Pikeman Archive
Thread: Don't worry Pikemen...you're secret is safe with me.
Not to mention the defense/speed/damage issues as well.
There have been some improvements to the range mods and we've received some small accuracy mods, but don't think because you're up to polearms 2 that you can disregard the experiences of those who have been pikemen for 8-9 months.
antares
master pikeman
Message Edited by antares_Kauri on 04-07-2004 11:49 AM
Not dissing your experiences, as a matter of fact, I seek your wisdom!
How come I would go buy one of those weapons you described, when I saw all kinds of speed and damage sliced (basic) lances that have positive modifiers for sale? I bought a speed sliced one that was 2.8 spd 283 maxdam because I figured I would be hella slow at first, but I thought the damage sliced ones would be good for me to use even beyond novice.
Are the negative modifier weapons you were talking about that much better that I wouldn't use, I dunno, say... a 3.5 spd max damage 360 lance with +11 modifiers at all ranges?
DarthBarrak wrote:
Yikes, you guys are a tough crowd. I guess this game and this forum is notaboutfun for many of you. I know little about mastering pikeman as you do andmy original post was not intended to disrespect anyone or your professions. It was merely an unsuccesful attempt to tell you in a humorous way that I was having fun trying outthe staffs and lances and other basic stuff. I guess I came off the wrong way, for that I apologize. It seems that people are quick to flame any thing here on the forums, so I guess I won't post any more crap, lol.
Yeah you did come off the wrong way. I think it was the "I'm at polearms II and pikeman is not nearly as bad as you all say it is. I've been a novice brawler for a few hours and I know everything and you guys are full of it" attitude your post took 
You haven't even scratched the surface of pikeman yet. It's like being at Carbines I in the marksman tree and calling the carbineers a bunch of whiners for saying their profession needs help.
As soon as you get your first Long Vibro Axe (trust meyou will get one if you ever want to finish the profession) you will slowly understand what we are all talking about. The profession is very fun but it does have major major problems and is the most gimped melee profession in the game.
The profession is unplayable without doc buffs because HAM costs are very high.
The range mods on the LVA make the weapon unusable (they used to be -50 but are now -30) until you get to novice pikeman and even then it may not be usable until you get to support II. Let that sink in for a second. The weapon of choice for the profession is totally unusable without +100 polearm accuracy. How many other professionspractically requirea +100 accuracy mod before their weapon of choice becomes usable? Can you imagine the uproar if Pistoleers required a +100 accuracy mod before they could hit anything with the FWG5 or if +100 Carbine accuracy were required to land a hit with a laser carbine?
Our low level weapons with the exception of the metal staff are artisan items. This means that the only players making them are artisans (not weaponsmiths)and they are usually only grind quality off the bazaar. It's rare to see a wood staff or a reinforced combat staff that is actually decent. Trust me,you got LUCKY with your wooden staff.
Our premier profession specific loot drop is dropped by one of the hardest mobs in the game that has 100% resists to our two damage types and is not nearly worth the effort involved in acquiring it. That means the mob that drops the pikeman loot cannot be damaged by a pikeman. While swordsmen get fast AP2 scythe's and fencers get acklay enhanced stun batons we get a AP1 energy weapon withbroken particle effectsthat has to be looted from a 400K HAM mob that spawns rarely.
Our defenses are the lowest for all melee professions. Our total toughness is almost lower than what all other melee professions get at their 4th tier brawler skill level. All other brawlers get +10 toughness. We get +4. We have the lowest melee toughness to go along with the lowest melee defenses.
Our defensive mod (block) still allows damage and this is intended. So while dodge results in zero damage and counterattack results in zero damage the profession with the least amount of defenses STILL takes damage when their defensive mod kicks in. COB actually HURTS us instead of helping us.
It took the devs 8 months to fix one of our biggest profession gripes (horrible range mods for the LVA) and that came about because our correspondent got on them for fixing the range mods for the scythe (which were not nearly as bad) and still ignoring us. If it wasn't for Gunman's efforts the LVA would still have -50 range mods.
I could continue but I think you get the point.
Don't forget. Block does reduces the damage we take by 50% when we get hit by somethign and it successfully fires.
TKAs have +57 toughness. That means every hit that they take is reduced by 57%. Every time.
When they are centered they get "missed" all the time to.
Swordsman has +46 toughness. They get a 46% reduction to all damage. On top of that, when they are centered they Counter attack and get a 100% reduction to all damage, almost every time.
Pikeman gets +26 toughness. For a 26% reduction in all damage, and we do center of being we Block constantly and take 50% of the original damage.
I don't know if the 26% toughness even kicks in when we block.
Keep with it, we obviously all (holoers not included) enjoy it after all in some way, so it can't be all bad and I don't think it's as bad as some people (holoers mainly) make it out to be. It definitely has issues, though.
The staff/basic lance comparison is very much like using a DH17 carbine as the measure for carbineer, DLT20 rifle for Riflemen or a stim A for doctor. Big differences.
antares
master pikeman
Message Edited by antares_Kauri on 04-07-2004 01:42 PM
atimes wrote:
DarthBarrak wrote:
Yikes, you guys are a tough crowd. I guess this game and this forum is notaboutfun for many of you. I know little about mastering pikeman as you do andmy original post was not intended to disrespect anyone or your professions. It was merely an unsuccesful attempt to tell you in a humorous way that I was having fun trying outthe staffs and lances and other basic stuff. I guess I came off the wrong way, for that I apologize. It seems that people are quick to flame any thing here on the forums, so I guess I won't post any more crap, lol.
Yeah you did come off the wrong way. I think it was the "I'm at polearms II and pikeman is not nearly as bad as you all say it is. I've been a novice brawler for a few hours and I know everything and you guys are full of it" attitude your post took
You haven't even scratched the surface of pikeman yet. It's like being at Carbines I in the marksman tree and calling the carbineers a bunch of whiners for saying their profession needs help.
As soon as you get your first Long Vibro Axe (trust meyou will get one if you ever want to finish the profession) you will slowly understand what we are all talking about. The profession is very fun but it does have major major problems and is the most gimped melee profession in the game.
The profession is unplayable without doc buffs because HAM costs are very high.
The range mods on the LVA make the weapon unusable (they used to be -50 but are now -30) until you get to novice pikeman and even then it may not be usable until you get to support II. Let that sink in for a second. The weapon of choice for the profession is totally unusable without +100 polearm accuracy. How many other professionspractically requirea +100 accuracy mod before their weapon of choice becomes usable? Can you imagine the uproar if Pistoleers required a +100 accuracy mod before they could hit anything with the FWG5 or if +100 Carbine accuracy were required to land a hit with a laser carbine?
Our low level weapons with the exception of the metal staff are artisan items. This means that the only players making them are artisans (not weaponsmiths)and they are usually only grind quality off the bazaar. It's rare to see a wood staff or a reinforced combat staff that is actually decent. Trust me,you got LUCKY with your wooden staff.
Our premier profession specific loot drop is dropped by one of the hardest mobs in the game that has 100% resists to our two damage types and is not nearly worth the effort involved in acquiring it. That means the mob that drops the pikeman loot cannot be damaged by a pikeman. While swordsmen get fast AP2 scythe's and fencers get acklay enhanced stun batons we get a AP1 energy weapon withbroken particle effectsthat has to be looted from a 400K HAM mob that spawns rarely.
Our defenses are the lowest for all melee professions. Our total toughness is almost lower than what all other melee professions get at their 4th tier brawler skill level. All other brawlers get +10 toughness. We get +4. We have the lowest melee toughness to go along with the lowest melee defenses.
Our defensive mod (block) still allows damage and this is intended. So while dodge results in zero damage and counterattack results in zero damage the profession with the least amount of defenses STILL takes damage when their defensive mod kicks in. COB actually HURTS us instead of helping us.
It took the devs 8 months to fix one of our biggest profession gripes (horrible range mods for the LVA) and that came about because our correspondent got on them for fixing the range mods for the scythe (which were not nearly as bad) and still ignoring us. If it wasn't for Gunman's efforts the LVA would still have -50 range mods.
I could continue but I think you get the point.
I actually agree with you for the most part....I just wanted to add a little something though.
First of all, there is a huge problem in the SWG community and that everyone seems to think that all combat professions should be just about equal or close to equal.....for instance, as soon as one profession gets a fix or has some special, defense or weapon that's better than another profession......people start screaming that the lesser profession needs a fix to be on par with the stronger profession. Personally, I have a problem with a blunt hammer doing more damage than a sword.....and I really have a problem with fists (TKA) doing more damage than any of the other weapon based professions....There is no fist in the world that can cause more damage than a gun, knife, sword or anything with a blade.....but thats another issue.
While fencers get better Defense than pikeman.....Pikeman out-damage fencers about 3 to 1.....at polearms 2, I could get 1k hits constantly......in 100 hit's I estimate I would do at least 20 1k hits easily......now as a novice fencer (3 boxes higher than polearms 2) I barely reach 1k hits and got lucky if I got 10 of them out of 100 hits. At novice pikeman, I can easily get 2k hits. Pikeman do get AP2 weapons, most other professions only get AP1, in the case of fencer...they only get a very weak vibro blade with AP1 but is basically uselss because it's damage is slightly better than a novice weapon. Fencers get 1 weapon that can reach 300 damage max......pikeman have a arsenal of weapons that easily can be crafted above 300 and even 400 max damage. I'm not talking about rare weapons or krayt enhanced weapons either. Fencers are also useless vs Nightsister Elders too. 100% to stun and kinetic....uhm that's all of fencers attacks just like pikeman.
Basically, theres a trade off......each profession suffers in some areas and is stronger in others......many can argue that pikeman's range mods are terrible and should be improved, only have 1 damage type, but do excellent damage and can end a fight in a matter of seconds, thus not needing a lot of defense since the fights can be very short (not enough time to take a lot of damage).
Others can argue that fencers don't do enough damage and it takes forever to take down mobs when your only doing 500 pt hits with a stun baton that did get improved but you still have to go through the geo cave (which is not easy at all) to get the bones from acklay to craft them. Fencers tradeoff is that they probably get the best defenses of any profession because more often than not, their fights will last a lot longer than a pikeman, TKM, Rifleman, Carbineer, or Commando......If they had less defense the profession would be useless kinda like smuggler with no pistoleer at all.
I won't even get into pistoleer (the most broken profession out there).....no profession hasproblems compared to pistoleer......
The energy lance.....Hmm....is it really that great of a weapon at all.....even ifthe needed lootdid drop from a mob that a pikeman can actually damage....it still doesn't outperform the LVA. Ok, so it does energy damage.....There just isn't that many mobs that's 100% resistant to kinetic to warrant having to use the energy lance over the LVA or VL.......then it's only AP1 and there is as equal or more mobs that are 100% or highly resistant to energy.....Pikeman actually need a acid, stun or other type of damage.....the energy lance just don't cut it......but I do see where having it would at least give you the chance to do some damage to a 100% kinetic resistant mob.
If the energy lance had AP3 (ala T21 for rifleman) or did some other kind of damage type or had a higher damage output than a LVA....then it would be a great weapon and worth something.....
Really, I'm just not a fan of comparing one profession with another when each profession is meant to be something different than the next one. Every profession has it's match and though the devs did a bad job of implementing certain aspects of each professions, they did try and give each profession strengths and weaknesses, they just didn't think a lot of stuff through in an attempt to rush content out to try and please the whiners yelling about this and that is broken, fix it or else....
Professions.......Some have bad range, some are more powerful, others are deal more damage, some have better defense, some have better offense....so what i'm saying is so far the devs gave us profession like this. Pikeman just happen to have some of the worst defense, but at the same time have some of the best offense......fencers are the opposites....some professions fall in between.......pistoleer is completely screwed up in both.
This is the main importance of being allowed to dabble in other professions.....it doesn't matter that pikeman's defense is the weakest when you can stack it with rifleman.....add some TKA and you can potentailly have very good defense.....as far as the profession specific defenses like toughness....just consider all the ranged professions...they don't get anykind of toughness to melee attacks besides melee defense.....basically they get one defense check where melee professions get 2 sometimes 3.
Melee professions are typically better and any ranged profession is just a boost to them.....pikeman is a great profession.....from my experience pikeman is the second best melee profession....I don't consider TKM because it's overpowered.....
ONe other thing I would like to mention, is that all the professions are messed up in one way or another....some more than others but pikeman is by far not one of the worse......
Having played almost all of the combat professions extensively (mastered some....at least 3-3-3-3 in the rest), I can safely say that pikeman really is a good profession.....the specials work fine, the defenses aren't uber but who needs a lot of defense when your pulling 4k hits out of your arsenal....speed is ok....weapons are superb....animations are great and most of all it's fun.......
You don't know **edit** about the profession. You were never anything but a brawler. So what if you could do your brawler specials with a staff on meatlumps. Keep on truckin and then come in here talking about how the secret is safe. Let's see you master Pikeman with that weapon.
Also, since you were never a Pikeman take it to the Brawler forum noob.
hey ppl dont be bad on the newcomer, ok we got issiues, broken defences, screwd ranged mods, but i love my pikeman and i can take almost anything solo....yes our ham coust are bas, so are TKAs for ex, and if your buffed...almost unoticeble
Pikemanan is great, smooth, stylish, still has sume bugs to solve thats all...when we like we like no matter the fauls
Speed kills...style is everything
Myst