Fencer Archive
Thread: Speculations on the combat rebalance? Chime in!
Here's some things we know:
- Armor will get reduced and RIS will become the best armor in the game. Mandalorian will also be extremely good. Both these armors are hard to get.
- Possble armor certs?
- Speed calculations are being completely redone. Slower weapons will be slower, even with the Master box.
- Lightsabres have new stats much lower than previous stats. These hint at new damage range and speed of weapons.
- Hints that profession advancement will eventually require quests, rather than just require the grind. (Post JTL).
- Fencers won't change much. (We seem to be the bellweather for the melee professions.)
- Fencers and Pistoleers will get dual wield sometime after JTL. The motion capture is done.
- Newly introduced weapons are based on the rebalanced combat system, so weapons like the Executioner's Hack, which doesn't look so hot today, will look much hotter after the balance.
- Existing caps won't change.
- Skill mods and damage reduction will be tied to professions. In other words, you either get your pistoleer dodge bonus or your fencer dodge bonus, but not both at once. Likewise, you either get you ranged damage reduction or your melee damage reduction, but not both.
- We will have redesigned HAM bars. Specials will be drawn from a pool determined by the HAM bar, but which drains and restores seperately.
- Combat changes will happen in a "Sandbox" server, allowing quick changes based on testing. There will be limited access to the sandbox. The details will be thrashed out in this environment, which is why we aren't getting hard numbers.
- Buffs will be rebalance, too.
- Targeted pools will now harder to hit, and only have a higher chance to hit that targeted spot. A head shot might wind up doing health or action damage.
- Specials will have drastically increased costs. you will use them as "specials" for their special effects, not spam them as basic attacks.
- Every armor will be vulnreable to lightsabre dmg no matter what except jedi robes.
- there will be some sort of mindheal, most definetly and it will be widely available
- foods / drinks and their effects will be redone once again
- spices and their effects will be redone once again
- wearing armor will cause movement speed reduction
- wearing armor will cause attack speed reduction
- you will never kill yourself again from using up all your HAM on specials in the new system
- not all players will move at same speed. for example a rifleman or flamethrower (or any large weapon) equipped commando will run much slower then unarmed TKA
- there will be 5 seconds delay on equiping and unequiping weapons and it will be inturraptable like bringing out your vehicle
- there will be 5 seconds delay on equiping each piece of armor and it also will be inturraptable
- riflemen will get a melee "rifle butt?" attack in return for geting speed nerfed
- combat tumbling will work !!! it will be used for much more besides macroing medics at the med centers
- you will be able to stand back up and not fall down after a KD but you will take some wounds when doing so
- perhaps other abilities at the cost of taking wounds or mad BF
Thanks for everyone who's added to the list!
Anything else?
Message Edited by VemaGara on 06-08-2004 11:51 AM
Message Edited by VemaGara on 06-08-2004 12:17 PM
Message Edited by VemaGara on 06-08-2004 03:42 PM
Message Edited by VemaGara on 06-09-2004 11:50 AM
Seems to me that the biggest issue here is the armor nerfs, and fencer won't be near as powerful if we can't wear the armor/buffs to protect ourself from nearly every attack in the game.
Thus, a swordsman's headhit3 (especially with a high damage slice executioners hack or scythe blade) will be much more devastating as it will actually do damage through armor. The ability to dodge, and dizzy PD may be the only thing to stop the hacking of our mind.
FallAM wrote:
This should stop the master swordsman from totally owning. I know mandolorian armor is vuln to stun, so I have a feeling we'll still be ripping through people, even when we cant fire off the specials quite as fast.
With the armour changes you will probably see stun damage get a bit of a nerf, atm most armours are vulnerable to it making it great in PvP. I wouldn't be surpised if the Devs change is to there is nolonger one type of damage that dominates in PvP.
I want to know exactly what skill mods are being tied to professions. Melee/Range Defenses?State Defenses? Melee and Range Mitigation should always work, no matter what weapon you are holding, imo. just because you don't have a pistol in your hand doesn suddenly mean you forgeta skill. The opposite can be said for defenses, like dodge...you learn the same skill doesn't mean they should combine. If someone is Master Pistoleer master Fencer they should get the Highest of the Dodge skills not a combination of both, imo.
What are they doing about healing and CM poisons and Diseases? Both are overpowered for PvP.
Given that padawans only benefit from Jedi stuff while wielding lightsabers, I'd guess that this is an absolute. The mixing/matching templates caused great headaches for the devs in terms of balance. Removing that lets them better tune each profession. In other words, you can have full template freedom, but all templates get a little nerfed to minimize abuses, or you seperate the skills, denying the player some freedoms, but letting the devs better work out the balance.
Currently, to be a competative pistoleer, you need both pistoleer and fencer to max out your dodge. So you wind up being far better than either a pistoleer or a fencer. In the new system, master fencers are roughtly equal to other master fencers, no matter what other profession you happen to be. This will equalize the PvP field.
Of course, anything/master doc will still kick mighty.
Its too early to tell... period. Gusses and assumptions are just that and untill we get some hard testing done on TC it's a mute point in my mind.
I would like to think however that we will once again be at the point where our fast attacks and stun weapon will balance us vs the slow attacks and raw power of swordsmen.
I've been thinking about the implications of the revised HAM cost system.
It sounds like specials will deplete a different pool or a subset pool that recharges. They said it would be something like "agility." It sounds kind of like the arcade-style fighter games where your special attacks are governed by a different bar. Could be interesting. But I believe this idea has been around for a while. This would make a distinction between something like "effort" or "exertion" as opposed to actual injury or damage.
It would mean different tactics-- either deplete your ability to do specials right away, and then hang for a little bit waiting for the pool to replenish, or save your special pool(s) to finish the fight. Another analogy would be like a boxer, using jabs to keep your opponent at bay or wear him down without exhausting yourself, then wait for the opportunity to deliver a more decisive hit.
Some other implications:
- There's no way to tell at this point whether buffs will still allow you to spam away.
- Fencer templates that rely heavily on medical skills will be slower to level-- no need to heal unless your friends are actually injured, so no medical xp by following your friends around and replenishing their pools when they spam, and it seems to also mean no healing in non-combat situations like cantinas or tumblers.
- Heavier damaging combat professions will perhaps do more damage but will need to manage HAM costs.
Someunrelated notes, someone posted a remark that there was no problem with stun damage-- the problem was that armor was too strong against the other damage types.
I also saw a remark that melee and ranged mitigation will only work with a corresponding weaponequipped.
Also, they supposedly talked about ranged, melee, dodge, block, and counter capping at 125-- since this is already the case, I wasn't clear from the report whether this will remain the same.
- Specials will have drastically increased costs. you will use them as "specials" for their special effects, not spam them as basic attacks.
- Every armor will be vulnreable to lightsabre dmg no matter what except jedi robes.
- there will be some sort of mindheal, most definetly and it will be widely available
- foods / drinks and their effects will be redone once again
- spices and their effects will be redone once again
- wearing armor will cause movement speed reduction
- wearing armor will cause attack speed reduction
- you will never kill yourself again from using up all your HAM on specials in the new system
- not all players will move at same speed. for example a rifleman or flamethrower (or any large weapon) equipped commando will run much slower then unarmed TKA
- there will be 5 seconds delay on equiping and unequiping weapons and it will be inturraptable like bringing out your vehicle
- there will be 5 seconds delay on equiping each piece of armor and it also will be inturraptable
- riflemen will get a melee "rifle butt?" attack in return for geting speed nerfed
- combat tumbling will work !!! it will be used for much more besides macroing medics at the med centers
- you will be able to stand back up and not fall down after a KD but you will take some wounds when doing so
- perhaps other abilities at the cost of taking wounds or mad BF
i think thats all that i know off from various interviews, fanfaire and whatnot. bits and pieces to add to the original.
Message Edited by Pire on 06-08-2004 08:14 PM
wow, no one else has heard any different details ? and here i thought all this listed so far was so interesting.