo almost useless. Also under question, IMO, is the effectiveness of Dizzy as a stand alone move. All it seems to do when I get hit with it is make it so I can't sprint, can't sit, and can't make a camp or use an item.. Does nothing to my combat. And while that has it's own merit in pvp perhaps, a blind will do the same thing, from what I have seen..
-Onei Linn
I think the move names were covered already so you should have those.
Lunge, I believe, is our ONLY posture change move. And it's not even a Fencer move, it's from the base profession of Brawler. Which is why this is a bigger issue than just Fencers - all melee is affected by this. And again it was already mentioned but lunge only serves to "posture down" our target to the next level - standing to kneeling, kneeling to prone. It does not perform a "knockdown" by taking a standing target to prone (or on their back).
Prior to the patch I would be able to lunge/dizzy, bleed, blind, and intimidate a target and none of them seemed to affect the duration of any other. In fact that was my typical combat opening - a little costly on HAM but as long as the lunge/dizzy worked I would be fine since no exteranal damage was being dealt to me for at least a while and I had significantly lowered my targets combat effectiveness. They all seemed to stack without issue.
Rexx
this may aid you in your resource
www.swgcenter.com/info/SpecialMoves.asp
I wish I knew what the strange text at the start of all these posts was for - something buggy on the forum?
Anyway...
>Has your tanking role, as a result of the patch, suffered? That might be a ridiculous >question, but I figured I'd ask it.
It is a funny question because no melee profession period had any tanking abilty to begin with. But oddly enough that makes the answer to this "No, it hasn't altered my ability to tank" - prior to the patch I was able to run up to a mob and die in 4 hits, post patch I can assure you I am still able to do this.
>Also, remember, these changes are, no doubt, attempting to realize Holo's dictum that >no person should solo reds or yellows. How has your solo and grouping play been >altered?
I'll answer this first and then I have a digression about this subject. To answer:
My solo and grouping play tactics have not been altered much at all. Here's how it works - I am aCreature Handler, the primary for my guild, so when we group and hunt I send my pets in to pull a mob, I call them back to draw the mob away from it's buddies who might be social, at the proper range I command my pets to attack again stopping the mob at the desired distance. Then all of us in the group wait for about 5-10 seconds while the pets do some damage and take damage (this is just to be sure the pets will hold the aggro) Then the ranged folks open fire, and myself and the other melee folks inch, inch, inch our way just to the edge of our combat range and then begin attacking. Why? because if you close to within 1-2m (which you do when on follow) you'll draw aggro almost immediately. By the time we get to the proper range and start doing damage those with LLC's and Flamethrowers have had their fun and while they get 3-5k of XP myself and the other melee classes wind up getting a few hundred and sometimes reaching 1300-1400xp. My pets are battered so we must burn stims to heal them before we can repeat this process.
To me, this is grouping in SWG. This is how grouping works. Up till now I did not mind the meager 1 hand XP rewards because I was getting very good CH XP. Last night I made Master CH. Now there is little incentive to hunt this way. But... this is grouping in SWG. Pets are the tanks, and without my pets the guild could not hunt on the advanced planets.
Has the patch changed this? Nope. Has it affected this? Yes, somewhat. When I could put a mob on it's back I did more damage and got more of a slice of the XP pie. I could also use /follow to stay close to my target and knew that even if I had the aggro if I could put the mob on the ground he couldn't hit me. The difference? I felt like I was doing something before - running in and forcing them down and banging away was... hmmm what's that word... oh yeah! FUN! There was always that chance it wouldn't work - and that made it exciting. Now I am certain it will NOT work. So grouping and hunting has become this sterile exercise in creature pulling and tanking to line up targets for my BH and Commando guildmates. If we are careful, and if we do things right there is almost no danger involved. The biggest danger is avoiding aggro on the way to the hunting grounds. No danger, no excitement, no real XP gain - Why the hell am I doing this?
When I took Fencer I never expected it to be like this, when I took CH I never expected to use it the way I do now. Game mechanics have forced me into this role where only my CH skill is beneficial to the group and only I care about my Fencing skill - so I stick with it... I use the pets so I can get in my 7-8 whacks because I like being a Fencer. This is SWG, hope you like it.
As if this wasn't already long enough... Here's a digression about grouping in general...
I am 100% in agreement withnot being able to solo "high" con mobs- I have played many MMORPG's all of them with a "con" system and in all of those games things that conned above you were not good choices to solo. But on all those games the things that "conned" slightly above you WERE doable given proper usage of your skills and sometimes a little luck - that made it fun to TRY and take them on. Things that "conned" well above you were not to be fooled with unless you were in a group. Fair enough.
The real question to me here is - what are the mechanics that let grouping work to take down bigger prey?
A simple way is to think of grouping as doing 2 things - increasing damage over time, and increasing the overall health "pool" to a level able to deal with the high damage output of high level mobs. Simply put, there's more of you to hit the thing and more of you for the thing to hit.
Does it work this way though? Does the mob go through the group hitting each person once in turn, equally spreading it's damage across the group? Not that I recall. Should it work that way? God no! So how does it work? The mob picks out a target based on many factors - range, taunts, damage dealt, effects, etc - and decides "I'm going to kill... YOU!" Now any 1 person that was the target of this beast would surely die. But in every other game I have played the difference wasn't that you wouldn't die, the difference was.. I guess, how soon you would die. Let me explain:
I ALWAYS played a magic based class (or a ranged class if you prefer) I had paper armor and little health, yet I could deal massive damage. But in doing so I'd draw the attention of the thing I was trying to kill, and it would come after me - killing often in 2 blows (or less!) or about 3-5 seconds time. 3-5 is not typically enough time for another player to determine I have just made myself the aggro target and that it's going to eat me. Hence the healers rarely had time to save me. This is good. I SHOULD die that quickly. Being able to deal out heavy damage is balanced by the fact that I cannot TAKE damage - I am weak. This seems to be accepted because "magic" is related to frail old men wearing pointy hats - and old + frail + pointy hat = physically weak.
Now there were other people. People who could still do good (although less) damage, but boy could they take abuse - maybe they could last 6 or 7 hits from an uber mob - roughly 9-15 seconds time. Hmm, but these guys were designed to take a beating and the healers EXPECTED them to, so they were ready, and 9-15 seconds is plenty of time to see "oh the beastie has switched from target A to target B I need to heal target B now". And this allowed those people to go toe to toe with high level creatures quite well. Take away the healers, make them solo and you have 9 seconds until death - they CANNOT solo these mobs but they do "last a little longer" than those who prefer to stand back at a distance and deal damage. The balance here- more "toughness" but lower damage output than the highest level "ranged" classes.
The overall balance - high damage over less time, or lower damage over more time. Less time and more time here referring to "time until death"
So grouping works in these games because the guys who are tough can go in and protect those who are weaker. Now the tough guys are not invincible - they NEED those weak guys to pop off some BIG damage to make sure the fight does not go too long, and those weak guys NEED the tough guys to keep them alive long enough to DO some big damage. Wow - sounds like that might work pretty well!
What's wrong with grouping in SWG?
Problem: No real difference in available "health" based on profession. Which leads to no real difference between ranged or melee "toughness". The wizard is just as tough as the berserk viking to the mobs.
The fix? Give melee classes defense bonuses, dodges, parries to "virtually" increase their health by not taking so many hits. We all know this is broken. Or increase the vulnerabilty of mobs to melee damage. This was implemeted through the stances and damage modifers/multipliers. We now have no way to change stances on humanoid mobs and never have on creature mobs - so... broken.
Problem: No difference in armor types available to professions. The wizard can wear full plate too.
The fix?First make armor usable. It kills almost everyone. Second, maybe have armor certs? Just like weapons wouldn't you need to qualify in the use of armor? This keeps melee based clasess "tougher" than ranged. Yes this applies to PvP but look at in the sense that it makes melee folks USEFUL to ranged folks when in a group - it gives us an ability that they lack - to last 6 hits vs 2 hits against that uber mob.
So without any distinct "toughness" advantadge melee folks are stuck with the 2 hits and out just like ranged people. So there can be no tanking. Only pets with more (much more in most cases) HAM and armor that does not seem to kill them can go forward and tank. Which is sad, and is all wrong. People complain about the proliferation of pets and this is why - I hate it, but I understand why everyone wants a pet and why I am Master CH now.
All the changes, all the "fixes", the con changes, the statements about you shouldn't be able to solo this or that all seem to stem from one thing to me - too many people leveling up too quickly and reaching end game too soon. Let's make things that used to con white con blue now so that "blues" are harder. Knockdown is letting people kill white cons! (even after the above change) Let's get rid of it. And so on. There's not much to do at end game here folks so people will leave if they get there before the devs can put something in, or at leastbalance PvP which may take a long time - to be fair it's not easy to balance PvP in ANY game not just SWG.
Anyway there's a very long digression but hopefully it gives you more info on grouping and "tanking" and why there can be no tanking. I know I feel a little better just writing it
Rexx Remus
Master CH, 0-4-1-2 Fencer
Gorath