Pikeman Archive
Thread: Pikeman Update
Gunman having read many of your posts for many months I've not always found myself agreeing with your point of view, however you seem willing to listen to the pike population at large therefore you've got my full support in a means to an end.
Accuracy, ham, toughness and block seem to pretty much cover the major issues. Better weapons might be a pipe dream but worth a mention.
Once again grats, good luck, now dont f#&k up.
Legwand Longfellow
Master Pikeman
Weapon Accuracy/ HAM Costs / Toughness (also: Ranged + Melee Defense)
Focus on that, and I mean dramatic increases in Weapon Accuracy and dramatic decreases in HAM costs. Post theaccuracy mods at all rangesfor the LVA to them in the Correspondent, ask them why it's like that.
Make sure it is clear those are our priorities... class definition and the rest of that junk (low dps will be fixed with higher accuracy) is not important at this point.
LACK OF DEFENCES.
We need an answer as to why other melee classes and even ranged classes like Pistoleer get higher defences vs Knockdown and Dizzy than us.
The high ham costs and the fact our Knockdown and Dizzy have little chance of succeeding vs other players makes using these moves useless...
yet when if we are hit with KD it has a very high chance of sticking.
dont put speed on the list, pikeman is a slow hard hitting class, we arent meant to hit as fast as fencers or TKA's, with a 4.4 long vibro axe at master, you hit just as fast, maybe a tiny bit slower then a fencer does with regular attack, so dont complain about something that is fine at master
i think you should focus the list in on one thing, like defenses, fix block, increase the pikeman's melee/ranged defenses, add ALOT of toughness
i dont think we should have the right to ask for good defense, high toughness, fast speed, best damage, im looking for them to improve pikeman, but giving us the best defense and the best damage isnt going to happen, and i think for most people, they would rather be a more defensive class then offensive
Damage output / More PvP issues / Class Definition
Clearly Master Pikemen are a force to be reckoned with in PvE [see www.andrewlee.dsl.pipex.com/pikeman.jpg for proof]
Using our Area Moves we can out damage any other melee class, by hitting a number of targets simultaneously for high damage.
Therefore I see Pikeman as being the melee equivalent to riflemen...initially slow but capable of dishing high damage at higher levels...
However when Pikemen are put into a 1v1 PvP encounter as stated above it is futile relying on our knockdown to win a confrontation and the area moves won't dish out any extra damage.
So what are we left with:
1 Random HAM pool attack [using a regular vibrolance/lva this hits for 400-500 damage in PvP], will take 4-5 hits to incap an unbuffed target who doesnt heal.
or we can use leghit 3 for 300 damage a time to Action Pool, also healable.
That's it we have no other attacks, yet Fencers and swordsmen can hit and bleed the Mindpool which is unhealable....TKA can blind decreasing our accuracy even further and can also hit just as hard.
In short we need Better Specials!
We are meant to be the hardest hitting Melee class yet since the PvP damage reduction patch we are doing the same damage as other melee classes [who also swing faster at master level than us] and we are being out damaged by Riflemen [3000 damage every second] and by Pistoleers [krayt enhanced FWG5 + fanshot = 500-600 damage a second].
for me the first issue is BLOCK. If that thing work that will be really nice i could be able to tank.
I'm a noob pikeman. (need to get to polearms IV). All I'm missing for master brawler is polearms IV.
Getting unarmed IV was slow but doable. One hand IV and two hand IV was fine and pretty easy. Polearms I was ok, polearms II was a bit difficult but not too bad. When I hit polearms III I got a Long Vibro Axe and then the pain began.
I'm tired of missing 5-6 times in a row all the time
Gotta love those -50 accuracy modifiers.
Fix accuracy please.
However Gunman21 could you create a pikeman on TC and tell us how the new accuracy mods work. The patch notes say the accuracy modifiers have been increased for pikeman. Could you give us a lowdown?
I guess I will throw in my 2 cents as well.
I would say our damage should be increased a little, as it is I have seen power hammers that do more damage than our best crafter made LVA. Our speed is fine so long as our damage will be increased. Our defense would get a nice boost if our Block would actually block the damage. Our accuracy does suck, but if we get our damage increased I would think that could be the trade off. More defense mods, keep our ranged defense the same, bump our melee defense up though. I would like to see the pikeman rule hand to hand combat, but be weaker than the other melee classes against ranged attacks. Toughness...nuff said.
To put it in a list:
1. Damage - needs to be increased so it is more then a 2-handed swordmens damage
2. Block - I put this here since it is the one thing that is actually broken in our class and so should be fixed as soon as possible.
3. Toughness
4. Melee defense - increase this so pikeman have the highest melee defense of any class
5. HAM costs - this is more of a weapon problem than pikeman problem, hence it is not the top issue. For the most part HAM costs suck on our main weapons, if you aren't buffed you can always change weapons for a better HAM stats, and accuracy. The problem with this is that no one wants to not use their best weapon.
One suggestion, don't use the LVA, in my opinion it should not be used till at least novice pikeman, keep using your lance, it will do a lot better for you. Others may disagree, but that is what my experience was
atimes wrote:
I'm a noob pikeman. (need to get to polearms IV). All I'm missing for master brawler is polearms IV.
Getting unarmed IV was slow but doable. One hand IV and two hand IV was fine and pretty easy. Polearms I was ok, polearms II was a bit difficult but not too bad. When I hit polearms III I got a Long Vibro Axe and then the pain began.
I'm tired of missing 5-6 times in a row all the time
Gotta love those -50 accuracy modifiers.
Fix accuracy please.
However Gunman21 could you create a pikeman on TC and tell us how the new accuracy mods work. The patch notes say the accuracy modifiers have been increased for pikeman. Could you give us a lowdown?
Accuracy is the key to everything, first and foremost.
With our current accuracy, you cannot properly determine our true DPS because there is no effective way to formulate accuracy into it, so we have no base with which to ask for a damage increase. Thusly, because of our accuracy, our damage is low, so we fight longer, taking more damage. Our poor defenses would be helped out if we were accurate, thus inflicting more damage, killing the creature quicker. Also, the problem is not so much HAM cost, but that so much HAM is wasted when we miss. Fix accuracy, we miss less, need to use less specials.
As I stated, until accuracy is fixed, it is impossible to accurately determine where I profession relates, as accuracy is a constant variable, so it is different for all of us at any given time.
Gunman21 wrote:
Hey everyone
TH appointed me Pikeman correspondent a little while ago,
Excellent work Gunman21! I was hoping for either you or Antares_kauri, so this is a nice change in the pace. I wish you luck with the new status and hope you get our list of issues translated into a language the DEVs might listen to.
again, excellent work
Personally, i agree with our accuracy and our ham and our dam modifiers being broken BUT, if the devs took the time to define the calsses say: swordsmen are good at A,B,C but bad at D,E,F and so on for each class, then we wouldnt have to argue that our accuracy or our ham drains are out of wack - it would be obvious.
Definition would sort the list of things that are broken and things that people want (which usually just cause a bottleneck situation and the broken things never get seen)
With definition we wouldnt be left wondering what our role is because they would state it clearly and then if they didnt deliver it would be plain as day.
Class definition is the most important thing because it blankets all of out other problems, however it is the hardest for the devs to achieve since they would have to restructure the entire melee setup ( and ranged too, since they dont want people getting the idea that care about melee)
So it's a dopuble edged pike if you will, we can push for all the little things and get denied because we end up looking like pistoleers in the end (whining to be better than BHs) or we can push for one big thing, and face a much harder slope.
ponder if you will