Pikeman Archive

I played around a little with this on TC, and honestly as it stands now I don't see it making a big difference (either positive or negative).

First, the initial switch is not delayed, you only run into the delay if you're trying to switch more than once within 3 seconds. You won't be delayed at all if you simply enter the fight holding a DoT weapon and then switch to another after sticking it. It could be an issue if swapping between 5 different weapons in quick succession (or if you accidentally unequip for a second and need to reequip quickly), but not when swapping from a single weapon to another.

Second, the switch isn't rejected, it's just delayed. So if you try to switch immediately it will take a couple seconds, but you don't have to monitor the timer to get the switch to take place.

Finally, three seconds really isn't that long, especially when you consider how slow many of our weapons are. Even at the speed cap it's only 3 hits, and with a mediocre potency DoT it may take that many for it to stick anyway. If you're a fencer/rifleman/whatever who picked up polearms 2 just for the DoTs it's probably already taking you more than 3 seconds just to land a hit.

So unfortunately I don't really see it deterring many people from picking up enough polearms to use DoTs, but I also don't think it's going to hinder us as much as people are expecting it to.

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Zydrigeon wrote:

why not just give each profession speed bonuses to switching weapons IN CLASS? ie your pikeman, you can switch out pikes faster than a fencer/pistoleer/bh/etc... Make the speed for switching weapons mod at Master level of each prof. that way you kill two birds with one stone. Dabblers are penalized, dots are better regulated, and Masters are just that, Masters of thier chosen weapon-type.

Craelion Lastday

Master Pikeman/Master Carbineer

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I really like that idea. Maybe if we can spread the idea to other combat profs, I doubt anybody else will like this, we can get a nice bit of leverage on the devs to introduce a weapon switch speed mod in the master box. imo the mod should negate the effects of the 3sec pauses alltogether.

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Zydrigeon wrote:

why not just give each profession speed bonuses to switching weapons IN CLASS? ie your pikeman, you can switch out pikes faster than a fencer/pistoleer/bh/etc... Make the speed for switching weapons mod at Master level of each prof. that way you kill two birds with one stone. Dabblers are penalized, dots are better regulated, and Masters are just that, Masters of thier chosen weapon-type.

Craelion Lastday

Master Pikeman/Master Carbineer

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I also like this idea.

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Combat_Medic_to_be wrote:

hopefully you are right in saying that if you switch within the same type of weapon it is instant but to other tpyes there is a delay. I quite like that and think that is fine.

If the 2nd idea you suggested about having a pike equipped for a minute then swapping to a pistol would be instant is implemented as well I just can't see the point in the delay in the first place. Ah well, we will see wont we.

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Like I said I *think* the delay is being forced onto the entire playerbase to keep a certain profession that has the ability to manipulate the force from exploiting. In Star Wars force powers are encumbered by armor. That'swhyyou see Jedi's wearing nothing but robes, because the heaviness of armor encumbers them and affects their ability to use the force. The next publish will enforce this restriction on the "Jedi" so that they can't use specials or force powers with armor on. The delay was added to prevent the "Jedi" from using macros to instantly take their armor off, use a special or force power and macro the armor back on.

The change won't mean jack to most professions because most people (like say us pikemen for instance) usually stick to one weapon type. However for a profession like Bounty Hunter it's writing on the wall. I've got a BH as well as a pikeman. As a BH I switch weapon types constantly using carbines, pistols and heavy weapons in a fight and switching often. 3 seconds may not seem like a long time but when a fight only last for about 20 to 30 seconds it can be. There have been some tests by some BH's and they haven't been too burdened by the change but I've always had 2 questions concerning this.

1. If it ain't broke don't fix it. There is no harm in allowing a person to switch weapons on the fly so why is this "fix" needed?

2. Why not make the restriction to armor only and leave weapons alone?

It is bad news for the BHs. The devs could remedy this by making it such that switching between weapon types within a profession gives no delay. For BHs, this would cover pistols, carbines and rifles. I also think that this was put in to stop Jedi from using a macro to take armor off, fire a lightsaber special, and put armor back on immediately.

antares
master pikeman