Fencer Archive

<This was placed as a reply but had meant it to be its own message>

Face it, Fencers are weak.Fencers are the red headed stepchildren of a red headed step child combat type (melee).

Now that 1hand lunge is useless, the 1hlunge + dizzy knockdown combo no longer works. This used to be my only defense against ranged users. In a scenario of my high level fencer vs someone using ranged that combo was my only hope of even standing a chance, now with that gone i am useless in pvp vs a ranged user.

Here's the problems *I* see with fencer as well as some ideas taken from my experience as a IRL Epee fencer. Below are some ideas as to how to fix said problems, in order to make the fencer class a more fair, balanced, and realistic combat class.

1. Weapon speed. How is it that 2 hand swords do 2x more dmg and are just as fast?

2. Defensive skills. Everyone knows fencing is not hack and slash. Think Parry, Block, Thrust. Touche!

3.Lack of decent quest weapon. You mean i spent 8 friggin hours running jabba missions to get a sword that sucks compared to the 1h curved i bought for 3000 credits?

4. Absence of decent special moves. I find it hard to believe other ranged classes get a disarm shot and fencers dont. Go watch a real life epee fencing match, disarm is the name of the game. Dont even get me started on how other classes get bleeding shots, but fencers who study technique, as well as wound placement lack this ability. In my ex-profession I've seenmore gunshots, and quite a few blade inflicted wounds in real life than i would have liked to, and let me tell you there isnothing nastier and bloodier than aknife wound.

5. Variety of weapons, or lack thereof. Why do ranged pistol users have 3x more weapons to choose from? You mean to tell me theres 101 different kinds of pistols, but only 5 or 6 types of swords in the known galaxy??!?!

6. Inability to use dual weapons. If you're going to make us just as slow as 2 handed swordsmen, but do half the dmg, and give us less usefull special moves, atleast let us double up so we can do just as much dmg. SOME reacharound is in order here. To make it fair give us dual weapons, which when used give us an extra attack, but with a less likely chance to hit but at the same time adding to defense (think parrying knife etc.)

7. Stun batons. Why is it that stun batons, despite the name, dont STUN?

8. Abscence of melee toughness. Am i to believe an elite melee artist is just as subsceptable to kinetic dmg as a ranged user?!?!?

These are some of my gripes as well as a few ideas. I could list 2 dozen other gripes, but that would concern all Meele combat artists. Lets face it, if you ever want to get anywhere in this game forget being melee. For the time beingi reccomend Meele as a side skill,kind of a useless hobby.

DEVS: Either fish or cut bait. Make us tankers (or in some way shape or form usefull) or just cut meele out of the game altogether, except for jedi. People wownt even invite me into hunting parties if i plan on using my sword as i am just a drain on their stimpacks, dont absorb more dmg, do less dmg, and die quicker. Used to be meele artists were welcomed into parties, to run up and take the hits while the ranged guys give support from the back row, but with CH pets the way they are, we're out of a job.

Fencer- SEE: Least desirable Meele elite profession.

Melee- SEE: Obsolete.

P.S.

If you are reading this and agree with me reply back and gimme a HELL YEAH.

Put YOUR 2 cents in.

Duncann Idaho

Duelist extraordinaire

Kettemore

1. Agree

2. Agree

3. Agree

4. We do get a bleed in the footwork line... we also get 3 different variations of blind *shrug*

5. Agree

6. Agree

7. I think that was the devs way ofjust rubbing in that when it comes to our class, we really did get the shaft

8. Agree

So very true! AMEN!

I will give you a hell yeah to that! I think all of those ideas are really well thought out and would make the fencer life so much more enjoyable.

Stun batons don't stun, they do stun damage. From what I can tell, stun damage is probably better than the ability to stun, which doesn't seem to do anything. Stun damage is good because all armor is vulnerable to stun damage except PSGs and stun layered armor. However, the stats on these are pretty attrocious, and it is a baton for crying out loud. Fencers defintely need actual fencer weapons instead of batons and butterknives.

1. Agree. They need to fix the weapon speed bugs.

2. Agree. Very badly needed.

3. Lack of almost any quest type weapon.. Jabba's happened to give some commando and bounty hunter weapons as rewards, but they weren't remotely unique, or even that good, compared to a built one.

4. We get a bleed move. As for specials, I agree, there could be more. However, looking at the way combat plays out in this game, it's all about damage. There just aren't that many status effects coded into the game. So all different specials would give you were different levels of damage.. Much like now.. They just need to think out our current specials a bit, perhaps shake them up.

5. It's not quite that bad. Pistol users have about 14 weapons to choose from. We have about 9. Still, there definitely needs to be more varied weapons in the game, even if they make some of the rare. Far too little diversity, among most of the weapon users.

6. No No No No No! I am absolutely opposed to dual wield. Why? A few reasons. One, they'd have to completely redo our damage tables.. and to not make dual wield overpowered compared to 1 weapon, either the bonus for it will suck, meaning it's mostly cosmetic, or the bonus for it will rock, making it just above most other elite profession's damage capability. If they make it rock, then common sense says that damage from using only 1 sword will probably be much less, and probably be sub par, forcing fencers that want to remain competitive to go dual or give it up. I personally don't want that. And as for the first way, mostly cosmetic, that would be worthless to me as well. Second, if you open up the can of worms that is Dual Wield, then you end up most likely letting the other class that reasonably could dual wield, pistoleers, have it. And giving them a bump like that, would throw everyone out of whack even more.

7. Stun batons do stun damage, as stated a few times above.. Besides, I have traps that do stuns, it's not all that. You're not missing a thing.

8. Agree. Ties into 2, really. They need to look at these so called defensive numbers we all get.

-Onei Linn

Well the idea i had was to allow dual wield but give the second weapon a less likely chance of hitting but with an added bonus of defense. Believe me, if you took the best made 1h sword and doubled its damage it would still be quite a bit below some of the 2h meele weapons max dmg. and with 1h and 2h artists doing about the same speed like they are right now, i believe it would balance out nicely.

You got to look on the bright side, people: we have, in all aspects, replaced the Commando class! Yep, now that they are effective, we're the ones who can attack a gnort and have it gnaw our legs off before we manage to get our blades inside it's thin, leathery hide!

As if we weren't useless enough in PvP the way it was...

Greetings,

For about a month I have read the posts on this board.

Now that SoE have forced me to login to read the posts I will now actually post to a few.

1. Weapon speed. How is it that 2 hand swords do 2x more dmg and are just as fast?

This is really bad and one of my biggest problems in the game. All Melee really should put out comparable damage for simular levels of ability. Some faster but lower output (Fencers and unarmed). Others Slower but more damage (Swordsman and Pikeman). Unfortunatly The way the weapons have been made and the 1.0 second speed cap we have been left in the worst position. The heavy melee wepons with skill mods can do more DPS than ours (which at the same skill level is just not right).

2. Defensive skills. Everyone knows fencing is not hack and slash. Think Parry, Block, Thrust. Touche!

Agreed!

3. Lack of decent quest weapon. You mean i spent 8 friggin hours running jabba missions to get a sword that sucks compared to the 1h curved i bought for 3000 credits?

IMO the only 2 swords worth using are the curved sword and the Ryyk. VB's are nice but look like knives. I have not done the Jabba quest so have no idea.

4. Absence of decent special moves. I find it hard to believe other ranged classes get a disarm shot and fencers dont. Go watch a real life epee fencing match, disarm is the name of the game. Dont even get me started on how other classes get bleeding shots, but fencers who study technique, as well as wound placement lack this ability. In my ex-profession I've seen more gunshots, and quite a few blade inflicted wounds in real life than i would have liked to, and let me tell you there is nothing nastier and bloodier than a knife wound.

I don't have much of a problem with the special moves. I don't use them unless I am solo'ing and then I only use Healthhit3. This allows me to target the mobs health pool only and therefore fights don't last too long.

The problem I do have is the lunge/dizzy combination. The worst mistake ever done to fencers since I have been playing. They should now remove lunge/dizzy/AE dizzy from use and replace them with something else. Or... Put it back the way it was.

5. Variety of weapons, or lack thereof. Why do ranged pistol users have 3x more weapons to choose from? You mean to tell me theres 101 different kinds of pistols, but only 5 or 6 types of swords in the known galaxy??!?!

I only use a Ryyk. Mainly for damage but they look kinda cool too. More variety (and please, make them look like swords and not other stuff) would be nice.

6. Inability to use dual weapons. If you're going to make us just as slow as 2 handed swordsmen, but do half the dmg, and give us less usefull special moves, atleast let us double up so we can do just as much dmg. SOME reacharound is in order here. To make it fair give us dual weapons, which when used give us an extra attack, but with a less likely chance to hit but at the same time adding to defense (think parrying knife etc.)

I am not actually for duel weilding but an extra attack would be nice. This would give us more speed if we doubled attacked every now and again.

7. Stun batons. Why is it that stun batons, despite the name, dont STUN?
Never used one.

8. Abscence of melee toughness. Am i to believe an elite melee artist is just as subsceptable to kinetic dmg as a ranged user?!?!?

Don't know much about this!

Astill

Aurora Noctum

Valcyn

"The force will be with me always!"

i elect this person the fencer correspondent.

Lol. The only class with disarmshot is, I believe. pistoleer. And it hasn't ever worked.

To defend the devs, they balance fencers perfectly... We are now just as bad in PvP as we are in PvE. I always figured that was our big thing, we could kick ass in duels...hence the title duelest. I used to run around with that title and house people now I am embarrased to show my blademaster title.