Balance Update 2011 - Stage 1 - Initial Discussion

[Shagratzz]

Originally Posted by _Nel_

- and again, give us our old altars. I'm sick of waiting for hours until a single enemy try to show up when we hold an enemy fort. This game needs a better flow of enemies to keep it dynamic as it was before.

!!!!!!!!!!

[Seher]

Slow steps, slow steps. First of all: I think all changes benefit balance, but it's FAR from being enough.

Originally Posted by chilko

Crowd control skills are an important part of combat strategy both for PVP and RVR. Even though all clases have different variations of CC skills, some of their possible combinations generate a great deal of frustrations for Regnum players.

Not just combinations. Every single CC is too strong.

Originally Posted by chilko

In this stage we will focus only on CC Skills with a single target.

Very good decision! That's Regnum's biggest problem. (The next problem are hunters) But this solution is in no way sufficient.

I just wonder... In the past you've made many radical changes, to fix conceptual problems of the game. All of that was needed, badly. Why do care that much about players now? Please, stick to your old policy, fix the conceptual problems of Regnum! The whole CC system is the biggest conceptual problem since attacking while strafing.
You've said that you don't want to do a proper solution, because it would feel like a bigger nerf. Why? You haven't cared in the past when it came to fixing important stuff, why do you care now?
Balance needs radical changes. A working balance just needs small adjustments, but balance in Regnum is broken. It's not about advantages of some classes, it's about a completely broken gameplay.

Why are CCs bad?

Originally Posted by _Nel_

As already stated a lot of times, CC should give a tactical advantage, but shouldn't mark your grave.

This. CCs are there to create more diversity, to make fights more interesting, not to make players wait ages for them to wear off or even be killed instantly by them. Current gameplay is centered around CCs, you can't win without them. So strong CCs are bad, as it's more or less a competition about who manages to cast the first one (see Miraculix' post) and to maintain the chain. No diversity. No, you can't just nerf CC chains, that's almost impossible. Small adjustments won't fix very much, you need to completely revamp CCs. Completely nerfing them is the only solution to get balance out of this critical state and to finally make fights interesting again.

I strongly recommend to nerf all knock-downs to 2-4 seconds on all levels and to make them work just on moving targets. That's the most elegant CC chain prevention. The only elegant one, to be exact.

All other CCs need similar treatments. Some weaker ones that don't disable you completely like knock-downs do may still last for 10 seconds, maybe even longer! (We lack WEAK CCs/spell effects with long duration) But, as you've already said, knock-downs are the biggest problem, it's the most overpowered effect.

And trust me, all players will sooner or later come to like this. No one likes the current situation. (It should even start to be measurable, do user numbers decrease?)


Ps: I agree that we need the old saves, but that's not related to this topic, please don't hijack this important thread.

[Phlue4]

Nice work!

Originally Posted by Darkyeti

Mana at marks is not such an issue imo, it would be better to lower their defence. Strategic position moved from marks to hunters would be a good way.

yop.

edit: dont really understand why you want to remove will domain ._. This spell is quite ok.

[isgandarli]

Even without testing i just want you to think about Barbarians tactics:

Spring + UM + Intimidate + Kick = death (According that lvl 60 Barbarians can do 1000-2200 damage per hit)

Second issue is, how Marksman will use Amush on melee range when Melee Ranges Class reaches him (under UM)?

[Dupa_z_Zasady]

Originally Posted by chilko

[B]
[*]Intimidate: moved to the “Tactics” discipline instead of “Kick”

We’ll have to do minor adjustments to the mana consumption and/or duration of these skills because of the change of place in the discipline. Although Barbarians will lose one of their CC skills, they will earn a slow skill that will allow them to reach their enemies.

Soooo. Barbarians will have spring and intimidate - stupid.
 

[*]Stunning Fist: the effect “Cannot attack” will be replaced either by “Stun” or “cannot cast” (please let us know what you think)

Stunning fist is fine as is now.

[*]Will Domain: this skill is going to be replaced by "Mummify".[*]Mummify: transforms the objective into a mummy showering its movements. Reduces movement speed and attack speed.

So you add slow spell for barbarians, and slow spell for warlock. How about follow that pattern and repalce all spells with variant of slow.

[*]Burst of Wind: damage will be removed.

Good.

Winter stroke should have longer casting time.

[DemonMonger]

I went to test and nothing was different.

When will the changes take place on AMUN?

[Raindance]

Originally Posted by DemonMonger

I went to test and nothing was different.

Balance Update 2011 - Stage 1 - Initial Discussion

[Daretobeconju]

Class: Warrior (Barbs & Knights)

I agree completely with the original suggestions. Giving barbs an area slow in exchange for a knock is a good trade-off. If a barb does the right moves, he can kill a mage of even level in one 8 second knock, but if the mage did all the right moves, the barb will be perhaps reduced strength, perhaps Karma Mirror or Steel Skin will be cast, perhaps attack speed will be slowed. This cuts down the chance of a barb killing in 8 seconds. With an archer, there is less chance of killing in one 8 second knock. It's the two 8 second knocks that ensures the kill.

* Feint: moved to the “vanguard” -knight only- discipline to replace “intimidate”
* Intimidate: moved to the “Tactics” discipline instead of “Kick”
* Kick: Moved to the 1st place of the discipline in place of feint
+1

Clase: Archer (Hunters and Marksmen)

* Ambush: Ambush should stay with hunters. Marks can afford to lose it. Switch Ambush for Ensnaring Arrow. Increase the cd for Ensnaring to 15 sec. Ambush range of 25 I think is also good if only hunter has it.
* Stunning Fist: The original spell is fine, I say leave it.

Class: Mages (Warlocks and Conjurer)

* Will Domain: The original spell is good. The range 20 means you have to go close enough to be within range of Marks' CC's, well within a hunter's reach under Son of the Wind(when it works), and close enough that a warrior has the ability to cast UM and get to you.

Subclass: Marksman

* Burst of Wind: Damage removal is a great idea. It gives groups the ability to DI and get past it. Also, casting the spell won't damage the attacker as they try to get within attack range.
* Mana regen: Slowing the regen of mana sounds like a well-rounded way to subtly nerf a Marks. It affects everything a Marks does. Barbs are left with little mana to work with when fully buffed. A Marks has more mana after buffing, but not nearly as much as a mage. If you want to directly cut down on the overall OP of Marks, cutting mana regen seems like a good way to do it.

[DemonMonger]

It seems that many people are looking at this balance issue from their own personal "class" advantage point of view. We need to focus on every aspect that every little change has on the entire range that game play offers.

NGD gave us a template of what they want to do and only asked our opinion on their chosen topic. So please lets keep the discussion limited to what the focus at hand currently is. The focus that they have given us. IOW - Don't bring up other topics and other skills that NGD did not talk about yet.

This is what we have always asked for. We have been given a chance to be involved in the changes that will take place. Let's see what you all can do in an orderly fashion.

Good luck and thank you NGD for this initial discussion.

* Concerned a bit about giving barb a skill to slow people down.
As is barbs can basically run down almost any person that is not on horseback.
If barbarians gain a ranged slow skill they will be close to 100% Over Powered.
Can you give barbs another skill instead?

[bois]

Originally Posted by DemonMonger

It seems that many people are looking at this balance issue from their own personal "class" advantage point of view. We need to focus on every aspect that every little change has on the entire range that game play offers.

Fortunately I think the posters are on spot.

*Feint to Vanguard looks good on paper.
*Intimidate for shared tree looks very iffy. Challenge may be the better option if they wanted to swap one. (Easy option)
* Ambush at melee range looks like a very bad idea. 15m seems to be the popular choice.
* Stunning fist as 'stun' is not good idea and 'Cannot Cast ' makes it too weak. Best to leave this alone.
* Will domain is the most balanced of all the knocks. Aside from tiny tweaks in CS and duration this should remain untouched.
* Change to BoW welcomed.
* Most are sceptical about mana regeneration reduction for marks.

Most of the opinions look pretty open minded and non biased. Hopefully NGD will take these opinions on board.

Personally, I would really like to have a go at reduced effect time on all knocks for a start. It is painfully obvious that they are all too long considering all the changes in terms of game speed and stripping away of all your resist/evade/ blocks while under the effect of knock.
Seher had a concept but I am not too sure if I understood it right. I was thinking that Seher suggested that knock be a static figure eg : 2 seconds for all levels and you add a damage factor which scales with the level of the spell. Added to this, knock works on moving targets alone. Once the net code can handle it I am interested in the concept.