Pistoleer Archive

In a sticky post that I wrote this weekend, I explained how the new Damage Mitigation system works and talk about how it will affect Pistoleers. A lot of you guys replied with questions about Damage Mitigation. I submitted them to the Devs, and one of the Combat Devs answered all of them, and gave me permission to release the info on here.

Please read the initial thread if you haven't done so already ... these questions/answers won't make sense to you unless you have.

Okay, here are the questions and answers:

Let me put the most important question first. sme356 and rufus102 asked "are you sure mitigation only affects the max?" because in the other thread I explained that Mitigation shortens the range, which effectively only changes the MAXIMUM damage. This is an important question -- it's good to verify that my understanding of Damage Mitigation is correct. Here's what I asked:

QUESTION: "Does mitigation only affect the MAXIMUM damage? Based on the posts on this forum, my understanding is that a 100-200 damage attack will change to a 100-140 attack if the defender has Mitigation 3. But some of the folks on my forum are skeptical, since slices affect both minimum and maximum damage. Can I get a solid answer either way?"

DEV RESPONSE: "Your example is correct. Damage mitigation actually mitigates the range, but the result is that only the max damage decreases."

So the calculations in the other thread are correct -- you guys are right that the system creates a lot of problems and isn't easy to understand, but for whatever reason that's the system the Devs chose. *shrug*

Here's answers to the rest of our questions:

1) Perrish asked: "Any word on whether mitigations from multiple professions will stack? If you're master carbineer and pistoleer, is there an advantage in mitigation?"

DEV RESPONSE: "The Ranged and Melee Mitigation levels do not stack. Two level ones does not equal level two. Only the highest one is in affect. Ranged and Melee Mitigation can both be in affect if you have both from different profession. They are not limited by weapon equiped."

2) Elzaa asked: "how does migrate help AT ALL in PVE? I was a master CH for a long time and ALL the mobs i saw had VERY little difference between max and minimum damage."

DEV RESPONSE: "We did adjust damage ranges when we put in the Damage Mitigation. It is only really effective for high level creatures though. You won't see any changes in damage ranges before level 30 but it does increase after that and the higher the level the greater the range. Very high level creatures will most likely not be able to be tanked at all without good damage mitigation."

3) Inspired by a post from Altitude25: Are bleeds, poisons, diseases, and other DoTs "mitigated"?

DEV RESPONSE: "DoTs will not normally be included in the mitigation damage calcs. The only exception to this is the bleed shot. (I haven't dug into how Dan was handling this yet so I'm not 100% positive on the current behavior.) If the initial damage of the hit is used to determine the amount of damage the DoT does then it is possible that mitigation will help, but that's just a bonus side effect."

4) Tullius_Cicero asked: "Do NPCs get this mitigation?"

DEV RESPONSE: "NPCs will not have mitigation in the initial release but we can and will add this to them later on."

5) rufus102 asked: Is the damage mitigation calculation done after the special's damage modifier is calculated?

DEV RESPONSE: "This most likely happens before, but mathematically it doesn't really matter."

6) from rufus102's same line of questioning: "Is the damage mitigation calculation made before or after the effect of armor is calculated?"

DEV RESPONSE: "Before. Same as 4."

7) another question from rufus102: "When a primarily melee mob uses a spitting (ranged) attack, does Ranged Mitigation apply? Or is it limited to Ranged-only mobs?"

DEV RESPONSE: "Ranged Mitigation should apply. If this is not the case then it's a bug and will be fixed."

Another quick note: The Dev confirmed that Bounty Hunters and Commandos get ranged mitigation, and said that "a small amount of both Melee and Ranged Mitigation" has been given to Smugglers.

I hope this helps clear up a lot of the confusion and questions we had.

Wow, we are getting some Q&A

so is now a good time to sell my .7 speed, 660dmg (with powerup) FWG5? heh.

Hm..

I'm taking the don't knock it til you try it attitude. The only immediate consequence I see is, if you are not a weapons master then you just wont be PvP'ing, because you're going to get slaughtered fast.

Those are the big questions I had, too.

Good to see that we're actually getting some feedback on game mechanics rather than having to guess and test for ourselves.

Well...gues sit no longer matters whether Fencer and Pistoleer dodge will remain stackable or not. The fact that you can have both Melee and Ranged mitigation makes an Elite Brawler + Elite Marksman combo very very attractive from a defensive standpoint. Ranged and Melee mitigation 3, coupled with our natural defenses and dodge capabilities would make for a very very interesting combination.

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Philosopher1976 wrote:

DEV RESPONSE: "The Ranged and Melee Mitigation levels do not stack. Two level ones does not equal level two. Only the highest one is in affect. Ranged and Melee Mitigation can both be in affect if you have both from different profession. They are not limited by weapon equiped."

2) Elzaa asked: "how does migrate help AT ALL in PVE? I was a master CH for a long time and ALL the mobs i saw had VERY little difference between max and minimum damage."

Another quick note: The Dev confirmed that Bounty Hunters and Commandos get ranged mitigation, and said that "a small amount of both Melee and Ranged Mitigation" has been given to Smugglers.

I hope this helps clear up a lot of the confusion and questions we had.

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Woot! Commandos and Smugglers just became worth it!

Wow so I guess we are being told that to be effective in PvP we MUST master a bralwer elite and a markesman elite. :/ Well... Teras Kasi is sexy anyway *laughs*.

Master Gunfighter / Master Fencer should also look really good for any Pistoleers that are interested in experimenting with a melee class.

If you are one of these brave folks, look forward to a really fun time (melee is a great change of pace from ranged combat). However:

• At the very least buy some Advanced or Basic Chitin/Ubese. Especially a good chest, legs, and helm.


• Pay doctors for a solid set of enhancements


• Pay your local chefs for some quality food/drink

You can thank me later

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Niza wrote:
Wow so I guess we are being told that to be effective in PvP we MUST master a bralwer elite and a markesman elite. :/ Well... Teras Kasi is sexy anyway *laughs*.

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If you don't have Melee skills, just stay out of Melee range. That's how it works now, and it's easy to do.

Here's a question: What is the point? If I interpret this correctly, it is yet another lame attempt to make everyone the same. Make everyone do the same damage, and force people to play the game they way the nazi control freaks want you to play. "You will suffer a penalty unless you master the profession" just sucks to high heaven. Also, if I understand this right, loot drop weapons (krayt, etc...) are now worthless? So there is no longer any point to looting anything. Everyone should go out and buy crates of DL44 pistols, and some min damage powerups, and everyone should be the same, right?

It wouldn't supprise me to learn that next, unless you master a profession, you are stuck wearing the newbie outfit you get when you create a character. Gawd, why can't you stop breaking stuff. You are totally making this game suck!

Please explain this to me if I am not understanding this right. But even at master, your damage will still be reduced, just less than at dabbler status, correct?

Putting a very good defense in the master box is not a penalty, its a reward and a reason to master. You can still get mitigation 2 (40%) without mastering.

Ok, the answers from the dev make me scratch my head...

I really appreciate that they are working on all of the combat classes, yet what I see coming out of them is in direct conflict with what everyone is asking for.

First, I am not sure how I feel about this kind of change in terms of dabblers vs. masters, but to keep things clear...it is a penalty to dabblers vs. masters and will sometimes be a nerf in fighting PvE/PvP NPCs as well (post NPC getting mitigation).

For those that say it is not a penalty or nerf to dabblers...try again. In at least 2 ways it is a penalty to dabblers...

1.> Once they add these to NPCs, it increases the difficulty of, say, a non-master range prof taking down NPCs with a higher range mitigation. This IS a nerf to dabblers in PvE/PvP (faction NPCs).

2.> Also, dabblers in a range prof, for example, now will do less damage to a master (or at least next mitigation level up) in a range skill prof.

No matter what your opinion is about the "good" of this, it is a nerf against dabblers, since they will be less effective in more situations...thus...the term nerf...duh.

Add to this that mitigation will often be some to be determined frequency of pointless against NPCs once they have implemented it on them. A master pistoleer against a master pistoleer NPC means longer battle, and not an improvement.

Does the term NPC include creatures? If so, do creatures get melee or range mitigation. Either the range or melee prof will take a huge hit in PvE against creatures if they get mitigation.

So what was the point of adding it all in the first place? Just a way to simply make many combats last longer with everybody doing less damage to each other per shot unless you have a melee prof vs. range prof, in which case nothing has changed...?

At best, it helps masters trounce dabblers and until it is on NPCs, gives us a temporary boost. Eventually, the latter will be lost or lessened in some situations as well.

Now...figure in the "known" pending changes.

A> HAM basic fucntionality changes. No healing of "special ham damage", which means when you are a medic or near one, your special spamming will actually be less (notice w/medic here!!!) and we all get to be that much closer to incap and death all the time, since this "special damage" can no longer be healed.

B> "HAM costs will go up" from the official combat thread. This means we get to do less special spamming (A+B), while being closer to death (A), and generally doing less damage to each other and NPCs who have mitigation.

One more thing to consider:

"Big" weapons will typically be affected by the damage mitigation the most, like T21 rifle, and the rifleman, for example, will be less effective against other range classes w/mitigation.

With this change in place, it may be really difficult to get our speed boost request answered (so we are the kings of speed & low damage, rather than just the kings of low damage), since we could easily become Rifleman killers while we ignore 60% of their max damage potential. The lack of speed calc adjustments might be fine if all there was to balance was PvP and humanoid NPCs.

The point here is that the more they try to create equilibrium with cross-the-board changes like this, the less each skill prof will get considered and balanced on its own merit.

Now, can anyone clarify what I am missing, because this seems like they are actively working towards decreasing our DPS across the board (more so in certain situations than others).

I REALLY am trying to see the good in all this. I like SWG, but I am uneasy about all of the changes coming. I am already on edge with current Master Pistoleer and pending changes to Master CH (of which I am both).

Sigh...I must be missing the SoE "vision" (the EQ people know what I am saying * grin * ).